‘But didn’t the government say when we came that at the end of the war, we would have to go back?’ It was Simon, Erich’s friend.
‘They did, Simon, that’s true, but that was at the start of the war when we thought it was going to be over quickly. Now everything is all up in the air, and the rules will have to change to suit the circumstances. But listen to me – I want every single one of you to hear this. Nobody – not me, not Daniel, not Rabbi Frank, not Ruth, not Levi – will ever let you out of our sights until it is back to your family, and only then if you want to go. I give you my word.’
She waited for the words to sink in. The other adults stood around, and Daniel backed her up.
‘She’s right. Nobody will take you from us. It doesn’t matter what anyone says, all right?’ He glanced at the rabbi, who took the cue.
‘God put you in our care, children, and we will take care of you, I promise you. You are safe now, and you will always be safe with us.’
Hearing it from all three of them seemed to have the desired effect. Elizabeth went on. ‘And so, because we are all staying here for the foreseeable future, we thought we might do a bit of a job on the place and make it more like a home. So we were thinking we could put some sofas in here, maybe even get a carpet and a wireless, and you can bring some of the board games from school, and it would be a place you could all relax and be together.’
This news was met with mixed reactions. The little ones seemed delighted, but the older ones looked worried. She would have to address their concerns at least a little bit – this was going to be the hardest part. She prayed she could strike the right balance.
Ruth seemed to sense it was a good time to split the group into younger and older, so she appeared with buns and cocoa. The smaller children descended on them, unused to such treats, as Elizabeth stood and addressed a group of the older children.
‘We don’t know what has gone on in your home countries, and we have no way of knowing for a long time yet. So how about we just take one day at a time? For now, just know that you are all loved by all of us. We are not your parents, we know that, but we feel like we are and we intend to take care of you, all right?’
‘Can we ask you something, Mrs Lieber?’ Viola, Liesl’s friend, asked.
‘Of course,’ she said, sitting down again. ‘Anything.’
Viola spoke again, but Elizabeth could feel ten or twelve pairs of eyes on her. She guessed what was coming. They would not have said anything in front of the younger ones.
‘At the cinema, the news said about the camps, and how the Jews were sent there, and how cities like Warsaw were destroyed.’ Viola was Polish and her family lived in the capital. ‘And so we are wondering how we can find our families if they have been sent away, and what we should do.’
‘They are saying in the newspaper,’ Haim Bonhoffer, a quiet sixteen-year-old from Bremen, said, ‘that Hitler killed a lot of Jews. Sean’s father was reading about it, and Sean asked him what it was and he told me.’
‘They are saying the Jews are all gone.’ This time it was Dieter Schultz, Abraham’s older brother. He was a rogue, and if there was ever mischief going on, you could be sure Dieter or Abe was at the centre of it, but they had kind hearts.
Her eyes rested on each one in turn. Viola and her sister, Anika, Simon, Yuri, Rachel from Munich, Michael from Leipzig, Konrad and Piotr Mann from Salzburg… She needed to tell them some version of the truth.
‘My darlings,’ she said, forcing her voice to stay steady. ‘It’s true that some terrible things have happened, and it may be a very long time before we can find out exactly where your families went. And yes, hard as it is to imagine, some Jews have died.’
The realisation that it must be true if Mrs Lieber said it was like a physical blow, and she hated being the one to deliver it.
‘But we don’t know anything more, and so we must not assume the worst. I wish I had answers for you, I really do, but I just don’t. None of us do. And it will, as I said, be a long time, so all we can do is wait and see. Your families put you on those trains to keep you safe, and they would want you to stay here, safe and loved, until they can come for you or we know more. Once peace is declared, we’ll do all we can, but all I can guarantee is that nobody will be sent anywhere until they have someplace to go.’
They stood close to each other, not moving. She had their undivided attention. At the other end of the room, the happy chatter of the little ones filled the air.
‘I know you want to go home.’ She sighed and smiled. ‘You worry about your families, and you want to see them as soon as possible. But until such time as that can be arranged, you have a home with us. For as long as you need it, forever if you like. Rabbi Frank, Daniel, and Levi are in the same position as you all. They’ve lost touch with people they loved too, and they’ve lost their homes and everything. Just as much as they’ve made a home for you, you all have made a home for them as well. Families can come in all shapes and sizes, and we are a family now, all of us, and we’ll stick together. So while I know you are feeling so confused and worried now, and that’s totally understandable, you do have this family, and we’re not going anywhere.’
To see them comfort each other made her realise that her words were true. They were a family.
She knew she had said enough. The gruesomeness of the mass killings would be something they would learn about in due course. They would find out eventually, she supposed, what happened to their specific families, or maybe they never would, but for now, this was enough.
Chapter 16
Ariella forced herself to walk at a normal pace, not rushing but not dawdling either. Her false papers were buried deep in her bag. It was only a thirty-minute walk. She could do it; she had no other choice.
She knew exactly where to go, which streets to take to get to Frau Braun’s house once more, but nothing looked as it once had. The beautiful wide boulevards of her city were reduced to a crumbling, smoking mess, and she wondered what the Nazis thought when they saw the carnage they had brought down on their beloved city. Did they think it was worth it, this destruction? It was hard to imagine how, if ever, it could be restored to its former glory.
As she walked, she tried to envisage the scene that would await her. It wasn’t ideal, but it was her only option. She’d seen the droves of people fleeing the city, and so perhaps the need to take in boarders was gone; there appeared to be hardly anyone left. Now that she had papers, maybe she could pose as a bona fide boarder.
The urge to join the throngs of those trying to get out was strong, but Father Dominic had warned her. There was no food or water for travellers, and huge numbers of those who left were either dying on the roads or returning in a worse state than they’d been in when they left.
Frau Braun took her in once; perhaps she would again, especially now as she had papers and a ration book. She could pose as a genuine boarder, a bombed-out victim. Over and over, she planned her speech, praying she’d find the right words.
Frau Braun’s main opposition would surely be her husband, but Herr Braun wouldn’t recognise her. She’d only seen him once or twice in the years before the war, and they had never spoken. Besides, she looked nothing like her old self.
He’d worked before the war in some low-grade clerical job in the city, and since joining the Party, he’d been elevated. That was the case with so many of them, Peter had remarked. Men who’d not achieved much suddenly found a way to rise up through the ranks of society quickly on account of their devotion to National Socialism. Even at Peter’s bank, he’d seen men promoted, who up to then had shown no promise or talent, just because they were connected to the Party. The governors of the bank had no choice – it seemed they were told who to promote and that was that. It drove Peter mad, and once or twice he’d objected as a director of the bank but was told to keep his opinions to himself for his own good.
Those men who had no merit or talent suddenly swaggering about like they were someone important, issuing comman
ds and barking orders at their former superiors – it was hard to take. That’s possibly why they were all clinging to what surely must be a lost cause at this stage, because without the Nazi Party and their affiliations to cling to, they went back to being nobodies.
Nobody from her former neighbourhood would recognise her either. She looked so different and could play the part of Marta well by now. Over the months, she’d encountered a few people when she was out and about and had casual conversations, and in each one, she expanded the character of Marta. She knew her now, wore her like a second skin. She could convince anyone she was, in fact, Marta Weiss. All she needed was for Frau Braun to agree. She had a ration book, so they could get food legitimately, and she wouldn’t have to hide her. Whatever had made her take her in the first time might still be there. It was a long shot, but it was all she had. Stella Kübler would not look for her there, Frau Groenig either. It was her only hope.
A group of Hitler-Jugend passed her, and she got off the footpath to allow them to walk three abreast. One of them smirked at her, delighted that his uniform wielded such power, though he couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen years old. She thought of Kurt, of Erich. They were only children, but nobody was spared in this horror. Every home in Germany would be forever altered by these years. That was all that was in the future of a once learned, cultured nation: grief, loss, shame.
She passed a few groups of people, all down at heel, all hungry and tired looking.
So few men remained in the city now; those who did were only the young and the old and the hopelessly injured. It was a city of women and children, but the bombing was nonetheless relentless. Germany would pay dearly for what they’d done – the Allies would make sure of it.
Eventually, she rounded onto the street where the Brauns lived. She paused for a moment outside, but however nervous she was, she didn’t want to draw any attention to herself by loitering. She opened the little wrought-iron gate and knocked on the big oak door with the spaces for six yellow glass panels on top, two gone altogether, the apertures filled with pieces of cardboard, the other four shattered in bomb blasts but held in place by tape.
She heard footsteps, and then the door opened. Ariella felt the colour drain from her face. A slight pause, a moment of recognition and then…
‘Good afternoon, Mrs Bannon,’ said Gefreiter Willi Braun, who was wearing the full uniform of the Wehrmacht.
Chapter 17
Liesl chose her dress carefully, brushed her dark hair until it shone and wondered if she would get away with a tiny bit of lipstick. It was the fair day in Ballycreggan, and Daniel and Elizabeth had said they could have some money for the hook a duck and to get a toffee apple. Bridie in the sweetshop had been making them all week with sugar she made from sugar beets, and the aroma was tantalising. Rumour had it she’d managed to make one for every child in the village, including the gang from the farm, and the excitement was at an all-time high. Major Kilroy, a doddery old retired army officer who had an estate on the outskirts of the village and who turned a blind eye every year to the children who scaled his orchard wall and went slogging apples, had delivered two boxes of apples himself apparently. However, his housekeeper, the sour Mrs Dawkins, showed no such kindness to children desperate for a treat. There had been so little sugar available – sweets were a rarity, even with ration coupons – so the delicious Cox’s Orange Pippins from the major’s orchard were in much demand.
Mothers who might previously have admonished their offspring for stealing now quietly took their booty and turned it into jelly, or if there was a birthday or a special occasion, they might even use up the flour ration to make an apple tart.
Their family managed well enough, though Liesl dreamed of German chocolate, because Elizabeth’s father had planted a vegetable and fruit garden and the old bushes and trees gave abundant fruit each autumn.
Erich’s job was taking the apples and pears and wrapping them in newspaper to store them for winter. Liesl picked blackberries, raspberries, gooseberries and strawberries, which she and Elizabeth made into jam. The jam was runny as they had no sugar to set it, but they added stewed apple, and the pectin in the apples thickened it enough so it was a spreadable consistency. They also had hens, so they had a plentiful supply of eggs, and Daniel brought milk and cream home from the farm. They grew potatoes, carrots, cabbages and peas, so their tummies were never empty, but Liesl did miss treats.
She hoped Ben would come to the fair. It was always fun. The adults were in good humour, and all the farmers came in from the countryside with cattle and horses to buy and sell. The tinkers came too, offering their services to fix anything broken about the house, and Elizabeth said she wanted the handle put back on her large saucepan and a lid made for an oval cast-iron pot she found in the shed. Daniel could have done it easily – he was able to do almost everything – but Elizabeth explained that she wanted to give the tinker the work.
Last week, they’d taken all the clothes that were too small for Liesl and Erich and divided them up. Some went up to the farm where they would be distributed among the smaller children, and some were given to the tinker’s wife who came to the back door with her paper flowers and prayers for the family. The travellers always seemed to have lots of children, and the woman was expecting another baby, so Elizabeth tried to give her all she could spare.
Liesl examined herself in the full-length bevelled mirror standing in the corner of her bright sunny bedroom. She and Erich were so lucky, she knew. The people up at the farm were in dormitories with no privacy – though plans were underway to change that. At least they were safe and well fed. The stories from Europe were horrible, and Liesl wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but she tried to tune out whenever people spoke of it. It was just all too sad and miserable. She’d had nightmares, picturing her mother in those camps, but during the day, she pushed all thoughts of her to the back of her mind. It was hard, but she couldn’t deal with it. The fair was the first nice thing to happen in ages.
She forced herself back to the present.
Her body was changing now, and she liked it. Her breasts were filling out her dresses, and her hips were getting more rounded. She looked a bit less awful and not like the beanpole that she’d felt like for years now.
Elizabeth was always saying how pretty she was, but she had to say that. Liesl thought of herself as looking like a big black crow most of the time. Elizabeth’s hair was that lovely chestnut colour, brown but with tinges of copper, but Liesl’s was just plain dark brown, not even black. Black at least would be dramatic. She had her father’s hair, not her mother’s beautiful copper curls.
She thought about her papa and mutti, and she felt ashamed of how distant their memory was. It felt like such a long time since she’d seen either of them. Elizabeth and Daniel felt like their parents now, and while neither of them ever tried to undermine the position of their real parents, the truth was that when she and her brother thought of parents, they pictured Elizabeth and Daniel. Peter and Ariella were just ghosts.
She tried to visualise them in heaven. Were they together? She hoped so. She had longed for so long to see her mother again, but now it seemed so unlikely and she had come to terms with the possibility that she would never see her again.
Though nobody discussed the news in any great detail, there were newspapers and BBC radio in their house, so they were more informed than the others who were kept in the dark. It was a relief in lots of ways for them to know that everybody wouldn’t be going home the day after the war ended. Her best friend, Viola, had talked all the time about going home to Poland, seeing her parents and grandparents again, even her dog Kacper, and Liesl had never said anything. They’d even had a falling out over it, with Viola accusing her of not caring about her family and going silent every time she told a story about her papa or her darling Labrador. Now that Viola knew that going home was unlikely, at least in the short term, she had become silent herself.
Liesl had hoped she’d come to the fair, b
ut her friend had declined. She didn’t want to pretend like everything was all right. When Liesl had begged her to come, Viola said she only wanted her there so she could see Ben without anyone raising eyebrows. It was so unlike Viola to be so catty, and Liesl did admit that it was a bit true, but she wanted her friend to smile again too.
‘It’s all right for you, Liesl,’ Viola had said bitterly. ‘You’re fine. You have your brother and a new mother and father and a lovely home and everything, but me and Anika don’t have anyone. We are alone in the world, and I can’t just pretend everything is all right and go to fairs and talk about stupid boys, so just leave me alone!’ She’d slammed the door on Liesl and left her standing there alone.
That had happened after Shabbat last week, and she’d not seen her friend since. She longed to go up there, to see her and try to talk it out, but she didn’t want to risk it. What if all of the others felt the same way, that she and Erich didn’t understand, that it was all right for them?
Elizabeth put her head round Liesl’s door. ‘You look lovely. Are you ready to go?’
Liesl looked up. Elizabeth looked lovely too in a cornflower-blue dress that had belonged to her when she was a girl and had lived in this house.
‘You do too.’ Liesl stood up.
‘Do you want to come with us or wait for Viola?’ Elizabeth asked, and the shadow that crossed Liesl’s face caused her to sit on the bed and pat the space beside her. ‘What’s up?’ she asked, putting her arm around Liesl’s shoulders.
One of the many things Liesl loved about Elizabeth was how easy she was to talk to. Ever since that first day when she’d picked her and Erich up from Liverpool Street station in London, during all the time they lived in Liverpool, even enduring the bombing there and the destruction of their house and school, Elizabeth had been open and honest with her and her brother. They knew that whatever she said was the truth, and she didn’t believe, like so many adults did, that children should be seen and not heard. She talked to them like they were important, and she listened too. She didn’t just dismiss childish worries as being silly but took their concerns seriously.
The Emerald Horizon (The Star and the Shamrock Book 2) Page 11
