Herta took a fancy leather pocketbook from the drawer. “Is it money you want? Seems like every Pole has their hand out.”
“If you don’t tell me exactly what happened to my mother, I will go to the people who sent me and tell them you’re here, with your Mercedes-Benz and your clinic where you treat babies. Then I’ll go to the papers and tell them everything. How you killed people. Children. Mothers. Old people. And here you are, like nothing happened.”
“I don’t—”
“Of course the fancy paintings will have to go. And the leather books.”
“All right!”
“The fine clock too—”
“Just stop it. Let me think.” Herta looked down at her hands. “She was a very good worker, if I recall. Yes, she had the Revier running well.”
“And?” At this rate, I would miss the border checkpoint time by hours.
Herta tipped her head to one side. “How do I know you won’t tell the papers anyway?”
“Keep going,” I said.
“Well…she stole. All sorts of things. Bandages. Sulfa drugs. I couldn’t believe it. Turns out a pharmacist from town named Paula Schultz came with deliveries for the SS apothecary and funneled supplies to her. Heart stimulants. Shoe polishes for their hair, so the older women—”
“I know what it was for. Keep going.”
“All that was bad enough, but I didn’t know about the list.” Herta snuck a look at me.
I leaned in. “What list?”
“The surgical list for the sulfa tests. Nurse Marschall discovered your mother took it upon herself to, well, edit it.”
“Edit it how?” I asked, but I knew.
“She tried to take you and your sister off. And another prisoner.”
“So they killed her?” I said, tears flooding my eyes.
“Sent her to the bunker first. Then Nurse Marschall told Suhren about the coal. How she took it to make remedies for the H?ftlings with dysentery. I never even told him she broke into the apothecary closet, but the coal was enough for Suhren.”
“Enough to kill her?” I said, feeling myself sucked down a drain.
“It was stealing from the Reich,” Herta said.
“You didn’t stop them.”
“I didn’t know it was happening.”
“The wall?” I groped for my purse looking for my handkerchief, unable to continue.
Herta took her cue.
“I really must be going now,” she said and started to stand.
“Sit,” I said. “Who shot her?”
“I don’t think—”
“Who shot her, Herta?” I said, louder.
“Otto Poll,” Herta said, speaking faster. “Binz woke him up from a dead sleep.”
She was afraid of me. Just the thought made me stand straighter.
“How did it happen?”
“You don’t want—”
“How did it happen? I won’t ask again.”
Herta sighed, her mouth tight.
“You want to know? Fine. On the way to the wall, Halina kept telling Otto she knew an SS man. Someone high up. Lennart someone. ‘Just contact him. He’ll vouch for me.’ I had sent that Lennart a letter for her, I’ll have you know. At great risk to myself.”
So that was why Brit had seen Lennart at the camp. Lennart the Brave had come to Matka’s rescue after all. Just too late.
“Keep going,” I said.
“?‘Are you sure?’ Otto kept saying to Binz. He loved the ladies. Then Halina asked a favor—”
“What favor?”
“?‘Just let me see my children one more time,’ she said, which Suhren allowed…big of him, considering her betrayal. I had no idea we’d operated on you and your sister. Binz took her to where you both were sleeping. After that, she went quietly. Once Suhren met them at the wall, they got on with it. ‘Just do it,’ Binz said to Otto, but his gun jammed. He was crying. She was crying. A mess.”
“And?” I asked.
“This is all so sordid,” Herta said.
Did I really want to know?
“Tell me,” I said.
“He finally did it.” Herta paused. It was so quiet there in her office, only the sound of children far off in a garden, playing.
“How?” I asked. Just get through this, and you’ll be back in the car on the way home soon.
Herta shifted in her chair, and the leather sighed. “When she wasn’t expecting it.”
At long last, the story I’d waited to hear. I sat down, hollowed like a blown-out egg but strangely alive. Hard as it was, suddenly I wanted every crumb of it, for each detail seemed to penetrate and bring me back to life.
“Did she cry out? She was terrified of guns.”
“Her back was turned. She wasn’t expecting it.” Herta wiped away a tear.
“How did you feel?”
“Me?” Herta asked. “I don’t know.”
“You must have felt something once you found out.”
“I was very sad.” She plucked a tissue from the box. “Are you happy now? She was a good worker. Practically pure German. Suhren punished me for getting too close to her.”
“Were you?”
Herta shrugged. “We were somewhat friendly.”
I knew the doctor had liked Matka, but would my mother really have socialized with this criminal? Matka had surely only pretended to be friendly in order to organize supplies.
“If you’d known we were Halina’s daughters, would you have taken us off the list?”
Herta laced her fingers and stared at her thumbs. We listened to the faraway hum of a lawnmower.
After several seconds, I stood.
“I see. Thank you for telling me the story.”
Why was I thanking her? It was all so surreal. Why couldn’t I rail at her, tell her to go to hell?
I started toward the door and then turned back.
“Give me the ring,” I said.
She clasped her hands to her chest.
“Take it off now,” I said. “And put it on the desk.”
The thought of touching her made me queasy.
Herta sat still for a long second and then pulled at the ring.
“My fingers are swollen,” she said.
“Let me see,” I said as I took a deep breath and grasped her hand. I spat on the ring and worked the band back and forth. It released and revealed a narrow strip of white at the base of her finger.
“There,” Herta said, avoiding my eyes. “Are you happy? Go, now.”
She stood, walked to the window, and looked out over the garden. “And I expect you to keep your end of the bargain. You won’t tell the newspapers? Do I have your word?”
I rubbed the ring on my skirt, wiped off every bit of Herta, and slipped it on my left ring finger. It felt cold and heavy there. A perfect fit.
Matka.
I walked toward the door.
“You won’t hear from me again,” I said.
Herta turned from the window. “Mrs. Bakoski.”
I stopped.
Herta stood there, one hand balled in a fist at her chest. “I…”
“What is it?”
“I just wanted to say that, well…”
The clock ticked.
“I would bring her back if I could.”
I looked at her for a long moment.
“Me too,” I said.
I stepped out of the office with a new lightness, leaving the door ajar, no longer craving the vibration of the slam.
—
I WAS ABLE TO FIND the Stocksee telegraph office and hurried in to send two short telegrams.
The first was to Pietrik and Halina: I am fine. Be home soon.
The other was to Caroline in Connecticut: Positively Herta Oberheuser. No doubt.
I ripped up the letter to the newspaper. Caroline would take care of Herta in due time. It was no longer important to me.
I drove to the Lübeck/Schlutup checkpoint and made it through with little difficulty. Though I hadn’t slept, I felt awake and alive on the road home to Lublin. My mufflerless engine seemed powerful and revved with each press of the gas as I drove over the gentle hills toward home. The moonlight showed the way past vast, dark heaths, past blue and white cottages, past slivers of silver birch shining in the dark forest.
I relived my conversation with Herta, reveling in the idea my mother had said goodbye. I touched my forehead and smiled. The dream kiss had been real.
I cranked my window down and let the scent of autumn run around the inside of the dark car, the smell of fresh-mown hay taking me back to Deer Meadow, to thoughts of Pietrik warm beside me, to him holding baby Halina at the breakfast table, reading the newspaper with the bundle of her in his arms. Not letting her go. How easy it is to get tangled up in your own fishing net.