by Anna Schmidt
With each new fact that Josef flung at her, Beth’s head spun with the implications and the sheer madness of everything he was telling her. People who opposed the Third Reich were dealt with harshly— even Josef’s so-called good Germans. This was not the same as helping a single person or family now and then. This was treason. Yet…
“I have to go,” she muttered as she stepped away from him and held up her hands to prevent him from coming any closer. “I have to think. I have to pray. I have to…”
Josef nodded and remained standing near his desk even as she backed away from him. “Will you come for dinner?”
“I don’t know, Josef. Please…”
He hastily scribbled something on a piece of paper and laid it on the lab table that separated them. “This is my parents’ address. I won’t pressure you, Beth. My mother will expect you at six. If you are not there, I will simply tell my parents that you have decided to return to your home in America.”
He sat down heavily in his desk chair facing away from her, his shoulders slumped in defeat.
“How can you be two places at once? You said you intended to attend that meeting and—”
“I will go there later.”
“And if I decide to come for dinner?”
He did not say anything for so long that she thought perhaps he had not heard her. Finally he turned and looked at her. “Then hopefully you will allow me to walk home to the professor’s with you, and you will then tell me what you have decided staying will mean.”
“Either I stay and join you and the others or…?”
“Or you stay to care for your aunt and Liesl because surely now you understand that Ilse’s fears are very real.” His gaze locked on hers. “And whatever your primary reason for remaining here in Munich, hopefully you will stay because you wish to be with me as I wish to be with you.”
After she left Josef, Beth walked for hours trying to think through all that he had said. To stay or to leave. Going home was a tempting possibility—no, it was something she could actually do. Josef’s father had seen to that. But when she thought of Siggy and especially of Anja and the children, she knew that she would never be content to be safely back on the farm while there had to be hundreds—perhaps thousands—of people like Siggy and Anja just that tiny step away from living without fear.
And then there was Josef.
From the day she had first seen him standing in the doorway of her uncle’s study, she had felt the power of his personality. His quiet certainty. The way he had looked at her with those deep-set eyes as if seeking answers only she might have. And now all these weeks later, what she felt for him was so much more complicated. She had never truly been in love, but if wanting—needing—to be where he was no matter the circumstances was love, then there really was no choice.
It was true that she could go back to America and work to save people like Siggy and Anja. But Josef would not be there. He would be here trying to save the country he loved by distributing essays that could eventually get him arrested and tried for treason.
The very idea that she might never see him again—might never hear his laugh, feel the touch of his hand on hers, feel his very nearness in the dark of an air-raid shelter—was simply unacceptable.
She would stay. The sense of peace and calm that settled over her made her certain that she had listened to God’s still, quiet voice guiding her from within.
Dining with Josef’s parents was several steps higher on the social ladder than the informal and simple suppers with plain, hearty food that Beth was accustomed to sharing with her German family. From the moment she arrived at the address Josef had given her, she was well aware that she was about to enter a world that was so very different from the one she had come to know since moving to Munich.
Certainly she had seen houses like the Buch mansion before. Unlike the apartment-over-shop structures that crowded together in her neighborhood, the homes in Harlaching sat separated from one another by expansive lawns and flower gardens. The gardens were dormant and covered in snow. But even the snow seemed a cut above the gray piles turned to slush that shopkeepers had shoveled away from their doors. The snow here was pristine—untouched by a human footprint and as white as…well, snow, Beth thought.
She smiled and felt herself relax slightly as she continued her way up the front walk toward the double doors of the front entrance to the house. As she would have expected, the windows were dark, the blackout curtains and shades blocking any light that might have ebbed out onto the lawn. But the night sky was clear, and a three-quarter moon provided enough light so she had no trouble at all making her way up the stone steps to a covered portico.
In the distance a clock chimed six. She was precisely on time, and somehow she thought that might actually impress Josef’s father. Before the last stroke of the clock, she pressed the bell. As she waited for someone to open the door, she touched her hair and the collar of her coat to be sure both were reasonably presentable.
She was about to press the doorbell a second time when she heard footsteps coming toward her from the other side of the heavy door. She folded her hands in front of her, clutching her purse, and pasted a smile on her face just as the door swung open.
“Guten Abend, Fräulein Bridgewater.” The man welcoming her was not Josef or his father but rather a servant—or at least she thought he must be a servant. He looked like a character out of a Rosalind Russell movie, and he treated her as if she were royalty. He helped her remove her coat and placed it over his crooked arm. She glanced around for slippers so she could leave her shoes by the door, as was the custom in every German home she had ever visited.
“Your footwear will be fine,” the man said in a voice so quiet that Beth thought she might have actually willed him to reassure her. She wiped her shoes on the small rug anyway.
“If you will follow me,” the man said and actually gave her a little bow before leading the way up a wide staircase to the main floor. When they reached a pair of beautifully polished wooden doors, the servant slid them apart to expose a room that took Beth’s breath away.
It was easily the size of her uncle’s sitting room, study, and kitchen combined. The high ceiling was striped with heavy dark wood beams, and from one of them hung a chandelier of black wrought iron with lights shaped like candle flames. A table surrounded by a dozen heavy mahogany chairs dominated the center of the room, but a matching sideboard was almost as impressive. The table was covered in a beautiful ivory-colored lace cloth, and places were set for the four of them with crystal stemware, china in a delicate floral design, and flatware that Beth had to believe was actual silver. Two matching candelabra with lighted candles had been positioned on either end of a low centerpiece of multicolored roses.
“Fräulein Bridgewater,” the man who had answered the door intoned. All eyes turned to her.
The woman crossed the room, her high heels clicking on the wooden floor. “Danke, Gustav,” she acknowledged the man, and as he nodded and left the room, she turned her attention to Beth. “So you are the young lady my son has been telling us about.” She took Beth’s hand and gently tugged her into the room. “I believe you have already met my husband.”
“Guten Abend, Frau Buch. Herr Buch,” Beth murmured.
“Fräulein,” Josef’s father replied. “May I offer you a glass of Weihenstephaner Hefeweissbier?”
“A fine Bavarian ale,” Josef explained as he came to stand next to her.
“Yes, our son insists we cling to the old ways,” Frau Buch said with a fond smile at Josef. “He’s Bavarian to the core, this one.”
Herr Buch handed her a tall glass filled with a golden liquid crowned with an inch of cream-colored foam. “Heil Hitler,” he said, his eyes never leaving her face as he raised his glass in a toast.
“Oh for heaven’s sake, Detlef,” his wife said, her smile now forced. “Must we bring politics to the table tonight?” She turned to face Beth and raised her glass. “To Elizabeth Bridgewater,” she said, “th
e woman who seems to have captured my son’s heart.”
“Mother, you’re embarrassing Beth,” Josef said, but they all drank to her—even Herr Buch.
“Thank you,” she said after taking a sip of the beer and hoping she didn’t now have a foamy mustache lining her upper lip. “It is my honor to be in your home.”
Gustav entered the room with a small silver tray balanced on one open palm. “Obazda?” he said as he offered a small china plate with the cheese and herb concoction.
“It looks delicious.” She juggled the plate and a napkin along with the glass of the ale. But the plate tipped, and in her haste to right it, the appetizers spilled off the plate onto the Oriental rug and under the large table. “Oh,” Beth squeaked and set her plate and glass on a corner of the table as she bent to retrieve the food. The truth was that she was so embarrassed that she would have happily crawled under the massive table and remained there for the duration of the evening.
“Never mind,” Josef’s mother said immediately. “Our dog is more efficient than the best vacuum cleaner when it comes to searching out and devouring whatever ends up on the floor.” The way she delivered this news made Beth feel as if food rolling off plates and onto the floor was a regular occurrence, and she realized that she liked Frau Buch very much. “Do you have pets, Beth?”
As she raised this question, the hostess placed a duplicate appetizer on Beth’s plate and handed her that and the napkin, leaving the beer sitting where Beth could easily reach it.
“Back home,” Beth began and saw Herr Buch’s thick eyebrows narrow. “In America,” she added, “our family has always had a menagerie of cats and dogs and once a rabbit in addition to the livestock we keep as part of the farm.”
“Chickens and cows and such?”
“And horses,” Beth said. “I have my own horse—or I did when I—”
“Beth has been here in Munich for eight years,” Josef said.
“Why you must have been a mere child when you arrived,” Frau Buch said.
“I was seventeen.”
“By now you are practically a native then,” Frau Buch said. “Isn’t that right, Detlef?”
“If you and our son say so,” he replied with an enigmatic smile at Beth.
Josef’s mother continued to direct the conversation, asking Beth questions about her parents and her brothers and their families. “You must miss them all so very much,” she sighed.
“I do.”
“And yet you have remained here in spite of the changing times,” Herr Buch said.
The man was baiting her, waiting and watching from his place in the shadows where the light from the chandelier did not quite reach.
“My aunt is not well.” Beth turned her attention to Frau Buch, ignoring Josef’s father. “She has been ill for several years now since the birth of her daughter. I would very much like to go home to my parents and siblings, but in our faith we place the greater good of the group ahead of our own personal wants.”
“You and your family follow the traditions of the Religious Society of Friends, do you not?”
“That’s right.” Beth wondered if it was Josef or his father who had provided this information.
Josef’s father took a step toward her. “From what I know of your beliefs, it would appear that they have much in common with Herr Hitler’s doctrine of Service before Self.”
“I don’t understand.”
“In your faith,” he continued, “do you not place the needs of the entire community above the needs of the individual?”
“That is not exactly—”
“I’m sure we could debate the semantics of the matter, Fräulein. But the fact is that our philosophies are similar. We Germans are dedicated to placing the good of our country above our own personal and selfish desires.”
“Oh my goodness, Detlef,” Frau Buch said without a trace of embarrassment, “come down off your soapbox. It is just us—no need to crow the party line here.”
Beth was shocked at the woman’s directness and even more shocked when she saw Josef’s father smile as he took a sip of his beer.
“Frau Buch, you have such a lovely home,” Beth said, trying to come up with some topic of conversation that held little possibility of leading to further debate about her religion or politics.
Josef’s mother smiled wistfully. “When I was a girl, we were so very poor even before the war—that war,” she amended with a flicker of a glance at her husband. “It’s because of my past that we have all of this,” she added, waving her hand to encompass the fine furnishings of the room. “It’s shameful, I know, especially when there are so many people who are struggling but…”
Her voice trailed off, and for the first time all evening, she seemed less than sure of herself. Herr Buch stepped to her side and put his hand on her cheek. “You deserve beautiful things, my dear.”
But did she? Did anyone when, as Josef’s mother had pointed out, there were others suffering? Beth thought of Anja and her family, and suddenly she felt as if the expansive walls with their fine paintings were closing in around her. She gripped the high back of the nearest dining chair.
“Are you all right?” Josef asked as he relieved her of the glass that was in danger of tipping. Once again all eyes turned to her.
“We should eat,” Herr Buch announced. He had a way of speaking that left little room for discussion or debate. He did not raise his voice, and yet his words were delivered with undeniable authority.
“Of course,” his wife said and signaled the servant to clear away the plates and glasses from the appetizers. “Beth, please take this place across from Josef.”
Josef pulled the chair away from the table for Beth while his father did the same for his mother. Beth studied the array of polished sterling flatware lined up to either side of her plate. She knew enough to realize that every utensil represented a separate course for the meal. Across from her she saw that Josef was also looking at the elaborate place setting and lavish meal set out for them.
“I don’t know, Mother,” he said with a grin, “if we eat all of this, what are the chances that we’ll be able to move for hours? We don’t want to be the cause of Beth being out past curfew.”
Where Beth’s aunt would have taken the comment for criticism, Josef’s mother simply smiled. “I happen to have influence with someone who can extend the curfew for our guest if it suits him to do so,” she said and winked at her husband.
The look of pure adoration that Herr Buch gave his wife was something that Beth had never seen pass between two people other than her parents. For all of his stern demeanor, Josef’s father adored his wife. And if he was capable of such utter devotion for one human being, might he not find it in his heart to have compassion even for those he did not know?
As he did for me in getting me a new visa?
Beth’s spirits swelled with hope rather than the usual dread she felt in the presence of persons of authority in the Third Reich. She understood now why God had led her to this table with these people. She was meant to stay in Munich and continue the work she had begun when she rescued first Siggy and then Anja.
She relaxed for the first time all evening. She even engaged in the conversation led mostly by Josef’s mother as they worked their way through each course. Finally when dessert had been served and real coffee poured, Beth cleared her throat and turned to face Josef’s father.
“Herr Buch? If you agree, I would very much like to extend my stay in Munich to care for my aunt and my cousin.” She could feel Josef’s eyes on her and knew that he understood that she had made her decision. But her true reasons for wanting to stay went well beyond her desire to help her uncle and aunt. She would stay so that she could continue to seek out others in need and help them. She would stay because to return to the safety of the farm in Wisconsin knowing there were people like Siggy and Anja—terrified, hungry, destitute with no place to turn—would be unthinkable.
The silence that greeted her request was far more dea
fening than if Herr Buch had suddenly stood up and begun to shout at her the way Herr Hitler seemed inclined to do.
Josef’s mother glanced from her son to her husband to Beth. “You wish to remain here when you could have safe passage home to your family in America?”
“I do. And earlier today, when he extended the invitation for dinner, Herr—”
Frau Buch smiled. “Well, well, well,” she murmured softly. “Isn’t that romantic?”
“You are an American, Fräulein,” Herr Buch reminded her. “You must understand that the very fact that our country and yours are at war makes everything more difficult.”
“Freunde do not believe that war is an answer,” she said and remembered her aunt mocking her when she had made a similar comment the first night that Josef had moved into the attic.
“To be sure I am hearing you clearly, Fräulein, you wish to extend your stay because of your aunt’s health issues in spite of the risk you take for yourself?”
“That’s true.”
“Really, Detlef,” Josef’s mother murmured, “you said yourself that she’s been here long enough that she’s practically a native. Her mother is a native, and surely that counts for something. Besides she is little more than a child herself—surely you cannot believe she poses any sort of threat to the Reich.”
Herr Buch smiled at his wife as if she were the child. “You would be amazed at the kinds of mischief these so-called children can manage, my dear.”
“That may be, but does not the government offer protection for Jews married to one of our own? And if we would do that for those people, then surely a good German…”
Beth cringed at the way the woman spoke the words Jew and those people as if such words left a bitter taste on her tongue. On the other hand she was certainly making the case for Beth to stay on in Munich. The debate between Josef’s parents continued as Josef and Beth concentrated on eating. She realized that he was nearly as uncomfortable as she was, and that surprised her. It was the clearest evidence yet of how far his views about the war and the role of Germany in the world were from those shared by his parents.