A warm wind caressed Patrik’s cheek as he hurried down the busy main street. Not wanting to draw attention to himself, he resisted the urge to turn around, but he couldn’t shake the tingling of his skin that told him someone was following him.
He was being ridiculous. The end-of-the-day rush was on, and many of Budapest’s residents were homeward bound. With everything going on with Zofia, he had turned paranoid.
He arrived at the side street he needed and broke off from the main throng, picking up his pace. After a minute or two, he dared to glance over his shoulder. See? He had been imagining things. No one was behind him.
Soon he came to his destination and climbed the single step to the dark-brown building, carved scrolls above the long windows on each of the three stories. Just as he was about to enter, the door swung open and a German soldier exited. He doffed his creased cap. “Jó napot kívánok.”
“Good day to … Bram? Is that you? I almost didn’t recognize you.” Patrik eyed him up and down. “What on earth are you wearing?”
Patrik’s fair-haired compatriot grinned, dimples appearing in each cheek. “Don’t you like it?”
“Have you gone mad?”
“Hardly, my friend. This is our latest Zionist Youth uniform.”
Patrik chuckled. “Sure it is. And next, we’ll all grow mustaches like Hitler.”
“You never know.”
Again, laughter exploded from Patrik’s lips. “Never lose your sense of humor. It may serve you well in the days to come.”
“I’m on my way out for some supper at the café. Would you care to join me?”
“What I have to discuss with you is better said away from the public. Can we speak in private?” Patrik opened the door and motioned for Bram to step inside.
“I’d prefer to converse with a good meal in my belly, but let’s go up to my flat. A pálinka and a cigarette will have to do.”
They ascended the two flights of stairs to the top floor. “Why would you wear that outfit if you’re on your way out to eat?”
“We all know the Germans get the best seats, the prettiest waitresses, and the fastest service.” A gleam lit Bram’s green eyes.
The world may be crumbling around them, but Bram would forever be the jester of the bunch. They crossed into his well-appointed flat, Chinese-style furniture standing on top of Oriental rugs. “Honestly, I managed to come across this uniform—”
“Don’t tell me—”
“And I wanted to try it out. See if I could fool people into believing I was a Nazi.” He slid the red armband with the black swastika from his bicep and shivered. “You never know when it might come in handy.”
Bram crossed the large, airy room to a brass beverage cart under a window accented by heavy red velvet drapes. He lifted the lid on an ice container, plinked two cubes into a glass, and poured liquid from a tall decanter. He turned to Patrik. “I’d offer you some, but I know you’d decline.”
“Much as I would like it to be, this isn’t a social call. We’ve had some trouble.”
Bram took a swig of the liquor. “I heard about Zofia. Nasty business, but she’s a smart woman. Now that she’s stashed away, she’ll be fine. With a good head on her shoulders like that, I imagine there will be no more problems.”
Patrik sat on the edge of the sofa and leaned forward. “The hitch is that the Gestapo searched the Bognár apartment the very night she went into hiding.”
Bram settled himself in an out-of-place brown leather armchair and crossed his legs. “Did they find anything incriminating?”
“I don’t believe so.” Patrik shifted his gaze to the scene outside the window, a light drizzle falling as dusk covered the city. Not far in the distance, an ambulance siren wailed. “Zofia told me she didn’t keep any paperwork at the house.”
“Then we have nothing to worry about.” Bram set his drink on a black-stained end table and lit a cigarette.
“She needs papers.”
“And she’ll get them. Eventually.”
“Eventually?” Patrik jumped to his feet. “That’s not good enough. Zofia has a husband she needs to reunite with. She already sent him one note, anonymously, saying she was alive and in hiding. How long before she dares to step out and go to her husband? The Germans will be on her like ants on candy. And I’ve lost Éva over this mess.”
“What aren’t you telling me?” Bram raised one eyebrow.
Patrik drew in a deep breath. Bram would be furious, but Patrik owed him the truth. “An old school friend of Éva’s saw me with Zofia the night she disappeared.”
“What? Why weren’t you more careful? This certainly is a problem.”
“Apparently, in the church, I dropped a picture Éva had given me as Zofia and I left. This woman told Éva she believes I am responsible for Zofia’s disappearance.”
“You are.”
“Éva isn’t supposed to know that. Now my relationship with her is threatened.”
“I’m more concerned about this woman who spotted you with Zofia and found the photograph. That’s where your carelessness might get us in trouble. How much does she know?”
“Nothing. As I said, she told Éva she thinks I’m involved with the Germans.”
“All the better for us. Better than having them think you’re part of the Zionist Youth.”
Couldn’t the man see Patrik’s point? “Zofia needs those papers. Now. Then she and her husband can get out of the country before she does something stupid.”
“I’ll do the best I can, but I make no guarantees.” Bram ground the butt of his cigarette into a brass ashtray.
“Why?”
“Because she’s already in hiding. There are others not so fortunate. Those are the ones who need the most help.”
The wail of an ambulance siren interrupted their conversation. Patrik rose and peered out the window. A group of people huddled together at the end of the street. He could make out nothing else. “But Zofia’s husband.”
“She has to stay away from him. They’re watching the house, in all likelihood.”
But Zofia might just be desperate enough to do more than send Ernő a note.
Anya came and touched Ernő’s shoulder as he sat in the living room staring out the window at the light rain deepening the gathering dusk. The warmth of her fingers penetrated his cotton shirt but didn’t reach the chill that had permeated him since Zofia disappeared.
The numbness was a blessing. If he dared to think or feel too much, the pain was unbearable.
“How are you, son?”
He clenched his jaw and shook his head. “How am I supposed to be? My wife is missing. And Patrik isn’t telling the truth about it. No matter what that note said, I have no confirmation Zofia is alive.”
“That Patrik. I never did trust him.”
Ernő glanced sideways at her.
“He wanted to get married so fast and take Éva away. Maybe in the country, that’s how it’s done, but not here. Families stay together. Plus, Éva wants to believe him, you can tell. All he’s done is upset her and the rest of the family. But if he’s not being truthful with you, then she shouldn’t marry him. Too many people have too much to hide these days.”
Ernő stared at his hands, the hands which God had gifted him to create some of the most sought-after clarinets in Europe. With the way they shook now, he couldn’t carve the wood the way he needed to produce the fine-quality sound musicians all over the continent demanded. “Maybe we all were fools.” Ernő spun around and stared into his mother’s soft blue eyes. Were those new crow’s feet?
She rubbed his upper arm. “I know.”
“Has he betrayed us? We trusted him. Éva almost married him. Has he duped us all? Did we allow another Nazi sympathizer like Károly into our lives?”
“I don’t know. I suppose it’s a good thing it happened now and not after Éva wed him.”
“So you think he was part of it?”
With a shrug, she turned toward the kitchen, then called to him over her shoulder. “Please tell Apu and Éva that dinner is almost ready.”
He lumbered down the hall and was about to knock on his parents’ bedroom door when the telephone rang.
“Could someone answer that? I can’t leave the gravy right now.”
“Sure, Anya.” Ernő hustled to the living room to the phone on the little stand beside the couch and lifted the black receiver. “Hello.”
“Is this the Bognár residence?” Noise in the background made it difficult for Ernő to pick out the tinny voice.
“It is.”
“She’s my sister.” Ernő clutched the receiver with all his might.
“I’m calling from St. John’s Hospital. Your sister was struck by an auto this evening.”
“That’s impossible. She’s in her room. I was about to call her for dinner. I’ll show you.” He held the phone away from himself and shouted up the stairs. “Éva. Éva! I need you now.”
Apu and Anya wandered in from opposite ends of the house. “What is the commotion for?”
Ernő covered the mouthpiece. “This woman says Éva was in an accident. But she’s in her room. Isn’t she?”
Anya furrowed her brow and hustled to the stairs. Ernő set down the receiver and sped after her, up the steps to Éva’s door, and flung it open. Anya gasped.
The room was empty.
God, nem.
“She’s not here.” Anya’s voice warbled. “She told me she was going out earlier, but I thought she’d returned.”
Ernő raced down the stairs and spoke to the woman on the line once more. “Which hospital did you say?”
“St. John’s.”
“We’ll be there as soon as possible.”
Apu already had his suit coat on and was helping Anya slip on her sweater.
No sooner had they left the house than the air raid sirens blared their nightly call. Already fires burned in other parts of the city, the flames licking at the darkened sky, casting a ghostly glow over all of Buda. Ernő turned to his parents. “Go back. I’ll check on Éva and ring you with news.”
Anya stomped her laced-up oxford. “Nem. My daughter needs me. I want to be with her.”
“The patrols will catch you. The planes are coming ever nearer.” Not too far in the distance, flashes of light brightened the early evening.
“And what about you?” Apu shrank into his over-sized black blazer.
“You know I run faster than a thoroughbred. I’ll outsprint anyone who dares to stop me.”
“I’m coming with you.” Anya set her shoulders, and her page-boy haircut swayed as she shook her head.
“I’ll run faster alone, and I won’t have to worry about your safety if I know you’re at home.”
Apu tugged on Anya’s arm, even though she rose at least fifteen centimeters above him and outweighed him by a good number of kilos.
“Promise me you’ll find shelter if the planes get too near.” Anya shook her finger in Ernő’s face.
“I promise.”
They returned inside, and he trotted down the street. His loafers weren’t designed for running, and the shock of every step jarred his bones. But he had no choice. He had to stay ahead of the air raid wardens and the Germans and get to Éva as fast as possible.
Within three blocks, his lungs burned. The rumble of planes and the whine of falling bombs broke the silence of the streets. Still he raced, willing his legs to carry him with all speed. The dark shadow of an air raid warden loomed in front of him and Ernő careened around the corner.
The dash wasn’t the sole cause of his rapid heartbeat. He’d already lost Zofia. Now this had happened to his precious Éva. “Not her too, Lord!” He shook his fist at the heavens.
Up ahead stood the hospital, a red brick building with its grand, arched doorway and arched windows. Sirens wailed as ambulances delivered patients, perhaps bombing victims. Gasping for air, Ernő burst through the doors into a chaotic scene.
Men, women, and children, probably brought in from all parts of the city, lay on stretchers in the lobby, the floor slick with blood. White-coated doctors and capped nurses triaged the wounded and dying.
Ernő covered his mouth but couldn’t block the metallic odor of blood. Was Éva among these patients?
A young blond nurse, a swastika pin on the collar of her white dress, pushed through the wounded toward him. “Can I help you, sir?”
“Bognár Éva.”
“I’m sorry. We haven’t identified everyone.” She appraised him, and he stood taller under her scrutiny. Perhaps if she believed he was an important person, she would assist him in locating his sister. “Did you come with the victims?”
“Nem, she was in an accident earlier this evening. Hit by an auto.”
“Fourth floor.” The woman pointed to the stairs at the far end of the lobby.
Averting his eyes from the mass of suffering humanity was impossible. Instead, Ernő tried his best to ignore the weeping, the cries of anguish, the moans of the dying as he made his way to the stairs.
Once he reached the fourth floor, another nurse pointed him to Éva’s bed, under the window near the end of the ward. The nurse in her white uniform reminded him of an angel robed in pure raiment.
But this was not heaven.
Ernő rushed to Éva’s side. Bandages covered her head, the flesh around her eyes was black-and-blue, and her cheeks were swollen. She was almost unrecognizable. Only her honey-colored curls gave away her identity.
As he clasped her by the hand, she convulsed.
Ernő’s own heart seized. “Nurse! Nurse! Help us! Please save my sister.”