I made it to the Stone Bridge and waited for half an hour as the sun waned and made Bruckmandl’s shadow grow longer. Edith hadn’t come as she had promised; I grew worried and started to walk down the bridge toward the side that faced the city center where she lived.
I then saw her slight figure with a suitcase, and her dear, pretty face. I didn’t even notice the bandage.
I ran up to her and embraced her, and though she was injured and unable to kiss me deeply, she kissed me on the mouth with affection.
It took two minutes to fill her in as she watched my face intently. I constantly looked around me to make sure no one had followed us. No one had.
“How do I know my mother will be safe?”
“There’s no guarantee of anything, but no one will be safe if we stay. This is the best chance we have—to leave.”
“They have to let you go home, back to America, as you are a citizen. They don’t have to let me.”
“You are friends with Tommy, he has a thing for you, surely he has pull.”
“Many Jews have tried to leave this country, and the US has admitted very, very few.”
I felt dejected. “But we have to try, and if not we will still leave town—I can work.”
“Let’s go to Tommy’s house; the embassy is closed and I know the way there. I don’t know if it will do us any good, but I suppose we must try,” Edith said glumly.
She sounded so pessimistic and she used to believe anything was possible. With that cut, Erich had not only wounded her face, he had stolen her personality. She wasn’t the brave, fearless girl I had been getting to know.
Edith led the way to the American ambassador’s residence. We walked for thirty minutes in the cold as our shadows grew longer and then disappeared—eaten by the night’s all-encompassing darkness. I started to doubt that we would make it; I wondered if Erich would change his mind and have someone waiting outside the residence to attack us or arrest us. I made Edith halt when she pointed out the grand house with pillars.
I held her arm and whispered, “Edith, just wait a minute and see if anyone moves, if there is any sign that we are being watched or that someone is waiting for us. Be my other set of eyes.”
We waited a couple of minutes and no one moved, and no sound came to my ear that was listening for any ambient noise that might be suspicious.
“Ok, come on, Charlie,” she said, prodding and pulling me by the arm.
We walked together to the front door. Edith knocked.
A maid, a stocky German woman, gruffly answered the door. “How may I help you?”
Edith quietly said, “I need to speak with Tommy. We need to speak with Tommy.”
“And who are you? What are you doing on the ambassador’s doorstep at this time?”
“I am sorry to bother you, but it is an emergency and Tommy knows me. Just tell him it is Edith and that Edith needs his help and is here at the door.”
She suspiciously eyed the bags that we carried.
“Please, I do know him and he will want to speak with me.”
“I don’t know that the ambassador would approve at this time of night, speaking with …”
“My name is Charlie Beck, I am Erich Beck’s—the obergruppenführer’s—nephew. I think the ambassador will be interested in official state business.”
She considered this and said, “I am not bothering the ambassador while he has his cigar after dinner. I will get Tommy and he will decide if whatever you need warrants the ambassador’s time.”
She went to fetch Tommy and not only closed, but locked the door behind her as she did. I heard the click.
A few minutes later, Tommy came out, and said, “Edith! What is wrong—what happened—are you ok?”
“Erich cut me, and he, he …” she started to cry.
“Sorry, just a second …” Tommy reached inside, flicked off the light and closed the door. “This will make us less conspicuous,” he said, as he grasped Edith to him and hugged her as she sobbed.
I ordinarily would have been jealous, but I just felt bad for Edith, for what she must be going through. Not only for her hurt face, but for having to leave her mother with potentially nowhere to go. She was right—she wasn’t an American citizen.
Edith spoke, and I nodded as she recounted our story to him, and he listened without asking a question. She told my part of the story, what I had said to Erich. I think she suspected that he would have more sympathy if the entire story came from her lips.
He thought for a second and then turned to me and said, “I fibbed a little. There are no photographs of him sleeping with Himmler’s mistress.”
I was so confused. “I thought that you said that …”
I could hear his smile, even though I couldn’t see it. “I really admire you, Charlie, you are a braver guy than I thought. I thought you were kind of a coward. But I was wrong, and you are quite clever. We have reliable intelligence, you are fortunate that it was accurate, that tells us that he did sleep with her. We just have no physical proof.”
“Well, can you help us, can you get us out of here—back to America?” I implored him.
“You, Charlie, of course we can. You are American, after all. It is harder with Edith.”
In the moonlight I could see tears welling in Edith’s eyes, as she said, “But I have nowhere to go.”
I was surprised to hear Tommy start to cry, sniffling, as he replied, “I don’t have much power, I am just sixteen. Even my Father’s power is limited. I know how this works and I know it would take practically an act of Congress to get you into the US right now, Edith. They aren’t taking many immigrants at all.”
Edith said, “Ok, let’s go somewhere to sleep for the night. Maybe we can sleep in the Lutheran church’s graveyard.”
“No, absolutely not, the least I can do is offer you a place to stay for the night. I will petition my Father. I just wanted to be upfront with you both. I can offer my help and I will advocate with my Father. But I just don’t know what he will say; what may get us somewhere is that Erich said that he will assist us, that is very useful. I thank you for your service to our country in doing that, Charlie.”
I nodded, I didn’t care about service to my country at that moment.
I told Edith, “Don’t worry, I won’t go to the States, or anywhere else, without you.”
Tommy opened the door and the light blinded me from having been outside in the dark.
He led us upstairs to a room with one bed, and said, “You both can sleep in here—and no funny business, Charlie, she’s my girl.” He winked and closed the door.
Edith and I didn’t bother unpacking—we just slept on top of the made bed. I spooned her, and we didn’t undress. Edith cried, and I comforted her by reassuring her that I wouldn’t leave her alone; I repeated this mantra until she fell asleep and I soon followed her into blessed rest.
I awoke to a soft knock at the door, which was followed by it being opened by the maid. She told us in a sterile fashion, as if giving directions on how to clean a bathroom, how to get to the kitchen.
“The ambassador knows you are here and is prepared to speak with you.”
“Is Tommy there?” Edith queried.
“Go see for yourself.”
So, we walked downstairs, then down a hall, and turned into a kitchen that was lit up brightly by windows that invited the sunlight into the room.
There sat an older man, just past middle age, in an expensive suit with a gold pocket watch chain showing, and spectacles. He had an aristocratic air and immediately stood up and shook my hand, not acknowledging Edith right away.
“Tommy filled me in, on every detail—you are a brave young man, and a patriot. Thank you for what you have done. It will serve quite useful—Erich Beck owing us favors.” He grinned at the thought of it.
He then turned to Edith, and said, “Tommy was right, I cannot get you to America. I am sorry.”
“Sir, with respect, I wonder that if a man in your position cannot, then who can?”
“FDR.” He half smiled.
“And what I have done makes no difference?”
“Not in that fact, but we are appreciative and of course you can go home.”
I was angry and forgot myself—that I was in his home and he was the ambassador. “You could do it if you really wanted to,” I said, raising my voice.
“You are the ambassador and I am sure you speak to President Roosevelt regularly, with the sensitive situation we are in with Germany at the moment. I have already helped you and so you don’t care to help us at this point, you have what you need. C’mon, Edith, let’s go. We will figure something out even if it means being on the street.”
I grabbed her wrist, but she hesitated and sniffled.
The ambassador reached for his handkerchief and handed it to Edith, saying, “I am sorry, my dear, for what that monster did to you. And, though I cannot get you to the United States, I can help you. I decided I would make you both an offer after speaking with Tommy.”
“Why is Tommy not here?”
“He is mad at me, he thinks I should push the president on the issue. I have thought on it since I spoke with Tommy.”
I agreed with Tommy, but was silent in anticipation of what the ambassador might offer.
“I know you are both great swing dancers and love that music—it is quite catchy, isn’t it?”
I was thinking about asking what this had to do with anything when he went on, looking at me. “There is a movement called Swingjugend, upper-class swing youth of which you know a little. It is much bigger in Hamburg, where it is truly centered.”
He turned to Edith, saying, “Dear, you are useful, too. You do not look Jewish, though these kids don’t care about that, whereas others would. So, as you don’t and as you are German, you will lend a sort of legitimacy to Charlie being German and American. I want you two to become friends, popular in the crowd. Get invited to dinner parties with these influential swing kids’ parents and get to know them. I will give you a list of our targets, you can gather information and profiles on the kids whose parents are important sources of information for us. It is risky, but it is somewhere to go. We would provide your lodging, fake names and papers, food, cash—everything you need. We would instruct you on what to do.”
Edith turned to me and smiled.
“Of course, sir, it would thrill us to have such an opportunity to serve the cause of freedom and the United States,” I said, trying to sound as patriotically motivated as possible.
“Ok, good, we will set it all up then. It’s a plan.”
I looked at Edith and then at the key in my hand. Looking at the red door in the swanky district of Hamburg’s city center apartments, I opened it and there was a fully furnished apartment—it was beautiful. I suddenly grabbed her off of her feet and carried her across the threshold and into the apartment.
“Oh, Charlie, what a gentleman,” giggled Edith.
“Sh, my dear, my name is Ulrich, remember?”
“Yes, and mine is Maria, oh this will be such fun!”
We explored for a moment, and as they told us, we had separate bedrooms because we were “cousins.”
“Kissing cousins,” said Edith, as she placed her mouth on mine. I led her to our fake grandparents’ bedroom—the one with the largest bed. They even had toothbrushes in each room, as if four people lived here.
I wasn’t thinking about toothbrushes, I was thinking about Edith. I didn’t notice her scar, just her sapphire eyes and her soft, feminine body with beautiful young curves. I kissed her, and we made love on that bed that we would sleep on for many nights hence.
After laying there awhile, she got up and put on some jazz—they had left us plenty of music that was not regime-approved.
“There is a big swing dance tonight and you know it is our ‘job’ now to show up,” I reminded Edith.
“You don’t say—let me go change into something appropriate,” Edith said.
We walked into the club and the crowd was several times larger than the one in the hall in Regensburg, and much more majestic. It was such a big gathering, several hundred. I thought there was no way the Gestapo didn’t know this was occurring. They must not have cared. These kids were the privileged ones—they were Aryans and their parents influential.
And then I forgot about all of that—I stopped analyzing. “Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing),” came on and I recognized the sound of the drum beat calling me. I took Edith by the hand and I grabbed her hips and swung her around and around.
She yielded to me completely and in a way that she never had before. For a moment I was the dance, and she was the dance inside of me. I looked into her eyes and it was then that I knew that she was completely mine.
The End