told him, as if he couldn’t see the truth. There were traitors everywhere, on the streets, in the shops, even in his own home.
The war is over, Corporal Relling had said.
The war is lost.
Go home.
At home, Willy would lay on his bunk in the cellar, and late in the night, Mama would tiptoe down the stairs and quietly open the door. He tried to keep his breathing deep and regular as she leaned over him to be sure he wasn’t awake. He shouldn’t know she’d been out. There were so many things she hadn’t wanted him to know.
Willy scrubbed the wood harder. He was going to get every bit of dirt out of the cracks. This wood was going to shine.
10
Fr?ulein.” One of Frau Berger’s girls had thrown open the cellar door and was calling down to Clara, panting. She had taken over guard duty from Herr Berger, and had been watching for police or the British in the street. “They’re coming.”
Clara had been warming herself by the oven, fretting about whether she had done the right thing in enlisting Jakob Relling’s help. She rushed for her backpack stowed under the bed. In the cellar, she was trapped. “How far away are they?”
“At the entrance to Sophienhof. They’re clearing the rubble we put in the street.”
That had been Herr Berger’s idea, and Clara was now hugely grateful for the precaution: anything to slow Captain Fenshaw. She said quick good-byes to everyone, no ceremony, no handshakes, and pounded after the girl up the stairs. “Thank you,” she called down to the family.
Herr Berger waved. “Go, fr?ulein. They’ll be here any minute.”
Outside, dusk was closing in under a white sky that hadn’t seen the sun since she returned to Sophienhof three days ago. The street was empty, but she thought she heard the sound of idling engines, the shouts of men. The girl darted across Elisa’s old vegetable patch, leading Clara onto a footpath through overgrown gardens flanked by the rubble of bombed houses. They crossed Sophienhof along secret routes carved out by local children and emerged on a street of abandoned shops. Clara tucked a can of ham into the girl’s hands as thanks.
Feeling shaken, Clara gasped for air, her hip aching again, and then began to walk, forcing herself to slow her pace. She should look like the people around her, moving slowly, weighed down by the packs on their backs or the bags over their arms containing valuables to exchange for food or something else they desperately needed. Knowing that she would feel safer in a crowd, she joined a group of people examining bits of paper on the wall of a shuttered house. Christmas gifts for the whole family, someone had written on a banner. The papers advertized what people wished to trade—a set of dishes, a grandmother’s kitchen cupboard—and what they wanted—a baby pram, a pair of men’s shoes, a camera. Clara pretended to read, glancing now and then over her shoulder. The wind was sharp against her cheeks, and she felt her nose starting to run in the cold. She didn’t want to sleep in the ruins again if she could avoid it.
She had six days until Jakob Relling would be ready for her. In the meantime . . . She started as a black car turned at the end of the block. It slowed as the children who played in the street moved out of its way. Clara saw the British soldiers inside, and felt sick. As they rolled past, they glanced at the crowd, and several men around her saluted. The car continued on.
She waited, taking deep breaths, then set off again, feeling the pull of her family home, Falkenhorst, where it would be warm and safe, for a while at least. She didn’t know if her mother was still there, or if she would even help her. Could she trust her mother to stand by her—finally?
Clara didn’t see that she had much choice but to shelter at Falkenhorst and take her chances with Anne. She needed to be off the streets, to wash, to eat. And there was the possibility that her mother might know where Elisa was.
On the way, she passed burned-out houses that seemed on the point of collapse. A reconstruction crew, all women, passed stones from one to the other down a hill of debris. At the corner, an old woman sold chestnuts she was roasting in a dented pan over a fire she’d built on the pavement. Not far