Children of the Promise

by Dean Hughes

  Bobbi couldn’t help but think that if Richard didn’t come back, maybe David really was an alternative. But the truth was, she couldn’t picture that happening now. She had given her heart over, and it felt wrong to turn back to David after that. What bothered her most, however, was the question David had posed. What was it she liked about Richard? The longer he was gone, the less clear she was about what had happened between them. Did she even know him? What if he did get back? Would she get acquainted, for real, and then realize that they weren’t right for each other either? Maybe no one was right for her.

  It was all so confusing and disturbing. She longed for Richard, spent every waking hour in fear that he was dead, and at the same time, couldn’t even remember why she loved him, or maybe, deep down, whether she did. She knew that in her state of mind she was looking about and spotting closed doors down every hallway of her life. But she had always been a realist, and she didn’t want to invent happy endings that just weren’t there.

  One afternoon she was working in the burn unit, feeling distant and uninvolved, when a sailor, a young man with his face bandaged, said, “Hey, nurse, I know my face is covered, but I’m not invisible.”

  Bobbi stopped and looked at him. She could see in his eyes that he was smiling. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Tell me your name.”

  “Paul Farrell. And in case you’re wondering, I’m very good-looking. Or at least I was the last time I looked.”

  Bobbi wondered what he would look like after the bandages came off. She hoped he would still feel all right about himself. At least he seemed to have some self-confidence, which would probably get him through some hard times. She also suspected, however, that this was the beginning of a flirtation, and she didn’t need that right now. “Nice to meet you,” she said, but she didn’t tell him her own name. “I’m glad you’re feeling so well.”

  She was about to step away when he said, “Hey, my ship was going down. I thought I was going with it. The way I look at it, a few burns might scar me up a little, but at least I’m alive–and heading home.”

  “You were on a ship that sank?”

  “Yup.”

  “Where?”

  “In the Leyte Gulf, off the Philippines.”

  “Not the Saint Lo?”

  “No. The Johnston. A destroyer. But the Saint Lo was part of the same task force. It went down the same day we did. Why? Did you know someone on the Saint Lo?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did he make it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Bobbi watched the man’s eyes for some reaction. He was lying on his back, flat. His face was completely covered, with only holes for his eyes and nose and mouth. His arms were bandaged too, and he lay motionless. It was hard to know what he might be thinking. “Is that a bad sign–that I haven’t heard anything?”

  “It’s hard to say.” He sounded hesitant.

  Bobbi stepped a little closer to his bed. She didn’t want the men in the ward to hear this. Some of the nurses had talked about Richard, and the word had spread among the patients. They were nice about it, but they asked her every day what she had heard, and she hated answering. “How did you get off?” she asked. “In a life raft?”

  “No. I got thrown into the water. That’s what happened to most of the men on the ships that went down. I had a life jacket on, but I was in the water for two days.”

  “Two days.”

  “And two very long nights.”

  “Who picked you up?”

  “The navy sent out LCIs–you know, landing craft–to look for us. Most of us were in really bad shape after that long in the water, and a lot didn’t make it.”

  “Do you know anything about the Saint Lo–how many got off, or anything like that?”

  “No. But I know that a lot of their survivors were in the water for two nights, the same as us. They got picked up around the same time.”

  “Once you got picked up, did someone let your family know?”

  “Sure. But not real fast. There were a lot of men–and every situation was a little different.”

  “What would it mean if someone’s family hasn’t heard anything by now?”

  Those eyes were still looking out from the bandages, but they weren’t meeting Bobbi’s now. “It could mean all kinds of things. He could have been picked up by the Japs, I guess.”

  “Would the Japanese pick them up–or shoot them?”

  “It’s hard to say. I do know that some men said the Japanese sailors left them in the water but threw cans of food to them.”

  Bobbi had tried to consider every possibility, and now she couldn’t resist; she wanted to ask the questions that had plagued her. “What about sharks?”

  “That was a problem for those in the water, like me. There were a lot of sharks around, and sometimes they did attack. A guy I knew got killed that way.”

  She nodded. “Can you think of any other way he could be alive, without his family getting word?”

  “Really, I’m not sure. You ought to ask someone who–”

  “It’s okay. But if I haven’t heard anything by now, that probably means he didn’t make it, wouldn’t you say?” Bobbi’s voice had gotten louder, even though she hadn’t intended for that to happen. By now the room was silent, and she knew everyone was listening. She turned and looked at the men in the other beds. “Isn’t that true?” she asked. “Won’t someone at least tell me that?”

  A sailor at the other end of the room, an older fellow who had been in the ward a long time with burns over most of his body, finally said, “Bobbi, you know that’s true. The longer you don’t hear, the worse it probably is. But no one can say for sure. Sometimes the Japs do take prisoners, especially if the men made it to land. He could be a prisoner in the Philippines.”

  “Thanks,” Bobbi said, but her voice had lost all its power. “I needed someone to be honest with me.”

  And she left the ward. All the rest of the day she told herself it was settled. He was dead, and so that was what she had to deal with. She would assume that Richard was gone–not fret, not whine, not feel sorry for herself. She wasn’t the first person to lose a brother and a boyfriend in this war. She had no right to expect anything better.

  But that night, in her room, after Afton had gone out for the evening, Bobbi’s anger returned. And when it did, she finally told God what she thought. “It isn’t fair!” she shouted. She knew people who were better off because of this war. She knew so many families that hadn’t had to send a single son. But she didn’t say all that; she said what lay closer to her heart: “I ask and I ask and I ask, and you don’t answer. If you’re going to say no, just say it! I’ll deal with that. But don’t just sit back and ignore me!”

  She tried to calm herself, tried to tell herself that she had no right to talk to God that way. But still no answer came. She felt no comfort, no strength, nothing spiritual–not even a reprimand. She wished God would strike her down for her insolence, punish her. At least that would be something. But there was nothing, and she couldn’t cry. “Fine!” she told God. “I can be as tough as you. If you don’t care, I don’t either.”

  The next morning she told Lieutenant Karras that she wanted to volunteer for a hospital ship. The lieutenant had announced recently that the navy was looking for nurses willing to serve on those ships, and the only thing Bobbi wanted right now was for her life to change in some way. She didn’t want to be in Hawaii, where everything reminded her of Richard.

  Chapter 18

  Berlin was a devastated city. Much of the central part of town was in ruins. Walls of buildings stood like shadows of a grand past. Heinrich Stoltz was not truly a Berliner; he had only lived there during the time of his exile, and he had seen much of this destruction before he left. Still, returning now, he brought with him the memories of what the city had once been. What it had become, this wasteland, was to him a symbol of what Hitler had brought to the German people. And it wasn’t just here. All across the nation Brother Stoltz had seen
the havoc and destruction. When he considered the sorrow represented in

  all the bombed-out buildings–the homes and shops, the museums and churches–the magnitude of the tragedy was overwhelming.

  Brother Stoltz sat on a bench in the Tiergarten. The park was full of craters and trenches, military equipment and debris, and yet lovely white swans still swam in the nearby pond. It was as though, in their serenity, they refused to be bothered by all the noise and fury they had surely experienced. Brother Stoltz was sitting on the same bench where he had sat the year before, but he hardly felt himself to be the same man.

  His contact, the man he called Georg, approached and nodded, and then sat down on the bench–at the opposite end. “Nice day we’re having. No?” he asked.

  It was actually a rather gray day, and quite cold, but Brother Stoltz said, “Yes. Compared to many.”

  “Any day is pretty when no bombs are falling,” Georg said. He was slowly scanning the area. There were people here and there in the park, but not many, and no one seemed to be paying any attention to the two of them.

  “How is Uncle Emil surviving?” Brother Stoltz asked.

  “Not so bad,” Georg said. “But we have lost a few more people since you were here. One would think the Gestapo would ease up now, with the war going badly for Germany. But the ones who have stayed true to the party are fanatics. They search harder than ever.”

  “What do the common people feel? Do they think the war is lost?”

  “People worry about getting food, more than anything, and keeping a roof over their heads. Some speak of Hitler’s secret weapons. They claim the rockets will turn the tide–and jet airplanes–but even as they say it, I see in their eyes that they know better.”

  “What keeps them going then? How do the factories keep putting out arms?”

  Georg was a little man with a bushy mustache and dark bags under his eyes. He was dressed in a heavy black coat, wool, with a gray scarf wrapped around his neck and a fedora hat perched low and level on his head so it touched the tops of his ears. He looked sad when he said, “I wonder myself. It’s force of habit, to some degree–and maybe hatred. However much the people may doubt the Nazis now, they hate the bombers more. What I hear people admit–intelligent people who whisper to me cautiously–is that they hope for a truce and a new treaty with the Allies. The worst fear of all is that the Russians will pour over our borders. Everyone knows how dearly we’ll pay if that happens.”

  “Are you afraid?”

  Georg shoved his hands into his overcoat pockets. “Certainly. When Berlin is overrun, no enemy soldier will know what I’ve done for the Jews. You and I remember those bitter years after the first world war. I hate to think what our people will suffer for another decade now–maybe longer.”

  The two sat and watched the gentle motion of the swans. Leaves were drifting down from the tall sycamore trees, big leaves like parachutes, settling on the grass and the water. Brother Stoltz felt the sadness again, the immeasurable sorrow. Everything he loved about Germany had been stolen from him, even Germany itself. “I have an envelope for you,” he finally said. “It’s from the American intelligence agency. I’m here primarily as a courier for them.”

  “Take it out and set it on the bench between us. When I leave, I’ll pick it up.”

  And so Brother Stoltz pulled the envelope out from under his coat and set it on the bench.

  But Georg didn’t leave. “When the Nazis began to take away Jews, I knew it was wrong,” he said. “And so I took action. But I’m not a traitor to my country. I don’t know what the Americans want from me, but I won’t help them bomb my city.”

  “They sent me because I knew how to make contact with your organization. They want to communicate with any underground or resistance movement. If all those in Germany who oppose the Nazis could work in concert, the war could possibly be brought to a quick end.”

  “You saw what came of the great anti-Nazi movement. Stauffenberg and the others who tried to kill Hitler only ended up getting themselves killed–or thrown into prison. Since then the oppression by the Gestapo and the SS has only gotten worse.”

  “I know that. But the Allies are at your borders now–and the Russians aren’t far away. A quick end to the war could save hundreds of thousands of lives–German lives.”

  “What on earth could we do? We have no way to get to Hitler.”

  “You can help to pinpoint bombing raids–to make certain that armaments are destroyed, crucial railroad crossings are struck, airplanes are knocked out on the ground.”

  “I told you. I won’t help England and America bomb my people.”

  “Georg, I love Germany, but I had to make a decision. Was I willing to do what I could to make certain Hitler lost his war–and the real Germany could return someday?”

  “I only want to do one thing–protect a few innocent people.”

  “It’s not that simple. If Allied bombers can strike more accurately and then learn, quickly, whether their air raids have been effective, this will also save lives. If fuel and vital parts for airplanes and tanks and trucks can be destroyed, Hitler will have to give up–or his generals will overthrow him.”

  “We’re told here that it’s the Allies who refuse to consider a truce.”

  “That’s true. Only an unconditional surrender will be considered. So there’s no hope for a separate peace with the Allies. The only way to keep the Russians from taking Berlin is for Hitler to end the war.”

  “I understand all this.” Georg looked out across the pond, and his voice was softer when he said, “I’ll look to see what’s in this envelope, and I’ll consider what the Americans want to know. But I cannot promise to answer any of their questions.”

  Brother Stoltz knew there was no point in pushing the issue, at least not yet. “Could I meet you here again tomorrow? If you have answers, you could give them to me.”

  “Yes. But we must choose another place. It’s never good to follow a pattern.”

  And so they arranged a meeting for the next day, this time in another part of the vast Tiergarten. But before they parted, Brother Stoltz said, “When my family escaped the country, my son didn’t make it out with us. He turned back, and I now know that he was caught by the Gestapo. Is there a way to know whether he’s alive, or to find out where he is?”

  “I do have contacts who might be able to learn something. I can’t say for certain. Tell me his name and his birth date. I’ll see what I can do.”

  And so Brother Stoltz gave him the information, and then he walked away. He spent the rest of the day moving about the city, trying to get some sense of the morale of the people, and to locate certain arms factories. What he found didn’t surprise him. People were continuing with a sense of dogged determination that was deeply German–and he loved them for that. The factories he had known before were functioning and productive, even though they had been bombed a number of times.

  As evening came on, Brother Stoltz found himself drawn to the building where he and his family had twice hidden themselves. Somehow it seemed only natural that Peter would go there, as the place in Germany where he had found momentary safety when he was being chased. What Brother Stoltz found, however, was that the block had finally been cleared. The rubble was gone, and so were the basements, all pushed in now. But he stood on the street and looked out across the flattened neighborhood. He thought of those frightening days in the dark, and what came upon him was regret for the life he had given Peter. The boy had been running since he was a child. He had been such a wonderful child, but he had never experienced the casual growing-up years he deserved.

  Brother Stoltz stayed at a little hotel outside the city that night. He showed his travel papers, and the man at the desk accepted them, but he said, “Too bad they would send you here now. There must be safer places.”

  “I’m not so concerned about my own safety. I want to do my part for my country,” Brother Stoltz said.

  The older man looked up from the ledger, w
here Brother Stoltz had signed his assumed name. But he didn’t react. It was as though he knew better than to pay attention to such empty words. He handed Brother Stoltz a key to his room on the third floor.

  The following afternoon Brother Stoltz met Georg again. They met on a path and pretended to be friends, merely stopping to chat. Georg had the envelope inside a newspaper, and he passed it to Brother Stoltz, who hid it in his coat. “I told them some things,” Georg said. “But not everything they wanted to know.”

  “I understand.”

  “Still . . . I gave them information that I didn’t think I would ever share with an enemy. And if it does help end the war a little more quickly, I won’t regret it.”

  “Yes. That will be our hope. But Georg, the Allies need information on a regular basis. They need to find out, after a bombing raid, whether they have knocked out the intended target. They need to track troop movements and arms shipments. I won’t be here long, but I’m hoping to set up a network of people who can observe such things and then get information out. We have radios now that beam a narrow wave to airplanes overhead–ones that carry a special receiver. There’s almost no chance of detection. I was hoping your people could help–and perhaps recruit others to assist us in other places.”

  Georg looked at the ground, and his voice was a mere whisper when he said. “I don’t know. I can talk to people. There are some who may think we should do this. It’s difficult to say.”

  “All right. That’s all I ask. I’ll be in touch with you again–in our usual way.”

  “No. Use a new code name. Don’t call me for a time, and when you do, refer to yourself as Franz Wolf.”