The shoemaker danced her around the room, holding her appropriately and closing his eyes. He had probably danced with a lot of pretty girls in his day. He seemed like a wise man, a kind man. I imagined he worked by oil lamp, cutting and sewing leather well into the night. He probably employed an apprentice and taught him an honest trade, unlike Dr. Lange, who had lured me with lies.
Lange must have considered me an easy target. I was so eager, captivated by all the old paintings, staring at them for days until they confessed their secrets to me. Dr. Lange taught me to carefully dissolve and remove discolored varnish. I studied pigments and tinting to match antique patinas. We spent months experimenting with the methods the old masters used to create real gesso. I learned quickly. I came to recognize all the crack patterns and each type of canvas and stretcher used by every school of art. Dr. Lange was impressed with how quickly I could detect a repainting, fake, or touch-up. My restoration work always passed, completely undetected.
“Stunning, Florian,” he would whisper over my shoulder. “You, my boy, are the Reich’s best-kept secret.”
My boy. My stomach turned with disgust. What an idiot I was. If I could detect a flawed painting so quickly, why had it taken me so long to see the truth about Dr. Lange?
The song ended and the nurse returned and sat down. I got up and carefully lifted my pack onto my shoulder. “I don’t suppose there’s a working commode?”
“You can leave your pack.” She looked at me, her brown eyes earnest. “No one will take it.”
I would not leave my pack. Ever. It had my supplies, my notebook, my future, my revenge. I walked across the stone floor, away from her. As I neared the tall doorway, the shoe poet raised his hand to stop me.
“What do you want?” I asked.
He stared at me and then looked down at my boots. “The shoes tell the story,” he whispered.
My heel. He had heard the hollow in my step as I walked across the room.
He knew.
joana
Ingrid sat silently braiding her hair. “When will we reach the ice?” she asked.
The ice. The goal we trekked toward. If we crossed the frozen Vistula lagoon, we could then make our way down the narrow strip of land to either Pillau or Gotenhafen. Ships would be leaving from both ports.
“Poet says we’re only a day from Frauenburg,” I told her.
“That’s where we’ll cross the ice?” asked Ingrid.
“Yes.”
Ingrid’s fingers stopped moving. “You’re nervous about it.”
I was nervous about it. The closer we moved to an actual village, the more military and wounded we’d encounter.
“If there are soldiers,” whispered Ingrid, “can you convince them?”
“The bandages will fool them,” I told her.
Ingrid had reason to worry. Hitler considered those born blind or disabled, inferior. They were called garbage children, life unworthy of life. Their names were added to an official registry. A doctor in Insterburg confided that the people on the registry would be killed. From then on we bandaged handicaps to pass them off as wounds.
“Maybe we should bandage my eyes tonight. Soldiers may come upon the house,” said Ingrid quietly.
“Yes, we’ll do that.” I reached out and patted her shoulder. “I’m going to look for some supplies.”
“Be careful,” said Ingrid.
I stepped between the sleeping bodies and pushed through the tall, heavy door. The old hinges let out an eerie, deep groan as they rotated. The air in the abandoned house lay cold and still, lingering dead without the family within it. Walking through someone’s home and personal possessions felt not only like trespassing, it felt like a violation.
A portrait of an older man in uniform hung crooked on the plaster. Which family did the estate belong to? Prussian Junkers had the reputation of being stiff and arrogant, but that seemed an unfair generalization. I had met Prussian families in Insterburg who were lovely. Many Prussian nobles had the preposition von before their last name to signify “of” or “from.” I looked at the portrait. If I belonged to Prussian aristocracy my name would be Joana von Vilkas—Joana of the Wolf.
An aristocratic killer.
I stared at the curving stairway of stone in the dim hall, the center of each step worn smooth by the tread of many generations. I hesitated. Should I go upstairs? I thought of our house in Lithuania. How many Soviets were in it now? Were they sleeping in my bed? Had they tossed all our books to the floor like trash? I took a few steps up the cold wide stairs. Silver moonlight shimmered through a window, revealing a gray stuffed rabbit lying on a step above. One of its ears was missing. Poor bunny. Even toys were casualties of war.
I climbed two more steps.
The supplies I needed were most likely in the kitchen or laundry. I didn’t need to go upstairs, but my curiosity beckoned.
I took another step up.
A clattering sounded below, making me jump. I hurried back down the grand staircase and made my way through the dark passage to the kitchen.
The German rummaged through the cabinets, his pack near his feet. A sheet was spread on the floor with a tumble of items in the center.
“Are you following me?” he asked.