My Enemy's Cradle (15 page)

I was in Germany. And Isaak didn't know.

We headed south, faster and faster. The land rose up from the soggy fields that were my last sight of Holland, but as we climbed, I felt I was plummeting. Everywhere on the roads were convoys of trucks and jeeps, lines of slow-moving tanks. No civilians were out, not even on bicycles, not even on foot. Only military—a country of soldiers. I could only watch as I hurtled into my enemy's heart, frozen and helpless.

No. I fingered the little moonstone earring in my sore earlobe.

"It was a good idea." I leaned forward between the two men and forced a smile, my voice contrite. "I could write to my family. Would you have a pen and some paper? I'd like to do it now, so I can post it as soon as possible."

The driver handed a pen back to me. The other one reached under his seat and pulled out a pad of paper, ripped off a sheet. "You can use the back."

I thanked them and pulled my suitcase over beside me to use as a desk.
Dear Mother and Father,
I wrote, in letters big enough for the soldiers to read if they glanced back.
There has been a change of plans.
And then, in tiny lettering underneath:
Checkpoint at Beek. E, SE, then E. Through Essen. To the Rhine.

I ate some of the food from the basket, wrapped the rest, and tucked it into my pocket. We pulled off the highway once, so the soldiers could relieve themselves. "Get out if you'd like. There are some hedges," they offered. I considered running, but beyond the hedges stretched open fields on all sides, and I had seen a gun flash at the driver's hip. Besides, even if I could get away, where would I go with only a few guilders in my pocket? I shook my head and we got back on the highway.

We followed the Rhine. The mountains folded along both sides grew steeper and the sun came out, lighting the snowcapped peaks in the distance. The landscape was beautiful, more stunning than any of my geography books had conveyed, but harsh, not soft like Holland. The river was soft though, its rising mist hazing the vineyards and villages that tumbled down to its banks. The Rhine flowed through the Netherlands, too, and so its presence comforted me a little each time it curled into view below, like a silver thread from my home. Except once, when the river widened and an island appeared, parting its current. From its center, like an illustration from a fairy tale, rose a stone castle. I stared as we passed along beside it, the feeling of comfort suddenly a terrible dread. Fairy tales always held great evil. Great danger.

Bonn, due East. Koblenz.
Gretel dropping her bread crumbs.

Toward the middle of the afternoon, the soldiers talked of stopping. There was to be a new Lebensborn home in Wiesbaden; they'd been there before to do some preliminary work, they knew of a restaurant.

We parked in front of a tavern but before we went in the driver pointed across the street to a tobacco store. They would get some cigarettes first. We stepped into the street, me between my guardians, and that was when I saw them.

Blooming on the left sides of coats with the suddenness of daffodils—at first that's what I thought they were: daffodils tucked jauntily into breast pockets. A sign of hope or defiance against the realities of war. But as we approached an elderly couple, I saw the cheap shine of the material, the color too garish for nature, and then the chunky Gothic letters, JUDE, in the center. Isaak had told me about the stars—people would be wearing them in Schiedam soon. The couple huddled against a doorway as we passed by, their eyes cast down, and the left side of my chest began to burn.

"What is it?" the taller soldier asked. He had stopped and was staring at me and I realized I was clutching my heart.

"Nothing, nothing." I forced my hands to my side, amazed that the fabric of my coat did not burst into flame.

In the restaurant, I left to use the washroom. I drank cold water from my hand, then I bent over, gripping the sink, staring at my face in the mirror. My half-Jewish face. "No one knows. No one knows." I stood there, shaking, until I was startled by a knock on the door.

The driver. "Are you all right? The meal is here."

They had ordered sausages and soup and bread, but I couldn't eat. I couldn't even pick up my cup of tea because my hands would not stop shaking.

It began to rain again. I leaned my head against the glass and from nowhere came a memory: my mother coming to find me at the window, looking out at the rain, disconsolate, wanting to go out. "The rain that falls today doesn't fall tomorrow," she said, patting my shoulder. Later, I learned what the saying meant, but that day I remember pushing her hand off and telling her tomorrow would be too late.

The soldiers hadn't said anything, but as we approached I knew. A granite wall, grown over with ivy, hid the grounds, but the stylized SS initials molded into the iron gates of the entryway left no doubt. From the first time I'd seen them, those double-S runes looked to me like gashes, like the teeth marks wolves might leave in their victims' throats. A tall white watchtower rose up beside the gates; towers like this held girls prisoner in fairy tales. And in the wet dusk, I saw fields sliding away in all directions. Beyond them, to the east and north, mountains rose. There would be no walking into the woods here.

The driver pulled to a stop at a hut and flashed his lights. A guard left the station buttoning his raincoat and came to the driver's door. His muddy boots, rain-slick in the lights, seemed covered in blood—like the butcher's boots back home in Poland when I was a little girl. He leaned in when the driver rolled down the window and spoke to the soldiers for a moment, confirming their orders. Then he pulled a black leather ledger from under his coat and opened it, read something. In the glow of the dashboard instruments, his eyes shone, ice-colored like a wolf's.

He turned them on me. "Anneke Van der Berg?"

"
Ja.
" The lie was not so easy now.

"Date of birth?"

"Eight July, 1920." Had I hesitated?

He nodded, then motioned for us to pass up the drive and followed on foot.

When I stepped out, I was afraid my legs would give way. "Do you feel faint?" the guard asked, reaching for my elbow.

I jerked my arm away. No one in that uniform would ever touch me again.

There was a large desk immediately inside, imposing as another wall. Behind it hung a photograph of Hitler; underneath that sat a middle-aged woman with steel-colored hair piled on top of her head in a braid so tight it reminded me of the cables coiled around the pilings where the canal barges unloaded. She rose and saluted the driver and the guard; standing, she was as tall as they were. The Nazi eagle flashed on her lapel. I stepped away.

"Frau Klaus," the men greeted her. "
Heil Hitler.
"

The driver handed her the file from my envelope, which she checked against some papers of her own. I turned my back to them, my fraud of a face turned away.

Along one wall were more photographs of Hitler—accepting flowers from a girl in a white dress; raising his arm in salute to a vast sea of troops; riding in an open car past crowds of Germans waving handkerchiefs. There were also several of Heinrich Himmler—Isaak had told me he was in charge of the Lebensborns. On the opposite wall were posters of mothers and their children.
EVERY MOTHER OF GOOD BLOOD MUST BE SACRED TO US!
declared one. THE PRAM IS MIGHTIER THAN THE TANK! read another. My uncle had sent his daughter here. I shuddered and lowered my eyes.

Marble tiles in a black-and-white diamond pattern gleamed in the light of a chandelier. I was unused to seeing lights lit at night anymore. Beside me a mahogany credenza smelled of lemon oil, which was a familiar scent from home, and over that floated the rich aroma of roasting pork, which was not. I smelled bread baking, and also something sweet, with vanilla. Anneke's scent. But
I
was Anneke now. On the credenza was a huge bouquet of pink roses and white chrysanthemums and in front of that a platter of fruit: crab apples, shiny red pears, and plump grapes so dark they looked black. Fruit used as a welcoming decoration—how long since I'd seen such extravagance?

"Follow me," Frau Klaus said, and in her voice it was an order. Women speaking like men—another thing to get used to. She rose and started down the hall. I had the sudden urge to call out,
Wait, wait!
But for what? I followed her tall form, her heels clacking on the marble tiles, up a stairway and down a long corridor with rounded corners. She rapped on an open door numbered 12B, startling a girl lying on a bed with her legs propped up on pillows. The girl looked as if she wanted to jump up, but the mound of her belly was so big it seemed to be sitting on her, pinning her down.

"Leona, this is Anneke, your new roommate. Show her how things are done here."

And then Frau Klaus was gone.

"I'm sorry, I can't get up." Leona crossed her eyes and groaned. "I don't think I'll ever be able to sit up again. But welcome. Make yourself at home." She waved to the far side of the room. "That's your bed ... well, of course ... and the bureau in the corner with nothing on it. I hope you brought magazines.... "

I couldn't move. Just this way, five years before, I'd stood in the doorway of my new home in Schiedam, my grip tightening around the handle of my suitcase, afraid if I stepped inside I would shatter.

Leona struggled to get up and came over and took my suitcase, set it down. "I've been here so long, I forgot how it can seem. Come in. Sit down." She sat on my bed and patted the space beside her. "I haven't had a roommate for weeks."

I sat and found my voice. "There aren't many girls here?" I asked it mostly to keep her talking, for the sweet comfort of hearing Dutch words in a girl's voice—it felt like a lifetime since I'd heard that. Since Anneke.

"There aren't many
Dutch
girls here. They like to keep us together, you know. But actually, it's almost full. Where are you from? You sound—"

A moment of panic surged and passed. "I was born in Poland. How many girls are here?"

"About a hundred and twenty, a hundred and thirty." I must have looked alarmed because she told me not to worry. "It won't seem like that many. For one thing, a lot of them are in the mothers' wing. You never see them except in the gardens, pushing their prams with their noses in the air like it's some sort of divine miracle to give birth to a German baby. They've gotten themselves knocked up, is all. Just like the rest of us." She lay back and then heaved herself over to her side to look at me. "Where are you from?"

"Schiedam. You?"

"Amsterdam."

I was glad. Girls from the country kept to themselves. Leona would probably be more open and more generous with information. And she looked open and generous—her face was round and deeply dimpled, as if she was trying to hold back a laugh. She wore her hair waved and pinned up on either side, like the American movie stars.

"So how many girls here are still pregnant?"

"Oh, maybe seventy now. But some of them are the married ones. They keep to themselves because they're so much better than we are ... oh, maybe you're married? No, why would any of us ... well, they have husbands, you see. Except most of the babies have nothing to do with those husbands—they're out on the Volga somewhere. That's why the
Frauen
come here, and why we're not supposed to use last names ... very secret."

"How many other girls are from the Netherlands?"

"Six others. Counting you and me, that's eight. But Resi will be leaving soon; she's overdue. And there are three girls from Belgium, and two from France. You have to speak German in here—how's your German?—except for in the rooms."

"Good."

"Mine wasn't. It's gotten better since I've been here." She propped herself up on her elbow and pointed to my middle. "You're not even showing!"

Isaak had prepared me for this. "No, but you don't have to be, you know. Things aren't very friendly at home."

Leona's glance darted to my split lip and I saw her decide against asking me about it. "Not for me, either. My parents stopped speaking to me when they found out. But ... why did you tell them so soon?"

"I thought"—a sharp stab, seeing Anneke's face so radiant—"I thought we'd get married."

"So he was your first? I've had a few. Not that they're such good lovers—Germans are the worst, all business, don't you think? How far along are you?"

"Oh, a couple of months." I relaxed my stomach and rubbed my back. As if that would fool her.

"Well, some of the German girls come in right away. They usually work here for a while first. I've just never seen one of us do it, is all. Watch out for the German girls, by the way. They hold it against us that their men lowered themselves to sleep with us. Anyway, you should unpack. Dinner's soon."

I got up and opened my suitcase. I put Anneke's nightgowns and underthings in the bureau, then her sweaters. Then I went to the wardrobe to hang up her dress and skirts.

"You didn't bring much," Leona said. "Nothing for later? Well, it's fine. There's always a lot of clothing left here by the girls who leave. I'll leave you my things when I go—I'll never want to see them again."

"How long do you have?"

"Five more weeks, can you believe it? I'll never make it. I swear it's twins, but the doctor says no."

I had come to the bottom of my bag. My back still turned, I slipped the velvet bag from my neck and tucked it into a yellow layette that had been Anneke's when she was a baby, and put that back into the suitcase.

"Cyrla," Leona said. "That's an interesting name."

I froze, then closed my suitcase carefully and turned.

Leona held up
Letters to a Young Poet.
"I never heard it before."

"It's Polish. She's my cousin. She loaned me the book."

Leona waved to her night table. "I have some romances. I've read them all. You can borrow them if you get bored. It's easy to get bored in here."

I opened my suitcase again. "Is there an extra key for me? For the wardrobe?" I asked, trying not to sound concerned.

"No, you can't lock it. I heard you used to be able to. But then last spring, the
Reichsführer
made a surprise visit to the Klosterheide home, and apparently he was appalled by how messy the girls were keeping their things. He ordered all the keys to be confiscated so the staff can do spot checks anytime. Himmler is such an old woman. He's got his nose into everything here—"