The long awaited day is here. When the letter from the Red Cross came last week, Gisela wanted to burn it without reading it; she knew what it would say. Friedrich wouldn’t let her. He was gentle with her, took her face in his hands and said, “We cannot keep what is not ours.” She didn’t argue with him, but inwardly she disagreed.
Jan has hardly been able to sleep he’s so excited. It’s four years since he saw his mother; he imagines the look on her face when she sees him and Lena. Perhaps – though this is too much to hope for – she’ll have found Maria, and they’ll all be together again. He’s so excited he doesn’t notice how quiet Lena is whenever he talks to her about their mother. When he mentions “mama” she looks confused and glances furtively at Gisela. Gisela sees this and feels quietly triumphant, but she knows it will mean nothing when the time comes.
The house has been scrubbed from top to bottom. The children are dressed in their finest clothes; their hair is brushed until it shines, and they have each had two baths this week. Gisela has not stinted on spending money on the children. She buys only the best for them and vows that whatever happens, this woman will not be able to say that she did not look after them properly. She is dreading today. They have been almost happy this past year. Lena is a darling, and the boy, once they got used to him and he began to trust them, well he’s a spirited little thing and a damn good worker. She can’t bear to think about the future. They’ve never discussed it, Friedrich and her, and she fears they never will. The day will end, the children will be gone, and they will say nothing about it. She wonders if perhaps they’ll live in silence punctuated only by what’s for supper? and it’s cold today isn’t it? It’s unbearable.
“They’re here, they’re here.” Jan’s shouts pierce her thoughts. Two slight figures are trudging up the track, the Red Cross worker and the mother. Gisela tries to smile. “Well, on you go, go out and greet her.”
Jan doesn’t move.
“What’s wrong?”
“That’s not my mother. That’s an old woman.”
The women coming up to the door do indeed look too old to be Lena’s mother. Jan had told her his mother was thirty-eight, and neither of the women look as young as that. But the war has aged everyone; she should know that. Knows it only too well when she looks into a mirror and sees the haggard wrinkled face and the dark hair liberally striped with grey.
“Jan,” she says, “remember it’s been nearly four years, and your mother has been through a great ordeal.”
He nods, but still looks uncertain. The women are at the door now, and Friedrich has gone to let them in. Gisela digs her fingernails into the palms of her hands to try to stop the pain in her heart. It doesn’t work. She forces herself to smile at the two women. She knows which one is the mother immediately. One of them is drinking in Jan with her eyes at the same time looking round for Lena. There is an air of desperation surrounding her. She steps towards Jan, who steps back.
This is not how it was meant to be. He was going to run down the path and into his mother’s arms. She’d swing him round the way she used to when he was a little boy. She’d be laughing and crying all at the same time, and Lena would be right there too, and she’d gather them both in her arms and everything would be all right again. And then she’d say “Guess who I found outside”, and Maria would appear looking beautiful. This was how it was meant to be.
Jan keeps staring at the woman. She looks a bit like mama, but thinner and older and oh so tired. She’s not laughing, there’s a little smile on her face, so little, Jan isn’t sure that it is a smile. This can’t be his mother; his mother would scream with delight at seeing her children once more. This woman looks scared as she comes towards him.
“Ahoj, Jan,” she says in a quiet voice.
It sounds a bit like her. He holds out his hand and says hello back. Her face falls, and he realizes he’s done the wrong thing, that she’s waiting for an embrace, but he can’t do it. He drops his eyes. His mother looks round at the other woman for help. She steps forwards.
“Well, well, so this is Jan. I’ve heard so much about you. You’re quite a hero, the way you found your little sister. Your mother hasn’t stopped talking about you all the way here. Why don’t we all sit down, and perhaps Frau Scheffler can get us something to drink.”
Gisela’s face flushes at this, and Jan realizes she feels rebuked for not offering them something straight away. He wants to help her, so gets up and says, “I’ll get the drinks.” But the Red Cross woman tells him to stay and talk to his mother. Trouble is, he can’t think of anything to say.
“Where’s Lena?” asks his mother.
Friedrich pushes Lena forwards, but she starts to cry when she sees the two women. With a shock, Jan understands that his mother and Lena are total strangers to each other, that they haven’t seen each other for three and a half years, half of Lena’s age. Mother tries to cuddle her, but Lena clings to Friedrich’s leg and won’t budge. The Red Cross woman looks irritated, an angry flush sweeps over her chest. A cross, red woman, thinks Jan. “Come on, give mama a kiss,” she says. Lena runs over to Gisela and hides behind her skirts. Jan’s mother starts to cry.
This is unbearable, not how it should be. Jan wants to reassure her, but she’s a stranger, how can he approach a stranger and comfort her?
They’ve been here an hour. The Red Cross woman is looking at her watch, and Jan predicts that any moment now she’ll say the fateful words. Now the time is here, he’s not sure he wants to go.
“Right,” she says, “time to go.”
Gisela has packed suitcases for them the night before. They’re by the door. The Red Cross woman picks up one and gestures to Jan to pick up the other. “My car is not far,” she says. Jan can hardly stand, his legs are trembling so much. He holds out a hand to Friedrich, who grabs it and pumps it up and down. Jan thinks he’ll never let go. Lena is still clinging to Gisela; she hasn’t looked at her mother. He goes over to Gisela and hugs her. Then he holds out his hand to Lena. Lena ignores it, holds out her arms to be lifted up by Gisela. She’s reverted to being a baby.
Gisela pushes Lena away. It breaks her heart when she wants to comfort the child. Lena screams when she does this, her face contorted with terror. “Hush, Liebchen. This is your mother. You must go with her. Jan will be there.”
“No,” screams Lena. “I won’t go. She’s not my mother. You’re my mother. Why are you doing this? I don’t want to go.”
Gisela turns away. She can’t bear this. Lena grabs her arm. Gisela has to unpick her fingers to loosen the grasp; she can’t look Lena in the eye. Lena kicks out at her, and she winces, but who can blame her? “Friedrich,” she pleads, “help me.”
The woman from the Red Cross strides across the room and pulls Lena away from Gisela. “I haven’t got time for this. You’re coming with your mother now.”
Lena is hysterical. Gisela runs over and grabs her back. She can’t let her go in this state. It’s inhuman. Lena is shaking with fright.
Lena’s mother stands by, looking on with helplessness. Tears stream down her face. Jan wants to scream at her, do something, you’re her mother.
Gisela is speaking softly to Lena, whispering in her ear. Jan can’t hear what she’s saying. Lena’s sobs grow quieter.
“What did you say to her?” asks the Red Cross woman.
“I told her she has to go away, but that she can come back and visit us.”
“I don’t think—”
“I don’t care what you think,” interrupts Friedrich. “Look at the state of the child.”
The woman’s face gets even redder. There’s sweat on her forehead. “We have to go.”
Lena’s mother turns to Jan and speaks to him. He says to Gisela, “My mother says you’re right, and we will come back to visit. She asks if there’s something you can give to Lena, something that she’ll have to return to you. To prove to her that we’ll be back.”
Gisela looks round the room. They have so few possessions, little that is valuable. What is there that would convince Lena that she will be back? Her glance settles on a photograph of Wilhelm. She goes over to the dresser and picks it up.
“Lena,” she says, “take Willi with you. But just for a few weeks, and then you must come and see us and bring him back. Will you do that?”
Lena is calmer now, still crying, but no longer hysterical. She nods and takes the photograph. Jan leads her out to the car.
As the door closes behind them, Gisela stuffs her fist into her mouth to muffle the roar of grief that is welling up inside her. She knows they’ll never be back; the mother did what she had to do to comfort Lena. Friedrich goes to her and hugs her. They stand in a close embrace, sobbing as their reason for living leaves.
Outside, Jan, his mother and Lena reach the car that is waiting for them. As he waits for the Red Cross woman to open it up, Jan looks up at his white-faced mother. She gazes back at him as if she’s trying to remember who he is.
“Will we come back to see them?”
She brushes the hair back from his forehead. “I don’t know, Jan. I just don’t know. It’s so far away…” Her voice tails off.
He slides into the back seat, Lena is already there, still crying. The engine starts, and they’re off, the car bumping down the rough track to the main road. Jan twists round in his seat to gaze at the farmhouse for one last time. It looks like home.