Page 18 of Library of Forbidden Books

“What in the world is going on?” Helene asked.

Klaus, his face tensed in a grimace and his hands clenching and unclenching, had lost his typical composure. “Haven’t you heard?”

“Heard what?”

Helene put her purse on her desk and hung up her light jacket. The chill of winter had passed and spring was turning the gray city air into something fresh and pure.

“They’ve made pyres in squares all over the country. The rumor is that the Nazis are going to search the public libraries for books by Jews, communists, and political dissidents. There’s a list, and the books that are on it will be purged tonight.” Klaus’s customary jovial tone was now choppy and strained with the effort of voicing such a terrible reality.

Helene’s eyes grew wide and her chest hurt like someone had just punched her in the ribs. “Where’s Lena?”

“She went to get the books that are out in the neighborhood. She wants to bring them here and see what we can save. I stayed back to keep watch. So far none of the groups have come close, but they’ve been out there watching for a while.”

Helene had no idea what to do. Her mind felt sluggish. She sat down, took a deep breath to calm herself, and tried to devise a plan.

“Okay, it’s a good thing we’ve got the secret room, but we can’t put everything back there. They’ll be suspicious if they don’t find anything. We’ve got to sacrifice the extra copies, the newer editions, and the titles there may be be more of in other locations. Make a list. We’ll go search for them and organize them.”

Klaus and Helene started scouring the shelves, wondering all the while how far the prohibitions would extend. Would the list include Mann, Remarque, Brecht, Feuchtwanger . . . ?

“Make sure to grab all Jewish authors,” Helene called to Klaus. Their eyes met briefly between the shelves, and each saw their own horror reflected on the other’s face.

Klaus was balancing a dozen books between his arms and roly-poly chin. “What about Tucholsky and Walter Benjamin?” he wondered.

“Yes, they’re highly critical of Prussian militarism,” Helene responded from behind a load of about twenty books that blocked her view of the floor below.

They gathered their plunder onto the main table into an enormous, wobbly pile.

Helene tried to catch her breath. “Did we get everything?” she asked Klaus, whose white cotton T-shirt was drenched with sweat.

“I think so. No, wait—Stefan Zweig, he’s a Jew. And Franz Kafka. Oh, and there’s Helene Stöcker. There’s no way the Nazis approve of her feminist understanding of womanhood.”

“Run for them, quick!”

While Klaus dashed off, Helene commenced the painful sifting process. On the left, first editions, costly bindings, and all that must be saved; on the right, the volumes to be sacrificed for the good of their brethren. It was gut-wrenching. At first she thought that the dust wafting up from the old pages was stirring up allergies like Mrs. Smith had talked about, but then she realized she was crying. Helene felt like she was bleeding internally. She recalled a phrase from one of her favorite English authors, Charles Dickens, in his book Our Mutual Friend: “I have not the influence I want to have, I cannot stop some dreadful things I try to stop, but I go on in the hope and trust that the time will come.”

Helene was still sorting when Lena rapped on the door. She bore two enormous cloth bags full of books, which she dumped onto the table before collapsing into an embrace with Helene.

“They’ve started looting the libraries. I just heard that a few days ago, a few students broke into the Institute of Sexual Science and took everything.” Lena’s voice trembled with emotion.

The three librarians worked as hard and fast as they could, selecting the most valuable books and storing them in the secret room. They had put away at least five hundred by the time they finished. Books were stacked on every square inch of floor, as the secret room’s shelves were crammed full. Then they locked the room and tried to hide it as best they could. They returned the rest of the precious volumes to their original spots on the shelves so the Nazis would not grow suspicious.

It was a tense morning, but nothing happened. Klaus decided to go buy some food, as his anxiety had made him ravenous. Finally, just after noon, the librarians heard a growing swell of approaching voices. The doors were locked, but when Helene saw the mob, she opened them to keep the windows from getting broken.

A hyped-up young man exclaimed, “On orders from Minister Goebbels, we’re here to take all the books with Jewish, Marxist, and anti-German ideas and any position opposed to National Socialism!”

Helene recognized the speaker as Peter, a sweet boy who had faithfully come to the library to study a few years ago.

“Peter, you know very well that this is not a political library.”

Peter’s head drooped when he saw Helene’s pained expression and realized he had been recognized.

Then from somewhere behind Peter stepped an older man with a spotless new SA uniform. Helene was taken aback to recognize Mr. Fuchs, the one who had pressured her so hard to push the communist agenda.

“Miss Nathan, it is in your best interest to comply. We have strict orders from the minister. If you resist, the police will arrest you and, if needed, we will burn the building down.”

Though Helene knew Fuchs’s passionate nature, the force of his threats surprised her.

“Tell us what titles you’re looking for, and we’ll bring them out to you,” she said in her calm librarian tone.