River's Edge (31 page)

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Authors: Marie Bostwick

BOOK: River's Edge
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“Poland? Are you sure you heard right? There's no mail coming out of Poland. It's occupied.”
“The boy wasn't in Poland anymore. He escaped. Don't ask me how, but he did. Walked all the way to the Swedish border and snuck across. Must have taken him weeks. Months probably. Anyway, soon as he got to Sweden he sent Milda a letter, and she'd got it that day. The letter said her whole family in Poland was dead!”
“Oh no!” Mama breathed, horrified. “Dear Lord, no! The whole family? What happened? A bomb?”
“No. The nephew said that a troop of Nazi soldiers came to town and called everyone out into the street. They searched all the houses and barns, everything. Made everybody come outside and line up. They gathered up everyone in the village—the women and children, too—marched them into the woods outside of town, and shot them. Just shot them all—two hundred and twenty people. They didn't say why. They just killed them like they were a herd of cattle.”
“Oh, dear God,” Mama said.
Or was it me? Oh, dear God.
Mrs. Scholler went on, an excited horror in her voice, the voice of a witness to a terrible accident that had been seen but not quite believed. “The boy survived only because he got hit in the shoulder and had the presence of mind to lay there and pretend he was dead. Bodies piled on top of him, but he lay still until it was all over and the Nazis drove off. When the coast was clear, he got up and decided he had better run in case the Nazis came back. He ran all the way to Sweden, and he wrote Milda. She was the only person left to tell. The whole family was wiped out.”
An acrid taste of bile rose in my throat, the same flavor of suspicion and shame that had surfaced on the day Mrs. Ludwig started to tell me about the letter. She had stopped short of telling me the whole story. Mrs. Scholler had held back nothing. I swallowed hard and fought to stay silent, to hold back the cries and questions backed up inside me. It was like choking on knots of rope.
No!
I thought.
That can't be right. Not a whole village. It's a lie. Or a mistake. The commanding officer went mad, or ... This would never happen!
I thought about Father's letter, back at the beginning of the war, when he was in Poland. He'd said he couldn't believe that people were capable of such things.
What things, Father? What people? Was
this
what you meant in your letter?
My head pounded with a vision of the boy—Dodek, Mrs. Ludwig had called him. His shouder searing with pain and burning lead, fighting to keep silent and still in spite of his agony, his ears filled with the nightmare rhythm of war:
CRACK—thump, CRACK—thump, CRACK—thump, as bullet after bullet found its target, and body after body fell on top of his, covering him like so many clods of fleshly dirt. I tried to force myself to think of something else, the way I'd forced the vision of the perishing Jim Flanders from my mind, but this time it didn't work. The vision wouldn't stop. I rolled onto my side and quietly retched into one of the sofa pillows.
Mrs. Scholler heard something. She asked, “What was that?” Mama didn't answer; she was distracted.
“Oh, Carolyn! Are you sure? It can't be. It had to be an isolated incident. Some kind of mistake.”
“That's what I said, but Milda said no. She was crying, Sophia! Milda Ludwig was out-and-out crying! She said it was no mistake. Said her nephew wrote about many things, things she didn't want to talk about, but it wasn't a mistake. She said things like that were happening all over Poland.”
I lay on the sofa, soaked with my own vomit, still as death, and waited for Mrs. Scholler to leave. Mama walked her to the door to say good-bye. Asked her not to repeat the story to anyone else.
“Please, Carolyn, don't. I wouldn't want Elise to hear this. Think how it would upset her. She's a good girl.”
Mrs. Scholler was embarrassed. “Oh no,” she said. “Of course not! I didn't think of it that way. I'm sorry, Sophia. I shouldn't have said anything. I wouldn't want to see her hurt. I'll never forget how she helped us that day when the hail came. Hadn't been for all of you, we'd have lost our place for sure. I won't say anything to anyone else.”
“Thank you, Carolyn. If these kinds of stories got out ... Things have been hard enough for her.”
“But you know,” Mrs. Scholler said soberly, “if these stories are true, it'll all come out when the war is over. You can't protect her forever.”
“We'll just cross that bridge when we come to it.”
After Mrs. Scholler left, Mama climbed the stairs. Her feet sounded tired and heavy on the treads, and after a minute I heard the bath water running.
I rolled quietly off the sofa and crept out the kitchen door, clutching the soiled cushion against my breast. I took off my shoes and walked on the dirt-and-gravel road toward the river. The stones hurt my feet, but not enough. I stomped on them. I ran as hard and heavy as I could until the rocks cut my feet and made them bleed and left a trail of foot-shaped bloodstains behind me, painting the stones and soaking into the dry, thirsty dirt. I ran over the crest of the hill and down the hard slope to the edge of the river.
I plunged into water up to my waist with all my clothes on, still holding the pillow. It was cold, but not cold enough. I wanted it icy, freezing and bitter and painful, so cold you can't breathe or cry out, but it wasn't that cold. I did cry out. I screamed and blubbered. Tears and saliva ran down my face and neck, onto the front of my dress and the pillow, washing the vomit into the river and downstream. Standing in the river, I threw up again and again. Everything inside came choking out in spasms of splashing liquid and bile, and the current took it all away. Blood from my feet seeped into the water, turning it pink.
Finally, when I had nothing left inside, no screams, or tears, or stomach, or blood, I let go. I lifted my feet from the sandy bottom, ducked my head beneath the surface of the water, hidden from sight, complete immersion. The current pushed against me, tugging at the folds of my dress, billowing the fabric out in front of my body, pulling at my hair and skin, washing me, removing everything that wasn't Elise alone. It would be so easy to let go and let the current take me with it, through the valley, past the tobacco fields, to Connecticut, past Hartford, past Saybrook, to the sea. I floated for a moment, submerged, and thought about taking a deep breath to make sure that every part of me was truly cleansed inside and out. I opened my mouth, felt the water cool and fresh on my tongue, but as I was getting ready to inhale, one of my feet brushed against the riverbed and held on. There was nothing left in my lungs. It was time to decide. Both feet found the bottom, gripped the sand, and pushed hard against the riverbed. I exploded into the air and gasped, found my footing, and stood in the water again, panting, sucking oxygen and reprisal into my body.
Disappointment and self-loathing surged though me.
I'll never be clean,
I thought.
Not completely. I am too much of a coward.
But somewhere in my mind I heard voices. My mother's—breath-less and loving. Mrs. Ludwig's—scolding and caring. And other voices I did not yet recognize.
No,
they said.
None of us is ever completely clean, but we stand our ground. That is courage. Standing up. Staying still. Facing your destiny with unclean hands. That is the best we can do on this side of the river. Just to stay standing.
 
I hid the wet pillow behind a bush, well out of sight of the house. The sun would dry it there, and I'd put it back on the sofa in the morning. No one would know.
Mama came out onto the porch, fresh and clean from her bath, rubbing her shampooed hair with a towel. Her eyes flew open at the sight of me walking toward her, dripping a trail across the grass. “Elise! What happened to you?”
“I went for a swim.”
“With your clothes on?”
I didn't answer. Mama's forehead puckered with worry. “Is something wrong? Elise? Tell me.” She reached out and picked up a lock of my wet hair, took her own towel and started drying me with it. “Tell me.”
“I think my father is dead.”
Mama's face was blank for a moment. “I don't understand. Why would you say that? Did you get a letter? A telegram?”
“No,” I said evenly. “I just believe he is dead.” I didn't know how to explain it; I had drowned him in the river and would not think of him again.
Mama frowned and took my hands in hers. “Come on. Sit here on the porch with me, and we'll talk.”
I shook my head. “No. I'd rather not. Maybe later,” I lied. “I'm going to go upstairs and dry off, change into something clean.”
“Elise?”
“I'm fine. Really. I love you, Mama.” I kissed her on the cheek and went inside.
 
It was better to imagine the best than to know the worst. Right then that was the best I could imagine, that Father was dead. If it was worse than that, I didn't want to know, I had decided.
It was impossible to explain to Mama, not then. Later she understood. Christmas came, and we all went to service and thanked God that Junior and Papa were together. We imagined them singing carols to the soldiers, passing out the Christmas stockings we'd sewn and sent to share with the troops.
It was better, that day, not to know the truth. Not on Christmas. We didn't know until afterward that Papa had been killed in the Battle of the Bulge. He'd been shot while giving last rites to a soldier. Junior had been shot, too, trying to protect Papa, and was in a field hospital. The telegram said his condition was grave.
Chapter 21
1945
 
“
I
can do it, Mama. I'm sure I can,” I said earnestly. “I'm not saying it wouldn't be a lot of work, but the twins will be graduating in a few weeks—”
“But they could be drafted at any moment, Elise,” Mama said soberly. “Then what would you do?”
“Curt could help, too, when school lets out,” I reasoned. “He's strong for his age.”
We stood at the edge of the yard, where the close-mowed grass gave way to the untended fields. Mama stood with one hand wrapped around her waist and the other covering her mouth, her eyes darting back and forth across the landscape, considering. “I don't know.”
I opened my mouth to begin restating my arguments, but the sound of Cookie screaming from inside the house stopped me cold.
“Mama!”
“Out here, Cookie! Why does she have to yell like that?” Mama looked irritated, but as the screaming continued, her expression changed to one of concern; Cookie shouldn't have been home from work for hours. Mama started walking quickly toward the house and I went with her.
As we approached the porch, the screen door flew open with a bang, and Cookie came out onto the porch with tears pouring down her face.
“Mama!”
“Come on!” Mama said to me as she broke into a run.
I followed, a knot forming in my stomach. How many tragedies could one family bear, I thought? What had we left to lose? The boys? Oh, dear God. Please don't let anything have happened to the boys!
“Cookie!” Mama cried as we came near. “What happened?”
Cookie threw her arms around Mama, sobbing. “It's over! It's over! The war in Europe is over!”
Mama's chest was heaving from the effort of running. Her hand flew to her mouth.
“Are you sure?” I asked. I didn't want to believe it if it wasn't true. “Cookie, are you absolutely sure?”
“It was on the radio,” she confirmed, bobbing her head urgently. “They played the announcement over the loudspeaker at work. I came home as fast as I could to tell you. It's over! It really is over!” she exclaimed as the tears streamed down her face.
By now we were all crying. We put our arms around each other's shoulders and cried together, forming a circle of tears and loss, relief and thanksgiving. We just stood there, leaning on each other, heads bowed, sobbing and laughing and sobbing again. We let flow all the tears we'd swallowed over the years of war, so many tears that at times it had felt like we'd drown in them. We'd had to be brave then. Not anymore.
The screen door opened again. Mama lifted her head from the circle and turned to the porch. “Did you hear, Junior? The war is over in Europe! Isn't it wonderful?”
I kept my head bowed and my eyes closed and listened for the now familiar sound, the thump-tap, thump-tap of a cane and wooden leg against the floorboards as Junior walked onto the porch and heaved himself painfully into a rocker, the sound like bitterness.
“I did, Mama,” Junior said softly. “It's wonderful.”
 
When Papa's body arrived home, his casket was wrapped like a terrible present in red, white, and blue. In a town that was worn out with funerals and thought it had no grief left, Papa's funeral was a spectacle of mourning, attended by hundreds of people who all wanted to say a word, touch a hand, offer some comfort, recount a memory that would shore up the family through the sad, empty days ahead, as though that would have been possible. The effort of shaking each hand and acknowledging each well-intentioned, vague offer of assistance, of enduring the public ritual of our very private grief was draining. Church service, graveside service, burial, reception in the church basement, and visitors in the house long past dark.
When the last guest left, Mama closed the door and dissolved into tears, and we all ran to hold her. “Thank God it is over,” she said, her eyes closed and a handkerchief held to them. “This was the worst day of my life.”
I thought, yes, and felt a strange sense of relief. It cannot get worse than this. But I was wrong.
The day Junior came home was the worst day ever, worse even than Papa's funeral, because that day we were prepared for sorrow. We knew about Junior's leg, knew about the grenade and the surgeon-severed limb, but none of that mattered, because Junior was alive and coming home. We had such parties planned! Such celebrations!
We weren't prepared for the anguished, sad-eyed Junior-shell the porters had to lift down the steps of the train. We didn't yet know that he'd left much more of himself on the battlefield than a shattered leg. I ran toward him on the platform with my arms outstretched, but as I came near he leaned hard on his cane and reached out his free hand to clasp mine, stopping my ready embrace. He squeezed my hand, the hand that still wore his promise, and said it was good to see me, but his eyes darted away from mine, nervous, as though greeting a stranger. An awful thought pierced my mind—he blamed me.
That was the worst day.
 
We blew the month's sugar and butter ration to make a cake for dinner that night and slaughtered two of the older hens. The birds were a little tough, but they were big, and, for once, there was plenty for seconds.
We laughed and talked through dinner. Junior was quiet but not sullen and smiled at the jokes, even the corny ones. Mama announced she was going to brew a pot of real coffee to go with the cake. “I've been saving it for a special occasion. I think this is about as special as it gets,” she declared happily and gave Junior the honor of opening the can.
As the blade of the can opener pierced metal, an intoxicating aroma of fresh coffee filled the room. Junior shoved his face up close to the can and breathed it in like it was air to a drowning man. “Mmmm,” he groaned. His head lolled back and he shut his eyes, his face an expression of rapture. “Oh! I'd almost forgotten,” he said in a tone that, for just an instant, sounded like the old Junior. “That is the best smell ever!”
Everyone agreed and gave a big three cheers for Mama and, if Papa had been there, it would have been just like the old days.
“Well, we've got a surprise, too!” announced Chip, raising and lowering his eyebrows like Groucho Marx and grinning at his twin.
“We do indeed!” Chuck agreed as he and Chip got up from the table. They briefly disappeared into the broom closet and, after an interval of loud banging and the sound of boxes being moved and a floorboard creaking, they emerged.
“Tah-dah!” they shouted in unison.
Mama was aghast. “Charles and Chester Muller! That had better not be a bottle of liquor in my house! And cigars, too! No, boys! I mean it. Where in the world did you get that stuff?”
“Won it off of Otto Karlsberg in a card game,” Chip replied.
“You were playing poker?” Mama exclaimed. “You were gambling?”
“Well, why not? Papa won Junior in a card game!” Everyone laughed, but I saw a stab of pain and memory flicker in Junior's eyes.
Chip waltzed across the kitchen floor, humming an off-key rendition of “Begin the Beguine” with one of the wrapped cigars stuck between his teeth. He lifted Mama off her feet and danced around the room with her while she laughed and slapped his shoulders harmlessly, saying to put her down, she meant it, no kidding, but not convincingly.
“Come on, Mama.” Chuck said in a wheedling tone. “One little glass isn't going to hurt us. It's a party!”
“Yeah, Mama!” we chorused. “Just one little glass!” We pounded the kitchen table in time with our song while Chip carried her through the steps of an involuntary dance.
“Oh, for heaven's sake! All right! Put me down,” she said, laughing. “Just one glass, but absolutely no cigars in this house. If you're going to smoke, you'd better do it outside, and you'd better not let me see you doing it. I mean it!” And we knew she did.
Chuck got down the glasses, and Chip poured sherry into six glasses. Though Curt complained about unfairness, Mama drew the line at letting him have any alcohol. When she got up to cut the cake, Junior put his finger to his lips to indicate the need for stealth and gave his littlest brother a tiny taste from his glass. Curt made a face and pushed the glass away.
We ate as much cake as we could hold and lingered around the table talking, drinking coffee, and sipping sherry. Actually, Junior and the twins drank it more than sipped—after all, it was a party. I didn't really care for the taste—it was kind of sweet and medicinal-tasting all at once—but I liked the way it felt so warm going down my throat.
It was late. Curt started yawning, and Mama sent him off to bed. The conversation lagged, but none of us really wanted to leave the table. It had been such a nice evening.
Mama brought the subject up first. “Elise and I were talking today,” she began. “You all know that Papa left a pension and the church took up a collection for a small educational fund for you children.” She threw a quick glance at Junior. “But the car is on its last legs, and the house is mortgaged. Until now, between the pension and Cookie's salary from the factory and Junior's government check—”
“Ah, yes!” Junior said sarcastically. “A token of thanks from a grateful nation!” Mama ignored him and went on.
“Between all that, we've been able to get by, but just barely. Elise thinks we ought to try growing tobacco.” A murmur of surprise rippled around the table, but Mama continued, “It's hard work, I know, and we don't know the first thing about it—”
“That's not so,” I protested. Junior shot me a look. “I know exactly what to do,” I declared, ignoring Junior's skeptical expression.
Mama continued. “Before today, I wouldn't have considered it, but now that the war in Europe is over and it looks like Japan won't be far behind, we are going to have to come up with some way to support ourselves. Cookie's factory job will surely end with the fighting.”
Chuck interrupted, “Mama, Chip and I will be graduating at the end of the month. We can get jobs and help out.” He sat a little taller in his chair, as if to show that he was man enough for the task of supporting the family.
Mama smiled and patted his hand. “I appreciate that, Chuck, but think. When the war is over there are going to be thousands of GIs looking for work. The jobs are going to go to them. Nobody is going to hire you or your brother instead of a veteran.”
The table was quiet for a moment as the truth about our situation sank in. Cookie toyed with her fork and gazed thoughtfully into the distance before speaking. “Are you sure it will take? The fields have never been cultivated. How do you know tobacco will even grow here?”
“Mr. Scholler's land is right next to ours, and his tobacco is fine,” I said. “The quality is pretty fair, and he gets a good price for it. Ours might be even better because the land has been lying fallow so long; the nutrients haven't been leeched out. Also, Mr. Scholler said we could use any of his equipment we need, tractors and everything, and we can use any space left over in his drying sheds. That would save us having to put out so much money up front.”
Chuck scratched his head, considering. “We got, say, fifteen acres out there. You want to plant all of it?” I nodded. “That means we'd still have to build at least one shed. How are we going to do that?”
“Well, I thought you and Chip could handle that part. You're so handy with tools and all.”
Chip was doubtful. “Yeah, but it's going to take some real money to buy lumber for a shed. Where are we going to get that kind of cash?”
I bit my lip. I didn't know exactly how this was all going to work, it was true. Still, something deep in me said we could do it, but only if we all pulled together. I had to convince them.
Junior made a sucking sound with his teeth and said, “Well, I don't think we need to worry about money to build a shed just yet. Let's just cross the bridge when we come to it.”
A little thrill of excitement jolted me. If Junior was for the idea, the rest of the family would get on board, I was certain. And it was so long since Junior had been for anything!
He spent his days sitting in chairs, reading or pretending to read, repeatedly opening and closing the cover of the pocket watch that Papa had left to him in his will, as if hoping that this time the clock face would show that hours had mysteriously passed and another day would soon be over. He didn't speak unless spoken to. His conversations were short, obligatory, and confined to bare, immediate exchanges of domestic necessity. He didn't want to talk about the future, or the past.
Mama said we needed to give him time, and I did. I still wore the garnet ring he'd given me, but we never spoke of it. I didn't press him. It didn't matter. It wasn't fulfillment of promise I was seeking from him, just ... I don't know. Just the barest acknowledgement that he was still in there somewhere, a reassurance that Hitler had not been able to kill every man I loved.

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