Swiss Francs From Heaven?

            The needle nosed pliers fastened on the child’s eye lid like a lover’s lips. Then the pliers wielder ripped Hannah’s left eye lid from its foundation and her left cheek was instantly swamped in blood as her screaming still failed to reach his ears. Even then Joseph Gherheart was astounded that all he could fixate on was the red rubber handle covers. His six years old daughter’s other world screams were only visual. Outraged as well as humiliated by his stoicism he turned to Katherine his wife sitting at his left. Their daughter is also beside them but is mute during this entire scene. Occasionally she shakes her head or stares at them, but there is no sign of incrimination or blame coming from them.

            “Can you hear her?” His wife shook her head. Joseph was amazed she was as dry eyed as he. “Why can’t we … “

            “Because we’re dead Joseph and I guess the dead aren’t allowed to hear living sounds. We can just witness our greatest mistake endlessly! And I don’t know how long we have been”

            “He’s ripped off Hannah’s eye lid Katherine! And if you can’t see us, we are there, strapped in and … “

            “We’re ghosts. All three of us were murdered. You do remember? And still there is nothing we can do! All of this is exactly like we were alive, and we’re watching a silent film.”

            Hans Able held the bloody bit of hair trimmed flesh and turned to the parents. “Do I have to continue?” he smirked before adding, “Next I’m going to pull out her eye, and if that isn’t enough I’ll start on the other one.” The ghosts watched the mother twist and tug at her canvas straps, her screams muffled by the cotton shoved in her mouth. The father’s head half slumped, and when Unter Storm Baum Fuhrer Able thought he recognized this as a sign of surrender he motioned for the obese Home Guard to remove his cotton gag also..

            “Now will you tell me where the gold?”

            “For God’s sake Joseph! Tell him!”

            “No! You don’t understand! As soon as we do he’s going to kill us!

            “And that’s exactly what he did, Katherine.”

            “I knew that! You think I’m stupid! You really think that all women are just stupid! We’re going to die give him the gold or not! You could have saved Hannah from all that terrible pain and agony! But no! You had to … You had to be the wise German noblemen right to the very …”

            “And as always, hind sights are always a hundred percent correct in all facets.”

            “I promise you, none of you will die! All I want is the god damned gold, you old fool! Are you going to tell me? Either of you? … No?” Able bent over the surgical table where the child was strapped. Her moans pleaded for her father to relent. When the Nazi officer straightened he held a thick sewing needle. “Very well, let me show you what we learned with our pain experiments, in Poland with the sub-human Poles Herr Gherheart! “

            He turned and faced the parents, extending the needle. “ We tortured Jews and Inferiors every possible way. Scalded then in slowly heated water, singed their entire body surfaces with blow torches, froze them in ice, beat them to death with leaded whips, there’s no end to our efforts to discover exactly what the most excruciating pain is! And after all that, someone picked up a pin, grabbed a Jewish woman’s eye lid, pulled it out like this and started running the point of the needle back and forth like this.”

To read the complete story and others by B. B. Riefner, see his newly published collection:  Mind Travels, available through Redgate Publishing Co., Amazon.com and for Kindle.