All God's Children (9 page)

Still he had accepted Franz’s invitation to join in listening to the poetry reading in progress and to stay for the discussion that followed. Beth acted as hostess in the absence of her aunt, who Josef later learned stayed in their bedroom whenever her husband insisted on hosting such a gathering.

Once the reading ended, the discussion deteriorated into stilted small talk. Josef was well aware that it was his presence in the room that had caused everyone to censor themselves. Beth was perched on the arm of her uncle’s chair, sipping her tea.

“I have a concern,” she said, as if the discussion of the poet’s work had continued at the lively pace that Josef suspected was normal for the gathering. During the weeks he’d spent living in the house, Josef had learned that this was the Quaker way of introducing a troubling topic.

The professor cleared his throat, perhaps intending to warn her, but she continued speaking. The other guests gave her their full attention, expecting no doubt some commentary on the work of the poet.

“Is not the poet saying that all are created equal?”

Around the room guests offered nods and murmurs of agreement in response to her interpretation of the poet’s words.

“Yet,” she continued, “there are entire groups of people that are being singled out for harassment and open persecution—not just here in Germany but around the world.”

“Even in almighty America?” another member of the group challenged, glancing at Josef as if to make it clear that he did not agree with Beth.

“Yes. Even there. My own family has written to me of the snubs of neighbors and the suspicions of local authorities simply because my mother is of German birth. And that bit of news was allowed to escape the black marking pen of the censor.”

“Is that why you have not returned to America?” the young man asked.

“Why would she?” The speaker was a woman who was looking not at the young man but directly at Josef. “Things are surely so much better here.”

A few people laughed, while others looked away. Franz struggled to find words to defuse the potentially volatile thread of conversation. “My niece has a point. The role of government is to serve all its peoples equally. Especially in those nations founded on the Judeo-Christian principles—”

“In any civilized society,” Josef interrupted as he crossed the room to stand next to the professor’s chair with the intention of showing his support for Beth and the professor. Beth had glanced up at him, and her smile was so tentative and uncertain that it had taken his breath away. The truth was that he was wracking his brain to come up with some way he might change the direction of the conversation. Regardless of the connections among those gathered, no one could be certain of another person’s loyalties. The challenging student might well be working for the government to ferret out those who would dare dispute the Reich’s absolute power.

“I wonder if I might share a poem a friend of mine has written. It’s titled ‘On a River Bank’,” Josef continued. “Although my friend’s work has not been published, I believe that it has some similarities to the work read earlier.” To his relief, most of those in attendance nodded and sat back to listen to his recitation.

It was later that same evening that Josef had come down from his room in the attic to retrieve a book he’d left behind. The others had all left, but Beth was curled into the depth of one chair while Franz sat slumped in the other, his legs outstretched toward the fire.

“But child, you go too far,” the professor was saying. “How can you not appreciate that as someone with no proper identification papers— as an American…”

“I know. I am so sorry, Uncle,” she said softly. “Sometimes I don’t know what gets into me. It’s as if—”

She had looked up then and seen Josef standing in the doorway.

“I left my book,” Josef had said, indicating a table just inside the room even as the incriminating phrase—
someone with no proper identification papers
—echoed in his brain. She had no papers? She was an American living in the midst of her country’s enemy. She was in grave danger for that reason alone, and without the proper documents…

“Come in, Josef,” Franz said, his voice weary and defeated. “How much did you hear?”

Josef pulled a third chair up to the fireplace. “Enough,” he admitted.

“Can you help?” Franz asked.

Josef looked at Beth. “I will try,” he promised her.

“Danke,” Franz said as he turned his attention back to the fire.

Beth stood then. “You must not involve yourself in trouble that I alone am responsible for creating.”

He had shrugged. “People lose papers from time to time— sometimes they are stolen, and other times simply misplaced.”

He saw her exchange a look with her uncle and understood that he had not yet heard the true story. Once Beth had said her goodnights and left the room, Josef had turned to Franz. “If I am to help her, I have to know the whole story.”

Franz had indicated that Josef should take the chair that Beth had vacated. The two men had talked long into the night, and by the time Josef returned to his room, dawn was breaking.

Later he lay on the single bed and stared at the rafters of the attic’s ceiling. He was attracted to Beth Bridgewater in a way that might have been possible for them under other circumstances. But a German officer and an American who was stranded in Munich? That was inviting problems for each of them.

After that it was Josef who had avoided her. He would stay late in the research laboratory or beg off joining the others when he arrived home. The truth was that he was so smitten with the woman that he could not bear to be in the same room with her without blurting out his true feelings. But in the days and weeks that had passed since that evening, he had not forgotten his promise to the professor, and to that end he had finally gone to the extraordinary lengths of asking his father for help.

Of course he had not told his father the real story but instead had simply spoken of the papers being misplaced. But his father had seen through his efforts at nonchalance. “This young woman must be someone quite special if she has driven you to come to me,” he had said. “I would like to meet her.”

“Perhaps one day that could be arranged.”

“It will be arranged,” his father replied, “or there will be no replacement of the woman’s documents.”

The conversation was so very typical of the conversations Josef had shared with his father from the time he was a young boy. His father always established the ground rules.

And so tonight he had a surprise for her, a gift—the precious papers would be delivered to the apartment within the hour. He was excited to be able to bring her such good news, but he did so with some regret. He admired her courage a great deal, but the truth was that his feelings for her had moved well beyond simple respect. Any woman who could inspire him to ask his father for a favor was a woman to be reckoned with.

An inch or more of snow had covered the streets and sidewalks by the time Beth led Anja and the children to the rear entrance of the apartment building. She checked carefully to be sure no other tenants were around, then set the boy down as she used her key to open the door. But instead of following Beth into the dark hallway, Anja shifted the smaller child in her arms to remove the shawl.

“Thank you,” she said in perfect English as she handed Beth the garment.

Beth smiled. As good as her German was, there was something in her accent that immediately identified her as a foreigner. “There’s no one home,” Beth assured her, leaving the door ajar as she stepped back into the small courtyard and whispered, “Come upstairs with me. We can dry your clothes and give the children something to eat and—”

“No. You have done enough. Thank you.”

“Where will you go?”

“I…” Anja’s voice broke. “We will be fine.”

Beth glanced toward the rows of windows above her. With the requirement for blackout curtains to be secured before any lamps were lit, it was difficult to know if their neighbors were at home. To reach her uncle’s apartment would require leading Anja and the children through the building and up past two other apartments on the second and third floors to the apartment on the fourth—the apartment with the extra attic room. She leaned her head back to look all the way up to the small attic window. Of course there was no way of knowing if Josef had come back.

“At least step into the hallway here out of the snow,” she urged. “No one will come this way at this hour of the night. You can wait here while I get you some bread—a little cheese.” Beth wrapped her arm around Anja’s thin shoulders and guided her inside. The woman was shivering, whether from the weather or fear or sheer exhaustion, Beth could not say. Probably all three.

Once they were all safely inside, Beth secured the door and checked to be sure the blackout curtain was properly in place. Then she switched on the light—a single wall sconce that did a better job of casting shadows than lighting the way.

The boy sneezed.

“Oh, Frau Steinberg, we really must get him and the baby some dry clothes. If you’ll come upstairs with me—just for a little while, we can at least hang their coats by the kitchen stove and…” Beth told herself that what she was offering was simply a part of what God had already led her to do in rescuing this woman and the children.

To her relief, Anja nodded, but it was not a gesture of acceptance. Rather it was an act of surrender. The woman looked utterly defeated.

“Good,” Beth said with forced cheerfulness.

The trip from the back entrance to her uncle’s fourth-floor apartment was blessedly uneventful. The younger child was asleep in her mother’s arms, and the boy followed Beth’s whispered instructions to be “as quiet as a mouse” with a sigh of resignation that told her this was not the first time he’d had to play this adult version of the game of hide-and-seek.

Once they were inside the apartment, Beth led the way to the kitchen. “You get those wet outer clothes off them and your own coat as well. I’ll start some water to warm. We can mix powdered milk for the children and some tea for you and me.”

Within minutes the air was permeated with the scent of damp wool. Beth placed half a loaf of bread and a carving knife on the table, then grated cheese and stirred up the last of the powdered eggs. “I have an extra coat you can have,” she said, thinking aloud. “Forgive me for saying so, but you are fair enough to pass for Aryan. Perhaps if we—”

“I am Aryan,” Anja replied as she carved a paper-thin slice of the loaf of bread and handed it to her son.

“Then why…?” Beth could not stop herself from glancing toward the yellow star sewn to Anja’s coat.

“My husband is Jewish. I was raised in the faith of the Freunde.”

“Me too,” Beth said. “American. Society of Friends.” The teakettle whistled, and Beth reached for it after pouring the egg mixture into the hot skillet. “Wait a minute. Your husband and the children would be protected by your status as Aryan.”

Anja gave Beth a wry smile. “That protection was removed when I stood with my husband in a protest against the government.”

“Where is your husband now?” Beth asked and noticed the boy’s eyes fix on his mother’s face with interest.

“This afternoon he was taken for questioning.”

“But not you?”

“I was returning home with the children when we saw the—saw him leave.” Her eyes begged Beth not to ask more.

“Here we are,” Beth said with a heartiness she didn’t feel as she placed a plate of eggs and a mug of thin, watery milk in front of the boy. “And because you have been so very brave and good, I have a special treat for you.”

As Beth had intended, the boy’s focus immediately turned from the fate of his father to her. She went to the cupboard and brought back a single small square of chocolate. The boy’s eyes sparkled with excitement as he glanced at his mother, and she nodded her approval.

“Thank you,” he whispered in German.

“I am Elizabeth, but friends call me Beth.” She extended her hand to the boy.

“I am Daniel. My friends are all moved away.” He placed the piece of chocolate on a side of his plate as if it were the most precious of possessions and slowly ate his eggs, savoring each bite.

Beth prepared a second plate and set it before Anja. “The baby’s name is?”

“Rachel. She’s eleven months, but small,” Anja said as she held a cup of the warm milk to her daughter’s lips.

The child was more than small. Beth would have thought her to be perhaps six months old. “Stay here while I get the coat,” Beth said and hurried down the hall to the bedrooms. She was well aware of the risk she was taking and just hoped that this would not be a night when Josef decided to stop by for the book she’d found for him while cleaning her uncle’s study.

In the bedroom she shared with Liesl, Beth pulled the coat from the back of the wardrobe. Then she took a spare shawl and pair of mittens down from the shelf. She caught a glimpse of the sleeve of a coat that her cousin had outgrown and pulled it from its hook. Inside the pockets was a pair of mittens. Both would do for Daniel.

As she approached the slightly open door of the kitchen, she could hear Anja crooning softly to the baby. Beth wondered at the woman’s courage. Her husband was gone—more often than not being taken for questioning was no more than a euphemism for
under arrest
. And Anja’s home was no longer safe. She was alone on the streets of Munich with two small children. How would she manage?