Margot: A Novel (11 page)

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ance.
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“You know what worse than Gestapo?” She pauses, and
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clucks her tongue. “Snake,” she finally says.
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I run down the steps in Bryda’s building, to the street. I run so
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fast that it is hard to breathe. I run past the bus stop I came
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from, to the next street over. And it is only here that I slow my
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pace and attempt to take slow deep breaths. Even now, so many
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years later, the memory of the camps, of staying hidden, it is a
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muscle memory, one that neither time nor distance can com
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pletely erase, and it takes so little for me to slide back into my
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fear. Over and over again. Bryda, her voice, the smells of her
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terrible apartment, our shared horror, they are everything about
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my past that I am running from, all the things I try to avoid in
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my American life. And now I understand that these terrible
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things, they are only a bus ride away from the safety of the Jew
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ish law firm, which in so many ways reminds me of the com
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forts of my childhood, before the war. This is perhaps the most
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terrifying thought of all.
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It takes me a few moments to catch my breath on the
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street, and when I do, I look around. Here, on this street, the
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buildings look even worse. One has been ravaged by fire, and
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the bricks are black and ashy, the glass of the windows blown
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away. I hear a child crying from somewhere in the near dis
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tance, and my head begins to ache as I remember a similar
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sound from the camp. It is a particular wail of pain or hunger
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or desperation. I confuse them now.
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I hear footsteps behind me. Heavy. The gait of boots. The
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Green Police or the NSB. I do not turn to face them, but I run
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again, faster, farther, up the street to where I see a city bus
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pulling into a different stop. I have no idea where the bus is
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going, if it will take me anywhere near to the right place, but
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I do not even care. I run up the steps, hand my coin to the
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driver, and fling my body into a seat.
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Even when I am sitting there, against the hard seat, my
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eyes peering out the dirty window as the bus drives away and
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the broken buildings fall from my reach, I do not feel even the
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smallest sense of safety. I have no idea where the bus is
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headed.
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This is no escape plan, I think.
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In 1944, when we were held against our will in Poland,
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Mother had a plan. She always had a plan. Even when we
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were girls and we first moved from Frankfurt to the Mer
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wedeplein and she fed us books in Dutch to integrate us into
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our new world, or when she filled our soup with extra chicken
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fat in an attempt to get us to gain weight when my sister and
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I grew sickly in the new world of Holland.
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I believe, even now, that the plan she had in the camp, she
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had worked out for a long time, before we even needed it, just
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like Father did, with the annex. When I received my call-up
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notice from the Germans, he was ready. But the difference
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was, Father never believed we’d be found in the annex.
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Mother, I suspect, did.
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Mother whispered her plan to me in pieces, late at night,
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after the others in the camp were asleep, once our heads were
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already shaved, our arms marked, our bodies falling apart.
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She was sick by then, and her voice came out of her in gasps.
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There had been whispers that they’d be moving us soon, to
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another camp, but not Mother. She was too sick. I did not
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want to leave her behind, but I was in no position to protest,
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and I knew she would never let me, anyway.
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“When they put you on the train, you run,” she whispered
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to me. “You grab your sister and you run. Wait until the train
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is moving, but not too fast. Wait until he is watching. He will
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not shoot you.”
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I knew who she meant, the one guard, who I vaguely
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remembered from our life in Germany. A neighbor. A Nazi.
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His name was Schmidt—I could not remember his first
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name, and I did not want to. I could still picture watching
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him out our front window in Frankfurt, watching as he
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watered his grass with a long green hose. Once, when I was a
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very young girl, not even in school yet, I walked across the
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yard and played with his shepherd puppy. Schmidt smiled at
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me then while he tossed the puppy treats and cooed sweet
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things at her. Schmidt was a different man in his Nazi uni
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form, his arm wound tightly with the red swastika. His face
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had grown hard, unyielding.
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“He will not shoot you,” Mother repeated.
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I nodded, not because I thought she was right, but because
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by then, I was not afraid of being shot. It sounded like an easy
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way to die, almost a relief.
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“You run,” she told me, “and you take your sister.” She
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paused. “And when you are free, you find Eduard, in Frank
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furt. He will help you.”
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I nodded again, the rhythm of her whisper tickling in my
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ear. It was like she was telling me a bedtime story, lulling me
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to sleep, winging on a fantasy.
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“Promise me,” she said again.
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“I promise,” I finally said, my throat so parched that the
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words barely formed.
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Chapter Fifteen
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Friday morning Ezra Rosenstein is not at work, hav
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ing already departed for Margate, but Joshua comes into the
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office and announces to me and Shelby that he will not be
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heading to Margate this weekend.
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“This fight must be serious,” Shelby whispers to me after
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he goes into his office and shuts the door. She is frowning, I
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think because she knows Joshua’s presence means she won’t
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be able to start her weekend early.
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“Maybe,” I say. “Or maybe he just has a lot of work to do.”
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Shelby shakes his head. “He’s a lawyer,” she says. “And he’s
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rich. It’s not about the work.”
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Joshua buzzes me, just as I am beginning to wonder if
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Shelby is right, if their fight is the reason why he’s here. “Yes,
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Mr. Rosenstein,” I say.
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“Margie,” he says, “did you get me those papers I asked for?”
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“Papers?” I ask.
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“After work yesterday . . .”
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“Oh yes,” I say, thinking of the four different city buses it
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took me to finally make my way home. “Yes, I did.”
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“Good,” he says. “Let’s discuss them over lunch today, all
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right? We’ll walk down to Isaac’s Delicatessen at noon.”
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“We?” I hear myself saying, though I know it is a stupid
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thing to say even as the word escapes my lips.
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“Unless you have other plans,” he says.
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“No, no. Of course not,” I say. “Lunch will be perfectly
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fine.”
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I hang up the phone, and Shelby is staring at me with
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raised eyebrows, her lips in the shape of an O, but I ignore her
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and begin typing. And then I smile to myself as I wonder if
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Ezra is not the reason why Joshua is here today. If the reason
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why is me.
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As I wait for Joshua to come out of his office, just before
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noon, my cheeks grow warm at the notion of our upcoming
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lunch, just the two of us. Then I find myself thinking,
That
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was how it began with Peter and me, lunch
. And it is confusing
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how my mind wanders to Peter, when I am so eagerly awaiting
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the time with Joshua. But I cannot push the thought away.
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Peter is there, always there. And the woman’s voice from the
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phone sounded so much like my sister, though, of course, it
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could not be.
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My sister’s voice and Peter. They go together in my head
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now, though, don’t they? Even when things first began
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between Peter and me, it was because of her. My sister and I
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had been lying on her bed together that day, writing in our
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diaries and studying, just the two of us, as we did often.
Sometimes my sister slept, and I watched the door. Other
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times, that day, she could not sit still. It was so small in the
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annex, and there were so many of us, and we weren’t sup
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posed to talk above a whisper during the day when the office
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was filled with workers below us.
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This was the hardest for my sister. She enjoyed the sound
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of her own voice hanging in the air. She was inquisitive. She
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always wanted to know things, to analyze them out loud. She
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whispered to me, all the time, about everything. There was
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no room to think.
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“Can’t you just stop?” I finally said to her, in something
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that verged on louder than a whisper that day.
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“Just stop what?” she asked, chewing on the edge of the
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fountain pen she was writing with.
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“Talking,” I said.
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“I’m just asking you how you feel about the weather,” she
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huffed. We could hear the gentle sound of rain against the
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rooftop.
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“The weather?” I fumed. “Who cares about the weather?
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We’re trapped in here. And you’re always talking, always so
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cheerful.”
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“So I shouldn’t say a word, and what? Be a paragon of
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virtue like you? A silent and gloomy and determined-to
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become-smarter-with-all-your-studies-while-you’re-here
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bore?” She glared at me, and I got off the bed, and I stormed
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out of the room, or my best attempt at it while also tiptoeing
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in my stockinged feet. Right in the hallway, I nearly bumped
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into Peter.
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He stood there, holding on to his cat, Mouschi, and a few
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pieces of bread. Peter was tall, with blue eyes the color of the
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sea. I’d noticed him at school before, but he’d never once
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seemed to notice me before that moment; even in our close
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ness in the annex, we’d barely spoken.
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“You can sit in our room with us,” he said then, referring
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to himself and Mouschi. “It’s quiet. And we’ll share our lunch
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with you.”
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“Margie.” Joshua’s voice interrupts my thoughts, and I
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glance at the clock and see that it is exactly noon now. “You
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ready to go to lunch?” He taps his hand easily against the
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edge of my desk before reaching up for his hat. Shelby is typ
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ing. I hear the clickety-click of the keys, but I also feel her
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eyes on me, burning steadily through my skin. She will ask
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me many questions about this when I get back.
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“Yes,” I tell him, standing and picking up my satchel. “I’m
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ready.”
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Isaac’s Delicatessen is at the end of the block, at the corner
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of South Sixteenth Street and Market, a mere twenty steps or
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so from the front entrance of our office building. But I have
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never been in Joshua’s presence outside the office before, so
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it feels strange, stepping out into the sunshine, next to him,
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keeping up with his long strides on the sidewalk.
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“I hope you don’t mind that I asked you to come out to
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lunch with me today,” he says as soon as our feet hit the pave
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ment. Joshua’s long black shoes turn my small black pumps
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into dwarves.
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