Isabel’s War (2 page)

It's probably not a good idea to go exploring along one of the footpaths today because I'm barefoot and already my feet have been cut by sharp stones from when I crossed the dirt auto road at Moskin's to get to the lake. Still, I'm sort of entranced by the path just to my left through the deep piney woods. It has to lead somewhere.

So maybe I'll wander just a little way in through the dimness, stepping softly on the pine needles that cover the dusty soil. It is dark in here, though. Not spooky, but not exactly friendly either.

What if there are snakes? That curved branch over there, for example. It could be a snake. Simply because it's lying so still doesn't mean it isn't a living slithery thing, just waiting to strike. I draw closer and peer down at it. How close do I dare get, and why am I being so dangerously nosy anyway?

Suddenly there's this strange rustling noise coming from somewhere nearby. It could have been a bird flying out of a tree. But when I look down I could swear that the “branch” on the ground has moved. Now, I really do have to satisfy my curiosity. Was that the warning rattler on a rattlesnake's tail that I heard rustling? Could there actually be rattlesnakes in the nearby woods threatening Moskin's juicy summer guests?

Softly, softly, I approach the snake/tree-branch. Not a sound, nothing stirs. And, then, in a flash, something springs up at me. It has no mouth, no flicking tongue, no venom-filled fangs, but surely it's alive.

I jump back as far as I can, stumble on some tree roots, and go sprawling on my backside. My head bangs hard as I hit the ground, and for an instant, everything goes black.

Then, slowly, the pain of a bruised elbow, a badly bumped shoulder, and a bonked head bring me to. I open my eyes to a startling whiteness and think instantly of the uniformed nurse who was standing over me when I had my tonsils out. But, no, I'm still in the woods. Only now I'm no longer alone.

“Gosh,” says a soft male voice, “what happened to you, girl? Looks kinda like you dropped right outta the trees. Help you up?”

I am so embarrassed. I'm not really a klutz—one of those kids who's clumsy at everything and always falling down. And this, this person who's peering at me from above is the cutest sailor in the U.S. Navy that you ever saw. He's wearing his summer whites, middy and bellbottom trousers, no cap, and has earnest brown eyes and dark hair. He reminds me a little bit of Bob, last summer's saxophone player in Moskin's band. And, of course, he's eighteen or so, and—just like Bob—probably too old for me.

He pulls me up with one hand and I brush myself off and say, “
Merci beaucoup
,” trying to sound casual and not the least bit put out by my recent tumble.

“Are you French?” he asks, raising one eyebrow.

“Not really,” I confess. “My name's Isabel.”

We chat awhile as we walk back toward the lake. His name is Roy and he's a recent enlistee in the Navy. Right now he's visiting his family at one of the bungalow colonies and he's awfully bored—and wondering what there is to do around here...

A few minutes later I'm hurrying back to Moskin's. I can't wait to tell Ruthie that I met a sailor in the woods and that he's coming to Moskin's casino tonight to dance to the jukebox. (Oh, about that “snake”—it was just a weirdly curved greenish-black tree branch, after all.)

Two

Still in my slightly damp bathing suit, I'm looking all over Moskin's for Ruthie. This sailor boy, Roy, really looks groovy to me. I'll bet he can do the Lindy. And he doesn't seem to have that supercilious attitude toward twelve-year-old girls that my brother Arnold has. So maybe, war or no war, the summer at Shady Pines won't get off to such a dreary start after all.

The best place to find Ruthie when she isn't taking care of the guests' kids is in the hotel kitchen. When I was younger, I have to admit, it was my favorite hangout, mainly because of the crock, always filled with big thick cookies topped with cinnamon and sugar or with chocolate sprinkles that were there for the taking.

Sure enough, Mrs. Moskin, Ruthie's mother, who's in charge of the kitchen and does most of the hotel cooking, spots me with a nod of her chin toward the cookie jar. As usual, she's wrapped in a white apron that looks like flour sacking and wears a head cloth that completely covers her hair. Even her pale eyebrows and her broad-featured face appear to be dusted with flour.

Mrs. Moskin enfolds me in a warm, familiar hug. “About time you came in to say hello, Isabel. You were already at the lake? Take a cookie.”

I guess I have been rude. It was always the custom in the past to greet Minnie Moskin the moment one arrived, and I'm sure my parents have already done so. It's just that I've been in such a bad mood over all the arguing with my parents and the war suddenly being an excuse for everything.

As to Ruthie, Mrs. Moskin tells me she's now having a story hour in the children's dining room. “Oh,” I say, “then I won't bother her until after I change for supper. I have something interesting to tell her.”

Mrs. Moskin smiles and nods approvingly, almost as if she knows about the sailor I met in the woods, who's coming to Moskin's this evening. But of course that's silly. How could she?

I trudge across the hotel grounds to the Annex. It's already getting toward late afternoon and there aren't many people around. Moskin's guests, the older ones anyway, often take afternoon naps before dinner and then make an early rush for the showers before getting dressed for the evening meal.

The door to my room is slightly ajar, which isn't surprising since nobody locks their doors at Moskin's and my mother may already have gone in and out several
times. I just wish she'd shut the door, though, because Moskin's is the main haunt around here of bees, wasps, hornets, horse flies, and even bats.

I nudge the door wide open with my foot, already starting to undo my bathing suit top, when I'm struck by the presence of a tall young woman bending over a suitcase on the twin bed next to mine.

“Excuse me!” I say indignantly. “You're in the wrong room. This one is mine.”

The figure across the tiny room turns. She's not quite old enough to be called a young woman. She's a girl, taller, skinnier, and older than I by maybe a couple of years. She has honey-brown hair that is long and wavy, a swan-like neck, and luminous gray-green eyes.

“Oh,” she says, “you must be Isabel. I am Helga.”

Her accent is a little strange, and automatically I say, “
Pardonnez-moi?
” French, as you can see, comes to me at the flick of an eye when I'm baffled.

“Helga,” she repeats. “We will be roommates. You speak some French but I am sorry. I speak only German and the English I've learned living a few years now in the English countryside. I hope it will be good enough for us to have many conversations.”

All this time I'm holding my detached bathing suit top up to my chest. Helga may be a girl close to my age, who even speaks my language, but she might as well be a menacing alien from Mars or even a Nazi storm trooper.

“Excuse me,” I say, rapidly reattaching my bathing suit top. “I just remembered something.”

Two seconds later I'm banging on the door of my parents' room, a short distance from mine in the annex. My mother, in her cotton pique summer negligee, opens it and peers out suspiciously.

“Oh, it's you. Why are you making such a racket? Your father is napping. How come you're still in your bathing suit?”

She
is asking
me
questions. What nerve. I brush them all aside. “
Who
is Helga?” I demand. “What is she doing in my room, unpacking a suitcase on the other bed? You told me I was going to have my own room this summer.” I know that I'm screeching out here on the annex porch. But I really don't care.

My mother reaches for my shoulder and hustles me across the threshold, while my father grunts irritably from one of the twin beds, where I've probably ruined his pre-dinner nap.

“It all happened while you were at the lake,” my mother explains quietly but none too apologetically. She sits down on the other twin bed and motions for me to do the same. “You see, the Frankfurters arrived late this afternoon with this wonderful surprise, their niece.” Harriette Frankfurter is my mother's best friend. “She was smuggled out of Germany in 1939 and has been
living in England. They finally got her over here to live with them. She has no other family, poor thing.”

“Okay,” I say hesitantly. “But what has that got to do with me having to share a room, when I was promised I'd have one all to myself.”

“Isabel, how can you be so selfish? For one thing, the Moskins are short of rooms right now. And Helga is fourteen. So she really shouldn't have to share with her aunt and uncle.”

“Fourteen,” I snap. “She's too old for me. I don't think we'd be such good roommates. And her English is kind of...well, stiff.”

“Nonsense,” my mother cuts in. “She's a lovely child. I had quite a conversation with her myself. You and Ruthie and Helga will make a wonderful threesome. And you'll have a companion when Ruthie is busy with her duties. Don't you have any feeling at all for somebody who's been through a terrible time in this war? Go back to your room and be as nice as you can to her. I'll see you at dinner.”

I'm still grumbling to myself about
the war
,
the war
, and how it's causing so many problems and annoyances, when Helga and I cross over in the slanting sunlight to Moskin's main building where the dining room is located. Believe me, though, it's nothing fancy, just big and buzzing with noisy conversation, as the guests of
Shady Pines whet their appetites with glasses of tinkling water and vigorously tear apart Minnie Moskin's home-baked rolls.

Helga is wearing a flowered chiffon dress that is much too pretty and dressed up for the occasion. But I didn't say anything to her. Maybe it's all she has in the way of dress-up clothing. I have no idea what people have been wearing in wartime Germany and England, but I imagine it's something drab and practical.

We head for the big round table where my parents and Mr. and Mrs. Frankfurter, Helga's aunt and uncle, are already seated, watching our approach with appraising eyes. Everybody
oohs
and
aahs
at how lovely Helga looks. Before they can say a word about me, I spot Ruthie at the far end of the dining room where the Moskin family has its own table, and I dash off to tell her my news about Roy, the sailor I met in the woods.

Ruthie is having a quick bite because she has to watch the little ones while their parents are at dinner.

Ruthie's eyes widen. “Really? A sailor. How old do you think? Cute?”

“Very. You'll see. I'm sure he'll show up at the social hall later.”

Ruthie nods in the direction of the table where Helga is sitting and chatting with my parents and her aunt and uncle. “What about
her
?”

“Oh, well, I don't think she's his type. She's sort of
foreign, you know. Anyhow, I'm still recovering from the shock of having her dumped on me like that. I was supposed to have my own room, you know.”

Back at the table, my mother gives me a sour look. “What was so important that you had to tell Ruthie?” She turns to Helga. “You must excuse my daughter. Her manners...well, she tends to be a little impulsive.”

Helga looks at me forgivingly. I doubt if she even knows the English word
impulsive
. Meantime, Harry the waiter is bearing down on us with a tray laden with plates of soup. Harry, with his polished black hair, his dark seamy face, his swirling dancer's movements, has been the headwaiter at Moskin's ever since I can remember.

“So Miss Isabel, who's your new friend, the beauty?” Harry asks me familiarly as he elegantly sets a brimming soup plate down in front of Helga.

“She's Helga. From Germany,” I reply.

Harry is already halfway around the table, and my parents and the Frankfurters are filling in the details of Helga's presence at Moskin's. With his free hand, Harry lifts two fingers to his lips and tosses a kiss of approval in Helga's direction.

I turn to Helga. “Don't mind him,” I tell her confidentially. “Harry is such an old flirt. He blows kisses to all the ladies around here. He does it for the tips, you know.”

But Helga isn't really listening to me. Nor has she
touched her soup. She's looking up at one of the busboys who's been standing, mesmerized, just behind Harry's shoulder. I think his name is Ted. And Ted's gaze, in turn, is riveted on Helga.

Aha
, I think to myself. So this is how it's going to be. Helga, the pale green-eyed beauty, the waif, the teenage princess from abroad, adored and admired by men from sixteen to sixty. And me, the twelve-year-old kid, with the semi-developed body, a mop of black hair, and a nose that's just crying out for a plastic surgeon who can be spared from the front lines.

The evening meal at Moskin's goes on much longer than usual tonight. People from other tables come over to talk to the Frankfurters and to question Helga with curious, pitying expressions on their faces. “Did you ever see Hitler, that bum?” one of the guests inquires.