by Dean Hughes
“Gosh, it’s so amazing!” Afton kept saying. “Sort of like the desert, only gray.”
By then Bobbi had discovered the reality of traveling on a large luxury liner with a couple of thousand soldiers on board—and a couple of dozen women. To Bobbi, it was not the paradise that some of the other nurses seemed to think it was. She and Afton couldn’t walk ten steps on deck without hearing catcalls. Just as Bobbi had experienced on the train, most of the men seemed to have lost all sense of propriety. They came on strong—suggestive if not outright insulting. The draft, so far, had only extended to the age of twenty, but many younger boys were signing up, and many of these guys seemed awfully young. Bobbi had planned to do some sunning and swimming, but she and Afton decided quickly that they didn’t dare put on their swimming suits—to be stared at by thousands of eyes. They did go out to the pool in their uniforms, where they took their jackets off and sat on lounge chairs.
Almost immediately, a pair of soldiers, neither one seeming to be out of his teens, walked over to them. “Hey,” one of them said, “how ya’ll doin’?”
“We’re all fine,” Afton said.
“Oh, now wait a minute,” the boy said. “Are you making fun of me just because I’m from the South?” He was a tightly built, rather short boy, with a natural, nice smile. Bobbi noticed immediately, however, that his teeth were stained from smoking.
Afton sounded entirely too flirtatious when she said, “Would we do that? We have nothing against the South.”
“Well, where you from? Pittsburgh, or somewhere like ‘at?”
“Nowhere like at. I’m from Arizona.”
“Is that in the U-nited States, or is that a foreign country?”
“Now you’re making fun of yourself,” Afton said, and she giggled.
The other fellow was taller, thinner, and his uniform looked newer, the crease still in his trousers. Until now he had seemed to be the quiet one, but a subtle, rather dangerous smile appeared, and he said, “Where are you from?” to Bobbi.
“Salt Lake City,” she said.
“Really?” He sounded surprised.
“Yes. Why?”
“I just never knew anyone from there.” His speech was giving him away now. He wasn’t quite so refined as he had appeared. Bobbi guessed him to be a small-town boy, but not from the South. “I thought only Mormons lived out there.”
“No. Other people live there too.”
“Yeah. I can see that.”
“Well, actually, you can’t. I am a Mormon. We both are.”
Bobbi saw the surprise in both boys’ faces. But it was the shorter one who said, “I don’t believe that.”
“Why not?” Afton asked.
“Mormons don’t join the service, from what I’ve heard. And they wear black clothes all the time.”
“We do not,” Afton said, and she laughed again.
Both of the soldiers seemed awkward now, apparently beginning to believe Afton, but not sure what to say. The taller one finally said, “I thought Mormons drove around in buggies. And can’t have radios or dance or anything like that.”
“You’re probably thinking of Mennonites,” Bobbi said. “Mormons have modern conveniences—as opposed to you backwoods boys. And we do dance. But not with a couple of young enlisted men who only just recently left their mother’s apron strings.”
The soldiers smiled. The shorter one said, “I think we’d better salute and move on. What do you say, Mike?” The tall one snapped to attention and saluted, and the two walked away laughing.
“Bobbi, why did you scare them off?” Afton said. “That short one was kind of cute.”
“For a little boy.”
“Well, we had a chance to do some missionary work. We could have told them what we believe.”
“Oh, yes. I’m sure they were interested.” But more soldiers were walking over, three of them this time. “Let’s get out of here,” Bobbi said.
So Bobbi and Afton escaped to their cabin, where they thought they might sleep a little, since neither had slept very well the night before. But in the cabin they lay on their beds and talked. “Do you have a boyfriend back home?” Afton asked Bobbi. “Or in the service?”
“No. I was engaged once, but I called it off. And then I got interested in another man, but that didn’t work out either.”
“Oh, wow. Golly! Two already. I want to hear all about this.”
Bobbi didn’t go into a lot of detail, but she told about Phil, the tall, dark, handsome—and a little-too-good-to-be-true—fiancé she had broken up with, and then she told about her non-Mormon professor friend, David Stinson, whom she had fallen for completely only to find that the Church was too much of an obstacle between them. He had agreed to join at one point, but not with any real conviction.
“Oh, Bobbi, I can’t believe all the stuff you’ve done. How old are you?”
“I’ll be twenty-three in September.”
“Well, you’re two years older than me, so I guess you’ve had a little more time. But the only guy I ever cared about doesn’t give two hoots for me. Lowell Staley is his name, and he’s a swell guy—so good looking he makes my knees go weak—but I’ve made up my mind to forget all about him.”
“Actually, we’re lucky, Afton.” Bobbi was lying on her back with her head propped up on a pillow. She was looking toward a porthole, and for the first time she was beginning to feel the motion of the ship. She was already thinking that her stomach was less than happy with the experience—even though the ocean was quite smooth. “We’re young, and we’re heading out on a great adventure. Just think—Hawaii!”
“Gosh, I know. That’s what I’ve been telling myself for about six months now. But I wish I could find a guy to marry. And I don’t think we’re going to meet a lot of Mormons in Honolulu. I could bring me home a Hawaiian, I guess, but I don’t think my parents would be too excited about that.”
Bobbi’s father had had a chat with her on that very subject before she had left. “I’m sure there are some fine young men over there—islanders, who have the priesthood and all,” Dad had said. “But it does cause problems when people from different races intermarry. I just don’t think it’s good.”
Bobbi hadn’t argued the point. This was one time she thought her father was probably right. “Let’s forget about boys for now, Afton,” Bobbi said. “Let’s just enjoy ourselves. We can be married all our lives—raising kids and cleaning house—but this is our one chance to do something most girls never even think of.”
“Bobbi, that’s right. Goll-darn it, I just have to start thinking that way.”
But Afton didn’t sound very convinced, nor was Bobbi entirely sure that she believed her own words. She still thought a great deal about David, and she wondered whether she would ever meet a man who was that exciting—and LDS. David had been impulsive and full of fire, almost scary at times, but he had loved to talk to her, genuinely loved to be with her. And when he had kissed her, she had experienced a passion she hadn’t thought herself capable of. But she wasn’t sorry about the way things had worked out. She wanted to meet someone who would marry her in the temple.
The voyage lasted five days and was actually rather disappointing. A little storm came up, and while Bobbi didn’t get deathly ill, she never felt much like eating, either. Upon the nurses’ arrival in Honolulu, a bus was waiting to pick them up. Lieutenant Kallas, the woman who greeted them, seemed rather hard, and she was certainly all business. She directed the girls onto the bus and then said almost nothing on the way to the base.
Bobbi twisted her neck in all directions, and what she saw was even better than she had expected—all the exotic flowers, the feel of the air. But the bus pulled onto the base at Pearl Harbor and then stopped in front of a long, white, two-story building that looked like a barracks. Lieutenant Kallas stood up and announced in a barking voice, “I’ve kept the same roommate assignments you had on the ship. That’s just simpler for right now, so don’t request any changes. We’ll be meeting at 150
0, and we’ll have plenty to talk about, but just let me say this for now: You’re in a war, not on a vacation. You will work long hours. If you think you’re going to have a nice holiday here, think again. When you get off shift, you’ll be ready for bed. Trust me on that.”
She stepped off the bus, and then the new arrivals followed. As they climbed down, they told the lieutenant their names, and she handed out keys. Inside the building, what Bobbi and Afton found were very simple quarters: two beds, two little closets, two chests of drawers, and a shower room down the hall. Bobbi felt the austerity of the little cube of a room the minute she stepped into it, and she could see that Afton was having even a harder time. “Gee, do you think they’d let me buy a pink bedspread?” she asked, and she tried to laugh.
But the girls unpacked, and then they did have some time to walk outside and look around. In the distance they could see the docks where the famous bombing raid had taken place, but they could see little sign of the damage now. What they did see were bougainvilleas, ginger plants, and hibiscus shrubs. Even the white cinder-block buildings, as uninteresting as those on any military base, seemed exotic in this setting, with ferns and palm trees around them and set off against the deep blue water of the harbor in the distance.
“Do you think it’s going to be as bad as that Kallas lady made it sound?” Afton asked.
“I think we’d better learn to call her ‘lieutenant’ and not ‘lady.’”
“I know. I have to remember that. But do you think we’ll just work and sleep and nothing else?”
“I don’t know. She was probably exaggerating a little—just to get us thinking straight.”
“Maybe. But right now I sort of wish I hadn’t come here at all.”
Bobbi was thinking the same thing.
Chapter 6
Brother Stoltz took a breath, hesitated, and told himself to relax. Then he opened the door and stepped into the office. A man behind the counter didn’t bother to look up for a time, so Brother Stoltz merely stood in front of him and waited. He could see that the man’s left arm was gone, and that his coat was pinned beneath the stump. There were so many amputees in Germany these days: men, home from the war, who were perhaps lucky to be alive, but not looking as though they felt very lucky. After most of a minute, the man raised his head. “Ja, bitte,” he said.
“My name is Horst Niemeyer. Last winter—about six months ago—my house was bombed. I was badly injured. I’m only just now recovering. I found my identification papers in a desk, but as you see, they were partly burned in the fire. I’m ready to work again now, but I need papers before I can find a job.”
Brother Stoltz handed the remnant of the identification papers to the man. Brother Stoltz had carefully burned away most of the picture, leaving only a bit of the chin and the side of the face, and then he had burned off the other edges without destroying the name and personal information. It all looked a little too convenient, and Brother Stoltz fully expected to be challenged, but the clerk didn’t seem to care. He glanced
only briefly at the pass, and then he got up and walked to a shelf where he chose a Leitz Ordner—a two-ring loose-leaf
notebook—and brought it back to his desk. The notebook held a thick collection of filed papers, and the man thumbed through it until he found what he was looking for. Then he studied the sheet for a long time before he looked up and said, “According to this, Herr Niemeyer, you are dead.” He smiled, ever so little.
“No wonder I feel so terrible,” Brother Stoltz said, and he forced himself to smile.
The clerk looked tired, his eyes apathetic, his whole manner ponderous. He was a bulky man, with a heavy jaw, but his voice was soft and flat. “It says that your family died in the bombing raid with you.”
“My family did die,” Brother Stoltz said softly, “and I was hospitalized for many months. My shoulder was badly broken, and my right knee cap. I still have trouble getting around.”
“It’s much easier to die than it is to be made alive again,” the clerk said. “You will have to talk to my supervisor, and then you will have many forms to fill out.”
Brother Stoltz had certainly guessed that. He had gone through the wreckage of the Niemeyer apartment, searching out every bit of information he could find, and he had talked to a man who had known the Niemeyers. He knew the names of the wife and children, had memorized their birth dates, and he knew a smattering of information about Horst, but his knowledge was sketchy at best, and he had no idea what might be required of him. He hoped to take the papers home so he could consider his answers carefully, even search out government documents, if that became necessary.
The clerk removed a sheet of paper from the notebook, and then he walked to the back of the room and opened a door. Brother Stoltz heard a muffled conversation, and then the clerk returned and ushered him behind the counter. “Just sit here,” the clerk told Brother Stoltz, and he pointed to a wooden chair by the back office door. “Herr Lindermann will speak to you as soon as he can.”
The wait was actually not long—ten minutes at most—but it seemed more like an hour. Brother Stoltz knew that any mistake on his part could lead to a telephone call to the Gestapo.
The man who finally stepped from the office was a little, neat man, and he spoke politely. “Herr Niemeyer, please come in,” he said. He turned and stepped back into his office. As he sat down at his desk, he looked up at Brother Stoltz. “I understand that a mistake has been made. Please, sit down.”
“Yes, Herr Lindermann. I hope we can correct it. I want to go back to work now.”
“You understand, we must be careful in these cases. For all I know, you could be someone trying to create a new identity—perhaps a spy.”
“Of course. I understand that. I’m willing to do whatever is necessary. And I certainly understand how a mistake could be made. My wife and children, God rest their souls, were all lost, and I was buried in the wreckage. It was many hours before I was found—unconscious—and taken to a hospital. All was confusion in the neighborhood with so many houses struck. We had no warning that night. No one had gone to the shelters.”
“The British have no shame,” Herr Lindermann said, with sudden, surprising volume. “They are swine. Bombing civilians, coming at night like thieves.”
“I curse them every day of my life.”
“Yes, yes. I’m sure you do.”
And yet, somehow this all didn’t seem quite real. Lindermann was saying the right things, but Brother Stoltz thought he saw a game of cat and mouse coming.
“Tell me, Herr Niemeyer, where are you living now?”
“With friends. I’m very eager to get back to work now so I can afford a place of my own. And I know the Führer needs workers. I want to do my part.”
“You are certainly right that we need workers. So many are gone off to the war. And so many men have lost their lives. But it would help us if you had other papers—birth certificate, or perhaps a notice of your baptism. Have you any of these?”
“I’ve gone back to my apartment, but all was rubble. I was lucky to find my pass in a demolished desk. But everything else either burned or was buried. I thought of requesting copies of other certificates, but I’m caught in a trap: without my papers, I doubt I can get them. That’s why I came here first.”
“You are exactly right, Herr Niemeyer. This is the problem. Tell me this much. Where were you born?”
“Dresden.”
“Are you an educated man, Herr Niemeyer?”
“Not extensively.” Brother Stoltz had to be careful. He didn’t know exactly what education Horst Niemeyer had received, and Lindermann might have some way of finding out—if he cared. “I wish I had attended a university, but I was never able to.”
“What sort of work did you do—before your injury?”
“I worked in an office. I kept books at a small factory—one that made hardware. Door locks, hinges, fancy brass fittings, those sorts of things. It’s out of business now.”
All this
was true. One day Brother and Sister Stoltz had gone out from the basement to buy a few groceries. On the way back, they had met a man who was standing out front, gazing at the damage. The Stoltzes hadn’t dared to make their way into the building, and so they had stood and chatted with the man, who said he had once lived in the house. Brother Stoltz had taken the chance to say, “I believe Horst Niemeyer lived here, didn’t he?” Then he had managed to ask enough questions to get a general sense of Niemeyer’s background.
“I see,” Herr Lindermann was saying. And he seemed to be thinking things over. “Can you give me your parents’ names, and their parents’ names?” he finally asked. “That’s the surest way for me to track down your paperwork.”
“Yes. Of course. Do you want me to take the paperwork and record all those things. That might be—”
“Yes. That will have to be done. But for the moment, simply give me the names.”
This was a test, and Brother Stoltz was pretty sure he had lost the game. He knew Niemeyer’s father’s name but nothing more. What occurred to him now was that he had to handle this as best he could, tell what lies were necessary, and then get out with his life. Getting papers this way had probably been a silly thing to hope for. But he looked Lindermann in the eye, and he recited names, choosing the first names of some of his own uncles and aunts, merely so he would not forget what he had said.
Lindermann wrote the names down, but when he had done so, he pushed the papers aside, and he took a long look at Brother Stoltz. Finally, he said, “Herr Niemeyer, I’m going to trust you. You may be someone else. You may be a Jew. I don’t know. But all is in chaos in this city, and I have only one assistant out front, as you see. I could send him out to track all this down, but it would take him at least a full day, and I can’t spare him that long.”