Chapter 22 Audrey

BERLIN, GERMANY | MARCH 1939

They left Berlin after dusk. The sky turned from purple to indigo as the late winter sun sank below the horizon, a great fish dipping beneath the surface of the dark water. Audrey, Friedrich, and Ilse, holding Daniel, stepped outside and scanned the street. The Richters’ house was dark.

This was the first time Ilse had left the house since that terrible day, nearly five months ago now. As they pulled away from the curb, she glanced out the window at her family home.

“It will be all right,” Friedrich said.

“I appreciate the sentiment, but you cannot know that,” she replied.

Friedrich turned his attention to the streets. The drive to the Netherlands would take most of the night, six hours or so, he’d said.

As they drove, Ilse took in her once-familiar surroundings. All the Jewish landmarks and businesses were shuttered, destroyed. Audrey had hardened herself to these sights, but now saw them anew through Ilse’s eyes. A tear slipped down her cheek as they passed the remains of her synagogue. After the fire, it had been left to steep in its own destruction, like some half-eaten animal carcass at the side of the road. Gaping and hollow. Stripped of its dignity, even in death.

They traveled in silence until they reached the edge of the city and traffic slowed to a stop.

“What’s happening?” Audrey asked, craning her neck from the back seat, but all she could see was the car in front. “Why are we stopping?”

“Probably just a checkpoint,” said Friedrich.

“A what?”

“A security checkpoint. They want to know who is coming into and leaving Berlin.”

“What?” Ilse gasped.

“This was entirely expected,” Friedrich murmured, looking over at Daniel, who was dozing in Ilse’s lap. “We have our papers. Everyone just remain calm. Remember our cover story.”

Audrey steeled her nerve as they neared the front of the queue. Eventually a police officer tapped on Friedrich’s window.

Friedrich cranked it down. “Guten Abend,” he said, leaning his elbow on the window ledge.

The policeman’s eyes flicked to the decorations on Friedrich’s shoulder. “Guten Abend, er…”

“Obersturmbannführer Müller.”

The officer visibly straightened before saluting Friedrich. “Heil Hitler.”

“Heil Hitler.”

Ilse stared ahead, but a nerve jumped in her clenched jaw. She hadn’t seen Müller’s performative Nazi behaviour like Audrey had.

“I’m afraid I must ask for your papers, Obersturmbannführer,” the policeman said. “For yourself and these ladies, please. Forgive me, it is policy.”

Friedrich nodded and gave no argument. “I applaud your diligence, officer…?”

“Hermann.”

Friedrich withdrew his and Audrey’s real German documents and Ilse’s false one from his inner vest pocket. Aldous had made a variety of fake identification papers including a second set for all three of them, as Dutch citizens. “Here you are, Officer Hermann. This is my wife and son, and our nanny in the back.”

The officer skimmed the papers before returning them. He didn’t even look at Audrey or Ilse. “Where are you travelling to this evening?” he asked.

“My business is my own,” Friedrich said, curt but without heat.

“Very good, Obersturmbannführer Müller. Have a pleasant journey.”

The officer saluted again as Friedrich pulled away from the checkpoint.

“Was that it?” Audrey muttered. “Will that be the only one?”

“I don’t know,” Friedrich said. “I would anticipate another at the Dutch border, at the very least, but perhaps we will get lucky.”

As they left Berlin behind and drove through the dark countryside, Audrey felt some of the tension in her shoulders loosen, like a slackened line that had been pulled too tight to begin with. She grew sleepy, lulled by the car’s movements, and nodded off.

A couple of hours later, she awoke to Daniel crying. It made Audrey’s ears ring, such loud shrieking in a small space, but Ilse calmly retrieved a bottle from the bag she’d packed, and soon Daniel quieted. She never appeared flustered or perturbed by him. Her patience with Daniel was admirable, and far exceeded Audrey’s own.

“Where are we now?” Audrey asked, moving her head to release the stiffness in her neck.

“About halfway there,” Friedrich said. “We got past Hanover without a checkpoint.”

As they drove through Lower Saxony, the sky began to lighten. Audrey had never been this far west. The pastoral sight of the rolling hills untouched by traces of the Third Reich was somehow simultaneously disquieting and reassuring. Just two hundred miles away, Berlin was infected by the malignancy of Nazism. Its tentacles had grasped Bohemia and Austria. But here, it was as though life were carrying on mostly as normal. As they sped past the fields, she could almost imagine it was all nothing but a bad dream.

Almost.

They passed through small town after small town. Just outside the town limits of Osnabruck, Friedrich pulled over beneath a large oak tree. Without a word, he retrieved a bundle from the trunk strapped to the back of the car, then disappeared behind the tree. Audrey glimpsed a bare arm and shoulder and turned away. He was changing into his civilian clothes, she realized.

She leaned forward. Daniel was asleep again in Ilse’s lap, head resting against her chest. “How are you doing?” Audrey asked.

“I’m all right. A bit nervous to be alone there, actually. I’ll manage though. I hope it will give Daniel some stability at least. He’s had such upheaval for a child so young. It’s dreadful. But maybe Friedrich will be right. With our false papers, and outside of Germany, this madness might not touch us. We can go outside. Live our lives a little more fully. Perhaps, well… maybe it’s a blessing in disguise.”

“That’s exactly what you deserve, Ilse,” Audrey said. She imagined Ilse at liberty, playing and laughing with Daniel in the Von Albrechts’ garden a few months from now, a warm summer breeze lifting her dark hair.

“But you’ll still be right in the middle of that madness, Audrey. Please be careful. Promise me you will.” Her voice broke.

Audrey nodded, but in her heart, she knew she couldn’t keep that oath.

Friedrich emerged from behind the tree wearing slacks and a plain brown jacket, a newsie cap on his head.

“He’s a good man, Audrey,” Ilse said softly.

“He is,” Audrey admitted.

“Please take care of each other.”

“I will,” Audrey said, but she couldn’t suppress her relief that Ilse would be parting ways with Friedrich. Good as he was, selfishly she’d preferred it when Ilse was disdainful of him.

Friedrich opened the door.

“What about your uniform?” Audrey asked, noticing his empty hands.

“I left it behind the tree. My real papers too. Can’t risk anyone finding it if they search the trunk. We will stop off here again on our way back. It will be fine.”

He had a habit of saying that, Audrey noticed, and she wondered how much he believed it, and how much was solely for her and Ilse’s benefit.

Twenty minutes later they slowed down, approaching the border.

“Here’s the checkpoint,” Friedrich said.

As if on cue, Daniel stirred. Ilse bounced him and took a deep breath.

“Remember your roles,” Friedrich said. “Say nothing unless called upon. They will expect me to do the talking anyway.”

The sun had risen fully, and Audrey watched as the border check came into view. There wasn’t much to denote it aside from a couple of lean-to booths and a rather sad-looking fence running in both directions. The night before, she had asked Friedrich whether they could make an attempt on foot and avoid this road into the Netherlands entirely.

“Aldous’s work is impeccable. Flawless,” he’d assured her. “If we cross with those papers, no one will challenge us. If they see us creeping through the woods in darkness, there is a very good chance they will simply shoot before requesting our identification. And I need to cross as a civilian. An officer travelling outside of Berlin is one thing, but they would have serious questions about my business in the Netherlands. This is easier. Safer.”

Audrey still had reservations about this plan, but she had to trust that Friedrich knew the state, knew what to expect from its police services. Their experience at the checkpoint outside Berlin had proven him right so far.

The car slowed to a stop beside the guard and once more, Friedrich rolled down the window. The guard was young, but he had dark circles beneath his eyes; Audrey wondered if he had been on shift all night.

“Guten Morgen,” Friedrich said, and he slung his elbow over the window ledge again. This time Audrey wondered whether it was a deliberate attempt to appear relaxed, or if Friedrich had developed a habit of exhibiting his rank whenever the need to manipulate others presented itself.

“Guten Morgen,” the guard replied. He ducked his head briefly to glance at Audrey, Ilse, and Daniel. “Papers.”

Friedrich withdrew his civilian one, along with the others, from his jacket pocket. As the guard flipped through the documents, Friedrich drummed his fingers on the outside of the car door, smiling politely, but the guard ignored him. He looked over at Audrey and motioned for her to bring her face closer to the window, which she did. He glanced at the photo on her papers and back again, then repeated the process with Ilse. When he reached Friedrich’s papers, his brow knitted.

“Herr Schmidt?” he asked.

“Yes?” Friedrich said.

“Walter Schmidt?”

“Yes.”

“Of Schuttorf?”

Friedrich nodded. Aldous had deliberately chosen a town close enough to the Dutch border for the travellers to plausibly be heading over to visit family nearby in the Netherlands, and the name Walter Schmidt was common enough to avoid attention.

In the front seat, Daniel began to squirm, unhappy that the vehicle had stopped moving. Ilse cooed and bounced him more vigorously. Beside her, Friedrich coughed. The guard studied him again.

“Becker!” the guard shouted over his shoulder, and Audrey flinched. A second guard emerged from the small lean-to and strode over to them.

“Walter Schmidt,” the first guard said to the other, an older, stockier man with a noticeable scar along his chin.

There was a silent moment when Becker reviewed the papers, then Friedrich. Daniel was now crying in earnest, and the din made Audrey clench her fists in her lap.

“Get out of the vehicle,” Becker demanded. “Everyone.”

Audrey’s heart hammered a tattoo against her tonsils as she locked eyes with Ilse, who was next to tears, and Audrey willed her to suppress her emotion. What was happening? Friedrich had said they’d be fine. But here he was nodding and opening the car door. He moved to help Ilse out of the passenger seat.

“Stop!” The guards both shouted, cocking their pistols. “Turn around!”

Friedrich’s eyes met Audrey’s for half a moment, and she feared the apology she glimpsed in their depths. He turned around, hands in the air. Audrey slowly climbed out of the car. Ilse was already out, standing beside her door, futilely shushing Daniel. He was red in the face, drool shining around his mouth as his screams split the morning air and echoed across the nearby fields. But the officers’ attention—and their pistols—were solely on Friedrich.

“Is there a problem, Officers?” Friedrich asked them.

“Walter Schmidt?” The first officer repeated.

“Yes,” said Friedrich, his tone irritable. “I have told you so. As have my papers.”

Despite her fear, Audrey was impressed with his performance. He must have been sweating beneath his jacket, but if the character of Walter Schmidt had nothing to hide, he would indeed be aggravated by this scrutiny and delay. Still, defiance under the circumstances took courage, and perhaps for the first time, she fully appreciated the extent of Friedrich Müller’s bravery in taking on the Reich. Until now, it had existed in concept, and in action only within the safety of the Kaplans’ comfortable sitting room as they discussed what they might do in resistance to Hitler. But in this moment, she observed a different version of the man. More warrior than idealist intellectual.

“Please either explain your concern or allow my family and me to be on our way,” Friedrich went on.

“Wait here,” Becker said, and disappeared back into the booth, leaving the first guard on watch. Daniel continued to wail.

“Quiet that child!” he barked.

“He needs a new nappy,” Ilse said, her voice wavering. “They’re in my bag in the front seat.”

“Let her get the baby changed,” Friedrich said. “It will stop the wailing.”

The guard assented, and Audrey sidestepped over to Ilse and retrieved the bag from the car. She laid a cloth down on the gravel at their feet and Ilse changed Daniel, soothing him with her soft voice. Once he quieted, the sound of the morning sparrows twittering in the hedges along the fence line came into focus. Audrey stood and surveyed the Dutch landscape just across the border. They were so close. The landscape looked identical to the lush greenery where they currently stood, yet it glowed somehow. It was a beacon of safety, unlike the dangerous terrain of Germany. She watched as Ilse scooped up Daniel and pulled another bottle from her bag. Her hands were trembling. Audrey and Friedrich had to get them to safety. They had to.

The second guard, Becker, returned with a sheet of paper, which he thrust at his comrade. They muttered to one another, too low for Audrey to hear, and both squinted at Friedrich, who still held his hands in the air.

“I will need to search the vehicle,” Becker said, flicking his hand at Audrey and Ilse as though waving away some irritant. The previous bite in his voice was gone.

They stepped back from the car, then the guard began his search, tossing items out onto the road as he went. As he opened their travelling cases, pawed through clothing and sundries, Audrey was thankful that Friedrich had abandoned his uniform behind the oak tree earlier. Seemingly satisfied, he slammed a door shut and beckoned to his comrade to lower his weapon. Audrey’s heart leapt.

The guards approached Friedrich and spoke in low tones. After a brief exchange, Friedrich nodded, then gestured to Ilse and Audrey that they were leaving. As he helped Ilse into the front with Daniel, Audrey quickly collected the items the guard had scattered and climbed into the back.

“What happened?” she demanded.

“It would seem Aldous chose a name that was a little too common,” Friedrich said, taking shaky breaths. “There is a Walter Schmidt wanted for robbery and battery two towns over.”

Audrey gasped.

“Fortunately,” Friedrich continued, “I do not match his physical description even remotely. Good God, my heart is racing.” He cursed under his breath.

“So are they letting us through?” Ilse asked, eyes wide.

“Yes, they’re letting us through. You’re going to be safe now. You and Daniel.” He held her gaze, touched her hand.

Audrey cleared her throat. “All right. Let’s get the hell out of here. How much longer?”

Friedrich looked back at her. “We’re nearly there. Less than an hour, I’d wager.”

When they crossed the border, the mood inside the car lightened as the elation of success and freedom set in. They had done it. They had gotten Ilse and Daniel out. They continued through the countryside toward the Von Albrecht home in the Dutch woods, just outside Enschede. The sun was shining in earnest now.

In better spirits with a clean nappy and a full belly, Daniel babbled in Ilse’s lap as Friedrich talked about his childhood in the south, near Munich.

“These woods remind me of the ones I used to run to when I didn’t want to go to bed,” he said, and his lip twitched as his eyes slid into the middle distance of his memory. “My mother hated the forest. Wouldn’t come after me. She’d send my sister Gisela in to drag me out instead. I drove her mad, I think.”

Ilse watched him. “You miss your family, don’t you?”

“Well, that was my stepmother,” he said. “I do wish I’d had more of a relationship with my real mother. But she’s safe in Oxford. And that gives me comfort.”

Ilse swayed as the car rolled over a bump in the road. “Do you think you’ll see her again?”

Friedrich shifted his hands on the steering wheel. “I hope so. Though none of us knows what all of this will bring to our doorstep. I would hope a great many people will be reunited with their loved ones in the end.”

Ilse held Daniel closer to her and stared out the windscreen.

Not long after, Friedrich handed Audrey the directions he’d been given to the Von Albrechts’, and she navigated them the final few minutes. They pulled off the main road onto what could hardly be called a side road—it was more of a beaten path through the forest—and Friedrich had to slow the car to a crawl to avoid bottoming out on the large tree roots and holes of the forest floor. The house was well concealed, and Audrey was reassured. After a kilometre or so, the path widened at the edge of a clearing and a large stone house came into view.

“What’s that?” Ilse said suddenly. “There, on the grass. Just there.”

Audrey craned her neck.

“Oh fuck,” Friedrich swore, braking to a stop.

“What is it?” Audrey demanded. “What do you see?”

“There’s a body,” Ilse said shakily. “There’s a body on the lawn. A man, I think.”

Friedrich shifted gears and backed the car into the woods again, a good twenty feet away from the clearing.

“Stay here,” he said sharply, opening his door.

“What are you doing?” Audrey hissed. “You don’t have your gun!”

“Yes, I do,” Friedrich said, and he disappeared beneath the car for several seconds before emerging, pistol in his hand.

He strode toward the house, gun raised.

“I’m going, too,” Audrey said, scrambling out of the back and hurrying after him.

“Audrey, no!” Ilse called. “Wait!”

“Audrey, for God’s sake,” Friedrich muttered. “Stay behind me then. Right behind me. And keep an eye on the trees.”

She crept along in his wake as he entered the clearing. A crow took flight from a nearby tree, cawing and flapping its wings. Audrey scanned the tree line but saw no other sign of movement.

They reached the prone man on the ground. The grass around him was smeared with dark brown, dried blood. Audrey looked away as her stomach turned, but Friedrich knelt beside him.

“Who is he?” she asked.

“I’m guessing Henrik Von Albrecht, Wendelein’s husband. He matches the description I was given, and this is their house. He’s been shot in the chest. Dead a while. At least a day or two.” Friedrich was still for a moment, then slid the man’s eyelids shut.

As he rose, Audrey took a deep breath. “Friedrich—” she began, but he cut across her.

“Do you smell that?”

She sniffed the air, then looked up at the house. “Smoke.”

“Not from the chimney though,” he said, pointing. “The house is smouldering.”

It was. Dark grey curls drifted skyward from the roof and what remained of the broken and burned-out windows. The grass around the foundation of the building was scorched and littered with debris. This place was meant to keep Ilse safe from harm, but all that remained was the blistered detritus of a defeated possibility.

“This was targeted,” Audrey said. “It has to have been.”

“Yes.”

They stood together on the lawn as the reality of their circumstances hit. Everything they had done, the risks they had taken to get Ilse and Daniel here, were all for naught. They would have to turn around and go back to Berlin. Audrey’s mind began to spiral. To escape to the Netherlands had been their best answer to the cell’s ultimatum, and the futility of the whole venture settled itself inside her chest like some crouching spider.

She glanced back at the woods, the car. How would she break the news to Ilse? What would happen to them now?

The sun shone overhead, glowing against the robin’s-egg-blue sky, the hint of early spring, and a breeze blew through the clearing. The man’s body and the smoking house clashed impossibly with the idyllic scenery.

A thought occurred to Audrey. “What about his wife? Wendelein?”

“She could be anywhere. Abducted? She could have made it farther than him and been shot in the woods.”

They both scanned the edge of the forest around them.

“It’s too big to search,” Audrey said dully, turning her attention back to the house. “She could be inside. Let’s go look.”

The front door was open, scorched from flame.

“I don’t know whether it’s safe to go in,” Friedrich said. “Likely not. It could collapse at any moment given the state it’s in.”

“Nothing we’re doing is safe, Friedrich. We have to at least look,” Audrey said.

He sighed in resignation. “Come on, then.”

They entered the house, squinting as their eyes adjusted to the dim light. Sun shone through the windows, but it was much darker than the clearing. The air was heavy with the scent of smoke, and the burned floorboards beneath their feet creaked and cracked with every footfall.

“Hello?” Audrey called out, but there was no reply.

They didn’t make it farther than the sitting room before Friedrich stopped her. “There’s no one here,” he said. “Not alive, anyway. They must have been found out.”

“By whom?”

“I do not know. But there is no other explanation for this. We need to leave now. The local authorities might show up, and we have no reason to be here that they would accept. Or the people who targeted the Von Albrechts could return. We have no real idea what we just walked into. We need to leave, Audrey. I’m serious.”

When Audrey didn’t move, Friedrich faced her square-on. “None of us wants this to be true. But it is. We will think of something else.”

“There is nothing else, Friedrich. There’s no other option,” Audrey pressed, panic rising in her chest. “We’ve been over—”

He held her shoulders. “We cannot rail against what is true, Audrey,” he said. “No matter how much we wish it were not. There is nothing these people can do for us now, God help them. I promise you we will find another answer.”

“How? How will we keep her safe now?”

“Because we must!” he snapped.

He turned from her, but Audrey remained still. “You love her, don’t you?” she blurted.

Friedrich halted, looked back. She knew by the expression of angst on his face that she was right, and dismay settled on her like the ash floating around this burned-out house. Her eyes stung with it.

Friedrich shifted his feet.

“I do,” he said, and though she’d expected it, the admission cut her. “And I know you do too.”

They stared at one another in the remains of the Von Albrecht sitting room as silence stretched between them. Tears threatened, but Audrey beat them back. He could never know how much she loved Ilse, could never love her like Audrey did, anchored with the compounding weight of a lifetime of friendship.

Audrey swept past him without a word and into the harsh light of the clearing. The crow was pecking at the dead man’s body now, and took flight in alarm as Audrey strode past, its shrill cry echoing the turmoil in her heart.