Nightfall Over Shanghai (3 page)

Hannah was eager to tell Herschel Zunder all about the baby, but she could barely squeeze a word in edgewise. “They are all such appeasers,” the boy cried.

“Who are?” Hannah asked.

“The ones who call themselves Zionist but aren't willing to rock the boat. They would wait forever for a Jewish homeland rather than offend the British or any other goys who oppose us in Palestine.”

Hannah realized that Herschel was parroting the words of Rabbi Hiltmann, one of the most outspoken Zionists in Shanghai, but she held her tongue.

“Both sides of the Jordan River, like in the days of King David,” Herschel railed on. “Every last acre of Eretz Yisrael, just as the Torah promises. It's the only way forward. Nowhere else will we be able to live in peace. The Nazis have proven it. The Japanese too.” He waved a finger at the crowded street, where clusters of Jewish refugees milled among the native Chinese on Tong Shan Road.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary to Hannah, who had lived in Shanghai for more than five years. Her memories of Vienna had
begun to blur and what she did remember—that visceral sense of alienation and terror of living under the heel of the Nazis—she wished she could forget. The Tong Shan street market, even in its current rundown state, was as good a reflection of the refugee life as any Hannah could imagine. The storefronts, once all Chinese, had been reclaimed by refugees and turned into doctors' offices, a delicatessen, a pharmacy, a café and even the headquarters of a Yiddish newspaper. German Jews, many dressed in the same suits they had arrived in Shanghai wearing (and continued to wear regardless of the temperature or season), stood huddled in conversation or bartering with Chinese merchants, who hawked everything from rice and produce to street dentistry. Gaunt rickshaw drivers stood hunched over their empty carts, dejectedly soliciting anyone who passed, with dim hope of ever landing a fare.

Japanese soldiers in khakis and puttees, their distinctive lowerleg coverings, marched self-importantly through the streets. Hannah spotted one soldier at the end of the block berating a Chinese merchant for some perceived infraction. The infantryman shoved the merchant, who fell backwards into his cart, knocking it over and scattering heads of lettuce, or possibly cabbage, along the road. Hannah turned away with hardly a second thought. She had witnessed so much worse.

And yet, as familiar as the scene was, Hannah noticed subtle differences too. Despite the open businesses with their welcoming signs, few refugees were prospering. She could see men now wearing rags tied around their feet, their shoes destroyed from years of pounding the same broken pavement. Most people's suits and dresses looked a size or two too large for them, despite having likely been already taken in, as her father's suit had been. The Chinese had fared no better, particularly not the children, many of
whom appeared emaciated. Hunger was a constant in the ghetto. Hannah knew that her family was among the luckier ones—Esther somehow managed to ensure that there was something on the table almost every dinner, if only a bowl of wet rice—but she couldn't remember what it felt like to fall asleep with a full belly.

Herschel was carrying on about the kibbutzim and the need to cultivate land in Palestine, but Hannah tuned him out. She had heard this speech too many times already. She sighed heavily. “You sound like a scratched phonograph record. You've convinced me, Herschel. We need a homeland. I agree. But can't we talk about something else?”

Herschel grimaced as though she had suggested they stop breathing for a while. “It's so very important, Hannah. We need to convince the others. We need solidarity.”

“Solidarity, yes.” She nodded distractedly. “Do you remember my friend Feng Wei? That girl from my neighbourhood?”

“Yes, I do,” Herschel said warily. He crossed him arms and then uncrossed them, tucking his hands into his pockets, seeming uncertain of what to do with them.

Hannah suppressed a grin. At fifteen, Herschel Zunder was as gangly as a baby giraffe and as graceless, not at all accustomed to his long limbs. Paradoxically, Herschel was also an old soul, as serious as a middle-aged rabbi with a solemn narrow face and a long forehead that was almost always creased in a frown. And when he wasn't inveighing against the obstacles to Zionism, he could be remarkably shy and awkward.

Herschel squinted at her. “Why did you ask me about Feng Wei?”

“She had a baby.”

His mouth fell open. “A … a baby? But how?”

Hannah looked around to ensure nobody was in earshot before
speaking in a low tone. “No one knew. Feng Wei hadn't told anyone, not even her own family. She hid her stomach under baggy clothes. I don't know what she would have done if I hadn't found her crouched in the alley.”

Herschel gawked at her. “But that girl is no older than you or me, surely?”

Feeling sudden misgivings, Hannah grabbed his wrist. “You can't tell a soul,” she implored. “Feng Wei didn't keep the baby. No one in her family knows. Promise me, Herschel.”

Nodding, he looked down to her fingers wrapped around his wrist. She realized it was probably the first time she had ever touched him, but she liked the feeling of his slender arm in her hand, so she kept her fingers where they were. He reddened slightly before looking back up at her with a timid smile. “What will become of the baby?”

“My stepmother, Sunny, is looking after him right now. She says they will find him a suitable home but—” Hannah took another quick glance around her. “I think she wants to keep him.”

Herschel nodded understandingly. “I have a little brother. They can drive you crazy.”

Hannah hadn't even considered it. She would actually have a baby brother, or half-brother, at least. It seemed surreal. Her own mother had died from an infection only days after her birth. For her first eight years of life, Hannah had lived alone with her father. As a younger child, she used to pretend that her beloved rag doll, Schweizer Fräulein, was her little sister. As foreign as the idea of a brother now seemed, it also excited her.

Herschel cleared his throat. “Are you hungry, Hannah?”

Hannah squeezed his wrist a little tighter and laughed. “Who isn't, around here?”

“Yes, of course. I mean …” Herschel blushed deeper. He dug his free hand into his pocket and opened his palm to show her two coins, both Japanese military yens. “A few of us have worked the last two weeks for Rabbi Hiltmann, cleaning the synagogue. Painting a little too.”

“You should save your money, Herschel. Your family must need it.”

“Zeyde took the other three coins,” he said, referring to his grandfather.

Hannah liked Herschel's paternal grandparents. She knew he and his brother had accompanied them to Shanghai on one of the last ocean liners to leave Italy for the Orient in the summer of 1939. His parents had been scheduled to follow within a month, but the outbreak of war in Europe had blocked their departure, leaving them stranded in Berlin. Herschel never spoke of his parents, and Sunny had only learned their fate from a classmate who had known the family in Berlin.

“Zeyde told me I could keep these. He said I earned them.” Herschel pointed to a bamboo stall where an old woman stood cooking at a stove. Hannah had loitered near the same stand before just to inhale the delectable aroma. “I think I would really enjoy some of those dumplings.”

Hannah's mouth watered at the prospect. “They're not kosher, Herschel.” Her father had never kept their home kosher, but she wasn't sure if the same was true for Herschel. “They're probably made with pork.”

Herschel gently laid his other hand on the top of hers. “I won't tell, if you won't.”

She laughed. And, for the first time since Freddy Herzberg, someone set butterflies loose inside her chest.

Ernst Muhler nonchalantly waved his yellow-stained fingers around the room, a lazy tail of smoke following behind. “Personally, I would have opted for a cheerful throw rug.” He shrugged. “But no doubt a baby will brighten up the room too.”

Sunny bit back a smile; the cheekiness was typical of her flamboyant friend. “This is only temporary, Ernst. Until we can find a safe home for him.”

His eyes twinkled. “Ah, temporary, naturally. What was I thinking?” He pointed to the couch where, only hours earlier, Feng Wei had given birth to the baby. Esther now held the infant to her breast, discreetly tucked under a blanket, while Jakob sprawled out next to her fast asleep, his head in her lap. “That sight could melt a statue's heart, couldn't it?” Ernst said.

Sunny felt her own heart melting. She felt a glimmer of something else too—a sense of inadequacy. She knew it was irrational, but she couldn't help herself. She wished she could provide for the child, instead of watching helplessly while another woman nursed him.

Esther viewed Ernst plaintively. “Ernst, my Simon …”

“A thousand apologies, Essie. Sometimes, I forget that my sole
purpose here is as your mailman,” he said in an amused tone as he dug his free hand into his pocket and extracted a crumpled envelope. “Another letter from your beloved.”

“Oh.” Esther brought a finger to her lips. Her husband, Simon Lehrer, was an American Jew who had been swept up in the Japanese wave of internments of Allied citizens. He had been a prisoner in one of the camps before escaping to be nearer to his family, and now lived in hiding with Ernst on the other side of the city.

It had been more than a year since Simon had gone underground, but he was still considered a saviour among the refugees. He had arrived in Shanghai in 1937, allegedly to avoid the obligation of running his family's furniture business in New York, but he had quickly fallen into a far more responsible role, running the city's major charitable organization, the Committee for Assistance of European Refugees. With a compassion that was matched only by his energy level, Simon had spearheaded the building of the refugee hospital while helping to find food and housing for the penniless German Jews who had arrived at the harbour by the boatload almost daily in the late 1930s. It was in this capacity that Simon had first met the Adlers, and Esther.

Simon had also introduced Sunny to Franz and the refugee hospital, changing her life completely and forever. To say she felt indebted to the easygoing New Yorker would have been a massive understatement. Sunny was heartsick to see Simon and Esther separated by Ghoya's cruel order. Ghoya had banned the entire family, including Esther, from leaving the ghetto. Simon could only see his son whenever Sunny—who wasn't confined to the ghetto like the German refugees—had time to sneak Jakob out to Ernst's flat, where Simon lived. Ironically, Ernst was actually the
more wanted fugitive of the two men. Sunny could still see in her mind his haunting oil paintings of the rape and murder victims of the Nanking Massacre. They had enraged the Japanese authorities and sent Ernst fleeing to the countryside. Since returning to Shanghai, he had chosen to hide in plain sight. He lived in an enclave known as Germantown, behind wild whorls of hair, a beard and the assumed name of Gustav Klimper, a cheeky homage to the great Viennese painter Gustav Klimt. He made a living selling his non-controversial paintings, mainly German landscapes that he disdained as conformist and unoriginal. Every few weeks, along with Simon's letters, Ernst brought the family a bag of groceries or rice. And, unbeknownst to Franz, who was too proud to accept anything he viewed as charity, Ernst was slipping Esther the few dollars he could spare, which she pretended to earn through sales of her knitting.

Esther's eyes lit up at the sight of the letter in his hand, but she nodded to the baby below the blanket. “In a minute or two, Ernst. Thank you.” She cleared her throat. “Tell me, how he is?”

“The man is lovesick, Essie.” Ernst sighed. “Speaks of you day and night. Frankly, it's a little tiresome.”

“
Ach
, you talk such nonsense.” Esther looked down to conceal her happy smile and the sudden colour in her cheeks.

Ernst lit another cigarette. “Where, I ask you, is a man like that for me?”

“In that mountain village, waiting,” Sunny reassured. “Just where you left him.” She had always liked Shan, whom Ernst had met soon after arriving in Shanghai. The two men had fled the city together after the scandal of Ernst's Nanking paintings.

“Why would Shan wait for me? After the way I absconded without so much as a goodbye.”

“You did it for Charlie,” Sunny said. In the countryside, Ernst and Shan had met Charlie, a charismatic Resistance leader and the youngest general in the Communist army. After Charlie had been shot through the leg, Ernst had taken the risk of dragging him to the city for medical attention at the refugee hospital. “Charlie was dying from that infected wound. You sacrificed everything to get him here.”

“God only knows what has happened to that village or my poor Shan without Charlie. It's hard to believe that any of them might still be alive.”

Esther shook her head vigorously. “You can't talk that way, Ernst. You must have faith.”

He grimaced. “Oh, Essie, life has given me precious little reason for faith. And your people even less so. How do you Jews possibly sustain it?”

Esther repositioned the baby and adjusted the blanket. “Karl used to say that it takes no effort to believe during good times. That only in the worst of times can one demonstrate true faith.”

Sunny had never known Franz's younger brother, Karl, but she still felt a kind of closeness to the man who had been Esther's first husband. “Karl paid for his faith with his life. What those monsters did to him …” Ernst shook his head in disgust. “Besides, he was a better man than I could ever hope to be.”

“Nonsense, Ernst,” Esther said with a gentle laugh. “You are a good man. And a brave one too. Looking after my Simon the way you do. You, an Austrian goy, who has always been a friend to—”

Esther was silenced by the unexpected opening of the door. Franz entered, his face ghostly pale and his hair dishevelled. Dirt marks criss-crossed the pant legs of his only suit. But it was his halting movement, and the way he kept his right arm clamped to
his chest, that drew Sunny's attention. She hurried over and tried to wrap him in a hug but stopped when he gasped in pain. “What have they done to you, Franz?”

“My rib. It's broken.”

“Oh, darling.” Sunny lightly ran her fingers over his jacket. Just her touch caused Franz to wince and lean away. Then she noticed the bruising on his jaw and moved her hand up to carefully explore it. “And this?”

“It's nothing, Sunny.” He pulled her hand from his face. “Only the chest.”

Ernst marched over to the door. “Was it the Kempeitai?”

“No, not the military police. Just regular soldiers.” Franz looked from Ernst to Sunny and then down to the floor. “After all these years, they have shut us down.”

“The hospital?” Sunny took his left hand in her right and caressed his knuckles. “Tell me.”

Franz described the raid, ending with the decree being pinned to the entrance.

“Why, Franz?” she asked. “Why would they do this?”

“Ghoya,” he grunted. “He can't let us have anything.”

“That horrid little man,” Esther spat. The Japanese bureaucrat had kept her and Simon apart for the past six months by forbidding her an exit pass, but she was only one of thousands of refugees who had come to despise the man, who referred to himself as the “King of the Jews.”

“Now what, Franz?” Sunny asked.

Franz freed his hand from Sunny's. “I am going to go see him.”

“Ghoya?” Ernst frowned. “Not that I have ever been the epitome of caution or care but, Franz, do you really think that's wise?”

Franz turned on Ernst angrily, catching himself when he felt
a stab of pain in his chest. “My patients are all over the hostel. Most of them suffering on the floor like stray cats. No medicine. No operating theatre. No supplies. What am I supposed to do for them, for God's sake?”

Ernst held up his hand as though the answer were obvious. “What the rest of us do. Accept it. Turn a blind eye. Look after yourself. And forget about everyone else.”

Franz was about to respond when the baby, turning from Esther's chest, uttered a high-pitched gurgle. Something stirred inside Sunny, but she resisted the urge to go to him.

Franz looked over just as the baby's head emerged from beneath the blanket. Confused, he turned back to Sunny for an explanation.

“You remember Hannah's friend? The neighbour girl, Feng Wei?”

Franz squinted at her in disbelief. “The baby is Feng Wei's?”

“He was, yes.” Sunny explained what had happened. Franz said nothing, but his impassive expression cut her to the bone. She felt she could read his mind:
How can we bring another baby into our overcrowded home? Another mouth to feed.

Too hurt to even meet his gaze, she turned to Esther with her arms outstretched. “Let me burp him, Essie.”

As she took the boy in her arms, it occurred to her that he still didn't have a name. Inhaling his sweet scent and feeling the warmth of his cheek against hers, she realized that she would never be able to let him go.