The Book Thief(122)







THE WAR MAKER





There was the smell of a freshly cut coffin. Black dresses. Enormous suitcases under the eyes. Liesel stood like the rest, on the grass. She read to Frau Holtzapfel that same afternoon. The Dream Carrier, her neighbors favorite.



It was a busy day all around, really.





JULY 27, 1943

Michael Holtzapfel was buried and the book

thief read to the bereaved. The Allies bombed

Hamburgand on that subject, its lucky Im

somewhat miraculous. No one else could carry close to

forty-five thousand people in such a short amount

of time. Not in a million human years.





The Germans were starting to pay in earnest by then. The Fhrer s pimply little knees were starting to shake.



Still, Ill give him something, that Fhrer.



He certainly had an iron will.



There was no slackening off in terms of war-making, nor was there any scaling back on the extermination and punishment of a Jewish plague. While most of the camps were spread throughout Europe, there were some still in existence in Germany itself.



In those camps, many people were still made to work, and walk.



Max Vandenburg was one such Jew.





WAY OF THE WORDS





It happened in a small town of Hitlers heartland.



The flow of more suffering was pumped nicely out, and a small piece of it had now arrived.



Jews were being marched through the outskirts of Munich, and one teenage girl somehow did the unthinkable and made her way through to walk with them. When the soldiers pulled her away and threw her to the ground, she stood up again. She continued.



The morning was warm.



Another beautiful day for a parade.



The soldiers and Jews made their way through several towns and were arriving now in Molching. It was possible that more work needed to be done in the camp, or several prisoners had died. Whatever the reason, a new batch of fresh, tired Jews was being taken on foot to Dachau.



As she always did, Liesel ran to Munich Street with the usual band of onlookers.



Heil Hitler!



She could hear the first soldier from far up the road and made her way toward him through the crowd, to meet the procession. The voice amazed her. It made the endless sky into a ceiling just above his head, and the words bounced back, landing somewhere on the floor of limping Jewish feet.



Their eyes.



They watched the moving street, one by one, and when Liesel found a good vantage point, she stopped and studied them. She raced through the files of face after face, trying to match them to the Jew who wrote The Standover Man and The Word Shaker.



Feathery hair, she thought.



No, hair like twigs. Thats what it looks like when it hasnt been washed. Look out for hair like twigs and swampy eyes and a kindling beard.



God, there were so many of them.



So many sets of dying eyes and scuffing feet.



Liesel searched them and it was not so much a recognition of facial features that gave Max Vandenburg away. It was how the face was actingalso studying the crowd. Fixed in concentration. Liesel felt herself pausing as she found the only face looking directly into the German spectators. It examined them with such purpose that people on either side of the book thief noticed and pointed him out.



Whats he looking at? said a male voice at her side.



The book thief stepped onto the road.



Never had movement been such a burden. Never had a heart been so definite and big in her adolescent chest.



She stepped forward and said, very quietly, Hes looking for me.



Her voice trailed off and fell away, inside. She had to refind itreaching far down, to learn to speak again and call out his name.



Max.



Im here, Max!



Louder.



Max, Im here!



He heard her.





MAX VANDENBURG, AUGUST 1943

There were twigs of hair, just like

Liesel thought, and the swampy eyes

stepped across, shoulder to shoulder

over the other Jews. When they reached

her, they pleaded. His beard

stroked down his face and his mouth

shivered as he said the word,

the name, the girl.

Liesel.





Liesel shrugged away entirely from the crowd and entered the tide of Jews, weaving through them till she grabbed hold of his arm with her left hand.



His face fell on her.



It reached down as she tripped, and the Jew, the nasty Jew, helped her up. It took all of his strength.



Im here, Max, she said again. Im here.



I cant believe . . . The words dripped from Max Vandenburgs mouth. Look how much youve grown. There was an intense sadness in his eyes. They swelled. Liesel . . . they got me a few months ago. The voice was crippled but it dragged itself toward her. Halfway to Stuttgart.

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