Wildflowers of Terezin (25 page)

"I understand."

"I hope you do. Oh, and one more thing, Steffen."

Steffen paused halfway to the front doors, unsure how to thank the older man.

"That was still the best sermon I've ever heard."

"Tak," Steffen answered back softly. "Even if it kills me, right?"

SANKT STEFAN'S KIRKE, KØBENHAVN

SUNDAY AFTERNOON, 10 OKTOBER 1943

It is so hard to believe because it is so hard to obey.

—SØREN KIERKEGAARD

H
anne put her head down against the wind and pulled her scarf around a little more tightly. She still couldn't believe she'd been so foolish, visiting Steffen's church.Foolish! She had just wanted to see him again, to understand his heart and what drove him to do the things he did.

But what had she expected, for him to read from the Torah?

Instead, she'd been struck by a strange story about a prophet who raised a young man from the dead and hit full force by a kind of passion she'd never before seen in Steffen.

She was, however, fairly certain he had not seen her slip into the back of the Lutheran sanctuary. That at least was a relief. The other relief was the familiar smell of candles.If she closed her eyes and didn't listen to any of the strange back-and-forth singing between the pastor and his congregation, she might almost have imagined herself in the synagogue.

But that was a lot of ifs. And more than anything she was quite certain Rabbi Melchior would not have approved, had he known where she had spent this Sunday morning. Mor would not have approved. Aron would've had a heart attack.

Call it simple curiosity. But this felt more like a moth drawn to the candle's flame, and she could not avoid the heart of the words Steffen had read from his strange but Jewish-sounding Scriptures:

"Fear seized them all," he'd read from his big Christian Bible, from up on his podium, at the end of the story where the young man had been raised back to life. "Fear seized them all, and they glorified God, saying, 'A great prophet has arisen among us!' and 'God has visited his people!' "

She was not so naïve as to not recognize many of the names in the reading.
Lukas
they called the evangelist. And before that
Paulus,
the apostle. And of course the reading from Job, the one she knew already. But she wondered at the words of the Greek
Lukas
and those two Jews, as they were recorded in the Christian Bible. How could God himself have visited his people?

If only such a thing could happen,
she thought. The idea actually made her shiver. Or perhaps it was the cold breeze, laden with a hint of drizzle. She hurried her steps to outrun the oncoming weather.

She still couldn't imagine how the Lord had actually visited his people. But just supposing he had, as those Jews in Steffen's scriptures seemed to believe, then Hanne imagined there would then be no Hitler and no deportations, no death camps, and no German troops in the streets of København.Such a visitor would not allow these things, would he? Therefore it could not have happened the way he'd read.

So why did the story keep reverberating in her head, like truth or a jazz melody that played over and over and over?

Even more than that, how in the world had it moved her to tears, as if she were standing suddenly in her mother's kitchen as they sliced onions for dinner? That part baffled her completely. She would have to think on it some more, and she turned the story around and around in her head as she approached the familiar brick buildings of the Bispebjerg campus.

Years and years ago they'd built the hospital at the city outskirts, beyond narrow København streets, shoulder-toshoulder shops, and four-story apartment blocks presided over by dozens of church spires. How strange that she had grown up here in the shadow of all these ornate old churches, yet had never dared to enter one until this morning.

As the pavement grew slick with drizzle, she paused once again to adjust her scarf, and out of the corner of her eye caught sight of a tall man in a dark coat, pausing at just the same time. Familiar? She wasn't sure. But she supposed anyone else had the same right to be walking down
Tagensgade
as well. A woman pushing a stroller with a young boy hanging on her coat crossed by on the other side, along with several young girls and an old man. Nothing out of the ordinary there. Except that when she began walking again, she casually stopped at a shoe repair window to notice a collection of sturdy leather walking shoes, men's shoes at that. Again out of the corner of her eye she noted the man behind her, staring in his own window, and she could see the sign over his head.

Jensen: Tøj til Kvinder.

Jensen's Clothing for Women.

If Hanne hadn't been a Jew in a country where all other Jews were either in hiding or being deported to death camps, she might have thought nothing of it. Or if she didn't hold a forged identity card with another woman's non-Jewish name, she might have shrugged it off. But her mouth went dry as she turned away, knowing that something here was not right. Without waiting she turned and hurried toward the safety of the hospital, and it was all she could manage not to run in panic.

I'll get there,
she told herself, because now she could see the hospital buildings looming larger.
I'll get there, and there won't be anything they can do to stop me.

Now she didn't dare turn around, but she felt the man's eyes on her, closer and closer. Yet even as her heart beat wildly she kept up a normal Sunday stroll, forcing herself to deliberately slow down.

Breathe. Relax. Don't panic. It's nothing.

She didn't believe a word of the lies she told herself. And now she almost wished she had stayed back in the church, perhaps even spoke with Steffen. At the hospital she could lock her borrowed apartment door and hide, but then what?

Finally she entered the comforting embrace of the Bispebjerg campus, where that familiar cluster of buildings told her she was almost home. She ducked under an archway and down a covered walk, her footsteps echoing, then into a service entry where linens from the hospitals were taken.She knew this way better than most. Surely he would not follow her here?

Against her better judgment Hanne casually glanced back around and down the breezeway, waiting for . . . nothing out of the ordinary.

Silly,
she told herself.
He was just out for a walk, the same as you. You're making a lot out of nothing. Why would anyone follow you, anyway?

Still, she waited in the service alcove for just a few more minutes, just to be sure. And when she gingerly stepped out into the breezeway again she kept a wary eye on the path through the campus from the street where she had seen the man. A doctor in a white frock bustled along the path, clipboard in hand. A maintenance man in coveralls pushed a cart laden with tools and towels. Just what she would have expected.

There, see? You were just being paranoid. Everything is under control.

Now she stepped out with even more confidence, back out into the breezeway and the open courtyard. The afternoon drizzle had lightened into a mist, not even enough to justify an umbrella. In this case, a smile of relief would do the job, and Hanne lifted her face to the mist as she took the long way through the gardens to her apartment.

Her little celebration was cut short, however, when she noticed Ann-Grete headed her direction, arms crossed across her chest and a stormy look on her face, as if someone had just died. That, and Ann-Grete wore no coat, even in the chill of the afternoon.

"What's wrong?" Hanne asked the obvious question, but Ann-Grete only shook her head stiffly, grabbed Hanne by the arm, and dragged her away from the center of the plaza.

"Don't ask questions," said Ann-Grete, barely moving her lips. The expression of terror on her face sent a chill up Hanne's spine. "Just walk with me."

"Where?" Hanne was afraid she didn't want to know what had shaken up her friend this badly. "And what in the world is going on?"

Again Ann-Grete shook her head. And her grip on Hanne's arm nearly cut off the circulation.

"They're here, and they're searching your apartment."

"They. You mean—"

"The Gestapo. That awful man who's been in and out of the hospital, asking questions all the time?"

"Wolfschmidt?"

"Him, yes, and four soldiers. They looked like they were determined to find you."

"But how?" Hanne still couldn't believe it.

"I have no idea how they found out. I don't know. All I know is you can't go back to that apartment. Not now."

As numb as she was, it crossed Hanne's mind that the man who had been following her might still be waiting now, perhaps out on the street or at the edge of the Bispebjerg campus, behind a car or a tree. Her legs stiffened.

"Didn't you hear me?" hissed Ann-Grete. "Go wherever your Jewish friends have been going, but you've got to get out of here. You can't pack your bags. I mean now! Nu!"

"But what about you?"

"Forget about me. I can work my way out of this. I can just tell them I was reassigned to your apartment when you escaped, and that I didn't know what was going on. They can't prove anything."

"I don't want you to get in trouble for my sake."