by Ruta Sepetys
“Why me?”
“Because you understand more Polish than the rest of us.”
“She seems terrified,” said Eva.
“She probably is,” I told her. “She’s eight months pregnant.”
emilia
I liked the Lithuanian girl, but the towering woman called Eva spoke bad Polish and always seemed impatient. I had never seen such a tall lady.
“That.” Eva pointed to my belly. “From Nemmersdorf?”
“No. From the farm last spring,” I told her.
“The farm?”
I nodded. Should I tell her? Should I explain that my father had sent me from Poland to work on a farm in East Prussia? Should I mention that the farm was owned by Father’s friends, the Kleists? Father had said it would be safer for me there. The Kleists had a son named August. Heat brushed my cheeks as I thought of him.
“Emilia,” Mr. Kleist had said, pointing to a tanned boy dragging a sledge of wood. “That is our oldest, August.”
I smiled, remembering his gorgeous face. I put my hands on my belly. “I am on my way to meet August,” I told her. “It is the plan.” Eva nodded and walked away.
I lay back and thought of August, our wedding, and how we’d make a big nest for the storks above our cottage, just like the nest I had seen on top of the barn. The images were so peaceful, so perfect, that I soon fell asleep.
alfred
Greetings, sweet Hannelore!
The cold continues and I am braving temperatures of minus fifteen. My eyelashes freeze and stick when I step outside. This climate is unsuitable for tender-skinned women of course, so I prefer to think of you at home, soaking your stockings or drawing a bath.
Today I have news to share. I am confirmed to sail on the MV Wilhelm Gustloff, the most impressive ship in the harbor! She is enormous, two hundred and eight meters long, fifty-six meters high, and only eight years old. A true beauty. She was originally built for vacation cruising and has amenities I think you would enjoy, such as a pool, a formal dining room, a ballroom, and a library. But ho, let me tickle your thoughts with this—the ship even has a movie theater, a music room, a beauty salon, and a promenade deck completely enclosed in glass. Can you imagine? All of the cabins are the same, except the private luxury suite on B deck for the Führer himself. Perhaps I’ll be invited to lodge in the private cabin at some point, but I must decline. Sacrifices, Lore. I am making these types of sacrifices every day, allowing others to eat from my spoon.
I imagine the Gustloff was once quite pretty for leisure cruising, but the ship is now painted a chalky gray for the war effort. It once served as a hospital ship but was most recently used as barracks for a submarine training school. No matter, she is my boat now.
Yes, how fortunate I am to be a sailor of priority, taking voyage on a grand ship instead of digging tank trenches like most of the lads my age. My services are quite in demand, so I must close. I will leave you, however, with the most impressive fact of all—the capacity of the ship is 1,463 but I am told we may have as many as 2,000 on board.
Imagine, my darling, your Alfred is saving two thousand lives.
“Have you cleaned the toilets yet, Frick?”
“Not yet,” I replied.
florian
I sat in the corner, watching. They didn’t have much food, but what they had, they shared. The small boy discovered an old gramophone and dragged it across the floor. He found a single disc, a Swedish starlet named Zarah Leander singing “Davon geht die Welt nicht unter.” They played the record over and over. The squatty shoemaker made the giant woman dance with him. For his age, he was a good dancer, much better than she was.
I remembered dancing.
Dr. Lange had asked me to accompany his daughter to two balls. Unfortunately, I was a better dancer than she was and it made her angry. She was a selfish girl with a nose like a woodpecker.
The nurse walked over to me. “It’s only bean soup, but it’s warm.” She held out the cup.
“Give it to the girl,” I told her.
“She’s already had some. Take it, you’ll feel weaker tomorrow if you don’t eat something.”
I took the cup from her.
She sat down next to me, uninvited. “I’ve heard this song before. I know she’s singing in German, but I don’t completely understand the lyrics,” she said.
I spooned the warm soup into my mouth. “She’s saying it’s not the end of the world.”
The nurse folded her legs up under her skirt and rested her chin on her knees. “Well, that’s good to know. It’s nice to hear music. At the hospital, we sometimes played music for the patients. The soldiers loved the song ‘Lili Marleen.’” She looked at me. “Do you know it?”
“No,” I lied.
“It’s beautiful. It’s about a boy who longs to see his sweetheart.”
I wasn’t going to correct her, but the song was based on a poem written by a German soldier during the first war. The song was about him meeting his girl under a lamppost. Then he leaves for war. By lantern under a barricade he thinks of his Lili of the lamplight.
“So you like to dance,” she said. It was more of a comment than a question.
“Me? No.”
The shoemaker glided over to us. “Come, my dear Lithuanian, let us have a dance.” He extended his knobby hand to the nurse. “Do you understand what she is singing?”
“Of course.” She smiled. “She’s saying it’s not the end of the world.”
“Very good! Let us dance and celebrate. Tonight we sleep as aristocrats,” said the shoe poet.
“I doubt the aristocrats slept on the cold floor,” the nurse whispered to me before accepting Poet’s hand. I wanted to laugh, to keep talking with her, but instead I said nothing.
The shoemaker danced her around the room, holding her appropriately and closing his eyes. He had probably danced with a lot of pretty girls in his day. He seemed like a wise man, a kind man. I imagined he worked by oil lamp, cutting and sewing leather well into the night. He probably employed an apprentice and taught him an honest trade, unlike Dr. Lange, who had lured me with lies.
Lange must have considered me an easy target. I was so eager, captivated by all the old paintings, staring at them for days until they confessed their secrets to me. Dr. Lange taught me to carefully dissolve and remove discolored varnish. I studied pigments and tinting to match antique patinas. We spent months experimenting with the methods the old masters used to create real gesso. I learned quickly. I came to recognize all the crack patterns and each type of canvas and stretcher used by every school of art. Dr. Lange was impressed with how quickly I could detect a repainting, fake, or touch-up. My restoration work always passed, completely undetected.
“Stunning, Florian,” he would whisper over my shoulder. “You, my boy, are the Reich’s best-kept secret.”
My boy. My stomach turned with disgust. What an idiot I was. If I could detect a flawed painting so quickly, why had it taken me so long to see the truth about Dr. Lange?
The song ended and the nurse returned and sat down. I got up and carefully lifted my pack onto my shoulder. “I don’t suppose there’s a working commode?”
“You can leave your pack.” She looked at me, her brown eyes earnest. “No one will take it.”
I would not leave my pack. Ever. It had my supplies, my notebook, my future, my revenge. I walked across the stone floor, away from her. As I neared the tall doorway, the shoe poet raised his hand to stop me.
“What do you want?” I asked.
He stared at me and then looked down at my boots. “The shoes tell the story,” he whispered.
My heel. He had heard the hollow in my step as I walked across the room.
He knew.
joana
Ingrid sat silently braiding her hair. “When will we reach the ice?” she asked.
The ice. The goal we trekked toward. If we crossed the frozen Vistula lagoon, we could then make our way down the narrow strip of land to either Pillau or Gotenhafen. Ships would be leaving from both ports.
“Poet says we’re only a day from Frauenburg,” I told her.
“That’s where we’ll cross the ice?” asked Ingrid.
“Yes.”
Ingrid’s fingers stopped moving. “You’re nervous about it.”
I was nervous about it. The closer we moved to an actual village, the more military and wounded we’d encounter.
“If there are soldiers,” whispered Ingrid, “can you convince them?”
“The bandages will fool them,” I told her.
Ingrid had reason to worry. Hitler considered those born blind or disabled, inferior. They were called garbage children, life unworthy of life. Their names were added to an official registry. A doctor in Insterburg confided that the people on the registry would be killed. From then on we bandaged handicaps to pass them off as wounds.
“Maybe we should bandage my eyes tonight. Soldiers may come upon the house,” said Ingrid quietly.
“Yes, we’ll do that.” I reached out and patted her shoulder. “I’m going to look for some supplies.”
“Be careful,” said Ingrid.
I stepped between the sleeping bodies and pushed through the tall, heavy door. The old hinges let out an eerie, deep groan as they rotated. The air in the abandoned house lay cold and still, lingering dead without the family within it. Walking through someone’s home and personal possessions felt not only like trespassing, it felt like a violation.
A portrait of an older man in uniform hung crooked on the plaster. Which family did the estate belong to? Prussian Junkers had the reputation of being stiff and arrogant, but that seemed an unfair generalization. I had met Prussian families in Insterburg who were lovely. Many Prussian nobles had the preposition von before their last name to signify “of” or “from.” I looked at the portrait. If I belonged to Prussian aristocracy my name would be Joana von Vilkas—Joana of the Wolf.
An aristocratic killer.
I stared at the curving stairway of stone in the dim hall, the center of each step worn smooth by the tread of many generations. I hesitated. Should I go upstairs? I thought of our house in Lithuania. How many Soviets were in it now? Were they sleeping in my bed? Had they tossed all our books to the floor like trash? I took a few steps up the cold wide stairs. Silver moonlight shimmered through a window, revealing a gray stuffed rabbit lying on a step above. One of its ears was missing. Poor bunny. Even toys were casualties of war.
I climbed two more steps.
The supplies I needed were most likely in the kitchen or laundry. I didn’t need to go upstairs, but my curiosity beckoned.
I took another step up.
A clattering sounded below, making me jump. I hurried back down the grand staircase and made my way through the dark passage to the kitchen.
The German rummaged through the cabinets, his pack near his feet. A sheet was spread on the floor with a tumble of items in the center.
“Are you following me?” he asked.
“Don’t flatter yourself. I need supplies.”
He motioned to the bundle on the floor. “You can tear the sheet if you need bandages. There’s a sharp knife in the pile.”
“Thank you.”
I spied a few jars of blackberries and carrots on the counter. “Where did you find those?” I asked. “Eva said she checked the kitchen for food.”
“I know a thing or two about hiding places.”
I looked at the jars. “And those are all for you?”
“No, save some for the Polish kid.”
“I told you, her name is Emilia,” I said.
He ignored my statement.
“We’re all going to Frauenburg. Come with us and she can ride in the cart. The contractions and symptoms she described speak to early labor. She shouldn’t be walking for extended periods.”
He seemed to consider the proposition.
I rummaged through the dark kitchen and set aside dried herbs, scissors, and kitchen twine. There wasn’t enough. “I’m going upstairs to get some blankets.”
“No,” he said, moving quickly to block the doorway. “Don’t go upstairs. And don’t let the little boy up there either.”
“Why not?”
He didn’t answer.
I stepped in closer. “Why shouldn’t I go upstairs?”
He looked toward the door. He shifted his weight, hesitating. I stepped closer to him. He pulled in a breath and his eyes latched on to mine.
“No one should have to see that,” he whispered.
emilia
The pressure woke me from a shallow sleep. I had to go to the bathroom. Again.
I adjusted my hat. The pretty house was warm inside. The fire still crackled and glowed, throwing shadows across the bundled heaps on the floor. How funny some people looked and sounded when they were asleep.
But not the knight.
He was strong, handsome and fine-featured, even as he slept. I watched him from my corner, his face relaxed. Did he ever laugh or smile? The blind girl had bandages over her eyes. What did blind people see in their dreams? Could she dream of a flower if she had never seen one in real life?
The nurse, Joana, was kind. I had been certain she would be angry or disgusted by me, but she wasn’t. Her hands and voice carried a gentle calm, like my mama’s. When she touched my stomach she smiled and nodded. She often looked directly into my eyes and that made me wonder if she saw everything. But when she sat alone her face looked cheerless and forlorn, full of tears waiting patiently to fall.
And then the noise erupted.
Screaming.
It filtered from above, shadowed between the walls. And then it descended, clearer, sharper, drawing closer. The sound lifted the latch of memory. My shoulders began to tremble.
The wind howled down the hallway. A door slammed. The knight was awake, on his feet, gun drawn. He looked first to Joana and then to me. He moved quickly to the door but before he reached it, Eva burst into the room, wild with panic.
“Dead in their beds! They’re all dead in their beds!” she shrieked.
Eva’s face was so white it looked blue. A stuffed rabbit dangled from her massive hand. One of its ears was missing.
florian
There were many possibilities. I pieced together this one.
The family had been eating their dinner. They were alerted of a Russian approach—maybe someone at the door or a sound from outside. The older gentleman, probably the grandfather, instructed everyone to go upstairs and get in bed. He then walked to his room and dressed in his uniform from the Great War. Honor lost was everything lost. He would not allow his family or legacy to be stripped from their land. They would die with dignity. Shoulders square, rows of medals adorning the left side of his chest, the old man walked in and out of each bedroom, taking life yet sparing honor. He then marched to his own room, stood by the window watching the hills beyond, and pulled the trigger.
And now they lay lifeless, their legacy frozen with cold.
• • •
No one could go back to sleep. We left the estate before the first morning light appeared.
The shoemaker held the little boy’s hand.
The boy held the earless rabbit.
What a sorry group we were, brutalized and bandaged, yet luckier than most; certainly more fortunate than the dead family upstairs. The giant woman wouldn’t stop talking about it, describing the scene in morbid detail for the others. I wanted to hit her with a brickbat.
“Sorry, but you didn’t see it, the blood, the children,” she said. “Thank God it was so cold up there. Even so, the smell.”
We walked down the long drive and just before we reached the road, the giant s
tarted in about the Polish girl. “Get her out of the cart. She can’t come with us. We can’t be caught with a runaway Pole and a deserter. We’ll end up slaughtered like the family upstairs.”
“Shut up,” I told her. “I’m not a deserter.”
“Eva, she’s showing signs of early labor. She should rest,” said Joana.
“Well, she made it this far, I’m sure she can make it the rest of the way. We don’t want her in our group, Joana. The others just aren’t brave enough to tell you.”
The Polish girl looked to me from the back of the cart. I wanted to give the annoying woman a piece of my mind. The nurse stepped in front of me.
“All right, Eva. Perhaps you’ve forgotten that the horse is mine? I’ll take Emilia on horseback and ride ahead on my own. You can all pull the cart yourselves.”
The nurse girl was even prettier when she was stubborn.
“Joana, please don’t leave us. Please,” begged the blind girl.
The small boy clutched the maimed rabbit and began to cry.
“Really, Eva, at this point it makes no difference,” said the shoe poet. “We’ll reach the ice soon and—”
The blind girl threw her hand in the air. The arguing ceased. Noise, voices, and other sounds slowly emerged through the trees.
Someone was on the road.
I darted through the snow and peered out from behind a tree. A massive procession of people and carts created a long column, as far as the eye could see.
So it had happened.
Evacuation orders had been issued. Germany was finally telling people what they should have said months ago.
Run for your lives.
alfred
Hello, my Lore,
I woke this winter morning with memories of sweeping your sidewalk at springtime. Perhaps you noticed the vigor I applied toward your walk in particular? I smile and must bite my lip when I think of how often I overexerted myself on your behalf.