Daisies Are Forever

by Liz Tolsma

  “Other than myself?”

  “Ja. It has daisies on it.”

  “There are women with scarves every color of the rainbow on this train. What makes her so special?”

  Kurt, unwilling to answer that question, moved away and found Audra and the girls where he left them. “Do you know how many women have green scarves?”

  Audra fingered her gray one. “I have counted seven so far. None of them Gisela. No one I have asked knows of a woman who fits her description.”

  “Stay here and keep watching. I will search the barn and the house.” He would go faster alone and they would find each other easier.

  Though he conducted a frantic yet thorough search, he didn’t locate Gisela. His muse. His empty sleeve slung around as he stood in the farmyard and pirouetted, holding his breath.

  No Gisela. No woman with a green scarf who resembled her. It was as if she had fallen off the edge of the world.

  Kurt returned to the women. “Our best bet would be to return to the train. If Gisela is among us, we should have an easier time finding her there. She might be searching right now for the children.”

  Audra licked her cracked, red lips. “I can’t get on that train.”

  “You have to.”

  She shook her head so hard she must have given herself a headache.

  “I will be with you.”

  She peered into his eyes, her pupils small. Fear radiated from her.

  An intense desire to protect her took over. “For the kinder’s sake, at least walk in that direction. No one says we have to get on.” He would drag her aboard when the time came. For now, let her think she didn’t have to climb into the carriage.

  “You won’t make me?”

  He turned into a liar. “Nein.”

  She gave a brief nod, then turned and walked in the direction they had just come.

  Gisela set a brisk pace across the snow, now trampled by many feet, making it icy.

  Mitch reached out to her. “Take my hand so you don’t fall.”

  She shook her head. “There is no need for both of us to break our necks.”

  “Are you always this stubborn?” The dimple in his right cheek deepened.

  “Always.”

  “Suit yourself. If you fall and break an arm, I’m not going to help you.”

  “Fine.”

  “Fine.”

  They walked what felt like miles, the exertion warming her from the inside. Only the tips of her fingers and the tip of her nose were cold now. “They have to be up here. They have to be. With such little legs, they can’t walk fast. We should catch them soon.” She gulped frigid air through her mouth but pushed on.

  Mitch’s long strides matched hers. She glanced at him and his smile reassured her. They continued forward, passing slower parties on the left and the right. Each time they asked if anyone had seen the two little girls. No one had.

  Dear Lord, help us find them. Please, keep them safe.

  They walked in silence, saving their breath so they could maintain their rapid pace. Her new, larger boots didn’t chafe like her old ones. She could walk with greater ease.

  Darkness had fallen, but the snow glowed in the moonlight. Enough, Gisela hoped, so they would be able to see the girls. They couldn’t stay out here in the open with the temperatures dropping.

  Mitch soon outpaced her with his long strides. He turned and looked at her over his shoulder. “Come on.”

  “You go. I’ll catch up. Just bring them back to me.” Despite her best attempts to sound optimistic and cheerful, she couldn’t keep the worry and panic from her voice. Her airway constricted and threatened to close altogether.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Go. Please, go.”

  “I don’t want to leave you.”

  “You’ll get to them faster.”

  And he did, leaving her on her own in this wasteland. Why had she told him to move on without her? Loneliness enveloped her. No Mutti. No Vater. No one who loved her.

  Would she even make it to Berlin?

  The wind gusted. Her eyes watered, the tears freezing on her cheeks. Her nose ran and she wiped away the moisture with the back of her mitten.

  Perhaps she might be as fortunate as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. Her cousin from the United States wrote to her about the movie that was not released in Germany. Hitler hated the fact that many movie producers were Jewish.

  But her cousin had relayed the story, and Gisela liked it. If she clicked her heels together, she might wake up in Kansas. Close enough to California. To freedom and happiness. When Margot was still with them. Before that awful disease claimed her life. And snuffed the life out of her family.

  She didn’t even try what Dorothy did. She was too cold, too tired, too hungry for this to be a dream.

  For the longest time, she trudged onward. The farm never appeared to get larger. Was she even moving?

  She imagined warm sea breezes, hot sand between her toes, sunshine pinking her cheeks. She remembered Mutti humming as she washed dishes at the kitchen sink and hung the laundry on the line in the sun. Vater wasn’t home very often because he traveled for his business. She and Margo spent many happy hours playing in the grass. Wherever Margot went, Gisela went.

  The fantasy helped a little. Her fingers didn’t ache so much. Then the gust picked up and tugged at her coat and her warm imaginations fled.

  More steps and more steps and more steps.

  Just ahead, someone jumped up and down, waving his arms. “Gisela! Gisela!”

  Kurt? “Kurt!”

  Two little voices chorused. “Tante Gisela! We found you.”

  Like a bullet from a rifle, she shot forward, stumbling across the field. Her lungs expanded and contracted as fast as she ran. She passed Mitch. “Annelies. Renate.”

  A squeal came from Annelies. She let go of Kurt’s hand and raced toward Gisela. “Tante. Tante.”

  Nothing had ever felt as wonderful as having this little girl’s arms around her neck. Never mind that she couldn’t breathe. She had found the children. “Oh, my girls.”

  She tore her gaze away from the pale face to assure herself it was Renate in Kurt’s arms. The tiny girl wriggled free, ran to her, and joined in the hug.

  The other members of their party arrived. The Lord had orchestrated events to bring them together for a second time. Danke, Lord, danke.

  Mitch arrived, kneeling beside them, alternating between kissing Gisela’s cheek and the girls’. His grin was as wide as the Atlantic. “What did I tell you? We found them. God brought them to us.”

  She pulled the little ones close to her. “I will never, never leave you again.”

  Annelies patted Gisela’s face. “Do you promise?”

  “I promise. A hundred million times, I promise.”

  “That’s a lot.”

  Gisela laughed. A moment ago she believed all laughter had ceased forever. Joy truly was a balm to the soul.

  “Audra? You found the girls?”

  Kurt didn’t give the poor woman a second to answer. “I noticed two little girls with hats the same color as theirs wandering ahead of us. They didn’t look like they belonged to anyone. Just alone. I sent Audra to investigate, not wanting to frighten the girls with my big, deep voice.”

  Gisela took note of the quizzical expression that crossed Audra’s face.

  “Ja. I saw their hats and knew it was them. They were alone and I couldn’t leave them.”

  Gisela stood and embraced Kurt, then kissed him on both cheeks. “Danke, danke. I will be forever grateful to you.”

  He clung to her a moment too long. She had to pull herself from his hold.

  Audra took Katya’s hand in her own and rubbed it. “We were going back to the train to search for you. Unless you want to continue to the farm. They have built a fire in the yard.”

  Kurt nodded. “Ja, that is true, but we would have to sleep outside. The barn and the house are too full. In the train, we can huddle together and stay warm.” He sm
iled at Gisela as he spoke the last sentence.

  Mitch slipped his arm around her waist. “The train, then.”

  Would he never stop speaking his horrific German? “If that is what you feel is best.”

  “Nein. No train for me.” Audra stepped back. “Go on without me. I will be fine.”

  Without much tenderness, Kurt grabbed Audra’s wrist. “We will all go to the train.” He turned to Mitch and Gisela. “She is afraid of the crowd and the small space.”

  Gisela directed her attention to Audra. “I understand. If we had to climb a mountain to get west, I wouldn’t be able to go. I get nervous looking out of a second-story window. Right now it sounds as if most of the passengers have gone to the farm. The carriage won’t be crowded. You will see.”

  Without further comment, Gisela grabbed Annelies’s hand and began the trek toward the tracks.

  Kurt glared at Mitch and Mitch wanted to squirm under his gaze. The same kind of look his mum had given him multiple times throughout his childhood. Like the time he had knocked over the cookie jar and broken it. Or the time he had ripped his knickers playing in her rose garden.

  She had an uncanny way of sensing he was lying. And of drawing the truth from him.

  He glanced at Kurt, who turned away, caught in the act of staring.

  A few minutes later, though, Kurt decided to start a conversation. Or rather, an interrogation. “Which company did you serve with?”

  Thankfully, Mitch’s captors allowed the prisoners to listen to the radio once a week, so he had an answer for the man. “Fourth Panzer Division. Left me for dead during the battle of Kursk.” He spoke slowly, measuring each word and attempting to recreate every syllable of the guards’ pronunciation.

  “I had a buddy in the Fourth Panzer. Heinrich Hoffman. Did you know him?”

  Now what should he say? He scrunched his face. “Heinrich. Hoffman, you say?”

  “Ja.”

  “I remember the name. Never met him.”

  “Too bad. I’ll introduce you to him once the war is over. You will have many stories to share.”

  With any luck, Kurt would disappear from their lives long before the cease-fire.

  “But your uniform is SS.”

  “After I was hurt, I wanted to serve the Fatherland. I could be an SS guard.” He could only hope his explanation was plausible.

  The low whine of yet another Russian plane filled the air.

  Not taking a moment to think, Mitch pushed Gisela and both girls to the ground.

  “Hit the deck. Hit the deck.” Mitch screamed in English, his heart matching the rat-a-tat-tat of the guns. He flung himself on top of the pile but didn’t lean down hard on them, mindful of the little bodies underneath his own. Kurt pulled the old ladies and Audra to the ground, lying next to her instead of on top of her.

  “I want to see the fireworks. Stop blocking my view.” One of the Holtzmann sisters raised her head. Mitch pushed it down.

  Underneath him, Renate began to cry. “Hush, little one, hush,” Gisela crooned.

  “I’m scared, Tante Gisela.” Annelies’s body trembled.

  Mitch whispered to her. “You are safe. Soon it will be over and we can get back on the train.”

  “I want Mutti.”

  “Let me tell you about where I was born.” As Gisela described California, her soft words stopped Annelies’s trembling. She made it sound so idyllic, so inviting. He wanted to visit there one day. Especially if that meant seeing her.

  The rat-a-tat-tat of machine gun fire interrupted her story.

  It was close. So close. Too close.

  He would never get home.

  Icy pellets stung his face as the bullets pierced the ice-crusted snow in front of them. Pain exploded in his hand. He bit back the scream that rose in his chest.

  Lord, make it stop. Please, make it stop.

  Each breath sawed in and out faster than the last.

  Moments passed, perhaps only a few minutes, before the plane rose in the sky. Father, keep him from returning.

  As before, they lay still for several minutes after the shooting ceased. Mitch rolled off of Gisela and she picked up the children and hugged them with all of her might. They continued to sniffle.

  Mitch examined them and found no visible damage. “It’s okay. You’re fine. Everyone is fine. That bad man is gone now and you’re safe.”

  Mitch swiped his fingers across Gisela’s cheek. “You’re bleeding.”

  “Snow sprayed in my face.” She shivered.

  Before he could draw away, she grasped his hand. “You’re hurt.”

  Blood covered his fingers.

  SIXTEEN

  Mitch stared at his bloodied, throbbing hand. Was it his? “A bullet grazed me. Imagine that. I survived the entire war only to get injured by an ally at the end of it.”

  “Let me look at it.” Gisela held his hand, her touch gentle, soothing.

  They had drawn attention. Audra, Kurt, and the two old ladies gathered around.

  “My boy, you must be more careful when you use a saw.” Bettina leaned in close for a better look. “See that, Sister? Just see that.”

  Katya nodded, her salt-and-pepper hair sticking out from underneath her brown hood. “Will he lose his arm?”

  A flash of hurt crossed Kurt’s face.

  Gisela continued to hold Mitch’s hand. “Let me try to fix you up.”

  He didn’t want her to let go. “Are you a nurse?”

  “Even if I wasn’t, you wouldn’t have any choice but to trust me, would you?”

  “You are a nurse, then.”

  “I never said that.”

  “Should I be worried?”

  “Since I don’t have to remove your appendix, probably not.” One corner of her mouth hooked upward. A bit of the pain subsided.

  Audra came to his side. “Can I help? Growing up, I had to care for many injured animals on the farm. And my little brothers and sisters.”

  “A bullet grazed his hand.”

  Audra set her pack on the ground and rummaged through it. She pulled out her white nightgown and ripped a length of it. Then she wound it around Mitch’s hand. “When we get to the train, I’ll get my needle and thread. It’s going to need stitches.”

  He backed away from her. “Nein. No stitches. Bandages are good enough.”

  Kurt tried to stare at Josep without being obvious. When the tiefflieger had swooped down, he had shouted. But his words didn’t sound German. Kurt didn’t understand them.

  He now felt certain that Josep hid a secret. He was no SS officer. A thousand scenarios streamed through his mind. Was he a spy? And Gisela his partner? But spies wouldn’t be on a train in the middle of Poland. There was no military information to be gleaned here.

  Perhaps he truly was Gisela’s husband. She had married this foreigner and brought him to Germany. But then he would be—should be—off fighting. In this case, he would be a coward.

  Kurt narrowed his eyes and studied Josep. His dark hair and just-as-dark eyes told the tale. Kurt was positive Josep was no Aryan. There was a chance he had been a prisoner of war. Now escaped. On the run from his captors.

  As they made their way to the train, Audra sidled up to him, Bettina and Katya trudging ahead of them. “What are you thinking about so hard?”

  Kurt nodded in the imposter’s direction. “Him. Something isn’t right. I am convinced he is not German.”

  “Why would you say that?”

  “Did you hear him shouting before? That was not German shooting from his mouth.”

  Audra shook her head, her blond hair falling in waves from under her gray scarf. “I didn’t pay much attention. But you are sure he is foreign?”

  “I would bet my vater’s house on it.”

  She giggled. The sound produced a warm, comforting feeling in him. It just wasn’t the aria that Gisela’s laugh was.

  She stopped mid-chuckle. “You don’t think he is Russian, do you?”

  “Nein.”

&nbs
p; They tramped through the snow for a while. Clouds scuttled across the sky and hid the moon for a moment.

  Kurt tugged on her arm and halted. “Like I said, you need to talk to him. Imagine how famous you would be if you broke up a spy ring. Marlene Dietrich would have nothing on you.”

  Gisela and Audra sat together on the worn red-velvet train seats. The carriage stunk of unwashed bodies. Gisela wanted to hold her nose and gag, even though the wind howled through the broken windows and chased away the worst of the odors.

  The old sisters occupied the seat in front of them. Renate sat on Audra’s lap, clapping her hands and chattering away about the monkey in her book at home. Annelies snuggled against Gisela and dozed.

  The men had gone out a while before to try to glean information about the engine. She wished they would return. Soon.

  Audra bit her lip, then crossed and uncrossed her legs. “Josep didn’t speak in German when the plane came. What language was that?”

  Gisela shifted, Annelies’s bony backside digging into her thighs. Had he slipped and spoken English? “You’re mistaken. Perhaps you didn’t understand the dialect since he is from the west.”

  “Really? Where?”

  Once again, that speaking before thinking problem flared up. “Oh, um, Mannheim.” She would have to tell Mitch as soon as possible about his hometown, to keep their stories matching.

  “Why aren’t you headed there?”

  “We are. First we must stop in Berlin and get my mutti. With all the bombing going on there, I’m worried about her. My vater is off fighting with the Volkssturm.”

  “Is Josep your husband?”

  Audra asked too many questions. “Ja, of course. Why would you ask such a thing?” How many other people suspected the truth about Mitch? They would have to be more careful.

  Renate patted Audra on the cheek. “Listen, Tante, listen.”

  “I am listening, little one. Tell me another story.” Audra shifted her attention to the child and Gisela breathed a sigh of relief.

  She stared out of the window, no dirty pane blocking her view of the groups gathered outside of the carriage. Those still too afraid of another attack to come in from the cold. At last Gisela must have dozed, because the shouts from outside startled her.