THE REAPPEARANCE of the crocuses in the spring of 1943 meant that another year had passed, but Lisa had barely noticed, she was so absorbed in her new studies. She hardly had time to read the corner chalkboard, which was plastered with encouraging headlines like ALLIES ENTER NAPLES and KIEV LIBERATED!
The Royal Academy of Music had proved as exciting as she had hoped and as demanding as she had anticipated. Theory classes, history classes, elements of orchestration— Lisa loved them all.
In the fall of 1942, her first year, she had been assigned a “master teacher” and was surprised when she opened the door to the small studio to find that it was the same small lady who had been on the jury at the audition. Her name was Mabel Floyd, a teacher with a very distinguished reputation.
Mrs. Floyd had greeted her warmly, giving Lisa great assurances about her talent (calling her a “diamond in the rough”), then launched into a first lesson where she corrected almost everything about Lisa’s playing.
In the entire first hour of that first lesson, she did nothing but go over and over and over the first two pages of Chopin’s ballade.
“Why did you put the space there, Lisa? Listen . . . it continues . . . it’s a question, then an answer . . . keep going, Lisa! . . . That’s right, it’s driving now! Don’t stop! . . . There! Wonderful, Lisa!”
That day Lisa walked home with Mabel Floyd’s parting words ringing in her ears: “We have a lot of work to do!”
She couldn’t wait to tell Hans all about it. “Can you believe it? One hour on two pages! At first, I thought she was going to be so reserved, this little British lady. But do you know what she did? She started singing the phrases before I played them. You should have seen her waving her arms all around, like she was conducting!”
Then Lisa sat at the piano: “Listen to this,” she said, playing the new phrasing of the Chopin.
Hans listened carefully, smiling in appreciation. “Ah! Now you’re sounding like Rubinstein!”
“You said I sounded like Rubinstein before,” she shouted, above her playing.
“I was fibbing,” he said, laughing.
She stopped, grabbed the music, and beat him playfully on the head.
That first year brought many other changes in Lisa’s life. After a long struggle, Johnny had died, leaving a hole in the heart of the hostel. Lisa was devastated—she had really thought her friend would pull through, but his internal injuries were more severe than any of them had known. She missed him terribly.
To add to her loneliness, Aaron enlisted in the Auxiliary Military Pioneer Corps as a paratrooper. After having seen the look in his eyes as he watched the soldiers from the tower of Big Ben, Lisa knew his announcement should have come as no surprise—how long could he bear looking at the parade of heroes and not feel left behind?
At first she was excited, visualizing a war hero for a boyfriend. “Ooh, look at you, handsome!” Lisa said when Aaron first appeared in his neatly pressed uniform, having returned from training camp.
But when Lisa had to face the reality of their impending separation, she was distraught. On the night before he was to ship out, he came to the hostel to say good-bye, Mrs. Cohen kindly lending them her room for a few private hours to say good-bye.
When the evening was over, Aaron came into the living room and shook everyone’s hands. It was especially hard for Gunter to see him go; he was feeling guilty for not having enlisted himself. But Gina consoled him by reminding him of his recent decision to dedicate himself to his studies. Gunter had decided to become a doctor, even though he knew it would be a struggle, since he was only now being given the opportunity to attend middle school.
Lisa was crying so hard that she couldn’t leave Mrs. Cohen’s room for the final glimpse of him going out the door.
At first she wrote him every day, then every week, but then she grew so busy that she wrote just once a fortnight. Aaron had done the same, as he was swept up in the life of the regiment and the hardships of the parachute division. In the beginning his letters were detailed and enthusiastic, but after his first combat experience, they became more guarded; Lisa tried to read between the lines. What was it like? What had he seen? She didn’t want to imagine.
When the weather got warmer, Mrs. Cohen had the children plant the year’s Victory garden—tomatoes, green beans and cucumbers. The younger children were given responsibility for the newest innovation—a backyard flock of laying hens.
“Eggs! I’d forgotten what they looked like,” Mrs. Glazer said, marveling when the first one dropped.
The summer of 1943 brought the glorious news that, after a year of begging, the Bateses finally agreed that it was safe enough to allow Sonia to come and visit with her older sister in London.
Lisa met Sonia at the train and enveloped her in an enormous hug. She was surprised to see that Sonia was still thin and small for her sixteen years. “Are you getting enough to eat out in the country?” she asked anxiously.
“It’s not like Mama’s cooking, but don’t worry, I’m trying to eat as much as I can.” Not satisfied by this response, Lisa devoted most of the weekend they spent together to plying Sonia with whatever extra portions she could sneak from the kitchen.
Lisa took Sonia to all of her favorite spots in her new city: At Buckingham Palace they strained for a glimpse of the princess. Lisa wanted to show Sonia the tube but was unable to get her to ride the trains; the younger girl balked at entering the frightening hole in the ground, and no amount of convincing could persuade her. Giving up, Lisa suggested the double-decker bus, which they rode happily for hours before getting off to feed the pigeons in Trafalgar Square.
When they walked past Big Ben, Lisa confided that she had been kissed on top of the bell tower. Sonia’s eyes widened at her sister’s brazen behavior, but Lisa told her that soon she, too, would meet a boy, and then she would understand.
The night was more difficult; Sonia cried out for their mother in her sleep, and asked, tearily, in the morning, when Lisa thought they would see their parents and Rosie again.
“I don’t know,” Lisa began, but seeing Sonia’s mournful expression, she added, “I’m sure it will be soon.”
Despite the rough moments, it was a wonderful visit, and both sisters were distraught on Sunday afternoon when it was time to part once again. They vowed to keep writing often, especially if either heard any news of the family.
Just a few weeks after Sonia’s visit, Lisa got a short letter from Leo’s cousin in Mexico. While letters from Austria had stopped completely, occasionally they still slipped in from other places. Lisa ripped open this letter and scanned it quickly for news.
“Still haven’t heard from Leo or Rosie, but we did get news that most all Jews from Vienna have now been deported to detention camps in Poland, near Lodz, we think. We have tried desperately to get word about our aunts and uncles there, but there are few ways to communicate from here in Mexico. Do you have better sources for information over there? Please write us if you hear anything at all.”
In panic, Lisa brought this letter to the Bloomsbury House, but neither they, nor the Jewish Refugee Agency, nor anyone else, could answer their frantic appeals. All letters came back stamped “Undeliverable,” and every attempt Lisa and the others at the hostel made to contact their parents was unsuccessful.
Lisa struggled to maintain a degree of normalcy in her life. Her routine was hard; she awoke early and worked the first shift at the factory. By 1943, Platz & Sons was making military accessories—duffel bags, backpacks, mudguards, camouflage, all sewn from heavy green canvas. The work was harder than before, and Lisa’s tired fingers began to feel the strain from the difficult, repetitive work of pushing yard after yard of heavy canvas under the presser foot of the sewing machine.
Then came her afternoon classes at the school of music, followed by the hours of practicing necessary to keep Mrs. Floyd happy. Because she was always working, she had no time to make friends with the other students and envied those she saw lounging and chatting in the halls, seemingly without a care in the world. She told herself that someday the hard work would pay off; she knew her mother would be proud of her.
On occasion, she, Hans, and Mrs. Cohen would go to the venerable Royal Albert Hall, with free tickets courtesy of Bloomsbury House. Lisa listened in rapture to the likes of pianist Clifford Curzon and the conducting of Sir John Barbirolli and was enthralled to see her idol, Myra Hess, play once again.
The centerpiece of her week was her lesson with Mabel Floyd. After faithfully practicing all that she had been assigned, she would appear enthusiastically at the master teacher’s studio at three-thirty on Thursdays.
“No, no, no,” Mrs. Floyd interrupted Lisa after just a few beats. “A trill is something light! Think of fairy dust, the tinkling of little bells. This sounds like a parade of army boots.”
Lisa rubbed the painful muscles of her right forearm hurriedly and began again. The same results.
“No, no, try it from the beginning, please.”
Again Lisa rubbed her arm before beginning.
“Is your arm bothering you, dear?” the teacher asked. “No, it’s all right. Just a little sore,” Lisa answered, inadvertently rubbing it again.
“Maybe you’re practicing too hard,” Mrs. Floyd said, suddenly concerned. “How many hours do you practice every day?”
“Three,” Lisa responded.
“Hmm, that sounds right. But let’s work with the left hand for a while, give the right one a rest, shall we? Why don’t you turn to that problem spot on page twelve.”
As she flipped the pages, the discerning teacher noticed the worry in her pupil’s eyes.
“Is there something else you need to tell me, dear?” she asked with concern.
Lisa had been reluctant to talk about her factory job with Mrs. Floyd, but finally she described her arduous work. The teacher had found out very little about her student; she knew only that she was a refugee and that she lived in a hostel, but she hadn’t known the details about the rigors of the assembly line.
“My, my, we’ll have to do something about that,” was her brisk response. Saying no more about it, she gathered up Lisa’s music and handed it to her. “Go home and get some rest. I’ll see you next week. There will be no assignment.”
At the end of the next lesson Mrs. Floyd handed Lisa a letter, handwritten in bold, black ink, on the embossed stationery of the Royal Academy.
“Take this to the Howard Hotel, the address is inside. They are looking for a pianist to entertain the soldiers. I believe the pay is reasonable and the work will be much more suitable.”
Lisa drew in her breath—a little gasp of delight. “Oh, thank you! Thank you, Mrs. Floyd.”
“And I’m sure you will, ah, take care to be, how do the French say it? Sage.”
Lisa thought she saw the feisty woman wink, but it was so fast that she might have imagined it.
She floated several inches off the pavement all the way to the Howard Hotel, where she presented the letter to the manager, was shown the piano in the lounge adjacent to the bar, and was told she could begin the following week.
The next day at the factory was difficult; Lisa dreaded good-byes. She sat, teary eyed, as she was presented with a camouflage backpack that had been autographed by all the ladies on her floor. “Wishing you the best of luck, Love Lois, Doris, Deirdre, Rachel, Louise, et al.”
Mr. Dimble said, “We’re sorry to lose you, but good luck in show business.” Lisa laughed and thanked him with a kiss on the cheek that made the poor man blush.
The farewell to Mrs. McRae was the hardest. “I’ll be reading the newspapers, searching for your name, Lisa. I’ll be reading the arts section! Won’t that set them a-titterin’.” They hugged, and with no further ceremony Lisa left the life of the factory behind.