A Trace of Smoke (Hannah Vogel)

by Cantrell, Rebecca

  “I cannot tell you,” I said. “How do you know it’s priceless?”

  “See the color? That deep, rich red is unusually rare. It’s called pigeon’s blood.”

  “Can you tell where it came from?”

  He turned the golden ring over and over in his hands as if shocked by its authenticity. Light glinted off the snakes’ fangs, poised to pump venom into the ruby.

  “Rubies of this size and quality are almost unheard of. I’ve never held one this size in all my life, and I’ve been cutting precious gems longer than you have been alive.” The rumble of automobiles passing by made me suddenly grateful for the thick bars on the windows.

  My heartbeat sounded loud in my ears. “Where did it come from?”

  “It came from Burma.” He smiled grimly. “But I’m sure that doesn’t interest you. It’s an old stone. See how it’s cut? It’s called a native cut. They cut them to get the biggest possible stone, without regard for the optic properties.”

  “Do you know who it belongs to?”

  “How could I not?” he asked, pausing dramatically. “This stone is famous. It’s called the Burmese Python. The setting was designed with the name in mind.”

  “The stone has a name?”

  “All rubies of this size have a name.” He coughed again. “They’re profoundly rare. How did you come upon it?”

  “I cannot tell you that.”

  He shook his head. The corners of his eyes tightened into a worried squint. “Hannah, this ring belongs to Count von Heinberg from Bavaria. Have you heard of him?”

  “Of course.” He was one of the richest men in Germany. Nobility for hundreds of years. His family lived in a fairy-tale castle that had been featured in the Berliner Illustrierte Zeitung a few months ago. Of course I knew who he was. What did that have to do with Ernst? He did not know the von Heinbergs. As far as I knew, he’d never been to Bavaria. But there was the ring.

  “The inscription reads ‘To Bootsie, from Ernst, with love.’ And there’s a tiny swastika next to it. Do you know what that means?”

  “No.” Was Ernst a Nazi? That I could not believe.

  Herr Klein sighed, a wheezy exhalation that I worried would set off another coughing fit. “You are in some kind of trouble, Hannah? Give it back to Ernst. Tell him to hide the ring. Drop it off at the Pergammon Museum. Get rid of it.”

  “Why? Is it stolen?”

  “I would have heard if something like this went missing.” He held it to the lamp again. “The count would have filed for his insurance. I believe it’s insured for one million American dollars.”

  In spite of my journalistic cynicism, my mouth fell open. “That cannot be possible.”

  It was not possible that Ernst had a million-dollar ring in the bottom of Mother’s jewelry case. That a million-dollar ring had been lying in my shabby apartment for days. Herr Klein must be making a joke.

  “It is true, Hannah,” he said, with such an air of conviction that I did not doubt him. “The count is a powerful Nazi. You won’t tell me how you came in contact with it. Something illegal going on, perhaps?”

  “That cannot be possible,” I repeated, like a fool.

  “Let me get you some tea,” Herr Klein said.

  He placed the ring on the table and knocked on the back door. He used a complicated rhythm. Seconds later the bolts pulled back, and Herr Klein scooted through sideways. The door shut soundlessly.

  I held the ring in my palm. The stone was deep red, like a pool of blood. Had someone killed Ernst to get the ring back? I placed the ring in the center of the table and wiped my hand on my dress.

  Herr Klein emerged from his back room carrying a fine china cup full of strong tea sweetened with honey, the way I liked it. “Thank you.” I took the cup with a hand that trembled.

  He nodded and said nothing while I sipped the tea. We both stared at the ring lying, sinister, on the old wooden table. A king’s ransom. Or a queen’s.

  “Ernst must get rid of it,” he said, speaking like a schoolteacher. “If he is found with it, he must prove its provenance. And he cannot, is that correct?”

  I nodded my head and took another sip of sweet tea.

  “There are a few things you can do.”

  “What?”

  He ticked off my choices on his gnarled fingers. “Give it to a museum.”

  “No.” It was not mine to give away.

  He held up a second finger. “Mail it back to the von Heinbergs anonymously. Put a return address such as Hotel Adlon on it. Pack it tightly and send it off. I’m sure you can find the address at your paper.”

  “I do not want to get rid of it yet,” I said, although he had succeeded in frightening me. This must be the package that Rudolf wanted back so desperately.

  Herr Klein sighed and stared out the window for a long time. I watched dust motes dance in the light. Finally he spoke again. “If it will keep you and your brother safe, I can take it and cut it down to two smaller rubies.” He shook his head. “It would be defacing a treasure.”

  “A Nazi treasure,” I said.

  “But even so, a treasure.” He held the ruby ring between his finger and thumb. “I can sell them for you. You won’t get one million dollars, but you will get hundreds of thousands of dollars. You could leave Germany, join Sarah. And be rich forever.”

  I wondered how he knew about Sarah, but I was not surprised. Although he rarely left his shop, Herr Klein knew everything.

  “I do not want to leave Berlin,” I said. “It is my home.” Berlin was the one place I’d been able to sink roots after moving from base to base throughout my early childhood. So many people here came from somewhere else. They did not care about your past, your parents, infractions you had committed as a child. It was a place of beginnings, a place to test yourself. Here I had established myself as a writer. The world came to Berlin, there was no need to go into the world. Anywhere else I would be alone, starting over.

  “It is my home too,” Herr Klein said softly. He cleared his throat with a rheumy cough. “My family has lived here for over two hundred years. But I will be leaving soon. I have one more shipment of stones to cut before I go.” He smiled. “Naturally, you can tell no one.”

  “I have nothing to tell.”

  “I have contacts in the gem industry. Places where I can go.”

  New York. Or Belgium. “Far from here?”

  “Far enough,” he said, “to never fear for my life because I am a Jew.”

  “Can you keep the stone here?”

  He pressed the cold ring into my hand. “That, my dearest Hannah, I cannot do. It is too dangerous.” A horn tooted outside, and we both jumped, then laughed. I took the ring.

  “How about these pieces?” I gestured to the pile of real jewelry. “How much are they worth?”

  “Some are worth much.” Herr Klein wrote an amount for each of them next to its description on his white pad of paper. “Sell them soon,” he said. “The price for jewelry is dropping and, if Hitler becomes chancellor, everyone will be selling their jewelry to escape. Prices will fall through the floor. I have heard of such things in Russia after the fall of the czar.”

  I sold one necklace to him. During the inflation, I’d learned to sell precious objects slowly, because the money you got for them became worthless so quickly. I left him the rest of the real jewelry, to hold in his safe. Herr Klein had a reputation for having impeccable security.

  Herr Klein handed me a receipt with a detailed description of each piece in his safe.

  “I trust you.” I tossed the fake jewelry from Rudolf into my satchel.

  “I may not be here when you claim them,” he said. “If you come back.”

  I dropped a bracelet on the floor with a clatter. “I beg your pardon?”

  “That ring is dangerous,” he said. “If you are found with it, it’s a death sentence.”

  I blinked. “That seems an extreme—”

  Herr Klein shook his head. “Gems like this invite death. Why do you
think so many of them have bloody histories? And you do not know where it came from, should anyone, including the police, ever ask.”

  I stared at him.

  “I’m sorry, Hannah, but if you are going to keep it, you must understand these risks.”

  “I understand,” I answered numbly.

  He shook his head sadly. “That you do not. But assuming the worst does happen, what should I do with the remaining jewelry?”

  I was still thinking about being killed over the ring, but I forced my thoughts back to Herr Klein’s question. What should I do with the money from the jewels? I thought of the people he could help with it. And then I thought of one small boy who might be forced to live with my older sister. “Put it in trust, for a boy named Anton Vogel. For a boarding school.”

  He nodded. “If it comes to that, I know lawyers who can see to it that the money is used for that purpose.”

  I took his knobby hand in both of mine. “Thank you, Herr Klein.”

  He shook his head. “There is nothing to thank me for. I have only told you of the burden you carry with you. I have not eased it.”

  16

  I wrapped the ring in Ernst’s red handkerchief and stuck it deep in my left coat pocket. I borrowed a safety pin and pinned the pocket closed. It was not enough, of course, but I tried to walk calmly, as if I did not carry a million dollars. As if I could not change my whole future in an instant.

  I went to Anton. The weight of the roll of bills in my left pocket, with the ring and the larger heft of gold coins in my other pocket, pulled at my coat. I had not seen this much money since the end of the inflation. Having money again made me feel buoyant, even with my worries about the ring and the fact that, for the first time since I’d left my parents’ house, I did not have a job.

  Tripping up the steps, I rapped on Bettina’s door.

  “You’re early,” Bettina said when she opened the door. “The sun is still up.”

  I smiled. “I could come back.”

  She pretended to close the door.

  “Hey.” I pushed it open again.

  “What is that on your face?” she asked as I stepped into her hall.

  I glanced at the mirror there. My face looked a little flushed, but ordinary. “Nothing.”

  “I do believe it’s a smile, but it’s been so long since I’ve seen one that I can’t be sure.” She dried her hands on a striped tea towel. “Try frowning so I know it’s you.”

  I laughed.

  “Are you in love?” she asked. “Or did you find a pile of cash lying in the street?”

  “You are closer than you think,” I answered. “Where is the boy?”

  “His name,” she said, “is Anton. He’s playing with Sophia in the back bedroom. He’s an Indian, big surprise, and she’s an Indian maiden, which seems to involve bossing him around and making him commit feats of daring that drive me crazy. Earlier, he counted coup by stealing cookies from the top shelf of the kitchen. But he wouldn’t let her eat any and he had to return them because stealing is wrong. Quite a drama.”

  We walked back to Sophia’s bedroom. The skirt on Bettina’s ample form rustled as she walked down the hall. I glanced at the few framed photographs she kept on the walls. Her children smiled down at me. I thought of the pictures in the Hall of the Unnamed Dead and shivered.

  When we opened the back bedroom door, Anton crouched on top of the wardrobe, three meters in the air. I looked around for a chair he might have climbed, but there was nothing there.

  Sophia turned to me and said, “Hello, Aunt Hannah, the brave Anton keeps watch from the canyon wall.”

  “I see that,” I said. “Why is he wearing only his underwear?”

  “I wear a loincloth,” Anton said from the top of the wardrobe, in his best Indian voice. “A brave needs nothing more.”

  I thought about the state of his clothes—ill-fitting hand-me-downs from Bettina’s children. “That’s a relief,” I said. “Now come down here this instant.”

  Anton jumped off the wardrobe. His tiny pale limbs flashed through the air. Even as I reached for him, I knew I was too late to catch him. He landed at my feet with a thump. Bettina screamed. My heart raced.

  I stood, rooted to the ground, but she bent over him immediately. “Are you hurt?” she asked.

  He shook his head. I was surprised that I had been so frightened when he jumped.

  “That’s too far to jump,” Bettina lectured.

  “The brave can jump great distances,” Sophia explained. “He’s very tough.”

  “Don’t encourage him.” Her mother felt Anton’s feet and legs.

  “Anton,” I said, finally finding my voice. “Please dress like a white man. We are going out on the street.”

  Anton stood and walked over to his clothes. “A brave understands the value of camouflage.”

  I smiled, remembering how Ernst had used those exact words while talking to Herr Klein. Ernst had spent time with his son.

  “Where do we journey?” Anton struggled into his short pants. Sophia straightened the waistband and handed him his singlet, already a proper mother.

  “Wertheim,” I answered. “We must buy you clothes.”

  He stopped. “My auntie Sweetie was thrown out of Wertheim.”

  “Why?”

  “She borrowed boots.”

  “Ah,” I said. “Stealing.”

  “She meant to return them.”

  “They won’t throw us out,” I said. “We will pay for what we take.”

  I felt jaunty, with my million-dollar ring.

  Bettina gave me a calculating look. She knew that I could not afford a shopping spree at Wertheim under normal circumstances.

  “Something came up, Bettina,” I said.

  She nodded, unconvinced.

  It was only a short bus ride from Bettina’s affluent neighborhood to the expensive shopping district on Leipziger Strasse. Wertheim was the largest department store in the world, even the Kaiser shopped there before the war. It had been built before the turn of the century, and the front had been remodeled a few years ago, in 1925.

  Anton clutched my hand as we mounted the imposing stairs. Massive pillars supported each of the four arches at the Leipziger Strasse entrance, and I felt as tiny as an ant. I knew I was meant to feel rich and important to shop in such a grand building, but I felt rather sheepish. I’d been once with Bettina, but had no money to buy anything then. Today would be different.

  Many department stores were bright, clean, and stocked with more than one would ever need, but I picked Wertheim because Herr Wertheim treated his workers fairly. Also because he was Jewish. I was aware of no formal boycott of the store, but I knew that the strident Nazis and their quieter but no less anti-Semitic supporters voted with their pocketbooks and spurned Jewish-owned businesses.

  I pushed the heavy brass-and-glass revolving door. Anton crowded against my knees and walked in tiny steps. We stepped into the noise and bustle of the first floor. The fishy smell of seafood rolled over us, and Anton wrinkled his nose. Cod lined up on a bed of ice shone like silver. Anton clutched my hand and looked around furtively, probably searching for the store detective.

  “You have nothing to fear,” I told him. “This is a safe place for those who can afford to pay.”

  “And we can pay?”

  “We can. We are safe.”

  Anton relaxed, but did not let go of my hand, barely glancing at luscious displays of food as we walked toward the escalators in the middle of the store.

  After we mounted the escalator to the children’s clothing department, he counted the disappearing stairs ahead. “Where do they go?”

  “They stack up in the cellar,” I answered with a smile.

  “Then where do they come from?”

  I laughed. “They go back down the other side. It’s a giant metal belt of stairs.”

  We almost reached the top when he backed down the escalator.

  I took his bony hand. “We can jump the last step toget
her. One, two, three.”

  We jumped safely onto the second floor, under the disapproving eye of a matron wearing a loden-green Bavarian hat. I resisted the urge to apologize for our boisterous behavior. We were paying customers and entitled to a little frivolity.

  Anton told me he’d never owned any new clothes before. He studied each article after I gave him the responsibility of picking colors and fabrics. I bought three trousers, three shirts, three undershirts, three pairs of underwear, and a nightshirt. Lugging our increasingly heavy bags, we went to the shoe department and bought a pair of leather shoes that he assured me were the same color as moccasins. We’d long since used up my paycheck, but I still had my money from the sale of the necklace.

  When we arrived at the café for a late tea, Anton looked at the dessert cart with wide eyes.

  “You can order something.” I unfolded his stiff linen napkin and put it in his lap. “What would you like?”

  “The brave desires . . .” His voice trailed off.

  I ordered a glass of milk, a pot of warm tea, and a piece of tart plum cake with a dollop of whipped cream.

  He stared at the cart, hypnotized.

  “Your father used to love the apple strudel.”

  “Apple strudel,” he said.

  I glanced down at the square of plum cake. Red plum crescents covered with a thin layer of clear jelly topped the cake. I had not eaten plum cake in at least two years. The whipped cream next to it was heavy and held its shape. Perfectly whipped, Mother would have said.

  “Start eating whenever you wish,” I told Anton.

  He nibbled his strudel. “It’s delicious!” He sounded surprised.

  I laughed and took a bite of my own, savoring the tart plums. I took a small forkful of whipped cream, then chased it down with a sip of hot, strong tea with honey. It tasted like the promised land.

  Anton and I ate in companionable silence, each of us savoring the luxury of sweets. It felt wonderful being extravagant with him in the way I’d always wanted to be with Ernst. Anton looked splendid in his new finery. I’d bought a new burgundy jacket for myself. Ernst would have admired it. I’d slipped my old coat into the shopping bag, with the ring still pinned in the pocket.