She had shaken the dirt from her hair and wiped the dirt from her mouth. She could not see him in the dark, but she sensed he was upset, and she reached up and put her hands on the sides of his face, and he reached out to touch her, too. And Monique knew then that the connection between them was still there, a bond that was unbreakable, a loyalty that takes years to build. She would have sobbed into his chest if she could, but he was ill and sedated, and she knew there was little time, and fear of Erich still gripped her.
“Georg,” she said, “I need you to do something, but the others in the house can’t know what you are doing. You mustn’t let them see you. Can you do that?” He stared at her in the dark, and she had no idea if this would work. “I need you to spy through the windows, like when we were young, to see what they are doing, and if the little girl, Vivi, is still there with the others.” And he sat there for a moment as if he hadn’t heard. She said it again, and suddenly he left. She waited, not knowing if he understood under the haze of his illness, and when the door had opened a short time later, her heart had leaped, expecting Erich. But it was Georg.
“The little girl has left with the man,” he said clearly. And she didn’t know whether to hug him or cry that Vivi was perhaps still alive, but gone also, and to where she did not know. “The other one is still there.”
She had instructed him to do one last thing, to fill in the hole that he had found her in, and she wasn’t sure if he had understood, but she had left him then, kissed him on the cheek, but she felt he wasn’t looking at her anymore, that he was lost somewhere else in his head. And she promised then that she would never give up on him, that they would be together again.
She had swum partway up the river. Then it was some British soldiers in a truck that she flagged down on the road to Dresden. She was badly injured and shaking uncontrollably, and they were shocked at her state. They were also surprised when she begged them to take her to a Russian military base just north of the city. A German woman was not safe alone, they said, and there was no mockery in their tone. They gave her a blanket and some water and took her to the destination, hesitant. They did not leave there until they knew she was safe, until she had safely delivered the lines she was told to say in Russian. She was taken to a hospital nearby, where she was later reunited with Stefano in another base with Fedor, north of Berlin, and away from the eyes of the Nazi underground suspected of operating near Dresden. She was to wait there until Stefano completed his mission to find Erich and her daughter. But after a failed attempt to capture Erich, with Georg shot by accident, Monique had rushed down from Berlin with Fedor.
Arriving in the afternoon, they had learned from the postmaster that the boy he brought with him, Michal, had delivered a second message from Stefano, and something else. From Georg’s bedroom window, Michal had seen Stefano dragged to the barn unconscious, and, not knowing if he was alive or dead, Michal had run to a place inside the wall under the stairs to hide. He had heard footsteps in and out of the house several times, and then, after he heard a car leave, he ran up the track toward the town.
He was orphaned, the postmaster told Monique, and had come through the town with Stefano several days earlier.
And Monique had been moved at the sight of him, had taken his hand and told him that there would be no more secret messages, and no more reasons to run.
OCTOBER 1945
CHAPTER 33
MONIQUE
At the hospital, Monique kisses Georg softly on the cheek. He has tears, and she is so glad that he remembers something. He will love Italy. She knows they both will.
“When you are a little better, I will have you moved so you can come and live with me. The doctor needs to monitor you for longer.”
Georg remembers her name. He remembers many things. He remembers her in the river. The process of remembering is slow, many memories lost.
She holds his hand. “I promise I will come back for you. You will come and live with us. Do you understand?”
She pulls out a postcard of houses on the Mediterranean and an address. “This is where I will be taking you.”
He stares at the writing and recognizes some of the words. He is getting better at reading.
“And what of the owls of Elbe?” he asks.
“Yes, one day there, too, when Germany is better.”
He starts to cry again, and she cradles him.
Seeing him upset is making her cry also. She doesn’t want to show this in front of him. She knows that her tears will distress him further. Monique is hoping the recovery is not too long. They delayed their journey to be with Georg while he recovered from the gunshot wound, and his withdrawal from the drug, the result of which is still making him moody and anxious at times. Even though he will be there for several months yet, he is over the worst of it, the doctor thinks, and is healing slowly but steadily.
It is an hour before she drags herself away. She hates seeing him alone in the bed, but she will make good on her promise. He is her family; he is part of her.
CHAPTER 34
STEFANO
Stefano is wearing a white shirt and black pants, his dark hair slicked back, the sides cut short, his stubble gone. He no longer resembles the man who lived in the forests and mountains, who nearly starved to death, who fought not just with guns, knives, and fists, but sometimes a silver wire, too, against the enemy. In front of him is his friend Fedor. If not for the war, they agree they would not have made so many friends, and it is something to say, to stop the talk of losses, to see a greater good.
As Fedor walks away, vowing to see him again, Stefano lights a cigarette and leans against the driver’s side door.
His sister Teresa has written from Amalfi, and he holds the letter with one hand, cigarette in the other. She is preparing rooms for him at the house where they had lived with their father. When she had first returned, she had discovered other people living there, but they have since relocated. It is a little run-down, but she has been painting walls and planting vegetables. She says that the lemon tree is still there. The meat vendor at the markets is back to selling lamb, though lean, and she is planning a feast for his return. She is looking forward to seeing him, to seeing everyone. He reads the letter again. He can tell that she was crying when she wrote it, as she did when she found him again. Mistakes were made. Appalling crimes committed. And the consequences for these were high. But these events, his history, he must place now in the past, not to forget but to enshrine, so he can focus on the living.
He had almost given up hope of hearing from Monique, thinking she had changed her mind, and had been planning his return to Italy, when Fedor told him what had happened, delivering the message personally about Monique’s injuries at the hands of her husband and cousin. The Russians had brought her to a hospital in Berlin, and Stefano rushed to her side, alarmed that she was torn and bruised. But she was not distraught about her injuries, just that Erich had taken her daughter. They both had reasons to find him.