The War I Finally Won

by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

  “This entire country is cold.” She sat down at her desk and picked up a pencil. “I’m working.”

  “Do you have any pictures of your grandmother? Of any of your family?”

  “None of your business,” Ruth said.

  I said, “I’m not your enemy.”

  She looked up at me silently.

  I said, “I’m not.”

  She said, “But I’m German. I’m your enemy. Remember?”

  I said, “You hate Hitler more than I do.”

  Ruth nodded. “Very true. But I still won’t tell you about my grandmother.”

  I waited. After a pause she spoke again, looking down at her desk. “If I start letting things out of my heart,” she said, “if I talk to you, if I bring out the photographs, I will fall to pieces. I won’t be able to endure living here. I won’t be able to learn what I need to learn to help my family. If I crack at all, I will come undone.”

  She kept her voice absolutely quiet and even.

  I said, “I know how that feels.”

  “I thought you did,” she said. “Now go away.”

  Chapter 31

  That was the last cold snap. Spring arrived with bits of green, and an enormous white pig came to live in the pen in our back garden. Susan and Lady Thorton named her Mrs. Rochester. In a few months she was going to farrow, which meant have babies, and the babies were going to be pig club pigs.

  Pig clubs were a war thing. Groups of people combined their food scraps and fed them to a baby pig. When the pig was grown and slaughtered, the whole group shared its meat. Pig clubs turned leftovers no one could eat into pork chops and bacon. You could almost never find pork chops in the shops anymore.

  Every day, Mrs. Elliston, the wife of the man who farmed the Thortons’ estate, collected her potato peels and gristle and other leftovers in a bucket. Fred added his, and I carried the bucket home from the stables. Susan added our scraps and boiled the stinking mess into slop for Mrs. Rochester. It was a lot of work.

  Jamie loved Mrs. Rochester. He fed her, gave her water, scraped up her manure, spread fresh straw for bedding, scratched her back with a stick, and sang to her, for all I knew. I avoided her as much as possible. Ruth, on the other hand, liked her. “She’s a very friendly pig,” Ruth said.

  Ruth moved a small table and one of the old kitchen chairs out to the back garden. She studied there, in a patch of sunshine beside the pigpen, with Bovril on her lap and the chickens pecking the grass near her feet.

  “Did you have pigs in Germany?” I asked her.

  “Of course not. Jews don’t eat pork.”

  “I meant for a pet,” I said. “Not to eat them.”

  She looked up. “No one keeps pigs for a pet. We had horses and a dog. That’s all.”

  “How many horses?”

  “Three. One each for my father, my mother, and me.” She scratched behind Bovril’s ears. The cat kneaded his claws into her leg. She didn’t mind. “When I was very small I had a gray pony named Schneeflocke. Snowflake. When I outgrew him we gave him to my younger cousins.”

  “What are cousins?” I reached for Penelope. She scuttled away.

  “My mother’s brother’s children,” Ruth said. “If you have a child one day, and Jamie has a child, they will be cousins.”

  It was irritating that Ruth knew English words I didn’t. I said so. “I started learning English in school,” she replied. “The rest I learned fast at the internment camp. I worked hard. I knew I needed to be fluent to go to university.”

  “Why do you care about university?”

  “I want to be like my father,” Ruth said.

  My father had worked on the docks. All the fathers I grew up with did.

  “Where are your cousins now?”

  “You’re asking a lot of questions,” Ruth said. I didn’t respond. She sighed. “They’re still in Germany,” she said. “My mother’s father and brother were both cavalrymen in the German Army. My uncle fought for Germany in the First World War. So he feels safe in Germany, even though he’s Jewish. He thinks other Germans will respect his service to the country.”

  “He’s fighting against us?”

  “He’s not fighting anyone,” Ruth said. “He’s too old to fight now.”

  “But he fought against us before?”

  “Yes,” Ruth said. “He’s a good German. You can’t blame him for that.”

  Of course I could. Germans were the enemy. Every time I was about to forget that, Ruth reminded me.

  Ruth shook her head. “I know it’s very difficult to get mail from Germany right now.”

  “Still nothing from your grandmother?”

  “Nothing from any of them.”

  • • •

  Maggie came home for the two weeks surrounding Easter. Her first night back we stayed awake late in our bedroom. “I’m worried about Jonathan and I’m worried about Mum and I’m lonely and I want to be home. You’re here. It isn’t fair.” She whispered to me across the space between our beds. We’d left the blackout down and moonlight streamed through the window. “I really hate school. I didn’t used to, but I do now.”

  I told Maggie about Ruth’s grandmother. I said, “Jamie and I must have had a grandmother too.”

  “Well, of course,” said Maggie. “Two of them.”

  I shivered. Perhaps my grandmothers had been as nasty as my mother. Perhaps it was lucky I couldn’t remember them.

  “It’s too bad you don’t have anything from your home in London,” Maggie said. “Your mother must have left some things behind.”

  Maggie loved me, but she could never understand what my life in London had been like. Only Stephen White and Jamie had known. I didn’t hear from Stephen and I hoped Jamie had forgotten. “My family didn’t have anything extra,” I said. “Photographs or books or anything like that.” I stuck my right foot out of the bedcovers. “I have this scar. That’s how I remember my mother.”

  “Susan gave you that scar. Not your mother. It’s a good scar.”

  “I suppose.”

  “You’ve got other scars, though too, don’t you?” Maggie rolled onto her back. I could see her hands clasp the edge of her bedsheets. “Everyone does. Invisible ones.”

  I took a deep breath. In, out. I thought of being up in the steeple, where it hurt to breathe. I could not really imagine Maggie having scars.

  She kept talking. “So you understand what it’s like at school, everyone afraid, and all the news of people dying. That wretched telegraph boy bicycling up the drive.”

  • • •

  Ruth was even quieter around Maggie than she was around me. “Does she ever talk?” Maggie asked.

  I shrugged. “Sometimes. Not really.”

  Jamie said, “She talks to me. When you two go ride.”

  • • •

  Susan said the Friday before Easter was called Good Friday. It was a special day to remember Jesus dying on the cross. “But this year,” she said, that morning, “it also happens to be a special day for Ruth. It’s the first day of a Jewish holiday called Passover.” Before dinner Susan poured salt water into several small bowls. She had Maggie set one next to each of our plates. She handed me several sprigs of parsley. “Put one beside each bowl,” she said.

  “Where’d you get the parsley?” We’d started planting our garden, but the only things sprouting so far were radishes and lettuce.

  “Mrs. Elliston had some wintering over in her cold frame,” Susan said. She opened a bottle of Lady Thorton’s wine, something she rarely did, and poured a small amount into a glass set by every place. “It’s not much but at least Ruth will know we are thinking of her.”

  • • •

  When Ruth saw the table with the wine and the parsley, her hands flew to her mouth. Her eyes filled with tears. “Oh, thank you,” she said.

 
; “I don’t know how to do a real seder,” said Susan.

  Ruth said, “But you knew it was Passover.” As we sat down, Ruth said that on the first night of Passover, her whole family would get together for a special meal called a seder. Wine, parsley, and salt water were part of the seder meal.

  “I went to a seder once at university,” said Susan. “Would you like to ask the four questions?”

  Ruth looked at Jamie. “Usually the youngest person asks them.”

  “What are the four questions?” Jamie said.

  Ruth took a deep breath. She said, “The first is, ‘Why is this night different from all others?’”

  Jamie put down his fork. He settled his hands in his lap. He repeated, “Why is this night different from all others?”

  Ruth sat very still. After a pause she said, “We dip parsley in salt water because we replace our tears with gratitude.” She picked up her parsley, dipped it into the bowl, and ate it. So did Susan and Jamie, Maggie, and, after a pause, Lady Thorton, and me.

  Salty bitterness filled my mouth. It tasted like tears.

  Chapter 32

  I couldn’t take Ruth up the church steeple—the village would never let a German fire-watch—but on a clear night a few weeks later, I stayed up until dark and took her outside. There were trees all around the cottage, but we went down the lane until we had an open view of the night sky.

  “Susan showed me pictures in the sky,” I said. “A plow and a dragon.”

  Ruth shrugged. “Sure. I know about them. You think the English invented astronomy? Kepler was a German.”

  “Who’s Kepler?” Sounded like Hitler.

  Ruth laughed. “Oh, Ada. Why did you drag me outside?”

  “I wanted you to see this.” The stars made me feel better. Perhaps they would help Ruth too. I said, “Maybe your grandmother is looking at these stars. The same ones. Maybe right now.”

  Ruth pressed her lips together. “What do you want me to say?” she asked, after a pause.

  “Nothing,” I said. “I thought you needed to see them, that’s all.”

  She walked back toward the house. “Don’t worry about what I need.”

  • • •

  On May 13, 1941, I celebrated my real birthday for the first time. I was twelve years old.

  I hadn’t known my birthday until I’d found my birth certificate last September. Susan had made up dates to put on our identity cards. She had celebrated our pretend birthdays too.

  Mam never celebrated birthdays. Mam never celebrated anything.

  Maggie was back at school, but Ruth and Jamie picked flowers from the hedgerows and covered the breakfast table with them. Susan gave me a piece of bacon and a whole fried egg for breakfast. She and Lady Thorton stacked presents by my plate—new books, three of them.

  It was too much. Church-steeple panic crawled across my skin. I handed the bacon to Jamie. I pushed the books out of sight. I made myself choke down the egg. Susan would be angry if I wasted it.

  I should have been used to birthdays. Mam should have celebrated my birthdays.

  “It’s okay,” Susan said, watching my face. “Whatever you feel, it’s okay.” She put her arms around me.

  “Why didn’t she love me?” I whispered.

  “Because she was broken,” she said. “Remember that. She was broken, not you.”

  I had the bad foot, but the foot worked better now. The foot wasn’t the reason. Something else must be wrong with me. Most mothers loved their children.

  I went out to the garden. Ruth followed. “Why are you afraid?” she asked.

  “I’m not afraid,” I said. “I’m never afraid.”

  “Huh,” she said. “You also say there’s nothing wrong with your foot.”

  “That foot,” I said, “is a very long way from my brain.”

  She arched her eyebrows. “Of course,” she said. “Who thought it wasn’t?”

  “I’m going to the stables,” I said. “I’m going for a ride.” I took two steps down the path, then turned back to Ruth. “Want to come?”

  Chapter 33

  “It’s my birthday,” I told Fred. “Ruth’s riding with me to celebrate.”

  Fred’s mouth worked back and forth. “Does Lady Thorton know?” he asked.

  “No,” I said. I’d found a pair of Maggie’s old jodhpurs in our wardrobe. They were a little short for Ruth, but she pulled her stockings over them. We’d run to the stables without saying anything to anyone. “Ruth can ride Butter,” I said. “He’s my pony and I can decide who rides him. I’ll ride Ivy.” Maggie wouldn’t mind. Any of the other horses Lady Thorton could get snippy about. “Lady Thorton went to the WVS office,” I said. “She won’t find out. We’ll never tell her.”

  Fred looked at me grimly. “It’s not right,” he said.

  “It is,” I said. “What’s right and what’s permitted are sometimes different things.”

  Fred scratched his head and sighed. “You two be sure to stay away from town.”

  • • •

  On Butter, Ruth could not quit smiling. I’d never seen her smile so much. I said so. “I know,” she replied, laughing as we trotted down the edge of a field. “My cheeks hurt.” She patted Butter’s neck. “What a lovely pony.” She rode with competent ease; Butter looked like he was smiling too.

  I took Ruth to the top of the lookout hill. The sun shone hot and bright. The air smelled like salt and new grass. The sea stretched out wide and blue, with white waves close to shore and nary a fishing boat in sight. Ivy tossed her head. Her long mane brushed my knees.

  “I caught a German spy last summer,” I said. “I was up here, and I saw him in a boat rowing into shore.”

  Ruth raised her eyebrows. “An actual spy?”

  I nodded. “He had a wireless set.”

  “Well, you can rest assured that I am not a spy. I do not have a wireless set.”

  “I know,” I said. “Jamie searched your things when you first came.”

  Ruth looked angry for a second, then burst out laughing. “That’s terrible!” she said. “You are horrible children!”

  It seemed funny, out in the sunshine. We turned the ponies. Ivy began to bounce. “Want to gallop?” I said. “We usually gallop down.”

  “Please!” Ruth shot Butter forward. I followed on her heels.

  I showed Ruth the beach where my spy had landed. We skirted the village, then took a long route through land Maggie’s family owned. Most of the pastures were planted in crops now. Lady Thorton said Mr. Elliston had doubled how many acres he’d put under plow. The government told Mr. Elliston exactly what to grow. “Potatoes, swedes, and flax,” I told Ruth.

  Ruth frowned. “I don’t know flax. What’s that taste like?”

  I shrugged. “Dunno.” I supposed we’d be eating it soon. I’d eaten all sorts of odd things since living with Susan.

  We circled a copse of trees and came upon a tractor stopped at the edge of the field. One of the Land Girls was fiddling with something under its bonnet. The bonnet wouldn’t stay up; it kept slamming onto her elbow.

  “Oi, help me, can’t you?” the Land Girl said.

  I jumped down and gave Ivy’s reins to Ruth.

  “Hold the edge of the blasted bonnet,” said the girl. “It’s not hard to fix, I just need a minute.”

  The Land Girl was barely older than Ruth. She wore a green shirt and rubber boots and pants that had been cut off, short and ragged, above the knee. She banged the engine with a spanner.

  “There, that should do it.” She nodded to me, and I dropped the bonnet. It clanged. “Now to get the blasted thing restarted.” She held her hand out to me. “Thanks for your help. You must be Miss Margaret. I’m Rose.”

  “I’m Ada,” I said, shaking Rose’s hand. “Ada Smith.”

  “Oh. Well, thanks anyhow. Cheers.�
�

  • • •

  “Will she tell?” Ruth asked when I climbed back into the saddle.

  “Tell who?” I said. “The Land Girls barely speak to Fred, let alone Lady Thorton.” We picked up a trot. “Fred doesn’t like the Land Girls. He says they’re lightfoots.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “No idea,” I said, “but I think it sounds fun.”

  We trotted past the potato field now covering the big front lawn of Thorton House. Ruth studied the house. “It’s very grand.”

  “Yes,” I said. “Like a train station.”

  Ruth laughed again. “Very much like a train station,” she said. “You are terrible, Ada. I like you.”

  When we finished riding and had put the ponies away, Ruth changed back into her skirt in the tack room. “I will help with the chores,” she said.

  “Better not,” I said.

  “Yes, I will.”

  “You’ll smell like a horse.”

  Ruth sniffed appreciatively. “Yes. The best smell in the world.” She grinned at me. “Don’t worry. I will visit Mrs. Rochester before I come inside. I will smell like the pig by the time Lady Thorton can sniff me.”

  • • •

  “You look happy,” Susan said to me at dinner. She had made me a birthday cake, a tiny one, with a single candle on top because twelve wouldn’t fit and candles were hard to come by. “Did you go for a ride? Did you have an adventure?”

  I was careful not to look at Ruth. “Butter was marvelous,” I said.

  Lady Thorton smiled. “How nice.”

  • • •

  After that I let Ruth ride Butter once or twice a week, on days Lady Thorton spent in town. Fred muttered until I told him how Ruth’s grandfather and uncle had been in the cavalry. “German cavalrymen were some of the finest horsemen who ever lived,” Fred said. “I was batman to a British cavalryman in the Great War myself, so I know. And just look at her—lovely seat, wonderful hands.”

  • • •

  Ruth rode with strength, patience, and liquid grace. Butter went better for her than he did for me. When I said so, Ruth nodded. “Swing your hips,” she said. “Loosen your muscles. When you try to sit still, the horse bounces you.”