Kingdom of Twilight Read online

  KINGDOM OF TWILIGHT

  MacLehose Press

  An imprint of Quercus

  New York • London

  Copyright © 2014 by Secession Verlag für Literatur, Zürich

  English translation copyright © 2016 by Jamie Bulloch

  Jacket design © www.salu.io

  First published in the United States by Quercus in 2018

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by reviewers, who may quote brief passages in a review. Scanning, uploading, and electronic distribution of this book or the facilitation of the same without the permission of the publisher is prohibited.

  Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  Any member of educational institutions wishing to photocopy part or all of the work for classroom use or anthology should send inquiries to [email protected].

  e-ISBN 978-1-63506-067-6

  The translation of this work was supported by a grant from the Goethe-Institut.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Uhly, Steven, 1964- author. | Bulloch, Jamie, translator.

  Title: Kingdom of twilight / Steven Uhly ; translated from the German by Jamie Bulloch.

  Other titles: Königreich der Dämmerung. English.

  Description: New York : Quercus, 2018.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017047019 (print) | LCCN 2017049746 (ebook) | ISBN 9781635060676 (ebook) | ISBN 9781635060683 (library edition) | ISBN 9781635060652 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781635060669 (pbk.)

  Subjects: LCSH: Refugee camps–Fiction. | National Socialism–Fiction. | LCGFT: War fiction

  Classification: LCC PT2723.H58 (ebook) | LCC PT2723.H58 K6613 2018 (print) | DDC 833/.92–dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017047019

  Distributed in the United States and Canada by

  Hachette Book Group

  1290 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10104

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, institutions, places, and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons—living or dead—events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  www.quercus.com

  www.maclehosepress.com

  Thanks to

  Tsvi

  Anat

  Lilach

  Israel (Izi)

  Christian

  Joachim

  Achi

  Avner

  Naomi

  Helmut

  Nili

  Matej

  Helga

  Walter

  Hanno

  Georg

  Klaudia

  Michel

  Carsten

  For Ricarda

  The night will soon be ending;

  the dawn cannot be far.

  Let songs of praise ascending

  now greet the Morning Star!

  All you whom darkness frightens

  with guilt or grief or pain,

  God’s radiant star now brightens

  and bids you sing again.

  JOCHEN KLEPPER

  (1903–42)

  A glossary of historical characters referred to in this novel can be found here

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  Chapter 83

  Chapter 84

  Chapter 85

  Chapter 86

  Chapter 87

  Chapter 88

  Chapter 89

  Chapter 90

  Chapter 91

  Chapter 92

  Chapter 93

  Chapter 94

  Chapter 95

  Chapter 96

  Chapter 97

  Chapter 98

  Chapter 99

  Chapter 100

  Chapter 101

  Chapter 102

  Chapter 103

  Chapter 104

  Chapter 105

  Chapter 106

  Chapter 107

  Chapter 108

  Chapter 109

  Chapter 110

  Chapter 111

  Chapter 112

  Chapter 113

  Chapter 114

  Chapter 115

  Chapter 116

  Chapter 117

  Chapter 118

  Chapter 119

  Chapter 120

  Chapter 121

  Chapter 122

  Chapter 123

  Chapter 124

  Chapter 125

  Chapter 126

  Chapter 127

  Chapter 128

  Chapter 129

  Chapter 130

  Chapter 131

  Chapter 132

  Chapter 133

  Chapter 134

  Chapter 135

  Chapter 136

  Chapter 137

  Chapter 138

  Chapter 139

  Chapter 140

  Chapter 141

  Chapter 142

  Chapter 143

  Chapter 144

  Chapter 145

  Chapter 146

  Chapter 147

  Chapter 148

  Chapter 149

  Chapter 150

  Chapter 151

  Chapter 152

  Chapter 153

  Chapter 154

  Chapter 155

  Chapter 156<
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  Chapter 157

  Chapter 158

  Chapter 159

  Chapter 160

  Chapter 161

  Chapter 162

  Chapter 163

  Chapter 164

  Chapter 165

  Chapter 166

  Chapter 167

  Chapter 168

  Chapter 169

  Chapter 170

  Chapter 171

  Chapter 172

  Chapter 173

  Chapter 175

  Chapter 175

  Chapter 176

  Chapter 177

  Chapter 178

  Chapter 179

  Chapter 180

  Chapter 181

  Chapter 182

  Chapter 183

  Chapter 184

  Chapter 185

  Chapter 186

  Glossary of Historical Characters

  1

  He had followed a short, haggard man in shabby clothes, who seemed a nasty enough piece of work to betray a few of his fellow countrymen. They’d been hiding in the church, the Pole had said in his thick accent. But we searched every nook and cranny, not a soul there. The Pole just shrugged as if to suggest, It’s not my fault you didn’t find them. He knew that the German would follow him, even if he suspected that the Pole would try to lead him astray, stall him to stay alive himself, or try some other dirty trick. The German would follow him, lured by the prospect of more Jews, maybe even women, the short man had made vague mention of women as if to avoid overstating his promise. And he was right. The German followed him through the winding alleys, ignoring the fine rain that fell incessantly on the city like a cold, silk cloth, lending everything a silvery-gray sheen, the low, crooked houses, which were narrow and packed together so tightly as if unable ever to get warm. The steeply pitched roofs glistened like molten tar and the uneven cobbles were slippery. The Pole was wearing a pair of old, well-worn shoes, his footsteps made only a muffled scraping on the stones, which was drowned out by the hard pounding of the army boots following in his wake. The German strode past the furtive windows with the assuredness of an untouchable. Everywhere, greyed curtains and closed shutters precluded a glimpse inside the houses, but he knew that the clunk of his footsteps was being tracked by countless ears, their owners frozen in silence, as if remaining motionless could save them from his grasp. He relished this feeling of power, and he relished even more the routine of this pleasure. Two years previously, when he came to Poland with the first important assignment of his career, the sudden affirmation of his superiority had left him confused and unsure. He could scarcely believe that the people they had conquered really were so inferior, and in every aspect too. On the very first day the Obersturmbannführer had taken him to Turck, a washed-out town on the Bug, a narrow but long river that flowed into the Vistula fifty kilometers to the west. We’re going to set an example, the Obersturmbannführer had said. His name was Ranzner, a tall, harsh-faced man, whose narrow head was covered with leathery skin, which in old age would not be furrowed with deep wrinkles, but countless tiny scores on the surface, like dried-up rivulets running from his temples to his eyes, and in all directions from the corners of his mouth. Perhaps the lack of depth in his facial features was due to his static expression, or maybe the cause was purely physiological. Publicly, Ranzner never exhibited any hint of satisfaction at a victory or an execution, and all his other emotions appeared inhibited too, as if he were conserving his energy for the decisive moment. He saw himself as the tough alpha male, ruling a bloodthirsty pack of wolves with ruthless discipline. Only at first glance did his marked passivity and the small, round professor’s spectacles perched on his aquiline nose seem to contradict the mask-like nature of his face. In truth these were precisely the elements possessed by the man who knows that, rather than having but two hands at his disposal, he can call on a thousand, at any hour and for whatever purpose. And so Ranzner never came across as horrific or terrifying, but more like a walking statue, an allegory of power incarnate, more credible than the Reichsführer S.S., more Himmler than Himmler himself, as if the latter were a copy of Ranzner rather than the other way round.

  They had driven in an open-top military car along bumpy country lanes, where the impressions left in the mud by hooves, boots and tanks had molded into a chaotic relief.

  Two rows of motorcycles ahead of them, two rows of motorcycles behind. The sun shone and he had sweated beside Ranzner in the back seat, wondering what to expect. From the start the Obersturmbannführer had treated him with that relaxed indulgence of the higher-ranking officer, a manner he had grown up with and was adept at nurturing. Superiors liked him, and not exclusively on account of his physical appearance, his thick, straw-blond hair, his perfect Aryan features with their youthful mien. They immediately felt that he would accept them for what they wanted to be, irrespective of what it was. This reassured them and stirred paternal feelings. Out of the corner of his eye, he looked at the gently rolling countryside, the fields ripe with corn and the dark-green, lush woodland in the distance, while Ranzner chatted to him about his future tasks. As Sturmbannführer he would translate Ranzner’s orders into concrete plans.

  “You’re to find Jewish hideouts,” he said casually, as if discussing berries that needed picking in the woods. “I don’t care how you go about it. But you have to find all of them. A single hideout you fail to unearth could be the breeding-ground for a new plague, just bear that in mind.”

  A single hideout. The slight Pole in front of him knew this too. The man had hunched his shoulders to shield his neck from the cold drizzle, clutching with his left hand the lapels of his worn leather jacket.

  “Almost there,” he said to the German, who from his Aryan height regarded him indifferently, as one might glance at a dog scurrying past. This Pole was the necessary means to a necessary end. No more and no less. The wretch would do all he could to stay alive; right now, here between the eavesdropping houses, in front of the blind, dripping windows, which were crammed with eyes and ears, he could give the man the order to drop his trousers and start masturbating, and he would do it. Just like the Jews of Turck, back in the first year of the war, who sang as they crawled alongside the pews in their synagogue, while having their bare buttocks whipped, just like the Jew who had been so scared he shit himself, then wiped his excrement over the faces of the other Jews. Because he had been given the order, because the execution of even the most perverse order harbored the promise of life like an encrypted message that only the recipient could understand. Ranzner had registered the disgust and fascination on the face of his new Sturmbannführer with apparent impassivity, he had briefly tapped him on the shoulder to bring him round again, while the Jews, their faces smeared with shit and their backsides spattered with blood, danced ring-a-ring-o’roses to the laughter of their tormentors, before being summarily stabbed to death.

  “Why don’t we shoot them?” he had asked Ranzner when the Jews were just bodies collapsed on top of one another in the middle of a slowly expanding red puddle.

  “Too loud in here,” was Ranzner’s terse reply. “Bad for the eardrums.” They had left the synagogue so it could be set alight. From somewhere deep inside had come a voice insisting that a dreadful deed had taken place, an utterly terrified voice that he had not heard since childhood. But unlike in his childhood, now in Turck he managed to overpower this fearful, feeble voice with the one he had appropriated over the years, like an antidote secretly purloined.

  He had learned, all his life he had learned how to be a man. Now he wished to be equal to his task, no other desire should have a place in his heart, and he understood that it was not by chance that Ranzner had brought him along. The example had been made for his sake, the whole thing had been a performance for a single individual, to ensure that man understood from the outset what stage he was on here.

  It was raining harder now, the cold silk had unexpectedly turned into a heavy curtain that obscured their vision. At this point the alley was even narrower and
the houses seemed to lean forward to allow their gables to touch. The area looked poorer, the houses were in disrepair. Sludge had oozed up between the cobbles, forming viscous puddles that forced them to stay close to the house fronts. He felt cheerful for the first time since they had left the camp. The Pole in front of him had transformed into a dark-gray specter, a kobold leading him through a town which was no longer above ground, but subterranean. As he continued along the tapering street he reprimanded himself for entertaining such unmasculine feelings. They had been walking for two minutes at most; the church must be just around the corner. He drew his pistol from the holster on his right hip, quietly, so the man ahead would not notice. The weight of the gun in his hand was like an anchor he was tossing at reality to prevent fear from hurrying him on. He was a tall, strong Aryan, born to rule over other peoples, and with a weapon to hand nothing and nobody could vanquish him. The Pole stopped, half turned toward his companion and stretched out an arm in a brief, feeble gesture. To the right he could see a church at the end of a gently sloping street. Like all the other buildings in this town it was short and squat, it cowered there humbly, as if pressing itself into the earth rather than standing on it. The short, wide tower housed two bells, one small, the other of medium size—he had noticed them during the first search.

  The street was ten meters long at most. Muddy water ran down the slope along the cobbles. The German took a deep breath, the church was a marker by which to orient oneself in the confusing web of the old town. Without realizing it, he had acquired a little more trust in the Pole, and when they entered the short street he began to walk beside him rather than behind. To their left a small front door opened. A young woman came out. She was wearing a long, heavy dress, which may once have been red but was now a pale gray-pink. Her head and upper body were wrapped in black scarves, it was impossible to say how many, but it seemed to be an inordinate number, for the shape of her body was entirely hidden beneath the clothes. Only her face was visible, a long, pretty face with a narrow nose and full, perfectly curved lips, which quivered oddly. She had broad brown eyes set at a very slight angle, lending her an Oriental air. As she approached the officer she fixed these eyes on him with an intense stare. An aroma of freshly baked bread wafted through the front door. The Pole stopped and made another feeble gesture toward the woman, who now stood before them.

  “This is Margarita Ejzenstain.”

  His voice betrayed no emotion, it was decidedly indifferent, as if he were introducing two people who meant nothing to him. From beneath one of Margarita Ejzenstein’s many black scarves two hands appeared, clutching an unlikely looking revolver. It appeared so old that the German fancied it must be from the last century. She grimaced as she cocked the gun with both thumbs, and the German thought the weapon must be terribly stiff. He had forgotten altogether the pistol in his own hand, he could no longer feel its weight, only the weight in the girl’s hands, so young did she look when she grimaced and pulled the trigger with her index fingers that he concluded she must still be a girl. When the bullet hit his eardrum and the echo chased through the streets like a wild animal, the German was swung round to the left and now stood directly in front of the Pole. He wanted to yank up his pistol and shoot the Pole dead, but instead his arm fell to his side and his fingers released the gun, which clattered as it hit the ground. No matter, he thought, he had not released the safety catch anyway. A second shot thundered in his ears, knocking him off his feet and sending him crashing against the house behind, then onto the cold, wet cobbles. Lying on his back, he watched as the Pole and the girl bent over him. The Pole crouched and picked up the pistol. He saw him release the safety catch and fire at him several times. Now the girl’s face appeared before him once more. Her beautiful, full lips were still trembling and rain, or were they tears?, ran down her cheeks. He saw her say something he could not understand, then curl her lips and spit in his face. He saw the Pole pull the girl up and drag her away. The last thing he saw was an unending succession of raindrops falling straight on top of him through the dark-gray crack between two shadowy gables, on they went until the chink turned black and the raindrops white, as when looking at a photographic negative or pressing your fingers down onto your closed eyes. He could still smell the tang of freshly baked bread and feel the cold stealing through his body, quietly and quickly like an army in the dark.