had sung a song, “March, March against Hitler!” [3] On account of this, we turned to D.’s mother, who was working for a Jewish doctor, to influence her daughter to retract the denunciation against me.
After long pleas, they agreed to save me, and indeed, the next day, when I appeared at the building on Szucha Avenue, the two women were already waiting for me there. Without a pass they went off to the office of the Gestapo, like one of their own people, whereas I was asked to wait for a pass. During this wait, a car with furniture and objects stolen from Jews arrived in front of the building, and I was treated to the honour of unloading them from the car into the building. Upon my return, I could go to the designated office. D. met me in front of the door to the room. She reassured me that I didn’t need to feel fear or anguish, because everything had already been taken care of in the best way, so that I would be free immediately and could go home in peace.
Inside the office, an officer started to interrogate me. He didn’t address me in the usual tone adopted towards Jews, with the familiar form of address, but with the formal form. He asked me whether I was familiar with the rumours that had been spreading about me, that I was disseminating illegal newspapers, etc. Inasmuch as the interrogation kept continuing and D. was afraid that I might suffer injustice, she quickly ran to the SS department to ask them to intervene on my behalf. [4] Indeed, at a certain moment during the interrogation an SS officer entered the office. With the arrival of the latter my interrogator changed his tone and started to speak to me using the familiar form of address. Each of them was apparently afraid of the other. And so the former quickly finished his interrogation of me and let me go with the threat: “If the previous rumours are repeated, you will be arrested!” At the end, he even came up with a Polish Do widzenia!584 During this process, the SS officer started to look for a paper of some kind, but in the end he left the office together with me.
After this experience, D. continued working for us. It was probably good for her business, whereas we were afraid to start anything with her, to dismiss her from her post, or even to throw her out. I got to feel her power again several months later when the ghetto was created. Since we had the right to exchange apartments with Poles, as confirmed by the accommodation office,
