Chapter OneHanna
August 1938
Don’t worry about the future. It will be no match for you.” Mama’s words echoed in my ears as the vast thickets of trees gave way to a forest of cement, stone, steel, and brick as the train entered Berlin and I left all trace of her behind. It was hard to heed her advice just then, but she’d never led me astray.
I pulled my worry stone from the secret pocket I had furtively sewn in my new brown traveling dress. I held the rock in the palm of my left hand and rubbed it with my right thumb.
Twelve years earlier, Mama took me to the bank of the stream that ran by our house. She took a stone from the bed of the stream and another from dry land beside it.“Liebchen, do you see how the water has made the stone smooth? The water has washed over it until the rough edges had no choice but to yield. You carry the same power within you.” She tossed the smooth stone back into the stream and handed me the small hunk of pinkish-white quartz that she had picked up from the muddy bank.“When your stomach begins to tighten, your shoulders begin to seize up, or when you can’t seem to fit air in your lungs no matter how hard you try, take this in your hand, concentrate on rubbing the stone, and let it take your troubles away like the stream rushing over the stone. It won’t happen in a day, but you’ll learn to smooth the jagged edges of worry that pierce your gut.”
That Mama’s suggestion worked didn’t surprise me at all. Mama knew how to fix every ailment that ever presented itself to her. That she knew exactly how it felt when my nervousness overcame me was what stole my breath. Some of the children in Teisendorf said Mama was a witch. I wasn’t sure they were entirely wrong. But if it were true, she had been a kind and benevolent one, so I didn’t much care if she was.
I didn’t care if she was a witch, a goblin, or Father Christmas. I wanted her back.
But she was gone, and I was on my way to live with Uncle Otto and Aunt Charlotte.
I also understood Papa’s reasoning for sending me to Uncle Otto and Aunt Charlotte to finish up my last year of schooling. They lived in the city and would be able to give me opportunities that he living in a small town could not. I understood why Papa wanted to send Pieter and Helmut to boarding school. He was too busy with his work at the shop to give two young boys the attention they needed. But just because I could make sense of it didn’t make it hurt any less.
Mama had been my monolith. Unmovable and constant like a star in the night sky to help me find my way. I kissed her cheek on the way out the door to school two weeks ago and came home to an ashen-faced Papa announcing that she’d been killed by a careless driver. There would be no funeral. No memorial. No viewing. With all that was going on in the country, Papa thought such things were an extravagance. I got no chance to say goodbye.
And now it seemed the Führer would get the war he’d been begging for, and I was headed away from my beloved green hills right to the center of the hornet’s nest. Exactly where I had no desire to be. The train groaned to a stop in the Berlin Hauptbahnhof and I wanted nothing more than to stay in my place until the train returned to Teisendorf. But I stood, shaking as I grabbed my valise, and walked down the aisle.
“My goodness, this young woman cannot be little Hannchen,” Aunt Charlotte said as I stepped onto the platform. She was as tall and reedy as my father’s brother was short and stocky. She had long, glistening honey-blond hair that was coiffed to perfection while he covered his bald pate with a brown porkpie hat. The contrast between them had always struck me, but it seemed even more distinct now as she greeted me with an ebullient smile and he with a silent scowl. She kissed my cheeks and Uncle Otto took my one suitcase wordlessly.
“I was expecting a girl, but your father sent us a young woman!” Aunt Charlotte
breathed as she held me at arm’s length to look at me. “Isn’t that right, Otto?”
“Quite the grown lady,” he agreed, his eyes scanning me from head to foot. For a fleeting moment I felt like a promising cow at a livestock auction. I rubbed my stone discreetly in my palm behind my back as he looked me over.
I hadn’t seen my aunt and uncle in more than six years. I’d been barely approaching the threshold to adolescence then and more than likely had been covered from head to toe in dirt from scouring the woods for wild herbs and mushrooms to use in Mama’s medicines. Today, I was scrubbed fresh, my hair neatly styled, and was wearing one of two new dresses Papa had bought for me so I’d have something decent to wear in the big city. I feared I looked like the poor country relation, and rumpled to boot, after the better part of the day cooped up on the train, but I hoped to at least meet with their approval on first impression.
“You must be exhausted, my dear. Let’s get you home so you can rest and eat, shall we?”
I nodded my approval and they escorted me to Uncle Otto’s shining gleaming black Mercedes-Benz. It probably cost twice what our home in Teisendorf did, and I was afraid I’d somehow spoil it just by looking at it. It was a half-hour ride from the center of town to the villa where they lived in the Grunewald district. I felt a frisson of relief as the trees became denser and the houses much larger and more dispersed. These mansions seemed too vast for single families. Manicured lawns and pristine gardens weren’t the same as the rambling woods but at least there was the comfort that their neighborhood wasn’t as cold and foreign as the heart of the city.
Uncle Otto pulled up the curved drive in front of the house where a uniformed man took his place behind the wheel, presumably to park the car in a garage. I looked up at the sprawling villa and wished I could vanish on the spot. I’d need breadcrumbs to find my way from my bedroom to the dining room if I didn’t want to starve. I tried not to appear overawed but was sure I was failing in the attempt.
Inside, Aunt Charlotte showed me to an impressive suite of rooms down the corridor from their own. “This is where you will stay while you’re with us,” she said. The bedroom was the size of the kitchen and parlor of my parents’ house combined and had deep crimson damask wallpaper and heavy oaken furniture with stark white linens to lighten the room. There was a sitting room with a freshly polished desk and an adjacent bathroom with a cavernous claw-footed tub as well. It was elegant and tasteful, and seemed more suited to an important guest and not a visiting niece.
“I really don’t need anything this grand,” I said. “Please don’t go to any trouble on my account.”
“Nonsense, darling. You’re the daughter of the house as far as your uncle and I are concerned. We’re determined to see your education finished and send you off into adulthood properly. It’s the least we could do for your poor mother.”
“You’re very kind,” I said, bowing my head, now worried I’d offended her somehow.
“You’ve had a few hard weeks, my dear, but I know you’re the clever sort. You’re going to make good use of your time here. And if you can enjoy yourself in the meantime, all the better. I’ve taken the liberty of buying you a few personal things. Nightgowns and such. I think I’ve done all right for size, but if there’s anything amiss, just let me know and we’ll set it right.”
I opened my mouth to protest that I had plenty of clothes but thought it might be unkind. Aunt Charlotte was childless, after all, and perhaps had always longed for a daughter to dress and fuss over. Mama would want me to accept her generosity with grace, though it felt disloyal to get motherly affection from anyone else.
She left me to rest until supper. Though I was bone-weary, I knew that if I laid my head on the decadent goose-down pillows I’d not wake until morning unless roused with a bucket of ice water. The process of unpacking took only minutes, though I agonized over where to put my one photo of Mama. My belongings probably made the room look shabbier, but at least it felt somewhat more familiar. I looked in the drawers to find starched white nightgowns with the hem and cuffs trimmed in tatted lace and silky underthings finer than I’d ever owned. I opened my case and wondered why I’d bothered to pack. As I placed them away, I knew my own clothes would look grungy in comparison to all the lovely things Aunt Charlotte had procured. Silly as it was, I began to almost feel sorry for them and the months they would likely spend relegated to the back of the drawer.
From the bottom of my case, I removed the small mortar and pestle that had been Mama’s, some of her dried herbs, and a few of the medicines she’d made before she died. I would never be as proficient as she was, but I knew enough to make a simple pain reliever or fever reducer. Papa had ordered me to throw out all her medicines, knowing that they weren’t fully in line with the law, but I couldn’t bear to throw away something that had been so dear to her. I’d hidden the most precious items where he wouldn’t find them and then smuggled them here. I tucked them away in the deepest recesses of the bottom drawer of my armoire under a few of my old nightgowns. It would be foolish to risk tinkering with medicines, but it was a comfort to know they were there.
The room was so large that I took up very little space, which left me feeling unsheltered and exposed like a woodland creature in a vast meadow. I longed for the snug solitude of my attic room back at home. I should have been grateful for such a lovely space to call my own, but I didn’t feel myself in such grand surroundings.
A half hour later a soft knocking at the door stirred me from my putterings about the room. I opened the door to find a young woman, perhaps five years older than myself. She had her dark hair pulled back in a tight knot at the nape of her neck and wore a black dress with an apron starched so severely, it didn’t seem to need the
wearer to lend it any shape.
“I am Mila, Miss Hanna. I came to help you prepare for dinner.”
“Oh,” I said, taking a step back as though she’d brandished a dagger. “Oh—do come in. I think I can manage, though.”
“All the same, Herr Rombauer likes things done properly. It’s best to do as he asks.”
“It seems that’s a prudent course of action in all things,” I observed.
“You’re a quick study, Miss Hanna. You’ll do well here. If you like, I can offer you advice on things. How the house is run and such.”
“That would be so wonderful,” I said, wondering if it would be unseemly to hug her. Though she didn’t seem like the type who would welcome such familiarity.
She moved with practiced efficiency as she began preparing my evening toilette. Given that I’d only brought the brown dress I’d traveled in and another in robin’s-egg blue that was a degree or two nicer, selecting an outfit for the evening wasn’t a time-consuming task. We opted for the blue dress and a simple milkmaid-style braid wrapped like a crown encircling my head with a few loose tendrils to soften the effect.
“There. You will please him just as you are,” she declared. “Herr Rombauer does not believe in rouge or perfume and other such frivolities. He prefers a healthy, natural glow.”
“Well then, I suppose it’s just as well I don’t have any of those . . . frivolities,” I said, though I wasn’t sure how I felt at the prospect. He seemed to have so many opinions, I was sure to come out on the wrong side of one of them before long. When Mila pronounced me suitable, I walked to the dining room, miraculously finding it without a map or trail guide.
“A quiet girl. This is good,” I heard Aunt Charlotte say to Uncle Otto in a low voice as I approached the door. “She seems respectful. And pretty, too. As beautiful as poor Elke was.”
“Better than I hoped for,” Uncle Otto agreed. “She’s come along well despite any . . . disadvantages. She still seems shy, but nothing like when she was a girl.”
Disadvantages? Papa was hardly wealthy—being a shopkeeper in a small town would never earn more than a modest living—but I would hardly consider myself disadvantaged. Of course, there was much to learn from life in a big city like Berlin, but I hoped my education there would be of short duration.
“No, her quietness is an asset. There will be plenty who prefer her reserve. I don’t consider it a fault now. It’s tedious in a child, but more becoming in a young lady.”
I waited another moment before entering so they wouldn’t think I’d overheard their commentary. Though perhaps they thought I’d do well to hear it.
“Good evening, Aunt Charlotte and Uncle Otto,” I said, not quite raising my eyes to theirs.
“I trust you’re comfortably settled,” Aunt Charlotte said, gesturing for me to take
a seat to her left at the foot of the table.
“Extremely,” I said. “Your home is lovely.”
“I hope you will come to think of it as your own, my dear.”
I couldn’t think of a suitable reply, so I muttered a “thank you” as she passed the platter of roasted lamb. I took a small portion before passing it on to Uncle Otto.
“We don’t stand for daintiness here, Hanna,” Uncle Otto said. “Take a decent piece and eat well. Weak women only serve to look pretty on movie screens. Strong women are useful.”
“Yes, Uncle.”
Aunt Charlotte turned to me. “If you’ve recovered from your travels, tomorrow I’d like to take you into the city to get you the rest of the things you’ll need for school. If you need anything altered, it will take some time these days.”
“That’s very kind of you, Aunt Charlotte, but I have clothes enough to suit, I’m sure.”
“Nonsense, every girl needs some pretty new things when she starts a new school. Isn’t that right, Otto?”
“Her economy is admirable, Charlotte,” Uncle Otto said. “But if I’ve learned anything in twenty-odd years of marriage, it’s that contradicting you can never arrive at any good outcome. You’ll go into the city with your aunt tomorrow and have a jolly time of it, too.” His words were kind, but they were a commandment.
“Yes, Uncle Otto.”
“That’s a good girl. Now tell me, how are things in Teisendorf these days? It’s been ages since I’ve been back.”
“Quiet as always,” I said. “Farming and shopkeeping and such.”
“Is there much fervor for the cause?”
“You mean Hitler’s plans?” I asked. I’d heard Papa muttering over his newspaper about it and it was all anyone in town could speak of.
“What else could I mean, girl?” he asked with a chuckle.
“Oh, well, yes, Uncle. I would say there is.”
More and more men were in uniform and the boys had all enthusiastically joined the Hitler Youth. The zeal for Hitler was rising steadily as farmers, laborers, and shopkeepers struggled to rebuild the country after the Great War and longed for the glory of the days before the defeat. They looked to him to deliver a prosperous new Germany, and more, to restore the pride of Germany. Mama was dubious of Hitler’s motives, but was always careful never to speak against him, even in front of Papa and the boys. With me she was more open.
“That’s good to hear. Mark my words, Hanna. He will set Germany on the path to glory again and your children will praise his name. I hope you see how worthy the cause is. Or will before long.”
Aunt Charlotte beamed at him and then to me. Silently, I reached inside the secret pocket on the side of my dress and found my worry stone.
Chapter TwoTilde
August 1938
The law is not truth, Tilde. It’s only a glimpse into the values of man at any given point in history. Don’t confuse the laws of men with the word of God.” My grandfather’s words rang in my ears as though he’d spoken them yesterday. I thought of him more and more these days as the regime squeezed the life from our people like a boa with his prey. I’d longed to follow in my grandfather’s footsteps, and my father’s, but that dream was dead now.
“Good afternoon, Frau Fischer,” I said, the tinkle of the shop bell stirring me from the courtroom back to the fabric shop. “I trust you’re well.”
She was a tall, imposing sort of woman with a pinched face that looked perpetually disappointed with everyone and everything. “Fine, fine, thank you. Have you got any more of that nice white calico with the pink flowers that I bought last month? I’d like to make a dress for my granddaughter.”
“I don’t believe we do, Frau Fischer. That particular floral was quite popular. But we’ve had a few new prints come in, several of which would do quite nicely for a young girl.”
“Very well,” she said with a sigh so deep one would think I’d asked her to swim the Atlantic to claim her fabric. I pulled several bolts of the floral calico that was becoming more and more popular as the magazines steered away from the high fashion of Paris and toward a more “wholesome” traditional aesthetic. Plain dresses with high necks made of sturdy fabrics. Sensible, feminine, and utterly boring. I held in a sigh of my own as I set the fabric on the cutting table for her to examine. A floral print was fine from time to time, but I’d seen enough in the past two years that I swore I’d never wear a dress made of the stuff again in my life. I personally favored the clean lines and bold colors that were gaining in popularity elsewhere. I longed for a tube of red lipstick like the American actresses wore, but Mama would have killed me for wearing something so daring.
I showed Frau Fischer a soft periwinkle blue with white poppies, a pretty lavender with yellow daisies, and a green with peonies. Nothing was quite right, but she settled for a pink-and-cream print with roses that was close enough to her original that she gave in. She selected some thread, buttons, and trim to complete the job.
“I’m sure she’ll be the prettiest girl in her class,” I said as I cut the yardage for her and wrapped the purchases into a parcel.
“Yes, yes,” she said. “It’s a shame she has to attend public school at all, but her father insists. So many undesirables these days. I taught my girls at home, and I’d hoped my daughter would do the same. But I suppose there’s only so much a grandmother can do.”
Undesirables. She didn’t have to say what she meant. Foreigners. Gypsies. Jews like me. I forced a smile as I accepted her payment and let it sink into a scowl as she left.
I was a Mischling, of mixed blood. My mother was Jewish, and my father was a Gentile. He abandoned us as soon as it became clear that Jews would be facing persecution when the Nuremberg Laws were passed three years earlier. Papa insisted on a divorce, and my mother and I had no choice but to move from Papa’s beautiful Charlottenburg town house to the ancient apartment above a yardage shop. Mama had come up with just enough savings to buy the apartment and the shop and had used her ingenuity and sweat to turn the rickety building into a home worth living in and a shop worth patronizing. We were left to run this modest fabric shop and scrape together our living selling yardage, doing odd tailoring jobs, and occasionally giving sewing lessons to girls from families who could afford such little luxuries. Thankfully Mama’s skill with a needle soon became renowed
in the neighborhood and she took the time to teach me what she knew. It had taken us three years, but we finally had a loyal clientele.
I switched the sign from OPEN to CLOSED and locked the door for a few moments so I could go check on Mama. Spending the bulk of her life upstairs took its toll and the more I looked in on her, the less isolated she felt.
“Ah, sweetheart. Look at how the dress for the Vogel woman is coming along. Good work, though I run the risk of being boastful by saying so.”
A lovely day dress in dove-gray wool graced the mannequin. It only needed hemming and a few finishing touches, but even the uninitiated could see that this was the work of a master craftswoman.
“It’s not boastful if it’s true, Mama. It’s gorgeous work. I couldn’t in a million years finish a seam as beautifully as you do. It’s far too lovely for the likes of that cow.”
“You shouldn’t say such things. Especially about a good client. Even if you’re right.” She snorted at her own jibe. Frau Vogel had been the most demanding woman we’d met in our years of running the shop. No matter what lengths we went to, there was no pleasing her.
Mama did most of the tailoring upstairs and I was the face of the shop. She looked “too Jewish” for the neighborhood and would be a liability for our safety and finances. My mother’s absence was the main reason we were able to stay in business. Because of my father, my hair was a soft caramel brown and I had hazel-green eyes. Altman wasn’t a surname that attracted suspicion as it was a “good German name.” Mama and I didn’t belong to a congregation, choosing to pray in the safety of our own home.
I denied my heritage to save my neck. And, necessary as it was, there wasn’t a day I didn’t hate myself for it.
“I’ll make dresses like this for you to wear under your judge’s robes,” Mama said. She had never thought my hopes to enter the law were silly or unrealistic. My father always thought my passion for his profession was both quaint and flattering, but never a realistic prospect. My grandfather—my mother’s father—was a different matter entirely. He’d made no attempts to hide the fact that the road to a legal career was a slog for a woman, but rather than discourage me from the pursuit, he endeavored to show me I was equal to it.
He’d been a preeminent lawyer and a senior partner in one of the largest law firms in Berlin. When my father entered the firm as a promising young attorney, it was my grandfather who mentored him, and later introduced him to his precious daughter. Mama claimed it was love at first sight, but that changed when having a Jewish wife and a Mischling daughter became tantamount to professional suicide. He claimed the divorce was just a formality, that he would be with us much the same as he had been,
but he remarried to a blond, doe-eyed woman from the “right” family barely three months after we moved out.
Grandfather refused to work with him after that and had been applying pressure for the other partners to force Father out. But then the laws came down that disqualified Jews from practicing law and his battle was left unfinished. What was worse, Father was promoted to Grandfather’s position as senior partner. It was too much for Grandfather’s heart to bear and he died not six months after the goons made him pack his desk. I only wish he’d lived to see how well we’d rebounded after Father left us behind.
“I have another party dress for Frau Becker to start on, too. Emerald satin. It would look far better on you, but so would most everything.”
I bent down and kissed Mama on the cheek. For all the ways my father had failed me, Mama was parent enough for both of them.
THERE WAS A small cluster of people waiting for me to reopen, some looking rather impatient, though none could have been waiting for more than a few minutes. I swallowed a sigh, for too many customers was far less grave a concern than the inverse. Three women pushed in right away. They were the ones armed with a lifetime of experience tending families and came with fabrics already in mind and a list of notions at the ready. They were rarely friendly but were efficient as customers, which was of far more importance.
After the gaggle of housewives cleared out, I noticed in their wake a tall, pale young man with a mane of curly black hair stuffed under a dark cap. While we did have the occasional male customer, he didn’t seem like our usual confirmed bachelor sort who were determined to learn how to do a bit of mending. He looked vaguely frightened to be in such a feminine domain and seemed relieved when the other customers left.
“You’re lucky you survived. They’ve been known to trample a man if the notion takes them,” I said, replacing fabric on the shelves.
“Thank you for the warning. I’m glad I made it out with my life.” He spoke with a slight accent, and I realized his mother was one of the Polish immigrants who frequented the store. She was a sweet woman, and I could see that same kindness in her son.
“It’s your lucky day, it would seem. And a fortuitous day for buying fabric. What can I get for you?”
“Well, it’s a gift for my sister. My mother wants to make her a dress for her birthday.”
“Ah, is it a special birthday?” I asked.
“She’ll be twelve,” he said. He cast his eyes downward for a moment as though he were betraying a secret. It was possibly the most significant birthday his sister would have, and this was meant to be no ordinary dress. She was coming of age, according to our laws. If she had been born a boy, she would have become a bar mitzvah at thirteen and read from the Torah before the congregation.
As she was a girl, she would take those first steps into adulthood a year earlier. There wouldn’t be the same ceremonies, but she would most likely have a special meal and hearty congratulations from her congregation. And a new dress.
“Ah, becoming a young lady. Nothing too babyish, then.”
“Exactly right,” he said. “I thought sixteen was traditionally the significant birthday among—” He stopped himself short.
“It is, among the Gentiles,” I said.
“But you’re not?” he asked.
I shook my head.
“I thought I sensed something of the kindred in you,” he said. “But you don’t . . .”
“My father isn’t,” I said simply.
“Ah.”
I turned my attention back to the task at hand. I found a pattern that I knew would suit her well. It was still demure enough for someone so young but acknowledged the transition to womanhood with subtle nips and tucks in the right places.
“That should do well,” he said, not paying much attention to the details of the design. ...
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