The German Wife(80)

I had just slipped back beneath the covers of my bed with Georg and Gisela when the roar of an engine sounded. A car door opened, and there was a brief moment of silence before I heard shouting outside my villa.

I sprang out of bed, rushing toward the window to crack it open just a little. The icy air rushed in, and so did the sound of the Gestapo at Adele’s front door.

“Open the door, Mrs. Rheinberg!”

How much could she bear?

“Have you got the wrong house, young man?” Adele called from her bedroom window. She sounded stubborn, irritated...and weak. “This is Adele Rheinberg. Mrs. Adele Rheinberg. I am eighty-six years old. Do you really have business waking up an eighty-six-year-old woman in the middle of the night?”

“You’ll need to let us in, Mrs. Rheinberg!”

There was a long pause.

“No,” Adele called back, almost thoughtfully. “No, I don’t think I will.”

Cursing, I ran down the stairs, pulled on a coat, and stepped outside my front door. I made it to the hedge before Dietger came running toward me.

“Sofie, go back inside,” he hissed, pointing to my door. “This isn’t about you.”

“What’s happening with Adele?” I demanded. “She’s an old woman, Dietger! They have no business with her. Please go find out what’s wrong.”

“We need to let this play out, Sofie.” He sighed, shaking his head as he glanced toward her house. He dropped his voice, then admitted, “I don’t even know why they’re here. I didn’t call them.”

“This is your last warning, Mrs. Rheinberg,” someone shouted.

If Adele answered this time, I couldn’t hear her. I took a step past Dietger, out onto the sidewalk, just in time to see Adele’s front door open. It wasn’t her on the other side, but the woman from the studio apartment on the ground floor, looking bewildered and disheveled as the large contingent of Gestapo filed past her. My panic clawed at my throat and left me flushing hot. I took a step toward her house.

“Sofie,” Dietger said. He was much closer than I’d realized, and his voice was low. “Go home. Please. Let them handle this.”

“But she’s a little old lady,” I said, and only then did I realize that I was sobbing, and my feet were so cold they were burning. I looked down and realized I was barefoot, standing in the light dusting of snow. I sobbed again and looked at Dietger—the closest thing I could find to a friendly face on that dark street. “She hasn’t done anything wrong.”

“Perhaps she’s suspected of disloyalty to the Reich?” Even he sounded unconvinced. I took another step toward the house. This time, Dietger’s hand caught my elbow. He gripped it firmly.

“Sofie, please,” he said flatly. Then he dropped his voice. “I have to report any suspicious activity and even a hint of suspicious activity from you. Putting yourself right in the middle of a Gestapo operation is the very definition of suspicious activity.” He tugged me toward my own house. “Go back inside, Sofie. Go inside. Please. You can’t help her.”

I tugged at his arm but he was gripping me hard, determined to save me from myself.

“Damn you to hell, Dietger,” I choked out. He propelled me toward my house—not with malice, but with determination.

“Surely it would be more comfortable for you in the warm...” It was so cold that when he spoke, his breath escaped as mist. I shook my head, craning my neck toward Adele’s building. Would they drag her out? And Mayim too? Would the two of them go kicking and screaming? Would they go silently defiant?

I wanted to go inside to get some shoes...some socks...something to protect my feet, but I didn’t dare in case I missed something, and I was too anxious to even sit down, to take the pressure off the burning skin of my ice-cold feet. But minutes began to pass, and the street and the building fell completely silent. Time was elastic. In a city that had been on fire for days, the whole world seemed to have fallen asleep.

“How long has it been?” I asked Dietger eventually. My teeth were chattering so violently it was hard to speak. He looked at his watch, then shifted awkwardly.

“Uh...close to fifteen minutes...?”

Just then, we heard boots on the ground, and I looked up to see the Gestapo filing out of Adele’s house—empty-handed. Had she won? For just a moment, I felt a flare of pride and hope—maybe she’d convinced them to leave her be. Maybe she’d even talked them into leaving without searching her house. Maybe...

Dietger held up a hand to me to indicate I should stay on my front porch. Then he jogged quickly over to one of the cars at the curb. He spoke quietly with one of the men. Then his shoulders slumped as if he’d suddenly exhaled. The streetlight above his head brought the shock and the sadness on his face into sharp relief. A feeling of dread hit me so hard, my knees almost buckled.

I ran past Dietger. Past the Gestapo officers, who were sliding back into their black cars. I ran through Adele’s lobby and through the smashed interior door into her apartment.

I found her on the floor in her bedroom, lying on her back by the window. Had the Gestapo seen her collapse? Had they even tried to help her?

“Adele,” I choked out, dropping to my knees beside her. I took her shoulders in my hands and I shook her limp body. “Adele, please. Please wake up.” My breath caught on a sob. “Adele. Oma. I can’t do this without you.”