A Bridge Across the Ocean

by Susan Meissner

  Simone listened for her father’s voice and the rap on the wall that would let her know all was clear and she could come downstairs. But she heard neither. Slowly she opened the door and peeked into the back room. No one. Carefully, she tiptoed to the front of the shop, staying to the shadows. She could see just beyond the front door’s glass that a crowd had gathered. A row of Gestapo officers stood in the street with rifles raised. In front of them stood four men—Papa, Étienne, and two men whom Simone did not know—with their hands raised over their heads.

  Another German officer pushed each man to his knees. And then, before Simone could work out what was happening, the officers with the rifles fired, multiple times. Simone had no time to scream or cry or think. A moment later, Papa and Étienne lay dead in the street.

  For the first few seconds she could only stand at the glass and whisper, “Wake up, wake up,” for surely she had to be dreaming.

  One of the Germans addressed the crowd in broken French. “This is happen when we find Résistance. This!” He pointed to the four dead men. And as he walked away with his comrades, he gave each of the bodies a swift kick with his polished boots.

  When Simone at last found her voice and legs, she bolted out of the shop. “Papa!” she wailed.

  But before she could step out into the street where the bodies of her father and brother lay, an arm shot out across her chest and held her fast.

  She struggled, but the man who had her in his grasp was strong.

  Simone looked up, ready to bite, scream, lash out with her fists, anything to get away, but she was helpless to break free.

  The man leaned in close to her.

  “Run, Simone. Now. They will come back for you. Some of them know your father has a daughter. Run.”

  She stared at the stranger. How did he know her name?

  His gaze back on her was steel.

  “Go! Now,” he murmured. “Run!”

  He pushed her away from the store—from her dead father and dead brother lying in the street, from the gun in the back room, from everything she knew—and she took off as fast as her legs could take her.

  Five

  NEAR SOUTHAMPTON, ENGLAND

  FEBRUARY 1946

  A teasing gust from the icy Atlantic thirty miles away tugged at the travel documents Annaliese clutched to her chest as the queue of war brides moved slowly forward. The ends of her wool scarf danced about her face, but she didn’t dare tuck them back into her coat and compromise her hold on the papers. They’d be impossible to replace.

  The other two dozen or so young women waiting to enter the registration building at Tidworth laughed and chattered despite the frosty chill. Some clasped the mittened hands of impatient toddlers whom they attempted to placate with promises of warm cocoa, very soon. Some held babies that cried, or cooed, or slept. Some stroked abdomens sweetly swollen with the unborn children of American servicemen. Some, like Annaliese, held nothing in their hands save their papers.

  Ahead stood the brick-and-mortar edifice where each would begin the final stage of her transition from war bride to American wife. Here, at the army base known as Tidworth, their immigration papers would be processed, their health scrutinized, and their passports stamped. Within a few days, or so they had been told, they would board a bus that would take them to Southampton and one of a dozen vessels that had been commissioned to transport them to New York harbor.

  Annaliese had never been across the Atlantic before and she wondered, as did nearly every woman in line, it seemed, if she would be seasick. Still, what was one more difficulty among so many others? The American husbands had first needed their commanders’ permission to even marry a European girl. Then there had been the hasty ceremonies and the wedding dresses made of parachute material or lace tablecloths or fabric remnants bought with donated clothing coupons. Then there had been, for most of them, the waiting. British women who had fallen in love during the months of preparation before D-Day had had the longest time to worry and tarry while their beloved soldiers marched across Europe. After Germany’s surrender in August, there had been more waiting, along with reams of paperwork to fill out and trips to the embassy in order to be reunited at last with their foreign husbands.

  But now all that stood between them and their new lives as official immigrants to the United States was the processing camp at Tidworth and the voyage across the Atlantic.

  A young woman in a red plaid coat just ahead turned to face Annaliese. She held on her hip a chubby-cheeked tot who had fallen asleep against her chest. “So, where’s your husband from?” she said brightly, in English.

  Annaliese thought maybe the woman had been speaking to someone else. The lady behind her, perhaps. She chanced a glance over her shoulder, hoping she was not the one being invited into a conversation in English. But the women directly behind her were engaged in their own chat. She turned back around.

  “Yes, you!” the woman said happily.

  “Oh.” Annaliese had not spoken to anyone all morning. Her voice sounded weak and unsure. The English response she had been rehearsing tumbled awkwardly off her lips. “He’s . . . he’s from Boston.”

  The other chattering voices around her stilled.

  The woman in plaid stared at her wide-eyed, a polite smile still plastered to her face. “Boston, did you say?”

  “Ja—I mean yes!” Annaliese’s cheeks instantly flamed hot, and she closed her eyes for a second. What a stupid mistake. She’d practiced speaking only French or English for days upon days. How could she have made such a blunder?

  “You’re German,” another woman gasped, unmistakably shocked.

  Annaliese shook her head. “No. Belgian. I’m from Belgium.”

  “But Belgians say oui for yes.” This from another woman, in a blue peacoat. Annaliese tried to calm the fluttering of fear in her chest.

  “I . . . I’m from Malmédy. Close to the border. Most speak German there. But we are Belgian. I . . . I am Belgian.”

  Her explanation was met with silent stares.

  “Why are you even here?” said a tall woman from farther up the line, whose baby had been crying in her arms for the last fifteen minutes. “These ships are for British brides.”

  Annaliese was struggling to work out a response to that question when a woman spoke from behind her, the accent clearly French.

  “No, they’re not,” the woman said.

  “I wasn’t talking to you!” the tall woman shouted over Annaliese’s head.

  Annaliese peered over her shoulder. The woman who had spoken up for her was petite and golden-haired. She looked to be Annaliese’s age, twenty or so, but her countenance suggested otherwise. There was a hardness in her eyes and in the set of her mouth that reminded Annaliese of the gray-haired Red Cross matron who’d welcomed them off the bus minutes earlier.

  The French woman fixed a challenging stare at the tall British lady before letting her gaze drift to Annaliese, who offered her a tiny smile of gratitude before she looked away.

  “Neither one of you should be here,” the tall woman continued. “I’ve got a flatmate who’s been married to her GI longer than either of you, and she’s still waitin’ for her travel documents. It’s people like you that are taking her place on these ships.”

  “It’s people like you that make the world a sad place when it should be happy,” the French woman tossed back.

  The woman in plaid leaned toward Annaliese. “Those two got into a row on the bus from the railway station about this very thing. Guess they’re still at it,” she whispered.

  Before Annaliese could nod, the woman in the peacoat spoke up. “So why are you here in England?” she asked.

  “I . . . My grandfather is British. He lives outside London. I’ve been staying with him since the war ended. We . . . I couldn’t stay in Malmédy. Our house was bombed.”

  “Welcome to the club,” the t
all woman grumbled.

  “Was it bad where you were?” said the woman in plaid, compassion filling her eyes.

  For a moment Annaliese felt as though she were teetering on the edge between two places—the private abyss from which she had just escaped and the tortured world of public war. In her mind’s eye she saw Rolf on one side, smelled his tobacco and schnapps, felt his hand strike her face, his boot crack against her ribs. On the other side she saw the rubble and blood on the streets of Malmédy: a haven nonetheless.

  “It was hell,” she finally said.

  “Did you get to see your husband before he went back to the States?” the woman in plaid said, clearly wanting to change the subject.

  Annaliese pushed away the images in her mind and shook her head.

  “Me neither. I haven’t seen him since he shipped out for D-Day. I’m half-afraid that when we get to New York I won’t recognize him!”

  The matron at the head of the line called out for their attention. “All right, ladies, we’re ready for the next group to come inside. Keep your little ones close to you and have your papers ready. That’s right. When it’s your turn, step up to the first table and present your documents. Then you will proceed into the theater for the medical screening. We’ll get you settled in the dormitory and then a hot dinner awaits you.”

  The line began to move forward. Annaliese was glad for the distraction. Perhaps she could blend back into the background now and attract no more attention. She had only one aim: to board the first ship to America without anyone else paying her any mind.

  But the line moved slowly. Only a few women at a time were allowed to approach the table inside. The woman in plaid turned her direction.

  “I’m Phoebe. Phoebe Rogers. My husband’s name is Harold, but everyone calls him Hal.” She smiled at her child, who had awakened and was now looking around. “And this is Douglas.”

  “It is nice to meet you,” Annaliese said after a moment’s pause.

  Phoebe grinned. “Aren’t you going to tell me your name?”

  The line inched forward. Phoebe closed the distance to the next woman in line and then turned around again. “Come on,” she said with a warm smile. “What’s your name?”

  Annaliese hadn’t expected such kind attention from any of the brides. “You don’t have to be nice to me. I know what I sound like to people.”

  Phoebe shrugged. “But you said it yourself. You’re Belgian. Is Belgium pretty? I’ve heard it’s very pretty.”

  Annaliese thought of the ballet studio, the hummingbirds in Madame’s garden, the slippery sound of the satin when she and her best friend, Katrine, tied the ribbons around their ankles, and the way Katrine’s laugh had sounded like music. “It’s the most wonderful place in the world,” she said.

  “I’ve never been to the Continent. I’ve never been anywhere,” Phoebe continued. “I’m scared to death of the open water. They’re probably going to have to drug me to get me onto the ship!”

  Annaliese smiled politely. Phoebe was kind, but Annaliese wished she would stop talking. She wanted to be invisible. She wanted no one to remember meeting her. They inched forward.

  “So you must speak French, too, then. Yes?” Phoebe said.

  “I do.”

  “And here you are speaking English, too! That’s so remarkable.”

  “Some English. I struggle with the words.”

  “But your grandfather lives near London? Where?”

  The stuffed pony Douglas was holding fell from his grasp. Annaliese bent to retrieve it, letting the woman’s question fall away.

  “He is a very handsome boy,” Annaliese said as she handed him the toy.

  Phoebe’s smile broadened. “I can’t wait for Hal to meet him!”

  A burst of wind suddenly swept around them. Two of Annaliese’s papers flew from her hand and swirled off in different directions. Other girls also found themselves chasing after their papers. Annaliese dashed after the precious marriage certificate and from the corner of her eye she saw Phoebe snatch from the air the other document: an affidavit that attested her husband had the means to care for her.

  She and Phoebe returned to the queue as the menacing wind settled.

  “Katrine,” Phoebe said, glancing at the affidavit as she handed it back. “What a pretty name.”

  Annaliese thanked her and pressed the documents to her chest.

  Six

  The chilled breeze that had earlier in the day taunted every war bride waiting to register had matured by nightfall into a surly tyrant that now hurled itself against the bricks of the dormitory at Tidworth Camp. Annaliese lay on her bunk and tried to block out the whining of the wind outside. Phoebe had sweetly insisted that she take the one above hers so that they’d be able to talk to each other as they tried to fall asleep in damp and unfamiliar quarters.

  The army had hastily converted Tidworth’s footlockers into cots for infants and toddlers, but Douglas kept climbing out of his. Phoebe was singing lullabies to her son, and every now and then she’d ask Annaliese if she was all right.

  Annaliese had no strength to fend off her new friend’s unexpected care. The activities of the day had mentally exhausted her, as had every day since she’d left Germany.

  She knew when she stepped up to the first registration table hours earlier that she had all the documentation needed to be processed into Tidworth; Katrine had had everything in order a week before she was to leave. But Annaliese hadn’t been certain she’d be able to convince the man behind the table that she was Katrine. They had always favored each other in looks; their ballet teacher had mistaken one for the other all the time.

  But that was when they were eight.

  Of all the documents Annaliese was required to present, it was the passport that had worried her the most. She and Katrine had been roughly the same height and weight, they’d had the same eye and hair color, and their birthdays had only been four months apart. But the black-and-white photograph of Katrine on page three of her passport had been taken in Brussels in October with a very nice camera. The image was sharp and clear. Cutting her hair and styling it exactly as Katrine had hadn’t diminished the fact that Annaliese’s eyes were narrower and her lips thinner. She’d trampled on the photo with muddied feet the day after everything changed. It was the only thing she could think to do to alter the photograph so that the subtle facial differences between her and Katrine wouldn’t be noticed. When the mud dried and Annaliese had scraped it away, the luster and crispness of the photo was gone. I was in a car accident the day before I was to come here, Annaliese had practiced saying. My passport flew off the dash and was run over. I’m so sorry. I cleaned it off as best I could.

  She knew she could say those words convincingly. Most of them were true. Her passport had been inside the car when it careened off the icy road and tumbled down an embankment. Her purse had flown out the space where the front window had been. But she’d left its contents, including her passport, in a spray of broken glass.

  When Phoebe stood in front of the registration table, Annaliese listened carefully to everything she’d been asked. But there were other conversations taking place next to her and behind her and at a second table to her right. She hadn’t been able to catch everything being said. Phoebe’s paperwork was processed quickly and she was soon moving off to the next station to be fingerprinted.

  “Next,” the official said.

  Annaliese laid her papers before him.

  “Name, please.” His gaze was on the documents.

  Annaliese took a breath and steeled herself for whatever would come next.

  “Katrine Sawyer.”

  He’d looked up quickly and Annaliese half-expected him to respond with, “Katrine Sawyer is dead,” and then shout for guards to come arrest her. But he didn’t.

  “You’re not British,” he said, his voice laced with equal parts annoyance
and curiosity.

  “I am Belgian,” Annaliese said calmly, masking her immense relief. The ruse was apparently working. No one had figured out yet what she had done.

  He began to flip through her papers. “And why are you seeking passage to America from England?”

  “As you will see there”—she pointed at the document in front of him—“I have permission. My mother was British. She married a Belgian man and moved to Belgium before I was born. But I couldn’t live in Belgium anymore. My home had been bombed.”

  The man seemed satisfied, with both her documents and her answer. Then he opened her passport and frowned.

  “I was in a car accident the day before I was to come here, and my passport flew off the dash and was run over. I’m so sorry. I cleaned it off as best I could.” The words flew off her lips in a rush, and the man raised his head to stare at her.

  “A car accident?”

  Her pulse pounded in her head. “Yes.”

  “Everyone all right, then?”

  His question had summoned images that Annaliese couldn’t stop from replaying in her mind: Katrine crumpled in the driver’s seat next to her, blood trickling from her nose and mouth, her head bent back at an odd angle and her eyes vacant and unblinking.

  “Yes,” she managed to say. “A few bumps and bruises, that’s all.”

  But the lie had tasted like bile on her tongue.

  “Do you have a criminal record, Mrs. Sawyer?”

  Annaliese’s heart skipped a beat. “What?”