LISA STUDIED the faces of the other children, hoping to see someone from her school, from her neighborhood, from her synagogue. Yet the train was filled with strangers.
Some of them were crying; others sat quietly. Each had his or her little suitcase, his or her pack of food. There was a tag around each child’s neck. Lisa was number 158. What a boring, stupid number, she thought, completely unmemorable. How high did the numbers go? she wondered. Are there a thousand of us? Where will we all go? Where will I go?
A couple of five-year-old girls sat across from Lisa, sharing an orange tea cake among them and giggling stupidly. They acted as though they were going on holiday.
A boy of eleven with freckles and round red cheeks sat next to her. He was nervous and eager.
“I’m Michael,” he said matter-of-factly. He fussed in his bags and offered up a smelly paper sack.
“Would you like half of my sardine sandwich?” he asked politely. “I don’t mind sharing.”
“Thank you, no,” she said curtly. She felt hemmed in by his forward behavior and his pleasant mood. There is no room on this tiny train seat for two, she thought, but was afraid to say so. Why was he so happy? She didn’t want anything to do with him—or with any of these children, now that she thought about it. She wanted to be alone with the thoughts of her family. She wanted to continue to memorize every inch of the existence she was leaving. She couldn’t take the chance of forgetting the slightest detail.
“I can’t wait to get to London!” he blurted. The boy would not give up. “I’ve read all of Sherlock Holmes and I’m going to see his home on Baker Street. I’m going to be a great detective when I grow up. What are you going to be?”
Lisa sighed her most unapproachable sigh.
“I know. I bet you’ll be a rich man’s wife and have lots of children.”
“I am a pianist. I will play music,” she said, unable to keep to her plan of aloofness.
“Wow,” he said, genuinely impressed. “What kind of music?”
“The music my mother taught me,” Lisa answered grandly. “The great music of Vienna.”
Suddenly all Lisa could think about was her mother, her poor mother. She heard the terrible sound of the breaking glass of Kristallnacht ring inside her head. She shut her eyes tightly, but the sound wouldn’t go away. What if another Kristallnacht came, would her family be safe?
When she opened her eyes, she was confronted again by the absurd smile on the face of the boy next to her. She hated him.
“London will be wonderful!” he insisted.
“You don’t know anything about London!” Lisa exploded. “You’ve never been there. You’re not a detective in a book, you know. You are a refugee!”
Michael looked at her. A dark mood overtook his face. She closed her eyes again and went back to her thoughts.
But Michael began again; his tone was different, and there were tears in his eyes. “My father told me . . . that I should only think about what I love the most and . . . it, it will come true when I get to England.” His lip trembled.
Lisa opened her eyes and looked at him. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean it.”
Michael kept crying.
“Please don’t cry,” she begged. “Forget what I said. Tell me what else you know about London.”
“London is the most marvelous city! The fog is thick and fills the air, and evil spies lurk around every corner, while master criminals prowl the underground stations!”
Lisa looked at him coquettishly. “No! Really?”
Several of the younger children near them climbed from their seats and huddled around Michael. He rambled and raved about Jack the Ripper and blood-curdling adventures. Lisa felt her eyelids grow heavy, and soon the monotonous rhythm of the train put her to sleep.
She woke to the sound of rustling beside her. Michael was digging frantically through his small suitcase. The lights in the car had been dimmed and most everyone near them was asleep.
“What are you doing?” she whispered.
“The train is stopping,” said Michael. “I saw SS soldiers out the window.”
“So?” she asked, still groggy from sleep.
He didn’t answer; he had found what he was looking for. He pulled a small leather drawstring bag out of the case on his lap and opened it, revealing a tiny pearl necklace, a silver bracelet, and a pocketwatch with a reddish gold chain.
“These belonged to my parents,” he said nervously. His voice was shaking. “But if the soldiers find them, they’ll take them away and send me back.”
“Really, they would send you back?”
Michael didn’t answer; he stuffed the jewelry back into the sack and stood up on the seat. He climbed onto the armrest, yanked down the heavy train window, and shook the contents of the bag out into the night. Lisa gasped and reached up after him but stopped herself; perhaps this was the right thing to do, she thought. She didn’t know what was the right thing to do anymore! She watched the brief flash of light as the gold and silver vanished into the night.
The train groaned to a halt and Michael sank into his chair, paralyzed by the enormity of what he had done. The engine let out a gasp of steam and jerked still. The children around them awakened and everyone, even the youngest children, sat eerily still, watching the long-coated soldiers move through the car.
Lisa examined their uniforms and their demeanors. They were identical to the soldiers who had marched through her streets. Her mood sank lower as she realized that these men were everywhere, not just in Vienna.
The Nazis came up the aisle, pushing, prying, and poking into bags. They shook toys and rummaged through lunches. A young child began wailing and someone put a hand across his mouth.
Michael leaned toward Lisa, his forehead dripping with sweat. His whisper was choked with panic. “Maybe they saw me!”
Lisa put her finger to her lips and hissed a forceful, “Shush!”
The guard approached and looked at Michael closely. The boy’s knees were shaking uncontrollably. “What is your name!” the guard shouted.
“Muh, Michael Liebel.” He fingered his tag and turned it toward the guard. Number 38. The guard moved on, never glancing at the suitcase on the boy’s lap.
After a while the heavy doors of the train closed, and the SS left the transport. The engines groaned again, and Michael started to sob. “I threw it all away for nothing! For nothing! I’m so stupid!”
Lisa placed her arm on his shoulder tenderly. “What you did was very brave.”
“No! I was stupid! That was my father’s watch, the one his father gave him!”
“Stop crying! You’ll be a famous detective and buy him a nicer watch, you’ll see! Let’s do a little something my mother taught me. Whenever I begin a new piece of music, she has me close my eyes and imagine a wonderful place. It’s very important. Let’s close our eyes really tight and imagine the new places we are going to see, all right? Ready?”
Michael regained his composure, and together they closed their eyes.
“Go.”
The two children sat with their eyes closed for a long time. Lisa opened hers first. “All right, you can open them. . . . So what did you see?”
“Nothing,” he said. “I couldn’t see anything at all.”
“Me neither,” she said softly. “Oh, dear. I wonder where we really are going.”
Michael smiled at her, and she laid her head against his shoulder. They tried to sleep.
The train stopped several times in the night, and more and more children got on. The newcomers were packed into the aisles and sat wedged on top of their suitcases. There must be fifty of us in this car alone! thought Lisa. Michael offered his seat to a pretty German girl Lisa’s age and went off up the aisle. She watched him staring out the window, fingering his leather jewelry bag.
“Did you see the handsome one over there?” the new girl asked. “He’s been eyeing me ever since we got on.”
“No, he wasn’t, Mela!” the friend snapped.
Both girls were vivacious and attractive, dressed in dark, stylish skirts and crisp white blouses. They turned to Lisa. “Look down the aisle. . . . Which one of us is he staring at?”
The idea of watching out for boys struck her as ridiculous under the circumstances. How shallow they are, Lisa thought, but soon she found herself stretching her neck to look down the aisle. “Which one?”
“Over there, silly! Quick, or he’ll know we’re looking!” The handsome boy looked up, smiled, and winked at his admirers. The two new girls dissolved into giggles. Lisa couldn’t help herself. She laughed along with them.
So what’s wrong with having fun? the voice inside her chided. If Rosie were here, she’d lead the way. And if Sonia were here . . . Sonia. Why couldn’t she have come, too? she asked herself. Why did I get the new life and not her? Oh, Sonia, I miss you.
The new girls practiced their English. “Shall I fetch you tea?” Helen asked.
“Two lumps!” answered the other, Mela, with a diction that Lisa would have died for. She had tried to prepare herself by studying an English primer she’d bought in the temple bazaar, but two weeks had not been enough time. She hated that she was going to arrive in England, open her mouth, and sound like a refugee.
“Would you like some tea?” Lisa uttered to herself over and over, silently imitating the pleasant tones of the other girls.
The train was starting up again; the guards had slammed the doors. As the children prepared for another departure, there was a loud rapping against one of the windows. An older boy climbed up and lowered it to see what was happening. As the train lurched forward, a wicker laundry basket was thrust into the boy’s arms.
“Somebody’s brought us hot muffins!”
“Maybe it’s chocolate!”
“I bet it’s cheese.”
“What if it’s a bomb?” one girl chimed in.
Everyone froze. The boy put the basket in the aisle and moved away from it.
“I dare you to open it,” a boy bullied his seatmate. “Not me, stupid, you open it.”
“Maybe we should throw it back.”
Lisa had an odd feeling she could not explain, a certainty about something. She walked up the aisle and stood over the basket, thinking, If I’m afraid of this, I’ll be afraid of everything new. I won’t let myself be afraid, I won’t. She opened the lid.
Before her lay a beautiful baby, wrapped in a clean blanket and sound asleep. A little angel. She picked it up gently and cradled it. The older girls rushed to Lisa’s side while the boys stood back. The car erupted in debate.
“What should we do with it?”
“Does it have a tag?”
“Do you think it’s hungry?”
The baby started to cry, and someone panicked. “If they hear it, we’ll all be thrown off.” Lisa immediately began to hum a Brahm’s lullaby—the first melody that she could think of.
But the infant continued to cry. Its wails got louder, and the children became more nervous. Lisa sang desperately to quiet the child, but to no avail.
From up the aisle a sixteen-year-old girl came and held out her arms. “I have a little brother at home. Let me try.”
The girl took the child expertly and nestled her nose into its flesh. It smiled for a second. The entire car breathed a sigh of relief.
When the infant’s crying stopped, she eased him back into the basket and joined Lisa in scouring the car for juice, milk, and blankets. They took turns rocking and feeding the new baby. At that moment, it seemed to Lisa that everyone in the car shared a common purpose.
Lisa felt a growing sense of determination. If I can keep strong, she thought, I can make it. I’ll make it for Mama and I’ll make it for Papa. And soon we will all be together again.
A long, shrill whistle sounded and the train stopped again. The children hid the juice and the blankets and pushed the basket under Lisa’s seat. Someone saw a sign out the window.
“It’s in Dutch! The sign is in Dutch! We must be at the border!” A hush fell over them.
A stony-faced SS officer made his way down the aisle for a final inspection, pushing aside suitcases to make way for his shiny black boots. He checked names and numbers off a list on his clipboard.
When the guard stopped at Lisa’s row, everyone held their breath. Several children began nervous conversations to cover the awkward silence that had fallen over the railroad car. The guard opened the lid of the basket and saw the sleeping baby. He stared at it for what seemed an interminable moment, then looked at his list.
“Isn’t he sweet?” Lisa asked, interrupting him. And she smiled brilliantly, praying it would distract him. She put every ounce of charm she had into that smile. He turned and looked at her for a long moment, and finally, without uttering a word, moved on, making his way briskly down the aisle. He opened the heavy doors at the end of the car and disappeared into the next carriage.
As the Kindertransport crossed the border into Holland, the lights inside the car came on for the first time, and cheers erupted. Lisa opened the basket and stared at the helpless bundle. “No one can hurt you now,” she whispered.
It was a bright, moonlit night. Through the window she saw the windmills turning slowly—like in the picture books Papa had shown her. The Chopin Nocturne in E Minor, calming and elegant, ran through her mind. The wooden arms of the windmills moved with the rhythm of the music.
They arrived at the Hook of Holland, the port on the North Sea. The train stopped, and an excited flock of round-cheeked Dutch women fluttered on board, carrying baskets filled with fat slices of fresh-baked bread and butter and big doughy cookies. One lady balanced a tray of steaming mugs of cocoa. The children forgot their manners and charged forward—shouting, “Me! Me!” as they devoured the treats. The Dutch women smiled at these faces smeared with chocolate.
There was discussion among the women about the baby boy. A serious-looking man with a red armband came up and introduced himself. He was from the Dutch Red Cross.
A group of girls gathered around the baby and watched as he directed a Dutch woman to pick up the infant from its basket. She held it snugly to her chest.
“We will find him a good home here,” said the man. “How will his parents know where to find him?” Lisa asked.
“I don’t know.”
Lisa picked up the wicker hamper and handed it to him. “Please take the basket,” she begged. “Maybe someday someone will recognize it. Please keep the basket with him.”
The man smiled sadly. “Yes, of course,” he said, and took both the baby and basket with him.
The children emerged shyly from the train compartments and were led through the small station and across the large busy road to the seaport. When they realized there were no Nazi guards to keep them in line, some of the boys began to skip and play and trip the younger children around them.
Lisa ignored the scuffling of the silly boys and looked up at the loud cawing of a seagull above her head. The smell of the sea air, crisp and cool, raised her spirits.
Michael came rushing back from the head of the line toward her. “I saw the boat, it’s a real corker! Hurry up!” he screamed excitedly.
“What do you mean, a corker?” she asked.
“That’s what Dr. Watson says about everything, what a corker! A corker is, well, something like that!” said Michael, pointing to the giant black cargo ship. “How does that stay afloat? It’s made of metal!”
A bearded old seaman in a stiff green peacoat smiled and waved them along the dock toward the ramp. “Hurry along and up. Next stop is England.” He sang out, “You’ll cross the sea tonight, ye will, ye’ll cross the sea tonight! You’ll cross by moon and stars, ye will, by star and moonlight’s bright.”
Halfway up the ramp, Lisa stopped and looked back at the serene Dutch town with its orderly rows of thatched roofs. It didn’t look the least bit like Vienna. Where will we end up? she asked herself. Will there be an opera house? Will there be a tower like St. Stephen’s? No time for such thoughts, she told herself, and headed aboard.
She was assigned the top bunk above a whiny fifteen-year-old from Cologne who proudly announced that she was seasick and proved it by vomiting into her pillow.
Lisa lay awake for what seemed like hours, and looked out of the tiny porthole next to her bunk. The moon had disappeared and it was impossible to tell anymore where the water ended and the sky began. Eventually, the steady rising and falling of the sea caught up with her and she succumbed to a troubled sleep.
She dreamed of her home on Franzenbrückestrasse. Everything was just as she had left it: the paintings, the lace, the porcelain figurines. Her mother had kept her promise—nothing was changed. The family was just sitting down to dinner. Mama was serving her brisket, Papa was at the head of the table, ready to carve. Sonia was there, noisy and impatient, and so was Rosie, stately and beautiful. One chair was empty. “Where is Lisa?” her father asked. From deep inside her sleep, Lisa tried to respond.
“Here I am,” she cried, but no one heard her; waves of green water drowned out her voice.
By morning they reached the other side of the English Channel. It was gray and cloudy as the single-file line of children walked down the gangplank. They clutched their little suitcases so tightly, one would have thought they carried their hearts inside.
A wiry man with a dark blue coat and a walrus mustache hurried them along. “There’s a train to catch, let’s look lively. Hurry along, luvs.”
The single-file line wound through the center of the tiny English village—looping around the quaint central square and into the train station. It was dawn and no one was up but the milkman. He stared at the eerie sight of more than two hundred children winding through his town. Lisa thought they must have looked like a lost school field trip.
She turned to stare at the vast sea that separated her from her family and all she had ever known.