Tag #128824 - Interview #77990 (Eva Bato)

One of his daughters was my grandmother. She had a younger sister, Rachel,who was a well-known writer: a novelist, journalist and poet. For instance,when Queen Elisabeth of Austria was murdered, the German Writers'Association held a memorial and her poems were recited, poems written forthe occasion. Rachel married one of her cousins, Otto Bardach. (He was alsofrom the Berdach family, but due to clerical misspelling of their name,they went by Bardach.) Because they were cousins they did not want to havechildren. Rachel was a very beautiful, very graceful woman. She livedpermanently in a hotel because she had a passionate affair with a man, andthey agreed they would leave everything behind and get married. They renteda flat, arranged it, furnished it beautifully with all sorts of antiquefurniture and fantastic paintings. It was no easy thing at that time tosimply move in together. They could not get married right away because theman was married and had two children, but they decided to live togetheruntil his divorce was final. Her lover said he would move into the flatahead of Rachel in order to be there to welcome her to her new home. And soit happened. Rachel went to the flat, opened the door and as she stepped inshe saw an enormous Turkish Bukhara carpet, the size of this room. And onthis enormous carpet lay the man - with a bullet hole through his temple.There was a note lying next to him; he wrote that he was unable to choosebetween his children and Rachel. We called that carpet "Blut-Bukhara" fromthen on. We never had it cleaned, and we never used it.