Page 69 of Hell to Pay
“Somebody lives there?” I asked.
“I live there,” she said. “Many others are doing the same. The Welfare Society gives soup each day, if you know where to go. Too late for today, though.”
“Where is it better?” I asked.
She shrugged. “If I knew, I’d be there. Keep walking.”
So we did, through our thirst and hunger. Gradually, the ruins became less, and we were in a bit of countryside again. We walked down to the river, eventually, and drank from it, hoping it wouldn’t make us sick but too thirsty to really care, and took off our shoes and socks to cool our feet in the water. It was a delicious sensation, and pleasant under the trees. I wanted to stay, but knew we couldn’t. We’d get no food sitting here.
After several minutes of this internal back-and-forth, I said, “That’s enough rest, I think. Let’s keep on,” and pulled my dirty stockings over my now-clean feet.
Dr. Becker didn’t stir. He was lying back on the grass, his hat over his face, and a lurch of fear hit my stomach. “Dr. Becker!” I said, and shook him by the shoulder.
To my immense relief, he sat up. “What?” he asked, looking around. “What’s happened?”
Relief made me shaky. “I thought something had happened to you. You were so still.”
“Ah,” he said. “No. Still living.” He settled his hat back on his head. “Let’s go, children.”
They didn’t argue. They never did anymore. They put on their shoes and socks, shouldered their rucksacks, and we went on.
We came to the outskirts of another town then, a smaller one. Some buildings were damaged, but not all, and there were soldiers in the streets, dragging logs and piles of rubble into place across the street—barricades, I supposed—and a group of SS in their black uniforms and high boots stacked sandbags and more rubble into circular piles at the side of the road. “For artillery, perhaps,” Dr. Becker said. “Or machine-gun nests.” Nobody paid any attention to us, yet I tensed anyway and felt Dr. Becker doing the same, as if at any moment one of the SS men would stand, point, and shout, “Jew!”
There was a faint rumble in the distance like faraway thunder, but the day was clear. Was it artillery fire? We had to get off the street, but how?
I knocked on a door and asked for bread and shelter, but was met with a shake of the head. The same thing happened at the next house, and the next. I asked, “Where does the mayor live?” and was pointed onward, so onward we went.
I was quite faint by this point with hunger and fear, and knew the children were flagging, too. Dr. Becker was carrying Gerhardt now, and as thin as the boy was, that couldn’t be easy. I took Dr. Becker’s rucksack and Andrea took Gerhardt’s without prompting, and we labored on under a sun that was warmer than ever, our feet nearly dragging. Once, I stumbled and almost fell, but righted myself again. Many windows were boarded over, and without them, the houses looked blank and unwelcoming. Would we find no help at all, then? There had always been something before, meager though it might be. A bed on somebody’sfloor or in a barn, a bowl of soup, a piece of bread—something.
We came to another intersection, a larger one, full of more soldiers. I made myself stop instead of hurrying on and looked both ways. “There,” I said, and pointed. “That looks like the town center.” It seemed more hopeful than anything else we’d seen today, so we turned and walked on.
At first, I thought I was hallucinating the smell, imagining myself back in the homely kitchens of the palace. As we walked on, though, it became more distinct. There’s nothing, after all, like the yeasty scent of freshly baked bread.
“Down there,” I said. “Come.” And hurried around the corner to a tiny side street, my fatigue forgotten.
A half-timbered building stood at the intersection, its whitewash peeling a bit. A peaked red roof with dormer windows set into it like friendly eyes, and a weathered sign hanging from chains.
Bäckerei.
32
THE TRUTH AT LAST—OR SOME OF IT
Once again, a journey that had taken us hours on foot lasted only a few minutes, even though Sebastian exited the motorway at Nuremberg and drove the back roads to the town of Fürth. The same way we’d walked, but none of it looked familiar except the river. “The Pegnitz,” I said, “where we stopped to rest. Oh, how weary that walk was!”
“Five miles,” Alix said.
“Yes,” I said, “and five miles when you’re hungry and thirsty and tired can be a very long way. Hunger tires a person.”
“You’d lose muscle mass, for one thing,” Sebastian said.
“Yes,” I said, “I suppose so.” Then I leaned forward in my seat, for we were entering the town proper now. “Here—take this left.”
“How extremely … tidy it all is,” Alix said. “That’s got to be the word. The other word, I guess, is probably ‘charming.’”
“Lots of bicycles,” Ben commented.
“Yes,” I said. “Tidy, of course—it’s Germany, after all—and bicycles are a practical solution in a city, especially back then. A bicycle was much coveted. One can cover the ground withmuch less fatigue. Oh, here it is! Park where you can, Sebastian.”
