The husband sat on a cot next to his wife. A dry little man, he stared at the cap in his hands and muttered something in a Slavic tongue, giving over the only chair in the room to Maria. She set her bags down and took the seat. It was a minuscule place, even for a tenement. Neither of the old couple was large, however. The cot cradled them both, they were so slight.
The men in the doorway said the couple had only lived here a month. He was a Serb, she a German from Alsace-Lorraine. Somehow they ended up here. The husband, the men told, was confused at the mention of Omaha or Nebraska, as if these were faraway places he’d never been. Maybe they’d been looking for Milwaukee or St. Louis but boarded the wrong train at Grand Central in Chicago. If they arrived here lost and broke, in some unknowable wend of the map, there was little that could be done to right their course. Anyway, the wife was dying.
Maria tried speaking German to the husband. He nodded, closed his eyes, then muttered to himself. Maria shrugged and looked to the others. “He doesn’t understand. She’s gone. She’s dead.”
Anna didn’t know what they’d do. She’d backed under the eaves, where the ceiling sloped lower and lower to refract the angle of the roof. Wool blankets sagged from the rafters where someone tacked them there for insulation, stinking wool that smelled like coal oil and fish, mildew. Anna crouched over herself so the wool didn’t rub her hair. She watched as the old husband muttered his prayer. The wife lying there, her face uncovered. Her eyes closed. Her lips sunken and toothless. Under the blanket was her body, a black silk dress exposed, a crucifix on her flattened breasts. Maria leaned near the husband. She whispered something short, a Psalm in Plattdeutsch, then pulled the blanket over the woman to make clear she was gone.
The old man wrung his cap harder. He said something no one understood then felt along a ridge in the blanket where his wife’s chin and nose marked a difference in the fabric. He repeated the something no one understood.
The men in the doorway entered. They were a group of singers, one of them explained, a touring Liederkranz from Bremen that was stranded here because of travel restrictions. They rehearsed across the hall twice weekly to stay in practice for the day they could tour again. Each doffed his cap and offered condolences to the husband. They were his friends as much as anyone and now lined up to lay hands on his shoulder. The leader nodded and they began singing, the baritone first, then the rest of them. It was “An der Weser.” Anna recognized the song. It came out of nowhere. Anna, Maria, the old husband, they turned to the singing men, their somber faces, and then to the floor because the rendition was sad and spare, sullen and beautiful too. The melodies intuitive and precise. Anna put a hand to the eaves, to the old wool, to keep from falling, her body forgetting itself. Everyone who heard must have stopped in their tracks. Each of them glassy-eyed, faces drooping, longing for homes unreachable, for friends long gone. The singers rolled it out magnificently. Anna let herself get carried away. She let a remembrance of Europe slip into her mind, the burial of her mother. The song was miserable and satisfying. She wished it could last forever.
When they returned home, there was a black Ford waiting at the curbstone. The front door of the Eigler house was cracked open. Herr sat inside with the inspector and a woman in a stiff blue skirt and jacket. The way Herr sat humped into himself, his eyes rimmed red, there was no mistaking what was going to happen.
“I tried to make them tea,” Herr said. “I don’t know where you keep the kettle down here, Frau Maria. Isn’t that embarrassing?”
“There’s no need for that,” the woman said. She was annoyed, like she’d had to repeat this to Herr already.
“That’s right,” the inspector agreed. “Will you go upstairs now, Anna? And make up a suitcase to bring? We’ve told your father here and now it’s time.”
“Your papers have been processed,” the woman said. “Now you’re to come with us.”
From upstairs Anna could hear them arguing in the parlor. Maria wasn’t going to put up with this. This was America, wasn’t it? They couldn’t just come and take a girl away.
Anna packed her suitcase like the inspector told her to. This was something she’d thought about before so she’d be prepared when the time came and would know what to bring. She only had the one suitcase and it wouldn’t even hold all her clothes. So she packed pajamas, two sets, and a few books, and a nicer pair of shoes in addition to the ones on her feet. Still the adults argued in the parlor, Maria louder and louder because the two from the state wouldn’t listen to her. The woman made the mistake of telling Maria that she had no say in the matter. Then Anna packed a couple dresses and a week’s worth of undergarments. The suitcase was nearly full. Her straw hat wouldn’t fit. Anna worried the inspector would take the hat if she tried wearing it out, so she took it off her head and hung it on the baluster for safekeeping. She’d come back for the hat. If she wasn’t gone for long. If the state didn’t keep her forever.
They were still at it when Anna came downstairs.
“It’s my recommendation,” the inspector insisted, “that Anna be moved to a state home. The situation is clear. You know very little about the actual condition of Anna’s health. That’s the deciding factor.”
The woman walked across the room and kneeled to Anna. “Has anyone told you that you have rickets?” Nobody had. Anna didn’t know what that was. They’d explain it to her in the car. A bone disorder. Calcium deficiency. An absence of vitamin absorption. Knock-kneed, bow-legged. “Now give me your suitcase. Nobody will steal that. Hand it over.”
The woman walked Anna across the room.
“But what’s the place for?” Herr wanted to know. “Is it for the terminally ill? For the mentally strange?”
“None of those,” the inspector said. “Mr. Miihlstein, I’m beginning to think it’s you who is deficient. Anna will be taken care of. She is sick in her bones and only the doctor will know what to do.”
Anna told herself she’d be all right, she’d be okay. She hugged her father good-bye, let Maria lift her and kiss her on the cheek, then heaved herself into the backseat of the government Ford. There was no time to wait for Silke and Theresa to come home. Anna had a train to catch, the woman explained. “It’s better this way. No bawling over each other. You’ll see your sisters soon. Believe me.” The woman rambling now that she was alone in the backseat with Anna, this sick girl who’d been removed from home.
“It’s for your own good. Save them from bawling good-bye and let them get on with their day. Let them forget sooner.”
A letter was left at the house that told where Anna’s family could visit her. She shouldn’t worry.
RED SUMMER
Autumn 1919
Jake had cause to leave Omaha. They left him no choice.