Chapter Thirteen #3
‘I was thinking more of what my mother once told me.’ She attempted to impersonate her mother’s voice. ‘“Elsa, my dear, a man has needs. His needs are like a raging bull. Don’t open the gate until you have a ring for his nose.”’
She watched Sam laughing. His unhindered delight filled her with liquid joy. If she could always feel this moment of natural, innocent happiness, she would die giddy with contentment.
‘She sounds a formidable woman,’ said Sam eventually. ‘I should like to meet her one day. You don’t think she would want to meet me?’ he asked, seeing surprise on her face.
She shook her head a little too vigorously. ‘It’s not that. It’s difficult to think about the future at all.’
‘Particularly a future where we can still be friends?’
Is that what they were? Friends, nothing more? Friendship was built on trust, care and sharing of confidences, so he must be right. He was her friend and she was his.
Sam reached for a towel. ‘Your hair is still wet. You’ll catch a chill if you have wet hair all night.’ He got up, picked up a discarded towel and stood behind her. Gently he lifted the ends of her hair and began to dry them.
Elsa felt his presence behind her, heating her skin and bringing a soft blush to her cheeks. ‘You don’t need to do that,’ she said quietly.
‘I want to.’
They fell into a companionable silence, helped by a full belly, the peaceful house and the single, hypnotic flickering candle in front of her.
‘I think you have done this before,’ she mused.
His silence told her she was right.
‘A girlfriend?’
‘No, not a girlfriend. I grew up in Cornwall—’
‘Where is that in England?’
‘Southwest England. My home was near the coast.’
‘Is it beautiful there?’
‘Most of the time. Winter can be wet and windy. Every year my uncles and aunts would visit and we would make a special day trip to the beach. Anne and Charlotte—’
‘Who are Anne and Charlotte?’
‘My cousins. They loved the beach as much as I did and we would spend most of the day bathing and playing chase games while our parents watched from their picnic spot. The girls had long hair, which became wet, sandy and tangled very quickly. I used to watch their mothers comb and dry it. I was an impatient boy at the time and I wanted to run on the sand and build sandcastles with them.’ He sighed.
‘But it seems I still remember their mothers’ attempts. ’
‘Do you miss Cornwall?’
‘Very much. If I ever get back to England, I will head for Cornwall. I don’t have anyone waiting for me in Kent. I thought I might have, but I realized . . .’
‘Realized what?’
‘People who really care stay with you during bad times, not just the good.’ He returned the towel over her shoulder. ‘Your hair is drier now.’
She reached up to take it, their hands brushing briefly. ‘Thank you. I hope you reach Cornwall too.’ She eased the towel from her shoulder but Sam did not release it completely. Instead, he continued to look down at their hands in silence. His thumb tentatively lifted and lightly caressed hers.
‘What will you do when you reach Bremen?’
‘I have to find my mother and sister. They are all I have now.’
He released the towel and she slid it from her shoulder. They fell silent, both unsure how to proceed. Elsa reached into her pocket and gently withdrew Otto’s drawing. She turned in her seat to face Sam. ‘My brother, Otto, is dead. He drew this,’ she said as she gave him the precious picture.
Sam carefully unfolded it and stared at it, his head bowed and his brows knotted in concentration. ‘This is you,’ he said eventually. He glanced up. ‘This is good. Your brother was gifted.’
She nodded and he looked down at it again. The knot in his brows softened. ‘What were you thinking at the time?’
She stood to inspect it with him. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘At first I thought you were daydreaming, but the longer I look at it, the more I see sadness. Perhaps your dreams were not good?’
‘Perhaps it was the day I admitted to myself that my dreams were not what I thought they were.’ He looked up at her, surprised by her sad tone.
She shrugged. ‘I did not sit for him. This is his own creation. Let’s not read too much into my expression.
Knowing Otto, my image is meant to tell many stories. ’
He touched the pencil-drawn hair. ‘Your brother knew what he was doing. A picture should tell a story and the story can change depending on who is looking at it. This picture changes. Now I see hope in your eyes. I think it is a very good likeness. This picture must mean so much to you. I know it would mean a great deal to me if it were mine.’
The meaning behind his words sent her heart racing. Elsa stepped back, unsure. She opened her mouth to speak but could not. She wanted him to have it as a reminder of her, but the picture was the only thing she had of Otto.
He saw her hesitation. ‘I’m sorry. I wasn’t hinting that you should give it to me. It’s probably all you have of your brother.’
‘It is.’
‘I only meant . . . that it is very special. That it is to be treasured. That I understood how much it should be cared for.’
‘I know what you meant, Sam.’
He folded it and held it out to her, but she did not take it. ‘Otto was a skilled artist. He captured your beauty in a way a photograph cannot.’ Sam’s breath caught in his throat and he allowed his hand to fall to his side. ‘Elsa . . . did you accompany Otto to the station once?’
‘Yes. When he went to war. Why do you ask?’
‘The woman I saw when I was on the cattle wagon and being taken to Poland was with a soldier.’
Elsa’s brow pinched in concern.
‘The soldier she was with on the platform took out a piece of paper and began to draw. The woman . . . I think it was you. Even then, despite my situation, you stirred an attraction in me.’
She lowered her gaze to the paper in his hand. It was already worn from its own journey, but she still did not reach for it.
‘I didn’t know. I didn’t realize,’ she whispered.
‘I know. I wonder if we were always destined to meet.’ He looked at the picture in his hand. ‘Your brother’s ability to draw was the thread that connected that moment all those years ago. Here, take it,’ he urged. A slight smile curved his lips. ‘I don’t need a memento of you.’
‘But I’d like you to have one.’
‘You do?’
‘I want it to remain a thread. From me to you. But you must promise to return it to me after the war has ended.’
It was an understandable request for such a big sacrifice, but they both knew it meant far more than that.
He lifted his gaze to hers, the drawing between them still waiting to be claimed.
She held her breath as she watched black pools grow in his eyes, their infinity and depth reminding her of the blackest night sky.
‘Will you promise to find me when the war is over, Sam?’ she asked.
His arm relaxed, taking the drawing closer to him.
‘Promise me, Sam.’
His gaze softened. ‘I promise to find you, Elsa. After the war is over, as God is my witness, we will meet again.’
Something shifted inside her that she could not quite name.
Hope perhaps? Happiness? She smiled as she searched the drawers for a pencil and scribbled her aunt’s address on the back of the drawing.
‘Now when we part, a little of me will go with you,’ she said as he slipped the picture inside his clothing.
‘Now you will not be able to forget me so easily.’
‘I don’t think there is a risk of forgetting you at all.’ He began to busy himself clearing the table.
‘Sam . . .’
He dropped the saucepan next to the sink. ‘Yes?’ he asked, seemingly distracted by his task.
‘Will our lives ever be normal again?’
‘Peace will come. It has to.’ He examined the contents of the pan. ‘I’ll make some eggs for Klara.’
‘I told you, she’s already eaten.’
‘Then I will make some more for us.’
‘I don’t want any.’
‘Well, I do.’
She watched him break two eggs, their whites dripping messily as he cracked their shells. ‘Do you think we will survive this?’
‘That is an impossible question to answer. You know that,’ he said, whisking the eggs in the pan. When she didn’t reply, he looked at her. ‘Don’t worry about the future. We have tomorrow to get through first.’
‘I want to marry and have children. I can’t see that happening now.’
He smiled sadly. ‘I can see it. You will have many children. So many you will not have enough beds for them.’
She could almost believe him. Warming to his story, she came to him. ‘What will I have?’
‘Two boys and three girls.’
She laughed. ‘And what will these children look like?’
He pointed to each chair at the table as if her brood sat around it. ‘The boys will have dark hair and eyes like their father. The girls will be like you.’
She raised her eyebrows. ‘So many.’ She tapped her finger on her chin as if in deep thought. ‘I think the boys will grow wild and the girls will gang up on me.’
Sam’s laughter reminded her of a burst of sunshine that could light up a room. It quickly faded. ‘No. Your children will adore you — as will your husband.’
He stopped preparing the eggs and allowed a bold silence to sit between them. Their eyes met.
‘And what will he look like?’ she asked quietly. ‘Will my husband be handsome and brave?’
Her throat grew dry in anticipation and she hoped he could not read her thoughts.
Sam tilted his forehead and looked at her through his brows, the picture of an old schoolteacher imparting his wisdom. ‘He has one eye, one leg and one large mole on the tip of his nose.’
She laughed again. ‘Then he must be very brave to have five children and very handsome for me to still love him so much with only one eye, one leg and such a large mole. I will be very lucky to be his wife.’
‘And he will be very lucky to be your husband.’
The silence descended again, but this time it felt different, as if a magnetic force was present behind her, waiting and willing to push her towards him if she allowed it.
‘Would you like children one day?’ she asked.