We walk separately, a hundred metres apart, past the soaring, classical structure of the university building, centuries old, solid and constant. I lift my face to the sun; a feathery breeze touches my skin. I glance back. He’s on the other side of the road. The slightest tilt of his head as he acknowledges my look. However many times we do this, it’s the same rush of adrenaline. Fear and excitement in equal measure.
I enter the small park beyond the university buildings. A park where Jews are forbidden. Thank God for Walter’s blond hair and blue eyes. A young man passes on his bike, a bag of books slapping heavily against his thigh. An elderly man shuffles in the distance with a stick. Nobody else is in sight. It’s as safe as it will ever be. I sit down and rest my back against the solid trunk of a tree and a couple of minutes later he sits beside me.
‘Hello, you.’ I lean towards him for a quick kiss. ‘I have one hour at most.’
‘Is that all?’ His shoulders sag.
‘I’m sorry, I’ll have more time next week.’
‘It’s not that…’ His voice falters. He looks wretched.
‘Walter? What’s wrong?’ I touch his shoulder.
He looks at me and swallows.
‘Hey,’ I rub his arm, ‘not even a joke today?’
He shakes his head. He is deathly pale. ‘There’s something I must tell you.’
‘What is it?’
He clears his throat. ‘My father finally accepted a few weeks ago that life here is intolerable, that Hitler will take everything that’s ours, whether we remain here or not. He has decided we must leave Germany, at whatever cost. So, every day he’s been walking from embassy to embassy, queueing for hours on end, trying to get visas for the family. But, as I predicted, we’ve left it too late. We should have done this years ago. Now, like vermin, no country wants any more Jews.’ I wince at his words. ‘We’re stuck,’ he continues, ‘Except…’
‘Except?’
‘There is one way.’ He sighs. ‘But I-I’m not sure I can go through with it.’
‘Why? But you must!’ My heart squeezes as I say it. The most important thing is that Walter is safe. So, it’s good news. Walter doesn’t meet my eyes.
‘It means me going alone,’ he says in a flat voice. ‘I’ll have to leave my parents, my grandmother, all of my family.’ He scrunches his fists tight. ‘Worse still, I can’t bear to think of my life without you in it.’
‘I don’t understand. Why is it that only you can go?’
He takes a long, deep breath. ‘We have good friends in England. The father is a doctor and they left Germany in 1933. They have a daughter who is a year older than me. Anna.’
‘And they can help?’
‘They think I would be able to get a visa…’ He swallows again. ‘… if I’m a relative, and they guarantee to support me financially.’
‘But you aren’t, are you? A relative, I mean. How—’
‘Hetty… oh hell.’ He looks skyward, then finally meets my eyes. With a jolt I see his are brimming with tears. ‘I have to become engaged to Anna. It’s the only way!’
I stare at him.
‘What? But you wouldn’t actually get married though? You’re only nineteen, and—’
‘Yes. I would have to get married. The authorities over there, they check everything. It’s helpful that they are a good family. Well respected. Anna’s father’s an excellent doctor and Anna – well, she is a lovely, kind girl, but she isn’t you. The last thing I want is to marry someone, anyone, other than you, Hetty.’
‘Married?’ Weakness spreads through my body.
‘I mean, it’s a lot to ask of her too, of course. I’ve no idea if she – she has someone else. It’s so good of her to help me out.’
Good of her to help you out? What would I not give, to be in her position?
My brain has numbed. I cannot conjure any words.
Walter stumbles on, as if trying to fill the silence. ‘She’s the sort of girl my parents would want me to marry, even if all of this…’
I spring away from him, anger surging, sudden and unexpected, through my body.
‘Don’t imagine for a single second this is easy!’ Walter says fiercely, grabbing both my hands. ‘In addition to leaving you, and having to marry someone I have no interest in marrying, I have to leave my parents behind – and to what sort of future? This is tearing me apart, Hetty. I told them I wouldn’t go, that I’d stay and see things through here, but my parents won’t hear of it. The fact I have a chance of a new life is all that is keeping them going.’ Tears flow freely down his cheeks. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen a man cry.
I nod, a lump forming in my throat, and I close my hand around his. We’ve always been doomed, us two.
‘I love you, Hetty. I always will. But it seems “we” could never be. Not properly. Not here.’
‘I’ve had these stupid daydreams,’ I say, ‘that one day, somehow, some way, we can be together. Live in another country, far from here, where nobody cares who or what we are. But now…’
‘I know.’
My nose begins to run and he hands me his handkerchief. I wipe my eyes and nose and put it into my pocket. Something of his to keep.
‘How soon?’
‘Nothing is fixed. I have no visa yet from the British, nor any permission to leave here because we have to pay the damned exit tax, and we don’t have any money, so honestly, I don’t know. But it could be as soon as a few weeks. Let’s try and see each other as often as we can until then.’
I stare at him through the wash of my tears, trying to absorb all he has said.
‘But everything’s changed now.’ The enormity of it finally hits. ‘You’re getting married to another girl!’
‘She will never know about us.’
Something collapses, folds in. A silent scream.
He pulls me towards him. ‘I am so very sorry. If it could be any other way, you know I would change it.’
‘But we can’t let this continue, can we?’ I push him away, slap his chest. I want to yell at him. Hit him. Make him feel my pain. ‘It’s better we stop it now.’
I stand in a rush and back away.
‘Is that really what you want?’
He comes towards me, tries to take me in his arms, but I fight to be free.
‘No, Walter, of course not. None of it is. But it has to be, doesn’t it?’ I’m trying to hold the pieces of myself together. ‘I have to go! Good luck with your new life in England. And good luck with Anna.’
‘Hetty – this isn’t fair!’
I walk away.
‘So, this is it? Just like that?’ He runs after me. ‘Hetty—’
‘It’s for the best. For me, I can’t… Please, Walter. Just let me go.’
I feel him watching as I walk. Silently. In shock.
I don’t look back as I leave the park and pass quickly beneath the looming university buildings, casting a deep shadow across my path. I should go home, but I can’t bear to. I keep walking until I can no longer see Walter, nor him me. Then I collapse against a wall and sob. Deep, wringing cries, as though I’ve been told my life is to end. It might as well have done.
No longer caring if I’m late, I wander the streets for a long time. It’s one thing to accept Walter may have to live somewhere else, one day. But this. This? Walter to marry a girl called Anna.
How can I ever come to terms with that?
*
Something is wrong.
A sense in the air which makes the hairs on my arms stand up as I step through the front door. Ingrid appears, her face pinched, a tense look in her eyes.
‘Oh, Miss Herta. At last! You must go straight to the afternoon sitting room. Your parents are waiting for you.’ She hovers while I take off my outside shoes. Her words, her tone, aren’t unkind, her usual sneer is absent.
I hurry in to find Vati standing near the window, silhouetted against the light. Mutti is on the sofa. She looks up at me, her face tear-stained. Her eyes red and swollen.
‘Oh, Hetty!’ She slaps a hand over her mouth as she begins to sob, deep, heart-wrenching sobs.
‘I’m sorry I’m so late. I didn’t mean to frighten you—’
‘It doesn’t matter now.’ Vati shakes his head and comes over to me, his face the colour of ash.
Mutti lets out another sob. Could she have found out about Hilda Müller and the girl-child? Did Oma die? Have they found out about Walter?
‘It’s Karl…’ He can’t finish the sentence and stares at me with stricken eyes.
‘Karl?’
‘There’s been an accident.’ He holds a telegram limply at his side. ‘He – he’s dead.’
Through the thin, brown paper of the telegram, I can make out the outline of the mighty Luftwaffe eagle, uneven letters stamped into words beneath. News. Plain, simple news.
The telegram blurs and a buzz as loud as a swarm of bees fills my ears.
‘It can’t be true.’ I exhale. ‘Mutti?’
People don’t die when they are nineteen years old. They don’t die when they are brimming with life and energy. They can’t die when they are beautiful and strong and Karl and my brother.
The words are wrong. They must be.
But Mutti continues sobbing, her hand over her mouth, her whole body heaving and shaking. Vati goes to her and wraps his arm tightly around her shoulders. I can’t bear to look at his slack face and hollow eyes.
‘Please…’ I try again.
‘It’s true,’ Mutti gasps through her tears. ‘Karl’s dead.’
‘Your brother—’ Vati begins, shuts his mouth and shakes his head.
A numbness engulfs me.
I’m sitting on the sofa, staring at Vati, willing him to say something. Something that will make it all better.
When I was little, Vati was the biggest, strongest person I knew. He was in command, and I was safe and secure. In my world, he had the power of God. But now his big frame is crumpled. In the face of death he is as helpless as the next man.
‘What happened?’ I’m numb, trembling.
Vati slides his arm from Mutti’s shoulders, collapsing forward as if he no longer has the strength to hold himself upright, and rests his forearms on his legs.
‘Not Karl,’ Mutti sobs, mopping her eyes with a sodden handkerchief. ‘Not my boy. Anyone but Karl…’
‘What the hell happened?’ I’m suddenly angry. ‘Why won’t you tell me what happened?’
Someone slips a cup and saucer into my hands.
‘Have a drink, it’ll help with the shock.’ Bertha’s voice, soft and gentle. ‘Come now.’
I do as I’m told but my hand is shaking so much I can barely lift the cup to my lips.
‘I spoke with Hauptmann Winkler, just a few minutes ago,’ Vati says, his voice tremulous, like an old man’s. He takes a slug of whisky, or brandy, or whatever is in the glass Bertha hands him. He nods to Mutti to do the same. She gulps hers and coughs.
‘He’d been on a routine training exercise, preparing for a test on aerobatic manoeuvres,’ Vati says, his features dropping as though pulled down by a great weight. ‘He had to learn how to handle an aircraft at high speeds. It was good and clear this morning though a little gusty, but Karl had flown in more difficult conditions. It was all going very well, but ten minutes into the flight, Winkler said, Karl had misjudged the speed of a steep descent and been unable to pull out of it in time. He crashed the aircraft into the ground.’ Vati takes a deep breath. ‘He had multiple injuries, most seriously to his head. He arrived at the hospital in a coma. But the doctors were unable to save his life.’
‘He crashed…’ I say, processing Vati’s words. My ears still buzz. There’s a growing pressure in my chest.
‘Why was he in the aircraft on his own?’ Mutti asks, her voice rising. ‘I mean, he was inexperienced! What on earth were they thinking!’
‘Shh, my dear, don’t upset yourself even more.’ Vati rubs his paw-like hand on her thin knee. ‘He’d been flying for over a year. It was a single-seater plane. A Heinkel HE 51. According to Winkler, he’d flown one many times before and had impressed his superiors. A bright future cut tragically short, he said. The only consolation is, had he lived, his head injuries were so horrific, it would have meant very severe disablement, so it was probably for the best.’
‘For the best?’ Mutti’s eyes are wild. She turns to Vati and begins to shout at him. ‘Who the hell does he think he is, saying what was best for our son? It is his fault our Karl is dead and he thinks he knows what’s best? He probably told the doctors to stop trying to save him. He probably ordered them to kill him—’
‘Hélène!’ Vati says sharply. ‘You are overwrought. Hauptmann Winkler was devastated. I could hear it in his voice. You think he wanted to lose one of his most promising pilots in a stupid, senseless accident? Of course not.’
‘Oh, Franz… how can I?’ Her eyes brim with tears again. ‘Not Karl…’
Vati stands slowly. He looks sapped of all strength.
‘I’m going to call the doctor to bring you a sedative,’ he says as he shuffles towards the door. ‘Look after her, Herta.’
I move to sit next to Mutti and slip her hand into mine. It’s limp and delicate, like the foot of a bird. I squeeze it, but she barely responds. She stares into space, tears sliding one after the other down her cheeks.
‘I’ll take care of you, Mutti,’ I tell her, trying not to think of Karl lying somewhere on a slab in an icy morgue.
The crushing pressure in my chest intensifies, threatening to squeeze all the air from my lungs and strangle my heart until it stops beating altogether.
*
Karl and I are in the treehouse. I can smell his cologne, clean and crisp, mingled with his own warm, oaty scent. He smiles and the corners of his mouth fold up, revealing the white of his teeth. His deep brown eyes wrinkle, just a little, at the edges and his skin is sun-kissed and glowing. He turns slightly and I see the soft fuzz of baby hair at the back of his neck.
‘Let’s play Roman soldiers,’ he says, handing me a wooden sword. ‘Whoever wins can be the Emperor and the other has to obey their orders for the rest of the day.’
‘That’s not fair,’ I say, sulking.
‘Why not?’ He smiles at me, knowing exactly why, but he wants me to say it anyway.
‘Because you always win. You’re bigger than me.’
‘Then fight harder – and cleverer. It’s the cleverest who win,’ he says, leaping up and tapping me with his sword.
I try to hit him back, but I can’t reach him because Karl is at the controls of his bomber. I’m sitting behind him, but he doesn’t seem to know I’m here. I try to shout his name, to warn him, but no sound comes from my mouth. The plane is shaking violently and he is sweating, fighting to regain control. It lurches and rolls, dropping fast. The engines roar. I scream, silently. There is a stench of oil, gasoline and hot metal. And something else – sweat and impending death. The ground rushes and then the dreadful crash and a screeching sound of metal being crushed.
I jolt awake and stare into the darkness, sweating and breathing fast.
I switch on my bedside lamp and peer at the clock. Three-fifteen in the morning.
Karl is dead. The last conversation we had was that awful one, full of distrust and accusation. Karl was the centre of my universe when we were children. Where did it all go wrong? How can I live with that dreadful exchange being our parting words?
Tears slide from the corners of my eyes, dripping onto the pillow. The room is so still and quiet it’s as if time has stopped and the world is no longer turning.
But the clock still ticks on my mantelpiece.
I turn towards Hitler’s portrait hanging above it. He looks smugly down at me, over his bristly moustache.
You did this. How could you let this happen to my beautiful, dear brother?
He stares back, his eyes stony, black, arrogant and taunting.
This is your punishment, Jew-lover. It’s all your fault, for consorting with the enemy. You chose the wrong path. You chose evil and this is your reward.
But Karl was your perfect child. He gave you everything he had. His love, now his life. Not like me. Why didn’t you kill me instead?
We all know what happens to those who make a pact with the devil… A wry smile plays on Hitler’s lips.
A rush of heat and I cannot bear the sight of him any longer. I’ve made my choice. No matter that Walter is leaving and will soon be married to this Anna girl. No matter that I shan’t ever see him again. He has taught me things I never understood before, but I do now. You have lied, Herr Hitler. And Karl is dead. You bastard.
I run across the room, ripping the portrait from the wall, pulling out the nail and a chunk of plaster. I throw the picture to the floor and I stamp on the Führer, cracking the frame and pounding his head, grinding my heels over his eyes.
I hate you. I hate you. I hate you!
Now I’m certain. It wasn’t God who sent him – it was the devil himself.
I shove the broken picture behind the wardrobe.