The Woodcarver's Secret (Samantha Sweet Mysteries) (33 page)

“
Vater
, it’s me. I have our
friends.” Helmut and the two bricklayers were coming down the long tunnel
toward him.

He showed them what he had in
mind—bricking over the doorway into the special room. “We must use bricks that
match.”

“
Ja
, we can come close to a match,” said Herr Schenke.

“And cover the light switch. We
can leave no clue that this room exists. Once they are gone, once the war is
over, then I will trust again and we can break it open.”

Schenke was nodding, eyeing the
job, taking some measurements.

“Be sure we bring the bricks here
late at night—quietly. If anyone sees, they will figure out what we are doing
and the secret might get out.”

The older bricklayer agreed.
“People are being very careful these days. We are slowly learning our lesson
about trusting the Party.”

It was true. Having a normal
conversation in these times was becoming more difficult. There was so little
that could be said, what with Nazis everywhere.

“You will be paid well,” Martin
said, “and in return I require your absolute honor in this matter.”

“How soon do we need to finish?
Keeping in mind that the mortar will take some time to dry in this dampness.”

It was true. The walls of the tunnel
dripped with moisture, so much so that mineral deposits formed, and the floor
was constantly wet.

“According to the wireless, they
have already raided Zell. They are coming by river so it will not be many more
days.”

Schenke spoke: “We will deliver the
first load of bricks tonight and begin work in the morning. It will not be a
problem to work down here in the daytime?”

“It is best. Traffic and other
sounds out on the street will cover any sound you make.”

“I can use some help. My youngest
son is good at mixing mortar and my wife’s brother is quick with a trowel. With
them, I think we can finish this in two days. As long as no one pushes against
the wall for a week, it should be all right.”

Would they have a week before the
troops began streaming through town? There was no way to know for sure. They
could only make the attempt.

Martin Helgberg agreed to the
plan and sent the others on their way. Then he went to the bank to draw out
some money.

*
* *

Nikolaus thought his father was
acting funny. Uncle Remy had come over and the three men sat in the parlor with
coffee and drawing paper. When grownups talked plans it was a good time for him
to get outdoors, knowing he could roam the village without much supervision. He
wandered to the
Marktplatz
to look around.
It was late in the day so a lot of the merchandise would be gone—the best
pastries and breads especially—but sometimes a sympathetic seller would see a
child alone and give away their last strudel or
blachindla
. He meandered between
the tables, trailing his hand along the edges, hoping he looked as hungry as he
felt.

Ahead, a uniform caught his
attention. It was usually best to duck into an alley if one could do so unseen.
But this one appeared to be off duty, strolling along with an obviously pregnant
woman and two young, blonde boys. Nik paused, his breath catching. It was the
same soldier who had thrown away the wooden box last autumn, the one Nik now
had hidden under the clothing in the trunk under his bed. He had given his
mother the scarf, discovering that the fabric was nice quality but not unusual.
But the box was. If this soldier happened to be one who searched houses, as
he’d heard the adults saying, he would surely recognize the box immediately.
Nik’s heart beat very fast.

What would he do? Surely he would
be accused as a thief and the penalty would be horrible. There were
twelve-year-old children in prison, he felt sure of it. Soon, he would be one
of them. Or he would be conscripted into the Army. The Hitler Youth were
recruiting boys his age and soon it would become mandatory. His palms grew
sweaty. The vendor selling wooden toys asked if he wanted to look at something.

Nikolaus turned, without a word,
and dashed down the nearest narrow street. He raced straight home, trying to
think, but thinking and running were hard to do at once.

“Nik! Did you not hear me?” His
father’s voice came from the parlor.

He slid to a stop in the hall and
looked inside, straightening his shoulders and standing as still as possible.

“Tomorrow we have a rush job and
I will need your help to mix the mortar.”

Nikolaus nodded.

“
Mutter
will make you an early supper and then it’s bedtime. We will
start before daybreak in the morning.”

“Do I miss school then?”

“Just for a couple of days. You
are to tell your brothers you have a fever.
Mutter
can send a note to school.”

A lie? A parent-sanctioned lie?

“Nikolaus, stop smiling. This is
quite serious and you are under an oath of secrecy to never mention it. Not to
anyone.”

He nodded again. The box upstairs
under the bed was proof that he could keep a secret.

In the kitchen, his mother had a
bowl of soup ready for him. Although she said nothing he sensed that she
already knew about whatever was happening.

“I suppose that if you were to
feel feverish during the night or early in the morning,” she said, “it would be
allowed for you to come and get into bed with your parents.”

He spooned up the soup, watching
her face, not saying anything. When he finished he followed instructions,
washing his face and hands, cleaning his teeth and putting on his nightshirt.
His mother draped his clothes over the foot of his bed and showed him that she
had put a sandwich into his rucksack. He crawled beneath the blankets and
thought about how he could pretend to have a fever.

The rucksack lay under the edge
of his bed and it gave him an idea. He could remove the box from the house and
find someplace to dispose of it, a place where the soldier, if he came upon it,
could never connect it to Nik or his family. He crawled quietly from the bed as
he heard the rest of the family gather downstairs for supper. The box went into
his pack and he placed it gently back exactly as his mother had left it.

As things turned out, neither of
his brothers spoke to him when they came upstairs later. Apparently their
mother had simply told them Nik was not feeling well and had gone to bed early.
He fell asleep without any coaxing.

The room lay in darkness when
Nikolaus felt a hand on his shoulder. His father knelt at his bedside with a
candle that cast a soft glow over the blankets.

“Gather your things. We need to
go to work.” He had already picked up Nik’s clothes and boots. “Quickly. You
can dress in the kitchen.”

The picture became clear. In
order to fool the other boys into thinking he really was sick, his father would
take him downstairs and his mother would pretend he had come into her bedroom.
What an exciting way to skip school! He pulled the rucksack from under his bed
and followed his father down the stairs.

A cat ran down Grabenstrasse and
jumped without effort to a window sill as they passed. Not a single person was
out and only a few lights showed from windows. Nikolaus had no idea what time
it was, only that he had never seen the streets of Bernkastel empty like this.

They came to an arched door set
into the side of a wall, with a narrow lintel above and a carved sign
advertising the name of a winery. Someone inside had heard their steps; the
door swung open only a few inches and then enough to allow them inside.

His grandfather was the man who
had opened the door and Nik nearly cried out when recognition dawned. The
gray-haired man placed a finger to his lips. Together, by lamplight, the three
of them walked down a very long, very frightening tunnel with water oozing from
the walls and green moss growing like the hair of some ancient troll. Nik
reached for his father’s hand.

They entered a large room filled
with rows of huge wooden barrels. At the far end, a brighter light filled the
area, showing a substantial stack of bricks.

“We worked until midnight,
bringing them here,” Grandfather said, “then we were afraid of making too much
noise. “Four wheelbarrows so far. I think four more will do it. I can bring
another now, before many villagers are out.”

“Fine. But hurry. It will be
daylight within the hour and we dare not risk any more visible activity. We can
get the remainder tonight. For now, this will keep us busy. Remy, set up a
stack for me. Quietly. Once there is activity on the street we can work at a
faster pace. Nik, you will mix mortar. I shall show you the first batch so you
remember how to measure the sand, the cement and the water.”

Nikolaus nodded. He had done this
before—it would come back quickly. He set his rucksack aside and rolled up his
sleeves. As his father laid out the first row of bricks, Nik spotted the
perfect place to hide the wooden box. When the other men turned to assist
Grandfather with the new load, he drew the box out of his rucksack and set it
at the base of a wine rack in the room that would soon cease to exist. Once the
Nazi threat was gone he knew the winery owner would come for his prized wines
and this wall would come down.

 
That is
when
—Nik promised silently to the box—
I
will come and get you.

*
* *

Nearly a month passed without
incident. Nikolaus went to school each day, returned to take up his normal
activities. His parents talked of politics, silently worrying in the privacy of
their own home about the all-reaching powers of the Party. On the streets, Nik
saw the same lines of anxiety on the faces of the townspeople, the invisible
burden of keeping quiet.

Yet no one talked about it;
conversations were about the weather or how beautiful the flowers had been last
summer. No topic of consequence was ever discussed openly although the
whispered rumors in the dark of the night spoke of camps and confiscation of
property. It was on a Friday that the Nazi Party train pulled into the
bahnhof
and a great cloud of steam
puffed from its engine as nearly fifty men in uniform streamed from the cars.

They spread out systematically,
covering both the Bernkastel side of the river and the Kues side, quickly
taking stock of the few valuables in the shops (most merchandise of any worth
had long since been sold out of the country or secreted away in the owner’s
home), then they began door-to-door searches. The questions began innocuously
enough: “What do you have to contribute to the war effort?” Within a household
that gave up nothing there would then come a search of every room.

They had apparently found fine
art, gold and silver jewelry, valuable collections in other cities along the
river—larger, more prosperous places. But Bernkastel and Kues held little of
that. They were small villages—historic and charming, to be sure, but not the
homes of the wealthy. Nikolaus huddled beside the statue of the bears as the
men spread through the marketplace and into the residential streets.

He edged his way along in their
wake, hovering a block or two behind, until they came to the boarded-up former
jewelry store. One man kicked the door in and three others rushed inside.
Nikolaus could have told them there was nothing left. The Jewish family who
once owned it had been taken away more than two years ago and the contents of
the shop packed up in Nazi sacks. Nik and his brothers had ventured in the
following day to find nothing but broken glass and shattered display cases.
Other shops suffered the same fate and the mayor formed a committee to board
them up so the village would be less unsightly. The men plunderers came back
outside now showing empty palms.

“What about up there?” said the
one who had kicked in the door. He stared at the apartment on the second floor
and two of them pushed their way up the stairs.

Nik held his breath. When his
mother opened the door she gave a friendly smile such as he had never seen when
her parents discussed the government. Behind her stood Grandfather, seeming
older and more stooped in the face of the danger. She opened the door wider and
stood aside. Nik’s stomach knotted. He thought of his parents’ conversations
about this. “We have nothing of value. They will see that. They will look
around and leave.”

He prayed fervently that it was
true—the men would leave without harming anyone. He waited until the men came
back down the stairs, fifteen long minutes later. They must have poked through
cabinets and under beds to take that long in the small place. He was glad he
had removed his only treasure.

Once the men moved along to the
next house, Nik raced to the next block and cut through a tiny lane to
Grabenstrasse
where he tucked himself
into a small nook beside a rather dusty clothing shop and watched. From the
carved doors of the wine cellar, uniformed soldiers were wrestling with the
huge wine casks that had lined the winery’s main storage vault. Curses split
the air as they fought the slippery wet, inclined floor trying to maintain
control over the barrels which wanted to roll back inside. Nik hid a smile
behind his sleeve as he watched their frustration.

Someone called for a truck and
the big, lumbering vehicle arrived a few minutes later. Eventually, the men
grappled and tugged one of the barrels aboard. A second and third waited. Nik
saw that they had no individual bottles or cases of wine, only the barrels.
Afraid of being spotted and nabbed as a spy, he ducked around the corner and
made his way home.

His mother seemed shaken but
there was a muted joviality at the fact that the Nazis had come and gone and
the family was no worse off. Nik tugged at his father’s sleeve and reported
what he had seen at the wine cellar.