The Road to Liberation: Trials and Triumphs of WWII

by Marion Kummerow

  “That smells delicious,” she said, and, sending to hell all the good manners Herr Wagner taught her, stretched her hand to grab one of them.

  He watched her munch without touching a piece himself.

  “You? Not hungry?” She pushed the plate with two remaining sandwiches across the table.

  He shook his head. “I love watching you eat. You know, since I laid eyes on you, I felt driven to feed you.” After a long pause, he added, “And to protect you. Not that I can shield you from this goddamned war, but at least I can be sure you are well-fed.” His soft, trusting gaze nearly gutted her.

  Caring and sweet. Had she had it before? Vati. Her Vati. The memory brought pain—she’d had no news from him since June 1941. How was he? She shook off the aching memories. Only the hope he was safer behind the Urals was a relative relief.

  “Let’s drink champagne but first, let me feed the stove.” Soon, logs burned in the hearth, and she felt the warmth of the flames. “I love these Russian stoves,” he said and took a bottle from a cupboard. He uncorked it and poured two glasses of the bubbly, yellowish liquid. She was conscious of his hand touching hers as he passed the glass over. Lifting his and clinking with hers, he toasted, “To the rapid end of this senseless war and the beginning of a new life.”

  “Yes, for your new life. You’ll marry your Annchen and have many sons. I wish you happiness from the bottom of my heart.” The sensation from her own words felt no more than a touch of sadness.

  For some time, they sipped champagne in silence.

  “A new life for us.” He touched her hand, the stroke of his fingers almost unbearable in its tenderness, then poured her another glass.

  Spellbound, she enjoyed the prickly drink. She closed her eyes to concentrate on the lingering taste, overwhelmed by the surfeit of pleasure from the meal and champagne and from the faint light that twinkled in the depths of his kind eyes, beckoning her irresistibly. The warmth of the room and the effect of the alcohol seeped into her muscles, loosening and soothing them, and her head felt dizzy. Suddenly, as if a merciless hand lifted a veil of her subconscious expectation for something beautiful between them, she shuddered. A feeling akin to a premonition like a snake sneaked into her heart, whispering into her mind that sooner or later, he’d leave her or would be killed. Back in control, she said, trying to keep her voice quiet, “Ewald, I have to go home.” She got up and, stumbling on the first step, grabbed him by the arm.

  “I’ll help you to the bed.” The closeness of his lips to her ear made her knees grow weak even more.

  “No!” she said, realizing it wasn’t what she wanted to say and let him set her on the edge of the bed and lean down to slip off her boots. It was all new to her and all wrong. Very wrong, she thought.

  Her lids struggled to stay open. In vain. When she opened her eyes after a short nap, she found herself in bed and him lying beside her and staring into her face.

  When he touched her back, his hand brushing along the spine, her body lit up like . . . There was a tingling in the pit of her stomach. What was it? She had nothing to compare it with. Pressing her legs together in an unsuccessful attempt to stop her body from trembling and, admitting to herself she was standing on thin ice and it was about to crack, she attempted to get up. And then, despite her momentous resolve to put an end to it, her arms locked around his neck, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to resist the longing or stop herself from going further.

  He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed. “Ursula. Liebchen—Sweetheart.”

  She helped him to free herself from her clothing and turned so not to see him undress. “I have never been with a man before.”

  Her words left a long pause between them, before he ventured, “Are you a virgin?” She felt hesitancy in his voice.

  “I am.”

  Now, they stared at each other in confusion and were silent again, but not for long. He tilted her face up and kissed her eyes then forcing back her head, kissed her throat.

  Ulya made a sighing sound.

  “I want children with you,” he said with such calmness, more like a whisper, she thought she had imagined it.

  For a fleeting moment, she mentally pictured her child—their child—and, with a sensation of self-discovery, loved the idea of it.

  They moved closer with their bodies. His bare skin was hot to the touch. So were his lips on hers.

  “I’ll be gentle, Liebchen.” He arched over her and after the excruciatingly painful push and her gasp, moved carefully in her, bringing her to the point when she experienced the onset of sweet and inward rapture, flooding her, making the ache no more. She clasped her arms behind his head. “I have never felt anything like that,” she exhaled.

  “You sleep now.” His lips touched her forehead.

  In Vitebsk, Ewald spent rarely more than two or three days in a row, cruising the city’s district. Their time together was short and tenderly calm. He touched on something deep inside her. His gentleness brought a sensation of completeness she had never allowed herself to feel. As though he was on a mission to heal her for her motherless life and losing her father.

  She did her work as scrupulously as ever, but her thoughts were on him and it was a strange lightness in her heart that she could not quite explain to herself. Had she felt something like that with Konstantin Petrov, that pilot school cadet from Volsk whose name was not Konstantin and not Petrov at all? The liar. Most likely an NKVD plant. With Nathan? Far from it. With him, she’d experienced a strange physical attraction, which she only now could fathom.

  With Ewald all was different. Wanting to see him, to be with him was so out of the ordinary for her. He became integral to her life. At the same time, she was conflicted. Being intimately close to him endangered her life and her mission, albeit he was a source of what was expected from her. But living without him meant a life without a bliss she had never experienced before. Could she subdue these unlooked-for feelings slowly filling up inside her? Was it love that she felt?

  54

  February 1944

  Ulya finished typing Hammerer’s urgent letter, removed it from the Remington, and motioned to Wulff that she was done. “Herr Hauptsturmführer awaits it for his signature.” He grabbed the paper and stepped to the closed door. A sharp knock and Hammerer’s “Step in!” prompted his adjutant to open the door. At that moment, she heard Adamkus’ voice, “…After her visit.” The door closed shut.

  Who was that “she”? What did they talk about? The pinpoint Soviet air raid on the storage depot she had visited with Ewald and Adamkus? Or something else not related to her?

  As lunch time came, still concerned, she headed to the canteen and, relieved Agnesya was serving her, ordered sandwiches and coffee. Then added, “A whole cabbage pie. Wrap it for me, please.” When Agnesya returned and shielded her from other visitors, Ulya slipped a sheet of paper under the tablecloth then snatched the cup. “Oh!” She banged it back on the table, spilling some drops on the white cloth. “You should have warned me it’s burning hot!” Ulya, outraged, blew on her fingers.

  “Sorry. I’m so sorry.” Agnesya looked as if she would break apart from terror. Good performance, Ulya applauded her mentally.

  The girl grabbed the cup. One quick brush, and Ulya’s dispatch disappeared in the folds of the crumpled tablecloth. With it, Agnesya wiped the coffee drops and staggered away to the kitchen. She still had a rather haunted, woebegone look about her when she returned with a fresh tablecloth, a cup of coffee, and a couple of paper serviettes, not forgetting the pie. Ulya took her time to finish her coffee then escaped into the bathroom. She unfolded the serviette and, after reading her next assignment, tore it in little pieces and watched them disappear in the whirlwind of flushing water.

  While in the evening she carried the pie and a bottle of milk to Nathan’s daughter’s place, a frisson of fear, an innate instinct told her she was being followed. She cast a quick glance around the street, but no one looked as if they might be on her footsteps. That w
as no comfort, as all it could mean was if someone was shadowing her, they were professional at it. Not a good idea to lead them to the little girl, she decided and headed to the West Dvina where she paused on the bank to reflect a moment. Maybe, she had just overreacted? Yet her instinct told her one could never be too safe. For some minutes, she took lungfuls of fresh air then went home.

  When the next day as she headed to the girl and felt rather than saw at the edge of her vision she was being followed, her intuition confirmed her pensive doubts and a terrifying realization washed over her: she stood with the dilemma of finding another way to supply the girl.

  “Is something bothering you, Liebchen?” Ewald seemed to recognize her concern as they got together.

  To conceal? To pretend? Or to tell the truth? Even as a half-truth? She could hardly believe she was this close to revealing her secrets, but her trust in him overpowered her wavering. “Ewald, there is a little girl who lost both her parents. She is dependent on me.”

  “A Jewish girl?” His eyebrows slanted in a frown.

  “No, she is . . . Byelorussian. With my little food parcels and . . . sorry, with your apple strudel sometimes, I helped her grandmother save the girl from imminent death from starvation. Yesterday and today, I noticed people following me.”

  “How do you know?” He eyed her, expectant, a clear gaze of his kind, smoky gray eyes.

  “But Ewald, it was so obvious.”

  “Why does it concern you, my Liebchen? You do a kind deed.”

  There was a pause between them while she debated whether to reveal or explain to him her worries and resolving for a half-truth, uttered, “I’m not concerned for myself, but for the girl and her grandmother. I work for SD and if they who followed me are the Underground workers, it may harm the little one. If they are from Hammerer, I wouldn’t know how to explain to him my care of two people who . . . Sorry, Ewald, there are things I can’t explain even to you.”

  “I think I understand. But from now on, your news will haunt my days and nights.”

  It was about a week later, when Ewald asked her matter-of-factly, “What do they need?”

  “Who do you mean?”

  “Your girl and her grandmother.”

  “Oh, they need bread, eggs, butter. Everything and anything. Can you get milk?”

  He took her hand in his. “I can get the moon for her.”

  “She doesn’t need the moon.” Ulya allowed herself a little smile.

  “Liebchen, I will do anything only to see a smile on your beautiful face. You must not worry about the little girl anymore. Nobody would follow me. I’ll deliver food for her and—” He didn’t finish and went to the wardrobe. From the upper shelf, he pulled a doll. Dressed in a lovely linen nightgown with lace, the bisque doll-girl had auburn hair full of curls, big brown glass eyes with lashes, open mouth with two bottom teeth, and a dimple in her chin. “For the little one.”

  Ulya took the doll in one hand then threw her other arm around his neck.

  “What is her name?” He took her by surprise.

  “Her name? Masha,” she gave the first name that came to her mind.

  “I wish we had—”

  They were silent for a long moment. No words were needed. That night, he loved her so tenderly, so sweetly, he drained all her doubts and fears.

  55

  End of February 1944

  “Liebchen, I’m called to Germany.”

  Ulya’s heart twisted with pain. “To see your Annchen.” It had been months since he or she even mentioned the name.

  His eyes widened and behind them something changed. She tried to look away, but he tilted her chin up, forcing her to look him in the eye. “Ursula, I am in love with you.” His voice broke with huskiness. “You are the one I want. Do you understand what I mean?”

  He was telling the truth. She felt it to the depth of her being. Raising her lifelong barriers, he left her exposed, vulnerable. Before she could open her mouth to confess to him, he drew her to him, planting his kisses across her forehead, cheeks, chin, and then her lips. She nestled closer into his arms. “Ewald.” Her throat constricted.

  He went on smoothing her hair with gentle hands, consoling her with whispered endearments, “Liebchen.” “My Herzchen.” “Schatzilein.” Then, after a deep sigh, he took her face into his hands. “I realized how helpless I am. I can’t protect you here. Will you come with me to my quiet Austria? When I return, I’ll arrange it.”

  Her heart wrenched in her chest. She turned her face away from him. If only he knew who she was. His enemy. She used him to comply with her obligations, she put his life at risk while reporting the locations of the storehouses he frequented. Who am I? A killer? A cold-blooded creature whose main objective is to kill his people? Her own people as well? She felt caught between two traps.

  His delicate, tender kiss on her lips moved her to tears, bringing her back into his cushioning embrace. “Ursulchen.” Gently, he eased her down onto the bed and unbuttoned her blouse. “You are so beautiful,” he exhaled. The touch of his tongue on her breasts was light and painfully teasing. He went on kissing her, whispering his love for each part of her body.

  He was the man who brought her untried senses to life.

  On February 27, to see Ewald off to the train, Ulya went to Hammerer to ask for permission to get off work one hour early.

  “Fräulein Kriegshammer.” He looked her up and down. “Not only do you seem upset, you want to get a leave. As your superior, I demand an explanation.”

  “A friend of mine is departing for Germany today.”

  “And who it might be?”

  “Major Demel.”

  “Ah, I have to blame myself since I introduced you to each other. So, you became—”

  “Friends, Hauptsturmführer Hammerer. We got friendly.”

  Her superior was not easy to read, and she couldn’t tell if he was buying her statement. Most likely, he knew the truth.

  “Ah, lucky people who get a leave. And especially now. My best wishes to Herr Demel on his way to the Fatherland.”

  At the railway station, she watched canvas-topped ambulance trucks with red crosses and scores of stretchers set down on the ground, the brisk air carrying waves of disinfectants or medical alcohol, and groans and shouts of pain. The walking wounded, some had their arms in slings, others their heads bandaged, moved slowly along with the men on crutches, who stalled the process.

  It took her several minutes to reach the platform. Not immediately, she sighted Ewald standing to the side, peering into the gathering crowd.

  He hurried to her, his progress hindered by the salutes he exchanged with other officers and soldiers. Instinctively, they made an abrupt move to each other then yanked away and, for a long silent moment, caressed each other with their eyes.

  She found her voice. “I will wait for you to return.”

  He leaned to her, his lips close to hers, but not touching. “I will return to you, my Liebchen.” His eyes were wet when they met hers. He found her hand, kissed it, and brought her palm to his chest. She could feel the tremor through the wool of his greatcoat. Without removing his hand, with her other one, Ulya took a small enamel icon from the pocket of her coat. “This is a Russian Mother of God icon. It will protect you.”

  With much care in taking it from her hand and putting into his chest pocket, he leaned closer to her ear. “Thank you, Ursula. You were the only sunny presence in my time here,” and then, “We should marry, darling.”

  Quite flummoxed, she peered into his eyes, not wanting the sensation of this moment to end.

  At the hiss of steam, they both startled. The first tug of the locomotive engine and, without any other warning, the train started moving.

  “I love you.” And there it was. She had said it out loud. The sensation she’d kept so deeply buried within herself. “Ewald!”

  His eyes laced with anguish, he dragged her to his chest.

  The carriages floated by slowly with the clack-clack-clack
of the wheels as the train picked up speed. He pulled away from her and ran. She saw him jump on the footstep and the smoke plume screened the back of the train from her eyes and she realized—a crazy idea that instantly shattered her—she should have gone with him.

  Breaking the curtain of the thick smoke, a group of women in nurses’ uniforms appeared. All of a sudden, nauseated, unsteady, as if the ground beneath her had given way, Ulya leaned against the railing and felt she might retch. Had she eaten something rotten for her breakfast?

  “Are you not well?” A female voice came from behind her and a hand touched her elbow. “Do you need help?”

  Ulya turned her head to see a haggard woman in her forties whose face struck her as familiar. She cares for my girl. The thought itself that she called the girl “hers” in her mind shattered her. Despite her inclination, Ulya took the woman’s hand and squeezed it. “Thank you.”

  “What for?” A glint of curiosity flashed in her amazing green-gray eyes and her soft full mouth froze in astonishment.

  “For your care,” Ulya said and, after biding her time for her nausea to pass, hastened away.

  Ulya was glad to see a bunch of papers on her desk the next day. For two hours, she was detached from the pain that gnawed at her like the press of an invisible presence and focused her mind on the task at hand.

  Toward eleven thirty, a courier stepped in and after the “Heil Hitler!” handed Wulff a sealed thin parcel. “For Hauptsturmführer Hammerer.” Nothing unusual. But why, adding to her heartache, sudden fear twisted around her heart and lingered? She shrugged the sense of foreboding away and scanned the document she’d just finished for mistakes. It was an appeal from the President of Belarusian Central Rada Radaslav Astrovski announcing a military conscription into Belarusian Home Defense Force.