Saving Amelie (5 page)

“Your incessant hounding is driving my father into an early grave.”

“My hounding?” He couldn’t let that pass. “Do you know what they’re doing as a result of his research and the research of his counterparts here in Germany? Did you hear what they said tonight?”

Rachel turned to walk away, but Jason kept pace. “If he’s innocent, if there’s a good side to this, then help me get the story. Convince him to talk to me. I’ll be fair—honest.”

“Honest?” She nearly snorted, reducing him to dung with her glare. “You’ve shown just how honest you are, Mr. Young. I don’t think either Germany or America can stand much more of your brand of honesty.”

Jason stopped short, the wind knocked from his sails. “Hey, I don’t make the news,” he called after her. “It’s people like your father who do that! I just write it.”

The piercing headache between Rachel’s eyes would not relent. Even the headlights of oncoming cars made her wince. But her father was in high spirits.

“Quite the affair, if I do say so.” He spoke as if expecting an answer, but Rachel knew better. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the seat of the Mercedes.

“I daresay Herr Himmler came across rather stronger than I would have, but Germany’s on the right track. They’ve moved ahead of us in America. We’ll benefit greatly from their studies.”

She turned away, uncertain which was the culprit that made her feel sick—her headache or her father’s skewed reality.

“We’ll be leaving for the conference on Tuesday. I’m driving to Hamburg with Major Schlick and Dr. Verschuer, then taking the ship
to Scotland. There will be meetings after the conference. Two weeks is a long time on your own.”

“I prefer it. I’d like to do some shopping while we’re in the city, and I’m eager to see what the local theatres are producing.” She tried to push back the throbbing. “I didn’t know Gerhardt was part of the eugenics conference.”

“He’s taken an interest. He’s quite the favorite with Dr. Verschuer. Someone worth knowing . . . a rising star in the SS.”

She felt her father’s eyes upon her, even in the darkness. The thought of Gerhardt Schlick numbered among Germany’s finest made her queasy.

“The trip would give you opportunity to get to know him better.”

“I have no desire to know him better. He was beastly tonight—to his wife and to me.”

“I don’t imagine their marriage will last.”

“Why do you say that?”

Now he turned his head away, toward the opposite window. “You saw how things are between them.” He hesitated, but only a moment. “Did you speak with Kristine?”

“No.” Rachel felt her exasperation rising. “I’d intended to, but we were not sitting near enough during the speeches, and by the end of dinner she was completely cowed by Gerhardt.”

“She was drunk.”

“I can see why. He’s horrid to her.”

“You don’t know what he contends with. You mustn’t judge harshly.”

“Harshly?”

“It was a poor match from the start. You could have handled him so much better. You were . . . hasty.”

Rachel could not believe her ears. Surely her father must have had too much to drink. “What about their daughter? Amelie must be—what—four, by now?”

But her father dismissed her and the notion of Amelie with a flick of the wrist. Rachel was just as glad to drop the conversation. Perhaps by morning he’d regain his senses.

Rachel woke to find a note pushed beneath her door. Her father had gone out to an early breakfast meeting with colleagues. He’d apologized that she must eat alone and promised to see her that evening for dinner. They were invited to join the American ambassador and his wife. Rachel knew it was an order.

She opened the balcony door of her hotel room, glad for the morning sun, glad she would not need to spend the day with her father and his cronies. Rather than call for room service, she decided to go exploring—find an outdoor café specializing in strong ersatz German coffee and good rolls.

She was nearly out the door when she remembered her room key. Rummaging through her evening bag, she pulled out her comb and lipstick, her compact and passport—but no room key. She turned the bag upside down. Still no key. She massaged the purse all round, could feel the key in the bottom, but couldn’t see it. Taking her bag to the window, she opened it. When it was held up to the light, she saw that a hole had been torn in the lining—a hole she knew was not there before. Rachel wriggled her finger through, felt the errant key . . . and something else.

She tried to grab hold of the paper, but both slipped away. Retrieving her nail scissors, she snipped the hole a little larger. Out came the key and a slim, rolled paper. Rachel recognized the hastily scrawled handwriting as Kristine’s.

4

F
RIEDERICH
TURNED
the small block of limewood over, and over again—first this way, and then that. It was the finest piece he owned, with the finest grain. He’d saved it until last. There was something about carving all the other figures of the Nativity first—the magi and shepherds, the sheep and donkeys, and even the archangel—that brought him with great satisfaction to the holy family, and finally to the
Christkind
. By saving its carving until last, he knew intimately the nature of the wood and the deeper personality of the family. For surely each was unique.

Ever since he’d married Lea he’d been carving her loving, concerned, and doting smile into Mary’s face. He’d carved his own protective nature into Joseph’s stance. And the babe—the babe was the child they hoped for, prayed for. The perfect child they imagined suckling and gurgling by day, the child Lea would sing to sleep at night. He’d carved a dozen in the last year—each one a work of which he was proud.

Friederich dropped the wood onto his worktable and stood. He walked to the window of his small woodshop and stared at the sun-drenched mountain. Mockery. There would be no babe to imagine. No babe for them—ever. What hope, what contentment could he carve into the holy family’s faces now?

Lea’s stricken eyes and grim mouth had not changed in the week since he’d brought her home, and there was no prospect in sight.

Why, Lord? Why Lea?
The doctor, that coarse Dr. Mengele, had
told her she’d never conceive, that she’d been sterilized the summer she turned sixteen—the summer she’d evidenced an obstinate nature.

“Like your mother,” the doctor had told her. “Such flagrant refusal to acknowledge authority is the evil strain that has run rampant through Germany, the very nature that puts our Fatherland at risk. We must weed out those strains.”

Lea had not understood, had dared to beg the doctor to reverse the process, citing her marriage to the older, stable Friederich, his longtime employment as a fine craftsman, how they’d faithfully supported the winter fund, his service to the Fatherland, how very much they wanted to raise children for God and Germany. Dr. Mengele had laughed at her stupidity, her naiveté, and said such simplemindedness was better erased from the New Germany. They’d clearly made no mistake, and there was no reversal possible. He was surprised that a man of Friederich’s caliber had married her.

Friederich pounded his fist into his palm, so angry was he at the cruel and senseless doctor. Lea had not been able to speak at the Institute. She’d fled the building and he behind her, not knowing what had happened. He’d been frantic with worry but determined to get her home. And once he did, she broke down. Such gut-wrenching sobs.

Even now, he wondered if she’d told him all.

A week later, his afternoon pass had not moved her. She sat, staring from the window. He’d waved his hand in front of her face, and she’d not noticed. If she would cry again, he thought that might help. But no more tears came—at least not when he was with her. With Oma, he prayed it was different. Lea would surely let her defenses down with her Oma. She must.

And now he was being deployed. He’d told his commander that his wife was ill and begged that he be allowed to see her one last time. He was not above begging where his wife was concerned. But she’d barely blinked. When he kissed her good-bye she’d leaned into his chest, then pulled back, resignation in the slump of her shoulders.

Friederich sighed, placed the wood on a high shelf, and straightened his workbench. He’d leave everything in order. There was still small satisfaction in that.

He’d pulled the workshop door closed when he noticed the Christkind missing from the large Nativity, the one on display in his shop window.

Heinrich Helphman—certainly. The six-year-old had stolen it twice in the last month. Friederich frowned. The door was always locked. How did he get in? He checked the door. There was no sign of forced entry.
Whatever possesses the child? He must know his parents and the priest will punish him for stealing, even if I do nothing.

If Friederich had all the time in the world, he’d carve a Christkind for the boy to keep, but this one was too valuable to let go, and part of a set—a set that had represented his hopes with Lea more than any other.

Even so, Friederich hadn’t the heart to go after the boy. He’d write Lea and ask her to deal with him or his parents in time. Perhaps it would give her purpose. And if not, it was only wood, after all.

Hilde Breisner, Lea’s Oma, who’d kissed away each hurt since Lea was born, could not mend this one. Lea did not tell her until Friederich had been deployed.

“Did you tell this doctor that your mother was raped? That the pregnancy was not her fault?”

“He knows this!” Lea sobbed in her arms. “He said she must have had ‘that look’ that drives men wild. That she must have wanted it.”

“This is not true!” Oma trembled in anger. But her fury did Lea no good, and her daughter was long dead and could not stand up for herself.

“He said the sterilization process cannot be reversed. That he wouldn’t, even if he could. He said that with such a lineage we would
never be allowed to adopt, no child will be placed in our care. He said I am no more trustworthy than my mother.”

Lea sobbed with such a vengeance that Oma feared for her sanity. Oma rocked with her granddaughter’s head across her breast, back and forth, back and forth, until Lea pulled away and ran from her cottage door, leaving Oma to weep alone.