The Road to Liberation: Trials and Triumphs of WWII

by Marion Kummerow

  Uncertainty plagued Magda all the way up the steep road to Villa Liška. It lay a half hour outside of town near the top of Radobýl Mountain. If they turned her away, she would have nowhere else to go before it got dark.

  She passed the sign for the mines and then came to a crest on the hill. To her right was a granary and a stable, with a wide, snowy plain stretching to the squat mountains on the horizon. The sun was setting before her, and the sky was a cold December pink.

  To her left was an iron gate and an elegant Gothic mansion with two and a half stories and a red tile roof with two chimneys. The facade was a cheery yellow limestone with brick red accents. She quickly realized this gate was for the service road inside the compound. It connected to a road directly along the north side of the house. If the third chimney was any indication, the door with the lead-pane windows likely led to the kitchen.

  The service road continued along the east side of the house, where Magda spotted a carriage house to the left and then the ridge. That meant the Taubers had a view of the Elbe and Ohre Rivers from there. Some of the bushes or hedges—roses, maybe?—had been covered by burlap.

  Lights streamed from the center windows of the house and onto a raised terrace. The windows were high and arched, like church windows, and when Magda looked closer, it looked as if the house had been built onto an old chapel.

  She smiled and checked the latch on the gate. It lifted and she was inside. She followed the service road just a little ways toward the back, stopping just before the windows. The left of the road was lined by cedar trees, and she gasped when she peered between them. Four deer blinked back at her from behind a fence. The Taubers had a deer park!

  When she clicked her tongue at them, they spun and leapt off into the deeper part of the woods. Backing away, Magda went to the service door and was about to knock but she decided to peek around the corner to see the front of the house. The main gate led to a circular drive with a fountain in the middle of it. Two sturdy oaks stood guard on either end of the house.

  Magda balled her right hand and tucked her thumb inside. She really, really hoped the Taubers would take her. She would do anything to stay here. To make sure, she doubled her luck and balled the other fist, then knocked on the servants’ entrance. When the door flew open, she nearly fell backward.

  A giant of a woman—broad shouldered, big boned, and with a mop of dark curly hair—held a dust broom like a sabre in her hand. She looked Magda up and down before saying in Slovakian, “Well, well. Look what the cat dragged in. At least you’re not one of them. What do you want?”

  Magda automatically tugged at the edge of her scarf to hide her left cheek. She shuffled her muddy shoes, and pulled at the ill-fitting skirt that had bunched up beneath her coat. The warm smell of mutton and vegetables wafted out from behind the Viking woman.

  Another woman appeared—shorter, reedier and older with many lines etched into her brow. She brandished a spoon at Magda from behind the giant woman.“I saw you poking around here. Why do I have to keep chasing you people off? It’s a deer park, not a petting zoo.”

  “Eva sent me,” Magda rushed, not sure which one she ought to speak to. “From the bakery? I’m Magdalena Novák. I’m looking for work, and Eva said I should ask for Renata.”

  The first woman sighed and leaned the broom behind the door. “I’m Renata.” She assessed Magda once more, then indicated the road. “And your people? Where have you left them?”

  Magda told her. Renata listened. The sky grew darker. When Magda was finished, Renata peered over her shoulder at the other woman before addressing Magda once more.

  “I’m the housekeeper. This is Jana, the cook. Between the two of us, we’ve got everything under control.” She paused and peered outside. “We are the last house before an emptied-out village up the road though. You may as well at least warm up.”

  She held the door open, and Magda ducked beneath the woman’s arm to get inside.

  After Magda served the main course, she set the empty fish platter into the sink. Jana and Renata were already eating, and Magda ladled a bowl of Jana’s kielbasa soup.

  Renata scooted over on the bench. “Eliška asleep?”

  Magda took a bite before answering. The sausage was smoky and delicious. “Like a rock. I hadn’t even finished the first half of her favorite book.” She noticed the clean bowl set across from her. “Where’s Aleš?”

  Jana rolled her eyes. “He and Walter are still in the vineyard.”

  “Who’s Walter?” Magda asked.

  Renata twisted her mouth the way she did when censoring herself. “The Fenkarts’ son. He used to come around and help Aleš with the deer until he entered the polytechnic in town. I think he’s just finished school…or something.” She made a sucking noise and glanced at Jana.

  Magda knew of the Fenkarts, one of the Sudeten families in the area. Frau Fenkart visited Dr. Tauber every week. Her husband, who was a quiet man and never appeared comfortable in the house, waited for her on the hard wooden bench in the foyer. But Renata seemed to have something else to add.

  “What?” Magda asked.

  Renata pursed her lips. “Nothing. Walter’s a charmer. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Magda scoffed. Who would ever be interested in her? After she finished her soup, she checked on the dinner party again. The Taubers and their guests had moved into the adjacent drawing room with their desserts. The tone was now serious, the atmosphere sedate compared to earlier. She cleared the dessert plates from the coffee and side tables.

  “The Führer doesn’t want to drag out the conflict,” the mayor said. He rolled an unlit cigar in his hand. “He’s got France. He’s got Denmark.”

  “He has Poland,” Dr. Tauber said. He gazed at Ruth Tauber and she shifted on the divan.

  Mayor Brauer flicked the cigar up and reached for his coffee. “Anyway, with Germany’s assets frozen in the United States, he’ll have to stop.”

  Anna Dvorákova clicked her tongue. “Max, I’m sorry, but if I had to cast you in a propaganda film, I wouldn’t. In Prague—”

  “I’m telling you,” the mayor snapped, “this will all blow over and things will go back to the way they used to be. You’ll be making films soon enough, Anna. Ruth and Gabriel here—these two—will be playing the concert halls again, and Johan won’t need…” He looked at Dr. Tauber but instead of finishing his sentence, he drank from his coffee cup. He shrugged. “It will all go back to normal.”

  Magda had no reason to linger, though she wanted to hear more. She stepped out of the drawing room and noticed that Dr. Tauber’s office was standing open with the desk lamp still on. She lay the tray onto one of the foyer tables and went in to turn it off. She rarely had reason to go into his office, but she liked it, especially the layers of contradictory scents—of wood and antiseptic, of books and metal, of nature and technology—all in one space. The office faced the gravel drive, the fountain now lit up in the dark. There were two plush chairs before a beautiful old desk with gold-plated handles. A bookshelf filled the space behind Dr. Tauber’s desk. Wooden filing cabinets were lined up on the wall opposite with a variety of instruments and anatomical models.

  She stopped at the brain and touched it. It was waxy. Renata had once claimed she had a strong stomach, but the anatomical models were enough to make her want to shut her eyes when she had to clean, saying it was unnatural to have one’s organs lying about on a filing cabinet. Magda laughed and reminded her they weren’t real. Magda peered at them closer now, fascinated by the veins and the parts and the shapes. Renata told her that if Magda asked, Dr. Tauber would certainly explain some of this to her. He did to Eliška. Magda only had to ask. She never did.

  His office was where he worked and held most of his consultations and wrote his articles for medical journals. Examinations took place in the adjacent room. The patients ranged from the neighboring farmers to rather distinguished townsfolk, some coming as far as from Prague through word of mouth. Politicians mixed with th
e newspaper seller or the tailor in the foyer on Mondays and every other Saturday. On Tuesday through Thursday, Dr. Tauber worked at the hospital in Litoměřice.

  Magda returned to the corridor, took the tray, and stopped at the stairs. She should check on Eliška. The six-year-old had a habit of waking up at some point when there was a lot of noise from guests. Her room was just above the dining room, and Magda’s room was in the attic floor above Eliška’s. Sometimes even Magda could hear Dr. Tauber coming home late, his footfalls tapping on the black-and-white marble floor.

  As she ascended the next floor, Magda remembered when Renata introduced the Taubers to her the day she came knocking. Frau Tauber and Dr. Tauber had risen and greeted Magda like an old lost friend. Even Eliška had stopped playing with her game and had come over. But Magda had shied away beneath the child’s intent gaze, a gentle fascination like a child discovering a ladybug for the first time.

  “What is that?” Eliška pointed to Magda’s face.

  “The map of Siberia,” Magda had replied quietly.

  Eliška had then reached up on tiptoe and gestured for Magda to bend down. She went to Magda’s left cheek and kissed it. “There,” she had said. “Papa always does that when something of mine hurts.”

  When she opened the bedroom door and as Magda had suspected, Eliška’s lamp was burning again and Eliška herself was sitting up beneath the sheets.

  “What are you doing under there, little finch?” Magda lifted the covers off the girl.

  Eliška giggled and threw herself back down on the pillows. Out popped her two dolls next to her. “We were having a dinner party.”

  “Did the guests and your parents wake you? They were laughing a lot.”

  Eliška shook her head into the pillow. “You didn’t finish reading the story.”

  “You fell asleep, silly.” Magda pulled the sheet up to the girl’s chin, making sure to tuck the two dolls in as well.

  “I still know when you don’t finish the story. Will you do it now?”

  Magda smiled. “No, it’s very late. Very, very late. Go back to sleep.”

  “It’s loud outside.”

  Crickets chirped down in the garden, and Magda rose to close the window. She returned to Eliška, stroked the blond curls away from her forehead, and kissed it. “Go to sleep now. Tomorrow we’ll see whether we can go to the lake.”

  Eliška’s eyes widened, and she made a big O with her mouth before flashing a wide, toothy smile. “And have ice cream?”

  Magda chuckled. “We’ll see. Light on or off?” She reached to turn off the lamp.

  “On.”

  “What’s the word?”

  “Please.”

  “Only for a little while longer. I’ll come turn it off before I go to bed. Good night, my darling finch.”

  Eliška giggled. It was her nickname, but they had made a game of it. Each night the little girl tried to come up with a different species for Magda. She looked up at the ceiling and then at Magda with those wide blue eyes. “Good night, my darling barn owl.”

  Magda laughed, made big eyes in return, and hooted before putting a finger to her lips and shutting her eyes tight. When she opened them, Eliška squeezed her own shut.

  Downstairs, Magda retrieved the tray of dessert plates and cups, her heart skipping when she bumped the glass flower vase. When it stopped wobbling, she breathed a sigh of relief and thanked the heavens above. Made of handblown Venetian glass, it was one of Frau Tauber’s favorites.

  The first time Magda had seen the house, she knew the kind of people who lived here. Renata had brought her in through the kitchen and into this foyer with its black-and-white marble floor, the limestone staircase with the iron banister, and the eclectic collection of vases and artifacts on the foyer tables. They were open people, curious people, and well traveled. She later learned that Frau Tauber had made it a habit to shop for something special wherever she performed. It was far from an even exchange, Magda thought. Ruth Tauber played piano beautifully, made people cry and smile, so the souvenirs she collected were worth only a fraction of the impressions she must have left behind.

  Magda returned to the kitchen, where Renata and Jana were drying the dishes. As she helped put them away, the back door opened and Aleš walked in with a young man.

  “My goodness.” Jana had her hands on her hips. “Is that really you, Walter? You’ve lost all that baby fat.”

  Renata chucked the young man under the chin. “Walter Fenkart, aren’t you just handsome?”

  Magda took him in within a second—a bit taller than Renata, sandy-brown hair, deep-set eyes, and a thin, straight mouth—then went back to furiously wiping a serving platter.

  Aleš moved to the soup bowl on the table. “Walter’s back for a few weeks to help me. Jana, you got an extra bowl for him?”

  The cook nodded. Aleš took his place at the table and served himself out of the tureen, but Walter hurried past Jana.

  “I’ll get it,” he said. “I still know where they are.” And then he was standing next to Magda, reaching into the open cupboard.

  “You’re new,” he said intently. “I’m Walter Fenkart.”

  Magda stared at the bowl in his hand. There was a small chip on the underside of the rim. When she dared to glance at him, she could put the picture together from the moment he walked through the door to where he stood next to her. He had nice ears, perfectly shaped.

  “Normally,” he said, “that’s when you tell me your name.”

  Magda stood with the dish towel hanging limply at her side. “Yes…”

  He chuckled abruptly, a thin smile. Magda backed away behind the open cupboard door, the glass pane between them.

  “Get on over here, Walter, and eat,” Aleš called. “Your parents will be wondering where you are.”

  “Magda, are you flirting over there?” Renata teased. “I say, Aleš, I think our Magda’s flirting.”

  Aleš steered Renata’s chin to look his way.

  Walter cocked his head at Magda through the glass. “All right then. Magda it is.”

  As soon as he turned away, Magda fled the kitchen.

  2

  June 1941

  In summer, the deer roamed the surrounding forests and fields, so after removing the fencing, Aleš had erected an outdoor play area for Eliška. She had a little house shaped like a Swiss chalet and an outdoor table made of a tree stump on which Aleš had painted a flowered tablecloth and trinkets. He had painted four smaller stumps into toadstools and put them around the table to sit on. The Taubers had been delighted and decided to hold a grand ceremony with a ribbon cutting and everything. Eliška dressed in her finest outfit and invited everyone to tea.

  Magda found herself taking Eliška outdoors as often as possible. They played games of Pesek or hide-and-seek. Sometimes she created a treasure hunt and hid messages in a hollowed-out knot in one of the cedars. Eliška would discover pictures or just shapes and colors with instructions to find things around the grounds that matched them best: flower petals, leaves, plants, sticks of wood, pinecones, or rocks. Magda planted the hints while Eliška slept. It was also usually at that time that Aleš and Walter cooled off by the pool. Magda had learned that Walter was a competitive swimmer and regional champion.

  During her time with the Taubers, Magda had paid little attention to what went on in the deer park. The animals were a curiosity, but the wildlife management itself was a mystery to her. It was really something the very wealthy or avid sportsmen did. But the Taubers were not interested in hunting, though once a year they organized a party for their friends and political connections.

  Sporadically, Magda asked Renata or Jana questions about it, but not much escaped the housekeeper. Renata had all the fodder she needed. As soon as Walter and Aleš stopped working and came in for a meal, Renata listed out Magda’s questions: Magda wanted to know how you get the deer into the pen come winter. Magda wanted to know why we keep them at all. Magda wanted to know if you wanted her to come out and hel
p you prune the vines. Magda wanted to know…

  Magda found a reason to flee the room as soon as Renata started.

  “Why ask at all if you don’t want to hear the boy talk?” Jana chided Magda later.

  “I think he would much prefer talking to you than to me,” Renata said.

  Magda’s neck felt hot. She was not like Renata. The groundskeeper and Renata were no secret affair, and if it was supposed to be a secret, they certainly were no good at hiding it. Once in a while, on the third floor where Magda shared a room with Jana, she heard Renata’s deep chuckling through the bedroom wall and knew that Aleš had popped in.

  Whereas the two were solidly proportionate to one another in character, Aleš and Renata were wholly mismatched in physical features. Renata was a tall, big-boned twenty-six-year-old Slovakian with a head of dark curly hair. Aleš, half a foot shorter than Renata, had a receded hairline. He was a compact Czech, rooted to nature, and had fourteen years of experience over Renata. He was the kind of man, Renata once laughed, about whom fairy tales were never written and, therefore, a man she could depend on.

  “Aleš”—she had winked—“gets things done.”

  Only later did Magda learn that Aleš had been a commander in the Czechoslovakian army. He’d been posted across the river at Theresienstadt when the Wehrmacht arrived to demobilize the local guard. His youngest brother, Gabriel, was in the seminary, another thing Renata teased him about—how could such a devilish man be related to such a humble sibling?

  Magda slowly gathered the stories about the others in the house. Jana, whose Prussian husband had died in the Great War, left her home in Berlin to take care of her dying mother and never left again. Renata was more mysterious. Magda imagined she was running away from a dark secret she’d left behind back east. Sometimes she would catch Renata daydreaming, a sheen of sadness draped around her. But if she caught Magda watching her, she became brusque and used her feather duster to swat Magda’s subtle queries away. It seemed, Magda decided, the Taubers’ help were all taking refuge in this house on the hill.