Resistance Women

by Jennifer Chiaverini

  Sara’s heart plummeted. “All right.” She glanced through the window, enough to see that the riot seemed to be escalating. “Let’s stay together and keep our heads down.”

  “Ladies, please, don’t go!” a waiter shouted as Sara inched the door open and peered outside. Up and down the street, men in suits or workmen’s clothing marched, shouted, and broke windows, their eyes lit up with a strange, fierce glow. Others—men and women, some clutching children by the hand—fled before them. The sound of swift hooves heralded the arrival of the Prussian police on horseback, but their attempts to disperse the mob with rubber truncheons only heightened the frenzy.

  A lull in the chaos beckoned. Sara seized Amalie’s hand and led her outside, instinctively fleeing perpendicular to the path of the mob, although it was opposite to the direction of home. Pulling Amalie after her, she darted down a quiet alley, around a corner, and onto a wide boulevard, where some citizens hurried in one direction—men grasping attaché cases as they ran, women clutching purses to their sides and hobbling as quickly as they could in their high-heeled pumps. Others, mostly younger men, grinned eagerly as they raced off to watch the fray, or to join it.

  A taxicab sped past. Frantically, Sara waved, but the driver ignored her though he carried no passengers. “Frau Gruen would have taken the girls home by now,” she assured Amalie, scanning the street for another cab. “I’m sure they’re safe—”

  Suddenly a red-faced young man rushed around a corner and nearly plowed into them. “Heil Hitler!” he shouted, his face inches from Amalie’s. He snapped out a one-armed, flat-palmed salute so sharply that Sara felt the rush of air from the movement. “Juda verrecke!”

  Amalie gasped, hand to her throat, but Sara pulled her aside and the man bolted away.

  Another taxi approached; Sara released Amalie’s hand, put two fingertips in her mouth, and let out a loud, shrill whistle just as Natan had taught her. The driver slammed on the brakes, and before his reason overcame instinct, Sara flung the door open, pushed Amalie inside, and scrambled in after her. She gave him Amalie’s address, adding, “Take the long way around, if it’s safer.”

  He nodded and sped off again.

  “What is happening?” asked Amalie, her face pale, her voice trembling. “This is Berlin. This sort of thing doesn’t happen here.”

  Peering through the windshield, Sara took in the thinning crowds before them, then turned in her seat to study the madness they were leaving behind. “It must have something to do with the opening of the Reichstag.”

  The rioters were fascists. That much was evident from their shouts and salutes, even though they were not clad in Brownshirt attire.

  The drive home took more than twice as long as it would have on an ordinary day. Sara and Amalie found the children safe indoors with their anxious, wide-eyed nanny, distracted by toys. As Amalie tearfully embraced her bemused daughters, Sara quietly told Frau Gruen what they had witnessed.

  “Fascist beasts,” the nurse said flatly.

  Sara nodded agreement. And where was Natan in all the madness? When her eyes met Amalie’s, she knew her sister wondered too.

  Eventually Wilhelm rushed in, shaken and outraged, to embrace his wife and kiss his darling girls. “Why do they hate us so much?” lamented Amalie, clinging to her husband, her luminous eyes brimming with unshed tears. “Women and Jews—what threat do we pose to those men, that they call for our deaths?”

  “Don’t let those cowards frighten you,” said Wilhelm. “I would never let anyone harm you or the girls. Never.”

  Amalie nodded and rested her head on his chest, but when she closed her eyes, two tears slipped down her cheeks. Sara said nothing. Wilhelm meant well—Sara knew he did—but his wealth, rank, and even his Christianity could not have protected his family earlier that day if they had taken a wrong turn into the thick of the riot.

  Wilhelm placed some calls, and when he was satisfied it was safe, he had his driver take Sara home to the gracious residence in the Grunewald where she had lived nearly all her life. Her parents met her at the door, her mother pale and trembling, her father grimly quiet. Behind them stood Natan, hands in his jacket pockets, frowning pensively.

  “Where have you been?” Sara cried, breaking free of her mother’s embrace to fling her arms around her brother.

  “Covering the opening of the Reichstag, of course,” he replied. “And then the riot. One led to another. Listen to this: When the new session opened, the National Socialists marched in wearing their brown uniforms, despite strict rules against party regalia in the Reichstagsgebäude. They snapped to attention, gave that Hitler salute, and—” Suddenly understanding dawned. “Oh, Sara. I’m sorry. Lunch.”

  “Yes, lunch.” She thumped him lightly on the chest. “Amalie and I were worried sick. At least tell me you got a good story. In that case I’ll forgive you.”

  “There is no good story to tell about what happened today,” their mother declared. “But at least we’re all safe. I don’t want to hear another word about this tonight or I’ll never be able to sleep.”

  Her children exchanged a look behind her back, but when their father raised his eyebrows at them in warning, they obediently murmured consent.

  As the days passed, Sara followed the story in the press, looking for Natan’s name in the byline and, despite the harrowing events, feeling a stir of pride at his new title. She was shocked to learn that none of the roughly three hundred protesters had been arrested, less surprised to read that most of the windows broken belonged to businesses owned by Jews.

  And though there was not a word of truth to it, the National Socialist press spread the rumor that the Communists had started the riot. They proclaimed the lie so often and so emphatically that those who had not seen the riot for themselves could not distinguish truth from falsehood.

  Chapter Four

  October 1930–August 1931

  Mildred

  When Mildred transferred to the University of Berlin in the autumn of 1930, she went alone.

  Earlier that summer, Arvid had received his PhD in economics, summa cum laude, and had applied to the University of Berlin to complete his Habilitationsarbeit, the postdoctorate research and publishing essential for acquiring a professorship. When he was assured that the position was all but certain, Mildred arranged to accompany him, but just as her transfer to the university was complete, Arvid’s application was declined due to budget cuts and faculty reductions. The only offer he received was from the University of Marburg, about five hundred kilometers southwest of Berlin.

  “To think I’ve crossed an ocean to be with you, only to part from you again,” Mildred had lamented after her frantic last-minute attempts to find a position at Marburg failed.

  “It will only be for a little while,” he had assured her, cupping her face in his hands and gently raising it to meet his kiss. “I’ll see you almost every weekend, and you won’t be lonely with Inge and the boys. She’ll be glad for your company too.”

  In the aftermath of Inge’s recent divorce from the sculptor Johannes Auerbach, she had moved with their two sons from their home in Paris to an apartment in Berlin. “Stay with me until Arvid can join you here,” she had offered when she learned of Arvid and Mildred’s impending separation. “I have the space, and we’ll be less lonely if we’re together.”

  Mildred had accepted gratefully. She adored Inge and the boys, and she and Arvid could barely afford one monthly rent payment, much less two leases in separate cities. But even knowing that she would have Inge for company, she had dreaded parting from Arvid. They had promised to write daily, letters so rich in detail and expression that they would feel as if they had spent every moment together. They were each other’s most devoted advocate and most insightful critic, partners in all things, colleagues as well as lovers. A mere five hundred kilometers could not change that.

  Once in Berlin, Mildred had settled into Inge’s spare room, and, almost as easily, into her roles as graduate student and lecturer. She
filled her hours with both duties and pleasures—studying, teaching, attending concerts and theater performances—and playing with her young nephews. Arvid visited when he could. One morning a few days after the October 13 riot, he and Mildred took his nephews to the zoo in the Tiergarten. Mildred marveled at how quickly the broken glass had been swept up, the scrawled graffiti painted over. One could almost pretend the new Reichstag had opened to utter tranquility.

  Wulf and Claus seemed to have forgotten the uproar entirely, if they had ever been aware of it. Mildred and Arvid shared smiles as the boys darted from one exhibit to the next, imitating a family of baboons, marveling at the enormity of the elephants. Someday, Mildred hoped, she and Arvid would bring their own children there.

  Even when Arvid could not be with her in Berlin, Mildred found much to love about the city—the museums, the opera, the parks, the theaters, and above all, the renowned university. Some of her new colleagues expressed surprise that a woman from Wisconsin would come to Germany to study for a doctorate in American literature, but she explained that studying American literature from a European perspective helped her to see it more objectively, to better understand her country’s place in the world.

  Berlin also provided some respite from the steadily increasing popularity of the Nazis in Jena and Giessen where she had previously taught. While teaching at the latter, Mildred had been shocked and dismayed when, in response to a university newspaper poll about political preferences, nearly half of the students said they supported the National Socialists. On several unsettling occasions she had witnessed hostile students openly confronting faculty members they suspected of being socialists or pacifists. At the University of Berlin, although increasing numbers of Mildred’s students wore Brownshirt uniforms or Nazi lapel pins to class, they kept their outrage at a simmer rather than a full boil, which was less than ideal but still better than elsewhere.

  On weekends when Arvid could not visit her in Berlin, Mildred went to him in Marburg if she could. She found the city’s Gothic character enchanting, especially after she learned that the Brothers Grimm had collected many of their fairy tales there. Throughout the autumn and into the winter, she and Arvid strolled through the narrow, twisting streets of the medieval district, occasionally accompanied by Arvid’s new friend Egmont Zechlin, a history lecturer at the university. Until the first heavy snowfalls made the trek too difficult, the three enjoyed hiking along the Lahn River or making strenuous climbs up Frauenberg to see the castle ruins, debating politics, the economic crisis, and whether the Soviets were on to something with their Five-Year Plan. Capitalism certainly seemed to have failed both the United States and Germany. Perhaps another economic system entirely would be required to pull them out of the Great Depression.

  Mildred and Arvid spent the Christmas holidays with the extended Harnack clan in Jena, nearly inseparable for a blissful fortnight filled with love and laughter, family and friends. When they parted early in the New Year to return to their separate campuses in far-flung cities, Mildred’s heart ached with loneliness despite the comfort of Inge’s friendship and the distraction of work. And yet as the new term got under way, she glimpsed promising signs that better days were just ahead. In February, quite unexpectedly, the university invited her to present a special lecture on American literature to faculty and students. She chose as her topic “Romantic and Married Love in the Works of Hawthorne,” and she was gratified—and relieved—by the audience’s overwhelmingly positive response.

  More lecture requests followed. “Don’t they know I’m only a graduate student?” she asked Inge over breakfast the morning after her third lecture, still glowing from the unusual honor. “Some people wait their entire careers to lecture at Berlin University, and many more never get the chance.”

  “Who better to lecture on American literature than an American?” said Inge, eyes dancing with their shared happiness.

  To Mildred, both her university and Arvid’s were islands of peace and rationality compared to the roiling sea of unrest surrounding them. Germany seemed more volatile by the day, with street fights between Communist Reds and Nazi Browns erupting frequently.

  “I’m almost not surprised anymore when I read about these brawls in the papers,” she told Arvid one Saturday afternoon in early spring as they strolled down a cobblestone street in Marburg.

  Arvid stopped short and touched her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “Darling, you must never become accustomed to the extraordinary and the outrageous. If you do, little by little, you’ll learn to accept anything.”

  She took his advice to heart, and as spring passed and summer came, and as Nazi belligerence toward women, Communists, and Jews became a daily occurrence, she refused to pretend it was not happening, to let it become background noise like so much passing traffic.

  On August 7, Mildred and Arvid celebrated their fifth anniversary with a two-day excursion to the Black Forest. They hiked through lovely pine and beech forests to a mountain cabin, where they celebrated with flowers and a cake that had survived the journey rather well considering that it had been packed in Arvid’s knapsack. When they discovered two narrow cots where they had expected a bed for two, they laughed, spread blankets on the floor, and made love to the sounds of nightbirds and wind in the trees.

  Afterward, as they lay close together, contented and deliciously fatigued, Arvid took her hand and laced his fingers through hers. “These have been the most wonderful five years of my life.”

  “Mine too,” said Mildred, resting her head on his shoulder, thoroughly content.

  “I have an anniversary gift for you—for us both, really.” He stroked her hair, his fingertips brushing her cheek. “I’ve found a temporary job doing legal work in Berlin beginning in late September. We’ll be together again.”

  She gasped, delighted. “But what about your Habilitationsarbeit?”

  “I’m mostly working on my own at this stage. I can do that in Berlin as easily as in Marburg. I’ll ply my trade by day, write in the evenings, and return to the university once a month to consult with my professors.” He kissed her tenderly. “Are you happy?”

  “I’m beyond happy! I’m overjoyed.”

  “Only one more wish remains to be granted.”

  She smiled wistfully. “We’ve been trying.”

  “Yes, and enjoying every attempt.”

  She laughed lightly to conceal a pang of worry. “I’ll be twenty-nine next month. I can’t help feeling that we’re running out of time.”

  “You mustn’t worry, darling.” Arvid brushed a long strand of golden hair out of her eyes. “We’re still young. Once we’re together for good, it will happen. You’ll see.”

  Mildred nodded, hoping he was right. She had seen her doctor, who confirmed that she was in excellent health. Every morning she did twenty minutes of stomach exercises meant to make conception and childbirth easier. And yet every month her period came, their dream of a baby eluding them yet again.

  “Perhaps I should see another doctor,” Mildred said. “A specialist.”

  Arvid agreed that it could do no harm. “I should see a specialist too,” he added, “but I truly believe if we were together more, these things would sort themselves out.”

  Inge recommended her own gynecologist to Mildred, but before she could arrange an appointment, she learned that a well-known authority on women’s reproductive health would be giving a public lecture in Marburg in the middle of August. Dr. Else Kienle, an outspoken opponent of laws banning abortion and discouraging birth control, had been jailed earlier that year for performing abortions, but she had won her release after a hunger strike. Mildred expected the lecture to be fascinating even if Dr. Kienle did not address her own specific concerns. If no question-and-answer session followed, she could try to speak with the doctor privately afterward.

  Arvid had a prior engagement with Egmont Zechlin and a few other men with whom he hoped to form a new economic study group, so Mildred attended the lecture alone. Although she arriv
ed early, the hall was already quite full, but she found a seat near the back and prepared to take notes. She had expected the audience to be mostly women, so she was surprised to discover many men scattered throughout the rows in groups of three or four. Most of them were clad in Nazi brown.

  Her heart sank. Why else would they be there except to make trouble?

  She checked her watch; the lecture was scheduled to begin at any moment. She glanced over her shoulder at the door, where a few women waiting to enter looked askance at several Brownshirts who sauntered past the queue and looked about imperiously for empty seats. Mildred turned back to face the empty stage and checked her watch again. Surely someone had informed Dr. Kienle that she would face a hostile audience; perhaps she would decline to take the stage. But just as she was wondering if she ought to leave, a white-bearded, stoop-shouldered professor approached the podium and introduced Dr. Kienle.

  The doctor took the stage to resounding applause, but when she shook the professor’s hand and approached the podium, a chorus of piercing whistles went up from the Brownshirts. She regarded them steadily over the rims of her glasses as she arranged her papers, as if she thought they might settle down if she showed no fear. The professor raised his hands for silence, and briefly the unruliness subsided, but as soon as Dr. Kienle began to speak, the men shouted her down, hurling profanities, demanding the closure of birth control clinics, and chanting, “Kinder, Kirche, Küche!” Children, church, kitchen—the alliterative phrase Nazis employed to describe a woman’s proper priorities.

  Dr. Kienle grasped the podium with both hands and spoke in a loud, clear, energetic voice, though nearly every sentence was punctuated with catcalls and jeers from the audience. Mildred listened attentively, determined to learn as much as she could. The doctor persisted, but when she finished her lecture and boldly offered to take questions, the professor shook his head and replaced her at the podium. His concluding remarks were drowned out by another blast of shrill whistles and profane jeers as a younger man swiftly escorted the doctor offstage. Mildred joined in when the rest of the audience applauded thunderously, hoping that Dr. Kienle could hear it and would know she had supporters there. Meanwhile, the Brownshirts strode from the room with military crispness, smug and smiling, well satisfied with having put the doctor in her place.