In the old story, Cinderella clung to hope in spite of the cruelness. And she watered the wishing tree outside her home with her tears. Her voice wasn’t her own inside the house either, but by her tree, she prayed. And a little white dove brought her what she needed most.
Still, I wish I’d never screamed, that night when Roger was here. Wish Frau Terrell didn’t know I could speak.
Frau has my voice when she needs it, but I’ll never tell her my name. And I’ve decided, just this moment, that I’m no longer calling the Terrells by their surname either, even in my mind. From now on, it’s Herr and Frau. Names that mean nothing really.
For Herr and Frau are meaningless to me.
NOVEMBER 1941
It’s autumn now, and I feel more like Gretel these days than Cinderella, lost in the deep woods. Without a Hansel.
There’s no Hansel, but there is a witch in my story. And some days I wonder if she might try to devour me. There’s a look in her eyes, of hunger and rage, so I stay in my caged room alone, with the rats.
In the old fairy tale, Gretel and Hansel are abandoned by parents who led them into the woods. Neither my mama nor papa wanted to leave me—they were taken away—but I know what it’s like to be alone.
Instead of a wishing tree, Gretel prayed to God in the tale. And God rescued her.
There is no candy house here. No hidden jewels to find. But I believe there is a God who can rescue me. So I continue to pray, every night. But sometimes, on the worst nights, when the darkness coils around me, when my door and window are locked and the rats chatter, my mind turns wicked.
I imagine Dietmar with pieces of bread, leading me to this house before he ran away, wanting to be rid of me. But in the daylight, I refuse to believe that Dietmar led me here. And I refuse to believe God will leave me.
I miss Dietmar so much it aches my whole body. I pray he is well. And I pray he returns to me, before more of Hitler’s men come.
When Frau lets me back outside, I’ll wait for my Hansel at the edge of the forest.
So the witch won’t catch him too.
CHAPTER 31
_____
Quenby tucked the letters back into the tin before glancing up at the riverbank. So Lady Ricker’s letter at the archives wasn’t meaningless after all. Her letters, it seemed, were meant for someone other than Olivia.
Closing her eyes, Quenby leaned back against a rock behind the log. It was exhausting, not just translating but hearing the story in Brigitte’s words.
She and Lucas had been working for hours—stumbling, really—through this translation. Several motorboats and a canoe had sailed past on the river, but no cars had passed them on the rural road leading toward Newhaven. For a moment, she felt as if she’d stepped back into the trappings of Brigitte’s world.
In her mind’s eye, Quenby could see the house made of cake and sugar, hidden in the bleak forest. A scared, hungry girl. The witch. In the German tale, the children escaped from the house, their arms full of precious stones and pearls.
Did Brigitte manage to escape? Or had the witch—or Hitler’s men—hurt her?
Sitting up, Quenby reached for another letter, but her eyes blurred when she scanned Brigitte’s German words, grief overflowing again. Unlike Quenby, Brigitte hadn’t had a grandmother left to rescue her.
“It sounds as if Olivia Terrell operated some sort of safe house during the war,” Lucas said, dumbfounded by their discovery.
Quenby nodded slowly. “She must have been part of Lady Ricker’s network.”
“So that’s why she moved here. For privacy.”
“And she used Brigitte’s German to communicate with her friends across the channel,” Quenby said, piecing it together. She glanced back at the abandoned mill, the tangled grove of trees around it. At the slow-moving current of the river. Anyone looking for her would have had to search hard to find this place.
“Perhaps the same person who took the pictures of Biggin Hill photographed a map to the Mill House.”
“I refuse to believe that Dietmar led me here.”
Brigitte’s words tumbled in Quenby’s mind. How was she supposed to tell Mr. Knight that Brigitte had longed for him deeply but he’d never come?
“She thought Dietmar had abandoned her,” Quenby said softly.
“Brigitte didn’t know that Dietmar was trapped too. That he wanted to find her.”
“It could have changed everything for her to have that glimmer of hope for the future.”
“She didn’t lose hope, Quenby.”
But it seemed to her that the girl’s confidence in her friend and any hope for her future was slipping away.
Lucas reached for another one of Lady Ricker’s letters in the tin, scanning the English words about her baby. “You’d think a story on the Ricker scandal would be championed at WNS.”
“My publisher doesn’t see it that way.”
“So write it for someone else.”
“I signed a noncompete, with you and the syndicate.”
He sighed. “Sometimes I hate contracts.”
She began to translate the letter in her hands, written in January 1942, but Lucas stopped her. “How many more letters are there?”
She counted them. “Six.”