We had struggled to find the right epitaph to be inscribed on her headstone, finally settling on: “We hope she found the peace she was looking for.”
After William solemnly laid a long-stemmed white rose on the grave, Aunt Martha took him home. Robert and I stood at the gravesite a few minutes longer, both of us lost in our thoughts about this woman who lay before us, far below in the ground.
Finally, I broke the silence. “I think you were right.”
“What could I possibly have been right about?” he said, still looking down at the fresh grave. “I’m shocked to hear those words from you.” He glanced at me with a puzzled look on his face.
“Ruth and I are a little bit alike.”
He groaned. “Oh Louisa, I never should have said that. Please forget it.”
“She even said so herself. But I disagreed with her reason,” I admitted. “Anyway, just a little bit alike. We both are, were, no, I mean, are stubborn women.”
“Pushy, too,” Robert added.
I raised an eyebrow at him.
“And you both think you’re right about everything and everybody.”
I frowned at him.
“But there’s a big difference between you. Ruth wanted everything her way. You’re willing to wrestle with God to make it His way. The difference is…well…quite literally, it’s a difference between life and death.” He looked back down at Ruth’s grave.
“Now there’s an interesting sermon topic,” I said with a half-smile.
Robert turned to me. “You know, for one brief moment, that day you disappeared, before I realized that William was gone, too, before I realized Mueller had taken you, before I found the ring, I thought that maybe you…,” his voice trailed off.
It slowly dawned on me what he was trying to say. I turned to face him. “But you knew, didn’t you? Robert, you knew I wouldn’t have left. You knew that, didn’t you?” I searched his eyes for my answer.
It was important to me he knew he could trust my promise, even if it was made hastily before a judge to ensure my citizenry. I might share stubbornness and pushiness and self-righteousness with Ruth, but that was where the similarities ended. I kept my promises. I was not like her.
He looked at me and smiled. “I knew.”
I stepped a little closer to him and slipped my hands into his. “There is just one other thing more I haven’t told you. Something I did tell to Ruth.”
He took a step closer to me.
“I told her I loved you.”
Then he kissed me, gently at first, then with deep feeling, not even caring we were right in front of Ruth’s grave. Rather symbolic, I felt. Ruth’s hold was finally broken.
Epilogue
Not long afterwards, Robert and I had an official church ceremony to, what Robert called, really ‘seal the deal.’ Reverend Hubbell, the retired supply minister from Douglas, was kind enough to do the honors. The judge’s wife banged out her rendition of Mendelssohn’s Wedding March on the organ, a special request by Robert as a surprise for me. The musicianship might not have been stellar, but I suspect Felix Mendelssohn would have been delighted to know his music was being played and appreciated in Copper Springs, Arizona.
Our courtship began on our wedding day. We started our life together with a renewed optimism, as the war in Europe slowly drew to conclusion.
The world of the Allies rejoiced, on April 30th, 1945, when Adolf Hitler committed suicide by shooting himself in the mouth after poisoning his mistress.
Hitler’s Thousand Year Reich had crumbled within a decade.
One week later, Germany surrendered unconditionally. Hitler’s henchmen scattered like rats to a sewer system. Some were found in the days and months and even years following the war, but Heinrich Mueller, head of the German Gestapo, has not been found. Nor has his cousin, Friedrich Mueller of Copper Springs, Arizona. Fortunate fools. But one day, I take comfort in the fact they will stand to be reckoned with before the Almighty Lord.
Hearing of Hitler’s death made us eagerly expect to learn of Dietrich’s release from prison. We were anxious to tell him our story and the role he played in bringing us together. He was never to learn of it. To our great sorrow, we heard that Dietrich’s trial had finally happened, after two years in horrible prisons with appalling, inhumane conditions, just three weeks before Hitler died.
In the kangaroo court of Nazi Germany, Dietrich and his brother-in-law Hans had been found guilty of treason and were hanged on April 9th, just one week before the Allies reached the camp where he had been held in Flossenberg. No one was notified of their death, not even Dietrich’s parents. They finally heard of their son’s death on a radio broadcast from the BBC.
When the news finally reached us, and we heard of the gruesome details of his execution, we both wept for our beloved friend. Heaven’s gain was earth’s loss.
* * * *
The townsfolk of Copper Springs survived. Perhaps because no one went unscathed, it was easier for the town to help each other get through Herr Mueller’s devastating deception. Even his own wife, Hilda Mueller, was left penniless and homeless. Amazingly, she knew nothing of her husband’s secret life.
In a remarkable show of charity, the town embraced her. She started working part-time as a receptionist at Ramon’s Barber Shop and part-time as a hostess at Rosita’s Cocina, a little Mexican restaurant the Gonzalves’ opened up not long after their baby boy was born.
Herr Mueller’s house, which had been heavily mortgaged so that he could free up the cash to take with him, was auctioned off for a penance to the bankrupt town and has become the new Copper Springs library and town offices.
And an interesting development happened in the local churches. They started filling up. Emptied bank accounts made for full churches.
Ruth’s death ended up being a blessing, easier to handle than her abandonment, for her death brought closure. William and Robert healed together, and this time, their wounds healed strong.
William’s language skills and speech have continued to develop so clearly he is now understood by many people in Copper Springs. He is starting to read and write and can lip read so well Robert and I can no longer have a conversation without his input.
Once a month, we take him to Violet Morgan, the retired teacher in Bisbee, for tutoring, and we always stop by the Prospector’s Diner to visit Wilma and check on her newest waitress, Glenda. In a fitting touch of irony, Glenda sold Mueller’s ring at our repeated insistence and used the proceeds to make a down payment on a little home for her and her red-haired nephew, Tommy.
All too soon, we are going to have to seriously consider letting William attend the Southwestern School for the Deaf. But I have another idea I’ve been mulling over, in which William might be allowed to go to the local public school. I’m still working on a strategy to persuade Robert.
There’s something else I need to tell him, first. William is going to have a new role soon, as a big brother. For a month or so now, I’ve been feeling suspiciously similar to how I felt after Ada’s visit. I’ve already chosen the baby’s names. If a girl, she’ll be Marta. If this baby is a boy, his name will be Dietrich.
Aunt Martha has let me start to teach her to play the piano though we’ve been on the same beginner’s piece for three months now. One thing I’ve learned about Aunt Martha, if I accept her where she is and give her time, she can surprise me.
A book I had once read described good and evil as equal and opposing forces: the yin and the yang. Natives in Southeast Asia wore fabric skirts made of a large black and white checked pattern, like a checkerboard, to symbolize the balance of good and evil.
I think they’re wrong. I have seen, with my own eyes, how good is greater than evil, God is greater than Satan, and God’s good ultimately triumphs. The scales of light weigh heavier than the scales of darkness. And as dark as the night can get, and it can get very dark, indeed, the sun will rise and expose the day.
Copper Fire
Book 2
; Chapter One
I’ll never forget that summer night. Our last vestige of normalcy. One evening we sat down to dinner, and by the time we finished, our lives would never be the same.
It was a beastly hot night in early July, 1945. We were celebrating William’s seventh birthday with his favorite dinner: hot dogs and baked beans.
“You’re not eating, Louisa. I hope you’re not sick,” Aunt Martha said, peering at my face to discern an ailment, probably worried it might be contagious. Aunt Martha belonged to my husband, Robert. It was whispered among the church ladies that she hadn’t smiled since the Hoover Administration. Just the other day, I overheard one woman asking another if the preacher’s aunt had been baptized in pickle juice.
“I’m just not very hungry tonight,” I told Aunt Martha.
“That’s certainly not like you, Louisa,” said Robert, glancing up at me, looking a bit concerned.
It was true. I wasn’t one of those women who scarcely ate. I never missed a meal. I brushed Robert’s cheek with my hand then deftly changed the subject. “Time to open the presents.”
William ripped off the newspaper wrapping of the present I had handed to him. “Junior Spy Kit,” he read slowly, in his thick sounding pronunciation, pressing his small finger along the lettering.
“A spy kit?” Robert’s eyebrows shot up. “Why on earth would you give a spy kit to a boy already blessed with an overabundance of curiosity?”
“Exactly because of that, Robert,” I reassured him. “He can practice his reading, his writing, his observation skills, his attention-to-detail. He’ll be learning as he plays. I’ve been reading a book that encourages deaf children to develop their awareness of life around them. It’s a good thing for him.”
“He’ll be spying on everyone in this town!” complained Aunt Martha. “No one will be safe.” She pursed her lips in that way I deplored. “You’ve been telling him stories again about being a resister.”
“A Resistance Worker, Aunt Martha,” I corrected her, frowning. She had never fully understood the role I played working with the Resistance Movement in Germany. To her, it seemed like child’s play. But I took my experience as a Resistance Worker very seriously. Very, very seriously. It was a dangerous but important job.
Well, mostly, I delivered messages to other Resistance Workers. Written messages. In sealed envelopes. While on assignment, I wasn’t even permitted to talk. My colleagues seemed to be under the impression that I was too outspoken. Dietrich, my friend and mentor, often remarked that he was sure I would get myself shot if I dared to open my mouth.
So I didn’t.
Even still, the Gestapo started following us, tapping our phones. Everywhere I went, an agent watched me, not caring if I saw him or not. Over my objections, Dietrich decided I should leave Germany, at once, and wait out the war in the United States. Before I knew it, Dietrich whisked me off in the dark of night to the Swiss border. After a rushed goodbye, I was in the hands of Resistance Workers, passed like fragile baggage from contact to contact.
One month later, I had arrived in Copper Springs, Arizona, to stay indefinitely at the home of Reverend Robert Gordon, courtesy of our mutual friend Dietrich Bonhoeffer. The two men had attended the Union Theological Seminary in New York in 1931 and became friends. They had kept in touch over the years. When Dietrich asked if he would sponsor someone for safekeeping, Robert readily agreed, assuming it would be a young man. The surprised look on his face when I stepped off that train will forever make me smile.
Once or twice I have wondered if Robert would still have agreed so readily had he known all that decision would hold for him.
William was studying the bubbles in his root beer bottle. He looked up at Robert. “Mom was brave.” Even though William wasn’t really my son, the bond between us was as strong as any between a mother and child.
“You’re right, William,” Robert said. “She was brave.” He stole a glance at Aunt Martha and noticed she was peering into a pot on the stove. Satisfied she was preoccupied, he leaned over and kissed the violin curve of my neck before getting up to refill his glass of iced tea.
Was I brave? Not really. I never felt very brave. But I never doubted I was doing the right thing. I was a Resistance Worker because I couldn’t help myself. The war had to be stopped. Hitler had to be stopped.
Just then, someone knocked on the door. Robert went to open it and found Ernest standing solemnly on the porch. “Come in and join us! We’re celebrating William’s birthday.”
“Thank you, but I’m here on official business, Reverend. I have a telegram for your missus.” Ernest handed the telegram to Robert and abruptly left. I looked at Robert, puzzled.
He shrugged. “Open it. It’s for you.” He held it out to me.
I tore open the envelope, not having any idea about its contents or who might have sent it. But as I pulled the thin yellow paper out of the envelope, our lives irrevocably changed.
* * * *
The next morning, I heard Aunt Martha complaining to Robert in the kitchen by means of a radiator pipe that, if the cap was unscrewed, offered a direct transmission of information sent. Nearly as clear as if I were in the kitchen. I hadn’t intended to continue my habit of eavesdropping. I really hadn’t. Before Robert and I married, it was a useful means, though admittedly shameful, to understand more about the very private Gordon family. Aunt Martha and Robert often had conversations that excluded me. After we were married, I persuaded Robert to move into my room rather than have me move into his room. But it wasn’t because I wanted to stay close to my radiator pipe.
It was because of Ruth.
I didn’t mind living in the same house where Robert had lived with his wife, Ruth, before she abandoned him and William for another man. After all, I’m a pragmatic woman. I had cooked in her kitchen, showered in her shower, and taken her place in the heart of this family.
But my pragmatism stopped at the bedroom. When I asked Robert if he would be willing to move down the hall into my room, he looked at me for a long moment and then answered, “Of course.” I didn’t need to explain. He understood.
Unfortunately, that meant I was constantly faced with the temptation to unscrew the top of my radiator pipe and listen in to conversations in the kitchen below. Ordinarily, I could resist. But not this morning. Not about this topic.
“You’re going to let her go? And get that child?” I heard Aunt Martha say.
Robert cleared his throat, stalling. “We haven’t decided what to do yet, Aunt Martha.”
“But you’re thinking about it, aren’t you? How can you even think such a thing? Taking in a child from another country?”
“Aunt Martha, she’s Louisa’s cousin. She’s just been released from a labor camp. She has no one else. No one! How could we ignore that?”
“Well, the Red Cross sent you that telegram. They’ll know best how to take care of her. They must have orphanages for her kind.”
Then there was silence. I could just imagine Robert’s spine stiffening. “What exactly do you mean by her ‘kind’?”
Aunt Martha had very brittle requirements about people and an unpleasant tendency to stereotype people into clumps. In this particular situation, she meant Jewish people. I heard the water running in the sink as she started to wash dishes. She wasn’t answering his question.
“Louisa is one of that ‘kind’,” Robert countered.
“She’s different.”
“You didn’t think so when she first arrived. You were quite cold, as I recall. But after getting to know her and understand her, after giving her a chance, now you love her like a daughter.”
Like a daughter? Well, that was quite a stretch, but Robert’s loyalty turned my heart soft. Many times, I could barely hold my tongue from telling Aunt Martha how I felt about her steady stream of opinions, but he always knew how to gently reason with her. Unlike me, he was often able to change her mind.
“Aunt Martha, what if circumstances were different and that child was Willi
am? What if he was left without anyone?” he asked, his words soft and unhurried.
My guilt vanished at once. That was the very line of reasoning I had used with Robert last night! I was pleased to hear him repeat it. I wasn’t always convinced he listened to me.
“Just how old is this child?”
“Louisa thinks she’s about twelve or thirteen.”
“Nearly grown, Robert. It just doesn’t seem right to take a nearly grown woman out of her homeland.”
Now, she’s suddenly a woman, I thought, rolling my eyes. I heard dishes clinking in the sink.
“If you ask me, you’re both flying blind with the windshield iced over.”
I cocked my head, puzzled. What could that possibly mean? Just when I thought I had learned all of her bromides, she came up with a new one.
He sighed. “Aunt Martha, when Louisa and I decide what we’re going to do, I will let you know. This is very fresh news.” I heard him put his coffee cup down. “But one thing I do know, you can’t abandon your family.”
The truth was that we had stayed up late into the night discussing the contents of this telegram. I had no idea that my little cousin, Elisabeth, was even still alive. I hadn’t seen her in years. She and her mother, my father’s sister, had gone into hiding during the war. I had tried to find them, to send them care packages and money, but I never discovered a single clue of their whereabouts. Not one.
At first, I thought that might have been a good sign, that they were safely hidden. As time passed, though, I had an unsettled feeling about their safety. And here in Copper Springs, I couldn’t do anything about that worry. Well, other than pray, of course. I had never stopped praying for them.
Then came the telegram from the Red Cross. It stated that Elisabeth had just been released from a labor camp. From Dachau, near München, the first of the camps designed by Hitler. One of the worst. And there was no mention of her mother, which was definitely not a good sign.
The Copper Series Page 24