The Ragged Edge of Night

by Olivia Hawker

  He tucks Anita’s letter back in his pocket. He has written her since receiving this note—in fact, they have exchanged several more letters each. But for some reason, it’s this letter in particular that moves him time and again, this one he keeps as a reminder never to accept that God is dead.

  He passes the lane to a small cabin, tucked several yards back from the road behind a paling fence with a thick backdrop of tall cottage flowers. The flowers are woefully overgrown, an untended jungle of color and sweet perfume. The little house hasn’t been used for some time—it is, or was, the country home of some wealthy city dweller. Who can say whether the owner is still living? But he hears a voice coming from the cabin, high and thin and small. He pauses, straining to listen, caught by some instinct he can’t yet identify. Then he realizes it’s Maria’s voice. Maria is singing—to herself, as far as he can tell—inside the little house.

  Anton checks his pocket watch. It’s barely past the lunch hour; the girl should be in school. A vague yet pressing fear needles him. This is not routine, not right; wary of some half-formed danger and with a sudden, protective energy, Anton hurries through the gate and up the lane, brushing the overgrown flowers from his path. Petals scatter in the uncut grass.

  The cabin’s door swings on its hinges, left carelessly ajar. He calls out, “Hello? Who’s there?”

  Maria stops singing.

  “Maria? Is it you?” No adult answers his call, so he opens the door wider and steps inside.

  “I’m here.” Maria sounds annoyed, and disappointed at being found.

  He turns in place, searching the sitting room, but the house appears empty. Dust lies thick and pale on the furniture.

  “Where are you, girl?”

  “I’m here, Vati.”

  He finds her sitting cross-legged behind the sofa, a great pair of black scissors in one hand and a magazine in the other. The floor is covered in a snowfall of paper scraps.

  “For goodness’ sake, what are you doing?”

  “Cutting,” she says. As if to prove her point, she snips at a page of the magazine, clumsily cutting around the outline of a woman’s body. The woman, fresh-faced and smiling, leaves the artificial realm of her soap ad and trembles in Maria’s hand.

  “You naughty child!” Anton whisks magazine and scissors out of her hands; she looks up at him, her hard, affronted eyes filling with tears.

  “I’m only making paper dolls!”

  It’s then that Anton sees all the girl has done. More magazines poke out from beneath the sofa—a few books, too. Some lie open, their illustrated pages mangled with ragged cuts. Anton shifts his glasses and rubs his eyes. He can only hope the books weren’t valuable.

  “Maria! Don’t you know it’s wrong to enter a house that isn’t your own?”

  She climbs to her feet and braces belligerent little fists on her hips. “That’s not in the Bible! God never said so.”

  “That doesn’t mean you aren’t doing wrong.” She is only seven. How has a girl so young developed such contrary habits? Elisabeth spoke the truth when she said Maria was as mischievous as the Lord ever made a girl to be. “Why aren’t you at school?”

  “I don’t like school. I haven’t gone in ever so long.”

  His hand falls from his face; the glasses drop too low on his nose. He stares down at the girl, astonished. “How long, exactly?”

  Maria shrugs. “Since it got sunny and warm. I decided it was funner to be out playing, so I go out and play.”

  “But your brothers walk you to the schoolhouse.” He’ll have to speak to them, and sternly, too. The boys must drift off, playing soldiers along the road, failing to keep their eyes on Maria. Such neglect of duty is dangerous at the best of times, but now, when any moment a plane might appear over the crest of a hill, laden with bombs—

  “They do walk me, and Al holds my hand the whole way.”

  A sigh of relief. “Then why are you here?”

  She beams at him, pleased with herself. “I tell the teacher I must go to the bathroom. She lets me go, because if she doesn’t, I’ll pee myself.”

  “And then you never return?” He fights to hold back a laugh. She may be a bad little girl, but at least she is clever.

  Coolly, with a decidedly grown-up air, Maria nods.

  It’s a wonder the girl’s teacher hasn’t yet spoken to Anton and Elisabeth. The poor woman must be run ragged, keeping up with all her students—and Maria can easily make as much trouble as five ordinary children.

  “A few times,” Maria says proudly, “my teacher said, ‘I’ll go with you, to see that you find your way back from the bathroom.’ But I just stayed inside and said, ‘I’m not done yet!’ until she went back to the classroom.”

  “Merciful Mother. That poor woman.”

  “She’s not a poor woman! She’s dreadful and I don’t like her one bit.”

  Anton suspects the feeling may be mutual. “Your teacher must be onto your tricks by now.”

  “She is harder to fool now. Last time, she told me she would make me sit in my chair and she didn’t care if I wet myself in front of the whole classroom; I would have to sit in my own mess until school was out.”

  “What did you do, then, to escape?” Anton isn’t certain he wants to know.

  “Once I faked a sick stomach and ran outside to throw up in the bushes. But I didn’t throw up. I kept on running, and she couldn’t catch me.”

  He resists the urge to cross himself, to plead with the Lord for mercy.

  “And this morning,” Maria goes on, “I told her as soon as class started that my Mutti is sick and I must go home to help her with the chores. She said, ‘Then go, you bad little girl! It will be a mercy to me, to be free of you for the day.’ I don’t think she likes me, but I don’t care. She’s the worst teacher you can imagine, Vati.”

  “It’s very wrong for you to deceive your teacher. And you’ve been deceiving your mother and me, too—and your brothers.” A thought occurs to him. He sinks down to her level, eye to eye. “But you always come home with your brothers, at just the right time. How do you manage it?”

  “I listen for the church bells. I go meet the boys in front of the schoolhouse when the bells ring the right hour.”

  The girl is too intelligent for her own good. Perhaps he ought to take her along on his errands; keep her under his thumb, and well supervised. But of course, that would be far too dangerous. If Unterboihingen has a gauleiter, why not Kirchheim or Wernau? If he were to be seen with his daughter, spotted by a man possessed of more ambition than mercy, the Party would know at once how to trap Anton Starzmann. They would have no trouble making that instrument sing a pretty tune of betrayal.

  “You’re coming home with me now.”

  “I’m not done cutting!”

  “Oh yes, you are. And once we reach home, you’ll write a note to whomever owns this house, apologizing for ruining their books and magazines, and you will leave it where they can find it.” Assuming the cabin’s owner ever returns to Unterboihingen, Anton will owe him money to replace what Maria has damaged. Angels, defend me—let her not have cut up some priceless antique book or a family album.

  “Can I take my paper dolls?” She pulls from beneath the couch an astonishing stack of colorful figures, two inches high—men and women snipped from countless pages. The girl must have been at this particular mischief every day for weeks on end.

  “Absolutely not! Put them in the stove.”

  Tears spring to her eyes again. “They’ll be burned up!”

  “That’s the consequence of deceit. Just be glad I don’t turn you over my knee and give you a worse punishment.”

  Anton carries Maria home. She has gone limp in his arms, in protest of his cruelty—though she stopped crying at once, as soon as she realized tears could not move him. Thinking of the money he may owe the cabin’s owner, his stomach curdles with frustration—but despite lingering sourness, he can’t help feeling a melting glow of love as he holds the girl, as she tucks h
erself trustingly into his arms.

  That evening, when the supper dishes are washed and the children are readying themselves for bed, Anton takes Elisabeth outside, into the warm summer night, to discuss Maria.

  “I found her hiding behind the sofa, shearing a stack of magazines as if they were sheep. I almost swallowed my tongue when she showed me her handiwork—weeks’ worth of cutting. You should have seen it.” He bites back the smile he can’t quite conceal.

  Elisabeth is not amused. “Frau Hertz always says, ‘Maria is a handful.’ But I can’t keep hold of her with both hands, let alone one. She’ll get herself into real trouble someday, and then what will I do?”

  Elisabeth’s look of pale distress moves Anton. He pats her shoulder, awkward as always, and wonders if he ought to risk embracing her. “The girl will learn. We must be firmer with her, that’s all—and show her that virtues have their own rewards.”

  “No virtue has enough natural reward to tempt Maria into proper behavior.” Elisabeth sighs and presses the fingers of one pale hand to her forehead. The ceaseless pain of motherhood. “I’m only grateful, to you and to God, that I have you to help me through this, Anton.”

  He blinks in surprise. It’s as close as Elisabeth has ever come to a tender word.

  She says, “Maria alone was more than I could handle, when I was by myself. And now the boys are getting bigger; they’ll soon be teenagers, and boys of that age are never easy. Even Albert and Paul, sweet as they are, will soon be more than I can manage alone. Without you, this family would fall apart.”

  “Well, I . . .” Lost for words, embarrassed by the swell of warmth in his chest, he pulls at his tie, loosens it, leaves it hanging askew. He takes his pipe from his pocket, lights it, and puffs once. He lets the ember die out, and the pipe parts with a final trace of smoke. “I’m only doing what I promised to do,” he says at last.

  “And now that we have the money from your music lessons—it’s such a blessing. The extra income has relieved so much of my burden. I admit, when you first said, ‘I’m going to teach children how to play the piano,’ I had my doubts. I thought, ‘He’ll never find enough work to keep a steady income, not with the war on.’ But I was wrong, Anton. I don’t mind admitting I was wrong.”

  He swallows hard. He has only just delivered a lecture to Maria about the sins of deceit. Some of his money does come from the lessons, of course, but most is paid by whoever keeps the Red Orchestra together—whatever shadowy figure pays Father Emil, who passes Anton’s cut along to him.

  I should tell her, he thinks. I should let her in on the secret. We’re a family now; we must rely on each other, trust one another. How can I expect my wife to ever trust me, or love me, when I hide this from her?

  The next moment, he dismisses that idea. Elisabeth would prefer not to know the truth—he’s sure of that. She wants nothing more than to keep her head down and muddle through the war. Keep her family safe and whole until, God willing, this madness finally ends.

  And Elisabeth and the children are safer in ignorance.

  “I’ve had a harrowing enough day,” Elisabeth says, “even without Maria’s naughtiness. Möbelbauer has been at it again.”

  “At it? What do you mean?”

  She sighs heavily and turns her face away. “That man is a pig. He shits on all the women of the town.” She blushes at her own coarse language. “I’m sorry, Anton. I know you don’t like those kinds of words. I don’t, either—but Möbelbauer has put me so much on edge, I can’t help myself.”

  “Has he done something to you? Said something?” He will go and see Franke, if that’s the case. Man to man, they will thrash it out. No one may speak a harsh word to Anton’s family and get away with it. Strange, the instincts God puts in a man, once he’s a husband and a father. It’s no wonder all the world fights wars. Look how many men are married, and the guardians of children.

  Elisabeth stares down at her feet, then out at the orchard, its late blossoms still visible in the twilight. She glances up at the cottage roof, then out across the field. She looks everywhere, anywhere but at her husband. “You know, Möbelbauer has never been faithful to his wife. Never. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that he spent his wedding night with some other woman—he’s that fond of straying. He has gone through every woman in the village, nearly—everyone who’s still young enough to catch his eye.”

  “You can’t be serious.” He wants to say, Why do the women permit it? Franke is not so handsome or charming that he would catch most ladies’ attention and tempt them to infidelity. But as soon as the thought enters his head, he understands. He says, “It’s because he’s the . . .” He almost can’t make himself say the word. “Gauleiter.” The eyes that watch for disloyalty, the ears that strain to hear the smallest whisper of resistance.

  “Yes,” Elisabeth says. “That. The women all go along with him, and give in to his advances, because they’re afraid. What might Bruno Franke say about them, or about their husbands, if they don’t? Unless they comply, he will write one of his letters to his contacts in Berlin. He’s a disgusting man—disgusting.”

  Anton has seen village women with haunted looks and distant eyes. He had assumed it was only the war that affected them—only the war, as if it is a small thing. But now he understands there is something else at work here, a greater darkness moving. The sharp ear of the Devil has turned toward their safe little town. In the cities, they force men to run out their bayonets, and herd children off to their deaths. The women, they force to break their marriage vows and dirty themselves with shame. There is no remorse, no care for the consequences. And no thought for what it says about us, as a nation and a people, that we turn our eyes away from our neighbors’ suffering. But of course, the pride and reputation of Germany mean nothing to the Party, or the dogs who lick their boots. They care only for what they may gain. The powerful take ever more power. They will remake the world as they see fit.

  “If Franke ever comes after you,” Anton says, “tell me.”

  Elisabeth flares up suddenly. For the first time that night, she looks directly at him. Her eyes are two points of anger, glowing in the dusk. “I’ll never break my vow. I said holy words before God; that means something to me.”

  It means something to all the women Herr Franke approaches, Anton is sure—but these matters are never as simple as one thinks when one is on the outside, looking in. It’s only when they come to your door—when the gray bus arrives—that you know for certain what you will do. When they present you with the choice that is no choice at all—in the moment of truth, when the lives of the people you love hang in the balance, will it be easier to break a vow made before God, or condemn your children to the gas chambers?

  “Tell me if he tries anything. I’ll sort it out with him, so you won’t have to.” And God help me if he has already noticed my comings and goings.

  Troubled, sleepless through the night, Anton goes to Father Emil the next day. Did he already know about the town’s gauleiter—what Möbelbauer does with the women, married women, mothers of the village?

  Yes. Emil knows. “Ambition makes the best of men dangerous,” the priest says, “but I’m afraid Herr Franke was never the best of men.”

  “Elisabeth seemed quite upset by him, when I spoke to her last night.”

  “That’s no wonder to me. You know this is a small town, Anton.” He says it apologetically. “We know everything about each other.”

  Anton takes his meaning, but he has to hear the words before he will believe. “Tell me.”

  Emil pauses and sighs. He doesn’t like to say it. “Herr Franke has already approached Elisabeth with the same foul proposal he has made to most of the other women in Unterboihingen.”

  Anton’s mind is a flash of whiteness, blankness. He freezes on the church pew, motionless, stunned.

  Emil says, “I am not breaking the sanctity of confessional by telling you this. I never would do such a thing. Elisabeth hasn’t brought me this news herself, but a few
of her friends have told me. They were troubled by it and sought my advice—wondering what they ought to do, how they could help her. I’m glad you came to see me about this matter, my friend. I have considered going to you and Elisabeth and offering my counsel. I know your marriage is unusual, and not especially warm. But for the sake of the children you both love, it must hold together.”

  “Poor Elisabeth. To face such a thing . . .”

  Emil chuckles. “Poor Elisabeth? She sent Franke packing! Her friends all agreed on that point. They were proud of her, awed by her—doing what few other women have had the fortitude to do.”

  She would send Möbelbauer packing, and with a kick to his stout behind. Elisabeth’s faith is a tower, a monolith. Woe betide the man who expects her to violate vows made at the altar.

  “But now Franke will be angry with her,” Anton says.

  “Yes.” It’s clear from Emil’s sober expression that he understands what Anton has left unspoken. How much does Herr Franke know? Is he even now scratching out a letter to whichever Nazi dog he reports to, implicating Anton as an instrument of the Red Orchestra—purely for vengeance against the only woman who has dared to spurn him?

  He says quietly, “Father Emil, what do we do about this?”

  Emil lifts his hands in a gesture of surrender. “We keep on, my friend. Is there anything else you would do?”

  No. There is nothing else.

  PART 4

  DEATH HAS ONE EYE

  OCTOBER 1943–APRIL 1944

  19

  Fall crisps the air again, leading in the winter. How has a year passed so swiftly? Woodsmoke hangs in the orchard, a blue haze caught among the dry, rattling leaves that still cling to the branches. It’s almost too cool now to dry the washing outdoors, but Elisabeth persists. She likes it when the scent of autumn smoke works itself into her dresses and old, threadbare jumpers. She has told Anton so, and now he has come to associate the smell of the season with his wife. The autumn is like Elisabeth—solemn, austere, a touch chilly, but not without its flashes of brilliant color.