Thirty-Six #2
Bertha shakes her head and bites her lip. “You can’t do anything, fr?ulein,” she says after a pause. “This is too dangerous to involve yourself in. You must obey your parents, Herta. There are some things that are too big, too much to take on alone.”
She’s right. It is too big. But if I can do this one minuscule thing that might help, at least Walter’s family, then I must do it. He would do it for me, I know it.
My tears have dried and I’m calm.
“I’ve a plan, Bertha,” I say slowly, looking deep into her troubled eyes. “I just need two tiny favors. Please, will you help me?”
I scribble a note.
My dear Erna,
That matter we spoke of yesterday is much, much bigger than we thought. People must be warned that terrible things are going to happen tonight. They must not fight back. I hope your father can do something. It’s all I can say for the moment. I hope you understand.
Yours,
Herta
Bertha promises to have it delivered and reluctantly agrees to my second request.
When Vati comes home, I’m allowed downstairs, to learn my punishment. Sitting in his study, he pours himself a whisky and drinks it down in a few gulps. I watch as he pours another.
“I truly don’t know what’s happened to you, Herta. Upsetting your mother. Defying me. I’m giving you one chance. What is going on?”
“Nothing is going on, Vati.” I meet his pale eyes.
He moves his gaze. He’s agitated, nervy.
He walks around the room. “I’m sorry I looked at your papers.
It was wrong of me, but Mutti told me something big was going to happen.
Nobody ever tells me anything properly . I decided to find out for myself.”
He swings around to face me, red-faced and angry.
“What you did is unforgivable. There are state secrets in this room.”
I think of the little stack of letters, neatly tied together with a ribbon. Personal secrets, too.
“I’ve heard something,” he says, “a rumor, which troubles me. I refused to believe it. But if it’s true—”
The telephone on his desk jangles.
“What things? What have you heard?” I brace myself for the accusation.
Vati stares at the ringing phone, snatches up the receiver, listens intently, and grunts, “I’m leaving immediately. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
“I’ve no time for you now,” he says, replacing the receiver.
“Events are moving too fast. We’ll discuss it in the morning.
In the meantime, I forbid you to come in here again, and I forbid you to leave this house until we’ve spoken, and that’s the end of it.
” His face is serious and unsmiling. “Vom Rath has lost his fight for life. Our nation has been attacked and we must act now to ensure worse will not follow.”
My guts squeeze thinking of Walter.
I follow him out to the hall where Mutti hovers.
“Take care, Franz. Please be careful tonight,” she says, her voice tremulous.
“I’ve been handpicked to do the Führer’s work,” he tells Mutti as he shrugs his coat on. “If Herr Himmler trusts me, you must too. Don’t wait up,” he adds, striding from the house, leaving behind him a faint aroma of liquor.
Mutti and I stand staring at each other.
“It’s all ready, Frau Heinrich,” Bertha says, hovering in the dining room doorway. “Shall I go ahead and serve the soup?”
A FTER A DINNER where Kuschi lay across my feet as if trying to protect me, Mutti and I go to the afternoon sitting room in silence.
She knits ferociously, her lips pursed, brow furrowed.
I hold a book in my hand but cannot focus on the words.
Bertha won’t let me down, I’m sure. But with each minute that passes, whatever is happening outside on the streets of Leipzig puts Walter in danger.
Unable to sit still, I go to the window and gaze out at the dark, empty street as if in some vain hope he might be standing out there, beneath the cherry tree, leaning nonchalantly against its trunk, his hat pulled low.
He isn’t there, of course, and I return to the edge of the sofa.
The empty space in the house grows. Room after room filled with priceless objects and the ghostly shadows of long-departed inhabitants.
Mutti’s needles click, click, click together, louder and louder until I want to scream at her to shut them up.
Bertha comes in with the coffee and gives me a long look. She carries a crease in her forehead. I meet her eyes and I know she won’t let me down, even though every fiber in her body is against my idea.
She places the coffee cups carefully on the table.
“I’ve told Ingrid to get off home to her parents,” she tells Mutti. “She’s no good to me, getting under my feet, stressing and worrying. You know how she is.”
“That’s fine, Bertha.” Mutti sighs, not looking up.
“So I was thinking,” Bertha continues, throwing me a look, “as we’re getting so close to St Nicholas’s and Ruprecht’s Day, perhaps Hetty could help me make the gingerbread house?”
Mutti finally looks up from her knitting.
“Yes,” she says finally. “Domestic chores will do her good. Herta, be so good as to put something on the gramophone before you go to the kitchen. Some Wagner, I think. It feels appropriate for tonight.”
“Yes, Mutti,” I say, picking out a record and placing the needle into the groove with shaking fingers. She settles back into her chair and waves me away with a dismissive hand.
I follow Bertha to the kitchen. She bangs the door shut behind me.
“God, help me, I don’t know why I’m doing this.
..” she begins in a low voice, beads of sweat appearing on her brow.
“Go warn that boy. I’ll collect the coffee cups in an hour or so and tell her you’re knee deep in flour.
That’ll buy you a little longer. After that, though, she’ll be wanting to go to bed and she’ll come in here, so you’d better be back.
It’s my neck you’ll be risking, too, you realize,” she adds briskly.
“Are you sure about this, Bertha?”
“Damn well get out of here before I change my mind. And by God, you’d better be back in an hour, two at most, or I’ll skin you.” She wipes the palms of her hands on her apron, and breathing heavily, she pulls the big mixing bowl, flour, and butter from the cupboard.
I don’t wait to see any more. I’m bolting out the back door, wondering where I should look for Walter first.
I START WITH the café. Lena is taking an order at one of the tables. She glances up as I rush in. Her eyes widen when she sees me.
“Come with me,” she says, passing close with a tray.
No need for any pretense. She leads the way behind the counter and through a small kitchen where an elderly lady, probably her mother, is working.
A wireless sits in one corner from which the voice of Zarah Leander is singing “ Eine Frau Wird erst schon durch die Liebe .” I follow Lena into a tiny sitting room at the back.
A dark-haired boy of eleven or twelve is doing his homework at a table, books spread around him.
This must be her son, who has delivered messages between Walter and me.
“He isn’t here...” she begins.
“Do you know if he would be at home? I need to find him, quickly. He... could be in danger...” My voice is shaky and Lena nods quickly.
“My boy will fetch Walter for you,” she says, leaning over him, gently rubbing his shoulder and speaking softly into his ear.
He nods eagerly, dropping his pencil, and tears out the back door.
“It is best. Nobody will notice a child. It’s safer than you going yourself.
” Lena shakes her head and sniffs. “Sorry, but I must get back to the café. You can stay in here.”
“Thank you,” I whisper and perch on the edge of a narrow green sofa pushed against the back wall of the room.
A threadbare rug covers the floor in front of the blackened fireplace.
A draft floats in from the open back door.
There is a clattering of pots and pans in the kitchen and the warbling voice of the singer crackles from the wireless.
Presumably Lena has a husband, too. Where is he?
She looks too young to be married, or even to have a child.
Until now, she’d just been a girl. A person to pass messages.
But like so many other ordinary folk, she must be full of fear for her son, for her mother toiling away in the kitchen.
Perhaps I should tell Lena what I know? I owe her at least that for sending her son out onto the streets for me.
Will he be in danger too? I chastise myself for my own paranoia.
How ridiculous. Nobody would want to hurt a child, would they?
A news bulletin comes on after the song. I can’t make out the words above the sizzling and clanking. The voice drones. I study a broken nail on my thumb; cross and recross my legs.
There is a rush of cold air and the boy is back, breathing heavily as though he has been running. I stand up, expecting Walter, but the boy shakes his head.
The old lady appears in the doorway, a wooden spoon in her hand, strands of gray hair drifting loose from her bun. The boy whispers into her ear. She nods and places a hand on his shoulder.
“He says Walter wasn’t home. He went into town earlier this evening with his uncle and father. There has been some trouble. Jewish shops targeted by youths. They went to help friends defend their property.” She shakes her head and purses her lips.
“I think worse might be to come. Take care, all of you. Perhaps its best you go home soon.” It’s the most I dare to say.
M Y STOMACH SOMERSAULTS as I take a tram toward the city center. The clock is ticking. I must have wasted twenty minutes. The dark pavements outside the brightly lit tram seem strangely quiet.
Please, God. If you are there, let me find him, unharmed and safe.
The tram winds its way around the outskirts of the old town. There are more people here. Shouts and cries in the distance. Has it already started? Four workmen jump on and stand near my seat. They talk in low, gruff voices.
“What’s goin’ on then, Wilhelm? What d’ya hear?”