“They didn’t look very hidden to me.”
“I don’t keep them in the closet, Max. I have a place. A compartment. I was looking at them last night when you came to my room. I wasn’t expecting you.”
“How long have you been planning this?”
“A while.”
“So what was I? A distraction? Some toy that you played with to kill time?”
“Hey!” She shoves him again and tries to pull away, but there’s no room in this tiny shower, and he’s right there in front of her, no matter where she moves. “That’s not fair and you know it. I didn’t meet you until last year. I didn’t expect you. You’re just…” She waves her hands in front of her face as though trying to bat him away.
A glimmer of understanding crosses his face. “You were making up your mind last night, weren’t you, when I knocked at the door?”
“I had already made my decision. But it was the wrong one.”
Max looks as though he wants to touch her. To hold her. As though he wants to collect her in his arms and swallow her whole so that she can’t run from him anymore. “How do you know?”
This crack in Emilie’s defenses is a temporary thing. She pulls herself together right in front of him. Squares her shoulders. Sets her jaw. She controls every emotion with the same detached resolve that has enabled her to survive for the last decade. Her voice is cold when she finally speaks. “Because you weren’t there when I got back.”
“I’m here now,” he says.
“Too late.”
“Because I discovered your secret?”
“Are you going to tell?”
“Are you going to leave?”
“Yes.”
“Why leave everything you’ve ever known? It makes no sense.”
“My God, are you blind? Deaf? Do you not read the papers or listen to the radio? War is coming, Max.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Hitler is trying to take Austria. Take it! Like a toy from another child. You think there won’t be war?”
“I think a lot can happen between now and then.”
“Then let me tell you what’s happening now. In case that future threat is not enough.” Emilie grows incensed but has no way to contain her trembling rage. “The Gestapo is more powerful than our court system. They are throwing people in prison just for criticizing Hitler.”
Max flinches at this. He reaches out a finger and sets it on her lips to quiet her. They are on Hitler’s prize airship after all.
Emilie continues in a whisper. “And the Jews? Where do I even begin with that?” She raises her hands and begins ticking offenses off with her fingers. “They are prohibited from all public and private employment. So they can’t work. At all. They are not allowed in public buildings. Many families cannot even buy milk or medicine for their children. There are rumors that…” She cannot even speak it aloud, it is too insane. “This is the country we are returning to. And you want me to stay there and be consumed? There is nothing left for me in Germany.” The diatribe leaves her breathless. Exhausted. To speak of her own people as they, as something other, to hide the fact that she is one of them leaves her ashamed, and she cannot meet Max’s gaze.
He lifts her chin with one finger. “You have me.”
“And you’re a navigator. An officer aboard the Hindenburg. You will be gone the moment that first shot is fired, called away to fight another man’s war, and I will be left again. Do you know what it’s like to hear that knock on the door? To have a stranger tell you that you are a widow? Is that what you want for me? Because I don’t. I am so tired of having things ripped from my hands. If you care anything for me at all, let me go. Please.”
“So you’ll do the leaving this time? The ripping? Without any concern for the state in which you’re leaving me?”
“You’re a man. It’s different.”
“And you’re a fool if you believe that. I just hope you change your mind before we get off this damned ship on Thursday.”
“I won’t change my mind, Max. I can’t.” She lifts her palm and sets it gently against the smooth skin of his cheek.
“Do you have so little faith in me?”
“I have faith in nothing.” She has never spoken the words aloud, but the admission leaves her gutted. For ten very long years this has been the truth. It is a jarring confession for a woman whose very identity is rooted in ancient faith.
“Give me the chance to restore it.”
She shakes her head. No.
And then there is an urgent rapping of knuckles on the other side of the door. “Herr Zabel.” The voice is young and male, and Emilie recognizes it as the cabin boy’s.
Max does not answer. He reaches for Emilie’s hand instead.
The cabin boy speaks again, his voice barely above a whisper, “There is an urgent message for you.”
THE CABIN BOY