by Dean Hughes
On the streetcar, Anna and her mother sat in front of the elders, and Peter and his father took the seats behind them. Peter was still excited, and he kept leaning forward to talk to the elders. “You must stay, Bruder Thomas,” he said over the noise of the streetcar. “You must tell your mission president this cannot be. Let’s call him up. I’ll tell him myself.”
Peter was only joking, of course, but his father was quick to tell him to be quiet. And Elder Thomas knew why. It was not wise to talk about missions, or to call each other “brother” in public. Religions were suspect these days. Hitler considered any viable organization a rival to his power.
Elder Thomas continued to watch Anna. Her hair, which was tied in a dark-blue ribbon, was still wet and shiny and hanging straight. When she turned a little, he could catch glimpses of her cheeks and the soft skin along her neck and jaw. She was carved so delicately. He wanted to talk to her personally, before he had to leave. But he couldn’t do that, absolutely wouldn’t do that.
By the time the little group reached the apartment building and climbed the stairs, the sun was setting. But inside, the Stoltzes didn’t turn the lights on. The living room glowed with the soft light from the windows. Anna, unusually quiet, sat in her usual place, the same as she had during the lessons, at the end of the coffee table, near Elder Thomas. She was sitting straighter tonight, however, and the tinted light made her skin glow. Elder Thomas kept glancing at her, and all too often he caught her glancing at him.
They ate cake and drank herb tea, and they chatted, but now everyone seemed to sense that the joy of their togetherness was ending, that the leave-taking couldn’t be put off much longer. Elder Thomas had been through this before in his first city, but he had never felt this loved. This was his family in Germany, the people he cared most about, and he knew that the chances were strong that he would never see them again. Even if the missionaries stayed, the most he could hope for was to see them briefly at a district conference.
“I was wondering,” Elder Thomas said, “whether you have a picture of your family that I could take with me.”
“Well, now,” Sister Stoltz said, “you have guessed my little secret. I told you I had something for you. It’s only an amateur photograph, nothing very nice, but I had it framed, and I think it’s a nice likeness.” She handed him a little package.
“Thank you,” Elder Thomas said, and he pulled the wrapping loose. He looked at the picture, and it was a good likeness—especially of Anna. But the problem was, the faces were beginning to swim as Elder Thomas’s eyes filled with tears. He looked around and thanked everyone.
A long silence followed. Elder Thomas got out a handkerchief and wiped his eyes. And when he looked up again, he could see that everyone else was also fighting tears, even Brother Stoltz. And poor Peter had begun to sob. “Can’t you stay?” he said. “Why do they make you go?”
“Elder Sawyer will be here.”
“I know. But why can’t you both stay?”
But no one answered the question. Elder Thomas glanced at Anna and saw the tears on her cheeks.
Sister Stoltz finally said, “Excuse us, Bruder Thomas. We don’t mean to make things more difficult for you. But you are like a son to us now. We were in such a dark time before you came. But you—you and Bruder Mecham and Bruder Sawyer—brought the Lord into our home. And it’s what we needed.”
“The Lord will still be with you,” Elder Thomas said.
“But we want you,” Peter said, the sobs coming again.
Elder Thomas could hardly stand this anymore. He wished he could think of something lighter, happier, to say.
“Bruder Thomas,” Brother Stoltz finally said, “tell me honestly. Won’t you be leaving Germany soon?”
“I don’t know. We keep hoping this trouble will pass away—the way it did before—and we won’t have to leave. I was called to serve two-and-a-half years, and that’s what I want to do.”
“Things are different this time,” Brother Stoltz said. “Hitler says he wants Danzig returned to the Reich. But that’s not the real issue. He can swallow all of Poland, and he won’t be satisfied. Europe will be drawn into this—all the world, perhaps. Hitler will keep pushing until it happens.”
Elder Thomas had been hearing this kind of talk from others lately, but he didn’t want to believe it.
“If war begins,” Brother Stoltz said, “you could be in danger. Kellerman has not bothered you lately, but during a war, foreigners will be rounded up, I’m certain, and Kellerman will try to find you. Did you register today that you are leaving Frankfurt?”
“Yes.”
“By now, he must know. Certainly, he is having you traced. He will make contacts in Heidelberg, I can assure you.”
“I’ve thought of that, Brother Stoltz,” Elder Thomas said. “But I don’t know what to do. All of the missionaries could be in danger. Our mission president has us on alert. If we get a telegram, we are to leave immediately.”
“Where has he told you to go?”
“The Netherlands.”
“Yes. That is probably the best, the quickest way out. But you may not have time. Your president should get you out long before the war actually begins. If it were up to me, I would send you home right now.”
Elder Sawyer said, “The Lord will look after us—don’t worry about that.”
Brother Stoltz took a long look at him. “I don’t know about that,” he said. “Jews are being taken away—more all the time now. And all of them are praying. I don’t know what God is up to, if you want to know the truth. But he might have stopped Hitler long ago, if he had had a mind to, and he hasn’t. Look what happened to Bruder Goldfarb.”
“It could have been worse,” Elder Thomas said weakly.
“Yes. And in a better world, such a thing would never happen.”
Brother Goldfarb, according to President Meis, had been roughed up but not severely injured. Elder Thomas had not dared to visit him again, and he wondered whether his spirit hadn’t been broken, maybe his health besides.
“Be careful,” Sister Stoltz said. “Say, ‘Heil Hitler’ whether you like to or not. Don’t take any chances at all.”
“There’s something else you should know,” Bruder Stoltz said. “I hesitate to bring this up, but if something happens, you would perhaps always wonder, and so it might be better to say something now.” Elder Thomas felt a kind of stiffness come over all the Stoltzes. “As you know, Anna was forced to join Bund Deutscher Mädel.” Brother Stoltz hesitated. “Now, certain SS men would appear to be . . . pursuing her.”
“Pursuing her? What do you mean?”
Herr Stoltz’s jaw tightened. “These degraded animals—Himmler’s men—are being told to have all the babies they can. With their wives, or with unmarried girls. They search out Germanic-looking girls—blond, healthy young women—and they tell them it is their duty, their glory, to create babies for the Reich.”
Elder Thomas was too stunned to respond. Anna was looking down at her hands, which she had gripped together in her lap.
“Anna has protected herself so far. And I won’t let this happen to her. I’ll die first. But that means, one day, we may suddenly be gone—and I don’t know where we might go.”
“Would you try to get out of the country?”
“There’s little chance of that,” Brother Stoltz said. “But we would . . . well, let me be completely honest with you. We will not give in to them. And running may not be possible. I fear we could be taken away.”
Elder Thomas suddenly felt sick.
“My husband is making the picture too dark,” Sister Stoltz was quick to say. “These SS men don’t want anyone to know what they are doing. They usually don’t push the girls too hard when they resist. At least that’s what we have heard. Anna will be able to avoid them. I know it. God will look out for her, just as he did before. You made promises to her, in your blessing, and I believe in those promises.”
The silence returned. But after a short time, Sister
Stoltz said, “We can’t leave each other like this. Let’s sing together, and then let’s kneel and pray together. Everything is going to be all right. I feel certain of it.”
And so they sang hymns together. And then to everyone’s surprise, Brother Stoltz said the prayer himself. He asked for a blessing upon Elder Thomas, on Anna, and on all of them. He asked that somehow they could all survive Hitler’s evil, that the Church could survive. “Lord, I struggle to believe anything at all,” he said. “But please, let those who are good triumph over the evil men who want to rule our world.”
When the prayer ended, everyone stood. And they all knew that something very significant had happened. Brother Stoltz had never said the family prayer before, and he had often expressed his doubts about prayer. This was his honest effort to show faith, but it was also his gift to Elder Thomas—to show him that he was trying, that he was making progress.
Elder Thomas knew that, and he walked to Brother Stoltz. He embraced the man, and Brother Stoltz accepted the affection, even wrapped his arms around Elder Thomas. Then Sister Stoltz grabbed Elder Thomas and hugged him for quite some time, patting his back and saying, “Oh, my goodness. This is so heavy for us.”
Peter hugged Elder Thomas, too, and cried, and then Anna was next. But Elder Thomas knew he had to be careful. He held his hand out to her, and she clung to it for a couple of extra seconds and then whispered, “Auf Wiedersehen.” Tears were streaming down her face.
Elder Thomas nodded and tried to seem as business-like as he could. “Yes.” He tried to say good-bye, but his throat had tightened, and he didn’t dare speak. He walked to the door. People were saying things, offering good wishes, saying good-bye, but Elder Thomas couldn’t get a word out. He took a last look around, nodded to everyone, and caught one last glimpse of Anna. She was leaning against her father, who had taken her under his arm. And in that instant he knew: he was going to get back to her somehow, sometime.
He hurried down the stairs, ahead of his companion, and then on the way home, he rode his bike ahead. He fought back the tears by saying to himself, over and over, “I’ll see her again. Somehow, I’ll see her again.”
Chapter 11
Bobbi was sitting across from Phil, a white linen tablecloth between them. “You have to have dessert,” Phil was saying. “The rice pudding is the specialty here.”
Bobbi knew that. She had eaten at Lamb’s Cafe before. She even loved the rice pudding. But she didn’t want any tonight. “I just couldn’t,” she told him.
“I won’t take no for an answer.” He looked at the waitress, who was waiting with her notepad in one hand and a pencil in the other. “We’ll both have the rice pudding,” he said.
The waitress scratched the order on her pad, tucked the pencil behind her ear, and walked away. “I don’t want any pudding,” Bobbi said, allowing more of an edge to her voice than she had intended.
“I know. But taste it. And if you don’t want it all, I’ll finish it. I can never get enough of the stuff.”
Bobbi was relieved that he hadn’t picked up on the irritation in her voice, and at the same time, she was rather annoyed that he hadn’t noticed. Still, she let it go.
“Honey, we need to make a decision about our wedding date,” Phil said. “You keep saying we’ll talk about it, but we don’t. Both our mothers want us to tie down a date so they can start to plan.”
“I don’t see why that’s so important. They’ll have plenty of time.”
“It would just be good to have things settled.”
Lamb’s was packed, and something about discussing their wedding date in the middle of this crowd seemed ridiculous. Bobbi was sure the couple at the next table was listening to their conversation. Phil always spoke louder than he needed to.
“Here’s a suggestion—just something to think about,” he said. “What about a Christmas wedding? Maybe get married right after fall-term finals and then have the Christmas break to go somewhere. We could go to a ski lodge—with a fireplace in the room and a furry bear rug on the floor.” He smiled and winked.
“I don’t ski.”
“Hey, who cares about skiing?” Phil laughed, but he stopped rather quickly when Bobbi didn’t. “Look, it’s just a thought. What do you have in mind? We could sail to the Hawaiian Islands if you would like that better.”
“Let’s not talk about it here.”
“Fine. But just tell me when you will talk about it. We’ve been engaged for a month now, and everyone I talk to wants to know our marriage date. It gets embarrassing.”
Now it was Phil’s voice that had the edge. Bobbi knew she was making things difficult. “I don’t know, Phil. I’ve been so busy with term papers, I haven’t had time to think.”
“What’s wrong with talking about it tonight? Let’s just figure something out.”
“I already told you I don’t want to get married that soon. Christmas is much sooner than we talked about.” The man and wife at the next table glanced at Bobbi. She was embarrassed. Even Phil ducked his head.
The waitress, in her mustard-colored dress and white apron, arrived with the rice pudding. She made a little curtsy out of placing each bowl in front of them. “Thank you,” Phil told her, smiling confidently. “I love this stuff.”
“Everyone does,” the waitress said, obviously pleased with Phil’s warm smile. It struck Bobbi all over again how girls must envy her to be engaged to such a classy-looking man. He had on a double-breasted blue blazer with a regimental striped tie. He called it his “sports outfit,” since he usually wore suits.
Phil scooped a large spoonful of pudding into his mouth. “Ummm, that’s good,” he said. The waitress continued to bask in his attention until she realized she had no reason to stay. When she walked away, Phil told Bobbi, “Now give that rice a try.”
“I’ve eaten it before, Phil.”
“Hey, not with me. Has some other guy been bringing you down here?” He gave Bobbi a blast of that big smile, as though he knew how well it worked.
Bobbi didn’t answer, but she remembered coming here with her dad, sitting at the long counter, looking at herself in the mirrors, feeling grown up to be on a luncheon date with Daddy. She took a mouthful of the pudding and was reminded how much she did like it, especially how much she had liked it then. Still, she pushed the bowl across the table to Phil.
“That’s all you’re going to eat?”
“I told you, I’m full.”
“You eat like a bird.” He ate another spoonful and then added, “I guess I’d better not complain. I want you to stay as slim as you are now. I don’t want one of those girls who gets married and then puts on fifty pounds the first year.”
“I’ll try not to be an embarrassment to you.”
And this time the irritation was unmistakable. Bobbi saw the little shock of surprise in Phil’s eyes. “Hey, honey, I didn’t mean anything like that.”
“I know,” Bobbi said, and once again she wondered what was wrong with her. Why did she say things like that?
After Phil finished both puddings and paid the bill—and left a nice tip for the waitress—he and Bobbi walked up Main Street to the car. Phil opened the door for her, held it while she got in, and then strode around to his side.
“Phil, I’m sorry I was grumpy with you,” she said as he got in the car.
“Oh, no. Not at all. I have no business shoving food at you. It’s your own choice whether you want dessert or not.”
“You just wanted two bowls yourself,” she said, trying to sound friendlier.
“Hey, you got me—dead to rights. I’m a bona fide rice pudding maniac.”
She slid closer and tucked her arm through his. “Well, I know how to please you. Now, if only I knew how to cook. The only thing I’m trained to do is correct your grammar.”
He laughed, and then he twisted and checked the traffic. Bobbi was glad they were back to small talk. But then Phil said, “You know, Bobbi, you really might want to think about changing your major. Reading C
haucer and Milton may not help you much when it comes to raising a family.”
Bobbi was instantly angry. “Oh, you’re right about that. There’s no value at all in reading books. It fills a housewife’s head with a lot of useless ideas.”
Phil took the shot with a reflex hunch of the shoulders, and for a time he drove in silence. “I’m sorry, Bobbi,” he finally said. “I’m a practical guy. That’s just how I think. It’s actually good that you’re studying the great books. That’s something you can give the kids that I can’t.”
Phil was amazing. Every time Bobbi got close to giving up on him, he did something like that. He was a dear person, so quick to recognize his own mistakes. If only Bobbi could stop reacting and just love him. “It’s okay. I need to be more practical. I will be, I’m sure, when I have to worry about lumpy gravy and crying babies.”
“You’re going to be a wonderful wife, Bobbi. You’re going to keep me on my toes.”
“I hope I’ll be a good wife.”
“I’m going to keep you on your toes, too—because I’m going to be kissing you all the time.”
Bobbi didn’t respond for a time. And then she said, “Phil, do you mind if we go home early? I don’t feel that well tonight. Maybe that’s why I’m being so cranky with you.”
“Sure, honey. I was planning to stay up late studying tonight. It’s probably better if I get an early start. But one of these first nights we have to talk about our wedding date.”
“I know.”
Phil took Bobbi home, and she did stand on her toes to kiss him at her front door. Then Phil stepped in long enough to greet Sister Thomas, who was sitting in the living room, reading. As he closed the door, she said to Bobbi, “You’re home awfully early for a Friday night.”
“I know. I don’t feel too well.”
“Are you coming down with something?”
“I don’t think so. I’m just . . . tired, I guess.”
“Well, go to bed early then.”
“I will.” Bobbi walked to the stairs.
