The Far Side of the Sky (30 page)

Simon and Esther traded concerned looks but said nothing.

“Forget the issue of whether, as a Jew, I’m betraying my people by helping this Nazi.” Franz gazed at Simon. “I have no right to use the hospital you and the CFA built, for such a purpose.” He turned to his sister-in-law. “And Essie, if Reuben is serious—and I am certain he is—it is not fair of me to risk Hannah’s future and yours this way.”

Esther stared at Franz with the same measured calm she had shown so often in their final days in Vienna. “Franz, you are certain that no Gentile surgeon can offer this woman the same treatment?”

Franz shook his head. “Those surgeons are the ones who sent her to me.”

Esther shrugged. “Then the answer is simple. You must operate.”

Franz was stunned by the casualness of her response, but Simon nodded his support. “Look, I don’t like this one little bit either,” he said.

“But Essie’s right. You can’t just turn your back on the woman.”

“What if Reuben or other Jews in the community find out that I operated on her?”

Esther’s expression remained placid. “You mentioned that her husband could pass for Jewish. How about his wife?”

Franz had a mental image of the emaciated, jaundiced woman. “She just looks ill.”

Esther held up a hand, palm upward. “So where is it written that she has to register at the hospital as the wife of a Nazi diplomat?”

“Brilliant, Essie! It just might work!” Franz exclaimed. “She could be admitted under any name. Nobody checks. And no one, except those of us in the operating room, even needs to know her real diagnosis!”

Simon nodded his silent endorsement, while Esther offered a tight smile. But Franz’s relief was short-lived. An icy chill crept down his neck. So much would be at stake.

A
PRIL
21, 1940, S
HANGHAI

Sunny’s fingers tingled and her back ached. She had hunched over the operating table for more than four hours—longer than any other surgery she had assisted—while Franz calmly excised Edda Schwartzmann’s cancerous bile duct, along with the head of the pancreas and sections of her stomach and duodenum. Sunny marvelled at his craftsmanship. With the touch of a magician, he merged all the fragmented organs back into some semblance of workable order, before sewing her abdomen closed.

Edda coughed twice on the operating table as she began to rouse. Free of the heavy surgical gown, Sunny stretched her throbbing lower back.

“Now you look like a real surgeon,” Franz said as he stretched too. He turned to the other nurse. “Berta, before we move her to the ward, will you please check and, if necessary, change the dressing on Mrs. Schwar—” He cleared his throat—”Mrs. Silberstein’s abdomen.”

It was the second time that Sunny had heard Franz stumble over the patient’s name, but Berta seemed oblivious to both slip-ups. “Certainly, Dr. Adler. I will ensure Mrs. Silberstein doesn’t bleed through the dressing.”

“And please, give her morphine injections as required for the pain.”

“Of course I will, Dr. Adler.” Berta’s tone bordered on offended.

“I’m sorry, Berta.” Franz grinned contritely. “You always have everything under control. A surgery of this length—with all that ether floating about—numbs the mind. Mine, at least.”

Appeased, the nurse unfolded her plump arms and smiled. “Certainly, Dr. Adler.”

Aside from Sunny, the other volunteer nurses at the refugee hospital were all middle-aged or older, married German refugees. They chattered relentlessly about Franz, referring to him behind his back as “Herr Doktor
Attraktiv.”
They were forever hypothetically marrying him off to unattached friends, sisters or nieces. Sunny’s name came up from time to time, but none of the other nurses were aware of how deep her feelings ran. While Simon had a hunch, only Jia-Li recognized how hard Sunny had fallen for the surgeon. The previous day over lunch, Jia-Li had pressed Sunny about him.

“I still do not see the problem,
xiao hè.”
Jia-Li exhaled a puff of smoke.
“This
doctor is not married, is he?”

Sunny shook her head. “But he has been involved with another woman for the past year.”

Jia-Li arched an eyebrow. “A year, and yet he has not proposed to her?” “Not that I am aware of.”

Jia-Li brought the cigarette holder to her lips. “Sunny, if there is one thing I understand better than you, it is how men think. Trust me, if your widowed doctor loved this woman, he would have asked her to marry him by now.”

“Do you really think so?”

“Without a doubt.” Jia-Li laid her hand on top of Sunny’s. “But he needs to hear how you feel.”

Sunny pulled her hand free and waved it vehemently. “No! I can’t.”

“I know you too well.” Jia-Li laughed out another stream of smoke. “Most women would have let him know long ago through gestures and tone of voice. Not you. You keep it all in. I would wager that the good doctor doesn’t have an inkling of your feelings for him.”

“Good.”

Jia-Li’s expression hardened. “Not good at all, Sunny. You must tell him!”

“I won’t.” Sunny folded her arms across her chest. “I will not be the other woman. Not again. I still have not forgiven myself for the last time.

With Wen-Cheng.”

Sunny had left the restaurant more determined than ever to bury her feelings for Franz. However, now as she walked beside him down the hospital’s narrow hallway with their elbows only inches apart, her resolve wavered.

At the end of the corridor, Hermann Schwartzmann paced furiously, a stream of pipe smoke marking his circular route. As soon as the diplomat saw them, he stopped dead in his tracks and yanked the pipe from his lips. He opened his mouth but closed it without a word, as though afraid to inquire about the outcome.

“Your wife is beginning to wake, Herr Silberstein,” Franz said in the same cool tone he always adopted with Schwartzmann. “You will be able to visit her soon.”

“Oh, good. Wonderful.” Schwartzmann nodded gratefully. “And the … the surgery?”

“It went as well as can be expected,” Franz said. “We found no unpleasant surprises. We were able to remove the tumour. And I could not see or feel any obvious spread of the cancer inside her abdomen.”

Schwartzmann’s shoulders sagged with relief. His face crumpled for a moment, but he quickly regained his composure. “Oh, thank you, Dr. Adler. Thank you so very much.”

Franz held up a finger. “I must remind you that none of this guarantees a cure. As I warned you, cholangiocarcinoma is an aggressive tumour. While I did not feel any masses, it does not mean the cancer has not already spread microscopically beyond the bile duct.”

Unperturbed, Schwartzmann slipped the stem of the pipe back between his lips. “You did indeed warn us. Without your intervention, my Edda’s fate would have been sealed. You have given us a chance. That is more than I had the right to ask of you.”

Franz studied him for a long moment before speaking. “Even if her recovery is uneventful, your wife will need to remain in the hospital for a few weeks, possibly longer.”

“I understand,” Schwartzmann said.

Franz glanced over either shoulder to make sure no one was within earshot. “I trust you will respect the terms of our agreement. No visitors aside from yourself. And you will tell no one where
Frau Silberstein
—” he stressed her alias—”had her surgery or who performed it.”

Schwartzmann laid a hand over his heart. “I swear it—again—on my life.”

Franz nodded. “The nurses will let you know when Mrs. Silberstein has awakened enough for you to visit.”

Franz began to turn away when Schwartzmann called to him. “Dr.

Adler?” “Yes?”

“You are a fine, fine man, Dr. Adler,” Schwartzmann said.

“No, Mr. Silberstein. I am just a Jew. Nothing more.” He strode off without waiting for a reply.

Schwartzmann stared after the departing surgeon before he turned to Sunny. Their eyes locked for a moment, and she detected a glimmer of shame in them. “Thank you, Miss Mah.” He broke off the eye contact. “I understand Dr. Adler would not have been able to perform the operation without your assistance.”

Schwartzmann struck Sunny as so civilized. She wanted to ask him how he could work for a government like Hitler’s, but instead she simply nodded.

Sunny caught up with Franz outside the changing rooms. He looked grim. “It’s over now, Franz.”

“We will see,” he muttered.

“It was the right thing to do.”

“For whom, Sunny?”

“For them. For you. For everyone.”

He nodded slightly. “We will see,” he repeated.

She ran out of words to reassure him. Instead, she asked, “Where are you going now?”

“To the Country Hospital. And I had better arrive armed with a flawless excuse for my absence this morning.”

“I have little doubt that Dr. Reuben will be enthralled by the details of Mrs. Silberstein’s hemorrhoid repair.”

Franz showed a fleeting grin. “Are you heading to the Country Hospital as well?”

“Yes, but I planned to stop for lunch along the way.” Without even considering, Sunny blurted, “Would you have time to join me?” “No.”

She flushed with embarrassment.

He cracked a small smile. “But I will anyway.”

Outside the hospital, the sun had finally broken through the clouds, bringing with it the first inklings of spring. Inhaling the warm air, Sunny glanced at Franz. Some of the worry had drained away from his features as he blinked in the bright sunlight.

Fai was already waiting at the curb. He drove them back to the International Settlement via the Garden Bridge. As the car idled at the Japanese checkpoint, Sunny’s heart thudded hard. As always, she scrutinized the guard’s face in search of a scarred lip but saw none.

“Are you all right, Sunny?” Franz asked.

Sunny looked away from the window.

“It can’t be easy, Sunny. With so many Japanese soldiers to remind you of that night …”

She forced a smile. “I am all right, Franz.”

As soon as they reached the International Settlement, Sunny pointed to the curb and said, “Here is fine, thank you, Fai.”

They climbed out in front of Public Garden, which jutted out to a point at the southern intersection of the Whangpoo River and Soochow Creek.

Many native Chinese resented the colonial English-style greens, which up until the turn of the nineteenth century had bore a sign reading, “No Dogs or Chinese Allowed.” But Sunny had always loved the manicured lawns, colourful flower beds and, especially, the central red-topped gazebo where her father used to bring her to watch brass bands play in the summer.

They walked along the perimeter of Public Garden. The oily aromas from the street kitchens wafted by. Sunny’s stomach rumbled as they approached the little stall where the same gnarled, old woman who had been there forever made some of the best bamboo-wrapped rice dumplings in the city.

A new concern struck Sunny, and she felt her face reddening again. “I am sorry, Franz. The food here … it’s not kosher.” Franz shrugged. “Neither am I.”

“But I thought … oh, good. Do you trust me to order our lunch?”

He bowed his head. “With my life.”

She laughed. “Hopefully, it will not come to that.”

Sunny ordered four dumplings or
zongzis
and, out of tradition, haggled with the woman until they agreed on a price. At the next stall, she ordered two other Shanghai delicacies:
cong you bin
or fried chive pancakes and
you-tia,
fresh Chinese crullers. Sliding the pancakes off the grill, the cook stacked and folded them inside newsprint before passing them to Franz.

They headed inside Public Garden and found an empty bench facing the gazebo. After they spread the food between them, Sunny described each dish, relishing the opportunity to teach Franz for a change. He sniffed the
zongzi
dubiously before taking a small bite. As he chewed, his eyes lit with pleasure. He took a much bigger second bite. “Delicious. And all this time, I was warned to stay clear of the street kitchens.”

“You just need to know which ones are safe.” Sunny grinned. “I can help there.”

They ate in comfortable silence. Sunny was full after finishing a
zongzi
and three slices of
cong you bin,
but Franz kept going until only a few pieces of
you-tia
remained. “I was hungrier than I realized,” he said with a sheepish grin as he wiped his lips with a handkerchief.

“It was a long, difficult surgery.” Franz’s smile shrank. “I suppose.”

“What is it, Franz?”

He paused a moment. “I always love the peacefulness of the operating room. Inside, I can tune out the rest of the world and focus only on the patient and the surgery. But today …”

“You performed a flawless operation, Franz.”

“Today I dragged all the ugliness of the world into the operating room with me.”

Sunny touched his hand. “It’s over now.”

Franz laid his other hand on top of hers. “I hope it gives Mrs. Schwartzmann relief from her symptoms. Perhaps even a cure. But if the Reubens were ever to discover that I went ahead and operated …”

“We won’t let that happen,” Sunny said, distracted. Franz’s touch had been spine-tingling. She felt her earlier resolve melting away. For a moment, she lost herself in his troubled hazel eyes.

He squeezed her fingers and leaned closer. “I am not sure where I would be without you.”

“At the wrong street kitchen, no doubt.”

A faint smile crossed his lips but his gaze grew even more intent. “You have no idea how much you mean to me, Sunny.” She swallowed. “I feel it too, Franz.” “You know with Lotte …”

The mention of the other woman’s name broke the mood like an air raid alarm sounding. Sunny sat up straighter and tried to pull her hand free of his, but Franz held on. “I don’t love her, Sunny.”

The words were painfully reminiscent of Wen-Cheng’s rationalizations. Sunny yanked her hand out of his grip and stood to her feet. “We should be getting to the hospital now.”

Franz nodded but made no effort to rise from the bench. He spoke to the ground. “If it were only about my position at the Country Hospital, I would never let that stop me. I could find work elsewhere.” He turned
to her, his face taut with angst. “But Hannah is so happy at school. She is accepted there. I cannot take that from her. I simply cannot.”