The Ragged Edge of Night(63)

“I’m not ill,” he says. “I’m perfectly well.” He almost says, M?belbauer expects me to tell our children—and all the children in this town—how to be good National Socialists. How to worship Adolf Hitler above even God and Jesus. It’s enough to rob any man of his sleep. But he stops himself. He remembers his dignified, very proper wife saying, He shits on the women of this town. The last thing she needs now is a reminder of Herr M?belbauer.

“Well,” Elisabeth says at length, “even if you aren’t ill, you should try for another hour or two of sleep. You look pale and tired.”

He tries to smile. “I feel pale and tired.”

“Boys,” Elisabeth calls, “come out of that shed. Go get ready for breakfast. It will be time soon for—”

“Look, Mother!” Paul emerges from the shed, running, holding something up above his head as if in victory. “Look what we found! What is it?”

It is small, papery. Newly scraped clean.

Anton pulls the workbook from Paul’s hand as the boy passes him. He presses it against his chest, cover side in, as Paul gives a wordless whine of disappointment.

“What is that thing, Anton?” Elisabeth fixes him with her eyes. The air has gone still around her.

“It’s nothing important.” To the boys, he says, “Do as your mother tells you.”

They grumble, but they run upstairs. Elisabeth is in no mood to deal with recalcitrance; the boys can sense it, and they are wise enough not to take the chance.

Alone now at the foot of the stairs, Elisabeth and Anton watch one another in silence, she wary, he anxious. He slides the workbook down toward his pocket, but the motion only makes her press her lips together, and her face reddens.

“What is it?” she says quietly.

“Only my workbook, from my Wehrmacht days.”

“Why are you so quick to hide it?”

“I’m not hiding it,” he says, edging the thing farther from her sight.

She holds out her hand. “If you’re not trying to hide it, then let me see.”

What can he do? He passes the book to Elisabeth. She turns it over, cover side up, and for a moment she sees nothing unusual. A look of mild confusion crosses her face, a pinch of her brow. Then she sees—she understands. She stares in horror at the place where the swastika should be. Slowly, she lifts her face to meet Anton’s eye, mute and afraid.

She returns the book to his hand. Anton prays this will be the end of it, nothing more will come. But then she brushes past him, moving stiffly, and enters the shed.

“Elisabeth, wait…” He hurries after her, too late to alter fate’s course. He has left the trunk open; its lock lies undone upon the shelf. Elisabeth approaches the open chest as if it might contain a nest of vipers. When she looks inside, Anton thinks she might have preferred to find a writhing knot of snakes than the musical instruments.

She whirls, stares at him, her mouth hanging open. “You never sold them. I thought—”

He shakes his head.

“My God, Anton—where has the money come from, then?” She glances at the defaced workbook in his hand. He can see the moment when realization dawns, the moment when she fits every piece of his puzzle together. Her face flushes red with her rapid pulse. It glows like a fire in the darkness.

Elisabeth all but runs from the shed. The nightdress flutters in her wake, a bird’s startled wings. She bends as she passes Anton, fitting herself against the doorframe so she will not touch any part of him. She takes the stairs two at a time, as if the Devil is after her—as if the Devil stands there in the yard, helpless and bewildered, curling the workbook in his clenched fist.

“Wait,” Anton calls up to her. He runs up the stairs, but he can’t catch her. “Listen to what I have to say. Please, Elisabeth—only listen!”

Inside the house, the children are dressed, though their hair is still uncombed. They look up from the table, where they are helping to make breakfast, spreading butter on slices of bread.

“You aren’t going to school today.” Elisabeth speaks shortly, words clipped and angry. Paul and Maria cheer, but Al looks pale; he glances from Anton to Elisabeth. “Pack up your clothes in your knapsacks. We are going away.”

Al says at once, “Is Anton coming with us?”

Elisabeth doesn’t answer him, only goes to her room and shuts the door. He can hear her opening and closing drawers, the rattle of closet hangers as she pulls her dresses down.

Anton taps on the door. “Elisabeth, please. May I come in?”

She doesn’t answer. He decides to take her silence for acceptance, and he lets himself in.

“Don’t do this,” he says quietly when the door is shut behind him. “My heart will break. I should have told you all about this; I’m sorry I kept it from you.”

She wheels from the closet, crumpling a dress in her distressed hands, crushing it against her chest. “And what do you imagine I would have said, if you had told me?” Her eyes are burning with outraged disbelief. “How could you think it was safe, Anton? How could you think it was wise?”

The door creaks open; the children are clustered there, Paul and Maria staring at them both with wide, teary eyes. Albert tugs at their hands, but the younger children will not look away.

“I didn’t think it was safe.”