Could Connie have known any of these boys? Perhaps they’d been with her husband’s regiment, or they were friends from back home in San Bernardino. Mrs. Milligan had said it was around the anniversary of V-E Day when Connie was low. Could that be it, these boys reminded her of Jim? In the background she could hear that Mae’s wailing had tapered off. She quickly skimmed through a handful of pages and then stopped. Her eyes landed on the title of an article: “NAZI PIN-UP GIRL continued from page 11.” She flicked back to the beginning of the article.
On page 11, Clara was blindsided. A flood of recognition, a face from the past. This had nothing to do with Connie Milligan. Clara was back on board the SS Europa, at a table laden with Kaffee und Kuchen, beaming at a glamorous German passenger. A streak of adrenaline shot down her arms to her fingertips, and the thin newsprint trembled in her hands. Above the photograph, the shock of the name: Nazi Pin-up Girl, Hitler’s No. 1 movie actress, Leni Riefenstahl. It was the answer to her own riddle—the owner of the handkerchief.
Chapter Eighteen
Easy Does It
SMALL FOOTSTEPS DRUMMED DOWN the hall, and Clara could hear Mrs. Milligan’s voice cooing after Mae to have some milk. In a flash, Clara had shrugged off her cardigan and draped it over the magazine in her arms.
She left the bedroom and walked down the narrow hall. It was only a news magazine, but because she’d taken it from Connie’s room, it felt like it was burning a hole in the pale cotton knit. Little Mae was charging toward her at full tilt, screaming some protestation. Clara managed to dodge her. “I should be going now, Mrs. Milligan,” she said, pausing at the kitchen door, where Connie’s mom was grabbing a pint of milk from the icebox.
The cardigan hung stiffly and unnaturally over her arm. “Thank you for taking the time,” she said, moving a step to the side, trying to conceal her arm behind the doorframe.
Mrs. Milligan poured the milk into a small cup. “She’s a terror when she’s hungry.” She tried a smile but didn’t quite manage.
Clara scanned the chaotic kitchen. “Perhaps I can drop off some groceries sometime?” Behind her, Mae’s yammering was getting louder. Clara had to raise her voice. “You’ve got your hands full here.”
“Yes, that would be— Mae, I’ve got your milk. Here it is.”
“I’ll see myself out,” said Clara. Holding her breath, she swiftly darted out of the apartment, and then closed the door firmly behind her with a surge of relief. The corridor was dark and still smelled of fried onions.
Outside, the girls playing jump rope were gone and the sky was draining light. Clara peeled her cardigan off the magazine and walked briskly up the street. She stopped abruptly, realizing she had another problem. The detectives were waiting for her a couple of blocks away on Beverly. Would they ask her where she’d gotten the magazine? No, it was just a magazine and it didn’t have the Milligans’ address on it. Still, when they’d dropped her off, she hadn’t been carrying it. She had to improvise.
On the corner of Gramercy she darted into the bodega, bought a bag of licorice. Now it looked like she’d gotten the magazine with the candy. When she reached the corner of Gramercy and Beverly, she turned right toward Western. She could see the cops’ Chrysler kitty-corner, idling by the curb. She crossed the street at a relaxed pace. At the next crosswalk she popped some licorice into her mouth and chewed nervously.
As she approached the car, they must have seen her in the rearview mirror, because the window rolled down. “Jump in,” said Rivetti.
She slid along the backseat, which was as big as a boat. On the back of the magazine there was an advertisement for Coca-Cola, a couple of sunny teenagers doing chores. Easy does it….Have a Coke.
The cops turned around. “So? What have you got?” asked Rivetti.
“The mother, what did she say?” said Ireland.
Clara took a breath and launched into an account of what she had learned. Connie was a war widow who had been in love with her husband; she wasn’t dating anyone new; she’d been down or out of sorts around the anniversary of V-E Day—probably missing Jim. She’d gone out dancing with Miss Bannon, which had cheered her up. Clara added that this was around the same time that she’d gotten her hair lightened to match the movie star’s. Connie had reacted strangely to the new look.
Rivetti rolled his eyes. “Her bangs too short?” he muttered.
Clara glared at him. She also pointed out that Bannon had claimed she didn’t really know her stand-in, but that didn’t match Mrs. Milligan’s story. (Clara didn’t want to come right out and call Babe Bannon a liar.)
Rivetti batted his hand in the air, dismissing this detail. “A regular guy spends five minutes with a movie star, he’s gonna dine out on that story the rest of his life. Doesn’t mean anything.” He turned to Ireland. “Come on. We’re running a murder case, not a Girl Scout troop. We’re wasting time with this.” He threw a nod to his partner. “And there’s that other lead to check out.”
From his low tone of voice, Clara knew this was something they didn’t intend to share. She felt a little shiver down her back and her mind leapt to Gil—his whereabouts the night of the murder and his secret past with Bannon.
The detectives offered her a ride home, but Clara, keen to be alone, said she’d take the streetcar. She supposed she had failed to find out anything helpful for the Connie Milligan case. Her observations had shriveled to nothing under the scrutinizing gaze of the detectives. Maybe Rivetti was right—Connie Milligan was a dead end.
Chapter Nineteen
Europa
THE BEVERLY STREETCAR LURCHED forward and ground to a halt almost immediately. The magazine lay on Clara’s lap, her hands clasped on its innocuous cover, the two boys watching airplanes.
Clara turned and stared out the window. For once she was grateful for the rush hour traffic and the slow progression of the eastbound streetcar. Having debriefed the detectives, she now had time to think—not about the murder, but about her own riddle. Looking out the grimy window at the bodegas and markets and liquor stores of Beverly Boulevard, her mind drifted to the past. It was no longer a warm spring evening in Los Angeles. It was a bitter afternoon on the Atlantic Ocean.
* * *
—
The sundeck in November was miserable and deserted. Klara gripped the rail of the ship, heart hammering. A smattering of cold rain hit her face. Something huge was happening to her for once, something that would change the course of her life—a sharp pivot from the straight line of continuity and routine.
She had been excited about the ship—the Europa—Germany’s fastest ocean liner. But now, all she wished was to be back home in Charlottenburg. She grappled with the realization that her parents had duped her and not the other way round. She had assumed it was her pleading and badgering that had finally convinced them to bring her on her father’s lecture tour—two months and no school. Excused from sitting the end-of-term exams, a triumph! And yet all along, their show of reluctance had been masking something more serious. The Bergs were never returning to Berlin. They were fleeing to America. Political refugees. Only now, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, did they reveal the truth. She felt a wing-flap of panic when she contemplated the fate of her beloved possessions. Her mother had explained that Frau Krupke next door was to pack up the contents of the apartment, and her son would put the boxes in storage. But Frau Krupke had granddaughters. Wouldn’t they be tempted by her collection of dolls, her porcelain horse figurines? How could they pass up the illustrated Grimm’s fairy tales? She imagined them picking over her things like a rummage sale. If only Klara had known the truth, she would have packed differently—“forever” changed everything.
Blinking away her angry tears, she ducked back inside and down a stairwell, which led to first class. It was warm inside. There were brightly lit shops in one direction and the grand dining room in the other. Her wool sweater was damp, her hair windswep
t. She noticed a ship’s steward craning his neck, watching her. He began to move toward her. Klara darted the other way—down a carpeted hallway, through a door, and onto the promenade deck.
It was a long enclosed walkway with large windows that ran the length of the ship. Lined with cushioned deck chairs, it was sheltered from the wind and rain. She stared through the glass at the slate-gray ocean, the same color as the sky. America waited for them. In just three days she would be there—incredible. Germany left behind. For Klara, politics had been background noise, the dull hum of adult conversation, annoying radio static. She had tuned it out—they weren’t Jewish; it hadn’t affected her. Until now. She shivered, chilled to the bone.
There were voices behind her. She turned and watched a couple hurry along the deck. As they passed, the man gave a momentous sneeze. Klara didn’t pay him much attention, for it was his glamorous companion who had caught her eye. The woman appeared to have stepped out of a magazine: fox fur, auburn hair, bright eyes. She strode along the deck ahead of her companion. The man, fumbling in his coat for a handkerchief, paused to catch another sneeze. At the decisive moment it erupted with such force that something fell out of his coat pocket—a wallet. An overripe fruit, it landed silently on the floor of the promenade deck, with Klara the only witness.
The woman had reached the bow end of the deck. “Ernst!” she called to him, and disappeared through a door. The man hurried after her, blowing his nose, as loud as the ship’s horn. It drowned out Klara’s feeble “Entschuldigung!” She needed to chase after him—Excuse me! You dropped something—yet she held back. Klara was trespassing. The first-class promenade deck was off-limits to lower-class passengers, and the last thing she wanted was to draw attention to herself. The wallet remained on the floor next to a row of empty deck chairs. Fat, juicy, unclaimed.
Another passenger might come along and hand it in. Klara looked both ways along the deck, but it remained deserted. She could find the steward, perhaps. But wouldn’t that get her into trouble? The crew might suspect her of having pinched it. They probably wouldn’t trust the word of a lower-class passenger. Was that what it was to be a refugee—always having a sneaking suspicion that you’d done something wrong? The Bergs were not typical second-class people; they used to travel first class. They were respectable (her mother’s favorite word). And now they were something else altogether: Enemies of the Third Reich.
She moved off the rail by the windows and stood over the wallet. A fringe of bills winked at her. With the row of deck chairs watching, Klara, heart racing, snatched up the wallet and peeked inside—German marks and American dollars. A flash of daring, which instantly fizzled. She was no thief. With less confidence than the woman had shown moments earlier, Klara scurried toward the bow end of the deck.
There was a sign for the Winter Garden, and through the porthole she could see passengers on wicker chairs enjoying an elaborate afternoon tea. There were potted palms and curved windows that wrapped around the bow of the ship. The opulence made her hesitate. She thought she should drop the wallet where she’d found it and run, but there wasn’t time. Someone approached: it was the man, Ernst, patting his pockets, eyes cast to the floor.
Klara wrenched open the heavy cabin door, holding the wallet like a prize. “Entschuldigung.” Her voice disappointed her; it always sounded younger than she felt.
His face lit up. “Ach so! Vielen Dank, vielen Dank.” The man gestured for her to come inside. “This deserves a reward.”
The table was laid like in a luxury hotel: Kirschtorte, Baumkuchen, Käsekuchen, and English scones, served on fine bone china with gleaming silverware bearing the ship’s insignia. This was nothing like the crowded second-class dining room.
“Your parents let you wander the ship alone?” asked the glamorous woman as she stirred her coffee. She had been introduced to Klara as Fräulein Richter.
“My mother has a touch of seasickness,” said Klara. “She’s resting in the cabin.” Somewhat true. The lower-class cabins were situated in the bowels of the vessel, where the motion of the ship was stronger.
“I never get sick on a boat,” Fräulein Richter said without sympathy. “Tell her to get out on deck and look at the horizon.” She said it as though it were Klara’s mother’s choice to be seasick.
Ernst flagged down the waiter. “Bitte. An extra place setting for the young lady.” He had a round, jovial face, and a familiar manner. Of her two hosts he was the more sympathetic but less interesting. Fräulein Richter was attractive, bright, and animated. Klara guessed she was in her early thirties. She had perfectly coiffed auburn hair, expensive clothes, and a quick laugh. Alert, her eyes scanned each newcomer to the restaurant. There was a restlessness to her movements, her hands always in motion when she talked.
“Where are you visiting in America?” Fräulein Richter asked.
“New York and then Los Angeles.” Then, remembering that her family was fleeing the motherland, she elaborated nervously. “My father is a professor. He has a lecture tour for two months. After, we return to Berlin.”
The woman didn’t seem to care about Klara’s answer. “I’m also going to California, to Hollywood.”
Klara smiled. She was both intimidated and bewitched by the fashionable fräulein and studied her like the cover of a magazine. This woman was attractive in a more modern way than Klara’s mother, or indeed any of the other mothers she knew.
The waiter produced an extra plate, and Ernst helped Klara to a slice of Kirschtorte. “A fitting reward,” he said, with a deft execution of the cake slice. Klara smiled, delighted to be feted as a Good Samaritan. She couldn’t remember the last time cake had been served in her own house. When Anna had still worked for them, perhaps. Months ago. She took a bite and felt a swell of pride at her single-handed invasion of first class—her mother would appreciate the surroundings. A flicker of guilt when she remembered how she’d stormed out of the cabin.
It had only been in recent months that life had unraveled for the Bergs. Her father had taken an unpaid sabbatical from the university to write a book. (Now she wondered if that were true.) Economies had been made, Anna, the housekeeper, let go. Instead of buying a new skirt for school, the hem of last year’s uniform had been let down. In the evenings, when she’d been in her room, she’d heard tense arguments between her parents, fighting and shushing each other like hissing snakes in the drawing room.
Sitting in the Winter Garden with strangers somehow felt familiar, like a return to how life used to be. It was civilized and reassuring. She took another bite of cake, icing sugar cascading down her chin. As the waiter had neglected to bring a napkin for the extra guest, Fräulein Richter gave Klara a handkerchief. Klara dabbed her mouth elegantly, mimicking her hostess. For a giddy moment she let herself imagine that these were her parents and that this was how she was traveling to America—in first class, with good-humored adults.
“Ernst.” A tall German man approached their table. He slapped Ernst on the back and whispered something to Fräulein Richter with a meaningful look. He was introduced as Herr Klingeberg. He ignored Klara and beckoned over an older American couple who had entered the Winter Garden at the same time he had. The Americans were polished, bursting with confidence and toothy smiles. They made no effort to speak German. Herr Klingeberg’s English was excellent, because when he spoke, it sounded like he had marbles in his mouth like the Americans. He aided Fräulein Richter, whose English was halting and peppered with German. But she made up for it with gestures and laughter. The others seemed to be in no doubt as to what she meant.
As an only child of a professor, Klara was all too used to the company of adults and was accustomed to being overlooked when grown-up conversation took over. As the adults talked, she looked around the Winter Garden, studying the other passengers. Even though she didn’t understand the conversation floating above her head, Klara could decipher that their table—and this w
oman in particular—was a source of intrigue and importance. She caught surreptitious glances from the other passengers, and other than the forgotten napkin for Klara, the waitstaff were very attentive.
“Fräulein Richter,” said the American man, tapping his nose. Klara didn’t know what it meant, but they were all laughing. Eventually the Americans moved off and Herr Klingeberg pulled up an extra chair next to Fräulein Richter, who seemed to be glowing from the brief exchange.
“You see, you’re quite the celebrity,” said Herr Klingeberg. Then he signaled the waiter.
“Nom de voyage,” Ernst said, chuckling. “Even the ship’s cat must know you’re on board.”
Herr Klingeberg shrugged off his scarf and tossed it onto the back of his chair. Klara froze midbite, a large piece of Kirschtorte lodged in her cheek. The pin on his lapel—an eagle clutching a swastika—was the Reichsadler. Swastikas were everywhere in Berlin, but only government officials wore this pin. She swallowed; the cake scraped down her throat like a stone. A voice in her head was echoing the words her father had uttered only an hour before: Enemies of the Third Reich.
After her father’s revelations—he was on some list; he could be arrested—Klara was unsure what side she was on. Up until the Europa, she had believed like Freya and Matthias in the greatness of Germany, that Hitler was strengthening the country, bringing the German Volk together. She knew her parents didn’t agree with Hitler, but she had chosen to emulate her peers and her teachers—and everyone else she knew. Admiring the Führer was the popular opinion, and who wouldn’t want to be on the cheering side?
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