Frieda Sternberg sat on the floor in the kitchen of their upstairs apartment, behind the door, covering her ears with her hands. But she could still hear the shouts and terrifying screams from outside, and the noise of shattering glass as windows were smashed.
When they heard the mob ransacking their bakery underneath the flat, Papa herded the family down the back stairs. There was no time to take possessions.
Outside, in the twilight, feet crunching over shards of broken glass, Frieda took Grandma’s arm to support her. She looked around her and was shocked at the destruction in the neighbourhood. Acrid smoke billowed from buildings; flames licked through shattered windows. Eyes stinging from choking smoke, Frieda ran, keeping to the shadows. She jumped in fright as her brother Kurt, two years younger than her, cried, ‘Look, those men are setting the synagogue alight.’
Through the open heavy synagogue doors, she saw men in uniform dousing pews with petrol and setting them on fire.
‘All is lost,’ Grandma screamed, collapsing.
Mama took Grandma’s arm and Frieda helped her, together dragging her sagging body along.
‘Where are we going?’ Mama asked Papa, who was leading the way.
He looked furtively around. ‘To the only place I know that’s safe out of the Jewish quarter. My good friend Claus Unger’s.’
Papa had told Frieda many times how the friendship between the two men had begun.
‘It was when we both served during the war,’ he had told her. ‘All men like to dream, little one, and our dream was that one day, when the conflict was over, we would own a business together. Claus had the finance and I had the business acumen. I decided bread was a necessity and therefore we’d never go out of business. Our dream came true when the war was over and we started this bakery of ours. I baked while Claus delivered and the business grew.’
‘Then why did Herr Unger leave?’ she’d asked.
‘He met a Fräulein.’ Papa had rolled his eyes. ‘Gerda didn’t want a husband who went out on a horse and cart delivering bread.’ He tousled Frieda’s dark hair. ‘Even if the cart was brightly painted.’ His eyes had glazed over as he smoked his pipe and remembered. ‘I bought Claus out and the business became ours. Claus and I have remained good friends ever since.’
So, now the family stole away in the dark, making the six-mile journey from the Jewish quarter, past Tiergarten to the safety of Herr Unger’s little house.
On a cold winter’s night, weeks after Kristallnacht, Frieda was tossing and turning in the bed she shared with Kurt in the tiny upstairs spare bedroom. As the wind howled around Herr Unger’s house, she could hear his anxious voice from the living room.
‘…it’s still too dangerous for you all to return to your apartment.’
‘But isn’t it dangerous for you to be harbouring us, Claus?’ Mama’s voice implored.
‘Many Jewish men have been arrested and sent to concentration camps. It’s best for us all if you aren’t seen. If anyone asks, I’ll say the children are relatives.’
‘The troubles are getting worse. We must leave Germany,’ Mama said.
‘We haven’t enough money to flee Germany.’ Papa’s voice was gruff with emotion. ‘Or any connections.’
‘That is why I need to talk to you, my friend. The Jewish orphanage here in Berlin was torched during Kristallnacht.’ At Herr Unger’s words there followed a shocked silence for a time. ‘The orphanage has organised the children’s emigration.’
‘Where to?’ Papa asked.
‘I have made it my business to find out. Discreetly, of course. An old work colleague I play bridge with confided that after Kristallnacht the British government has agreed to temporarily take thousands of Jewish children under the age of seventeen. A network of organisers has been established and my friend volunteered to help make a priority list of those children who are most in peril.’
‘And the children leave their parents behind?’ Mama’s voice sounded shaky.
‘Yes.’
There was a sob.
‘Who will look after them in the United Kingdom?’ Papa wanted to know.
‘Agencies operating under the name of “Movement for the Care of Children from Germany” have promised to find the Jewish children homes. They’re also funding the operation and sponsorship so the refugees won’t be a financial burden on the British.’
‘Who would think our children would become refugees?’ Mama wailed.
‘Meine Liebe, it’s paramount we send Frieda and Kurt to safety.’ Papa’s tone was firm. ‘We must make arrangements for them to leave at once. First I’ll make a trip to our apartment. The shop’s weekly takings and a few precious possessions are in the safe.’
‘Must you go?’ Mama asked.
‘I’ll be careful, meine Liebe. Our children must have some kind of financial security when they leave – and a photograph as a memento of us all in happier times.’
Whatever photograph Papa chose, Frieda never found out. He never returned from his visit to the apartment. Herr Unger heard that Papa had been arrested as he left the Jewish quarter.
Now, over three months since the November Pogroms, when ‘Nazi thugs’, as Papa had called them, attacked Jewish people and property, Frieda and Kurt stood in the railway station, each of them clutching a small suitcase and the ten marks they were allowed to carry.
Amidst the noise and confusion, Kurt’s expression mutinous, he told Mama, ‘I won’t go, you can’t make me.’ He removed his cap and ran his fingers through his raven black hair. ‘Papa told me that I’m the man of the family until he returns.’ To Frieda’s dismay Kurt’s eyes glistened with tears. ‘I promised him, Mama, that I’d look after you all.’
Kurt was as stubborn as Papa’s delivery horse, who wouldn’t budge if he’d so decided.
Mama told Kurt, ‘I know, but it was Papa who wanted you to make this trip to England.’
Though it was a calculated plan, Frieda knew it broke Mama’s heart. A no-nonsense expression crossed her mother’s face. ‘You will do as you are told and board that train. I’ll be fine here with Grandma until Papa returns. Then we will follow.’ She gave an unconvincing quivery smile. ‘Be good, children.’ She handed them each a card. ‘This is called an identity card. It allows you to enter England. It has your name, where you were born, who your parents are and where we live. Promise me you’ll always keep this document safe.’
Hearing the urgency in Mama’s voice, in unison they replied, ‘We promise, Mama.’
Numb with shock, Frieda waited in a queue of silent children, then she and Kurt climbed aboard the train. They found seats together and looked for their mother through the window.
When the train began to move, she waved until she couldn’t see darling Mama any more.
As the train chugged along the track, smoke billowing from its funnel, Frieda stared with teary eyes at the blurry scene outside. The journey was interminably long and she must have slept for hours because when she awoke it was dark and the train had stopped. Soldiers, using torches, were rifling through her suitcase.
Kurt whispered, ‘We’ve stopped at the border – they are searching for valuables.’
Traumatised, watching her suitcase being searched, Frieda was beyond tears. Even if Papa had succeeded in his mission, the family’s precious possessions would only have ended up stolen from his children.
When it was Kurt’s turn to have his suitcase ransacked, by the light of the soldier’s torch, she saw her brother’s bunched lips and glowering expression. Unlike Frieda, Kurt could be obstinate and unruly – Mama’s words to describe her son. Afraid that he would speak out, Frieda was relieved when the soldiers left and the train started up. The tense moment passed.
The train crossed the border into Holland and an older girl across the aisle shouted, ‘Hurrah! We’re free of the oppression of Germany!’
Finally, the train came to a halt at a platform and in the half-light, smiling Dutch women handed out milk and chocolate through the windows. It was the first thing Frieda had eaten since breakfast.
Later that evening, in the glare of the dockside lights, Frieda, insides quivering, followed the silent children as they filed up the gangplank, Kurt reassuringly behind. Up on deck, they made their way towards the rail. She looked below, seeing men preparing the ship for leaving the quayside.
‘I don’t want to go,’ a young boy beside her whimpered.
Frieda, not knowing what to say, put an arm around his shoulders.
She wondered if Mama was with Grandma and whether, after saying farewell to Herr Unger, they had made their way home to their apartment. At the thought of home Frieda’s pulse quickened in panic – for she and Kurt were bound for England, where they knew nobody and people spoke a different language. She shivered, not from the cold, but from apprehension.
Turning, she looked for Kurt. Her eyes searched the bewildered-looking children standing on the deck, their frightened eyes hollow with shock. But Kurt’s sturdy figure wasn’t amongst them.
A shout rang out and Frieda started. Men were pulling the gangplank onto the ship.
Quick as a flash, a figure ran down the gangplank. Leaping through the air and over the gap, Kurt’s feet slammed onto the safety of the quayside.
Frieda stood rooted to the spot.
A man shouted in a foreign language at him. But Kurt had gone, disappeared into a throng of people working on the quayside.
At last Frieda found her voice. ‘No! Please, Kurt, don’t leave me!’
Sandra Hudson closed the coalhouse door and, hauling up the heavy coal scuttle, made her way over the concrete backyard, through the scullery and into the warmth of the kitchen. With its gleaming copper pans hanging on the walls, scrubbed wooden table, and meaty smell wafting from the coal fired range, the room was satisfyingly cosy.
Mrs Goodwin – the cook – looked up from the pan of soup she was stirring on the range top and appraised the housemaid, inspecting her black uniform dress, white apron and cap. Sandra felt self-conscious and blushed under Cook’s scrutiny.
Cook moved towards Sandra and with a plump hand brushed coal dust from the bib of her apron. ‘I only do it for your own good, lass. Her ladyship is in a foul mood and I don’t want yi’ to get the brunt of it.’ She gave a broad, good-natured smile that showed a row of false teeth.
‘Thanks for the warning, Cook,’ Sandra replied.
It was still early morning, and Sandra hadn’t crossed paths yet with Mrs Kirton, her employer and the lady of the house. She made a mental note to be on her guard when she did.
‘The thing is, lass,’ Cook told her, ‘I know you feel awkward around Mrs Kirton but it makes you appear standoffish and if there’s one thing employers can’t abide it’s a servant who thinks she’s above her station.’
Sandra was appalled. ‘Do I really appear that way?’
Cook nodded.
Sandra felt inadequate in her employer’s presence – not good enough – but her upbringing had taught her that to survive you had to stay strong. Maybe she seemed more confident than she felt as a result.
‘I do feel uneasy around Mrs Kirton,’ she confided. ‘The thing is, I live in fear that one day she will terminate me employment. You see, I’ve no money and no one to turn to.’ She didn’t add that she would end up a homeless pauper.
Cook heaved her shoulders. ‘You’re too sensitive, lass, for your own good. Mrs Kirton knows a good worker when she finds one. Why do you think she kept you on when war started?’ She shook her head and returned to stirring the soup. ‘Mind you, it would make sense if you took that blessed apron off before you brought in the coals.’ She raised her eyes heavenward. ‘Thank the Lord, I don’t have to wear a uniform.’ Looking down at her ample bosom and wide girth, she cackled. ‘’Cos with this figure o’ mine it would have to be specially made. I cannot see her ladyship forkin’ out for that, can you?’
Mrs Kirton was very particular about her staff and their station in the house. Things had changed with this war on, though. The government’s Make Do and Mend scheme meant that Cook was allowed to dress in her own clothes, covered with a coarse apron. And these days the pair of them were the only staff employed in the Kirton household, which meant Sandra had her hands full fetching and carrying and doing all the housework.
Sandra had been brought up in Blakeley Orphanage with her younger brother under the hand of the forbidding Mistress Knowles, and she was used to hard work. The bleak days at the orphanage were tough and the mistress ingrained in all her charges the fact that they were worthless charity cases. Sandra had her pride and fought against the idea that she couldn’t do anything right. But her childhood experience at the orphanage had left her with a crippling sense of self-doubt.
When war had broken out, all of the staff, apart from Mrs Goodwin and Sandra, had left the Kirtons’ employ to do their bit for the war. Sandra had felt a certain relief when Mrs Kirton had announced, ‘Mr Kirton suggests I accompany you when you register for war work and insist you stay and work for us. After all, my husband is a solicitor and we need at least one maid to help run his home smoothly.’
Mrs Kirton’s plea to the authorities had worked and Sandra was granted permission to stay on as a housemaid for the Kirtons. The compromise was that she did a few hours’ war work every week. So, on her afternoon off, Sandra helped out with the Womens’ Voluntary Service. Her work involved standing behind a makeshift counter in the WVS clothes depot where she supplied clothes for bombed-out families or the needy. She loved seeing the kiddies’ faces when she gave them a new (albeit secondhand) pair of shoes that fitted properly. With a growing need for clothes, a local paper recently appealed to readers for donations and photographed a child being fitted out with a coat. The plea had worked and clothes had been collected around the doors and the storage shelves and boxes filled.
Whenever she worked at the WVS depot, Sandra marvelled how ordinary folk could go places and do as they liked, voice their opinions even without fear of reprisal. Being brought up in an orphanage and then working in service had left its mark on Sandra. It felt like she’d been institutionalised all her life. And though she outwardly looked older, inside she was still the little lost girl from the orphanage trying to find her way in the world.
Deep down Sandra hankered for the courage to leave the household and her present life behind, because life was passing her by. The sense of now or never increasingly bothered her. Besides, it was her duty to do her bit for the war.
The sun was shining through the coloured glass hallway door as Sandra made her way to the front room. Entering the room, Sandra crossed the once sumptuous, now threadbare carpet, passing the gilt-framed pictures of ships that sailed the high seas, and went to the bay window. Who needed the distraction of pictures of the sea when the real thing was before your very eyes? Through the sticky paper, which had been applied to the windows to prevent them shattering if they were blown in by a bomb blast, she glimpsed the expanse of deep blue sea that met with a whitish horizon, while an eastern sun shone on glittering waters.
‘Girl!’ The voice made Sandra start. ‘You’re not employed to gawp at the view. There’s work to be done. A fire to be laid. See to it now.’
Sandra turned and met the imperious stare of her employer, Clara Kirton, who sat on the chaise longue, the house accounts book in her hand. A slim woman, she wore a two-piece velvet costume with jacket to the hips and a blouse with a ruffled collar.
‘Yes, Mrs Kirton. Just give us time to do the—’
‘How many times, girl, do I have to tell you? The word is me. I don’t want common language in my house.’
As she considered her employer’s dissatisfied expression, Sandra wondered, as she often did, what Mrs Kirton had to complain about. After all, she had everything Sandra could only dream of. A husband, family and beautiful home.
As she moved towards the fireplace, Sandra’s thoughts of family turned naturally to her younger brother, Alf, the only relative she possessed. Mam had died in childbirth and Dad, unable to cope because of illness, and with no relatives to speak of, had sent his two bairns to the orphanage. The mistress there decreed that boys and girls weren’t allowed to mix, so Alf was sent to the boys’ department. Both brother and sister had been desperately homesick and had pined for each other.
Her eyes blurry with the memory, Sandra became aware of Mrs Kirton’s haughty expression and discontented stare. Fingers grasping the string of pearls around her neck, her employer seemed agitated.
‘I want this house spotless for Duncan’s homecoming this afternoon.’
At the mention of Duncan Kirton a knot of tension tightened in Sandra’s stomach.
The Kirtons had two grown-up children. Miriam, who lived in Yorkshire with her husband and small child, rarely came to visit. Duncan, the eldest, had been conscripted in the forces at the beginning of the war. Sandra had been delighted and relieved to see him go.
‘Stop dawdling, girl. You can start by cleaning the brasses.’
‘Yes, Mrs Kirton.’ As she placed the coal scuttle at the side of the mottled marble fireplace, Sandra thought to herself, If you think I give a hoot about your precious son’s homecoming, you can think again.
‘Will Mr Duncan be staying long?’ Sandra held her breath. She didn’t trust Duncan Kirton.
‘What business is it of yours?’ Mrs Kirton snapped the account book shut and stood up.
‘I just thought—’
‘You’re here to work not think. Now set the fire and say no more. And make sure you riddle the ashes.’
There was no pleasing Mrs Kirton when she was in this kind of disgruntled mood. Sandra mentally shrugged and got on with her jobs. It was a rare occasion indeed for a fire to be lit in the front room and Sandra wondered what Mr Kirton would have to say. Probably nothing. Cecil Kirton didn’t involve himself in family affairs. A partner at Carstairs and Kirton solicitors in the town, of an evening he usually sat in the small room off the master bedroom, a paraffin heater on for warmth, his office papers spread over an inlaid desk. The rest of the family used the dining room – a comfortable room with wall mouldings and painted frieze, a round mahogany table and chairs, and a pianola that Sandra secretly would have loved to have a go on – where a meagre fire burned in the grate.
Mrs Kirton made for the door. Her hand on the brass handle, she hesitated and then turned. ‘My son will be staying the night. See to it that his bed is aired and a fire set in his room.’
She swept from the room, clashing the door behind her.
There was no need to guess who the favoured child was. Duncan Kirton was a year older than Sandra. When she’d begun working for the Kirton household, missing her brother terribly, Sandra had at first had a soft spot for the quiet teenage Duncan. But he had changed as he got older, became more assured – his manner sometimes bordering on arrogance. He blossomed into a handsome young man who liked to tease Sandra when his parents weren’t around because they were apt to frown on him fraternising with the staff. Sandra took his naughtiness – when he would hide and suddenly pounce on her, laughing and grabbing her around the waist – all in good humour.
She wouldn’t now, though, knowing what she did from Molly, the sacked scullery maid. She kept out of his way when he was home, wary of attracting his attention in any way.
Sandra missed her brother Alf terribly. She’d seen him only twice since she’d left the orphanage; he’d always been at school when she had her afternoon off and neither the mistress of Blakeley or Mrs Kirton would compromise. Alf was now in the RAF, stationed somewhere down south. They corresponded with the help of Mrs Goodwin, who’d been kind when Sandra, knowing that Mrs Goodwin liked to read romance novels, in desperation had swallowed her pride and told her, shamefaced, that she could neither read nor write.
‘I skipped school when I was young,’ Sandra had explained. ‘Mam took in washing and I stayed at home to look after me little brother, Alf.’ She didn’t add that at the orphanage, too mortified to show her failing in front of the younger orphans, she’d sat at the back of the class where she could count on being ignored.
‘What about yer dad?’ Mrs Goodwin had looked at the girl with compassion.
‘He was an invalid. He had a weak heart from when he was injured in the Great War.’ In case Mrs Goodwin thought badly of him, Sandra quickly added, ‘Sometimes Dad manged to cobble neighbours’ worn-out shoes in the kitchen.’
‘Hinny, never think you’re dumb.’ Mrs Goodwin’s eyes gleamed. ‘You’re just unschooled. And you lack confidence. But tell me’ – she gave Sandra a quizzical look – ‘how do you manage here when you’re sent for the rations and so forth?’
‘I’ve taught myself to have a good memory.’
Mrs Goodwin was only too pleased to help. So, on Wednesdays, when Sandra needed Alf’s letter to be read, or a reply to be written, Sandra called in at Mrs Goodwin’s house in Wharton Street on her way back to the Kirtons’ after she finished work at the WVS clothes depot. After a time, it was agreed that Sandra write and tell her brother to send his letters to Mrs Goodwin’s address. Sandra thought it a good idea as she always felt uncomfortable when Mrs Kirton handed her the post, as if the woman was doing Sandra a favour.
Now, with the noise of the door slamming ringing in her ears, Sandra knelt in front of the fireplace and riddled the cinders with tongs for any lumps of coal. Like everything else, coal was in short supply and every bit had to be salvaged. She set the fire ready to be lit and, rising from her knees, wandered over to the bay where faded red velvet curtains with tie-backs framed the inset window. Through the sticky paper she looked out again at the spectacular view. The twin arms of the piers dominated the sea view, and a pilot’s boat, a frothy white in its wake, bustled over to where a freighter waited beyond the harbour in deep swelling waters.
The front doorbell rang, and Sandra, startled, automatically smoothed her apron and made for the hallway.
She opened the door.
‘Hi, Ma. I caught an earlier train as I… Oh, it’s you.’
Duncan stood thickset and tall in his army greatcoat, cap covering his cropped black hair, and a duffle bag slung over a shoulder. His dark eyes observed her.
Sandra backed away and lowered her eyes.
‘Duncan… darling.’ Mrs Kirton pushed forward and, taking her son’s arm, ushered him into the narrow hallway. ‘Come in and let me take a look at you.’
Sandra stepped out of the way, overturning the umbrella stand.
‘Stupid girl…’ Mrs Kirton glowered.
Sandra took the word ‘stupid’ to heart. Then she thought of Cook’s words: If I was you, love, I’d take no notice. Don’t let Mrs Kirton get you down. Sandra hoped Cook’s self-assurance would rub off on her one day. She pushed the hurtful word to the back of her mind.
As Duncan was led away, Sandra saw his lingering glance and recoiled.
Shaken, Sandra immersed herself in her work, setting and lighting the fires, polishing brass doorknobs, tidying and dusting rooms. Lastly, she stripped beds. When she’d finished, flushed and ready for a cup of tea, she realised now was not the time for a break as it was Monday – wash day.
Making her way into the yard, Sandra filled a washtub with buckets of steaming hot water from a boiler she’d lit earlier in the washhouse. Possing the clothes with a poss stick until her arms ached, she rinsed them in cold water in a tin bath, then hauled the mangle out of the washhouse into the yard.
The day was cold and a blustery wind rattled around the yard. Mrs Goodwin appeared wearing a wool hat, gloves and scarf. ‘I’ll give yi’ a hand, hinny, I’ve time. I’ll feed the clothes in the roller. You catch them and hang them on the line. Then we’ll have a cup of tea.’
‘Won’t Mr Kirton be coming home soon for his dinner?’
‘We’ll make time.’ Cook’s voice was firm.
Later, when Sandra entered the kitchen where the heat from the range made the skin on her cheeks tingle, Mrs Goodwin handed her a cup of steaming tea.
‘Why that man can’t go to the Co-op café for his dinner like he used to,’ she continued on from their earlier conversation, ‘is beyond me. Though, if yi’ ask me…’ She eyed the door and lowered her voice. ‘…the Kirtons are skint.’
‘They can’t be… he’s a professional man, a solicitor.’ Sandra repeated the words Mrs Kirton was wont to say on occasions she wanted to impress.
‘Aye, well my Tommy says with this war on folk like him are hard done by ’cos folk aren’t buying and selling houses any more which brings in big money. According to Tommy, solicitors these days must make do with being executor of wills and disputes and such things. My Tommy likes to look these things up.’ A glow of pride spread across her round, good-natured face.
Sandra thought that Tommy Goodwin was wasting his talents by working at Middle Docks.
Mrs Goodwin’s expression was knowing. ‘I reckon that’s why her ladyship’s keyed up… she’s been doing the account book.’
She moved to the range and bent over to open the door. The meaty smell wafting from the oven intensified, and the hollow feeling in her belly reminded Sandra that she was starved.
Mrs Goodwin only worked mornings, which she professed was fine as she didn’t want a full-time job. ‘I’ve stayed at home to bring me three kids up. I first came to work to help with the finances, but now, with the bairns up an. . .
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