The German Girl

by Lily Graham

  ‘Both?’ asked Jürgen in surprise.

  ‘Both,’ she agreed. ‘To the Jewish school – at least there you’ll get treated with some respect – and I can be sure they won’t fill your head with any of this sort of nonsense. It’s bad enough that people out there believe this sort of rubbish, I will not stand by and let them force it down my children’s throats too.’

  ‘We’ll get to be at school together?’ asked Asta in delight.

  ‘Yes.’

  Their mother was true to her word. The next morning, they went over to the hospital in which for the past twenty years Mutti was head nurse, and she was quickly indulged by one of her former colleagues and allowed to measure the heads of several young girls in the children’s ward, as well as four nurses and an intern, Mutti proved her point. By then she hadn’t needed to – Asta had already started to see that what Jürgen had pointed out the day before was true, but it was nice to have it confirmed, to expose the lie once and for all.

  ‘Everyone’s head is different – it’s not the size that makes it worth something, it’s what you do with what’s inside of it that counts,’ said Mutti.

  ‘But I still don’t understand why she would tell me that – if it’s all just rubbish?’ said Asta. ‘She likes me – she wouldn’t want to upset me!’

  ‘You can love a dog, Asta, but never think of it as an equal. I think that she wants it to be true – your brother had a point. She would never measure the heads of the other girls in your class because then she might have to doubt everything she’d been told… and right now, these lies, these slurs, they’re holding everything together, for the people using it to rise to power.’

  The twins were enrolled at the local Jewish school due to the sheer force of their mother’s will – that and the sympathy of Rabbi Bloch. They were past capacity but when Mutti explained what had happened, he said they could make things stretch a little wider to accommodate them.

  For the twins, the new school was a reprieve. After a year and a half of education that was becoming increasingly about the Nazi Party – that left them feeling like outsiders while they were forced to listen to incentives that encouraged the non-Jewish youth to become model German children and join the Youth League, where lessons on what made someone seemingly inferior was because they were like them, and Jewish, or had some other ‘flaw’ had become daily life – the new school was like coming up for a breath of air.

  Here they could speak loudly, laugh or say what they felt. Their new friends were like them; many hadn’t even known they were ‘Jewish’ in any real sense, until Hitler told them they were.

  ‘My grandfather was Jewish, apparently,’ said a boy named Otto on their first day. ‘I mean, my mother was adopted so she didn’t know until we were told we had to prove our ancestry.’

  ‘Same thing happened to our priest – he was told he couldn’t be one anymore because someone in his family had once been Jewish,’ said another girl, named Sara.

  ‘A priest?’ Asta asked in shock. ‘Even that’s not Christian enough?’

  ‘Apparently not.’

  For a time, it was possible to forget about Hitler, and their worries. ‘He won’t be in power forever,’ said their mother, ‘and then those stupid laws will be gone; they’ve lost too many valuable people – doctors, lawyers and the rest – they’ll have to change it back.’ They hoped that was the case.

  It certainly felt like life was improving. The twins came home from school with smiles every day. They weren’t the same children who’d once come home laughing and pulling pranks on Polgo Hausman’s water taxi; they were older, and warier, but the longer they spent in their new school, making friends like themselves, the happier they had become. Which gave their parents comfort.

  ‘It was a good call, that school,’ Papa said one Saturday as they walked to the park. They’d just finished their ice creams and for a while they could almost feel as if things were about to return to normal.

  On the way home, they passed their old neighbour, Geoff Rubenstein. He looked like a shadow of his former self. He’d lost weight and his hair had turned completely white. His clothes were old, dirty and frayed.

  They stared at him in shock, while Papa clutched his arm. ‘It is good to see you, my old friend, but I must admit, I am surprised – I thought you’d gone to England?’

  ‘Pah, that fell through – my cousin couldn’t vouch for me, he needed to be earning enough for us all. Times are tough there, too. We’re looking at other options now.’

  ‘But are you all right – where are you staying?’ asked their father, concerned.

  ‘We’re with my sister – her husband served in the war so he still has a job. Hana – my wife, she’s doing some sewing and washing – we’re getting by, we’re better off than many, don’t worry. Besides, we’re going to America, I have family there – it’s going to be fine. It was nice to see you,’ he said, stopping and smiling at the children like he always used to on the stairs of their apartment – usually after he handed them each a sweet from his pocket. Peppermints or toffees.

  He handed them each one now. ‘Still can afford these, so it’s not all bad,’ he said and he winked.

  He wasn’t the only one forcing a smile on his face.

  On 15 September 1935, new laws came into effect, known as the Nuremberg Laws. They forbade marriages and relationships between Jews and Germans and officially stripped the Jews of their German citizenship.

  Papa became obsessed with keeping their passports safe. ‘They can’t take these from us,’ he kept saying.

  Finally, even Mutti agreed that the time had come to look at moving.

  Unfortunately, there were half a million Jews in Germany thinking of doing the same, and many countries had begun making the process increasingly difficult.

  ‘We still have our jobs,’ said Mutti. ‘We’re okay.’

  Their friends felt the same way, including a fellow doctor, who had taken a job selling medical supplies to hospitals – because he hadn’t fought in the First World War and wasn’t allowed to practise medicine unless it was in a Jewish hospital. ‘It’s not all bad, my hours are better and besides, Hitler is focused on expanding Germany – and rebuilding the economy, so at some point they’ll see sense.’

  Papa had looked at him incredulously. ‘I don’t think he will.’

  ‘Oh, Fritz, you worry too much,’ said Mutti, patting his knee.

  Germany invaded Austria and got away with it, with not so much as a slap on the wrist. It seemed that no one wanted to enter another world war. Nineteen thirty-eight brought with it new laws that were going to make life even harder for them. Jews were forbidden from practising medicine, but Papa got around this by getting a job at the Jewish hospital with Mutti. It was not even a third of the salary of what he had before.

  ‘We’re lucky,’ Mutti told the twins. ‘At least we have jobs.’

  The twins knew that their parents wanted them to believe that was the case. Late at night they heard them talking about their aunt, Trine, in Denmark.

  ‘Do you think we should try to get hold of her – try to get her to help us, perhaps she can vouch for us?’ Mutti asked Papa.

  Asta heard them speaking on her way to the kitchen, and paused behind the door in the sitting room.

  ‘I don’t want to worry her,’ said Papa, ‘besides, we haven’t registered our paperwork yet.’

  It was a horrible predicament – they couldn’t apply for a visa without showing the authorities their passports – and that would ensure that theirs were stamped with the official ‘J’. And there was the possibility that the visa could be denied and then they’d never be able to get out of the country.

  She heard Mutti’s anxious voice. ‘She’s sent two letters already. I think we can safely say that your sister is worried.’

  ‘I thought you didn’t want to go to Denmark?’

  ‘That was before!’

  ‘Okay, okay, I’ll phone her,’ he promised.

  Asta left th
en, wondering if they were going to leave for Denmark after all. But in the days that followed they heard nothing more.

  All Jews were now required to have a new middle name, Sara for females, and Israel for males – these were to be added at the registry office by law. Also, a large J was to be stamped inside their passports. Papa refused – especially the latter.

  ‘I won’t do it, Frieda – we agree to this and then whatever rights we have will be taken away.’

  ‘Rights? We don’t have many left – and without these new documents we won’t be allowed to work at all!’

  ‘Think, Frieda, if we do it we won’t be able to leave. That’s why they want the passports stamped, so that Jews can’t pretend to be Christian and go to Switzerland.’

  Papa didn’t settle into his new job, like Mutti had done, it was hard for him to find peace in it – as he had one eye so firmly on getting them out of the country, hiding away the passports he’d refused to hand over.

  In the end, though, the authorities came for them.

  It appeared that Papa had made a scene at the Jewish clinic where he worked, when an SS officer came in asking to see everyone’s documentation and he refused to show them.

  The twins were on their way home when their world imploded. One of the nurses – who they knew only as Frau Kaplan – rushed over to tell them the news. She came running up to them in the street, her face red and streaked with tears. She was out of breath. ‘Oh, my dears,’ she gasped, clutching at them. ‘You can’t go home.’ A fresh set of tears began leaking down her face. ‘They’ve taken them both.’

  ‘Our parents?’ breathed Asta, her knees buckling. Frau Kaplan held her up. Her curly hair was glistening with sweat; she must have run all this way to tell them.

  ‘Taken them where?’

  ‘To Dachau, the labour camp – for refusing to change their documentation.’

  Asta and Jürgen gasped. ‘No – just for that – they can’t have taken them!’

  ‘I saw it myself. Your mother gave me a look to tell me to run here, knowing you’d just be getting out from school. The police are going to come for you next, I’m sure of it – I don’t know where they send the children, I think it’s some sort of camp somewhere else, but don’t let them take you.’

  She handed them some money. It wasn’t a lot. ‘I’m sorry, there was no time to get more – I heard them say that they would be going to your flat today to find you both, and to search the flat, so I couldn’t even risk getting your things, in case they found me there.’

  Asta clutched Jürgen’s hand. ‘We can’t go home?’

  Frau Kaplan shook her head. ‘No, I’m sorry, it’s the last place you should go now. I’d take you home with me, but they could look for you there.’ She swallowed. ‘They would know that I’m friendly with your mother and could figure out quickly that I came to get you. They could make trouble for us all. I’m sorry, I think it’s best if you find somewhere safe to go. Somewhere they won’t know. If you came with me, or any of your parents’ hospital friends, there is the chance that they could find you and take you away too. Technically, you’ve broken the law too – as you haven’t registered your documents either. I’m not sure they would be as harsh with you but…’ She broke off.

  They nodded. There was the chance they would. Who knew what they would do? They weren’t kids anymore – sixteen was old enough to be prosecuted, wasn’t it? It would be some time before they realised that she’d saved them, that she had risked a lot to protect them, but right then, they were told to run, and Frau Kaplan watched them dart away, before she, too, turned to go back to work. Hoping that no one had seen her leave.

  8

  They spent the night in Polgo Hausman’s water taxi. He still kept the keys in the same place, and with the winter season fast approaching he wasn’t running it as frequently anymore. It was freezing cold, but they shivered from more than just the cold.

  ‘I keep feeling like we need to go back there, that it’s all just a misunderstanding,’ said Asta. ‘That Mutti and Papa are there waiting for us and worried like hell.’

  ‘Me too,’ said Jürgen. His arms were wrapped around his knees. All they possessed were the clothes on their backs, which were easily identifiable as school uniforms.

  Someone was bound to notice and ask questions.

  ‘I think if we could just get into the flat – or find out more…’ he said.

  ‘You heard what Frau Kaplan said, though – they were coming for us, and going to search the flat. I doubt they’d give up that easily.’

  He nodded, tears beginning to course down his cheeks, which he dashed angrily away. ‘We should have taken Papa’s side when he wanted to emigrate, then we wouldn’t be in this mess now. We’d be in Denmark or somewhere safe, together.’

  Asta nodded, wiping away her own tears. ‘Mutti wanted to go a few weeks ago – she wanted to look into getting a visa. If Papa wasn’t so stubborn maybe we wouldn’t be here now either.’

  Jürgen’s head snapped up in anger. ‘So, it’s his fault that they were taken?’

  ‘Wasn’t it?’ she asked softly. ‘Couldn’t he have avoided this just by letting us change our paperwork? He made us hide our passports – that we never even used; he was saving them for what, for things to get worse than they already are? All he did was talk! Mutti said that Trine sent two letters asking if we were coming. Even she was worried about us. And now look at us – we’re stuck – our documents are at home, probably to be found by those damned SS, giving them the proof they need and making it harder to deny that he was planning something. What’s worse is they’re there and we can’t even use them – how far are we going to get without them?’

  Jürgen stared at her for a long moment. She was right, of course. But it felt horrible blaming their father, when he was only trying to protect them. Asta dashed away a tear and groaned. ‘Of course, it’s not Papa that’s done this – they did – they forced him.’

  Jürgen nodded, then stood up to pace within the small interior of the bridge. ‘We’ll have to get them. Tomorrow. Papa hid them well, so I don’t think that they will have found them that easily.’

  Asta raised a brow. They’d managed to figure out that their father hadn’t had his documentation altered… and come looking. Besides, the one thing you could never accuse the Nazis of was a lack of attention to detail, of not being thorough enough…

  Still, there was always the chance that they hadn’t found the documents. The advantage the twins had was that with any luck, they didn’t yet know about the hidden passports. She nodded.

  ‘Yes, tomorrow, we’ll go.’ There were other more pressing concerns too. ‘Either way, we need to go and get more clothes, food. Hopefully by then they would have moved on.’

  Jürgen nodded. ‘And Trine – Papa’s sister – the one who lives in Denmark. We’ll need her address too. I just know it is somewhere near the sea – Elsinore.’

  Asta blinked. Then slowly began to nod. He was right. Of course he was – it was time to leave Germany. Past time. They would be going to Denmark.

  They left the boat well before dawn, not having slept a wink. They were overtired, hungry and desperately sad and anxious by the time they arrived at their street. They kept to the shadows, stationing themselves by a set of bins outside the apartment block across from theirs. It was a well-practised move from years of being pranksters and hiding away from Mutti and their old cook. Even so, when they saw two officers stationed outside their building, it was all they could do to stop themselves from crying out.

  Asta leaned back against the wall, fighting for air, well out of the officers’ sight. ‘They’re waiting for us,’ she breathed in horrified realisation.

  Jürgen nodded, then tipped his head to the right. ‘Let’s go.’

  They crept away as silently as possible, only daring to take a proper breath when they were several streets away.

  ‘Now what? Can we go to the school, maybe someone can help us there?’

 
Jürgen nodded, and they made their way to the school, only to gasp when they saw a group of officers waiting outside there too.

  ‘That can’t be for us – surely?’ she asked.

  ‘I think it is,’ he said, backing away slowly.

  Unfortunately, he kicked a tin can, and an officer looked up from the school, and frowned.

  ‘Run!’ cried Jürgen, and they did, darting back up the street as fast as they could. The officer tore after them. But they had a decent head start, and the twins knew the back alleys of Hamburg better than most. They flew up a street, and entered a side door of a building that appeared locked but they knew from experience wasn’t – the padlock wasn’t threaded through properly. A minute later they heard boots outside the door, and they held onto each other tightly, hands clasped over their mouths. Then they heard the sound of those boots hastening away. It was some time before they unpeeled themselves from the door, and made their way out through the front of the building, racing into the city of canals.

  Using some of Frau Kaplan’s money they bought themselves cheap clothing from a charity shop, and a takeaway frankfurter roll from a stall near Polgo’s water taxi.

  They were exhausted and scared. ‘I wish we could just go to Granny,’ said Asta. Their mother’s mother lived not two streets away, and there she had warm beds, food, and no doubt a comforting place where the twins could process what had happened.

  Jürgen sighed. ‘I know, but you heard what Frau Kaplan said – we can’t go where they’ll know to look for us.’

  They spent their second night aboard the water taxi, and it was the first time they managed to sleep. In the morning, they regretted letting down their guard, as they rose sometime well after dawn to find Polgo Hausman staring at them with a look of horror on his swarthy face.

  ‘It’s you,’ he breathed, as they scrambled to their feet, eyes wide with fear.