The Last Green Valley

by Mark Sullivan

  Five minutes later, Adeline and the boys were inside the crowded sixth car, seated on the side opposite the platform. Will and Walt were so tired, they fell asleep against her as soon as she spread the blanket over them. She wanted to do the same, to seek refuge from her growing anxiety, to make her mind stop racing. But she could not.

  Adeline stayed hypervigilant, listening to the people talking around her and wondering whether they, too, were making a run for freedom.

  The train began to move. The boys shifted in their sleep against her, and it took everything Adeline had to fight the fear that built in her in tandem with the speed of the train. When the conductor came by to punch their tickets, he already smelled of whiskey.

  “How long?” she asked.

  “We’ve got clear tracks,” he said. “You’ll be there around five minutes to six, just before sunrise, in time for them to see you and shoot you when you make your run.”

  He walked away, seeming almost amused. Adeline felt a caustic taste in the back of her mouth as she did the math against the sunrise, which a book in the Soviet officers’ billet said would be at 6:23 a.m. Subtract half an hour, and the conductor was right; they would be arriving in Oebisfelde at the crack of dawn. With every step she and the boys took after leaving the train, the light of day would grow along with the chance of discovery, the chance of gunfire, and worse.

  I should have come earlier! I should have taken the midnight train to Berlin!

  But the midnight train would have been more crowded, and the central station most certainly so. They would have ended up in Oebisfelde at roughly three a.m. with only a sliver of a waning moon above. How would we have seen? How would we have known we were going the right way?

  She did not own a flashlight and had feared stealing one from the officers’ billet, only to have its light betray them as they ran for freedom. In the end, she decided a night run was not worth the risk. Now, however, as the train hurtled toward dawn, she was feeling regret.

  No, she thought, clamping down on the emotion. I have to believe this is the right time and the right way to go.

  Adeline closed her eyes and was actually starting to doze when she heard the conductor’s question echo in her mind. Aren’t you putting your kids in danger?

  She came to again, alert, tense, her chest heaving when she glanced at Will and then Walt, feeling her heart pang with alarm for them and for her. They were in danger, terrible danger, all of them. They’d been in peril from the moment they’d left the house with the wagon. If they were caught, the Soviets could separate her from the boys. They could send her east to a work camp and Walt and Will to an orphanage. With every kilometer that passed along the route heading west-southwest from Berlin toward Oebisfelde, the border, and the British Zone beyond, her anxiety rippled through fear toward terror.

  What if I’m shot? What if the boys are shot? And I’m not?

  Adeline’s mind reeled and threw her back more than a decade, seeing herself as if from the ceiling of their flat in Pervomaisk, where she’d held the first Waldemar in the moments after he’d died and she’d known what it was to have something ripped from her heart, an agony so complete and devastating, she’d wanted to lie down and die right there.

  In the train, Adeline gasped at the wrenching emotion of that horrible memory.

  “Mama?” Will said, jerking her back to reality. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes, I . . . ,” she said, her heart thumping and her stomach churning when she gazed down at her dear little boy in the dimly lit railcar. “Why?”

  “You cried out. You said, ‘Waldemar.’”

  “What?” Walt said, rousing.

  “Nothing,” Adeline whispered. “Go back to sleep, both of you.”

  As the boys readjusted and snuggled against her, she tried not to think about the cold sweat on her brow and the nausea in her stomach and the weakness in her chest and legs at the thought of one of them dying before she did. I can’t take that. I can’t do that again, Lord. I can’t.

  Adeline realized she’d been holding her breath and forced herself to take in one inhalation after another after another. And as she did, for reasons she’d never be able to fully explain, she thought of four lines in Emil’s third letter: “Remember that Corporal Gheorghe? The Romanian with the dented head and the honey wine? I saw him again. He said to say hello to Malia if you have the chance.”

  Corporal Gheorghe. Of course, she remembered him. How could she not? His hypnotic eyes and the way he talked about the Battle of Stalingrad, how he’d woken up after being shelled in the initial Soviet attack, how he’d seen the world differently, and how he’d known without a doubt that he would survive to tell the tale. That unwavering belief had seemed to protect the Romanian as he’d walked on through the bloodiest battle ever fought on earth.

  I have to believe like that, Adeline thought. I have to believe with every fiber of my being, with no doubt that we’ll make it. No doubt.

  Adeline suddenly understood that if she really had no doubts, none whatsoever, she’d be calmer and make better decisions in the waning darkness and waxing light that lay before her and her beloved boys.

  No doubts, Adella. You’re already there.

  She closed her eyes and repeated the words again and again as she drifted off, dwelling on that vision of reunion she’d held on to on the train to Berlin, feeling Emil’s powerful arms surround her, protect her, hold her to his chest while she—

  “Lady,” the conductor said, and shook her shoulder. “Wake up. Oebisfelde, next stop. We need to get you and your wagon off fast. Understand?”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  March 18, 1947, 5:47 a.m.

  Oebisfelde, Soviet-Occupied east Germany

  “Understand?” the conductor repeated, irritated. “And I want my cigarettes.”

  Adeline’s throat started to constrict, and her heart was racing again. Thoughts about losing another child returned. They tried to paralyze her.

  Stop it. No doubts, Adeline. You’re already there.

  “You’ll get the carton once we’re off,” she said. “Boys, wake up. We’re going for our walk.”

  “A walk?” the conductor snorted. “Lady, when it counts, I’d be in an all-out sprint. The Russians shoot first and—”

  “Stop,” she said as the boys slowly came to. “Please, sir. For their sake.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” he said, and walked toward the back of the car.

  Will said, “I’m thirsty, and I have to pee, Mama.”

  “I do, too,” Walt said.

  Adeline was folding the blanket and realizing that she’d forgotten to pack water.

  “We’ll pee when we get off and find some water before the next train,” she promised.

  Will groaned. “When’s that?”

  She started to snap at him but stopped herself. “Sooner than you think.”

  The train slowed. She looked out, trying to see back east, trying to find the dawn and finally spotting its pale purple hint far across a grain field covered in an inch of new snow.

  “Here we go,” she said, getting them out into the aisle and following them toward the rear exit. “The traveling Martels are off on another adventure.”

  “You always say that,” Will said.

  “Because we’re always traveling,” Walt said with an air of condescension.

  Adeline looked outside again, catching the silhouettes of rooftops before the train came to a stop with a squeal and a hiss at a two-story brick station with a single platform lit by gas lamps and the cracking dawn.

  “C’mon, now,” the conductor said. “Fast.”

  She climbed down, telling the boys to stay on the platform, and then ran after the conductor, saying, “Are we the only ones getting off here?”

  They reached the baggage car, and he stopped, saying, “The only ones crazy enough on this trip. Most people take the earlier train to Oebisfelde and try in the dark.”

  “But I was told there were trees that would hide us.”
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  “There used to be trees you could sneak through to get across the border unseen,” he said as they got the wagon down. “They cut them down last week, and they’ve started to dig up the stumps. It’s becoming a real no-man’s-land near the border.”

  No doubts, Adeline. You’re already there. Already in Emil’s arms.

  “Thanks for the information,” she said, handing him the cigarettes. “And your kindness.”

  Adeline expected him to say something snide. Instead, he took the cigarettes, sighed, and said, “Good luck to you, lady. And your kids. Someone told me if you see the medieval tower in the town, you’ve gone too far, and they’ll probably see and stop you before you can even try to start walking toward the border.”

  “Good to know,” she said, and set off toward the boys with the little wagon.

  The conductor climbed aboard the first passenger car. By the time Adeline reached Will and Walt, the train was pulling out, leaving them alone on the platform, with the eastern horizon now pale purple slashed with moody reds.

  Will danced around and said, “I’m thirsty, and I have to go pee.”

  “So do I,” Walt said.

  “You can’t go here,” she said. “Outside.”

  They pushed and pulled the cart through the empty station. Adeline noticed the wagon felt odd, as if one of the wheels were out of line and dragging as they went out onto snowy steps that overlooked the intersection of a road running west parallel to the railroad tracks and another that wound south into the town, which was where Frau Schmidt had said to go.

  “They’ll stop you at the border if you try the paved road next to the rail tracks or the paved road on the south side of town,” Frau Schmidt said. “But Peter and I were told that midway between the two roads, there’s a diagonal alley to your right. It will lead you to a lane that cuts west through farmland to the town of Danndorf, about four or five kilometers away.

  “Just before the border itself, on your left about one hundred and fifty meters, you will see a two-story house where Soviet soldiers watch the lane and the paved road to the south. But the lane goes into trees that shield the border near there. If you can get to those trees without being seen and stay hidden, they won’t see you cross until it’s too late.”

  But the trees have been cut down!

  “Mama!” Will whispered, dancing about. “I have to pee as bad as that time you made me pee in the jar.”

  Walt said, “I have to pee but not that bad.”

  “Go,” she said, pointing to her right. “Over there, while I get the wagon down the steps.”

  The boys hurried down the stairs, over to some bushes, and unbuttoned their flies. She tried to ease the wagon down the steps, but the weight got away from her, and it went bouncing down into the slushy street with four big thumps and a crack.

  “What was that, Mama?” Will whispered.

  She pushed on the wagon, felt it roll, and said, “I don’t know.”

  Will finished and hurried to her. Adeline glanced east at the red-and-purple horizon growing brighter and felt panic again. She looked back toward Walt, who was just standing there by the bushes, peering around as if they had all the time in the world.

  “Let’s go, Walt!” she hissed.

  “He’s always like that,” Will said as Walt startled and ran toward them.

  Adeline could almost make out her older son’s features in the dawn light when he puffed up to them. She knew their chance for easy freedom was slipping away, second by second.

  “Both of you behind the wagon,” she said. “Quick now. And if you see an old tower ahead of us, tell me to stop.”

  They made it two steps before the arm that held the front right wheel to the wagon snapped and the wheel fell off. The wagon tilted and sagged on top of it. Adeline stared at the broken wheel lying in the slush.

  “What do we do?” Will asked.

  Adeline wanted to cry. But sunrise was coming. She had to act, and fast.

  Going around to the wagon’s opposite side, she saw that the front and back wheel arms were bolted into rectangular support structures, each made of four wooden bars. The longer sides of the rectangle were bolted across the bottom of the wagon about fifteen centimeters apart. The shorter wooden bars were bolted over and into the crossbars.

  Adeline noticed a gap of perhaps five centimeters between the short bars and the bottom of the wagon and was inspired. Finding a large rock, she used it to pound at the left, top, side rail and soon had it separated from the wagon.

  She beat down the nails so they would not cut her, then fed the rail through the gap in the front-wheel support from the left side to the right. The rail now stuck out from the bottom of both sides of the wagon a good thirty centimeters.

  Adeline got a piece of rope she’d used to bind some of their things in a bundle, cut it in two, and used the pieces to tie the rail in place on both sides of the wagon. It took far too long. The sun was rising as she finished. For a moment, she thought about turning back, but the idea of being in Emil’s arms would not let her.

  “Walt, come around front and take the handle. Will, you still push.”

  With that, Adeline went around to the right side, squatted to grab the rail, and lifted it and the wagon’s front end, becoming the fourth wheel. She had to adopt an awkward position to do it, bent over, taking most of the weight in the mid and low back, which almost immediately began to protest as they started down Bahnhofstrasse, the street that wound away south from the Oebisfelde train station and the frontage road that ran west toward the border.

  They passed between rows of smaller homes interspersed between large brick-and-stucco buildings. Adeline barely gave them a glance. Sweat was pouring off her brow into her eyes, making it difficult to see as she tried to crane her neck to gaze ahead and down every side street they passed, looking and listening for anything that might indicate the approach of a patrol.

  “That smells good,” Will said as the aroma of baking bread wafted on the wind.

  Somewhere in the distance, Adeline heard a sound like wood striking wood, followed by a long rushing sound that took her breath away. That was a gunshot!

  Part of her wanted to turn around, but she didn’t.

  No doubts, Adeline. You’re already with Emil.

  One block. Two blocks. Three blocks. Her back and hands were on fire. She peered ahead and up, trying to spot that medieval tower before they went too far and missed that diagonal alley that led to the farm lane heading west.

  But what about the trees?

  They walked on, the remaining three wood-and-tin wheels of the little wagon sliding in the slush as they went through a roundabout at the intersection of two roads. They continued south on Lessingstrasse as more sun poured into the town. Why hadn’t they encountered anyone else?

  “Mama,” Will said.

  “I told you—”

  “The tower, Mama,” Walt said.

  Adeline saw Oebisfelde’s medieval tower in the distance, tall, peak-roofed, with big windows thrown wide at the top.

  She set down the rail and the front end of the wagon, spinning around and picking it up again before crying, “Back the other way, boys!”

  She hurried them out of sight of the tower toward that roundabout. Before they reached it, she spotted an alley on their left cutting diagonally northwest. At the end of it, she could see where the buildings stopped and met empty ground beyond. Is the lane there?

  As far as Adeline was concerned, it was. She puffed with effort as they moved the little wagon into the alley and up its length, passing the backs of homes where lights glowed and children laughed and cried.

  Nearing the end of the alley, Will said, “Mama? I’m thirsty, and that lady’s getting water.”

  He was pointing at the dim figure of an old woman cranking a bucket from a well in the yard of the last house on the right. Adeline stopped as the woman poured water from the well bucket into another.

  “Excuse me, ma’am,” Adeline said. “Can I bother yo
u for some water for my sons? We’ve come a long way, and they’re very thirsty.”

  The old woman looked at them and then at the little wagon.

  “No,” she said. “I’m sick and tired of helping the traffic.”

  Before Adeline could beg, she’d turned, walked down the side of her home, and disappeared into the shadows.

  “Here we go again, boys,” Adeline said, and lifted the wagon as the rising sun lit up the snow-clad meadows and overgrown fields beyond.

  “Mama, I’m thirsty,” Will complained.

  “We’re all thirsty, Will,” she snapped. “Please, help Mama and be quiet. I promise to get you water as soon as I can.”

  Frau Schmidt had said there was a dirt road running north-south that they would cross to get to the farm lane. Adeline could see that road now, just beyond an open-faced shed in the old woman’s yard that had firewood stacked inside. They passed the shed. Across the north-south road and slightly to her left, she spotted the two-track lane heading west.

  She’d taken the first step out of the alley toward the lane when she heard the clop and jingle of an approaching horse.

  She glanced to her right, seeing a swarthy man driving a horse and cart loaded with large milk cans. He was almost upon them and waving wildly at her.

  “Can’t you see?” he cried, pointing out into the farmland. “There’s a Soviet patrol coming in from the guardhouse! Get back and hide!”

  Adeline did not wait to look and spun around to pick up the wagon’s front right corner from the reverse direction. “Go back again!”

  Will and Walt could see the fear in her face and pulled until they were back into the alley. The man on the horse and cart went by, waving at her to get into the old woman’s firewood shed. Adeline grunted with effort as they hauled the wagon behind the shed and urged the boys to follow her into it.

  “Don’t move!” she gasped. “And not a peep now from either of you!”

  Adeline could see in their faces that the boys understood they were in danger, but they said nothing when she motioned them to crouch behind the woodpile while she peered over it.