Shadows of Berlin полностью

“Friedel, you’re not wearing the star,” her eema is saying, her voice low, concerned for him, yes, but also with a note of panic. But Feter’s mouth is set. His eyes are dark with determination. He speaks closely to them.

“You must listen to me now,” he instructs. “Are you listening, Lavinia? I need you to listen to me.”

“I’m listening. Yes, for God’s sake.” Her eema’s eyes are wide. Her expression raw.

“Tomorrow morning,” Feter Fritz begins, “before you leave for work, I want you to pack whatever you have of value and take it with you.”

“What do we have of value any longer?”

“Listen, Lavinia,” he scolds her impatiently. “Don’t talk. Anything of value. Any food you can carry without drawing attention. Fill your pockets. Sew what you can into the linings of your clothes. Whatever money. Whatever jewelry. Anything of value that you can lay hands on. But do it covertly. You don’t want to encourage questions from anyone.”

“And why am I doing this?”

“Because tomorrow morning, you are not going to work,” he informs them, followed by the unconscious tic of the German glance—­his eyes darting from side to side to safeguard against eavesdroppers. “The Gestapo,” he whispers grimly. “They’re planning an aktion. In the factories.” An aktion on a scale that dwarves everything that’s past, he says. Raids all over town. Gestapo and Kripo men. Companies of Waffen-­SS troops dispatched with empty lorries to fill with Jews. “Are you understanding me, Vinni?” He so seldom calls her by this name from their childhood.

Eema, however, appears confused, maybe a bit incensed. “But. But that’s nonsense,” she insists. Her grip on Rashka’s hand is steadily tightening. “We are doing their labor. For the war, Fritzl. Why would they take us from this? It’s meshugaas!”

“Meshugaas, perhaps, but it’s happening none the less. Listen to me. I can’t stay much longer. The story is that Goebbels is champing at the bit to declare Berlin ‘Jew-free.’ So he doesn’t care if you and Rashka are vital labor for the war. He simply wants you out. And you should know this too—­the SS have quit sending people to the ghettos. Now they are shipping them straight through to camps in Bohemia and Poland. This is not what you want for your daughter, Lavinia,” he assures her. “Fortunately, your little brother has a plan. We are diving under.”

“Under?”

“Submerging, Vinni, beneath the surface. As of tomorrow morning,” Uncle Fritz announces with a spark of his old playful confidence, the Macher, the maven of deals who gets things done with a gleam in his eye. “As of tomorrow morning, we are U-­boats.”

11.

The Clog

Rachel awakens with a bolt of lightning shooting through her. For an instant, she is still in Berlin on the morning she and Eema step out into the street without their stars. She remembers those first steps, the scuff of her ill-­fitting shoes on the slate pavement, and feeling as if a thousand eyes were spying from every window. She must catch her breath, return to the present, to the traffic noise from the windows reminding her that she is in her bedroom on West 22nd Street, not Berlin.

In the kitchen, murky water stands in the sink. And then a plunger appears. A plunger being plunged at an even, measured pace before it’s removed. Water gushes in from the faucet for a moment before it’s shut off. Small drips. But the sink does not drain.

“So the drain is clogged,” Aaron announces.

“What?”

“The drain in the kitchen sink. It’s now officially clogged.”

“Are you sure?”

“Pretty sure, yeah. Three inches of standing water, not draining even a little. Makes me suspect.”

“Can’t you just try the plunger?”

“You didn’t notice? I just tried the plunger. Got me nowhere.”

“Try it again.”

“Did you call the super like you said you would?”

“Did I what?”

Aaron expels a slow breath, sticking the plunger back under the sink. “Rachel. Honey,” he says with a note of strained husbandly patience. “He’s just the super,” he assures her. “That’s all.”

“That’s not all.”

“I know. I know. He’s a kraut. But his name is Bauer, honey, not Bormann.”

“You don’t know who he is, Aaron. Mr. Klinghoffer said he came here after the war. He could be anybody. How do you know he’s so innocent?”

“I know that Klinghoffer hired him as the super. And when the drain clogs, it’s the super’s job to unclog it. This is what I know. Now, I gotta go. No Time for Sergeants just opened at the Alvin with what’s-­his-­name. The hillbilly guy, so the matinee crowd’s gonna be a ballbuster, and we’re down a waiter. G’bye. Call ’im. You’ll be fine. G’bye.”

Door opens, then closes.

A beat.

A clattering noise and then suddenly here comes the plunger again, but this time splashing furiously into the standing water, thumping hard before it’s yanked out.

A beat.

Nothing.

Nothing until here it comes again—­the plunger smacking the water, thumping manically before it is yanked out.

Water settles.

No change.

Still clogged.

“Scheisse!” Rachel swears.