‘How long have you been hiding her?’
‘Less than a year.’
She was shocked. ‘I had no idea.’ Yet as the words left her lips she realized it explained why he no longer received visitors at home.
‘Her parents left her at a nunnery early in 1940. The nuns hid and cared for several Jewish babies. They changed theirnames and obtained false documents through a corrupt official who was easily bribed by money and a promise of a place in heaven. They kept them for some years until the official’s widow later betrayed them. They were raided. Fortunately, the children had already been fostered by other families and she was not able to identify them. Klara was hidden by her new family, but it is not easy and circumstances change. I’m her fourth family . . . you will be her fifth.’
Elsa looked at the child’s baptism record, signed by the pastor himself. She didn’t want a new family. Especially one that would put her own family at risk.No, Elsa. No.
‘Pastor, you know as well as I do that the authorities are not interested in baptism certificates, only in race. You cannot change blood as easily as religion. The journey I’m taking is going to be difficult and out in the open—?’
‘I know that what I’m asking you to do is dangerous.’
‘Too dangerous.’ Elsa didn’t want to see his pleading eyes.
‘And I understand that if Klara is found to be Jewish, you may be sent to a labour camp—’
‘So could Miriam,’ said Elsa. She looked at the documents again.
‘Klara.Klara,’ insisted the old man. ‘Don’t ever call her Miriam.’ His voice softened. ‘But if she stays here—’
‘Where did her parents come from?’Don’t get involved, Elsa. Don’t.
‘Stettin. Not long after they left her with the nuns, all the Jews in Stettin were sent to Lublin.’
‘Are they still there?’
His silence frightened her. No one had heard from anyone who had been sent to the labour camps and ghetto for several years. She thought of the burned-out synagogue in Gollnow... and all the Jewish people who had been moved on to a place she knew so little of.
‘She’s such a good little girl. She will do whatever you tell her.’
Elsa thought of the good little girls who had disappeared since her childhood. Being good had not helped them or their families.
‘I don’t know if I am the right person to ask.’ The doubt in her voice was palpable.
‘Which makes you the perfect person. No one will suspect you.’
She touched her fair hair, for the first time feeling ashamed of it.
‘Haven’t you always wanted to speak out? To help?’
She remembered the Rabbi’s terrified face on that terrible night, and waking in the night to her mother’s weeping when Margot and Josef had disappeared. ‘I’ve wanted to do more,’ she conceded. ‘I just didn’t know how.’
‘Well now you do.’
‘What will happen to her if I say no?’
‘She will have to stay with me. I fear the Russians won’t believe me or care if I tell them she is a Jew. And they may well kill me before I can plead her case. The Red Army is showing no mercy.’
‘Nor Hitler. Even if I reach Bremen, I will have to continue this deception if she is to survive.’
‘I’m sorry to put this on you, Elsa. But you have always impressed me with your empathy and kindness.’
She shook her head. ‘No! Don’t give me praise when I deserve none of it!’
‘Elsa?’
She frowned. ‘Let me think.’ Silence fell. It hung heavy as lead between them. ‘Tell me her name again. Her real name.’
