The German Wife(50)

“I’m worried about Georg. Lydia said some of the boys may have been teasing him about Mayim.”

“Ah,” Jürgen said, wincing. Then he sighed heavily. “I’ll put him to bed tonight and talk to him, man-to-man.”

For the first time in a long time, the six of us were home for a meal. We sat at the end of the long dining table in the formal dining room, Laura happily tucked between Adele and Mayim, Georg beside me opposite them, and Jürgen at the head of the table.

I was struck by the warmth that burned in my chest at the simple pleasure of us all being together around a table spread with good food. Adele served juicy slices of roast chicken, while Mayim and I began to dish out the vegetables. But when she tried to ladle carrots onto Georg’s plate, he pushed the spoon away aggressively. His expression was sullen, and he refused to look at her.

“What’s wrong, little buddy?” she asked him gently. “Aren’t you feeling well?”

“Georg,” I said, surprised. “You love carrots.”

He looked up, then around the table, his eyes filling with tears as he flicked his gaze between me and Jürgen and Adele. I noticed then that he was going to some lengths to avoid looking at Mayim, dropping his eyes to the table every time they might pass her.

“I don’t want carrots either,” Laura said, as if she sensed a chance to avoid her vegetables.

“Everyone is having carrots,” Jürgen said firmly, but then Georg burst into noisy sobs, pushed his chair back, and ran from the room. Mayim and I exchanged startled glances, as Jürgen also pushed his chair away from the table. “Let me talk to him.”

I left Laura with Adele and Mayim and followed Jürgen and Georg down the hallway, but lurked outside Georg’s bedroom, out of sight.

“What is it, Georg?” Jürgen asked softly.

“Papa,” Georg said hoarsely. “Is it true? Is Mayim a dirty Jew?”

There was a long pause. I could hear my pulse in my ears as I waited for Jürgen to respond.

“Please don’t use those words,” Jürgen said carefully. “But yes, it is true that Mayim is Jewish. Why are you worried about that, Georg?”

“Mrs. Muller says that the Jews are the enemies of the Führer. Is she going to hurt us?”

“Of course she won’t hurt us!” Jürgen said, flustered and frustrated.

“But the boys say that if she’s in our house she will steal our money and make us sick.” Georg gave a shuddering sob. “Papa, Hans won’t play with me at school because he said I have dirty Jew germs. He said we might even die!”

“That’s silly, Georg. You know that Mayim isn’t dangerous.”

“But Hans said—”

“I know what Hans said,” Jürgen said abruptly. I could almost hear the cogs of my husband’s mind turning. To defend Mayim was to invite trouble from the Gestapo. To not defend Mayim was to fracture our family. He paused, then called helplessly, “Sofie?”

I came around the corner and joined him in the room. Jürgen was seated at the end of Georg’s bed. I sat beside Georg’s pillow. He sat up and threw his arms around me, suddenly weeping anew.

“Mama,” I heard him whimper. “I don’t want Mayim to give me carrots anymore.”

I wrapped my arm around him and looked over his head at Jürgen. My husband’s shoulders slumped as he stared down at the carpet.

We gave Georg the option to return to the table to eat his carrots. He told us he just wanted to go to bed. Tears in my eyes, I kissed him good-night and let him have his way. By the time we emerged from Georg’s room, Mayim was in her own room, and her door was closed.

“Let me put Laura to bed and then I’ll see myself out,” Adele said quietly. “It sounds like you two need to talk.”

“Thank you, Aunt Adele,” Jürgen said, and he bent to kiss her cheek.

We retreated into the study with a bottle of wine. I locked the door behind us, then wandered past his heaving bookshelves, over toward the armchairs in the corner. The study had grown dusty with Jürgen away so much. I hated to clean and we could have afforded a housekeeper, but I couldn’t figure out how to bring someone into the sanctuary of our home without bringing Nazi ideology with them.

There was simply no escaping it.

I dropped myself into an armchair, stretching my neck to look at the ornate plastering on the ceiling.

“We could leave Germany,” I blurted suddenly. Jürgen was uncorking the wine at his desk, but he paused and looked up at me in surprise.

“Where would we go?”

“Adele has been trying to convince Mayim to go to her grandfather and Moshe in Krakow. We could pack up and leave Berlin behind.”

“We’re going to uproot our entire family and move to Poland just because Mayim’s grandfather lives there?” Jürgen said wryly, as he poured us each a glass of wine. I slumped. It was a terrible idea. “I don’t love the idea of Poland. Neither one of us speaks Polish, for a start. But we could think about leaving Germany.”

“Then where would we go?”

“England? My English is basic, but you know I’d pick it up quickly. You could help me.”

“Or France,” I suggested, since we both also spoke rudimentary French. We stared at one another, as if we were assessing just how possible this was. “How would we survive?”