January 1939
Lovely, dear,” Aunt Charlotte pronounced as I joined her in the foyer. I wore a dinner dress of periwinkle blue, courtesy of Frau Himmel, and made my obligatory twirl for her to inspect me. The dinner party was set to begin in fifteen minutes, and I was expected to be there to greet the guests like the daughter of the house.
“Thank you,” I said, wishing I were clever enough to come up with an excuse to stay in my room with a good book.
“Don’t forget to smile. You have a tendency to look a bit sullen at the table on occasion.”
“It happens when I get lost in thought,” I said.
“Stay in the moment,” she said. “No man likes a silly daydreamer. You can indulge your idle thoughts when you’re alone, if you must, but be present in the room.”
“Yes, Aunt Charlotte,” I said, swallowing a sigh. I made sure my mask rarely slipped for these people, but Aunt Charlotte insisted I be flawless. To the point where I couldn’t even be the sovereign over my own thoughts.
As usual, the most elite members of Aunt Charlotte and Uncle Otto’s social circles were in attendance. Klara’s parents entered the room, with her a pace behind them, looking flawless in an evening dress in a shade of Bordeaux red that was exquisite with her dark hair and milky complexion. She looked thinner than the last time I saw her, especially in her face, and her gait implied that, despite the weight loss, she was wearing a girdle tight enough to crush all her internal organs from the waist down. I cast a side eye at Frau Schmidt when she wasn’t looking. It had to be her doing.
We sat down to the meal, elegant as always, and I smiled and made idle conversation with those around me. I smiled between bites of meticulously prepared food and made sure to keep my conversation light. Friedrich was seated to my left, and I wanted to remind Aunt Charlotte about what she’d said about seating couples together at dinner parties being a tedious practice. But, of course, that had a lot more to do with her enjoying as much time away from Uncle Otto as she could manufacture and was at odds with her desire to see me married off. The meal seemed to last an eternity, but I endeavored to be charming for the duration of it. When the waitstaff came around with the dessert trays, I had to stifle an audible sigh of relief.
“Klara, I think you can skip dessert,” Frau Schmidt chided loud enough for the whole table to hear as the staff was offering slices of cakes and pies for the guests to select from. I’d tried not to pay Klara too much attention during the meal, but she’d taken minuscule portions of each course.
Klara flashed a weak smile and waved away the uniformed footman, who scurried on to the next guest.
“Klara should have some of the chocolate marzipan cake,” I interjected, addressing the footman. “It’s her favorite. I asked Cook to make it especially for her.”
“How very thoughtful of you,” her mother said before Klara could respond. “But Klara is watching her figure at the moment.”
“How interesting,” I said. I turned to my left. “Captain Schroeder, isn’t it true that the Führer has discouraged women from the wasteful pursuit of waifish figures? Seems rather French to me.”
“Well,” he began. “I suppose that’s true.”
“I should think young women like Klara and myself, on the verge of family life, ought to be focused on building strength for the upcoming challenges of motherhood and running a household. I believe, Uncle Otto, you reminded me of this on my first night here when my appetite wasn’t what it should be.”
“Just so,” Uncle Otto said.
“Let the girl have some cake, Hildegarde,” Klara’s father piped in. “For God’s sake, it’s a party.”
The footman, looking as though he wanted to disappear into the blue-and-silver dining room wallpaper, placed a delicate china plate with a sliver of cake in front of Klara before moving on. Klara’s mother flashed me a challenging look but softened her expression just as quickly.
“You’ve been taking the BDM teachings to heart,” she said. “How clever of you.”
“Why else would I attend if that weren’t my intention,” I said. “If indeed the goal of the BDM is to prepare women to establish healthy German homes for a stronger Germany, it seems to do otherwise would be foolhardy.”
“Especially for one engaged to the captain,” Frau Schmidt said. It sounded more like a threat than a simple statement of fact.
“Hanna understands her upcoming role in society, Hildi,” Aunt Charlotte said, her face cool and expressionless, but I knew her well enough to know she was seething under that calm façade. “And takes it seriously. She’ll be a leader in society and a role model to the women of her acquaintance.”
“Quite so,” Frau Schmidt replied. She turned to the person to her left, a lieutenant of some description, and began chatting. Anything to change the subject.
As soon as dessert was ended, we retired to the parlor for coffee and conversation.
“Without caffeine,” I assured Friedrich as I handed him a cup. The party discouraged the overconsumption of caffeine, and coffee, being imported, was especially suspect. Decaffeinated coffee was an acceptable indulgence, especially as it was a German coffee merchant who invented the process for removing the caffeine from the coffee beans.
“You made rather a spectacle at dinner, didn’t you?” he said, his tone biting but his face placid. I half wondered if he’d been studying Aunt Charlotte’s technique.
“I was simply sticking up for Klara,” I said. I felt a pang in my chest when I realized I almost said “my friend.” I didn’t want to impose my friendship on her if it wasn’t wanted, and it was clear it wasn’t.
“You should learn to mind your own business and let families deal with their own matters,” he growled in low tones. “I was mortified. I’m sure Klara’s mother knows what’s best for her.”
“Hildegarde Schmidt is a beast,” I countered. “It looks like she’s starving Klara. I’ve heard the way she speaks to her daughter in public and don’t even want to consider what she says in private.”
“I’m telling you now, don’t concern yourself in the affairs of others. I won’t have it.”
“Even if someone I care about is being mistreated?” I hissed. “I’m just supposed to ignore it?”
“Precisely, if you wish to have a peaceful life,” he sneered. “I won’t have a meddlesome crone for a wife.”
“I thought I was meant to take my place as a ‘leader in our community and a role model for other women of my acquaintance.’ Isn’t it my duty to point out when a mother is mistreating her child? And not adhering to the teachings we’re supposed to espouse?”
“Your duty, first and foremost, is to be charming and hold your tongue. And not to embarrass me. Is that understood?”
“Well and truly,” I said.
And it was clear I was not meant to have any role of significance at all, other than as a cloak of respectability for Friedrich to wear.
MY SUITCASE WAS open on the bed and my belongings were strewn about in a maelstrom. I packed my best blue dress and was wearing the brown one I’d worn on the trip to Berlin. I wrapped Mama’s picture carefully in some underthings. Of all the items Aunt Charlotte had purchased for me, I only took a few basics, some nightgowns and a couple of sturdy skirts and blouses that she’d be unlikely to begrudge me. I didn’t want to be accused of theft, nor did I want to give the impression I was coming back. If I only took what I’d brought with me, I figured the message would get through.
The engagement ring from Friedrich lay in the wood-and-tooled-leather jewelry box I’d been given shortly after my arrival. It was accompanied by the rest of the jewelry “rewards” from Aunt Charlotte and Uncle Otto and a note containing instructions to return the ring to him with my fervent hope that he’d find someone better suited to his needs. Someone like Klara.
A knock sounded at the door, and I redoubled my efforts. I ignored the knocking and kept packing. Aunt Charlotte would stop me, and any of the staff would betray me to her. A more insistent knock followed, with Klara entering soon after.
“Your aunt said you’d be in here. Mama left her cloak last night and asked me to come fetch it.” She rolled her eyes dramatically. “She thought I ought to pay you a visit while I’m here. I don’t mean to intrude, but if your aunt were to tell my mother I hadn’t come when I promised I would . . . well, you understand.”
“Yes, I can imagine. It’s fine. I never said you couldn’t come. Though you won’t have much call to be vexed with me for long. I’m leaving.”
Klara eyed the tattered old bag and the clothes strewn all about the bed. “What? Are you eloping with a dashing chauffeur? That would sort things for me, wouldn’t it?”
“Hardly, Klara. But I hope the end result will be the same for you. I’m going home,” I said, snapping my grubby bag shut. “On the seven-o’clock train if I can hurry. And I’ll be gone, and Friedrich will be yours.”
“You clearly don’t understand men like Friedrich. They don’t go back to their castoffs. They’re too proud.”
“Well, that I can’t help,” I said, flinging more clothes in my bag. “But none of it matters to me. I’m going home.”
“What are you talking about? You are home.”
“No, I’m not. Teisendorf is home. This isn’t my home and never will be.”
“Have you thought this through?” Klara asked. “Your father wouldn’t have sent you here if he thought your prospects were good at home.”
“He sent me here to get me out of his hair. So he could grieve for my mother in peace. I’ll simply show him that I can be of more help than he realizes. I’ll do my lessons by correspondence at night and help at the shop during the day.”
“So you’re going to trade the most eligible bachelor in all of Berlin and a life of comfort to help run a dry goods store with your father?”
“You got the measure of it in one try. Well done.” I didn’t bother concealing the rancor in my voice. She wasn’t a friend any longer, so she didn’t expect any of the kindness that went along with such an attachment.
“Are you mad? Why would you sacrifice all this?” She stood, mouth agape, as if I’d suggested the sea were a violent shade of green.
“Because this isn’t me.” I gestured my hands at our grand surroundings. “It isn’t my life. It’s not what I want, nor what my mother would have wanted for me, no matter what everyone says. I knew her best. Even better than Papa, I think. She wanted me to be happy and to have choices. Marrying Friedrich would determine the course of the rest of my life, and I’m not ready for that. Not by half.”
“Don’t do anything rash,” she said, her tone softer. “Tell your aunt and uncle you’re homesick. Once you’re there you can decide for sure what it is you want.”
I looked at Klara, who, for the first time in ages, looked completely sincere. The advice was being given in earnest, and it would be ungenerous not to take it. Besides, options were what I was after.
“You might be right about that,” I said. I eyed the letter I’d left and collected it. I considered tossing it in the bin but didn’t want to risk anyone reading it. I’d rip it to shreds and toss it at the train station. Part of me wanted to leave it behind. To burn this bridge and forge something different. But I knew in my heart that Klara was right.
“What about the ring?” she asked. “Leaving it behind might be suspicious.”
“I’m a young woman traveling alone. If they ask, I’ll just say it was safer to leave valuables behind,” I said.
“Smart,” she said. “I still think you’re foolhardy, but at least this way you have an out. Or, a way back in, more precisely.”
“Options are good,” I said, remembering Mama’s words. But I was fairly certain that, as the miles separated me from Berlin, I would strengthen my resolve to stay in Teisendorf. Uncle Otto and Aunt Charlotte had been kind, but their sort of life was not for me.
“Well, I showed my face here. I don’t see any point in staying long enough to see your aunt Charlotte in high dudgeon. Good luck, I suppose.” She turned at the door. “But thank you for last night. You embarrassed my mother and it made me happier than I’ve been in ages.”
I paused and cracked a genuine smile. “I assure you it was my distinct pleasure.”
I collected the last of my things and tidied what I was leaving behind. I inhaled sharply and walked to the foyer, bracing myself for the worst of Aunt Charlotte’s temper.
“Why are you wearing that old thing?” Aunt Charlotte said as she saw me in the entryway. She was removing her coat and passed off a stack of parcels to one of the maids. More shopping to compensate for her loveless marriage. It seemed cold comfort to me, but I hoped it gave her some joy.
“It’s only a few months old,” I reminded her.
“Well, nevertheless, dear, you have so many prettier things to wear now. This isn’t Teisendorf, after all.”
“That’s just it, Aunt. I’m terribly anxious to see Papa again. With the holiday and all it’s made me homesick. I hope you won’t mind terribly my going back home for a while.” I didn’t state a specific time so that I wouldn’t be telling a lie.
“My dear, what about your studies? You made it clear you’re so very keen to finish them. Why keep Friedrich waiting if you’re really so cavalier?”
“I’ve arranged it so the teachers can give me some work so I don’t fall behind.”
“I don’t think it’s wise to leave when you just got engaged. Men can be so fickle.”
“Absence makes the heart grow fonder,” I said. “It will make him all the happier for my return.”
I feared that was true.
“Well, very well. I just don’t think it’s all that prudent a move. But perhaps a short trip home will remind you of what you have here.”
“Just so, Aunt Charlotte.”
Surprisingly, Uncle Otto offered to accompany me to the train station and was perfectly jovial as we took the ride into the city. He kissed my cheek before I hopped onto the train and waved from the platform. He smiled.
A pang of doubt surged in my gut. Maybe they did care. Maybe they did just want what was best for me and my future. They were convinced that Friedrich was just that. Even if they were wrong, they were trying to do what they thought was right. They could hardly be faulted for that.
I spent the ride to Teisendorf wondering if I was making a grave error. Perhaps I was foolish to leave Berlin and all the opportunities it afforded. Maybe I could grow to love Friedrich. In time I might come to see what everyone else seemed to see in him.
By the time I arrived in Teisendorf, I was twisted in knots and felt like I’d worn my worry stone down several centimeters over the course of the trip. I was clutching it in one hand and my valise in the other when I stepped off the train. I saw a familiar face waiting for me in the crowd. His arms were crossed, and he looked put out.
“Papa!” I exclaimed, tossing myself at him. “I didn’t expect to see you here. I was going to walk home.”
“Your aunt and uncle called to tell me you were coming back. I had to leave Felix in charge of the store.” Papa never liked leaving the store in anyone’s charge. Even his most trusted clerk, Felix, was rarely given the honor.
“You didn’t have to go to such trouble, Papa. I know my way.”
He said nothing, but then looked me up and down, pausing at my left hand where I held my worry stone.
“For God’s sake, put that pebble away, girl. Your mother never should have given you such a crutch.”
I stowed the stone in my secret pocket before he got a notion to toss it out. He’d done that once before and it had taken Mama and me hours to find it.
He rolled his eyes but looked mollified. “Let’s continue this discussion at home, shall we?”
We rode in his old pickup truck in silence. As we entered the house, I was greeted not with the rush of familiarity I’d expected, but with the pang of something that was so close to right that it just felt off. A middle-aged woman with a lumpy figure in a stained dress stood at the sink peeling potatoes. In the same spot my mother had stood countless times when she prepared our meals, usually with me at her side. I arched a brow at Papa.
“Greta, I have an extra for dinner tonight. This is my daughter, Hanna. Hanna, this is my housekeeper, Greta.”
She gave me a courteous nod and went back to her labors without giving me more than a cursory glance. Of course Papa had hired a housekeeper. It made more sense than him learning how to manage on his own. But it would reduce his need for me considerably.
Greta served us a hearty meal of chicken stew and crusty bread and left us to enjoy it in peace. She didn’t live with Papa, and this pleased me. In that moment it occurred to me that the next time I saw a woman at the sink, she likely wouldn’t be a simple housekeeper. He would want to remarry and move on. He probably saw me as an impediment to that process.
“Your aunt and uncle tell me you’ve become engaged to a rather promising young man.”
“Well . . . yes. It’s all been so sudden.”
“And you wanted to come back here because it scared you. I warn you, Hanna. I won’t coddle your nonsense like your mother did. I want you back on the train tomorrow so you can face your duties.”
“But I don’t love him, Papa. He’s a brute.”
“Most men are, Hanna. And your mother would have done well to prepare you for that. Life will have to teach you that lesson now. Your aunt and uncle have done a tremendous amount for you, and coming here is poor repayment for that generosity. I sent you to the city to give you a chance at a real future.”
“Papa, I don’t like the city. I’d prefer a simple life here in Teisendorf like you and Mama had. I can be useful to you, Papa. I can help run the store. I can cook and clean for you. Wouldn’t it be better to have me here taking care of you than some stranger? You could bring the boys back and we’d be a proper family again.”
“The only house I want you keeping is your own, Hanna. I don’t want you wasting your youth taking care of your brothers and me. This Friedrich your uncle tells me about will be a good husband to you. Don’t throw a good proposal away on a girlish whim.”
“How could you possibly know? You haven’t met him. You want me to run off and marry a man you haven’t even taken the time to know yourself.”
“I trust my brother and his judgment. If he says this young man is a good match, then I believe him. You should, too.”
“I trust my own heart, Papa.”
“The most sentimental nonsense I ever heard. Many a time I’ve kicked myself for giving your mother free reign over the raising of you, but never more than today. She mollycoddled you instead of teaching you the ways of the world. But I won’t have it, Hanna. It’s long past time that you give up these childish ideas your mother stuffed in your head and face reality. You’re nearly a woman and you need to settle your future.”
“I just wish you, Aunt Charlotte, and Uncle Otto would give me some say in it.”
“You’ve shown by your visit here that you’re not grown up enough for such a responsibility. These decisions will be left to me now. And my brother. And if you have any sense, you’ll recognize what we’re trying to do for you.”
“Yes, Papa.” I pushed my bowl, still mostly full, to the side.
“Good. I know you miss your mother, Hanna. You were as close as a mother and daughter could be. But you’ll see, by and by, that we know what’s best for you. You were left too long under some dangerous influences, and I won’t have you succumb to them. I blame myself for it, but I can rectify my mistakes now.”
I bowed my head. “So I’m to leave tomorrow, then? I won’t even be able to have a proper visit with you or see anyone at all?”
Papa sighed. “You may stay a week. You can get some rest from the city. I know how tiring it can be.”
“Thank you,” I said, my voice little more than a whisper. He’d always hated trips into the city and ensured that they were few. At least in that, we could agree.
THE HILLS OF Teisendorf were enchanting, even in the shroud of winter. I ambled aimlessly in them during the day, perhaps hoping to see Mama around the next bend. Papa refused my help at the store, mostly because he didn’t want to have to admit how much help I could be to him. He couldn’t bear to be proven wrong, so he didn’t give me the opportunity. On the Wednesday of my trip, with only three days left in my reprieve, my wanderings took me to a lonely cabin on the edge of the forest. There was a Romani family that Mama checked in on frequently, and I was sure she would have wanted me to carry on when I could.
The eldest daughter, Kezia, was a bright girl of about fifteen who spoke German better than the rest of her family. She had the most arresting hazel-green eyes I’d ever seen. If she’d been free to socialize in town, I was certain that the boys and young men would have been half-mad for her. Her lovely face lit up as she recognized me, and she called to the rest of her family in their native tongue. I could hear the commotion inside as she rushed over to embrace me.
“I am so sorry about your mother. I wondered what happened to you.”
“I’ve been in Berlin. I’m only here for a visit.”
“He sent you away?” She cocked her head to the side. The whole idea was anathema to her.
“He sent me to be with family. It’s complicated.”
She shrugged as if our ways were incomprehensible to her. I scarcely understood them myself, so I could hardly blame her for her confusion.
“Do you think you could come look in on Vano? He’s been unwell and Mama is worried.”
“Of course,” I said, wishing I’d thought to bring Mama’s kit along. I’d left it hidden in the darkest recesses of my case in my bedroom. I didn’t dare leave it unattended in Berlin but didn’t want to risk Papa seeing it, either.
Her brow was furrowed as we entered the little cabin. She was an unflappable girl, so even this minor show of concern gave me pause. Vano was only about five years old, the youngest of the children, and the beloved baby of the family.
The one-room cabin was kept cozy warm against the chill of winter. It was tidy and cheerful, though their mother made her living off the land and hardly had two pennies to rub together. Kezia spoke to her mother in Romani, and the woman lifted the boy from the bed and brought him over to me. I sat in the chair in the corner of the room and let her place him in my lap, where he immediately went limp. He had a high fever and was a listless imitation of the vibrant boy I knew.
“How long has he been like this?”
“Two days,” Kezia replied. “Mama has tried everything she knows.”
“And she hasn’t taken him to a doctor?”
“How can we?” she asked. It was a fair point. We’d all heard about the party’s absolute hatred of the Romani. They were disappearing in greater numbers with each passing year, either because they fled Germany or because they were rounded up. The only way Kezia and her family were able to stay safe was because they were hidden in these remote woods. There were no Romani left in our cities to speak of, and I’d heard Friedrich speak of this with pride on more than one occasion. These were people my mother had cared for and considered her friends. To the Nazis, they were vermin.
I racked my brain to think of any fever remedies that Mama used that Kezia’s mother wouldn’t have already tried. I wished more than anything that Mama were here to treat the boy herself and give him a better chance at survival. I’d been a fair apprentice, but I wasn’t ready to treat people on my own.
“Have you tried yarrow or elderflower tea? Bone broth?”
“Yes. None of it did much.”
“He needs real medicine,” I said, knowing I might as well have been asking to borrow the Queen of England’s favorite tiara.
“We know this, but there must be something else we can do.”
“Give him cool baths to lower his temperature, but don’t let him get chilled. And all the water he can drink.” I rattled off the list of remedies Mama used before seeking out a licensed doctor. “Keep up with the yarrow tea. It will help him sweat it out.”
She looked panicked. She knew these efforts weren’t enough.
“Can he keep anything down?” I dreaded the answer but knew it all the same.
She knew the significance of the question, too, and looked pained. “He hasn’t purged in a while, but I’m not sure he has anything left to get up.”
“If he can’t keep anything down, even the best medicines won’t work. The best we can do is try. You do what you can here, and I’ll see what I can do about getting him some medicine.”
“Please hurry,” she said. “Please.”
“Just hold tight.” I bounded out the door and found myself running back toward the house. The boy needed a sulfonamide or he’d be gone within a day, provided he was lucky. Asking a doctor for a prescription when I was well would raise dangerous questions. But Pieter had been ill last winter and Mama had to break down and take him to the physician. She’d gotten a second dose of the medicine in case of a relapse, but he’d pulled through with just one round. Mama was certain to have kept the rest on hand. I just had to pray Papa’s new housekeeper wasn’t overly efficient at her job.
To my dismay, Greta was there preparing dinner when I burst through the front door.
“What has you in such an all-fired hurry?” she asked, looking up from the stove.
“Never you mind,” I said, not bothering with pleasantries. Chances were my visits to Teisendorf would be few if any once I married Friedrich, so there was no sense in pretending I had any feelings for this interloper in my mother’s home.
I ran down to my father’s bedroom, crossed over to the small private bathroom he’d shared with Mama and flung open the door to the medicine cabinet.
Greta followed me down the hall and stood at the doorway to the bathroom. “This is your father’s private room. You don’t belong in here.”
“Mind your own business. This is my home and I’ll go where I please.”
“I’ll tell him you’ve been meddling.”
I looked over the bottles of pills and nearly cried for joy when I found the bottle of sulfonamide. I grabbed it and slammed the cabinet shut.
“You do just that,” I said, turning to face her. She looked like she wanted to challenge me, but stepped aside reflexively. Perhaps my time at Uncle Otto and Aunt Charlotte’s was proving to be of some use after all.
I dashed past her and ran back to Kezia’s cabin at full tilt. Little Vano looked just as ill, but had managed to keep some yarrow tea down. There was at least a shred of hope.
“Give him one pill morning and night,” I instructed. “And pray he keeps them down. I won’t be here to get you more.”
Kezia nodded and relayed the information to her mother. Both offered me their thanks and I hugged them both with prayers for Vano’s recovery in my heart. If he’d been in Mama’s care she would have returned twice a day to check on the boy until she was convinced he was well. She would have brought salves and restorative broths even after he began to improve. But I could not fill her shoes. It pained me with every step I took toward the house. I didn’t run this time but walked slowly. Greta would have told my father everything by now and I would have some somber music to face.
True to my premonition, my father was waiting at the dinner table, his arms crossed, when I got home.
“What have you been up to?” he asked. “Greta says you were rummaging in my room.”
“I was not rummaging in your room,” I said. I did not raise my voice or give in to my anger. I would meet him rationally. “I went to find medicine Mama left in your cabinet.”
“She said you ran in and out of here like a possessed banshee. What was the matter?”
“I came upon some old friends. Their son was sick. I gave them some of Pieter’s old medicine. It wouldn’t have been good for much longer anyway.”
“Precisely what I was worried about. You know you’re not supposed to prance around acting like a doctor. Your mother did and it caused more trouble than you’ve been made privy to.”
I took a breath to steady the rapid beating of my heart. I would not let him see my rage. I was on the point of marriage and yet I was still a child to him. To be dictated to and ordered around. “My mother didn’t act like a doctor. She was one.”
“They took her license. She wasn’t permitted to practice medicine. She did so against the wishes of the country and my own as well.”
“She did what she thought was right, and so did I.”
“You went off to see that gypsy family in the woods, didn’t you?”
“How could you possibly know?” I asked. “Are you having me watched?”
“I don’t have to, Hanna. People are watching anyway. I knew what you were up to before the boy swallowed his first pill. At least you owned up to it, but you shouldn’t have gone. I was foolish to let you stay even a week.”
“If I hadn’t, he would have died.”
“That’s their own affair,” Papa said. “And you going to their shack won’t be doing the rest of them any favors, whether the boy lives or not. You were foolish today in ways you don’t understand. And not just to yourself, but to your brothers and me. People are watching. Your mother never believed that. She never cared for our safety like she should have.”
Papa’s face wasn’t filled with rage. It was filled with resignation and fear. He was right in one thing. If my going to their home brought attention to them, I’d exposed them to danger.
“I promise I won’t go back,” I said. “I didn’t know I was being watched.”
“If you’re smart, you’ll assume you are at every moment from here on out. Every move you make is seen. Every word you speak is heard. Every word you write is read. And no, you won’t go back to the gypsy family. You’re going back to your aunt and uncle’s on the morning train. You’ll pack your things after dinner and be ready to go at first light. This foolishness has gone on long enough.”
“Yes, Papa,” I said. I took my place at the table. Greta put a plate of sausage and potatoes before me while shooting me a triumphant expression. I returned a glower that seemed to scare her back into submission. I’d find a way to convince Papa to replace her. I wasn’t too childish to think that I’d approve of anyone taking my mother’s role in the home, but Papa could certainly find better than this nasty old crone.
I ate enough of my meal to satisfy my father and my own conscience and put the rest of my belongings back in my valise. And just like the night a few months earlier, before I embarked on my trip to Berlin, I cried myself to sleep wishing that my mother could somehow return and make things all right in a way they never would be again.