by Sally Laity
Copyright
ISBN 1-58660-170-9
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.
© 2001 by Barbour Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the permission of the publisher, Truly Yours, PO Box 719, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683.
All of the characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events is purely coincidental.
Cover illustration by Victoria Lisi and Julius.
prologue
Poland, 1945
A chilly spring wind wailed across the ashes of Warsaw, as if mourning the loss of the once proud capital’s soul. Only the multistoried Polonia Hotel and a few other buildings remained unscathed—the ones the German armies had required for headquarters or troop barracks. The rest had been bombed or gutted by fire. Gone were the tree-lined streets and magnificent landmarks renowned throughout Europe. The main marketplace, the Rynek, lay in rubble. Twisted and blackened ruins marked the demise of the formerly luxurious railroad station. Even the Blue Palace, frequented in bygone days by pianist and former premier of Poland, Jan Ignacy Paderewski, had been reduced to waste. Block by block, building by building, the bombs, cannons, and fires of the methodical and relentless Nazi destruction had spared nothing, not even cathedrals or hospitals. The latter, they had torched while beds and corridors still teemed with helpless, trapped patients. The smoky pall of long-dead fires still lingered in the air, along with the sickeningly sweet odor of burned human flesh.
It is all as Josep told us, Marie Therese conceded bitterly. Warszawa is dead. Having learned to hold her emotions inside, she could not even speak for the heaviness that pressed upon her spirit as the young man affiliated with the Polish Relief Organization drove her and her Jewish friend, Rahel Dubinsky, along a crater-pocked street.
In this city, which used to bustle with streetcars and happy children, they passed not even one automobile, only horse-drawn carts or bicycle-propelled pushcarts. What little trading still took place occurred on street corners, by ragged people in crudely constructed wooden shacks. Girls in Polish uniforms directed traffic, assisted by Red Army soldiers, and additional Soviet troops patrolled the city.
But most heartbreaking of all was the sight of the one-legged children, in nauseating numbers, hobbling about on such sticks as they could find, silently holding out grubby hands to passersby. Hatred for the German forces and their maniacal leader who had committed suicide to save himself from the world’s retribution rose like bile in Marie’s throat.
The depth of the rubble at Stare Miastro, the oldest section of town, forced Josep Klimek to park his rickety vehicle, and Marie and Rahel got out.
The faint drone of motors drifted toward them on the breeze, and Marie raised her gaze off into the distance, where a handful of battered trucks carted away loads of debris. Except for the absence of that distinctive, abrasive squeaking, the sound seemed reminiscent of the Nazi tanks which had rumbled through the city six years ago, rendering an end to her peaceful and idyllic life as the daughter of a professor and a French-born mother. . .a life that would never again be the same, once her father had spoken out against Adolf Hitler.
And it was even worse for her friend, Rahel.
Even before the German occupation, anti-Semitism had been strong in Warsaw. But nothing could have prepared the girls for the sight of the Ghetto, where Rahel, her family, and the rest of the Jewish population had been imprisoned behind barbed wire, enduring starvation and disease before their ultimate liquidation at Nazi death camps. The two could only stare in open-mouthed horror at the four square miles which had been utterly pulverized by the German army.
It broke what was left of Marie’s heart to see tears roll from Rahel’s sunken brown eyes and down her sallow cheeks, making dark splotches on the faded coat. “Nothing is left,” the devastated girl cried, her expressive face contorted with grief. “Nothing. I cannot even tell where Papa’s shop used to be.”
Marie put an empathetic arm around her friend’s gaunt shoulders. Small comfort, but she had nothing else to offer.
“I had hoped to spare you,” Josep reminded. The bearlike young man who had befriended the girls since they’d come back to Warsaw returned to the truck and waited for them to join him inside. Then he restarted the engine and inched forward again, steering around huge craters and the debris in their path to head out of the city, his truck bed packed with supplies for a village to the north.
“You are still positive I am to let you out in the middle of nowhere?” he asked a few minutes later. “Such a foolish scheme I cannot condone.” He wagged his head, a shapeless charcoal felt hat shadowing the glower on a ruddy face lined beyond his thirty years.
Rahel stared straight ahead. “I am positive. I will tell you where.”
“But two young women alone—even dressed like boys! It is folly.” He cut them an incredulous scowl. “The Russian soldiers are worse than the Nazis. They are not so disciplined, and for women or young girls they have no respect at all. Right across the river, on the Praga side, they are shipping trainloads of Polish refugees to slave camps in Siberia. My head Ania will have if harm comes to either of you.”
“Do not worry,” came Rahel’s calm assurance. “We will be careful. There are places to hide. We will watch for your return.”
Marie Therese held her silence. Since their release from the concentration camp, Rahel had hinted of a secret she had harbored throughout their captivity. But she had yet to disclose the particulars.
The two of them had been through so much—even after Ravensbruck had been liberated. The majority of the freed Polish captives begged to return to their homeland to see what, if anything, remained of farms, businesses, or relatives of whom they’d received no word in months. Thanks to the efforts of the brave souls sympathetic to their cause, small groups of refugees were shepherded by night through Russian-occupied Eastern Germany, a harrowing journey none of them would likely forget.
When the pathetic lot finally gained the Polish border, the Polish Red Cross and other relief organizations took over. Among them were Josep Klimek and his wife, Ania, two more individuals doing the work of angels. The couple took Marie and Rahel into their care. For today’s venture, they had even supplied the girls with men’s clothing so they would more easily blend in with other workers around Warsaw. Hunching deeper into the scratchy jacket she wore, Marie drew a troubled breath and let her mind drift to the past as the truck wheezed and coughed its way up a lengthy rise.
Barely nineteen, it seemed a lifetime ago that she’d been a giggly schoolgirl in uniform, walking home from classes with her brothers and younger sister, blushing whenever a handsome boy glanced in her direction. As the daughter of a prominent college professor, she had traveled in far different circles from Rahel’s, and would never have been allowed to associate with someone of the Jewish faith. Now this young, painfully thin woman was her only friend in the world. Like a sister. Both of them, along with a number of other naturally attractive and appealing young women, had been dispersed to various locations in Poland and Germany for the private entertainment of the Nazi officers.
Her and Rahel’s destination had been Ravensbruck, the infamous German extermination camp.
Strange, how such a horrendous place could create an incredibly strong bond between individuals forced to suffer the unspeakable shame and agonies they had endured.
But what would become of them now? They could never return to the innocence of their lost youth.
Pondering her hollow future, Marie Therese almost envied the emaciated souls who’d met their end in the gas chambers. No amount of years would ever completely banish the memory of that squat, square concrete building smack in the middle of the grounds, the thin acrid vapor rising in a constant stream from its huge smokestack. Nor would she forget the horrendous, hellish sounds which emanated day and night from the punishment barracks, the lice and fleas, the constant gnawing hunger. Or parading naked before the snickering SS guards to the icy showers and humiliating medical examinations. . .and worse.
So much worse. . .
As the truck bumped and lurched over the unpaved country road, Marie deliberately forced her thoughts away from the horror to concentrate on the single good element of that despicable camp: an older Dutch spinster with the unlikely name of Corrie ten Boom. With a small Bible she and her sweet, frail, even older sister Betsie had somehow managed to smuggle past the guards, the dear woman had instilled a measure of hope to the wretched captives amassed in flea-infested Barracks 28.
Every night until lights-out, the pair would take turns reading Scripture passages. Some were familiar to Marie Therese. But what struck her most was the way Corrie spoke of God and to Him—as if He were her very closest Friend. Her words, spoken in Dutch, had to be translated by other women to be understood by the different nationalities. Marie surmised that somewhere along the line from Dutch to German, and then on to French, Russian, Polish, and Czech, the original thoughts acquired a far-too-lofty idealism that couldn’t possibly be taken literally.
Nevertheless, in the cold dark of night, as the searchlight swept in regular intervals over the barracks walls, sending flashes of thin light through the rag-stuffed broken windows, those very promises brought an inner warmth to Marie beyond any the threadbare blankets provided to her body. And a hope that at least some of what Corrie had related was true.
Someday, somehow, she would obtain a Bible and search things out for herself. But for now she could only struggle to follow the older woman’s admonition to dwell on thoughts of a loving God rather than on cruelty and hatred, however impossible that seemed at times. A ragged sigh came from deep inside.
“Here!” Rahel declared with force. “Stop.”
Josep stomped on the worn brakes, and the old truck lumbered to a halt.
Marie Therese peered at the open, rolling countryside dotted here and there by woods. Traces of new green had begun to soften the stark winter-bare bushes and trees framing the fertile farmland. But the absence of freshly plowed furrows made the fields appear lonely and desolate, like a canvas waiting to be painted.
Rahel’s bony elbow jabbed Marie’s ribs, urging her to quit gawking and get out. “Do not forget the shovel,” the dark-eyed girl reminded her.
Marie Therese nodded and opened the door, stepping down from the running board. From the truck bed she retrieved one of two digging tools Josep always carried with him. Rahel claimed the other.
“I’m going on now,” he called to them, “to deliver these goods. In two hours I should be back. Maybe a little longer. Be careful. Keep your eyes peeled. Russian convoys come through all the time to plunder whatever is left from the towns and villages,” he added grimly.
“We will be careful.”
At her friend’s confident statement, Marie gave a dubious smile and a nod to their benefactor and watched after the lorry as it chug-chugged over the next rise and vanished from sight, leaving a silence broken only by the sighing wind.
Marie turned to see her friend already well on her way toward an irregular grove of trees some distance away, the oversized tan coat flapping with each step. She only hoped the two of them did appear to be men, just in case. Tugging her hat more snugly over her hair, she hastened to catch up. “Where are we going?”
“Not far.”
A stand of trees rose up from a spot where the contour of the land hid the road from view. Approaching the grove, the Jewish girl slowed, her dark eyes focusing on one tree in particular, studying the gnarled roots, its position among others. Then a corner of her lips curved in a tiny smile. “We will dig here.” She jabbed the pointed end of her shovel into ground moist from recent rains, stepping on the dull side to add her weight.
Marie Therese followed suit, amazed to find herself quickly winded by the uncustomary exertion.
When they’d dug about a foot down, Rahel’s shovel struck metal. “Ah!” She fell to her knees and sat back on the heels of her too big shoes, a satisfied smile adding a sparkle to her wide-set eyes. “Just where we left it, Papa, Aron, and I.” She brushed aside the remaining layer of soil, revealing an object flat and round.
“What is it?” Marie panted, leaning on the handle of her own mud-caked shovel to catch her breath.
“Our future, yours and mine.” Grasping what turned out to be the edge of a milk can lid, Rahel gave a mighty yank, but to no avail. “You must help. Take hold of the other side.”
Marie sank down and added all the strength she possessed, grunting and tugging along with Rahel. On the third try, it popped open with a loud squeak of protest and clunked to the ground.
Rahel reached inside the hollow interior of the buried container and withdrew a cotton sack, dumping out its contents.
Marie stared incredulously at more jewelry, loose gems, and zluty, Polish money, than she had ever seen at one time in her life.
“Papa was a wise man,” Rahel explained, gathering the items and stuffing them back inside the bag. “He saw this war coming well in advance, knew that deep trouble would come upon our country. One day he brought our family here—for a picnic, we thought. But once we had eaten the food in the basket, he and Aron buried our savings at the base of this tree, in case we survived whatever was ahead.” She paused, her chin trembling. “I. . .never imagined I would be the only one left to come back to reclaim it. Mama, Papa, my four brothers. . .” She met Marie’s gaze through a sheen of tears.
It was the most the young Jewess had ever said at one time since their months of enforced silence. Reminded of her own wrenching loss, Marie Therese leaned close and hugged her hard, struggling to contain the anguish she dared not give in to. There weren’t enough tears in the world to relieve that depth of sorrow.
A scant moment ago, they’d been utterly destitute and alone in the world. But things had changed. They were still ragged, to be sure, pale and gaunt from near starvation, and dirty from digging. And still alone. But no longer destitute.
As she watched Rahel cinch the mouth of the sack and tuck it securely inside her coat, a verse Corrie ten Boom had often quoted flooded Marie’s mind. My God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. “But—are you sure you want to share your family’s treasure with me?” she asked.
“Of course. Why should I need all of it, just one person? You are my very dearest—indeed, my only—friend in this world. I will give some to Josep and Ania for helping us. And you will take half of what remains. I insist. You will need it.”
“Nie!” Marie exclaimed. “I cannot take so much.”
Rahel regarded her evenly. “I have been thinking about this for a long time. When I realized we were going to survive Ravensbruck, the thought came to me. I shall go to Palestine, my people’s homeland. I have never been there. I shall live in Jerusalem, our Holy City. Make jewelry, perhaps. Like Papa. He would like that.”
Marie brushed straight blond bangs from her eyes and stared, awed by the dreamy expression subtracting lines of suffering, one by one, from Rahel’s exquisite features. In their place, her classic beauty rose to the fore, despite the pallid complexion and dirt smudges, despite ill-fitting clothes and the dull, chopped hair peeking out from beneath her boyish hat.
“And what about me?” Marie asked, a sudden sense of awe surging through her as she tucked a few strands of lifeless hair back inside her cap.
“You, dearest friend, will go to America. The land of hope.”
“Go to America!”
&nb
sp; “Josep and Ania have contacts to help us reach the Ameri-can sector. They say Jews are the only ones who have no trouble leaving Poland. Josep can obtain forged papers stating you are Jewish, get us both to Switzerland. From there we can go where we want.” Smiling sweetly, she took out the sack and reached into it, withdrawing a Star of David on a fine gold chain. She slipped it over Marie’s head, letting the medallion fall inside the shirt Marie had tucked into her baggy trousers. “There. This will help.”
Still somewhat in awe, Marie fingered the necklace through her shirt. “But I don’t know a soul in America.”
“And who do you know here? Our families have been taken from us.” Rahel stood and spun in a slow circle, her thin arms flung wide. “Look around. Where are the crowds that used to leave the city to bask in the quiet countryside? There is no one in sight. The only people we have seen are strangers. You must go where there is life. Make a new start.”
The notion took on credibility as Marie Therese mulled it over. And gradually she understood the wisdom in her friend’s words. She would go to America.
But a single thought sank into her heart, cruel and cold as the Ravensbruck barracks. A new life would be a thousand times lonelier.
In America she would not have Rahel. . .the only one who understood her special shame. Her curse.
one
New York City, Spring 1946
“What means this—babe, this chick?” Mary Theresa asked, moving to the dressing table for a closer look at herself. “Like infant I am? My legs, they are too skinny?” Turning sideways, she eyed her reflection in the pinkish light streaming through the bedroom’s dotted swiss curtains.
Mr. and Mrs. Chudzik had fed her well in the six months she had been living in their home. Even she could see that her once emaciated frame had lost the bony contours. And her honey blond hair had grown considerably, recapturing much of its former length and shine. With her now Americanized name—from Marie Therese to Mary Theresa, her new, fashionable hairstyle, and a wardrobe with an abundance of long sleeves to conceal the evidence of her imprisonment, only her halting English set her apart from other young women her age.