White Rose Black Forest(31)

Seeing his daughter’s downcast face, he went on. “I’m proud of you for wanting to fight, Franka. But the best thing to do is just hold on. The National Socialists are not going to last forever. They’re steering us toward war. It’s as inevitable as the sun coming in the morning, or the dark at night. It’s going to take a lot to oust them, but they will lose in the end. And when they do, our victory will be our survival. As long as we remain true to ourselves and don’t let them scar our souls, then we will have won.”

“But at what cost, Father?” Franka shook her head. “I’m tired of feeling afraid all the time.”

“We will get through this, as a family. I promise you. Your mother is watching over us every day.”

Franka wanted to agree with him but didn’t feel her mother’s presence in her life anymore. The memories were slipping through her fingers.

The facade of Nazi civility crumbled when they unleashed their attack dogs on Kristallnacht. They used the murder of a German diplomat by a seventeen-year-old Jewish boy to unleash the full pent-up rage of their thugs. The Propaganda Ministry organized a series of demonstrations that spread throughout the country like a disease. From the roof of her house, Franka watched with growing horror the mobs and storm troopers attacking Jewish-owned businesses. Almost every local Nazi turned out to throw bricks or firebombs, to intimidate or even to kill. And she saw Daniel, a swastika on his arm, directing the mob into Greenberg’s bakery. Herr Greenberg was dragged onto the street and beaten until his body went still.

The next day the newspapers spoke of the justified vengeance of an outraged people. The journalists gloated that at last the Jews were receiving the punishment they deserved for years of unspecified abuses against the German people. The editorials warned against the squeamish opinions of people who disapproved of the heroic actions of the mobs. Such liberal opinions were dismissed as delicate and sentimental. The journalists warned their readers to report to the proper authorities any cross attitudes and decried any German who could not recognize the glorious times that they were living in.

Two days later the government levied a fine of one billion marks on German Jews for the destruction of Kristallnacht.

Tens of thousands of Jews were sent to concentration camps—mysterious prisons known in whispers as KZs by the Germans who dared to speak about them. Franka’s father reminded her of the stories he’d heard about the first camp, at Dachau, stories that seemed beyond doubt now. The Nazis had revealed their savage nature but did not lose support. The Hitler Youth still sang their songs as they jogged through town. The members of the League of German Girls still sowed their swastika flags and giggled about “handsome Adolf,” the monster in chief. The lackeys of the National Socialists still strutted through town with their heads held high and their Nazi badges shining in the sun. Millions throughout the country still greeted one other by saluting the führer. The German people still seemed entranced by the hold the Nazis had taken of them.

Life went on, despite the injustices and horrors that were now the daily currency in Germany. Franka had finished her training and been offered a job in Munich. Somehow, people were still graduating college, looking for jobs, and contemplating moving between cities. With everything that the Nazi regime had imposed upon them, the Gerber family was still trying to function, but even that was about to change.

Fredi was getting worse.

At the end of that summer in 1939, they talked to him about the hospital—they couldn’t avoid the topic any longer. The sun was setting, beaming ethereal light over an infinite horizon, casting the leaves of the forest all around them in gold. Fredi was in his wheelchair. He was almost as tall as Thomas now, but his limbs were thin and bent, his legs almost beyond use. He was playing with a toy train, running it on his thighs. His choo-choo noises were interrupted every few seconds by the sounds of his own chuckling.

“Fredi?”

“Father, what’s wrong? Why are you crying?”

“It’s because I love you so much, Fredi.” He turned to look at Franka. “We both do.”

“More than anything else in the world,” she said.

“And I love you,” he said.

Franka hugged him, felt his spindly arms gripping her and his soft kiss upon her cheek. She tried to speak but couldn’t get the words out. She couldn’t believe they were giving charge of Fredi to an institution. She couldn’t fathom that this would have happened if their mother were still alive.

“How do you feel?” Thomas said.

“I feel great.” Fredi smiled.

“Your arms—they don’t hurt?”

“No, I feel good.”

Fredi was always happy. It was all he knew. The world could not sour the wonder of his spirit. His smile remained through the pain, and through the hospital stays, through things that almost no one else could endure. His smile never left. Everyone knew him on his all-too-regular visits to the hospital. The nurses adored him. Some of the doctors—the ones with Nazi badges on their lapels—stopped just short of openly dismissing him, of expressing their resentment at having to treat someone that the government had deemed an “idiot” and “unworthy of life.”

Franka knelt beside him. The sun was still warm, even as the dusk settled in. He seemed to know something was going on. His intuition was sharper than hers. She went to speak, but he beat her to it.