“You are often sorry, Rose, but that is not the answer.”
“Mrs. Cohen, I truly am sorry, truly.” Rose lowered her eyes. The room felt warm, murky. Rose thought she could detect the dank traces of her blood in the air. Could Mrs. Cohen smell it too? And what about the postcard? Was it hidden beneath her pillow? She didn’t want Mrs. Cohen reading her mother’s words, all that Rose sensed from the short card that Mutti couldn’t bring herself to say. Mutti’s hand had formed the beautiful cursive in black ink, her skin had touched the paper, and Rose couldn’t bear for Mrs. Cohen to see it. “I was just getting dressed, and in Vienna,” she tried, “at home—”
Pink blotches bloomed on Mrs. Cohen’s cheeks. “I know, I know. You do everything differently at home. I am sorry this is not like your home.” She turned her head away. “I am trying to do well by you. Mr. Cohen and I both are trying to do well by you. But you act as if the world were against you, as if I were against you.”
Rose didn’t answer her, and the silence grew thick, ungainly. “I don’t mean to,” she finally said. But too much time had gone by; the words hung in the air, prickly short.
“Yes. It does seem to be beyond your control.” Mrs. Cohen reached over and picked up Mutti’s scarf. She examined the wrinkled silky material, casting an eye on the scarf’s purple parrots, caught in flight. Put it down, Rose pleaded in her head. But she said nothing as Mrs. Cohen pulled on the material, revealing her slender bone-white wrists, hands not much bigger than Rose’s own. “This could use a good cleaning,” Mrs. Cohen said. “I’ll give it to Mary.”
“No!” Rose said, and snatched it back, buried her nose in its silkiness. She was convinced the scarf still held traces of Mutti’s smell; her mother had packed it herself. Hers were the last hands to touch it, besides Rose’s. Who knew what would happen if it were cleaned? But Rose could feel Mrs. Cohen’s reproachful gaze on her, and finally she looked up from the scarf. “I’m sorry,” she said, and the words felt stuck in her throat. “I like it this way.”
“That is exactly the type of unacceptable behavior I’m talking about,” Mrs. Cohen said. “Some would consider you a very fortunate girl.”
“I know I am,” Rose said quietly into her lap.
Mrs. Cohen sighed again. “Of course,” she said, and then she was gone.
Rose woke up early the next morning, determined to do better. A steady rain was pelting the eaves as she squirreled away her makeshift napkins in a bag beneath her bed, went down to the breakfast table, and asked Mrs. Cohen how she could help. Soon she was perched next to Mrs. Cohen in her sitting room, her arms held wide for the skein of navy wool Mrs. Cohen was using to knit scarves for Margaret’s brothers in the service.
Not long after the rain stopped and a grainy light speckled the room, Mary appeared. Handing Mrs. Cohen a sheaf of letters that had arrived by post, she announced: “I’d like to take the child for a walk.”
Mrs. Cohen looked at Mary. “A walk?”
“A turn in the park.”
Mrs. Cohen glanced from the resolute expression on Mary’s face to Rose, who, too excited at the possibility, snapped her gaze down. Mrs. Cohen pursed her lips, considering for a moment. Finally she said, “Ah, yes, a turn in the park,” as if the idea had occurred to her. “The fresh air might do her some good.”
The cool air outside felt like a relief. Then Mary took a right instead of a left at the street lined with horse chestnut trees. Rose became confused. The park was the other direction. They were walking toward town. Mary hadn’t spoken a word, but seized Rose’s hand and walked at too fast a clip, her bag thumping at her side. Rose struggled to remain apace.
The streets became narrower, the houses smaller. After a bend in the road, they passed a newsagent and a pub with lace curtains. A man clutching a little girl in a camel overcoat by the hand said, “Why, hello, Mary.” Mary didn’t reply.
“Where are we going?” Rose asked.
“You’ll see soon enough,” Mary said, not breaking her stride.
Now Rose was growing scared. Mary continued to grip her hand; they walked farther. Maybe she was being kidnapped! Maybe Mary was snatching her away from the Cohens because she couldn’t stand that Rose was being raised Jewish! Rose’s breath picked up speed. Could that be it? How would she ever alert Gerhard? Could she get word to Margaret? What about her parents? Would they ever know?
And just as Rose was growing misty-eyed about the Cohens—it would be written up in all the papers, they didn’t deserve this fate—Mary made an abrupt left, pulling Rose past some scraggly hedges into the tiny back garden, more gravel than grass, of a low-slung brick home.
“Sit.” Mary ordered Rose onto a chilly stone bench by a trio of bicycles and answered the unasked question forming in Rose’s eyes. “This is where I live.”
Rose was too stunned to do anything but comply. Mary removed a small tin bucket from beneath the bench and then opened up her bag, revealing the crumpled paper bag that Rose had placed under her mattress hours earlier. “How did you get that?” Rose asked, astounded, her cheeks spotty and hot.
“Do you have to ask?” Mary snorted. “It’s your bag, you take out the remains.” She pointed for Rose to place the soiled napkins in the can. “I’ve got proper napkins for you inside. And I’ll get you one of these to keep at the Cohens’. You’re to tell me whenever you need to use it.”
“Does Mrs. Cohen know?” Rose whispered, too embarrassed to meet Mary’s eye.
“Please.” Mary snorted again. “You think she notices anything?” She stooped her considerable girth low over the tin bucket, trying to strike a match. It didn’t take. The second one sputtered aflame and died out. “This dampness is the devil itself,” she said as she cupped her hands and the third caught and cast a weak glow.
As Mary poked inside the bucket with a stick, Rose stole a glimpse at her surroundings. The house was modest, more like a cottage, with gingham curtains lining the windows and a handful of stone, rain-streaked bunnies lining the walkway. She thought she heard the tinny sound of a dance number coming from inside. That didn’t seem like the Mary she knew. But maybe she didn’t know her, Rose thought, and for the first time in a great while, the realization of not knowing didn’t fill her with dread, but rather a quiet, rising expectancy.