My Brother's Secret (19 page)

I hurried to the window and tugged back the curtain, letting the moonlight flood into the room. I pressed my nose to the glass, and saw Stefan’s silhouette standing by the front door. He paused there for a few moments, then turned right and headed past the alley that ran along the side of the house, and continued down Escherstrasse.

Quick
. I told myself as I let the curtain fall back into place.
I have to be quick
.

Still fastening my buttons, I crossed to the door and let myself into the hallway. Creeping downstairs, I kept my feet to the very edges of the steps, trying to avoid any that might creak. Once at the bottom, I jammed my feet into my boots and tightened the laces as quickly as I could. I grabbed my jacket and snatched the key from the bowl, sticking it in my pocket alongside my new penknife.

Then I opened the door and slipped into the night.

For a second I felt like a freed animal. I was both thrilled and afraid. I shouldn’t be out in the night. Stefan would be so angry if he knew I was out, and if the police caught me, they might think I was some kind of spy – or up to no good, at the very least. And if the air raid sirens started up their screaming and the enemy came and the planes dropped their deadly bombs, what then? I would be killed for sure.

Adrenaline raced through my veins, both hot and cold, and I hardened my resolve. There was no going back now.

I walked quickly to the end of Escherstrasse and passed Herr Finkel’s boarded-up shop without seeing any sign of Stefan. When I turned the corner, though, there was a group of figures further along the street, close to the wall. I stopped and drew back around the corner, leaning out just enough to watch them.

They made no sound at all, but stood huddled together like ghosts waiting for someone to scare.

So I waited, too.

The night was cooler than I had expected, and I shivered as a gentle breeze nestled around me. The moon was not much more than a fingernail, but the sky was clear of any clouds so it gave enough light to illuminate the streets with a silvery grey shimmer. There were white lines painted around the base of the lamp posts and along the centre of the road. There were some on the pavements, too, to help people find their way during the blackout, and they seemed to glow in the moonlight.

Still the figures didn’t move, and I began to wonder if it was even Stefan at all. Perhaps he had taken a different
route. Maybe this was someone else. Maybe this was—

Footsteps.

On the pavement behind me.

Someone was coming.

RUN!

T
he shape was heading towards me along Escherstrasse. Whoever it was, they were alone and trying to walk quietly, but the night was so silent I would have heard a mouse on the pavement.

Wearing my dark jacket and pressed hard against the bricks, I was almost invisible from this distance, but the figure was coming closer and closer, and soon they would be almost beside me. Whoever it was, they were sure to see me in just a few seconds.

It might be a soldier or a policeman who would drag me home by my ear. Or it might be Kriminalinspektor Wolff.

Just thinking his name was like an electric shock
running through me and I started moving right away.

Keeping close to the wall, I slipped around the corner and edged along the street towards Herr Ackerman’s butcher shop. His doorway was set half a metre or so into the wall, forming a small porch that was shrouded in darkness, providing the perfect hiding place.

The figures remained huddled ahead as I crept along the street, then turned, peeling myself away from the wall and slipping into the shadow. I crammed myself into the near corner of the entrance to Herr Ackerman’s shop and crouched low.

Then the footsteps came around the corner and someone was right there, close enough for me to reach out and touch them. What surprised me, though, was that it wasn’t a pair of trousers I was looking at, but a skirt. And a pair of girl’s legs.

I looked up and watched her walk past quickly and quietly. On her back, she carried what could have been a satchel, and it jostled up and down making a swish and bump with each step.

I knew who it was. I couldn’t see her face very well, but the moonlight reflected off her golden hair that had been left loose, and I just
knew
that it was Jana – Stefan’s girlfriend.

I remained crouched in the doorway, wary that she might not be alone, but leaned out just enough to watch her join the others.

When Jana reached the group, she went straight to one of them and the two shapes joined for a few seconds, as if they were just one person, and I knew it was Stefan. When
they broke apart, muffled laughter carried towards me on the breeze, followed by the rhythm of tense but excited speech as they spoke in voices that grew louder until one of them hushed the others.

Jana took the satchel from her back and handed something around, then there was more talking and the group divided. Three of them began walking back in my direction, but Stefan was not in this group and I wanted to know where he was going, so I kept my head peeping out until the last minute, and saw him go further into town with Jana. Another pair crossed the road and disappeared in the other direction.

I ducked back into the doorway and stayed low while the three passed me, then waited until they had rounded the corner before I set off in pursuit of my brother.

Once I caught up with Stefan and Jana, I trailed them at a safe distance.

They kept in the shadows close to the houses and shops as they moved through the streets, so I did the same as I followed them onto Klosterstrasse in the wealthy part of town. Here, the houses were set back from the pavement, and had front gardens behind railings and gates. The road was wide and lined with thick-trunked sycamores and horse chestnuts that were in full leaf and blocked much of the moonlight, making it easier for me to follow.

Creeping after them, scuttling from car to car and tree to tree, I watched as Stefan and Jana let themselves through the gate of the first house. They approached the
front door, stopped for a moment, then moved away and did the same at the next house.

I edged as near as I dared, trying to see what they were up to.

They seemed to be taking things out of Jana’s shoulder bag and putting them through people’s letterboxes.

As they were coming away from one of the houses, though, just leaving the path and passing through the gate, the faint whisper of footsteps sounded on the pavement behind me.

I turned to see three silhouettes several metres away. For a moment I wondered if they were some of the other Apaches, but as they drew closer, it became clear they were not. These silhouetted figures were wearing caps and I knew, right away, they were Hitler Youth, perhaps coming back from a meeting.

The three figures didn’t see me, but they saw Stefan and Jana, and they stopped dead.

‘Look,’ one of them whispered. ‘Who’s that?’

‘Shh,’ said another.

Suddenly I was very afraid for my brother. Whatever he was doing, it had to be illegal – otherwise he wouldn’t have come out in the dead of night – and he was about to be caught. I wanted to call out to him, to warn him the Hitler Youth was there. I wanted to shout at him and tell him to run, but I was too afraid to make a sound.

I crouched low and watched as the three figures moved off the pavement into the shadows cast by the trees.

They were like lions stalking their prey.

Over by one of the houses, Stefan and Jana had stopped
and come together as if embracing. They had no idea they were being watched.

When I looked back to see the other boys, their shadows were closer.

‘What are they doing?’ one of them whispered. His voice was like the breeze in the branches as they moved to the shadow of the next tree.

‘Keep watching,’ said another. ‘Get closer. We’ll surprise them.’

‘And then what?’

‘Arrest them.’

‘Give them a kicking.’

My mouth was dry. My hands were cold. This felt very different from the night exercise with the
Deutsches Jungvolk –
this wasn’t fun, it was
dangerous
. My whole body felt heavy with fear as I edged onto the road and lay down along the kerb, almost wedged beneath a car. There was nowhere else to go. Nowhere else to hide.

With wide eyes, I looked from the silhouettes of the Hitler Youth, creeping ever closer, to those of Stefan and Jana standing together at the gate.

Why don’t you move?
The thought screamed in my head.
Move! Run!

There was only one tree between us now. I could hear the boys breathing, the sound of their boots on the grass, the swish of their clothing, the creak of a leather belt.

Then something snapped inside me; something that made me break through the fear that threatened to paralyse me.

I crawled away from the car, jumped to my feet, and shouted at the top of my voice.

‘RUN!’

CHASE

A
t first, it was as if I hadn’t shouted it at all.

No one reacted.

The boys who were sneaking up on us stayed hidden. Stefan and Jana remained where they were. Everything was frozen for a fraction of a second.

‘RUN!’ I shouted again. ‘RUN!’

And the world came to life.

‘Get them!’ said one of the boys behind me and I took off like a rabbit breaking for cover from the farmer’s gun.

I leaped out of the shadows, into a shaft of moonlight that fell between the trees, and sprinted towards Stefan and Jana.

When they saw me coming right at them, closely
followed by the group of three boys, they turned and ran.

Now the world was full of the sound of boots pounding the pavement. My own breathing was loud as I pumped my arms and legs as hard as they would go. In front of me, Stefan and Jana ran side by side, the shoulder bag bouncing about on Jana’s back.

I could feel the hot breath of our pursuers on the nape of my neck. I imagined their fingers snatching at my clothes, trying to grab me and yank me back into the darkness. It was as if I were being chased by hellhounds, and I ran, ran, ran as fast as I could go.

We reached the end of Klosterstrasse and turned left, dashing along the pavement.

My chest was tight now, my breathing coming harder and harder. My legs starting to tire. My heart was filled with a thousand needles, as if it would explode inside me.

Behind, the Hitler Youth boys grew closer.

They were bigger and stronger and faster than me. They would catch me. Stefan could outrun them, maybe Jana too, but I had no hope of getting away from them.

I was slowing down. Falling back.

They’re going to catch me
.

It was only a matter of time. A few seconds and I would be theirs.

As if he could sense me tiring, Stefan looked back. He slowed to come alongside me. ‘Keep going,’ he said between breaths. ‘Be strong.’

I couldn’t run much longer.

They’re going to catch me
.

Jana had other ideas about being caught, though.
Running just ahead of us, she slipped the bag from her shoulder and slowed down so we were running in a line. Once we were together, she half turned as she ran, holding the bag by its strap and throwing it at the boys, aiming low.

The bag hit its mark, falling at the feet of the first boy, the strap tangling about his ankles.

He went down like a felled tree, shouting in pain as he hit the pavement. The second boy tripped over him, sailing through the night and landing with a sickening crunch when he smashed into the concrete. He rolled as he cried out in pain, and the third boy came to a halt to check on them.

‘Get after them,’ the first boy shouted. ‘Don’t let them get away.’

But Jana had already bought us some time, and when I saw the entrance to the cemetery looming ahead, I knew we had a chance.

‘Hide,’ Stefan said as soon as we passed through the gates in the tall iron railings that surrounded the whole place.

I could hardly breathe now; my chest was hurting so much. I had never run so far and so fast in my life.