it: having finally escaped Gerhard’s rage, she is now enslaved by his emotional legacy. Like father, like daughter. But the feeling is now useful, steeling her spine to deal with Mathilde. If there is any belated lesson that Gerhard has taught Anna, it is that the only way to earn a bully’s respect is to respond in kind.
She walks over to the table. Then I’ll carry on the work Max was doing, she tells Mathilde. I’ll take his place.
Mathilde doesn’t bother to look up. A princess like you? she scoffs. Please! You have no idea what you’re talking about.
Then tell me.
Mathilde tosses the rag into the sink and waddles into the storefront. Anna hears the ding! as the register is opened, the sound of the baker removing the cash drawer. She folds her arms and waits.
Upon her return Mathilde lowers herself onto a stool and scrapes it over to the table. She separates Reichsmarks, change, and ration coupons. Counting under her breath, she enters numbers into a ledger, tongue lodged in the corner of her mouth.
You’re still here? she asks, looking up in feigned surprise. Not back to bed yet? You should go. A woman in your condition needs rest.
Anna reaches over and slams the ledger shut, nearly catching the baker’s stubby fingers.
Listen to me, you, she says. Don’t you forget that I hid Max in my own house, right under my father’s nose. I couriered information back and forth for you. I’ve got as much nerve as you or anyone else.
Mathilde examines Anna for a moment.
Sit, she commands.
Anna obeys.
The baker gets up and walks to the cuckoo clock on the wall. Opening one of its tiny decorative doors, she retrieves something that she sets on the worktable.
You know what this is? she asks. You should have used a couple of these.
Anna picks up the condom, gingerly.
Go on, says Mathilde, unroll it.
Inside the prophylactic Anna finds a slip of paper no longer than a finger, covered with writing the size of ants. She brings it to her eyes, squinting to decipher the minuscule code. One line in particular catches her attention: The Good Doktor sends best regards.
Max, Anna murmurs. She glances at Mathilde. You got this from him?
The baker nods, sitting back down. Not directly, she says. But we have our ways of communicating.
How?
If your lover didn’t trust you enough to tell you, why should I?
Anna says nothing, but the look she bends on the baker makes the older woman suddenly fall to inspecting her hands.
All right, I’ll tell you how it works, since you obviously won’t give me a moment’s peace otherwise, Mathilde mutters. Well . . . We have a deal, the SS and me. They provide me with supplies, I deliver whatever goods they order. Since 1937 I’ve been doing this, since that hellhole was just a muddy pit in the ground. Koch, the Kommandant, came to me himself. He said he’d heard about the quality of my pastries.
Mathilde preens a bit, then flushes at Anna’s arched brows.
Well, they are the best, she says defensively. And if I didn’t supply them, somebody else would. Why should another baker get the business? Besides, I could see the other advantages to the arrangement, ways to use it for the Resistance. Oh, yes, the network existed even then. You wouldn’t know it, but there are plenty of people in this city who hate what the Nazis are doing. And what I could see during my deliveries to the camp would be priceless information to them. So I accepted Koch’s contract. And I’ll tell you, did I ever see some things.
She leans closer to Anna, lowering her voice to a reedy whisper.
Every week the SS have Comradeship Evenings at the Bismarck Tower, she says. You know where it is, on the hill there? Such goings-on, you wouldn’t believe. Prostitutes, male and female, little boys. Orgies. Those fine officers will fuck anything that moves, don’t let anybody tell you different. They wash each other in champagne afterwards. Some comradeship, don’t you think?
Anna manufactures a worldly expression.
Mathilde gives Anna a caustic little smile. You won’t understand, a pretty young thing like you, but when you get older, men don’t really see you. To the SS, I’m just a fat old widow. That’s what they call me—die Dicke, Fatty. But the advantage is that I’m invisible. When I’m bringing pastries to the Tower, when I deliver bread to the officers’ fine Eickestrasse houses or to their mess, I might as well be a chair