Page 49 of With a Vengeance

“I’m not,” she says.

Edith ignores the jab. “I saw someone exiting the galley. I didn’t want to mention it in front of the others. I didn’t want anyone to think I was making accusations. But not long after the train left the station, I went to the dining car, hoping to get a cup of tea. Finding no one there, I left. But as I was heading back to my room, I spotted someone else leaving the dining car. Since he wasn’t in there when I peeked in, I can only assume he came from the galley.”

“Who was it?”

“The lieutenant colonel.”

Lapsford. So he lied about not being there before everyone gathered in the lounge. Anna stands, eager to confront him about it. In order to leave, though, she must squeeze by Edith, who reaches out as she passes, uttering a beseeching “Schatzi.”

Anna evades the touch and makes it to the door, but not before thinking of something else she can say to Edith. Something sheneedsto say, even though she knows what she should be doing is running away as fast as she can.

“Was any of it real?” she asks, unable to keep her voice from cracking with pain. “The hugs. The comforting. The love and care and devotion for me and Tommy. Did you mean any of it? Or was that all just an act?”

Edith steps toward her. “No, Schatzi, I—”

“Stop calling me that!” Anna snaps. “Don’t youevercall me that again.”

“You have every right to be angry. You have suffered terribly.”Edith shakes her head, as if she wasn’t one of the causes of that suffering. “But what happened, it was not personal. You must understand that.”

Anna recoils in disbelief, astonished Edith could say such a thing. Her brother wasn’t just killed, he was erased, leaving no trace, as if he never existed. Her father was murdered so violently that Anna still can’t comprehend it. Her mother chose to join them in death rather than stay alive with Anna. All because of something Edith was a part of. That made itverypersonal.

“My entire family is gone,” she says.

Edith gives a curt nod. “As is mine.”

“But I didn’t cause that. No one in my family did. Yet they’re dead. Because of you.”

It takes Anna every ounce of self-control to not wrap her hands around Edith’s neck. She keeps them clenched at her sides, aching to experience the sensation a second time. A finger twitches when she notices a slight bob in Edith’s throat as she says, “I never wanted to hurt you or your family.”

“But you did.”

“Because there was a war going on,” Edith says, as if that excuses it. “That’s the cruelty of war. It makes good people do terrible things for their country.”

“But you weren’t in Germany. You were here. In America. With us.”

“Just because someone leaves their home doesn’t mean they no longer love it. Nor does it mean they won’t do anything to help it.”

“That’s what you thought you were doing?” Anna says as she absently touches the tiny silver locomotive pinned to her chest, reminding her of everything she has lost. “Helping your homeland?”

“Of course that’s what I was doing.”

Anna’s entire body goes rigid when she realizes what’s just happened.

Edith has confessed.

Not that Anna had any doubt she was involved. Aunt Retta’s boxes of proof made sure of that. But it’s more shocking when coming from Edith herself. More painful, too. Especially the part about why Edith had betrayed her family.

“You testified under oath that you thought my father was a German sympathizer.” Anna’s hands continue to clench, all but begging her to reach out, encircle Edith’s neck, squeeze. “But it turns out you were merely talking about yourself.”

“I refuse to apologize for my beliefs,” Edith says.

“But you’re still going to pay for them. And you should be afraid of what’s coming.”

“Perhaps,” Edith says with a resigned sigh. “But when you reach my age, you find that things you once feared don’t scare you anymore.”

“Not even death?”

Edith fixes Anna with an enigmatic smile and says, “There’s no reason to fear what’s inevitable.”

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