by Andie Newton
The girl beside me had the contents of her makeup bag strewn across the counter, a purple ribbon with hairpins threaded into it coiled like a snake next to the tap.
‘I’ll pay you for some pins,’ I said.
Her eyes jolted more than they did when I slapped my own face. ‘For pins?’
I pulled my hand from my pocket and a few coins fell into the sink and settled in a ring of standing water. She picked them up with painted nails and tossed them into one hand.
‘I would’ve just given them to you,’ she said, ‘but since you offered…’
I wetted my hands, slicked back my hair and tightened it into a bun at the base of my neck. The pins locked it in place. I have to warn Christophe. In the corner of the lavatory I scribbled a frantic note on some toilet paper: Don’t trust the moustache.
I crumpled the note in my hand, wondering if I could really go through with it—slip the note into Christophe’s pocket right in front of the Gestapo. I was watching them now at a distance from the line for the toilets as they drank and talked. One of the women I cut in front of earlier pushed me from behind. ‘Move on, girl,’ she said, walking past with her friend. ‘You’ve had your five minutes.’
My jaw locked. I can do this. Hand squeezing, I walked straight toward Christophe.
Alex came at me with hugging, open arms. ‘Where did you go?’ he said, lunging toward me. I ducked, and with a heavy hand I slipped the note into Christophe’s pocket. Alex stumbled forward, and with no one to hold onto he fell to the ground. People scooted back, and then walked over him as if he wasn’t there. Dietrich turned around from the noise, scanning the crowd, but I slipped out the side door.
Outside, my whole body fell against the side of a dark building. Instead of feeling relief, I felt a little sick, thinking how I could have been caught if the wrong person read the note or saw me slip it into Christophe’s pocket. My hands shook.
It’s done now, I thought, rubbing my hands steady.
It’s done.
*
I pushed my way through Joseph’s crowded apartment. Max sat with Sophie on a small bench chatting about something near the window. I felt instantly comforted and slid into the space next to him, exhaling.
‘It’s been a long night.’
‘A long night? It’s barely past eight,’ Sophie said, giggling.
‘The whole day has been long.’ I looked around the room for Joseph, hiding my hands which still felt jittery. ‘Maybe I just need a beer.’
‘I’ll get you one,’ Max said, standing up.
‘No, Max.’ He’d had a long day too, going to class and then filling his guard post. I started to get up. ‘You’ve worked just as hard—’
‘Ella, sit down,’ he said. ‘Let me get you a drink.’
He touched my arm and I sat slowly back down. Even Auntie would tell me that if a man offered to get me a drink, to let him. ‘All right.’
The door swung open and more people joined the party. Joseph spotted me from across the room and took Max’s seat, putting his arm over my shoulders and giving me a squeeze. He glanced at my empty hand. ‘Get this girl a stein!’ He laughed, and several people cheered.
‘You’re happier than I thought you’d be.’
He leaned in but talked loud enough for everyone to hear. ‘There’s nothing I can do about it. The Reich was going to get me somehow.’ He pulled back. ‘Besides, I’ll get to see Papa.’ I wrapped my arms around him like I did the day he left Nuremberg, and felt very sad at the thought of him moving away again.
‘I’ll be back, Ella. Don’t worry. They can’t get rid of all the medical students. Who would make the stink bombs?’ When I didn’t laugh, he pulled away and looked deeply into my eyes, deeply, the way Auntie used to.
‘Joseph,’ I said, my voice weakening, ‘I feel like I just got here and now you’re moving away…’ I was suddenly very emotional, my lips near quivering, reminded of when I left Auntie.
He kissed my forehead. ‘Don’t worry. I know Alex is worthless. But you still have Max.’ Joseph became serious. ‘He’s the one, isn’t he?’
I was a little shocked Joseph had said such a thing, but then realized it was getting harder and harder to hide. ‘Is it that obvious?’ I said.
‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘He’s a good one. I approve.’
‘Oh, you do?’ I said, chuckling away my little sobs. ‘Thanks.’ Max had come back with my stein, but with Joseph in his seat he stood in the crowd talking with some others. He glanced at me more than once while he talked, looking very handsome with his strong arms, yet sweet with his smile and soft eyes.
‘You should find a girlfriend too,’ Joseph said. ‘Someone your own age, one that doesn’t wear so many wool work suits. Who was that one you used to get in so much trouble with back home?’ He snapped his fingers as he tried to recall. ‘Claudia!’
Hearing her name out loud and with so many people around startled me.
‘Maybe I should introduce you to Alice,’ he said. ‘She just moved into the building.’ Joseph pointed to a girl standing in the middle of the room. I could tell she was new by the way she looked—a pinch of rose blushed over taut cheeks—and laughed, nervously, clutching her beer with both hands, bouncing around on her tiptoes. ‘She could be your Claudia. Without the troublemaking, of course.’
I watched her join other people’s conversations only to give up when she couldn’t get a word in. Then she laughed at someone else’s joke and I realized she was closer to my age then I thought by the sound of her.
Joseph got up, about to call Alice over, when I put my hand on his arm, stopping him. ‘No,’ I said. ‘Not now.’
He looked confused.
‘What I mean is, not tonight,’ I added. ‘I’ll meet her later.’
He smiled and then gave me a parting hug before rejoining his guests. I looked back to Alice only she was gone. I was glad she had left, I told myself as I stared at the space where she once was.
Max sat back down, handing me the stein he had poured. ‘I was wondering when I’d get my seat back.’ He smiled and I caught his eye.
‘Thank you,’ I said, ‘for the beer. And for sitting with me.’
He saw the tears still budding in my eyes from when Joseph was talking to me. ‘Is everything all right?’ He looked at Joseph across the room and then to me. ‘I know you’ll miss Joseph, but…’
I swallowed. Changing information in the tunnel files was a secret job, shoving a note into Christophe’s pocket right in front of Dietrich was out in the open, and it felt different. If Max had looked at my hands, he’d see there was still a fluttering tremble to them.
‘Ella?’
I looked up. ‘Everything’s fine.’
*
It was close to midnight before I left Joseph’s, and I was tired—more tired than I ever thought I could be. I slipped into my flat, yawning, fiddling with the light switch, flicking it on and off, but it wouldn’t turn on. That’s when I noticed the bulb was missing, and that the shades had been drawn, which were open when I left.
I froze, staring into the darkness because I wasn’t sure where else to look, and then my bedpost squeaked as if someone was in the room with me.
‘How did you know?’ a deep voice bellowed from the shadows.
I slammed my back up against the door, the wood cracking from the thrust of my body as a dark figure rose from my bed and moved toward the sliver of light coming from the window. My hands started shaking again, thinking it was Dietrich, or someone else—someone who saw me.
He struck his metal lighter and sparks sizzled into a flame, moving closer to the cigarette hanging off dark lips. The glow illuminated his face; brown eyes, flat cheeks, and a patch of dark hair that hung over his right ear.
I peeled myself from the door. ‘Christophe?’
He took a long, drawn out puff from his cigarette. ‘How did you know I was a spy?’
I felt relief it was him and took a breath, taking a moment to dust the fear off my fa
ce and from my shaking hands, which had suddenly turned steady.
‘I know lots of things.’
I threw open the curtains to get some light. The drawer to my nightstand hung from a broken track and the tray from my desk lay on the ground. Papers from the files I had been memorizing lay all over my bed as if he had gone through them. My mouth had dropped, and then hung wide open when I saw my yellow scarf laced in his fingers.
My back straightened.
‘I think we’re working for the same side.’ He closed the curtains and then rested his back against the window frame. ‘You’re a wolf that looks like a lamb.’
I scoffed.
‘Am I wrong?’ he said. ‘How did you know about Dietrich?’
Just then air raid sirens revved. We threw open the curtains and heard bombs in the distance—a slight rumbling followed by muffled booms. Then the entire city went dark.
‘RAF bombs are brilliantly fierce,’ he said. ‘As they should be.’ He smiled, and then said something in English I didn’t fully understand.
‘We should hide,’ I said.
‘No,’ he said, looking out the window. ‘That sounds eighty kilometres away at least. They haven’t reached the city, yet. We’re safe here. For now.’
I moved away from the window and he followed me, nearly stepping on my heels. He’d gone through my mail. I picked up what little I had, flipping through the tenant letters and leaflets. ‘What were you hoping to find in my mail?’
‘Posts from home. But you had none.’ He took a long drag from his cigarette. ‘I know you’re not from Munich since you know Dietrich.’
‘You ransacked my flat to find out where I’m from?’ I set the mail down. There was nothing from home. ‘I don’t believe that’s the only reason.’
‘I need to know what the Reich knows. You have access to information the British need. Not only what’s in the tunnel files, but the administration meetings.’ He pointed his cigarette at me. ‘I’m sure you sit in on those and take the minutes.’
‘Sometimes I do.’ I paused, thinking about his request. Despite my position inside the Reich, I still felt like the young girl from Nuremberg who liked to cut pictures out of magazines. I had to remember, Christophe knew nothing about that girl, and he might be able to help me find Claudia.
‘You want me to be your spy?’
‘Do I have to say it out loud?’
‘I’ll get you what you want,’ I said, ‘but call me Sascha. It’s my codename.’
A thin smile wiggled across his lips.
‘But I’m also looking for information. A girl from Nuremberg has gone missing. I believe the Reich took her someplace secret. A resister from the Falcons. She went by the name Marta but her real name is Claudia.’
‘I’ll see what I can find out.’
‘Good.’
I eyed my scarf still in his hands and thought up something tough to say. ‘And touching a woman’s scarf is like touching her stocking.’ I snatched my scarf from his fingers. ‘You need permission.’
15
August
Weeks had turned into months working at the V-building for Hoffmann. When I wasn’t working to the bone as his secretary, I was hiding in my flat, staying out of Erwin’s crosshairs, and making up excuses why I wasn’t able to go dancing with him.
Nobody told me Munich summers were so hot, and I all but stripped my wool suit off the moment I walked through the door each night, opened the window, and begged for the wind.
On this particular night, I had poured myself a glass of shandy and sat in the windowsill, gazing across the Marienplatz, watching Herr and Frau Haas working away in their little shop, carving wood and making hats. I wondered where they lived, where they went at night. Sometimes I’d see them sweeping the pavement outside their shop, and it reminded me of Herr Rudin and the little bakery back home.
I got very sad thinking about Auntie alone in our old half-timbered house in the Altstadt, making eggs for one and having nobody to clean up after. I missed her voice, and I missed Claudia coming to my window late at night.
A knock at my door startled me. ‘Ella! Open up, it’s Max!’
I ran to the door, not sure if he was in trouble or not by the sound of his voice. He hurried into my flat, urgency creasing in his face.
‘I know what Nacht und Nebel means.’
I didn’t care that he had caught me half-dressed—he had my attention with his words, and I dared not move.
Max turned on the radio so nobody could hear us. The Nazi anthem, ‘Die Fahne Hoch’, had just begun and he raised the volume to a medium blare. We stood in the middle of the room, our bodies touching, and he talked into my ear.
‘I overheard two kommandants on their way back from the Führerbau. Night and Fog is a secret system for political prisoners, reserved for the most destructive. No trails. No files. Like the prisoner doesn’t exist.’
‘Did they say anything else?’
‘Hinzert. There’s some at Hinzert.’
My eyes widened. ‘I’m travelling there tomorrow—escorting a set of files to the V-building!’
When Hoffmann initially told me I needed to go to Hinzert I made a half-dozen excuses why I shouldn’t have to. It meant a day of travel on one of the hottest days forecasted that year. Now, all I could think about was how lucky I was.
Max wrapped his arms around my waist and spun me around. Then there we were, staring into each other’s eyes. A blast of blank noise replaced the stiff anthem. He caressed my cheek and a strange sensation fell over me—I had never been held or touched like that before. I went to say something, but what I didn’t know. His hands slid slowly down my back.
Students pounded on the walls, yelling for me to turn the radio off, as we stood very still, holding each other warmly. And we kissed—a kiss that started out long and slow with hands sliding over each other’s bodies, but had turned into a fury of heated moments, with my hands moving down to his waist and finding his belt.
‘I have to go,’ he said, suddenly.
‘What?’ My heart thumped out of my chest. ‘Why now?’
‘I’m sorry. I can’t stay because I have a late guard post,’ he said, pulling away. ‘Tomorrow?’
I nodded, knowing exactly what he meant. ‘Tomorrow. After my trip.’ He let go of me, his hands sliding down my arms until our fingertips were the last to touch.
He smiled just before he shut the door, and so did I, still tasting him on my lips.
Tomorrow.
*
The hum of the Mercedes G-4 Wagen turned into a low groan and jerked when the driver down-shifted to turn up the long, dirt road that led to Hinzert Prison. He looked over his shoulder to the back seat and winced his apology.
Built for luxury, the car had a dark-brown leather interior, double-stitched at the seams, and cherry-wood grained floorboards that shined like a polished apple. It had six knobby tyres and enough space for eight passengers.
As we got closer to Hinzert a midday breeze blowing through the Hochwald plateau warmed with the scent of berry, dandelion and purple wildflowers. The Hunsrück mountains bordered the prison at a distance and curved into a dark green line. It was hard to believe I was on my way to a prison with such beauty all around. I closed my eyes, thinking of Max waiting for me back in Munich, and the kiss we shared last night.
‘That’s where our lumber comes from… to build the prison,’ the driver said, and my eyes popped open. He pointed a gloved finger through the convertible top and then quickly pulled it back in, wrapping his hand back around the steering wheel. I reached for my yellow scarf and tied it over my head to protect my hair, which had been set and smoothed into perfectly formed neck-length barrel rolls. The driver glanced at me through his rear-view mirror. ‘Should I put the top up?’
‘Nein,’ I said, looping the scarf under my chin. ‘I’m fine.’
Hinzert’s rectangular prison huts rose from the ground like ploughed dirt. At the far end workers laid the foundations for more hu
ts; a shallow fence surrounded each one. Its two-storey high, red-brick command building overlooked it to the west like the manor house on some vast estate. Umbrellas attached to lounge chairs and pots overgrown with mauve and dark pink flowers flanked the sides of the building near the service doors like a mountain retreat.
We lurched to a stop. Gravel sprayed out from under the wheels and fogged the air with caramel-coloured dirt.
Just be yourself, I thought, sell yourself as one of them and they’ll talk.
Alma Hirsch, the camp secretary, greeted me at the gate. She had neatly combed strawberry-blonde hair and childlike eyes that she kept half-hidden from the sun under the cover of one hand. When the dust settled, her lightly glossed lips spread into a smile.
‘Willkommen to Hinzert.’ Her hand was soft and it left the scent of rose on my palm after she shook it. She wore a pink suit and two-toned heels; not the harsh black skirt-suit I was told prison secretaries wore. ‘Sorry for the dust. We’re improving the property with additional huts, and I am afraid the construction is a tad unsightly.’
Wooden planked walkways lined with blue enzian and cloud-shaped yellow flowers curved with a serpentine bend into the prison. ‘All I see are flowers,’ I said, removing the scarf from my head.
‘Come,’ she said, smiling. ‘This way.’
I tied my scarf to the strap of my leather travel bag before following her past the guard shack and into the command building. Her supervisor, Kommandant Hermann Pister, had been waiting for us inside his office. His jacket was thrown over the back of his chair, and the sleeves on his black collared shirt had been rolled haphazardly to his elbows. Behind him, a large window, half the size of the wall, looked into an empty, light blue room. Ropes hung from the ceiling, knotted every few feet until they hit the floor, where small puddles of water pooled around maroon-stained drains.
‘Fräulein Strauss,’ he said with a nod. ‘Willkommen.’ He shook my hand with a damp, almost wet palm. ‘How did you like your ride? It’s one of my favourites.’