“I know, ‘love the one you’re with.’”
“There is truth in the poetry of song, Ella.”
“Even crappy pop music from the seventies?”
They both laughed, but Ella’s laugh sounded a little hollow to her ears. On impulse, she leaned over and took Heidi’s hand.
“Hey, Heidi? Is everything okay with you?”
Heidi’s mouth dropped open in near shock. She looked down to where Ella was holding her hand. Ella tried to remember how Germans felt about people invading their space. Some of them were not very cool about being touched.
“I…yes, of course, Ella. Is everything okay with you?”
“You’d tell me, I hope. If you ever need to talk…you know, about anything.”
“We are talking now, Ella. We talk every day.”
“I guess I mean really talk. Like about problems we may be having.”
Unless she was wrong, the always jovial Heidi looked very close to tears. Ella prayed she wasn’t overstepping her boundaries with her friend.
Heidi pulled her hand out of Ella’s grip and then took Ella’s hand with both of hers.
“I knew you would be a good friend to me,” she said, her eyes sad and watching Ella. “I knew you would be special in that way.” She squeezed Ella’s hand and the smile returned to her face. “Now where is that waiter? I have been craving a tofu melt all day long.”
The next morning, her head throbbing with the fun of the night before, Ella pulled out a map of Heidelberg and located nearby Sandhausen, her mother’s hometown. It looked to be just a few miles outside of Heidelberg, easily reachable by bus. She looked at her watch. On the other hand, Hugo had offered to drive her there and she figured that would work too.
It doesn’t mean anything, she thought. It’s just an afternoon between friends. Although she recognized she’d feel a little better if Heidi had been available to accompany them, she wasn’t going to make a big deal of it. She liked Hugo. And she could certainly handle him.
What had her father meant last night? Was there something to be learned about her mother that she didn’t know? Could it possibly have something to do with the mysterious circumstances of her mother’s death? How could finding some distant aunt or cousin possibly be cause for concern or worry for her father? While Ella knew he had a habit of worrying over nothing, still, there was something about the way he had approached the topic last night that had her thinking that maybe there was something.
An hour later, she and Hugo were driving through the streets of Sandhausen in his Renault. Ella knew her mother’s maiden name was Klaus, which seemed to be the German version of Jones. She found a Sandhausen address on the Internet for a Klaus, but no phone number or email address. Her plan was to knock on the door.
“Germans don’t usually like that sort of thing,” Hugo said as he pulled up to a stop sign and read the street sign. “Brings back memories of storm troopers coming to the door.”
“That’s silly,” Ella said. “Don’t tell me y’all didn’t have door-to-door salesmen in the sixties.”
“Y’all?” Hugo grinned and gave Ella a little poke in the ribs. “You are my own little Scarlett O’Hara, aren’t you?”
Ella forgot how annoying it could be to have someone relentlessly come on to you. She forced herself to smile. He was doing her a favor after all. She began to wonder how bad the bus trip could’ve been.
“I’m not going to bang on the door and demand identification papers,” she said.
“It will probably amount to the same thing,” he said, driving slowly down the block. “This is the street. What’s the number?”
“508,” she said, looking at the house numbers. It was a typical German suburban street with the homes built in the last twenty or thirty years. If her relatives did live on this street, they had moved here after the war. “There it is!”
Hugo pulled the car into the driveway. “It will be better if I stay here,” he said.
“I was going to suggest it.” Ella smiled and hopped out of the car.
The house was a tidy two-story with an orange tile roof. The shutters were blue and under the windows there were flower boxes full of geraniums. As she walked up to the front door, Ella noticed that the flowers were dramatic and full—even this late in the season. Whoever lived here was conscientious and proud of their home.
As she tapped on the door—damn that Hugo for making her nervous—she rehearsed what she would say. Hi! I think I’m your long-lost American cousin…
A tall woman with red hair and a lined face answered the door quickly, making Ella wonder if her approach had been observed. Could this be someone I’m related to? Ella felt her heart beat faster.
“Guten morgen,” Ella said.
The woman frowned. “Guten tag,” she said. She looked at Ella’s empty hands and then at her face.
“I am looking for Jane Klaus. Ich bin auf der suche nach Jane—”
“Ich weiss jenen namen nicht,” the woman said. I don’t know that name.
“Her family name was Klaus,” Ella said hurriedly, picking up on the impression that the woman was ready to end the interview. “They moved to America after the…after the…in about 1950 or so? I’m just trying to find if anybody is left because it was my mother, you see.”
The woman waved her hand at Ella as if to make her stop talking. Ella was surprised at her unfriendly manner. There was an awkward but brief silence.
“Many people left after the war,” the woman said finally, looking Ella up and down. “Ich weiss jenen namen nicht.”
“Okay. It’s just that, on the Internet, it says the family at this address is named Klaus. So your name isn’t Klaus?”
Before she could finish, the woman retreated inside the house and slammed the door in Ella’s face. Stunned, Ella stood staring at the closed door and then caught the movement of a curtain being yanked across the window beside the entrance.
Ella walked back to the car where Hugo was playing a game on his cellphone.
“How did it go?” he asked as he started up the car.
“She says she doesn’t know any Klaus.”
“Oh, too bad. How about lunch?”
“Is everybody this unfriendly in the hinterlands?” she asked. “Or was it something I said?”
“She was rude?”
“She slammed the door in my face.”
“Well, Americans often have different definitions of what is rude and civil behavior.”
“Really? So door slamming is a gray area over here? How about a fork in the eyeball? People here divided on whether that’s rude or not?”
“You are upset.” Hugo put his hand on her thigh.
“Hands and eyes on the road, please, Hugo,” Ella said. “Yeah, sure, let’s find a restaurant. I need to do some more research.” She pulled out her own cellphone and opened up a search browser.
An hour later, with the remains of a very good Dover sole on the restaurant table, Ella knew that there was a woman living one township over from Sandhausen who might actually be related to her mother.
“I don’t know what that woman’s problem was,” she said to Hugo as he poured her another glass of Rhine wine, “and it’s true she probably wasn’t a Klaus herself but I bet she knew something about the family. Why slam a door in someone’s face if you’re not freaked out about sharing information?”
“Again, Ella,” Hugo said. “Germans are not as touchy-feely. I love that word. I learned it in Indiana. We are not as touchy-feely as Americans. It could well mean nothing.”
“Hugo, how many times have you slammed a door in the face of a stranger who came to your door?”
“I am not your typical German,” he said, leaning toward her. “Which you would soon discover if you give me half a chance.” She had to admit he smelled great. And he was handsome. Maybe it was the wine or the thrill of her little quest, but it suddenly felt like a great idea to let Hugo kiss her.
At that moment, the waiter approached to ask about des
sert.
Hugo sighed and took the dessert menu. He ordered two coffees and a torte to share without asking Ella.
“Okay,” he said, flapping out his starched napkin onto his lap. “Where is it we are going now?”
“Dossenheim,” Ella said. “It’s not far from here.”
“And who is in Dossenheim?”
“I have no idea,” she said. “And, seriously, if this is a dead end, Hugo, we’re done, okay? I honestly don’t care that much.”
“But who do you think is there?”
“It’s possible this woman,” Ella squinted at her cellphone screen to read the name. “Erica Weiss…is related to me somehow. Her maiden name was Klaus and she was born in Sandhausen in 1940. Even if she isn’t a relation, she might know my people.”
“She is pretty old,” Hugo said as the waiter brought their coffees and dessert. “Is she in her own house?”
“It looks like the address for an old folks home.”
“Lovely,” Hugo said.
Ella felt a surge of gratitude toward him that he would give up his Saturday to drive her around. She knew he was hoping to score but he was still very pleasant company and he was doing her a big favor. There was no way she could have done all this on the damn bus.
Erica Weiss sat in the sunny day room of the Sonnige Tage nursing home and observed her visitors through rheumy, clouded eyes. Ella noticed her plucking at the wool afghan across her lap.
What am I even doing here? Ella wondered. Hugo had accompanied her inside but she could tell by the way he held himself and the pinched expression on his face that he wasn’t comfortable. Frau Weiss did not speak English. Once again, she needed Hugo to help her if she was going to find out the answers she was seeking.
“So,” Ella said brightly. “Thank you for seeing me, Frau Weiss.”
The old woman smiled at Ella, the first indication that she wasn’t totally unhappy to have her morning routine interrupted.
“I am happy to have company,” the old woman said by way of Hugo’s monotone, very bored translation.
“I’m here,” Ella said, “because I’m trying to find some of my family and I think you might have known them. Your maiden name was Klaus, right? And that was my maternal grandmother’s name. I know it’s a common name—”
The woman leaned toward Ella as if she were going to tell a secret that she didn’t want Hugo to know but Hugo leaned in, too, because, of course, Ella couldn’t understand her.
“I was born Erica Klaus,” she said. “Which was my mother’s maiden name. She married during the war and changed her name to Vogel. But I stayed Erica Klaus.”
Ella nodded and looked at Hugo. He appeared to be very interested all of a sudden and she couldn’t understand why.
“I have a memory at four years old of a family visit,” the old woman continued. “My two older sisters, and my brother came to visit me. My sister Jana was nearest my age. I remember we played with paper dolls together. My other sister was a grown woman…or so she seemed to me at the time.”
Came to visit her?
“You did not all live together?” Ella asked.
Frau Weiss smiled sadly. “Mine was not a sad childhood,” she said. “I knew love. I was cared for.”
Ella looked at Hugo and her eyes were wide with concern. He was not looking at Ella. He was focused on the old woman. Ella watched him lean out and take her hand and she smiled at him and patted his own hand with her withered, spotted one.
“What’s going on, Hugo?” Ella asked. “I’m confused. I don’t know any Vogel in my family tree. Does this make any sense?”
Hugo spoke softly to the old woman and she nodded and turned to Ella. She spoke in slow, methodical German and Ella understood only snatches of it.
“She says when the war ended, she saw her mother and Jana a final time. She was ten years old and Jana told her that they were going by the name Klaus again which made Frau Weiss happy because they all had the same name again.”
Ella looked at Hugo. “Who was Klaus?” she asked. “I thought he was my mother’s father. But then who’s Vogel? And why call themselves Klaus again?”
“We don’t yet know the relationship between your mother and Frau Weiss,” Hugo reminded her. Ella could see he was not one bit bored and she wondered what had changed and what she had missed.
“My mother had a little brother named Hans,” Ella said to her. “My grandmother’s name was Elise.” Ella held her breath as she waited for the old woman’s response.
Frau Weiss said simply, as if she had known it all along: “Sie sind meine Nichte.”
“She says you’re her niece,” Hugo said, frowning.
Ella reached out and took the old lady’s hand. “That’s amazing! How come you’re not acting like this is incredible, Hugo?”
Hugo shook his head. “No, of course, it is wonderful. Truly.”
“My name is Ella Stevens,” Ella said and the woman clapped her hands together in delight.
“Abe rich heisse Ella.”
“Mein Gott,” Hugo said. Ella looked at him in surprise.
“She says her nickname is Ella.”
Ella felt as if her mother had reached out beyond the grave to the two Ellas sitting there and touched them. Ella searched the woman’s face for any trace or resemblance of her mother.
“I can’t believe I’ve found you,” Ella said, tears filling her eyes. “Ask her why she didn’t live with my mother. Why they didn’t live as a family.”
“Are you sure, Ella?” Hugo said. “It may be embarrassing to her.”
“Then ask her who visits her here,” Ella said. “What family comes to see her.”
Frau Weiss listened intently to Hugo’s question and then turned back to Ella.
“They are all dead,” she said. “My husband had a large family but all I had was my mother, my sisters and my brother.”
“What happened to them?” Ella asked.
“My brother, Hans, died as a little boy,” Frau Weiss said. Ella knew that her mother’s brother died young. “The rest emigrated to America after the war.”
“Ask her why she didn’t come too,” Ella said.
“Ella,” Hugo protested. “It may be too painful for her.”
“It was seventy years ago,” Ella said. “Please ask her.”
When Hugo asked, Frau Weiss began to cry.
“I was to stay in the orphanage in Germany,” she said. “It was my mother’s wish.”
Orphanage? Ella looked at Hugo and he made a face.
“I knew there couldn’t be a happy reason why she wasn’t with the rest of the family,” he said. “Since she obviously wasn’t mentally impaired or crippled. I figured it meant she was probably illegitimate.”
Ella looked back at her aunt who was looking at Hugo as if trying to figure out what he was saying.
“So, my grandmother had a child by another man,” Ella said, “while married to my grandfather? Couldn’t she have just passed her off as his?”
“Love the way your mind runs,” Hugo said wryly. “Good to know. But if her husband was away because of the war, he probably would have figured out it couldn’t be his.”
“So she was institutionalized. This is sad, Hugo. Really sad.”
“A lot about that war was sad,” Hugo said. Ella had to look twice to register that the always-jolly Hugo was making such a serious comment.
“So they just left her here in Germany.”
“Appears so.”
Ella leaned out of her chair and put her arms around the woman and hugged her tight and felt the shaky arms of her aunt clutching tightly around her. With a shock, Ella realized that, for the first time ever, she felt like she was embracing her mother.
An hour later, after assuring her aunt that she would be back to see her, Ella and Hugo were in his car and heading back to Heidelberg. Ella was emotionally exhausted but exhilarated.
She had found a piece of her mother! She had found the woman she had been named after. Her blood r
an in Ella and vice versa. For an only child, whose only family had come from her father’s side of the family—and none of them had she ever had anything in common with—it was nothing short of a miracle. Ella could not stop smiling.
“Well, I’m probably not going to do it right away,” she said to Hugo, “but now I’ve got another name to track down to see if I have any more relatives around here. Who did she say my Grandmother married? Rudolf Vogel? I cannot thank you enough, Hugo, for spending the full day doing this with me. I definitely owe you dinner.”
“You really don’t know who Rudolf Vogel is?”
Ella looked at him. “You recognize that name?”
“Every school child in Germany would recognize that name,” he said, keeping his eyes on the road and both hands on the steering wheel. “It is the name of the Butcher of Auschwitz who was hanged by the Allies at the Nuremberg Trials in 1945.”
Chapter Four
Well, it explained a lot.
Ella stood in her kitchen late that evening and fried up a couple of eggs for dinner.
It explained why her mother’s family left Germany, why they changed their name—and why it had been impossible to do a successful genealogy search before now.
Ella sat down with her eggs and a can of lager and stared out the window into the dark. It also explained why her mother had taken every dangerous assignment the CIA could possibly hand out. She had been wracked with shame and determined to make it up in some impossible way—right up to the moment she gave her life for her new country.
Ella thought about calling Rowan but resisted picking up the phone and found herself wondering why. It was true that the last couple of calls had been awkward. She realized that she’d found excuses not to call him in the last week or so and more than once she had screened calls from him. So now when she had a real reason to talk with him, to someone she was genuinely and personally connected to, she no longer felt comfortable doing it. Somewhere between the boring drudge that was her nine to five and the shallow activities that were her evenings, she realized she had let go the idea of him, let go of the magic, the warmth, the wonder of him.
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