Birds sang in the trees. Loving him more than she did there, at that moment, was impossible to imagine. The thought played on her mind to the slow rhythm of her feet on the pedals. If only she could leave, take him with her to some other country. Their short stay in Switzerland had been so blissfully peaceful. It was there, during a stroll in Geneva, that she had said, on a sudden impulse, why don’t we stay here, Carl, why go back to doom-laden Berlin? Now was the moment, this was their chance, they could disappear – her father would certainly help them. London, America, anything was better than staying put and having to watch as ruination drew near. But she knew the answer. Carl understood how she felt, naturally, but there were his parents to think of, and the rest of the family. They would be rounded up immediately and sent to a camp, or worse. Emma abandoned the thought. They were hostages, she knew that by now.
With one hand she held the shoulder strap of her bag, a girl on her way to school, or to her grandmother’s, in the filtered light of morning. She pushed the pedals round, then lifted her feet off them to freewheel almost to a standstill before pedalling onward again. She took her time cycling to Wapenaar’s home in the heart of Grunewald. No hurry, as she didn’t quite know what she would do when she got there. And anyway it was all a bit pointless, because there was no way she could speak her mind. Nonetheless, she pedalled on, steering her bike to the Bismarckbrücke near the Hubertus lake. She knew the address, although she had never visited the house before.
It was a small villa, not much larger than where Carl and she lived, but with a long garden reaching down to the lake. A wrought-iron gate with climbing roses gave the Wapenaar residence a romantic touch. The front entrance, too, was framed with roses.
The door was opened by a woman. Emma introduced herself, saying she was Dutch and that her father was a friend of Mr Wapenaar’s, that she happened to be cycling around in the neighbourhood, and had wondered if it was alright for her to drop by to say hello. Emma’s flustered preamble made the woman laugh, and she invited her in. Her husband was not at home, but that was of no consequence, she was expecting him back any minute. Would Emma like something to drink? She suggested going out into the garden to sit on the terrace by the lake with a glass of orange juice. She spoke Dutch with a strong German accent, which had a surprising charm to it. Emma did not have the nerve to decline the hospitable offer, and meekly followed Wapenaar’s wife into the garden. It was eleven o’clock, the lake at their feet was smooth and black. A dog barked in the next garden. It seemed unreal, a scene in a film. What was she doing there, why had she come?
The dog carried on barking, growling, yelping, running and jumping up against an invisible fence alarmingly close by. Wapenaar’s wife went over and called the animal by its name, softly and commandingly, then put her hand through the hedge to pat it. Order was restored, quiet reigned once more.
“She’s a nice enough creature, but she’s left alone for far too long.”
Emma nodded understandingly. Alone for far too long, that was something she was finding increasingly difficult to cope with. Carl going off to work, leaving her sitting at home facing a lonely, empty day ahead of her and having to find things to keep her busy until he came home in the evening. Days during which she banished the war to the back of her mind and worked in her garden, weeding and pruning. The pretence of normality was a way of dealing with a hostile environment, something she saw women everywhere attempting to do, acting as if nothing was wrong, as if they were leading their ordinary lives. Was it not ever thus for wives, whose husbands were always working, as soldiers, bakers, professors, civil servants, ministers?
Emma eyed the friendly woman over the glasses of orange juice on the table between them. There was an idyllic-seeming quality to the setting, which she was loath to disturb. The woman asked Emma to call her Elka, a nickname, really, dating from her childhood, when her father used to write little notes to her always beginning with a capital
