Children of the Dusk (28 page)

"Don't patronize me!" She picked a grasshopper from her nightdress and tried to deposit it onto the floor. It headed for the entrance in a loud whirring of wings. She was annoyed, at Franz that he would naturally enough assume that she had been referring to Erich, and at herself for not having made her meaning clear. In fact, she thought, she was just plain irritated by everything.

"Patronize?" Franz shook his head. "I assure you, I'm just trying to--"

"And what's that God-awful stench!"

Franz walked around to face her. He tried to smile, but the effect was more like a grimace. "The smell of the tropics before the rain." He drifted to the entrance of the tent and stood leaning against the tent pole, looking out into the night, his body blocking her view. "Why would anyone want to bring a child into a world like..."

He looked at her, with embarrassment. "I didn't mean that, Frau Alois." Coming toward her, he took her hand as though he meant to kiss it. "Forgive me. I've tried to maintain a brave front in the face of things, but I guarantee you, you're not alone in being frightened. Like you, I wish I Dr. Tyrolt were here."

"I have placed myself and my child in your care," Miriam said.

"I'm sorry, I...." He lifted his head and she could see that he was actively attempting to arrange his features into a mien of competence. He gave her a distant, detached look that was less than reassuring. "Things will work out," he said softly. "Everything will be fine. You'll see."

Miriam's head had begun to pound. Her breathing was shallow and irregular. She returned her hands to her belly. "We've an important curtain call to make," she said, trying to lighten things up.

"I will stay with you," Franz said. "Or do you wish me to find the Oberst?" He paused. "Or Solomon Freund?"

Miriam closed her eyes. She felt distanced from everyone, even Sol. She loved him now, more than ever, but that love seemed to draw strength from her that she needed to survive. That she and the baby needed. To survive. Maybe, she thought, it was as Erich had so often insisted--that pregnant women drew into themselves, shutting out the men they loved.

"I want to go to Solomon," she said suddenly. "I want to have the baby in there. With the Jews. Where I belong."

"I cannot let you do that, Frau Alois. My instructions--"

"Damn your instructions."

She swung heavily off the cot. Dusk had come and gone, and night was descending. She could sense the shadows creeping across the tent top, the sky darkening to ink. Would the stars be out tonight? Would it hold any meaning for her, for any of them, if they were?

She listened to the work-noise of the prisoners, to the talk of the guards, to the occasional laughter.

The baby kicked. For a time Miriam was very still, her mind at rest, then a wave of pain washed through her. She took several deep breaths, and moved toward the tent opening. Franz did not try to stop her. Cobalt-blue light spread like paint over her mind.

"Sol," she cried out, pushing away the vision that was trying to intrude upon her efforts. "Sol!"

Her gaze searched the Jewish quarters and she thought she saw him in the glare of the searchlight. Then it illuminated Hempel, who flicked a finger toward Solomon, indicating for him to come. Solomon did so, at a sprint. As he reached the major, he whipped off his cap, stuck it in his left armpit and stood at attention.

Together, they walked toward her, and she toward them, with Franz at her side. When they faced each other, Hempel directed Sol to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with her.

Do what he says, Sol's body language said to Miriam. For the baby. Lick Hempel's boots if you must. I did so at Sachsenhausen, and you must do so, too, if it is necessary for survival.

Hempel paced in front of the three of them. There was about him a particular arrogance that Miriam had not seen since meeting him on her uncle's estate, before the major's departure for Sachsenhausen. He was the supreme lord-overseer--lean without appearing hard-muscled, silver-haired without appearing elderly: the quintessential commander.

Abruptly he stopped pacing and looked directly into Solomon's eyes. Sol showed no fear. His life, Miriam was sure, depended on his being able to show self-respect and false respect for Hempel at the same time.

"Did you have sexual relations with this woman...the wife of Erich Alois?"

Fear seized Miriam. If Solomon told the truth, would Hempel kill him--and her? If he denied the charge, would he be killed for lying? She wanted to cry out that she had never really been Erich's wife except by right of paper, but she remained silent.

Sol remained frozen at attention, apparently afraid that Miriam would be killed if he admitted what Hempel probably already knew to be the truth.

"Answer me, Jew!"

"Yes," Miriam said. "Yes, we made love."

Hempel grabbed Solomon by the Adam's apple as though to tear it from his throat. "Jews do not know the meaning of love. Everyone knows that. You rut like animals. We proved that beyond dispute at Sachsenhausen!"

He released Solomon, who rocked back on his heels, eyes watering as he tried to catch his breath without choking. Miriam started to reach for him, but as Hempel turned her way Solomon shook his head.

Hempel looked at her and cocked a brow. "You let a Jew have you? You let a
Jew
inside you?"

She crossed her arms, mostly to stop the shaking of her body. She could feel none of the pain which she had earlier thought must be the start of labor. "I, too, am a Jew," she said.

"The Führer says otherwise. He proclaimed you not only Gentile, but German. Gauleiter Goebbels himself offered to assure your status by arranging for a complete blood transfusion for you."

"I am sorry that I could not accept the Gauleiter's generous offer. And I am sorry," she lowered her eyes, "that I have not lived up to the Führer's trust."

Hempel's eyes flashed.

This is it, Miriam thought. The day of our deaths. Without changing her line of sight, she made herself aware of the sky. It was a rarified blue-black, velvet and studded with diamonds.

Hempel unholstered his Mann and placed its barrel against Sol's temple. With the index finger of his other hand, he lifted Miriam's chin as though to assess her beauty. "You will be kept from harm," he said. "Until the child is born. After that," he looked back at Sol, "you can live wherever you please, with whomever you please. If you live at all."

"You are not in charge of me, Otto," Miriam said, her voice contemptuous. "What makes you think--"

A shadow stopped her. Shielding her eyes from the searchlight's glare, she looked upward at the darkening moon.

A sense of awe settled about the compound as even Hempel peered upward. The shepherds began to whine.

As if sensing that the guards' attention was no longer riveted upon their weapons, a group of Jews moved in unison toward the area of the gate.

"Activate the ghetto fence!" Hempel yelled.

Miriam, too, had seen the movement, but unlike Hempel it had not occurred to her that the Jews might try to make a spontaneous break for freedom. Sol would surely have told her if such a thing were imminent.

Still, anything was possible, she thought, as grasshoppers swarmed in from all sides, filling the air, sizzling into sparks on the fence around the Jewish quarters. Guards and prisoners alike danced and batted and cursed at the deluge. The insects covered Miriam's clothes and head, eyed her from the bridge of her nose before droning away, sought to invade her nostrils and ears.
 
Through the whirring, maddening wings, she looked around at the Germans' maniacal antics, at the dogs leaping and snapping, at the Kalanaro who had dropped their spears to scoop up and devour the crisped insects near the fence.

"What the hell is going on?" Erich asked, staggering from his quarters.

Hempel moved in front of Erich, looked at him momentarily, without speaking, and stepped back formally, as though about to issue an edict. "Why don't you take a cold shower and sober up, Herr Oberst," he said. "I'll take care of things here."

Erich swayed. "I dis-distinctly told you that fence was not to be electrified," he said, pronouncing the words with difficulty.

"Nor was it," Hempel said. "Until now."

"You had no business...I promised the prisoners...."

"I did what I had to do, Herr Oberst. I would have consulted you, but you were...indisposed."

Erich started to argue, then apparently thought better of it. He turned around and began to limp toward the Jews who were clustered behind the wire. Halfway there, as if he had just realized that she was there, he turned around and stared at Miriam. "Get her to shelter," he called out.

He looked, Miriam thought, like anything but a commander. Head hanging. Pressing at his hip joint as if to grab hold of an all but unbearable pain as he walked out of sight. Despite everything, her heart wrenched with pity at Erich's plight, that part which had nothing to do with Solomon, or with her, but rather with his humiliation by Hempel. And with a hatred between Erich and Hempel that went back seventeen years, to when Erich had been a member of Hempel's Freikorps-Youth unit.

"I am going into the Jewish quarters," Miriam said to Franz. "That is where I wish to give birth."

"This is not possible, Frau Alois. Surely you can see that for yourself."

"I can see nothing," Miriam said quietly. "Are you saying that you will not assist me in there?" She held her hands palms upward, as if in supplication, and they were quickly covered by grasshoppers.

"I am saying that I cannot," Franz said. He sounded at the point of tears. "To help bring the Herr Oberst's child into the world is one thing. To bring a...a--"

"Say it, you coward! To bring the child of a Jew into the world would be, what? A sin against the Fatherland?"

Miriam felt herself sway. Her fingers closed around the insects, crunching them to a pulp. Battered by renewed pain, she collapsed onto the ground. In a state of semi-consciousness, she thought herself beneath the canopy of her bed in the villa. She thought she could see Erich Weisser peering in through the chiffoned French doors that led onto the balcony, while behind him the night was ablaze with Berlin burning. An acrid stench permeated everything, as though the villa itself were part of the conflagration, and for an instant she expected to see smoke roil beneath her bedroom door. "Papa," she tried to call out. "Papa?" But Erich had never been part of her life when Papa had been, and nothing made sense. Where was Papa! Down having one of those predawn breakfasts he and Uncle Walther so enjoyed, three-minute eggs and the
Tageblatt
spread out across the table, each complaining and commiserating about the state of the Fatherland what with the war reparations, while her dog lay between their feet, fitfully snoring?

Returning to full consciousness, Miriam fought to get a grip on reality. She dug her hands into her hair and pulled off squirming grasshoppers in each fist. Shuddering, she flipped the insects aside. They whirred away and sat twitching on the ground.

A cry followed by a crescendoing ululation of African voices rose to greet her. She heard footsteps crunch across the grass, followed by a series of excited yells and more laughter.

"What
is
it!" She clutched the neckline of her dress as if to cover herself more thoroughly and looked around for Sol.

"Hempel take Solly back to Jewish quarters. I watch. I come. Noise you hear is lemurs, Lady Miri." Bruqah leaned over her. "At the gate." He smiled as if to reassure her. "They all over out there, beyond the fence. Running around like little children, teasing the guards." He took a few steps in their direction, and she heard the crunching again. He looked up at the moon. "Kalanaro have full bellies tonight, all right, after eating they."

His face clouded as Miriam doubled up in pain. "Baby not come yet, but soon. This what you call pretend labor."

For the first time Miriam smiled. "
False
labor, Bruqah."

"Trouble coming. I feel it." He bent down and lowered his voice so that only she could hear him. Pointing up the hill toward the crypt, he said, "I take you there for birth of child."

Miriam started to argue. He placed his hand gently over her mouth. "Do not battle with me, Lady Miri. I carry you if need be."

The Malagasy's mouselemur crawled out of his
lamba
, peered at Miriam from behind Bruqah's head, and scuttled back within the cloth.

"You're not wanted here," Franz said, without conviction. "Herr Oberst Alois has said that you're troubling Frau Alois." The corpsman glanced with a certain sheepishness toward Miriam, "and the Sturmbannführer has told us privately that you're a threat to the entire operation."

"Has told
us
?" Bruqah asked, chin rising with the aristocratic arrogance of one severely slighted.

"Well, some of us," the corpsman said hesitantly. "Most of the guards, anyway. I wasn't there when he said that, but I heard. They still confide in me. Some of the others, I mean." Franz looked at Miriam, and nodded. "They do." His former look of confidence had dissipated.

Bruqah eyed Miriam anxiously. "We must leave here," he said.

"And go where?"