MUNICH
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1938
Flames raced up, darkening ink and paper until both turned black, and Evelyn dropped Peter’s notes into the kitchen sink. With a fork, she poked every bit of his neat handwriting into the flame. When only black flakes remained, she rinsed them down the drain.
She’d typed up his notes as soon as she’d come home from the café, editing so it sounded less Peter-like and deleting revealing details. Since her landlord had refused to fire Helga, the snooping maid, Evelyn stored anything suspect in her new lockbox. Peter would be in great danger if the Nazis found out what he was doing.
At her desk, Evelyn opened the curtains to admit the late-afternoon sun. Then she penned a u-umlaut in the corner of the typewritten page, secretly marking Peter as the source.
Never once had she pressed him to tutor her in the frustrating sound. It would mean watching Peter’s lips as they rounded around words like fünf. And he’d hold that position, only making her want to kiss those rounded lips.
“That would be stupid.” Evelyn folded the paper in half.
Now that Peter’s fondness for fascism had dissolved, nothing repulsive remained in him.
Therein lay the danger. He might have changed, but she hadn’t. She still wouldn’t fit in his neat little boxes. Especially the marriage box. Not with her career, her ambition, and all her sharp points.
Evelyn headed for the bedroom to lock up his notes.
The phone rang. She laid the notes on the phone table and answered. “Hallo?”
“Hi, Ev. O’Hara here.”
Evelyn smiled and rested her hip against the table. The past weeks with O’Hara in charge had been idyllic. “Hi there, chief.”
He grunted. “Not anymore. I’m transferring to Rome.”
“Rome?” Mussolini had once been the talk of the world, but now Italy was a sideshow. “Why would you leave Berlin?”
Silence fell, and Evelyn fiddled with the cord. The line might be monitored, so they both had to be careful.
He cleared his throat. “Do you remember that gift our friend Sigrid received?”
“Yes . . .” Sigrid Schultz was the Berlin bureau chief for the Chicago Tribune and a pioneer for women in journalism. In 1935, she’d received an envelope in the mail containing secret designs for a German aircraft engine. Immediately, she’d burned them. Soon after, she’d intercepted Gestapo agents and informed them she’d burned the papers, she knew what they were trying to do, and she was on her way to the US Embassy to tell them about it. If she’d been caught with those plans, she could have been executed as a spy.
“I received a similar gift.” O’Hara’s voice was taut.
Evelyn clenched the receiver in her fist. “You did? What a lovely surprise.” They didn’t just want O’Hara out of Germany—they wanted him dead.
“I’ve told you about my ailments. New York thought a warmer climate might help.”
“I’m sure your wife will love Rome. But we—we’ll miss you here.”
“Chase will send a replacement. In the meantime, call Keller if you need anything.”
“Not Norwood?” She couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of her voice.
“He’s on his way to Nuremberg for the rally. A test.”
“I see.” Apparently Chase wanted to find out if Norwood could write a balanced article about the Nazi Party’s big yearly spectacle. Peter would be there too. Maybe he could set his Harvard chum straight.
“Ev? You might want to consider a warmer climate too.”
From any other person, she would have bristled at the suggestion, but not from a man who’d narrowly avoided arrest for espionage. “I’ll keep an eye on the weather.”
“Good. You know how quickly it can change.”
When she hung up, a sensation swept over her, unmoored and floating, like when she’d gotten lost at the fair when she was five. A sensation of being small and alone and vulnerable.
“Nonsense.” Evelyn pushed away from the table and brushed ash from the sleeve of her red-and-white print blouse. She might have lost her champion, her mentor, one of her best friends in Germany, but she could handle herself. Even after Libby returned to the States.
A knock on the door, and she smiled. “See? I’m not alone.”
After she exchanged her house slippers for gray pumps, she opened the door.
Two men stood in the hall in unbuttoned trench coats—Herr Shadow from the Gärtnerplatz and a smaller man. Evelyn’s breath turned solid and plugged her throat.
“Fräulein Evelyn Brand?” the shorter man asked. “We are with the Geheime Staatspolizei. May we come in?”
The Gestapo agents stepped right in, not waiting for a reply.
Evelyn backed up out of necessity, and her heart rate skittered out of control.
Herr Shadow closed the door and leaned back against it.
Caged.
Lord, help me! Evelyn struggled to breathe, but she schooled herself to look unconcerned.
The other officer, short and nondescript, with a thin layer of beige hair, removed his hat and strolled around her apartment.
To keep up her spirits, Evelyn would privately call him Herr Zero.
“Please have a seat, Fräulein.” Herr Zero gestured to Libby’s favorite chair.
Offering her a chair in her own home? “How kind of you.” Her knees wobbled, and she lowered herself into a chair—a different one, just to be contrary.
The Gestapo hadn’t arrested her, hadn’t taken her in for questioning, so she forced herself to relax, to pray, to remember all she’d been taught about dealing with the Gestapo. Show no fear. Reveal nothing. If they talked tough, talk tougher.
Evelyn dramatically crossed her legs. “To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”
Zero stood at her desk and inspected the paper in her typewriter. “You are a reporter with the American News Service.”
“Ja.” Oh no. Her transcription of Peter’s report. Had she locked it up? No, it was still on the phone table. With every ounce of strength, she kept her gaze on Zero, not letting it fly to the phone. Even with her care to conceal Peter as the source, the material was raw, too dangerous to put in an article—or to be seen by the Gestapo. Lord, keep them away from Peter’s notes.
Herr Zero looked up and sniffed. “Do I smell burning?”
Evelyn pointed with her toe to the ashtray on the coffee table. “My roommate and I have friends who smoke.”
His lip curled. “That is the smell of burning paper, not tobacco.”
“Oh, that.” She lifted one shoulder. “I have a suitor who writes annoying love letters. I burn them.”
He huffed and sifted through papers on her desk. For the first time in her life, she was glad she was messy. With so many papers lying around, he was less likely to find Peter’s notes.
Zero picked up a paper and scanned it. “I once liked your writing, Fräulein.”
“What a pleasure to meet a fan.”
His gaze darted to her over the paper. “I no longer care for it.”
“Oh dear.” She frowned as if that were the saddest thing she’d heard all year.
“Dr. Goebbels is not pleased. You were one of the few reporters who were fair to Germany. Now you are like the others, spreading lies and hatred.”
What hypocrisy, coming from a regime that thrived on lies and hatred. “I report only what I hear.”
“Then you listen to liars.” He tossed the paper on the desk, came closer, and put one foot on the coffee table. “Who are your sources?”
My, my, my. Not even subtle. She gave a casual little shrug. “I hear things around town.”
Zero whipped a notepad from his coat pocket and flipped it open. “In your article of August 12, you stated that German troops were preparing to invade Czechoslovakia.”
Magda’s information. Evelyn raised her sweetest smile. “Aren’t they?”
“You mentioned plans. Who told you such lies?” His pale little eyes glared.
Yet she felt no intimidation. She rolled her eyes heavenward and sighed. “With so many men in my life, it’s difficult to remember who says what.”
Zero’s upper lip curled. “I find that hard to believe. You are not an attractive woman.”
Strange how unattractive men felt perfectly comfortable condemning women for being unattractive. She gave him a stiff smile. “It’s interesting how beautiful a woman becomes to a man when she flatters him.” Better for him to think the information came directly from a military officer. If he thought her a tramp, so be it.
Herr Zero kicked away from the coffee table and sauntered behind her chair. “In your article of August 4, you mentioned a delegation being sent from Munich to the Sudetenland. That information was known only by Party members.”
And by Peter Lang. She gazed at Zero over the back of her chair. “Is that so?”
“I need his name.” He marched around to stand directly in front of her chair.
With her elbow on the armrest, she rested her chin on her fingertips. “You assume it’s a man. Never underestimate the vengefulness of a scorned wife or a jealous mistress or an underpaid servant. You should remind your men to treat their women more kindly.”
“What’s her name?” His face reddened.
Evelyn flapped her hand to the side. “Oh dear. These long, complicated German names—von den Hohenuntenkleinengrossenburg—oh! They’re so confusing.”
Zero raised his hand as if to slap her.
Everything in her wanted to cower, but she refused. Heart pounding, mouth tightening, she stared him down.
His fingers curled, claw-like, into a fist. He lowered his arm, and his facial expression flattened. “You are a woman, Fräulein. You should be more careful.”
Evelyn sharpened her gaze to a razor and stood, her pumps lifting her above him. “On the contrary, mein Herr. You should be more careful. I am an American citizen and—as you noted—a woman. If anything were to happen to me, it would be bad for German-American relations. Right now, no American wants to get involved in this insanity in Europe. Not again. We learned our lesson twenty years ago. Your Führer likes it that way. He likes it when America minds her own business. You do not want to be the man responsible for changing that.”
Not a hint of understanding or fear or doubt flickered in the man’s bluish eyes, and he strode to the door. “Be careful what you write, Fräulein, or we’ll have to meet again. Since I visited your place this time, next time I’d have to reciprocate and invite you to my place. I doubt you’d find my place as . . . pleasant.”
Evelyn dropped a curtsy. “I’ll bring a bottle of wine for your wife.” Then she directed a big smile to Herr Shadow at the door. “I hope I see you again soon at the Gärtnerplatz.”
He blinked, and his chin jutted out.
Zero motioned to the door, Shadow opened it, and Evelyn followed to lock it.
Libby was coming up the stairs. She passed the Gestapo men with wide eyes and a polite “Guten Abend,” and she darted inside the apartment.
Evelyn pushed the door shut and threw the lock.
“Who are they?” Libby whispered.
Evelyn snatched up Peter’s notes, gestured for Libby to follow her, and dashed to the bedroom. “Gestapo. They’re Gestapo.”
“Evelyn! No!”
“I’m all right. I’m all right.” She yanked open the middle drawer of her dresser and pulled the lockbox from under stockings and slips. “They wanted my sources, but I told them nothing.”
“Oh my goodness. Did they hurt you?”
Evelyn shook her head, sank to her knees by the bed, and spun the dial on the combination lock. But her fingers jerked and didn’t cooperate.
Libby knelt beside her. “You poor thing. You must have been terrified.”
“I wasn’t. I—I wasn’t.” But the jerking spread up her arms, shaking as if she were out in a Chicago blizzard without an overcoat. “I—I was. I was.”
Libby hugged her from the side. “It’s all right to be scared, sweetie.”
Evelyn clutched her hands together on top of her knees, but her arms trembled out of control. “They didn’t know I was scared. I didn’t let them know.”
“Of course not.” Libby leaned her head on Evelyn’s shoulder. “You’re a strong woman, and the Lord was with you.”
“He—he was.” She pounded her clenched fists on her knees. “I hate it. I hate depending on others. It makes me weak.”
What was funny about that? Evelyn sat up straight.
Libby’s brown eyes warmed with compassion and amusement. “Don’t you know God makes us strong? He didn’t create us to be completely independent, but interdependent. That’s why he gave us families. That’s why he gave us friends. That’s why he gave us himself.”
Evelyn frowned. Although she enjoyed her friends and family, she didn’t need them for strength. But for Libby’s sake, she nodded.
One more squeeze and Libby got to her feet and straightened the skirt of her green-and-white floral dress. “Go wash your face, and I’ll make tea. Then we’ll pray together. We’ll read some Psalms.”
Psalms? Libby had a Scripture for everything.
Libby rested her palm on the doorjamb, and a smile glowed. “David wrote many of the Psalms, you know. He was a warrior, and he leaned hard on the Lord. That didn’t make him weak. It made him—”
“Strong.” Evelyn’s mouth hung open. She knew the stories. All her life she’d heard them. Why had she never seen?