Safe Haven (24 page)

But Suzanne had news of her own, and her obvious distress made him reluctant to share his good news until he knew what was upsetting her so much.

“Let’s go for a walk,” she said after they had finished supper and Hilda and Hugh had returned to their rooms while Selma remained at the table reading the newspaper. “I need to talk to you about something and …” She glanced up the stairway and he understood that whatever this was she did not want anyone else to hear.

“I’ll get my coat.”

Selma had given him a room on the second floor now that she had vacancies, and he was grateful not to have the attic room, which no doubt would have been as cold in winter as it was hot in summer.

“Going out?” Hilda’s door was as always partially open, and she called to him as he passed her door on his way back downstairs.

“I am. Do you need anything?”

“No, but it’s supposed to snow again so bundle up.” Her motherly advice did not surprise him. Hilda liked him. It was Suzanne who ruffled her feathers.

“I will. See you in the morning.” He hurried down the stairs to Suzanne, who was waiting for him by the front door.

She was wearing her heaviest coat, a wool scarf, mittens, and a hat that covered her hair, ears, and forehead. As soon as he reached the bottom step, she opened the door and stepped onto the porch.

“What’s going on?”

“I met someone at the library today.” She told him the story as they walked into town. The streets were mostly deserted, and as Hilda had predicted, a light snow was falling. “His name is Detlef Buch, and according to what he told me, he was someone of importance back in Germany—an officer or high-ranking person in the secret police. It’s not hard to envision him in such a role. His whole demeanor suggests a man used to giving orders and having them obeyed.”

“He just started talking to you at the library?”

“Not exactly. He … I think he has been following me. He was one of the men in the orchard last fall and overheard me interviewing the guards.”

“And what does he want of you?”

“He wants me to write his story. I think he believes that if he can just find a way to tell his side, things will go better for him.”

“Does he understand that when the war ends it is not the American court but one in Europe that will determine his fate?”

“I have to assume that he does. He is obviously an educated and intelligent man. His English is flawless—something that surely helped him in his position back in Germany.”

“So what did you say?”

The details of her meeting with the German POW had been rolling off her tongue like water over a falls, but now she hesitated. “It’s not a simple decision for me, Theo. He made the point that his story could be a huge break for any reporter. How many newspeople are going to have the opportunity to sit with someone who was a part of the Nazi regime and ask the key question of why?”

“So you are considering it?”

She released a sigh of utter exasperation as if she could not believe what she was about to tell him. “I am. I told him that he needed to start writing down what he had done in the war. I have friends in Washington who will check the facts for me. If he tells me the truth about his role before he was arrested, then …”

“Think this through before you decide, Suzanne. You came here to write the stories of the refugees at Fort Ontario—stories that could help the cause of those who wish to stay in the United States.”

“I know, and believe me, I am torn. But what if the real reason I was led back here was to meet this German and write his story?”

Theo smiled. “ ‘Led back here’? Careful there. You’re beginning to sound like a Quaker,” he teased.

“I’m serious,” she said. “What should I do?”

He took his time considering his answer. “Well, let’s think this through together. It seems to me that there are several different questions here. One question has to do with you and your career. Will this help?”

“And the other questions?”

“How will the people at the fort feel if they learn you are writing the story of a POW? Will they understand or might they become more reticent to speak with you about their stories?”

He took hold of her arm and led her into the small café across from the movie theater, where they had gone a couple of times for coffee. She sat in the booth they normally shared, pulling off her outerwear, while he went to the counter and got two mugs of coffee. He set them down and removed his coat and hat, hanging them on the post that separated each booth.

He nodded to two men at the counter who had glanced their way. They returned his nod and went back to visiting with the waitress. No one else was in the café.

“Do you want some pie?” he asked.

“No thanks.” She poured sugar from the dispenser into her coffee. “But if you want some …”

He shook his head and took the seat opposite her. “I’m fine with just this.” He watched her stir her coffee slowly, drawing the spoon through the dark liquid as she stared out the window at the falling snow. “So those are the questions you need to consider as far as I can see plus one more.”

She gave him her full attention. “What?”

“You might want to ask yourself what’s in this for Detlef Buch. You said that he appeared well educated and intelligent. Surely he can’t believe that a story published in an American newspaper—assuming any paper would agree to print such a story—would do him any good once he returns to stand trial in Europe.”

“I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

“My dad once told me that whenever I had trouble figuring something out I needed to consider it from all sides.” He sipped his coffee.

“You’re right. It has to be something else. Something more that made him choose me.” She studied her coffee as if she were reading tea leaves. “What could it be?”

“Ask him. Make that another condition of considering whether or not to do this.”

“I will.” She finally took a sip of the coffee. “How do you think Ilse would react if she found out that I was working with a POW?”

Theo shrugged. “I don’t know my aunt that well. She’s a complex woman who has been through a lot. She also practices a faith rooted in forgiveness and not taking sides. I would imagine after everything she and Uncle Franz went through and after everything she’s lost in the bargain, those are two challenges that would be tough for anyone to meet.”

He waited until the waitress had come by to offer a refill and then reached across the table to cover Suzanne’s hand. “Whatever you decide, take the time you need.” He almost encouraged her to join him and his aunt and niece for a meeting for worship but decided that would be going too far. He was about to withdraw his hand when she surprised him by linking her fingers with his. “How was your day?” she asked.

He had a momentary vision of his parents sitting at the kitchen table in the farmhouse long after the last supper dish had been dried and put away and long after he and his siblings had supposedly gone to bed. They would sit there talking for an hour or more, sharing what had happened while they’d each gone their own way during the day.

“Smart gave me a job,” he told her.

“Theo, that’s wonderful.” She tightened her hold on his fingers. “What kind of position is it? Tell me everything.”

So he did. They sat in the booth, holding hands and drinking their coffee, until long after the two men at the counter had left and their places had been taken by moviegoers stopping for some pie and coffee after the late show.

“Closing up, folks,” the waitress said as she leaned across an empty booth and switched off the neon sign. “Looks like that snow is getting heavier.”

Theo glanced out the window and saw that several inches had fallen while they talked. He put on his coat and hat while Suzanne did the same and then handed the waitress payment for the coffee plus a generous tip. “Thanks,” he said.

“Anytime,” she said. “You two make a nice couple, but then you probably don’t need me telling you that. You married or just planning on it?”

Theo’s discomfort at the woman’s assumption struck him momentarily dumb, but Suzanne seemed to take the comment in stride.

“Married to my work,” she told the waitress.

“Pity. I wouldn’t kick this one out if he showed up at my door.”

“Thanks again,” Theo called back over his shoulder as he headed for the door.

Outside Suzanne started to giggle.

“What’s so funny?”

“She thought we were married. All the times we’ve been in there she’s been thinking of us as a couple.”

Theo had no idea why her words stung so. “Well, maybe in another time and under other circumstances we might have been,” he said and thrust his hands into his pockets as he started breaking a trail through snow that now covered their shoes.

They were almost back to the boardinghouse before either of them spoke again.

“Are you mad at me, Theo?”

“Of course not. Just tired. And I told Mr. Smart I would come in early tomorrow.” He opened the front door and waited for her to precede him.

A single lamp burned in the front hall. He started toward the stairs.

“Theo? I didn’t mean … I was embarrassed and didn’t want you to think that I took what that waitress said seriously. The truth is …”

Theo turned around and pulled her to him, kissing her with all the pent-up feelings he’d kept to himself. Almost from the first time he’d met her he had felt drawn to her in a way that he’d never experienced before. Certainly he had had his share of girlfriends and even a couple of serious romances. But his feelings for Suzanne were far more intense. He wanted to be where she was, know what she was thinking, share his dreams and hopes with her. But he could not deny that their circumstances were unique, and even though she was definitely returning his kiss, he had no idea how she felt about him. So he eased away, kept his hands on her shoulders, and waited for her to open her eyes and look at him.

“Like I said, Suzanne, in another time … Good night.”

  CHAPTER 12  

J
anuary faded at last into February, and spring was a month closer, but the weather was foul with snow and wind and ice storms. The walls of the barracks were still thin as paper. The grounds were still covered with more than a foot of snow and ice. The gray sky remained threatening and overcast, and darkness seemed to come earlier than usual even though the days should be longer.

Theo spent his days in the offices of the administration building, typing reports or answering calls from his counterparts in various government agencies. The connections he was making in Washington would surely be an advantage in his run for Congress. Of course Jim Sawyer did not agree. He was urging Theo to come home and start “pressing the flesh and kissing some babies.” But the election was still months away. He had time, and the work he was doing was important.

He barely saw Suzanne. She spent most of her day moving from building to building and talking to residents of the shelter. As soon as supper ended, she left the boardinghouse for the library. More than once he had offered to walk with her and suggested they could perhaps stop for coffee after she had finished her work there. But she had always refused, citing the uncertainty of her time and not wanting him to have to sit around waiting for her. He was not fooled.

He was fairly certain that she had agreed to meet the German and record his story. Twice he had walked to the library, making sure he left half an hour after she did, and she had not been there, nor had the librarian seen her. On those occasions he had walked back to the boardinghouse, his hands thrust deep in his pockets and his shoulders hunched against the wind, wondering where she was. Where was she going to meet the German?

Theo had mixed feelings about the POWs in general. He knew from working with them in the orchards that some of them were just young men who had signed on to defend their country and been sent to the Russian front. There they had experienced horrors of their own—the brutal winter, the lack of enough food or protection from the cold, the hatred of the Russian army for their country—and them.

Most of them counted themselves fortunate to have been captured by the Americans or British and not the Russians. And it was obvious to Theo that many of them knew nothing of the camps or the persecutions of the Jews and others that had transpired in their leader’s determination to rid the world of such people for the sake of a “pure” Aryan society.