The Highway Kind(48)

“Ferdie,” she said softly and reached out to touch my gloved hand, very briefly. “Thank you. You are our friend, our good friend, and I’m grateful to you. Some people say it’s better not to know too much, but I’ve never thought so.”

She paused, but I could tell she wasn’t through, and I waited. On the far side of the park, I heard the throb of a twelve-cylinder motor; the big car that had stopped at her house was pulling away.

“You had a visitor,” I said, nodding toward the fading sound. “Someone brought you a fancy basket.”

That made her lips compress again and for the first time, a small light came into her eyes—not a pleasant light, though. She made a little snorting sound and tossed her head.

“Them,” she said. “He’s not been dead a month, and the courtship begins. There are half a dozen at least, and more to come, I’m sure.”

That shocked me for a moment. I hadn’t thought of it. But of course, a young widow, and a famous one, a person valuable for her fame...I was sufficiently taken aback by the situation that I missed what she said next.

“Bitte?” I said, and she looked at me sharp, like a governess.

“I said I won’t do anything,” she repeated. She saw my face, and her expression relaxed. “I’m grateful to know, Ferdinand—and so grateful for your friendship. But...” She stopped for a moment and looked at me with great penetration, as though she could see through me to the row of town houses behind me. She turned round to the pram and bent, fumbled among the blankets, came out with a handbag. This she opened and took out a piece of paper, which she handed to me through the bars.

It was an envelope, folded in half. I spread it out; it was addressed to Bernd Rosemeyer et Ux—et uxor; that meant “and wife”—and the address in the upper corner was of the Chase Morgan Bank, New York City. The envelope was empty, and I looked up at her, bewildered.

She took a deep breath and let it out in a white wisp.

“We went to America last year, Bernie and I.”

“Yes?”

“We opened a bank account in New York while we were there.” She nodded at the envelope and waited for me to grasp the implication, which took only a moment.

“Oh,” I said, realization hitting me like a blow in the stomach. They’d meant—maybe—to emigrate. To move to America. Leave Germany.

“Oh,” she echoed with a mild irony. “Yes.” She nodded again at the empty envelope. “The bank sends us a statement of the account each month. That one arrived a few days ago. I didn’t feel up to doing anything about it, so I left it on the little desk in my bedroom. Yesterday, I found some energy at last, and began to tidy things up a little. That was still on the desk—but it was open, and empty.”

I took hold of the iron railing with my free hand and felt the cold spread through my body.

“Your bedroom,” I said. “Your maid...”

“No. I don’t let her go in there. And—” She took the envelope from me and, with one brisk movement, tucked it back in her bag. “Why would she take such a thing?”

Who would? Someone who recognized that that paper was a statement of intent as well as money and had taken it as evidence.

“One of your—your suitors?” I managed.

“Perhaps. Maybe one of their minders; the suitors”—her mouth twisted at the word—“the ones who belong to the party always bring at least one, maybe two or three men with them. Like a knight in the old times, coming with squires to show how important he is.”

She’d meant that as a wry joke, and I smiled a little in response. It was true; all the high-ranking Nazis trailed retinues in their wake.

“Don’t worry about me, Ferdinand.” She leaned forward, her eyes intense, and wrapped her own bare hand around my gloved one where it grasped the fence. “They won’t harm me, and they can’t force me to marry. But I have family here...” Her other hand rose, gesturing to the world outside the palisades. “My parents, my brother, my grandmother...and of course...” She glanced over her shoulder at the pram and its snug bundle. The child—quite invisible—wore a woolly knit cap with an enormous red bobble on it that trembled in the slight wind.

“If I left—” Another deep breath. “Well. There’s nothing to leave for, is there? Not without Bernie.” She closed her eyes briefly, then opened them.

“But if I were to go to the newspapers, if you and I were to tell what you’ve found out—it might damage Eberan and the others...God damn their souls!” she burst out. She stood with her fists clenched, trembling. I said nothing, and after a moment, she got hold of herself again.

“It might,” she said, her words clipped off like bits of wire. “But it might damage me and my family a lot more. The newspapers accusing me of betraying Germany, planning to leave, making up stories. Auto Union has a relationship with the Reich; they wouldn’t suffer me to slander them. Or you.”

There was a long silent moment between us. I coughed and bowed my head.

“You’re right,” I said quietly. “If you should change your mind, though...”

“I won’t,” she said, and she reached for the handle of the pram. “Bernie never looked back—I won’t either.”