by Dean Hughes
“No, Wally. I don’t want to do that.”
“Why?”
“We’re just friends.” She turned and began to walk up the hill. Wally didn’t follow. He said, softly, “I love you, Lorraine.”
She spun around. “Wally, what a stupid thing to say. Don’t ever say it again.” She turned again and hurried away.
Wally had said the words suddenly but not impulsively. He had thought to tell her every time he had been with her lately. He worked his way along the creek until he found his shoes, and then he sat down and put them on. When he finally caught up, Lorraine was leaning against the car, facing him. “I do love you,” he said. Lorraine opened the door and got in. But Wally caught the door before she could close it. “Isn’t it obvious?”
“I know that you feel something for me,” she said. “But it’s not love, Wally.”
“I want to marry you.”
She pulled at the door, and he let her close it. Then he walked to the other side and got in. “Wally,” she said, “please don’t do this.”
“Lorraine, listen. I’ve decided to go to the U this fall. I’ve changed my mind about the navy. I want to keep dating you—and then I want us to get married.”
“Wally, I’m not going to talk to you about this. I don’t think we’d better see each other anymore.” She rolled her window down. The car was warm inside. “Please, take me home now.”
Wally wondered why he had said anything. He had known how she would react. But he was tired of feeling this way about her and acting as though he didn’t. “Lorraine,” he said, “why do you say that? What’s wrong with my being in love with you?”
“I’ve told you from the first—we can only be friends. Let’s go.” She folded her arms and sat straight and rigid.
“No. Let’s talk. I think you have some feelings for me, too. Why can’t that develop into something?”
“I’m sorry, but you’re not the kind of person I want to marry.”
“There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m going to be successful. I’ll be a good husband. What else do you want?”
“Wally, you don’t know what you want out of life. You just float along with the current.”
“I just told you—I’m going to college. I’m signing up this week.”
“Oh, is that so? And what are you going to major in?”
“Business. I’ve thought all about it. I’m going to have my own business—of some kind. And I’ll do all the things you want me to do. I’ll make something of myself.”
“And what about the Church?”
“What about it?”
She turned and leaned closer to him. “Wally, you don’t care about the Church.”
“You don’t know that. I go to church every Sunday.”
“Wally, you don’t get it. I happen to believe in the Church. I want a husband who feels the same way.”
Wally tried to think what he could say to her. He didn’t want to claim anything that wasn’t true. “Lorraine,” he said, “I know I’ve been mixed up. But I know what I want now. I want you. I’ll work hard—the way I’ve done this summer. I’ll do good things with my life. I’ll be a good father. And I’ll be true to the Church. Don’t worry about that.”
“You can’t want those things because of me. You have to want them because they really matter to you.”
Wally didn’t know what else to say. He only knew that he woke up in the morning thinking about Lorraine. And this summer, working in the orchard all day, he thought about her virtually all the time. He hurried home each night and called her, hoping she would want to see him. He longed for moments when she showed even the slightest sign that she cared about him.
“Wally, I do like you. I have more fun with you than anyone. But that’s just the point. Fun is what you’re good at. And dancing. In all the time we’ve spent together, this is the first time you’ve said anything about your goals—or about the Church—and I had to bring those things up.”
“Then why haven’t you told me to get lost before now?”
Her voice had lost all its irritation when she said, “I like you more than I should. I wish I didn’t.”
“Will you keep going out with me?”
“Why, Wally?”
“Because we like each other. Let’s just leave it at that, if that’s all you feel for now.”
“Oh, Wally. It just won’t work.”
“Just keep seeing me. That’s all I ask. I won’t push you to think about the future.”
She didn’t say yes, but she also didn’t say no, and so Wally left it at that, and he drove her home. And as he drove to his own home after, he thought about praying, about promising to reform himself if he could just have her. But he hadn’t prayed for a long time now, and he thought God would consider him a phony if he tried.
Wally parked his car out front, and then he walked to the house. His parents were sitting on the porch.
“I’m glad to see you home at a reasonable hour,” Dad said. “Your sister got in a little while ago, too. It’s a miracle to have everyone home before we’re in bed.”
“What are you doing up so late?” Wally asked, just trying to say something before he walked on by.
Mom said, “It’s stifling in the house tonight. This porch is the only place we could get a breath of air.” Then she got a better look at him as he stepped under the porch light. “Wally, what did you do? You’re all covered with mud—or something.”
Wally didn’t want to tell the truth, but he didn’t have the energy—or the heart—to think up a story. “I slipped in a pond. Up at the golf course.”
“What in the world?” Dad said.
“We go in there after golf balls.” Wally stepped to the screen door and hoped he could get away. “It’ll wash out.”
“Wally,” Dad said, “I don’t think that’s an honest thing to do. Those balls don’t belong to you.”
Wally took a breath. He didn’t want to hear a lecture. “Okay,” he said, but he couldn’t resist saying, “It’s not that big of a thing, Dad.”
President Thomas stood up. “What isn’t, Wally? Honesty?”
Wally had no idea how to respond to that. He merely stood and looked at his dad.
But Dad backed off. “Look, Wally, I don’t mean to sound like an old fogy. It’s not grand larceny. But I just don’t think it’s right.”
Wally was surprised. He could tell that his dad had caught himself and was actually trying to sound less strict than usual.
But Wally couldn’t resist saying, “Alex used to do it. That’s where he and his friends always got their golf balls.”
“Well, that doesn’t make it right.”
“I know.” Wally thought of saying, “I just wanted you to know that Alex isn’t perfect either.” But it wasn’t worth it. Wally knew he wasn’t going to gain anything by bringing up that comparison.
When Wally reached his room, he was depressed by the heat—and by everything that had happened. He walked to the open window, where he could see the moon rising over the mountains. Behind him, he could hear Gene breathing, deeply and steadily. He thought of being married to Lorraine, of lying in bed with her at night, hearing her breathe. But it wasn’t going to happen.
“I get along without you very well. Of course I do,” he sang, and he thought again of holding her in his arms, out in the parking lot, and then of those few seconds when she had allowed him to kiss her. “Except perhaps in spring. But I should never think of spring. For that would surely break my heart in two.”
Chapter 15
Elder Thomas and his companion, Elder Taylor, decided they should go about their work normally and assume for the present that they would be able to complete their missions. But it wasn’t easy. It was late August now, the twenty-fifth, and Hitler’s troops were lined up on the border of Poland. All the people of Heidelberg seemed to be holding their breath, waiting to see whether Hitler would dare march into one more country.
The Nazis had been setting up this confronta
tion for months. The newspapers were full of accusations against the Poles, and Hitler was making his usual claim that the German minority in Poland was being mistreated. He was also demanding that Danzig, part of Germany before it had been taken away by the Treaty of Versailles, be returned. In addition, he wanted a corridor through Danzig and on to East Prussia, so he could build an autobahn and a railroad passage.
Most Germans seemed to agree with the Führer—if they said anything at all. But some of the members of the Church admitted their fears to the elders. In Czechoslovakia, Hitler had signed a treaty and then ignored it. But he wasn’t likely to get away with that again. France and England and the other democracies seemed ready to stand firm with Poland this time. And now, this week, Russia had signed a “non-aggression” pact with Germany. The lines were being drawn for a great European battle.
So tension—even dread—was in the air. Germany had been building its armaments at breakneck speed, in defiance of the treaty. Still, it hardly seemed possible that the military was strong enough to take on the great powers of the world. And no one wanted to think of another war like the last, when Germany had been devastated.
On that Friday morning, Elder Thomas and his lanky young companion, Wayne Taylor from Kanab, Utah, rode their bikes to Heidelberg’s Alt Stadt—the “old city.” But as they knocked on doors, they found people preoccupied and nervous. Some even asked, “Don’t you know what’s happening? You should leave the country while it’s still possible.”
Elder Thomas kept reassuring his companion that things had looked very bad the year before but that all the trouble had evaporated, and the missionaries had stayed. All the same, he knew that this was different, and not as likely to be resolved.
After lunch, the elders went back to their work, but tracting had only gotten more difficult. “Don’t bother us now,” people told them. “The Führer is on the radio.” The elders were about to give up and go back to their apartment when an elderly man told them, “Come. Listen. You should hear this.”
And so the elders walked into the apartment. Elder Thomas had once heard Hitler speak in person—in Frankfurt. The strange little man had raged, his black hair flopping over his eye as his head bobbed and his arm chopped. The Führer had shouted his allegations, his vows, and the people had cheered after every sentence. Just as the crest of the noise would pass, he would fire out the next blistering sentence, the words only half the import, the passion—the rhythm—having the greater impact. “Sieg! Heil! Sieg! Heil!” The crowd had chanted wildly at the end. “Hail victory!”
Elder Thomas heard the same pattern now, the voice a little muffled on the radio but still conveying that intensity, still strident with passion. Hitler was denouncing foreign powers who had robbed his country of its natural rights, and he described the atrocities committed upon German residents in Poland. However much Germans loved peace, however much they hated war, the Poles need not think that Germans would abandon their brothers and sisters.
“This is right,” the elderly man said. “We want no war. We’ll start no war. But we’ll do what is required. The Poles are attacking us across the border. It’s they who want a war.” His eyes focused on Elder Thomas, dared him to disagree.
But Elder Thomas only said, “Maybe we should come by another time,” and he and Elder Taylor left.
Outside the door, on the landing, Elder Thomas stopped and looked at his companion. “We’d better wait until this broadcast is over,” he said. “No one will talk to us right now.”
And so they got on their bikes and pedaled back to their apartment. And when they arrived, they found what Elder Thomas had been fearing for days: a telegram. Their landlady had apparently accepted it and then pushed it under their door.
Elder Thomas felt the breath go out of him. He didn’t have to open it; he knew what it would say. But he sat down on his bed, picked up a letter opener from his little night stand, and sliced the top of the envelope. “Leave for Holland immediately,” the telegram said. “Turn over all Church records to local leaders. Contact the mission office before you leave.”
The next few hours were maddening. The elders had to find branch members and turn over records, but more important, they had to give them encouragement to carry on. Heidelberg had a fairly strong branch, but the members depended on the missionaries, who had been like an extension cord, their power coming from the source, in Salt Lake City. It was frightening to pull that plug and know that for a time—possibly a long time—the members would have to manage on their own.
As it turned out, getting train tickets was more of a problem than Elder Thomas had expected. Trains were being taken over by troops as the army mobilized for the massive buildup on the Polish front. The train schedule was tentative, and according to railroad officials, unpredictable from this point on. Elder Thomas tried to purchase tickets to Holland, by any route available, but the man at the busy ticket booth could offer nothing definite, and he became impatient. Finally, he said, “I can sell you tickets for Frankfurt, leaving early in the morning. From there, you will have to see what you can do.”
Elder Thomas had known that he might pass through Frankfurt, the next big city to the North, and that would bring him tantalizingly close to the Stoltzes, but he saw no way he could take time to visit them.
That evening the elders took much of what they owned to members: bicycles, books, household items. And they packed their trunks late that night. After, they lay on their coverless mattresses and tried to sleep in the oppressive, humid heat. Neither slept much at all, and they were up before sunrise. They walked to the Bahnhof, hired a taxicab, and drove back to their apartment for their trunks. They had little concern for
the expense at this point since they knew they were only allowed to take ten deutsche marks with them when they left the country.
The train, even though it was departing at 5:35 a.m., was extremely crowded. For a time the elders thought they would have to leave everything behind. They paid a porter something extra, however, and got the trunks on, but then had to stand up in a crowded, already hot passenger car.
The train ride should have lasted a couple of hours, but it took four, with a long delay in Mannheim, where more soldiers got on. The elders wondered whether they might be forced off, but they pushed themselves into a corner and tried to remain inconspicuous.
Elder Thomas listened to the soldiers talk about the war. They spoke of their certain victory—if the Poles refused to negotiate. But Elder Thomas watched one young man, maybe nineteen, who was standing opposite him. The chugging of the locomotive, the rattling of the tracks, along with all the talk, made the noise intense in the car. And somewhere in all that confusion, the young man seemed lost in thought, staring ahead, perhaps feeling homesick already and wondering what it would be like to fire a weapon at someone—or be fired upon. It was a memory that would stick in Elder Thomas’s head long after. And when he heard people talk of the well-trained, fierce German fighters, he would picture that boy with the thin face, staring at nothing, like a homesick kid going off to summer camp for the first time.
At the Frankfurt train station, the elders were able to get their trunks off the train, but it was clear to them now that this wasn’t going to work. They needed to leave much of what they were taking and pack what they could in suitcases that they could carry more easily. Suddenly Elder Thomas realized that he had an excuse. “The Stoltzes are not too far from here. They can help us,” Elder Thomas said. “I want to talk to them anyway. I want to see whether Brother Stoltz isn’t ready to be baptized.”
The elders carried their trunks outside, but they found a taxi hard to procure. Finally, they spotted one arriving and ran to the driver before he had opened the door to let his fare out. They offered him money, lots of it, and then they ran back for their trunks. They piled the baggage in the back of the car and then offered the driver another bonus if he would get them out of the confusion and to the Stoltz’s place quickly.
The driver took them almost too
seriously, driving rather recklessly, but he made it. And then, once at the Stoltz’s apartment, Elder Taylor stayed downstairs with the trunks while Elder Thomas ran up to the apartment.
Elder Thomas was hoping that everyone would be home on a Saturday morning. But Sister Stoltz was the one who appeared at the door. She took a moment to accept the shock and then grabbed Elder Thomas and hugged him. “Oh, my,” she said when she finally calmed down, “the others are not here. They will want to see you.”
“What time do they come home?”
“Early on Saturdays. Anna comes home from work at noon. Heinrich and Peter get home from school a little later. But you must stay until they come. Absolutely.”
Elder Thomas looked at his watch. It was after eleven. He didn’t know how long it would take him to buy suitcases, repack, and purchase train tickets. What he did know was
that he was going to see the others before he left. He had to talk to Brother Stoltz. It was his last missionary effort, and he couldn’t leave until he had carried it out.
And so the elders carried their trunks upstairs, and they walked to a leather-goods store, where they bought good suitcases. Then they walked to the post office, where they called President Wood.
“We’re in Frankfurt. We couldn’t get tickets to Holland,” he told the president. “Can anyone help us?”
“Not really. Are you at the train station now?”
“No. But we’re close.”
“Go there. Buy tickets for Amsterdam, but you’ll need tickets on to London by ship. We just got a call from the border. If you can’t prove you’re continuing on through, the Dutch border guards won’t let you in. Do you have enough money to do that?”
“I think so. We can’t take any with us, can we?”
