Page 46 of Hell to Pay
I knew before I saw, of course. My mind tried to wall off the knowledge, but it didn’t succeed. I can still feel each step I took as if it were yesterday. I can still see a crust of bread and one of Frau Heffinger’s good knives on the table, a quilt thrown over a chair, Frau Schultz’s metal-framed eyeglasses on the ground, one lens crushed.
They were in a pile at the back of the cellar. Their bodies looked … normal. Frau Heffinger was sitting to one side, cradling Lotte in her arms like a child. Herr Kolbe leaned against one wall as if he were taking a rest.
Or as if he were standing guard over those below, because Father knelt on the stone floor, his arms around Mother. They looked peaceful, as if they’d fallen asleep.
Except that their eyes were open.
My flashlight swayed and danced. I wondered why—were we having an earthquake? Could fires of such power cause such a thing? Then I realized that I was shaking all over. My mouth was trying to find words.No,I wanted to shout.This can’t be true. It can’t be!ButI couldn’t get breath or strength enough to say the words.
Dr. Becker was holding me now, I realized dimly. Holding me against him, murmuring something. “Steady, now,” he was saying. “Steady.” As if he were talking to a horse. I realized that he was saying that because he couldn’t say the usual things.It will be all right. It will all be all right.No, he couldn’t say that, could he?
Wait. He was saying something else. “Your mother,” he said. “Her notebook.”
Oh. There was a notebook and pen beside my mother’s body, as if they’d fallen from her hands. Her housekeeping book, where she made notes of things arranged with the housekeeper and cook. A queen, and also a good GermanHausfrau,my father had always teased.
My limbs felt as if they belonged to somebody else as I picked up the pen, the open notebook.
My darling Daisy,I read.
I made a noise. Incoherent, like a wounded animal. I didn’t recognize the sound.
Dr. Becker’s hand, steering me to the table, helping me sit. “It won’t have been painful,” he was saying. “Lack of oxygen, carbon monoxide building up. Your father got sleepy, I’m guessing, and knew the reason. Tried to get out, and when he couldn’t, moved them to the other side of the cellar. They will have fallen asleep there, that’s all. Just fallen asleep.”
I barely heard him. I was looking at the notebook page, my vision blurring with tears.
My darling Daisy,
I don’t know if we shall come through this. Your father says the way is blocked, and there is a great heaviness in our chests. It’s growing hard to breathe. I’m holding to the belief that you’re safe, and that you’ll stay safe. You must do all you can to stay safe. That is your mission now.
Take the parure. Hide it. Take all the money you can find, take everything you can carry, take Dr. Becker and the children, and run. Run west, to the Americans. Don’t wait here, and don’t come back while there are Russians in Saxony. Don’t give in to homesickness. Don’t come back.
I loved you from the moment I held you. I love you still. You are strong and brave, and you
The last word trailed off with a smear of ink.
Dr. Becker handed me his handkerchief—the same filthy one he’d used on me hours ago—and I mopped my face, blew my nose, forced myself to stop the tears. I felt a sort of ice settle over me, and welcomed it. I needed that ice now, and I was going to keep needing it. I said, “We must take what wecan from here, and quickly, before the authorities come. Food, money, anything useful. The police will be shooting any looters, so we must do it now, before anybody sees us.”
“Shoes,” Dr. Becker said. “I haven’t been able to get my shoes mended. The cobblers won’t work for Jews.”
“Shoes, then,” I said. “My father’s, or Herr Kolbe’s, or Herr Wolmer’s, whichever ones come closest to fitting. We must be cool and unsentimental now.” My voice was still shaking, because I was so cold, I was trembling. I made a mighty effort at control. “My parents wanted me to survive,” I told Dr. Becker. “They wanted you and your children to survive. We’re going to do that. We’re going to leave, and we’re going to survive. Whatever it takes.”
22
FULL OF JOY
It took me a minute to come back from that memory. When I did, I realized that we were still in the church, standing around the tombs of my ancestors. Some of the group were looking at me, and some were looking away. Well, Ihadjust shared the kind of nightmare memory that nobody wants to hear.
“Jesus Christ,” Sebastian said.
“Well, yes,” I said. “Veritably.” And gestured around me. “Also my grandmother and grandfather, and my grandfather’s parents, too, all the way back to Augustus the Strong. It’s odd to leave a place that holds so much of one’s history, but it didn’t feel nearly as odd on that day. Dr. Becker and his children were a gift, in a way. We had to leave in order to keep them safe. That made the decision much easier. When I think of my parents becoming refugees, fleeing from the Russians … I can’t imagine it. I don’t think it would have happened, and here we would have been, trapped in a new country that hated everything we stood for.”
“A remarkable story,” Dr. Eltschig said.
“Akillerstory,” Ashleigh answered.
“Except that everybody’s missing the point,” Ben said. “Hello? Tiara?”
“Yes,” Alix said. “About that tiara.”
