Page 74 of Hell to Pay
“Nonsense,” I said, as the noise increased. A chatter, now, that must be machine guns? “I have all this dough. What, is it to go to waste? No, I’ll go on and prepare it.” I went to the blackout curtain and said, “Turn out the light.” Frau Adelberg ventured from the stairs, then, and the two of us pulled back the curtain and peeped out of the open spaces between the bits of packing crate. The light outside was still gray with approaching dawn, but I saw a flash from a high window. What was that?
“Muzzle flash,” Frau Adelberg said. “From a pistol. Who would shoot a pistol now, when the Americans aren’t even in the street yet? The foolish Party officials have given out weapons and ammunition to the Hitler Youth, and here’s the result. We’ll all be killed by mistake, as like as not.”
“Mm,” I said, then dropped the curtain, turned on the light,and went back to my kneading. Whatever was happening out there, at least we’d have bread.
Did I become less philosophical as the shelling and shooting came ever closer? Well, yes, I did, but I went on baking all the same. The walls were filled with brick in this kind of half-timbered house—Frau Langbein had explained that to me—and the squared-off oak timbers were enormously heavy. If we were actually shelled, we could certainly be killed, but mere bullets could penetrate only the windows. I wasn’t any more likely to die while baking than while cowering in a bedroom! I punched down my dough, set it to rise again, and went to work on my Pumpernickel.
True Pumpernickel bread takes at least four days, and surely this battle wouldn’t last four days. So I turned the crank to mill rye berries into coarse flour, working carefully—the machine guns were chattering constantly now—then poured the boiling water over it. Tomorrow, I would add more flour and salt, then mix and bake it; it would take nearly twenty-four hours to bake.
I could hear shouts now, and running feet. Frau Adelberg had long since gone upstairs again, after urging me without success to come with her.
What I did next was foolhardy, I know, but I’ve always been beset by a strong curiosity. “Like the Elephant’s Child,” Nanny had scolded, when she’d caught me taking a pistol from the armaments collection to see how it worked, “with your ’satiable curiosity, and you know what happened to him!”
“No, Nanny,” I’d said—teasing, for I knew very well, but I loved the story—“what happened to him?”
“He went to the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees, to ask what the Crocodile has for dinner. And when he got there and foundaCrocodile, the Crocodile told him that today, he would begin with the Elephant’s Child!”
“And then what happened?” I edged closer to her, for Nanny was a very cozy sort of person, all soft and rounded, and could never stay cross for long.
“Then,” she said, “the Crocodile pulled, and the Elephant’s Child set his four legs and pulled, and they both pulled and pulled until the Elephant’s Child’s nose was stretched out like a garden-hose, and the Crocodile fell back into the water with aPlop!and released him.”
“And then,” I said joyfully, “the Elephant’s Child frisked and whisked his wonderful new trunk all the way home across Africa, and he pulled grass from the ground to eat, and he swished flies from his back with a whisk made of branches, and he snorted up mud and made a cool, slushy-squshy mud-cap whenever the sun was hot! And when he got home, he spanked all his dear family and friends with his trunk as they had once spanked him, and he pulled out his Aunt Ostrich’s tail-feathers, and he blew bubbles at his broad aunt, the Hippopotamus! And all his dear family saw how lovely it was to have a long nose, so they went off to the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees, and got new noses from the Crocodile, and all elephants have them still today. So you see, Nanny dear, I think it’s a very good thing to have a ’satiable curiosity.”
She shook her head. “Oh, there’s no telling you what to do. Mark my words, you’ll come to a bad end if you don’t take care.”
“Or,” I said, “I’ll get a lovely new trunk myself, and frisk and whisk it all the way across Africa.”
So you see how I was the last person who could hide under the bed while a battle raged in the street! I crept to the outer room, got down on my hands and knees in case of a stray bullet through the glass—I wasn’tquiteas foolish asNanny had thought me—and crawled to the display window to look out between the slats.
I couldn’t see much at first. A stealthy figure, that was all, creeping along across the street, hugging the wall of the house. I thought at first that he was aWehrmachtsoldier, but his uniform was more green than gray, his jacket was hung about with all sorts of straps and bulges, and his helmet was much too round. I realized with a thrill of—fear? excitement?—that he must be with the U.S. Army. He carried a rifle, and things bobbed at his side. Rounded things that I couldn’t identify.
On he crept—I had my whole face pressed to the glass to see—and then there were some bursts of shooting and things became quieter. Fewer explosions? What? I couldn’t see the soldier anymore, and didn’t know what he was doing.
I kept watching—I don’t know why—and saw a boy come out of a door across the street. It was the building where I’d seen the muzzle flash, and he was holding a pistol. He looked barely older than Gerhardt, though, and certainly younger than Andrea. What was his mother thinking, allowing him out like this during a battle?
Movement to the left, and I pressed closer, then stood for a better angle and saw the American soldier again, raising his rifle, aiming away from me, down the street. I held my breath, and then there was movement across the road. The boy fired three times, the pistol jerking with each shot, and the American jumped and dropped his rifle. He ran, then, in a zigzag pattern, but as he went, he threw something, and a few seconds later, I heard a blast.
A grenade? Was that it? The machine-gun chatter stopped, and the soldier was running back in my direction, still weaving as he went.
The next thing happened very quickly. He was directly in front of my window when there was another shot, and he fellback against the wooden slats. I saw the boy across the street, the one with the pistol. He was holding it in front of him, his hand shaking, and the soldier reached with his left hand, groping for something.
Groping for a grenade.
I don’t know why I did it. I don’t quite remember how I did it. All I know is, I was flinging the door open, running outside, and grabbing the soldier. Grabbing him, and dragging him back.
He was heavy and I was small, but full of—what?—Resolve? Adrenaline? I dragged him over the threshold as he scrabbled with his feet, helping me, and slammed the door even as two more bullets hit the wood. I shot the bolt home, then dropped to the floor, panting.
The man made a sound. Not a groan, just a sound. I crawled over to him, and only realized there were wet smears on the near-black slate floor when I put my hand there and it came away red with blood. His eyes were open, he was panting, and there was a hole in his uniform jacket. Just a little hole, on the right side, nearly at the top. Nearly at his neck.
I sat over him and wondered what to do now. He was lying on his rucksack and staring up at me. Just staring. I said in English, “You’ll be all right. You’re safe here. Wait. I’ll get … I’ll get towels.” That was right, wasn’t it? I ran to the kitchen and grabbed a handful of clean white towels from the drawer—how fortunate that this had happened in a bakery!—then ran back.
He had his elbow on the ground, was trying to sit up, but with the weight of his pack, it was beyond him. I dropped to my knees and said, “Here. Let me take your helmet off,” but couldn’t figure out the secret of it. He tried to raise his right hand, cried out, and fell back.
My father’s voice in my head.“When you feel yourself panicking and hurrying, stop and take a breath, then proceed withdeliberation. Haste kills.”I took a breath, and then my hands found the buckle and I pulled the helmet away.
He was a man now. Just a man. A thin face, a beaky nose, and spectacles. His hair was thick, though it was buzzed off as all soldiers’ hair was. Brown hair, brown eyes. I registered that even as I tried to figure out how to get his pack off, and then his jacket. I said, “Try to lift up.”
He still hadn’t said anything. His breath was hissing now—pain, I thought, not fear—but he got his left elbow under him and pushed up on it, and I pulled the pack off him, then took various items from him as gently as I could manage it. I took great care with the two grenades, for those were the round things I’d seen at his side as he ran along. I thought,The boys. They’ll think this is playing soldier,and wished I could throw the things into the street, but that wasn’t possible.
