by S. J. Rozan
“Listen,” he said. I glanced up: His tone had changed. “What’s in there—it’s not very cheery.”
“I guess I didn’t expect it to be.”
He nodded. “The top one isn’t Rosalie’s. It’s to her, from a neighbor.”
I took a look. Bill’s handwriting isn’t particularly legible, but I’m used to it.
He headed the car over the Manhattan Bridge as I took a sip of my tea and began to read.
12 June 1938
My darling Rosalie,
It is with a heavy heart that I put pen to paper tonight. I hardly know how to tell you of the events that have occurred here. My dear, prepare yourself: Your dear uncle Horst is no more. I have no further facts than this: Attempting to go to the aid of an elderly rabbi who had been set upon by a mob, he would not obey a soldier’s command to back away and let the mob go about its business. They exchanged angry words. Without warning, the soldier drew his pistol and fired. For what consolation it may be, those who saw say the bullet pierced Horst’s heart and he died instantly; he did not suffer. Rosalie, I am so sorry. But it is my painful duty to tell you that the troubles of the past days do not end there. Oh, my darling! Your mother was arrested hours later as she was preparing to go claim your uncle’s body. On what pretext I do not know—it has become a common thing here for Jews, for Catholics, for supporters of Chancellor Schuschnigg, to fall into the arms of what now passes for the law. I saw the police mount the steps of your home, and watched them lead your mother out. I ran and asked where she was being taken, and went myself to that police station, where after a few hours’ wait I was allowed to see her. She was unharmed, but she is being sent to a work camp and they would not tell me where. As you would expect of your mother, she was much more composed than I. She asked me to take some things from your home, as she fears, and with reason, I’m afraid, that her possessions will be confiscated before she is released. I returned quickly and retrieved what she requested: your letters from Shanghai, and the tickets for the train to Dairen. I took also some family photographs—the one of you and Paul at the Mirabell Gardens the day we all went together; your parents’ wedding portrait; and some others. At your mother’s request I’ve given one of the train tickets to Herr Baumberg for his eldest son, and will keep the other for your mother, praying she will be released in time to use it. Her instructions were that if she is not, I should give it away also. She also asked that I request of Herr Baumberg that if possible he arrange for a proper Jewish burial for Horst, which I have done. Klaus and I will remain in Salzburg until she is released, or until the date of the train’s departure. Then, Rosalie, whether or not your mother is on that train—which I dearly hope she is!—we will leave for Switzerland. We will go to Klaus’s brother in Geneva, and Klaus will start a practice there. We have been discussing the unhappy possibility of this step since February, and are now prepared to take it: We feel we can no longer remain in a country that treats its citizens so. Klaus is traveling there tomorrow to make our arrangements, and I shall give him this letter to send to you, because I find I am distrustful now even of my beloved country’s post. Oh, Rosalie, Rosalie, I am so sorry! With you I mourn your dear uncle, and I pray for your mother’s rapid release. I hope the day comes very soon when you are reunited. And that the day comes even sooner when this wicked, murderous, usurping government is overthrown and we live in sunlight once again!
Please keep yourself and your brother well, my dear. I hope to be able to send you more and much better news very soon.
With much love,
Hilda Schmitz
When I finished reading, I looked at Bill, then back out the window. “I guess this is what Mei-lin meant.”
“When?”
“She mentioned Rosalie’s terrible news, how bad she felt for her, but she didn’t say what it was.” Almost afraid to turn to the next sheet, I asked him, “She didn’t, did she?”
“Who didn’t what?”
“Hilda Schmitz. Send better news.”
“There aren’t any more letters from her.”
And we already knew there wasn’t any better news.
“What are the rest of these?” I asked. “If her mother was in a camp?”
“Rosalie kept writing. She responded to that one, not to the neighbor but to her mother. After that there are only a few more, when big things happened.”
I hesitated, then pulled out the next sheet.
5 July 1938
Oh, Mama, Mama! I’ve received a letter from Frau Schmitz with news so horrible I cannot bear it! Mama, I cry for you, for Uncle Horst, I feel my heart will break! Please, please, keep yourself safe, I pray, yes, pray, I beg God to prove His kindness by releasing you unharmed and bringing you to us here!!!
Mama, I cannot send this letter but I cannot help but write it. I’m reaching for the comfort I’ve found these months as I imagine you reading my words; that comfort is all but gone, only the faintest warm breath of it remains, and in the heat of Shanghai I’ve gone so cold! I don’t know what to do, I can’t think at all. But this, but this, Mama: we will say kaddish for Uncle Horst, I will go to a rabbi and learn what must be done and we will do it. And beyond that, I don’t know, except we will continue with all our hearts to hope and pray!
Ever, ever,
Your Rosalie
“Damn,” I breathed.
Bill didn’t answer. I slipped that sheet behind the others and took a look at the next one.
“Three years later,” I said, and read it.
25 June 1941
Dearest Mama,
I am to be married.
Oh, Mama, how different this is from the way I hoped to tell you such news! Racing breathlessly into the parlor—or tiptoeing into the garden as you prune your roses—even, Mama, asking your permission, certainly your advice—so many ways I’ve daydreamed about this moment since I was a child. And to tell you like this, in a letter from across the world, a letter I cannot even send—! My eyes fill with tears as I write. Where are you, Mama? Are you well? Are you utterly alone? Not you; no, not you. Your humor and good sense will draw people to you as they always have, however bad the circumstances. I comfort my heart with the certainty that you have found friends.
The entire world is mad. It’s only when I’m with Kai-rong that I feel again my memories are memories, not consoling fairy tales of a time that never was. It’s no small thing, in days as dark as these, to have found someone who makes me remember the light, and even believe it will return. Some around us are counseling us to wait until the madness passes. But how long will that be? And more—how will it pass, unless we refuse its hold, and defy it?
So Kai-rong and I will marry. I will pray every minute for the miracle of your arrival to share our joy, and make it complete. Please, Mama, please, wherever you are, give me your blessing.
Your Rosalie
2 October 1941
Dearest Mama,
Oh, I hope and pray that wherever you are, you are well, you are safe. As the fourth Rosh Hashanah passes without word of you, my heart aches, Mama. I did not attend services because I could not bear to hear the shofar blown, remembering what pleasure you have always taken in the sound of it. Paul did go; he regularly helps form the minyan at a shul near us, and has embraced our traditions in a way I cannot, though I admire him for his dedication. I admire him for much, Mama. What a fine young man he has become! You will be proud of him, Mama, so proud.
I’m writing now to tell you of a decision my heart has brought me to. Kai-rong has given me a gift: a carved jade disc that has been in his family many hundreds of years. He gives it with the blessing of his father; I’m to wear it on our wedding day to mark the uniting of our families, and I will do that with joy. But the union of two families cannot be marked by a precious object of one family only. I’ve determined to remove this jade from its setting and add to it the stones from the Queen Mama necklace. The jade represents many generations of Kai-rong’s ancestors, and is there fore precious to him. The ne
cklace represents you, and is therefore extraordinarily precious to me!
My beloved Kai-rong, having heard my reasoning, is in complete accord. Tomorrow we’ll take the jade and the necklace to Herr Corens, the jeweler in Avenue Foch who bought from me the ruby ring. He’s a lovely man, Mama, and quite an artist. He will make for us a new piece, a brooch, I think. It will tell tales: of steadfast love over time and distance, of generations of ancestors revered, of the joining of two proud traditions, and the union of two devoted hearts. It will be beautiful, Mama. And when I wear it, I will have both you and Kai-rong ever with me, no matter where you are.
I pray every day for you, Mama.
Your Rosalie
21
“There’s Kleenex in the glove compartment,” Bill said.
“We’re going to a funeral. I brought my own.” I wasn’t exactly crying, but my vision had blurred. “You’re right. These aren’t very cheery.”
“There are just a few more.”
“I’m not sure I can take it.”
“You want me to summarize?”
“In a minute.”
I wiped my eyes, then laid the papers on my lap, gently, even though they were only Bill’s scribbled translations. “Have you ever been to an Orthodox Jewish funeral?”
“Yes.”
“What goes on?”
“Same as anyplace, but in Hebrew.”
“If they don’t bang gongs and walk around the coffin with incense, it’s not the same as the funerals I know.”
“Basically, though, it is. Prayers, songs, a eulogy. No sermon, I don’t think. You know we won’t be able to sit together? They separate men and women.”
I nodded; somewhere, I knew that, though I hadn’t thought about it. I felt a pang of anxiety, which made me mad. Boy, Lydia, first you’re not sure you ever want to talk to this guy again, and now you’re fretting because he’ll be sitting on the other side of the synagogue? “Will the coffin be open?”
Bill’s eyebrows lifted at my sharp tone, but all he said was “No.”
That was good; Chinese coffins usually are, and I find it creepy. Maybe in the old days it was okay, a chance to see your loved one looking peaceful as you said good-bye. Today funeral homes embalm and use makeup and when you see your loved one he looks like someone else. I didn’t want to see Joel looking like someone else. But when the last time I did see Joel—the office, the blood—flashed behind my eyes, I decided Bill’s distraction tactic was a good one.
“The rest of Rosalie’s letters. What are they about?”
He looked over at me. Just don’t ask if I’m all right. It worked, because he didn’t. “The next one’s about the wedding,” he said calmly, just two investigators talking over a case. “At the Café Falbaum, the way the professor’s article said. The one after that, very brief, that she’s pregnant. She imagines her mother singing to the baby. Then she writes about Kai-rong’s arrest; she’s frantic, but Mei-lin has a plan. She says the cost of getting Kai-rong out will be high, but she knows her mother will understand.”
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know. Then she writes about his escape, and how she’s taking care of Mei-lin’s son until Mei-lin comes back. The next one tells why they have to move to Hongkew. She’s worried her mother won’t be able to find them there.”
“Oh, God, Bill.”
“I know. And then one about the birth of her son, and how she’s naming him Horst but because he’s growing up in China they’ll use his Chinese name, Lao-li, which means ‘labor is truth.’ ”
“It can also mean ‘truth is hard work,’ you know.”
He nodded. “The last letter is on Lao-li’s first birthday.”
“No more?”
“That was October ’forty-four. The Japanese surrendered in August of ’forty-five. The war in Europe was over by then, and the Red Cross lists of concentration camp confirmed dead began to reach Shanghai in the fall. By Lao-li’s second birthday, Rosalie must have known her mother was gone.”
I slid the papers back into the envelope. “Poor Rosalie.”
“She was pretty tough. Most of that time, Kai-rong was away. She was on her own with those two kids—she and Paul. Her father-in-law gave them money, so I guess they ate as well as anyone in the ghetto, but toward the end of the war no one in Shanghai had much to eat.”
“But Kai-rong kept coming back? The way the navy report said?”
“In the one about the baby, she says he held his son soon after he was born. So he must have been slipping in and out. I don’t get the idea, by the way, that she didn’t know what he was up to.”
“What makes you think that?”
“She says she misses him, but what he’s doing is important and she’s proud. I don’t think she’d say that if he were just on the run.”
We drove in silence for a while. A sense we’d missed something kept waving at me for attention, but when I looked right at it, it disappeared. This section of expressway cut through a residential area. A young woman pushed a baby carriage; on the next block a much older woman, thin and bent, carefully picked her way down the sidewalk. I wondered if they knew each other, if the old lady cooed at the baby when they met in the supermarket aisle.
“Up for reading?” Bill’s voice, solid and real, pulled me back.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Mei-lin’s diary. You brought it, right?”
“Of course. We had a deal.” I reached into my shoulder bag for my own manila envelope with the stack of Xeroxes. I’d flagged some entries, but I hadn’t made a written translation the way he had. That struck me as not very nice of me. “It starts off well, but it wouldn’t win any Pulitzer for cheeriness, either. I didn’t make it quite all the way to the end, but I don’t think it gets any better.” I turned to the first flag. “Let me catch you up, and if we have time I’ll translate the last few.” Maybe simultaneous translation would make up for my lack of written pages. “This one’s a couple of weeks after what we read yesterday. The thrill of dinner at the Cathay has worn off and it’s beginning to dawn on her that nothing’s really changed. Then something happens. General Zhang—she calls him ‘dashing’ again—comes to tea.”
“To see her?”
“Umm, ‘He found himself in the neighborhood and sent his card in.’ ”
“Oh, sure.”
“Her father asks Kai-rong to join them and sends for her, too. She’s overjoyed and figures it was Kai-rong’s idea because it couldn’t possibly be her father’s. She runs and puts on the red shoes, and then takes her time going downstairs. She says she knows just how to behave.”
“And that’s how?”
“ ‘Polite, but cool and distant.’ ”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake! You see? She’s overjoyed, but she gives him the frost anyway.”
“She goes beyond that. ‘Kai-rong tried to tease me—so childish! I ignored him. Father inquired about the general’s family. He’s a widower, with one son. He admitted to being lonely, but said with a smile that one must bear what one can’t change. I felt for him—I know about loneliness! We discussed art, music, and literature. The general’s very cultured, with opinions on everything. When Father and Kairong spoke he listened respectfully—and to me, also! Though I was careful not to express strong ideas. He asked to see my calligraphy, and praised it! He said it was refreshing to see a young woman accomplished in the traditional arts. He’s a bit old-fashioned, actually. For one thing, he doesn’t like American jazz. Although he said he was willing to try it again, and invited Kai-rong and myself to the Cathay’s nightclub! Oh, I wonder if Father will agree? He smiled, as though the general were joking, but maybe Kai-rong can persuade him.
“ ‘Twice I felt the general watching me when Father was speaking. I kept my eyes downcast, of course—but I could barely supress my giggles! I hope the general didn’t notice. He stayed a long while and promised to call again. I hope he does!! It was as though he brought a cool breeze when he came through the door.
While he was here, I could breathe.’ ”
“Well,” said Bill. “That’s our Mei-lin.”
“And for your information, the frost worked. The general came back.”
“Of course it worked. I never said it wouldn’t work. We fall for it every time.”
“So if you fall for it, why should we stop using it?” I looked around. High walls fenced in the expressway. There was nothing for me to see, and nothing to think about except where we were headed. I went back to Mei-lin’s world. “This is a week later. ‘General Zhang came to tea again—and brought me a gift! Last week the subject of foreign languages came up. The general speaks French and English, like Kai-rong, and Father speaks those and German, too. When the general asked me—I waited until he asked!—I said I only speak English, and poorly. Kai-rong looked sour and told the general I was being modest. I denied that. Father was only too willing to come to my aid—he said I’d never suffered from modesty, so it must be true! He never believes I can do anything! If he’d take ten minutes to speak to me in English he’d know better, but that would waste his valuable time.
“ ‘But the general spent his valuable time buying me a beautiful book! To improve my English, he says.’ ”
“So the false modesty worked, too.”
“You want to know the truth? Pretty much everything works.”
“We’re that easy?”
“Sorry. ‘It’s a book of poems by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, love poems, in fact they made me blush when I read them years ago. Of course I didn’t say I knew them. Father was pleased, though Amah pursed her lips when she saw the author was a woman. Kai-rong looked even more sour than last week! He’d been planning to go out, but changed his mind when the general arrived. I don’t know why, because he was out of sorts—if he wanted to be somewhere else, why didn’t he just go? But Father seemed delighted the general had come, and said he hoped he’d be a frequent guest. And the book is so beautiful! I can’t wait to show the Feng sisters. A gift from an army general!’ ” I broke off and demanded, “What are you smiling about?”
“I guess we have tricks that work, too.”
