Page 22 of The Berlin Sisters
They pulled over on to the side of the road, and Hanna’s heart began to race as it always did. Not so much from adrenalin as fear of something going wrong; because it wasn’t only her life hanging in the balance if it did.
Once they’d stopped, she ran around the back and pulled open the two doors, hauling them back and smiling at the two young children sitting there. Even though they were perfectly healthy, they’d been bundled up as if they were unwell, their little cases of belongings hidden beneath the stretcher beds.
‘Hello, my loves,’ Hanna said brightly, climbing in and dropping a kiss on one head, and then the other. ‘Remember how I told you we must hurry when it’s time to put you in the other ambulance?’
Both children nodded, their eyes wide.
‘Well, we’re ready to do that now. So let’s get your things and hurry along.’
Hanna helped the little girl first, taking her hand and reaching for her case. She took her papers out and pinned them to her coat so they wouldn’t get lost, before passing her out to Dieter. Then she helped the little boy, lifting him as he trembled, hating how scared he was.
‘Come on, we just have to move you to the next ambulance.’
She paused for a moment, feeling his little warm body in her arms, remembering what it had been like to hold her own son, to be a mother, to have a child cradled against her chest. Sometimes the memories caught her at the hardest of times.
‘Hanna?’
‘Coming,’ she said quickly, checking the boy’s papers and belongings before passing him out, too.
When she climbed out she followed Dieter to the next ambulance, watching as the children were loaded in and waving to them. Sometimes they had to hide the children, but these two had papers and a good cover story, and they’d decided it was easiest to move them in plain sight. If they acted as if they had nothing to hide, then they would be relaxed if they were questioned, which could be the difference between being successful or not – the SS were experts at detecting fear, and she didn’t want to give them any reason to doubt the story the children would give if they were stopped.
‘See you next time,’ said the other ambulance driver and nurse.
Hanna nodded, standing there on the road as they pulled away, until Dieter touched her shoulder, his hand heavy. She wished she could hold the children for longer, show them how much they were loved, soak up the feeling of having a little one in her arms.
‘We need to go, too.’
She turned to follow him, wiping her eyes and wondering how life had become so cruel that two little children were being smuggled into another country in order to stay alive, while their parents were either still in hiding or being sent to a camp where they might or might not live. The more she heard about the camps, the more convinced she became that no one would ever return.
‘Let us pray for a night free from bombings,’ Dieter said with a sigh. ‘The other night I almost stayed in my bed. I was so exhausted I couldn’t face dragging myself to the shelter.’
‘Would you have been fine?’ she asked, understanding how he felt. ‘If you’d stayed?’
Dieter looked over at her, taking his eyes from the road for a second. ‘That night I would have been, our house was missed. But at the last moment, I thought about Amelia, and I couldn’t stop thinking that there was a chance she could come home, that she might just survive whatever hell she’s living through right now, and then how angry would she be with me? That I was too lazy to climb out of bed and take myself to safety without her there to hurry me along?’
Hanna started to laugh despite her sadness, appreciating his effort to lighten the mood. It began as a giggle at the way he spoke, as if he were genuinely terrified of his wife hunting him down, so cross at him for his laziness, and suddenly they were both laughing so hard that she could barely catch her breath. Hanna laughed like she hadn’t in such a long time, her cheeks aching and her belly tender when she finally stopped.
She reached out to put her hand over Dieter’s then, knowing how quickly laughter could turn to tears, how much he was hurting despite his attempt at humour in an effort to cheer her up. He was like family to her, and she knew that if she had the choice of reuniting him with his wife, she’d swap places with her in an instant, to give him back his family.
‘She’s going to come home, I know she is,’ Hanna whispered. ‘We have to keep believing in miracles, otherwise what do we have left?’
They rode the rest of the way in silence, Hanna’s thoughts turning as they often did in moments of idleness to the day she’d lost everything.
Hanna smiled to herself as she made a cup of coffee, planning on sitting outside in the sun to relax until Michael and Hugo returned home. She knew how fortunate she was to have her husband at home still, as his work as a pharmacist had meant he was exempt from receiving his military orders, but she was still exhausted. Running around after a toddler was never easy, and she’d had a week of working the night shift at the hospital, so a moment to herself was something she’d been craving for days.
Once she had her coffee in hand, Hanna made her way outside, taking a sip as she sat. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the feel of the sunshine on her skin, tempted to take off more clothes to work on her tan. Before having Hugo, she’d gone to the park on her days off and sunbathed with friends, but now she barely had time to even see the sun, let alone lie in it.
Hanna sighed and opened her eyes, taking another sip of her coffee. But her perfect little oasis of calm was ruined by a loud bang, followed by screams for help. She set her cup down and hurried inside to find her shoes, before making her way out of the door. She followed the screams down the road, surprised to see a crowd gathered on the street not far from her house.
Hanna began to run, realising that there must have been an accident of some kind and wanting to help if she could. There were far fewer doctors in the city than there once were, and she knew how long it could take for an ambulance to arrive.
The first thing she noticed as she neared was the shiny black Mercedes that was parked at an odd angle, and then the sight of a short man yelling at another man, who appeared to be the driver. It was Dr Joseph Goebbels – she’d have recognised him anywhere – and another high-ranking Nazi officer who looked vaguely familiar to her, perhaps someone her father was acquainted with.
‘Drive me back to the office at once, and watch your speed this time.’
‘Yes, sir, but what about the man and child? Should we not wait for an ambulance or to give a statement to—’
‘Who cares about the man? He isn’t a soldier, so he’s of little concern to me, and the child is already dead. Someone else can see to it.’
