Annelies полностью

“A pinch,” Margot answers.

“Well, another pinch won’t hurt. Anne, go set the table, please.”

“But I’m scraping the carrots, Mummy.”

“Margot can finish that. Now go do as I say, will you? For once without further resistance.”

Anne huffs to herself. “Yes, Mummy,” she concedes.

“Margot, I’ll need you to check on the lamb in another five minutes, please. I’d like to go get changed before supper. And the two of you should, too. Mr. and Mrs. van Pels will be here at six o’clock.”

“Is their blockheaded son coming, too?” Anne asks.

“Anne,” her mother scolds. “Peter may not be as quick as you and your sister, but Mr. van Pels is a valuable partner in your father’s business dealings. To speak of his son so is out of the question.”

“Sorry, Mummy,” Anne mumbles. “I won’t call him a blockhead when he’s here. At least not when he’s in earshot.”

Their mother sighs with dreadful resignation. “I simply don’t understand you. Why must you be so harsh with people? What are you trying to prove?”

“Sorry, Mummy,” she repeats, but this time she is obviously abashed. She remains silent after their mother leaves, listening to the scrunch of the scraper against the meat of the carrot, and looks over at her sister, who is slipping on a pair of quilted oven mitts. “You know, Margot, even if I do say awful things about you, I never really mean them,” she says.

A glance from those lovely eyes behind the lenses of Margot’s glasses. “I know that, Anne. And when I say awful things about you, I almost never mean them either.”

“Ha,” Anne snorts, though she cannot help but smile.

“Now go and do as Mummy said,” Margot instructs. “And remember, when you’re laying the place settings, the blade of the knife always faces inward.”

Near the end of the week, they stopped by a shop to pick up provisions for the office kitchen. Surrogate sugar, surrogate coffee, a box of surrogate tea, a box of soap powder. Margot performed the complicated transaction with their rationing coupons, but somehow that made it Anne’s job to carry the sack. When she steps out onto the street, however, her heart thumps thickly at the sight of the GVB electric tram that has bumped to a stop in front of them, its bell dinging. She can feel a pair of eyes stick to her. A girl on the right side of pretty, firmly attached to a well-coiffed, cocky-looking fellow in a German army uniform. The girl drills Anne with a stare that gapes somewhere between unpleasant alarm and utter abhorrence, but in any case there is not a trace of pity in it.

“It’s Nelli,” Anne says aloud.

“Who?”

“Nelli. Bep’s sister Nelli.”

Margot glances up. “Where?”

“On the streetcar with a mof.” Anne tries to point it out, but by now the tram is banging away down its track, casually tossing off sparks.

Margot shrugs it off. “I think you must be seeing things.” But on their walk to the office, Anne is debating with herself. Should she talk to Bep? Will it shock her to know that one of her sisters has been publicly observed hanging on the arm of a mof invader? Anne doesn’t want to embarrass Bep, but what if Bep hasn’t a clue about what’s going on? Maybe if Anne spills the beans, Bep can do something to dissuade her sister from such shameful folly. On the other hand, if Bep already knows and is too ashamed to mention it, then Anne risks humiliating her further.

In the office Anne enters the kitchen to put away the provisions and finds Bep there with her back to her. Anne calls her name, and Bep twists around, her eyes burning behind her glasses. “Anne,” she says, and gulps.

Quickly Anne crosses, sets down her sack, and takes Bep gently by her arm. “Bep, what’s happened?”

For a moment all Bep can do is shake her head.

“What is it? Did you have a fight with Maurits?” Anne guesses.

And at the mention of his name, Bep’s eyes fill. “No. Not a fight,” she says. Bep seems to want to hold in her next words, but she can’t, and they all come tumbling out. “Maurits has been called up for the Arbeitseinsatz,” she confesses in a shaky voice.

The Arbeitseinsatz. This explains everything. The so-called labor deployment of Dutch subjects deported to Germany to keep the mof’s war machine cranking. And now to think Maurits is facing daily life toiling in a German factory or some abominable work camp, it’s horrifying! How can he suffer through such a nightmare? Under the moffen heel like a slave? And not only that, but what about the fleets of Allied planes they hear roaring toward Germany? What if the bombardiers drop their bomb loads on Maurits’s head? Bombs can’t make a distinction between a German and a Good Dutchman, Bep points out tearfully. They only fall and explode.

“There must be something that can be done,” Anne insists adamantly, but Bep only shakes her head harder, yanking off her glasses to clear her eyes with the palms of her hands. “No. Nothing.”

“What about Pim? Have you talked to Pim?” Anne asks. “Surely he can come up with some solution.”