The Children's War (60 page)

61

I
T WOULD BE SUICIDE,
Peter thought. Trying to leave would be tantamount to suicide. There would be no more second chances, they would kill him, and they would do it very, very painfully.

He put the kettle on and stared into the void of his future as he waited for the water to boil. Months had passed and still he slept on the floor of Uwe’s room, still he was awakened at completely unpredictable hours of the night, and still he could not leave the house to meet his students or talk with his friends. And with the arrival of autumn, his last refuge, the garden, was winding down and his last excuse to leave his prison would evaporate with the coming of winter.

It was time to peel the potatoes, but he felt tired, so he decided to make himself-a cup of tea before beginning. When the kettle screeched, he poured the water onto some tea leaves he had set aside the night before, stirred it around a bit, and then poured the tea from the pot into one of Elspeth’s teacups. Then he gathered the potatoes and bowls and took them over to the table and sat down.

Elspeth came downstairs earlier than he expected and he groaned slightly but did not move. She was humming happily but interrupted herself as she saw him sitting down on her furniture. She glared at him meaningfully but he did not get up nor did he even bother to apologize.

She shrugged, apparently deciding to ignore his insubordination. “What’s
that?” she asked, walking over to the table and peering into the china teacup he was using.

“Tea,” he replied tersely.

“You’re out of tea.”

“Kind of you to have noticed.”

“Where’d you get it?” she asked accusingly.

“It’s the leaves from the pot I made for you yesterday evening,
gnä’ Frau,”
he answered without looking up.

“Our leaves? You didn’t throw them away?” Her voice conveyed shock.

“Obviously not,
gnä;’ Frau.”

“Used tea? That’s disgusting!”

“I agree,” he answered with irony that was doubtless beyond her.

“And my china as well!”

“What else am I going to use?” He finally looked up at her. “I don’t own a teacup. I don’t own anything.”

“How dare you! You have forgotten your place, boy!”

“I know.”

It was insufficient to mollify her, and she went to her little book and picked up her pen.

Without meaning to, he exclaimed, “Oh, for heaven’s sakes, what are you doing that for? It’s only some worthless, used tea leaves!” As he uttered the last words, he closed his eyes in chagrin, wondering what the outburst would cost him. He attempted to ameliorate the situation and, forcing a smile, added somewhat more diplomatically, “If you provided me with a cup and some tea of my own . . .”

She surprised him by interrupting to say, “All right. You can come out shopping with me and Teresa after our supper—perhaps I’ll buy you something then.” She placed her book back on its shelf without marking anything in it.

He should have been grovelingly grateful, but he wasn’t, and it was all he could do to force a thank-you out of his mouth. He continued to peel the potatoes, setting the unblighted peels into a bowl of cold water so that they would keep and he could cook them later since they were a reasonable source of nutrients.

Elspeth continued to watch and was finally driven to ask, “Why are you putting the peels into water?”

“They’ll compost better,” he lied.

“Then why aren’t you putting all of them in?”

Sighing, he scooped up the separated peels and dumped them in the water as well. “No particular reason,” he answered tiredly, wishing her away.

She nodded and continued to watch, smiling at him fondly, and without even thinking, she brought her hand up to stroke his hair, sort of like petting a cat or a dog. She did not notice how he flinched when she touched him, nor did she know the self-control he used to keep from pulling away.

* * *

After the family’s meal, Elspeth and Teresa went to the local shops to pick out some shoes and a few other items and took him along with them to carry the packages. Elspeth had intimated that she would not only buy a teacup and some tea for him but a bit of food as well, saying that perhaps that would improve his grumpy mood. The stores were not far and they walked along the pleasant treelined paths, stopped to watch the ducks in the pond, and continued on their little journey enjoying the rare September sunshine. Teresa was her usual impish self, and even Elspeth maintained her good mood, going so far as to direct a few comments about the weather and the flowers to him.

The shops faced inward, away from the street, and formed a sort of pedestrian square, which, at this time of day, was fairly empty. The nearest of the shops was the bakery. Peter cast a glance at it as he went by. He had learned that Roman had simply been transferred to another bakery across town where his experience was needed.

The shoe store was on the other side of the square, and they headed in that direction, veering from their straight-line path only enough to skirt around the war memorial in the center. As they crossed the plaza, they heard a patrolman shout out to a woman who was striding obliviously out of the square. She was dressed in the uniform of a
Zwangsarbeiterin,
and on the shoulders of her blouse could be discerned the patches that identified her as a domestic laborer.

“Halt! Halt or I’ll shoot!” the patrolman shouted, waving his pistol around excitedly. He was young and looked thoroughly stunned that the woman seemed to be ignoring him. Her back was already to him and she simply kept on walking without taking any notice of his words. Peter wondered if she was committing suicide.

The three of them stood stock-still watching the drama unfold. The woman walked with a strange almost sideways gait, as if she were half limping. Peter thought he recognized her. He whispered, “No.”

“Halt!” the patrolman shouted even more angrily. Then, without a further moment’s hesitation he fired.

The woman spun around with a look of surprise and then crumpled to the ground, soaking the pavement in blood. Peter caught a glimpse of her face then.

Both he and Elspeth stared in silent amazement at the patrolman. Teresa retreated a step to stand closer to her mother; she looked repeatedly from the woman to Peter and back again as if making some mental connection. Elspeth put a protective arm around her daughter.

“I wonder why she didn’t stop?” Elspeth finally breathed.

“She probably didn’t hear him,” Peter answered evenly. “She’s nearly deaf. Her hearing was destroyed some years ago.”

He heard Teresa repeat softly to herself,
destroyed,
as Elspeth turned and looked at him. “You knew her?”

He was watching the patrolman and his colleague as they approached the
woman. He did not bother to look at Elspeth as he answered, “Sort of. I’ve seen her around, but I’ve never talked to her.”

“Why would you?” Elspeth asked. “What could you possibly have to say to each other?”

He turned to look at her then, but she met his glare with innocent superiority.He realized that she had no conception of their lives, and unable to answer her question, he turned back to look at the two patrolmen as they rolled the woman onto her back.

“I wonder who’ll compensate her people,” Elspeth mused.

Peter felt sick to his stomach. The woman’s blood glistened in the sunshine, yet, other than for the patrolman and his partner, everyone else was beginning to return to his or her usual business, afraid that staring too long might be interpreted as criticism of the police action. He wanted to go to the woman to comfort her, yet he lacked the courage. He wished desperately that he had reacted more quickly when he saw her—maybe he could have saved her life.

As if to put an end to the scene, Elspeth sighed to no one in particular, “Rather unfortunate, isn’t it?”

Her words washed over his grief, mocking him for his inaction. Before he could stop himself, he was saying, “You put children in uniforms, you arm them with guns, you fill their heads with lies and hatred, then when they murder someone in cold blood, you say, ‘How unfortunate.’ ”

Elspeth drew herself up and said in her most aristocratic voice, “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that.” With that, she began to walk off, pulling Teresa along, expecting him to follow.

He stood his ground, calling out scornfully, “You never hear anything, do you? You don’t see, you don’t hear, you don’t speak!”

She stopped and turned. Indicating to Teresa to stay put, she walked back to him, then using all her strength, she hit him as hard as she could across the face. There, in the plaza, in public, in front of everyone.

“Keep your hands off me!” he hissed at her.

Elspeth was rubbing her hand, but she stopped when he spoke. Her eyes widened in surprise, then narrowed threateningly. “What did you say?”

“I said . . .”

Teresa was staring at him, shaking her head slightly, pleading silently,
No!

He became aware of the other people in the square—the two patrolmen, in particular, had looked up from their work and were watching to see what happened next. He shifted uneasily, scanning the familiar plaza as if it were alien to him.

“What did you say?” Elspeth demanded.

Some of the people were staring at him, but nowhere was there the face of an ally. He was alone, as alone as the woman whose corpse now marred the pristine plaza. He met Elspeth’s hard look, but it was too late; he had lost this battle years ago.

Defeated, he dropped his gaze miserably to the ground. “I said . . .” But still the words stuck in his throat. He continued to stare at the ground beneath her feet, at the earth that he wished would simply swallow him up. He swallowed and tried again. “I said, please forgive me,
gnädige Frau,”
he whispered.

“I didn’t hear that.”

He took a deep breath and tried to speak louder. “I said, please forgive me,
gnädige Frau.”

“I thought that’s what you said,” Elspeth sneered.

He looked up then, his eyes taking in her triumphant look, the woman’s blood as it spread on the ground, Teresa’s fearful expression.

If it would be suicide, then so be it.

62

P
ETER TRIED NOT TO
watch too closely as Uwe drank the hot, sweet tea he had prepared. Uwe slurped noisily, downed the last drops, apparently not noticing the combination of his own pain pills and Elspeth’s sleeping pills that had been dumped into it. When Uwe finished, he yawned and set the cup down on the tray. Peter picked up the tray and asked if there was anything else he could get him. When Uwe said no, Peter left, promising to return in a few minutes to check that everything was all right.

Once he was in the hallway, out of Uwe’s sight, he stopped to gather himself. He leaned against the wall, breathed deeply, and wiping the sweat off his palms, returned to his normal routine.

Ulrike was next. As he entered her room, she looked up from her book and studied his face. He thought for a moment that he had somehow betrayed himself, that she could read his intentions in his face, but then she said, “I can’t decide which civic service to join once I graduate from high school. It’s all so confusing!”

He sighed his relief and silently derided himself for being stupid enough to think that anybody would notice what was on his mind. In nearly three years nobody had ever taken even the slightest notice of his physical state, not to mention anything as ephemeral as his moods or feelings. He acknowledged her unstated question by saying, “Yes, it’s a big decision, isn’t it?”

“Do you have any suggestions?”

“I don’t think it would be appropriate for me to advise you.”

She sighed with exasperation. “Nobody wants to help. I wish I had some idea what I want to do!”

“Maybe you could find a service that does acts of kindness for poor, dumb animals,” he offered with subdued irony.

She cocked her head at him as if trying to determine if he was serious, then she shrugged and went back to reading her book.

He collected her cup, and as he left the room, he risked saying, “Good-bye, Ulrike.”

“Good night,” she called back absentmindedly.

As each member of the family retired for the night, he breathed a small sigh of relief. So far so good. Elspeth and Karl were the last to turn in, just after eleven. He returned to Uwe’s room and checked on the effect of his ad hoc concoction. He was pleased to see that he had not accidentally killed Uwe and that the boy was sleeping soundly. He went back downstairs and collected Karl’s satchel from the hall closet. Then he went to the kitchen and opened the pantry. He selected some supplies and several useful items from around the house and placed them in the satchel; he debated for a second and decided to add several personal items: the handkerchiefs Teresa had given him, the hair he had removed from the chair, and finally, the book from Karl’s study that had survived confiscation.

He unlocked a desk drawer and removed the packet of documents that pertained to him. He did not know what purpose they might serve, but since it contained his history, he felt they belonged to him. Satisfied with what he had packed, he placed the satchel by the back door. Grabbing his jacket, papers, and the morning pass, he stuffed them into the bag as well. If his absence was noted early in the morning, it would look as if he had simply gone to fetch the bread. The extra minutes that could afford him might well save his life.

After he had packed his supplies, he stood by the steps and listened for the sound of anyone stirring. All was quiet, so he proceeded to the desk and dug out the masking tape. Carefully, he wrapped the tape around his wristband to prevent the metal from reflecting light and rousing suspicion, and then he shoved the band as far up his forearm as it would go and taped it into place. He decided against trying to cover the numbers on his left arm. If anyone got as far as having him roll up his sleeves, then . . . He decided not to pursue that line of thought.

Once he had finished preparing everything downstairs, he returned to Uwe’s room and rested on his rug. It had been a long day, fraught with the fear that he would betray his intentions. Earlier in the day Elspeth had raised her hand to strike him, but he had impulsively reached up and caught her wrist in an iron grip. The look of shock on her face had been priceless. After just a second he had released her, but her fist had remained stuck in midair. He’d taken a step backward, and as she still did not react, he’d turned and walked away before she could reconsider her leniency. It had been, in retrospect, one of the stupidest and riskiest actions of his life: to have waited so long and borne so much just to betray himself at the last minute! Fortunately no ill had come of it. Elspeth had grown tolerant since their confrontation in Uwe’s room and chose to ignore his illconsidered action.

After about an hour, he got up and gathered the clothes he had selected from
Uwe’s closet and placed them in the kitchen, near the back door so he could change into them just before he left the house. Returning to the first floor, he listened outside of Karl and Elspeth’s room. There was no sound. Carefully, grimacing with tension, he bent the door handle downward. Although they rarely locked their door—that would necessitate getting out of bed in the morning to let him in—he had, to be on the safe side, disabled the lock earlier in the day. He had also oiled the hinges, and the door opened smoothly and quietly under his gentle guidance. He slid into the room and waited there in the darkness, listening to the steady rhythm of their breathing.

After a few minutes had passed, he crept across the room and lowered himself to the floor by the bed. Karl snored lightly a few inches away; the bedside stand beckoned. He waited another moment to make sure that they were still deep in sleep. Karl stirred and groaned in his sleep. Elspeth awoke and sat up.

“Karl, Karl, did you hear something?”

Karl mumbled something unintelligible and rolled over. His arm dropped over the side of the bed, dangling a few inches above Peter’s nose. Peter lay as still as he could next to the bed, his heart pounding so loudly he felt sure Elspeth would hear it.

Eventually, Elspeth decided nothing was amiss and lay back down. Stuck there on the floor, Peter could do nothing more than stare at the hair on the knuckles of Karl’s hand and wait. It took an eternity for Elspeth’s breathing to become regular, and then Peter waited another quarter of an hour to be sure she was truly asleep.

Carefully, quietly, he reached up and tugged gently on the drawer of the bedside table. It did not move. He had expected that; he had seen Karl unlock the drawer in the morning once or twice, and he imagined Karl locked the drawer at night and slept with the key in his pajama pockets. Peter pulled out his lock pick and began work. He had opened the lock numerous times, but had never done it with Karl’s hand dangling in front of him nor from as awkward a position as he currently was in. He swore silently as sweat dripped down his face. His palms were slick and the pick slipped from his grasp, clanging against the polished wood floor.

“Karl! Did you hear that?”

“No! Now go to sleep and leave me alone,” Karl replied groggily, but then decided to get out of bed anyway. Peter only just managed to slide under the bed as Karl’s foot landed heavily on the floor. He watched from under the bed as Karl went into the bathroom and returned moments later. The springs pressed perilously close to him as Karl dumped his massive frame back into the bed.

Peter waited again. They both fell back asleep relatively quickly, and this time he decided not to waste any more time waiting. He grabbed the pick off the floor and unlocked the drawer. At this point he was obliged to sit up so that he could see inside. Karl and Elspeth looked deep in sleep so he slid the drawer silently open. Inside were Karl’s papers, his gun, and his car keys. Peter removed them,
took a moment to relock the drawer, and crept out of the room with his treasures.

Once he was back downstairs, he took a moment to look at Karl’s papers. He had checked yesterday—while Karl was bathing—that the photograph had not been updated, but before he bet his life on it, he wanted to be sure that he bore at least a passing resemblance to Karl’s old picture. The cold eyes stared lifelessly at him. He pulled his face into as arrogant and disdainful an expression as he could muster, glanced in the mirror, and nodded with satisfaction. Yes, he could do it— at a glance, at night, they looked the same. In fact, he probably looked more like Karl’s old picture than Karl did. What a charming thought! As for the fingerprints, well, there was nothing he could do about those, except hope that they would not be checked.

He tucked away the documents and quickly changed into Uwe’s clothes. The boots were the hardest and he cursed and swore quietly as he tried to force them onto his feet. Although the boots Frau Reusch had given him were old and quite worn, he packed them in the satchel—they fit much better than Uwe’s boots, and once he was safe somewhere, he might need them. Fully dressed, he took a moment to inspect the result in the hall mirror; satisfied, he then went to the back door, ready at last to leave forever. As he placed his hand on the bag, a voice like a Klaxon cried out his name.

It was Gisela. He cursed his bad luck. His name was called again. It would wake the whole house! Instantly he made his decision. Stripping off Uwe’s jacket as he went, he bounded up the steps to the second floor. He arrived in Gisela’s room just as she was preparing to call him again.

“Gisela! What do you want? What is it?” he panted. The run up the steps had aggravated the leg injuries that Karl had inflicted months ago, and he had to struggle to keep his voice from betraying the pain he felt shooting through his bones.

“I want a glass of water.”

He restrained an urge to tell her she was quite old enough to get her own water and said instead, “All right, I’ll be right back.”

He brought back a glass of water and a pitcher and placed it by her bed. “Here. I’ve brought you a whole pitcher so you can get yourself some water whenever you want. Are you okay now?”

She nodded as she brought the glass to her lips, but there were tears in her eyes.

He sighed and stooped down so he could be near her. “What is it, little one?”

“I had a bad dream.”

It was always the same. No one else came when she called them, so she called him. Water, a blanket, close or open the window, whatever the excuse, the reason was always the same. “Tell me about it,” he said gently as he seated himself next to her bed.

She told him her dream and he assured her everything was all right. He kissed her good-night and then held her hand until she fell back asleep. When she was finally asleep, he released her hand and stood quietly. How much time had he lost?

“Peter?” Teresa’s voice called softly from behind him.

“Yes, it’s just me. Go back to sleep.”

“Those aren’t your clothes.”

“No, they’re not,” he replied forlornly. He could not think of any plausible reason for wearing Uwe’s clothes, so he did not try to explain. A thousand options crossed his mind, but none seemed particularly hopeful. His plans were like sand running through his fingers. Would it all fall to pieces so easily? He sighed and walked over to her and squatted by the edge of her bed.

“Are you leaving us?” she asked simply.

He stroked the hair back from her forehead. “Yes, I’m going.”

“Where will you go?”

“I honestly don’t know. There’s nowhere safe for me.”

“Peter, they’ll kill you!” she said, frightened. “I’m scared!”

“I’m scared, too.”

“They’ll catch you and they’ll kill you!” she predicted.

“I know.”

“Don’t do it then, don’t go. Put everything back the way it was. It’s not too late!”

“I have to go.”

“But we need you!” she pleaded.

“I have to go.”

“But they’ll kill you, you know that! Suicide is wrong!”

“So is slavery. I used to be a real person, now I do nothing but try to stay alive. I’ve endured unspeakable torture, I’ve obeyed ridiculous commands, I’ve become . . . I hate what I’ve become. You know what’s going on here. You know what’s expected of me. I can’t be a part of this anymore.”