He watches a barge make its way to Rio’s port, wondering as he often does what his family would think of Eliska. She is smart, and she is Jewish. She’s passionate and well-spoken, capable of a good debate. Surely his siblings would think highly of her. His father, too. But would his mother? He can hear Nechuma sometimes, telling him he’s in over his head—warning that Eliska is too spoiled to be the kind of wife Addy deserves. She is spoiled, he can admit, but he knows that this isn’t the real reason his mother would object.
Relationships begin with honesty, Nechuma once told him. This is the foundation, for to be in love means to be able to share everything—your dreams, your faults, your deepest fears. Without these truths, a relationship will collapse. Addy has spent hours contemplating his mother’s words, ashamed to admit that for all of his and Eliska’s talk of Prague and Vienna and Paris—those glamorous snapshots of their lives before the war—he still cannot speak freely with her about his family. Nearly two years have passed since he last heard from his parents and siblings. Two years! On the outside, he maintains his characteristic cheerfulness, but inside the uncertainty is tearing him apart. He is unraveling. Eliska, on the other hand, is bright and sharp and seems so sure of her future. Addy knows instinctively that she would not be able to understand why at night he dreams of Radom and not Rio, why often he wishes he could wake up at home, in his old room on Warszawska Street, despite the circumstances. He runs a thumb along the rim of his cup. Eliska has suffered losses too, he knows. Her father leaving when she was young was hard for her—and perhaps because of this, she’s convinced herself it’s useless to live in the past. Eliska’s world, Addy has begun to realize, does not allow for retrospection, for grief.
You don’t need to choose between Radom and Rio, Addy reminds himself. Not at the moment, at least. You are here now, on a nearly deserted island in South America, with a woman you love. Addy closes his eyes, trying for a moment to imagine a life without Eliska. A life with nothing connecting him to their shared European roots. A life without her smile, her touch, her unwavering ability to find joy in looking ahead, rather than back. But he can’t.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Jakob and Bella
Outside Radom, German-Occupied Poland ~ Late July 1941
Jakob and Bella crouch behind a wall of supplies in the back of the delivery truck, their knees pulled to their chests, leaning into one another for support. Franka, her parents Moshe and Terza, and her brother Salek are hidden along the opposite wall. Up front, their driver curses. Brakes whine as they begin to slow. Since leaving Lvov, they’ve stopped only twice, for fuel; otherwise, per Sol’s instructions, they’ve barreled northwest, toward Radom.
The truck is crawling now. Through the walls there are voices. Germans.
“Anhalten! Stop the vehicle!”
“Don’t stop,” Jakob whispers aloud. “Please don’t stop.” What will happen if they are discovered? They are carrying their false papers, but it’s obvious they are being transported illegally. Why else would they be hidden?
Beside Jakob, Bella is silent, unflinching. It’s as if, since losing Anna, she has become impervious to fear. Jakob has never seen her so inconsolable. He would do anything to help her. If she would just talk to him. But he can see it in her eyes; it’s still too painful, too raw. She needs time.
He wraps an arm around her, holding her close as the truck rolls to a stop, weaving a plea together in his mind. He will offer the Germans his camera, he decides, if they will let them continue on. But just as quickly as the truck had stopped, it lurches, engine roaring. They swerve hard and, for a moment, it feels as if they are balanced on two wheels. Succumbing to gravity, boxes begin to topple. Outside, German voices swell, angry, threatening. As the truck picks up speed, a volley of shots is fired and a bullet rips through the wooden walls, inches above Jakob’s head, leaving two small holes in its path. Amid the chaos, he and Bella bend their bodies between their knees. Jakob cradles the back of his head with one hand, Bella’s with the other, praying as the engine growls and pops in its exertion. Faster. Drive faster. The crack of gunfire chases them long after the shouting has dissipated.
At first, Bella had opposed the idea of returning to Radom, clinging to the hope that Anna might still be alive. “I have to find my sister,” she’d snapped, surprising Jakob with the anger in her tone. When it was safe enough to come out of hiding, they’d discovered that the Germans had set up detention camps around Lvov where anyone “suspicious” was imprisoned indefinitely; Bella had become fixated on visiting these camps, on the chance that her sister might be confined to one of them. Jakob didn’t like the idea of her going anywhere near a German detention camp, but he knew better than to object. And so for a week, Bella made the rounds, risking confinement herself. In the end, she found no record of Anna, nor of her husband, Daniel. It was through a neighbor that Bella finally learned what, exactly, had happened: Anna and Daniel had been in hiding as well, along with Daniel’s brother Simon, when the Germans first invaded Lvov. On the second night of the pogrom, a group of Wehrmacht soldiers broke into their apartment with a warrant to arrest Simon, calling him an “activist.” Simon wasn’t there—he’d ventured out to find some food. “Then we take you,” the soldiers had said, grabbing Daniel by the arm. He had had no choice but to leave, and Anna insisted she go with him. The neighbor said that there were dozens of others taken as well, that a friend of hers lived on a farm nearby and had seen them being funneled from a caravan of trucks to the edge of a forest, had heard the shots detonating, like fireworks, late into the night.
Reluctantly, painfully, Bella gave up her search, agreeing, finally, to accept Sol’s offer to send a truck. Since then, she’s barely spoken.
The truck decelerates slightly and Jakob lifts his head. Please, not again. He listens for shots, for shouting, but all he can hear is the rumble of the truck’s diesel engine. He closes his eyes, praying they are in the clear. Praying that life in the ghetto will be better than the one they’ve left behind in Lvov. It’s hard to imagine it could be any worse. They would be near family, at least. What’s left of it.
—
Beside him, Bella wonders whether they will make it back to Radom alive. If they do, she’ll have to face her parents. Henry and Gustava have been assigned to Radom’s smaller Glinice ghetto, several kilometers outside the city. She’ll have to tell them what has happened to their youngest daughter.
It’s been nearly three weeks since Anna disappeared. Bella closes her eyes, feeling the familiar pain in her chest, deep and hollow, as if a piece of her is missing. Anna. For as long as she can remember, Bella has imagined her children growing up alongside Anna’s—a fantasy that had felt almost attainable when, just before the pogrom, Anna had hinted that she and Daniel had exciting news to share. Briefly, Bella had pushed the war out of her mind and let the dream of children, of cousins being raised side by side, take over. Now, her sister will never have children, or know hers. Fresh tears run along the curve of Bella’s jaw as she swallows this cold, incomprehensible truth.
JULY 25–29, 1941: A second pogrom engulfs Lvov. Allegedly organized by Ukrainian nationalists and encouraged by the Germans, this pogrom, known as Petlura Days, targets Jews accused of collaborating with the Soviets. An estimated two thousand Jews are murdered.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Addy
Ilha das Flores, Brazil ~ August 12, 1941
What kind of ship is it?” Eliska asks.
Addy had spotted the small gray craft that morning on his walk around the island. As soon as Eliska woke, he’d brought her to the dock where it was moored, to see for herself.
“Looks like a navy ship.”
“Do you think it’s for us?”