“You certainly won’t get one from me,” said Emi, speaking to Kersten’s pins rather than her face.
Letting the apology drop momentarily, Kersten said, “You’re going to practice all alone without that Jew? Can you even play without him anymore?”
“Leo Hartmann,” said Emi, trying to move around Kersten. “Of course I can.”
“You shouldn’t see him again,” said Kersten, still blocking her way. She spread her feet wider so Emi could not get around her and leaned in closer to her nervous face. “In case you were thinking about it. It’s too dangerous now.”
“I know,” said Emi, standing still. “My father said the same thing.”
“And he’s right.” Kersten flashed Emi a disingenuous smile and said, “I’m just warning you because we’re such good friends, and I think as a foreigner you don’t understand what is happening in this country. I just want to help keep you safe.”
“Don’t understand?” echoed Emi. “I don’t think you have to be Austrian to understand what Adolf Hitler is doing. And Kersten,” she said, taking a bold step toward her, “we are not such good friends. Especially not now,” she said, pointing to the swastika patch on her arm.
Kersten shook her head. “Everyone our age of Aryan descent has to join now. It’s an honor. You do not understand the good that’s happening in Vienna because of Hitler, not like an Austrian does. If you did, you would never have gotten caught up with Leo Hartmann in the first place. You wouldn’t have been seen around Vienna kissing him. You don’t understand Austria and all we’ve suffered at their hands. So you went and ripped your clothes off with some dirty Jew. Do you want to end up with Jew babies at a time like this?”
“What?” asked Emi, teetering on her heels, feeling faint. “You have no idea what I did or didn’t do with Leo.”
“Oh, Emi, please. Don’t play chaste now. We all know. But you should know that it’s illegal for you to be with a Jew,” said Kersten, ignoring Emi’s disgusted face.
“Why would it be illegal for me to be with a Jew? I’m not Christian. I’m not even Austrian.”
“Because it’s disgusting! Against nature. Like making love to a dog,” Kersten exclaimed. “See, like I said, you have no idea what you’re doing. You made a big mistake, and now the whole school knows you as the Jew lover. You better start going out with another boy soon so you can try to save your reputation. Everyone wanted to be your friend at first, but you ruined it when you ran off with Leo Hartmann day after day.” She took a few steps toward Emi. “But that’s all over since this school is rid of him. Now you can fix your Jew-lover problem.”
“I’ll be leaving the school next year,” said Emi. “So you can all remember me by whatever name you want. Go ahead, yell ‘Jew lover’ in my face. I don’t care.” She sidestepped around Kersten and rushed toward the music room, but Kersten yelled back at her before she could make it around the corner and out of earshot.
“He’s going to die!” she shouted. “Leo Hartmann is going to die. He has the red J stamped in his passport now and my mother says that’s the kiss of death. And no one will care but you.”
Emi looked over her shoulder and said, “Thank you for your concern, but you have no idea who is going to die. You are not God.”
“No, I’m not,” said Kersten. “But you don’t have to be God to know that all the Jews in Austria will die. Don’t you listen to the radio? Jews have finally bitten off their own big noses. After all these years of taking our jobs and our money, they’ve written their own fate with their greed. Now Hitler has decreed that the Jew must go and no one wants to stop Hitler.”
She paused and looked at Emi, tilting her head. “I take it back. Leo Hartmann will die and no one will care, not even you, because you’ll be back in Japan.”
Emi and her family were due to sail back to Japan in March 1939, four months off. She stared at Kersten and shook her head no.
“At least you were able to play their piano,” said Kersten. “Though don’t feel so special because I’ve played it, too. We all used to go to his house when we were like you. When we didn’t understand the plague of the Jew.”
Emi thought she saw Kersten hesitate, perhaps reminded of a good memory from her time at the Hartmanns’, but the moment quickly passed. Kersten scowled and continued. “Too bad you’re leaving so soon, Emi. If you waited long enough you’d be able to have their piano for yourself. You do play it so well. Everyone will take from the Jews when they’re dead. With all their money, the Hartmanns’ house will probably be first on the looting list. That beautiful house will be stripped bare.”
Emi blinked back her tears and shouted, “Leo Hartmann is not going to die!”
“He is, Emi,” said Kersten, softly. “They’re all going to.”
Kersten left Emi standing in the hall, her tears running down her face onto her blouse. She wiped her eyes and glanced at a clock hanging in the classroom next to her. The music room was just a few steps away, but her amah was not due to meet her at the school for two more hours, after Emi’s practice was over. Instead of going into the music room, Emi took the shortcut out through the chapel that Leo had shown her on her first day and ran all the way to the Hartmanns’ house.
As she turned the corner onto their street, trying not to trip over her own feet, she could see that there was still black paint all over the right side of the fa?ade’s ground floor. This time “Alle Juden müssen sterben” was scrawled in thick letters over layers of painted-over words. All Jews must die.
Emi put her hands over the letters, only able to cover the word sterben, “die,” and closed her eyes. Before anyone could confront her, she wiped her hands on her skirt, as the paint was still wet, and knocked on the Hartmanns’ door. After a minute of waiting and no answer, she started to shout Leo’s name.
“Get away from that dirty Jew door,” a woman scolded as she passed, hitting Emi’s back, but she did not stop and Emi pounded on the door again. After several minutes, Zalan, the Hungarian chauffeur, finally opened the door, his hand with four fingers held behind his back. He was not in uniform.
“You’re not supposed to come in,” he told her, his dark eyes looking at her with suspicion. “Mr. Hartmann’s order.” Emi was about to protest when he said, “But I told them you wouldn’t go away, so here I am. You have five minutes, and then I will drive you home. Not the same car. Horrible little car, but safer. Go,” he said, holding the door open wide enough to let Emi in, then slamming it shut behind her and locking it.
Emi thanked him, clasping her thin hands together, and ran up the stairs to where Leo was waiting in the dark hallway. Every curtain in the house had been pulled closed, and only a few electric lights were on.