Secrets She Kept (10 page)

HANNAH STERLING

JANUARY 1973

It was nearly five when Carl returned me to Grandfather’s. He stood, cordial, as he waited for Frau Winkler to open the door
 
—as cordial as he’d been all day, but preoccupied. He spoke briefly in German to Frau Winkler, who looked over her shoulder and into the hallway, nodding with understanding. Carl tipped his hat to me before leaving.

I followed Frau Winkler toward the kitchen.

“Dinner is at seven.”

“Thank you. I just wondered if I might make a cup of tea, please. I’m frozen to the bone.”

She filled the kettle and set it on the burner, then pulled a canister from a high shelf and measured out a teaspoon of leaves.

I perched on the stool beside her counter, understanding I was not
welcome to “make myself at home.” “I’m so glad you use real leaves. I don’t much care for tea bags.”

She raised her brows, this time in mock amusement.

“Have you worked for Grandfather long, Frau Winkler?”

She visibly stiffened, as if I’d questioned her regarding something personal, but after a moment’s hesitation answered, “Five years, nearly six.”

“You must know him very well.” Hope rose. I’d no idea she’d been there so long the way Herr Eberhardt had spoken. “I want to get to know him too, but the language is such a barrier. Perhaps you could help me.”

“Help you? What do you mean?”

“Tell me what you know about him, what he likes, what he’s done in life, anything you know about his family
 
—my family, really. Does he ever speak of my mother? Did she have siblings
 
—does she? What happened to Grandmother? I saw her picture
 
—at least I suppose it was her picture, in Mama’s room.”

They seemed like such normal questions, but Frau Winkler fumbled her spooning of the tea into the pot and looked as if I’d asked her to steal across the Berlin Wall. She didn’t look at me, but busied herself scooping up the spilled tea.

“Perhaps Grandfather told you. My mother recently passed
 
—the middle of September, actually. I’m sorry to say that I didn’t know Mama very well, never understood her. I didn’t even know until recently that I have a grandfather, let alone one who lives in Germany. So, you see, I really know nothing about my own family. I’m anxious to learn all I can.”

Frau Winkler continued to fuss with the teapot, pour the tea, and finally pushed me a cup with a spoon and a sugar bowl. She opened her mouth to speak but, looking up and over my shoulder, froze, clamping her lips into a grim line.

“Good afternoon, Frau Winkler. Fräulein Sterling, I presume.” A man who looked to be nearly as old as Grandfather, but taller and with a full shock of thick white hair, filled the door to the hallway.

Startled by his bigger-than-life presence, I didn’t speak, but caught the sudden fade and rise of color in Frau Winkler’s cheek.

“I am Dr. Peterson, your Grossvater’s physician.”

“Dr. Peterson.” I rose, extending my hand, but he stood at attention and bowed his head slightly, old school. I half expected him to click his heels.

“Herr Eberhardt told me you had arrived. I am honored to meet you.”

He nodded again.

“Thank you for taking such good care of my grandfather.” What else could I say?

He looked slightly amused. “Herr Sommer has been my patient
 
—and colleague
 
—for many years.”

“Then you know him well.”

“I have attended the Sommer family since 1930.”

“And you’re still practicing, over forty years? That’s amazing.” Immediately I realized what I’d said might offend. “I mean, it’s wonderful to maintain relationships with clients so long. I’m sure he counts you as his friend as well, from everything Herr Eberhardt told me.”

“We have a long history.”

This was more like it.

He gave a half bow, charming. “I will go to Herr Sommer now and see you this evening at dinner.”

“I look forward to it.” I smiled my best Southern smile.

The moment he left I turned back to my tea, but started when he spoke again, having reappeared in the doorway.

“Any questions you may have
 
—concerning your Grossvater
 
—you may ask me. My long and intimate acquaintance with the Sommer family should qualify me to explain all you might need to know. I am also able to translate any particular questions you might have.” He smiled ingratiatingly toward me, but his eyes frosted over Frau Winkler, who’d busied herself washing a pot that didn’t need washing.

I had the distinct feeling I was being reprimanded, or warned. “Thank you, Doctor, I’ll keep that in mind.”

His departure sucked the warmth from the kitchen. Frau Winkler refused to look my way, did not open her mouth, even when I attempted to resume our conversation.

What a long and wearisome day since Carl had picked me up
 
—and confusing
 
—even if a mostly pleasant one. The sights and sounds of Berlin intrigued me, but the people and their expressions, verbal and nonverbal, made my head swim. I didn’t know if I’d imagined apprehension lurking around every lamppost. I carried my cup of tea upstairs and sank into the wingback chair by my window, closing my eyes, trying to fit together the pieces of the day’s puzzle.

Nobody in this household seems happy. They avoid one another like the plague, and every time I open my mouth it feels like I’m pirouetting on eggshells.
I just want to know about Mama. Why did she leave? Why did she never come back or tell me about Grandfather? Why hasn’t he asked about her? Why hasn’t he asked about me?

Dinner with Dr. Peterson felt just as strained as dinner with Herr Eberhardt the night before.

“You enjoyed seeing Berlin today, Fräulein?”

“Yes, very much. Please thank Grandfather for me. I appreciate all the arrangements he’s made for my well-being.”

Dr. Peterson nodded, but didn’t say a word to Grandfather.

After Frau Winkler served the meat and root vegetables, I tried again. “I’m very interested in my family, Dr. Peterson. Can you tell me something about them, or ask Grandfather if there are family albums I might look through?”

Both men shifted in their seats, and Grandfather’s face clouded as he first addressed Dr. Peterson. Dr. Peterson replied at some length with Grandfather in German. It seemed he questioned him, that they
disagreed, perhaps negotiated, but that finally Grandfather gave an order
 
—almost an ultimatum.

“Fräulein Sterling, your Grandfather realizes that it is natural you would like to know more about your family, but the loss of those dearest is a very painful subject for him. It has been the cause of much heartache in his life, the reason for the serious decline in his health.”

He sounds like Daddy talking about Mama.

“Nevertheless, he does not intend to disappoint you. After dinner he wishes me to show you his library and the family album. They will reveal happier days, before your Grossmutter’s death, before the war. Perhaps then you will understand your Mutter’s family better, and all that my friend has lost.”

“Thank you; I truly appreciate that. And thank you, Grandfather
 
—
danke schön
. I can’t tell you what this means to me.”
Picture albums aren’t answers, but they’re a beginning.

Grandfather nodded, his brow creased, as if he understood at least part of what I’d said.

The rest of the meal passed in silence. The moment I set my dessert spoon down, Grandfather stood and spoke softly.
“Schlaf gut, Hannah.”

“He is wishing you a good sleep.”

“
Schlaf gut
, Grandfather,” I returned, so pleased to communicate with him directly.

“Grossvater,”
Dr. Peterson corrected.

“
Danke
, Doctor.
Schlaf gut, Grossvater
.” I smiled at Grandfather.

He nodded his tentative approval, picked up a cane from the floor beside his chair
 
—a cane I’d not noticed before
 
—and made his way through the door and up the stairs.

Sitting alone with the intimidating Dr. Peterson had clearly been Grandfather’s design, but I forged ahead. “Dr. Peterson, what caused the rift between my mother and grandfather?”

“You have no idea?”

“None. Before December I didn’t even know that I had a grandfather.
Mama claimed all her family had died in the war. She never spoke of them
 
—not one of them.”

Dr. Peterson sighed. “It’s a long story, and I’m afraid it does not cast your mother in a pleasant light.”

“My mother and I were not close. I’d say . . . she kept a part of herself shut off from Daddy and me.”

“Your father was an American soldier, I understand.”

Now I was uncomfortable and looked away. “Yes,” I forced a smile, wondering if Dr. Peterson might have any idea as to the identity of my real father, wondering if I dared ask.

“Your mother was an unusual young woman. I admit that I was surprised to learn she had married an American. It must have been soon after the war ended.”

Was he quizzing me? “Yes, I believe it was. But my parents never really shared that part of their lives with me.”

“As though she had something to hide?”

I thought about that. “Maybe. I don’t know. She certainly hid her father from me. I don’t think Daddy knew anything about him, either.”

He nodded. “Your Grossvater commissioned an attorney, you know
 
—Heir Eberhardt’s predecessor
 
—to locate your mother some years after the war. He found her in America and wrote to her. She never answered.”

“That was the envelope that led me to Grandfather. I just don’t understand why she didn’t respond, why she cut off communication like that. I’d have thought she’d have been glad to hear from her father.”

“Perhaps your mother was afraid.”

“Afraid of Grandfather? That’s hard to imagine. He’s so . . .”

“So?”

“So feeble, and kind.” I spread my hands.

“This is true.”

“Then?”

“I am not certain Wolfgang will appreciate all that I am going to tell you, but it is clear to me that you are a determined young woman.”

I straightened my shoulders, relieved that someone at last took me seriously and glad that I’d given the impression I wanted.

“Come, let us see what we can find in the library.”

The library door opened to a smallish, fairly dark room, more like a study. Floor-to-ceiling bookcases lined two walls. In the center of the room stood a massive mahogany desk polished to a high sheen, covered by a blotter holding an ornate gold pen and inkstand. Two large wingback chairs in black leather flanked a fireplace. Everything in the room spoke of order and sobriety and looked as if it had not been used for a very long time. Not that there were dust mites floating
 
—nothing of the sort. But it looked more like a museum
 
—a place to see rather than to work in.

“What did Grandfather do for a living
 
—before he retired?”

“Your Grossvater has not needed to work for many years.”

Grandfather
 
—wealthy?
“But . . .”

“He worked for the government in younger days
 
—a well-positioned clerk. He has not squandered his finances through lavish living. Sadly, since your mother left him, he has had no one with whom to share his life.”

“But that had to be at least twenty-seven years ago.”

“A long time to live alone.” He ran his fingers over a shelf of thick books, stopped, and pulled a slim volume from the case. “Here you will see your family, Fräulein.”

For the next hour Dr. Peterson pointed out the people in photographs
 
—many of them stilted and posed, but a few more candid snapshots taken at odd moments or family events.

“This is your Grossvater when he was a young man, and your Grossmutter, when they married. She died in the late thirties
 
—of cancer.”

“Like Mama.” Grandmother looked like Mama, but smiling
 
—in all the pictures, smiling. How I wished I’d known her.

“The cancer tends to run in families. You do not resemble her so much
 
—a little, maybe.”

“No. But I don’t look much like my daddy, either.” I held my breath.

“No?” He studied me. “Your name . . . Hannah. It is an interesting name. A family name from your father’s side?”

“No, I don’t think so. Mama just said it was a name she’d always liked.”

Dr. Peterson’s brow creased, but he pressed on. “And here is Rudy
 
—Rudolph, your Mutter’s older brother.” He sighed. “A fine young man. Such a loss to Herr Sommer. Rudy’s death stole the wind from Wolfgang.”

“How did he die?”

“Killed in the war, as were thousands upon thousands of good men.”

The next picture showed the same young man in a uniform, proud, even arrogant. “Was he a Nazi?”

“A Nazi?” Dr. Peterson adjusted his glasses. “Why do all Americans think that every German was a Nazi?”

“Excuse me, but I didn’t say that. I just asked
 
—”

“He was a soldier in the Wehrmacht. Every young man served, doing his duty for the Führer and the Fatherland.”

“Boys in America were drafted too.”

“Drafted?”

“Conscripted.”

“Rudy was not conscripted. He joined eagerly, to help create a New Germany.”

Dr. Peterson sounded so proud of Rudy. I didn’t want to be rude, but that gave me the creeps. “What about Mama? What was it like for girls in Germany then?”

“They joined the Young Girls League, then the BDM
 
—the Bund Deutscher Mädel, a female division of the Hitler Youth for girls ages fourteen through eighteen. A very important part of a girl’s education at that time.” He closed the album. “The organizations provided excellent training for the physical and mental growth of young people . . . sorely missing today.”