When I was a child, I wanted to explore the places I read about in my books, but I don’t want to go away anymore, at least not by myself. But the two of them look so happy about their gift that I can’t possibly refuse. “I appreciate it.”
“No, you don’t.” Brie laughs. “But you can thank me when you return.”
Hours later, after falling onto my bed, I think about what it would be like to visit the islands of Hawaii, but I’m terrified to go someplace like that alone.
Before I turn off my lamp, I make one more wish.
I wish I had someone special to share a trip like this with me.
CHAPTER 14
MAX
VIENNA, AUSTRIA
JULY 1938
“It won’t be long until it’s over.”
His back pressed against the papered wall of the hallway, Max heard his father’s declaration in the salon. Instead of shouting this morning, Wilhelm Dornbach’s voice was hushed, but like so many secrets, his words drifted away, clinging to the smoke from his Woodbine cigarette.
Max peeked around the corner and saw both parents—his mother sitting quite properly on a stiff-backed chair, hands folded in her lap, his father pacing across the rug nearby, the Woodbine shaking in his hand.
Neither of them had discovered that he’d left two weeks ago tovisit the lake. They, like most everyone in Vienna, were distracted by all the new mandates that the Nazi Party brought with them.
“It’s like you’re talking in code,” Klara replied. “It won’t be long until what’s over?”
“The transformation of our city. Our entire country. In a matter of months, we’ll be rid of them.”
“Rid of whom?”
“Don’t be absurd, Klara.” His father tapped his cigarette on the ashtray, embers raining down inside the green glass.
His mother knew exactly whom this city was striving to rid itself of. Windows in shops across Vienna displayed signs that their Jewish customers were no longer welcome, and the Gestapo were raiding Jewish businesses across the city, examining their cash books, warning Gentile customers to find another place to shop, another coffeehouse to sip theircafé au lait, another doctor to see.
And Luzi—how he had missed her since their dance in May. Frau Weiss was furious when she discovered what happened, and his parents had been angry as well, lecturing him in the hours after they left the ball about his indiscretion, as if dancing with Luzi had blemished them all. As if they hadn’t been friends with the Weiss family since long before Max and Luzi were born.
Rubbish. That’s what he thought about this madness. A dance with Luzi Weiss was something to be prized, not regretted. He was a lucky man that she’d agreed to a dance with him at all, and when the people of Vienna returned to their senses, most of them would agree. They’d fling open the doors to their shops and restaurants and hotels, welcome the Jewish people back as their neighbors.
The grandfather clock in the sitting room chimed four times.
“Why is everyone so obsessed with the Jews?” his mother asked, exasperated.
“It’s not an obsession. It’s vindication. They’ve plundered our city for long enough now.”
Anger blasted through Max as he stepped away from the wall, his fist grinding into his palm. Luzi and her family were hardly plundering Vienna, contributing music and medical care to their city instead. This new mantra about vindication had been passed down from on high, a ghastly song everyone was supposed to sing whether or not they agreed with the lyrics.
Was his father angry at someone in particular? Some of his top customers at the bank were Jewish, and some of his colleagues in the Viennese banking world as well. The Rothschilds, for heaven’s sake, were Jewish. At one time, they’d been the biggest banking family in Vienna.
His father had always been jealous of the Rothschilds’ success, but even if he weren’t, how could he—how could anyone—speak about the Jewish population as if they were dirt needing to be scrubbed off Vienna’s elegant walls?
“Hitler will do here what he’s done in Germany,” his father said.
His mother shifted on the chair. “Require the Jews to leave?”
“Prompt them to go.”
“Not everyone wants to leave,” his mother said.
