A Feather on the Water(85)

She took the list to show to Father Josef. She wanted to know what he thought of the bribery the army was resorting to. He was in the chapel, clearing the altar table after Mass.

“It feels all wrong,” she said, as he scanned the names. “I wonder how many of them would have signed up without the extra rations?”

“Probably no more than a few dozen,” the priest replied. “Everybody’s worried about what life will be like when they get back there, but the thought of having two months’ worth of food gives them courage.”

“Do you think it’s wrong?”

He hesitated before replying, rubbing his beard with his fingers. “It’s not a simple matter of what’s right and what’s wrong. There are thousands of DPs across the occupied territories. They all need feeding and housing. It can’t go on indefinitely. And with other countries refusing to take them . . .” He trailed off, shaking his head. “I’m not saying I like what the army is doing—but I understand why they’re doing it.” He glanced at the list in his hand. “These people have made their choice. No one is being forced to get on that train.”

“But it feels like I’ve failed them, sending them to a place where they could be worse off than they are here.”

“That’s understandable. The trouble is there’s no way of knowing what daily life is like there now. It’s almost impossible to get firsthand information. I’ve written countless letters to the bishop’s office in Warsaw, but I never get a reply.”

Martha’s insides clenched. Was that why she’d heard nothing from Stefan? Was it possible that he had written to her, but his letters had never arrived? The thought of that was unbearable. “Do you think letters to the West are being intercepted? Censored?”

“Yes—both, I should think. And the Communists want to crush religion. I don’t even know if the bishop’s office still exists. I don’t suppose the government would want a person like me knowing what was going on.” He shrugged. “I’m probably on some blacklist.”

Martha nodded. No doubt he would be seen as a troublemaker, this priest who had been sent to Dachau for his outspoken views about the Nazis.

“So, you can’t go back?”

“Well, I could, of course. But it’s likely I’d be arrested the moment I stepped off the train.” He pressed his lips together, the tuft of gray above his chin coming up to meet his mustache. “Don’t misunderstand me—I’m not afraid of going to prison. But I think God would rather I was here, doing what I can for the people who are still in the camp.”

“Does it worry you to think of there being no church for the DPs to go to back in Poland?”

“I think of little else. When I listen to the radio, I get a sense of real evil coming from the mouths of men like Stalin. I’ve been trying to prepare people for what it might be like when they go back, encouraging them to meet in each other’s homes for secret fellowship if the churches are closed.” His eyes ran over the altar table, where the empty chalice sat, along with the plate scattered with bread crumbs. “It’s all too easy to lose your faith if you’re trying to practice it alone. It’s like a coal falling out of the fire: it soon goes cold.”

Martha thought about how quickly she had lost habits that had seemed like second nature when she and her grandmother had stopped going to their neighborhood church in New Orleans. “You don’t think it’s possible to go on believing unless you’re with others who share those beliefs?”

“It’s possible, yes. But it’s not easy.” He grunted. “Not even if you’re a priest. That’s one thing I learned in Dachau: if I had just one or two others to talk to, to pray with, it built me up. The times when I was all alone were the hardest. But the other thing Dachau taught me was that they can take everything away from you except what’s in here.” He raised his hand to his chest. “It’s like the memory of someone you love: you carry that inside yourself always—even if you can’t be with them.”

He must have seen the expression that flitted across her face. She wondered if Stefan had spoken to the priest about her, in the confessional perhaps. Because the look he gave her was one of such compassion—as if he knew her pain.

“You know, I pray for you every day: for all of you.”

“Well . . . thank you.” God knows we need it. She’d almost said the words out loud. But that would have sounded flippant. “I did go to church when I was a little girl: to a Catholic church. I thought it was so beautiful—the candles and the statues and all of that.” There was no need to tell him that, at the age of twelve, she’d started to think of religion as being like believing in fairies and Santa Claus.

“Do you still pray?”

The directness of his question caught her by surprise. There had been many times—especially since coming to Germany—when she had shot silent, fervent requests like arrows into the sky. Why? She couldn’t answer that. “I suppose I do, in a way,” she murmured.

“God hears those prayers.”

“Even from people who don’t know what they believe?”

“You believe in love, don’t you? You spend all day, every day, caring for people in need. You didn’t have to take that path—you chose to. And that kind of love is the essence of what God is.”