Lace Weaver

by Lauren Chater

  ‘So. We are alone,’ Jakob said. He had taken off his cap and placed it with his gun on the hallstand. I was glad; I did not like the feel of his gun against my hip when we walked side by side through the marketplace, as evening fell or along the banks of the Emajõgi River.

  My heart gave a sharp twist. ‘Did you want to talk?’ I said. ‘Or I could make tea.’ I tried to undo the shawl around my shoulders, ready to hang on the hallstand. A habit I’d picked up from the others. I could feel the lace tangling around my fingers. I tugged at it, not wanting to rip the stitches but unable to untie the knot I had fastened to stop it slipping and being crushed beneath the boot heels of the Germans as they marched up the street.

  Jakob’s hands appeared suddenly, snaking over my shoulders. He undid the knot with ease, and then slipped the shawl into my hands. I realised I was trembling. I glanced up at him, afraid he would laugh at me, but he had taken a respectful step away, his expression patient.

  ‘Whatever you like,’ he said. I caught the glimmer of amusement in his eyes. He was waiting for me to set the rhythm, as he always did. We had been talking for five months now. Talking and talking, endless stories. We would meet whenever he had leave, at the apartment or outside the barracks where the Home Guard were now stationed. As troops of German soldiers marched past and tanks rumbled over the cobblestones, we would talk about the events that had shaped our childhood, the places we dreamed one day of visiting. I retold Olga’s stories and sang Mama’s songs. As we became comfortable, I had found the courage to confide in him that Olga had been lost to me the night of the deportations. Jakob had promised to look for her name among the official documents left behind, but the outcome was not optimistic. There had been so many people deported that night it was impossible for all their names to be listed. Other lists had been destroyed in the bomb blasts that damaged the records office at the Town Hall.

  The knowledge that I might have to live with the guilt of never knowing whether Olga survived was a crushing blow. Only Jakob’s kindness and sympathy seemed to comfort me.

  Sometimes we conversed in Estonian, and other times, out of earshot, in Russian. My Estonian was improving. I could remember my mother telling me that Estonian was one of the most beautiful languages in the world. Each time Jakob and I met, it never seemed long enough. There was always more to say. It seemed as if my mouth could never catch up with my brain. As I walked back to the apartment, I would recall some little observation I thought would amuse that I had forgotten to tell him and as the week passed, I would hold it inside me like a small candle flame, determined not to forget. But when I saw him leaning against the stone wall of the barracks, a half-crunched apple in his hand, his lips shiny with juice, it was as if the words I had tried so hard to recall were no more than embers blowing away on the breeze.

  And yet in all our conversations, two things had weighed upon my mind; the secret burden of my parentage and the truth about Joachim. A few times I had started to tell him about Stalin and then forced myself to stop, unsure if I could trust my own judgement. What if I was wrong? Jakob seemed caring. He seemed to want to know everything about me. But what kind of person could accept as his friend the daughter of one of the world’s most dangerous men? In my worst moments, I imagined him running to tell the authorities. I imagined the looks of horror which would cross the women’s faces as my secret was revealed. I feared Kati and Etti’s rejection most keenly. Our connections were already so fragile, shaped by what we had witnessed the night of the deportations and then the decimation of the camp. We had built our own small world in the apartment with Leelo. Amidst the uncertainty of the changeover from Russian to German hands, we had grown close and created our own routines and habits to keep each other safe. I did not want to lose that now, when for the first time I had friends I could rely on and people who cared enough to involve me in their lives. I only wished Olga was with me, to share in my newfound freedom. I grieved her loss bitterly.

  I stayed silent when Jakob talked with sadness of his parents, unable to share with him the immensely complex feelings my true parentage brought up. It was my secret, now that Olga was gone. I alone would be its keeper.

  Jakob thought I was the Partorg’s daughter and that was surely bad enough.

  ‘Thank you.’ I hung the shawl up now with the others. They looked like ribbons tied on the branches of a tree, the patterns all mingled. One day, I thought, I will know what each of those patterns is. One day I will get Kati to teach them all to me.

  ‘You were quiet today.’ Jakob perched on the edge of an armchair.

  I moistened my lips. ‘I’m always quiet.’

  Jakob’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Really?’ Slipping into the armchair, he leaned back, his hands behind his head. ‘This is the girl who swears to have seen every one of Greta Garbo’s movies and can quote almost every line? The girl who can describe – in great detail, mind you – the exact formula for successful cutlery execution at a formal dinner party.’

  I burst out laughing, despite myself. ‘You don’t understand,’ I said, moving to stand at the window and let the sun warm my back through the glass. ‘Today was . . .’ Disturbing? Troubling? ‘It was not a day for light-hearted chatter,’ I said. I shot a look through the windows. Swastika flags hung from every corner of the street. German soldiers in their clean, pressed uniforms leaned from the back of trucks, radiating smiles, happy to play the role of saviours.

  When I looked back at Jakob, it was to find his face had changed. He ran a hand through his curls. ‘I know,’ he said, his voice low. ‘I thought so, too. We must be careful. That is what Oskar says. We must wait and see.’

  He was silent for a moment, looking down at his shoes before he raised his eyes to grin at me from beneath his curls. ‘At the very least, we are together. I don’t think we have ever been alone without the rumble of tanks around us or people rushing back and forth. Or Kati, fussing around with that awful kettle which sounds as if it’s being murdered.’

  ‘You don’t want tea then?’

  His eyebrows contracted before he realised I was joking. He laughed and shook his head. The armchair squeaked as he rose from it and came to stand in front of me. I felt my breath quicken, my pulse beating faster. Do not think of Joachim Squeak of shoes. Car door slamming.

  Jakob’s warm brown eyes seemed to see right through me, right down to my soul. ‘Lida,’ he said and the breathless tone of his voice made my stomach flutter nervously. Very cautiously, as if he half-expected me to stop him, he leaned forward and placed a hesitant kiss on my lips. I froze. When I didn’t resist, Jakob kissed me again. Harder. Desire made my legs tremble. It surged through my body and I felt my heart soaring, like a bird freed from its cage.

  And then suddenly, I was back in the cinema. I was tasting Joachim’s cigarettes, the coffee he had drunk that morning. I was listening to him beg for his life as my real father’s minders interrogated him and accused him of spying. I was watching guards shove him into a dirty railroad car, hearing him call for his mother, his father. Begging them to save him. Begging me.

  I pushed Jakob away, gasping hard.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ I put my face in my hands. My skin was cold. How could anyone want to kiss me? I was tainted.

  Joachim’s memory hovered just out of reach, still there like a shadow. If I could only purge it from my mind. I shook my head. ‘It’s not you.’ To my horror, I realised I’d begun to cry. Tears leaked down my cheeks and dripped onto my blouse.

  Jakob whipped out his handkerchief to blot them. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said again. I scrubbed at my nose, wishing I could ask Olga for the handkerchief she’d always carried. ‘I’ve only had one boyfriend. And, you see, he was killed.’

  Jakob’s hand froze, his handkerchief halfway to my face. His face had paled. ‘Killed?’

  I nodded. ‘I think so. If not, he was taken far away from his family and everything he knew. Nobody comes back from those places. He might as well be dead.’

  Jakob’s expression clea
red. ‘He was deported.’

  ‘Yes. My father—’ I paused. I could not tell him. He still thought of my father as the Partorg. ‘My father had him sent away.’

  ‘That’s horrible.’

  ‘Yes.’ My sobs had lessened. ‘Yes. It was horrible.’

  ‘But not your fault.’ Jakob dabbed his handkerchief against my skin, soaking up my tears. ‘Not at all your fault. You mustn’t blame yourself.’

  I stared at him. ‘But if he hadn’t met with me, he might still be alive.’

  ‘You’ve told me about your father,’ Jakob said. ‘Well, the little you know about him.’ I felt a hot ember of guilt burn my throat. ‘If I might suggest, your boyfriend knew the risks he was taking. He took them anyway.’

  ‘But why would he?’

  ‘Why?’ Jakob looked at me as if I was mad. ‘Because you are kind. And funny. And you almost always end up telling a rambling story about Olga or your mother. Because you know how to use fine cutlery and how to read poetry and about cinema and a hundred other completely useless bits of impractical knowledge.’ I smiled. I did not believe everything he said, but the way he said it was almost convincing. Jakob pursed his lips as if he knew my thoughts. ‘It’s true.’ Using his thumb, he raised my chin until our faces were level. ‘I want you to promise you will let him go. Let go of that guilt. Your father was a horrible man. You are not your father, Lida. You will never be your father.’

  I wanted to throw my arms around him and kiss him at the same time.

  I did both. As our kisses deepened, I realised with a pang of longing that I had been blind to my own desires. Hadn’t I wondered more times than I cared to admit what it would be like to trace my fingers along the ridge of his collarbone, or to tousle his curls or to run my hands across the flat of his back? Had I been so intent on sabotaging my own happiness that I had not seen what was in front of me? And Jakob, I knew now, felt the same. The last few times we met, he had seemed preoccupied, his hands always busy, fidgeting with his belt or hitching his gun up on his back or playing with the cuffs of his sleeve. I too busied my hands with other things; knitting needles. Baby bottles. Cooking implements. I had not realised that my hands would remain restless, empty until Jakob filled them and made the rest of the world disappear.

  All my fears had been unfounded. Joachim was the past. Jakob was my future.

  Now, at last, he stood before me and I was kissing him and for once, I didn’t want to talk. I wanted instead to listen to the sound his breathing, to hear his heart quicken and the clamour of my own blood surge in my ears in response.

  A rush of impulse flickered up my body. I moved away. The thin cotton of my blouse crinkled as I unfastened the buttons. The sun from the window warmed the bare skin of my back. Through the glass, I could still hear distantly the crowd of voices from the procession moving off.

  My fingers were shaking as I fumbled with my waistband until the folds of my skirt fell in a soft puddle around my feet. Jakob was right. Joachim was gone and nothing I could do now could bring him back. I could not continue living as if I was already dead, as if my body was not able to experience desire and hope and love.

  Jakob was watching me. When I’d begun to undress, he had looked wary. Now he was following my every move with his eyes. When I unclipped my stays, he made a sound in his throat and stepped towards me. His lips warmed my throat.

  ‘You are sure?’ he said against my skin. I could feel him trembling. It made me feel stronger, more confident, to know that he was as nervous as me.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, in Estonian, to please him. All my limbs were warm from the sun. I wound my arms around his neck and he kissed me swiftly and a little clumsily, his beard grazing my chin. My hands travelled beneath his shirt, exploring the hidden landscape of his body. His skin was covered in a fine soft down. It made me think of feathers and the dream I had experienced the night of Leelo’s birth.

  I thought of what Olga had said. Love is complicated.

  Perhaps it was.

  *

  ‘No bread today.’

  Helga, the baker’s wife, threw her hands down on the counter to emphasise her point. Clouds of white flour flew into the air. Through the hazy obscurity, her scowl was visible, her thick lips moulded into a stubborn pout as if someone had pinched them out of the doughy folds of her face. Flour dusted her cheeks and collarbone, speckling her apron like a drift of snow.

  A hush fell over the group of women clustered beside me at the counter, conversation emptying until the only sound was the creak of the door between the back workroom and shopfront still swinging in Helga’s wake.

  In the queue beside me, Etti tapped her foot nervously against the tiled floor. I risked a swift glance at her. She was pale, her skin like chalk against the dull bronze of her hair. One of Juudit’s old grey coats was buckled around her thin waist. I wondered with a sinking heart if I should have left her with Leelo at home. Kati and I usually collected our rations together, one of us heading to the bakery while the other queued up for the meat. Of all the days for Etti to come out.

  I squeezed the ration tickets that Kati had given me tightly in my hand.

  A sudden explosion in the street behind us made the people in the queue cry out and glance around in fear. Etti clutched my arm, her eyes wide. But it was only a truck backfiring. Some people smiled hesitantly, perhaps feeling foolish. Etti and I did not smile. We stayed pressed together. Etti’s foot resumed its tapping and she cast me an uneasy sidelong glance.

  I wondered if she was also thinking of the way the German presence seemed to have increased this past week. Their uniforms were everywhere. Trucks could be heard rumbling day and night along the streets, ferrying soldiers from the barracks to the Baltic borders where the fighting was worst. Tanks constantly rolled into Tartu, making the ground shudder. Posters had sprung up, too, seemingly overnight. They were different to the propaganda posters I had seen all over Moscow. Those posters with their bright, primary colours had seemed so innocent, with their fairy tale depiction of workers toiling in fields while farm overseers counted their profits with thick fingers.

  The posters I had seen today plastered on the walls were openly hostile, dripping in vitriol. In small beady letters, they detailed an issue from the Sicherheitspolizei stating that Jews could not change their place of residence, or walk on the pavement or attend the theatre or school. All property owned by Jewish people was to be confiscated, and work to register any Jews remaining in Estonia would be carried out as soon as possible. Anybody who knew the addresses of Jewish people was encouraged to contact members of the Selbstschutz. Doctor Otto-Heinrich Drechsler, the High Commissioner of Ostland, had decreed that all Jewish residents must wear the yellow Star of David on the left side of their chest and back. Anyone of mixed race or who was suspected of having sexual relations with a Jewish person was considered ‘mischling’ and could be arrested for having Jewish sympathies.

  Etti was safe for now, but things could change quickly. Her husband had been Jewish by birth, but non-practising. She could not be arrested while the laws remained. I would also be at risk if the laws changed. If my mixed parentage was exposed, even the fact that my mother had been Estonian would not be enough to save me. I kept as low a profile as I could, never speaking more than was necessary to the baker’s wife or the man who sold us our meat. I spoke only in Estonian or the German I had learned at school.

  There were other changes, also. Those people who had dared to hide their radios when the Soviet government outlawed them were encouraged to bring them out now, so that they could listen to Goebbels or Rosenberg, the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, outlining Germany’s role in establishing a stable seat of government in the Baltics. Far from leaving, the Germans seemed bent on settling in and the longer they stayed, the greater the sense of dread which seemed to creep into everyday life.

  The presence of their new propaganda was an unspoken weight. It stifled ordinary conversation and squeezed out any small pleasure
that might be found in snatches of time spent bent over lacework. I wished I had Jakob to ask about it, but I had only seen him once over the past week and we’d been surrounded by others. I had suggested visiting the barracks, but Kati refused to go with me. I suspected that despite her calm, aloof manner, Kati was just as afraid as I was.

  ‘Are you deaf?’ Helga said. ‘I just told you there is no bread. You might as well go home.’ She raised her chin a little as if defying anyone to decry her claim. ‘All of you!’

  The crowd around us murmured. One of the other women in the queue was brave enough to call out: ‘There was bread yesterday, Helga!’

  Helga’s scowl deepened. She palmed back a wisp of hair with a dusty hand. ‘I know. But that was yesterday. Today, there is none.’ Her eyes roved over the crowd. Two small flames of colour danced in her pouchy cheeks. ‘There are soldiers here who are defending your lands. They require food, sustenance. Their needs are greater. If you’ve any complaints, you may take it up with Reichskommissar Lohse. He’s in charge now.’

  The men and women muttered as empty baskets shifted from hand to hand. As if to torment us, a breath of yeasty air puffed out before the door to the workroom finally shuddered to a close.

  Helga waved at us, making shooing gestures with her hands. ‘Out! Out!’

  People began to move, shuffling reluctantly towards the entrance of the shop.

  ‘What are we supposed to feed our children?’ a young woman asked, standing her ground against the shifting tide.

  Helga squinted. ‘That’s not my problem. There are plenty of other foodstuffs to be had. Try the butcher; I saw a lorry pull up this morning with fresh slaughter from the factories.’

  Grasping my basket, I guided Etti towards the front doors.

  ‘I suppose we should be thankful Leelo has not started eating yet,’ Etti said as we made our way towards the butcher’s shop.

  I flicked her a cautious smile, but she seemed unusually optimistic, swinging her basket so that it bumped against her knees as we passed a boarded-up pharmacy. An army truck rolled past, obscuring the window, flooding the road with petrol smoke.