The Red Thread Read online

  Our neighbors were a mix of Christians and Jews, and when I was small, everyone was friendly to each other. A few mornings a week, after the men left for work, the women, with babies and young children in tow, would gather for coffee and gossip before starting on their housework. I remember playing with blocks and marbles with other little boys and girls. Our neighbors invited me to trim Christmas trees and hunt Easter eggs with my playmates, and in return, my family invited them to our house during Chanukah. That was before Nazi propaganda spawned the hate and fear that poisoned our neighbors against us.

  ***

  The first concentration camp opened at Dachau in March 1933, less than two months after Adolf Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany. At the beginning, only political prisoners were sent to Dachau, and most of them weren’t Jewish.

  That same year, Miriam, or Mira, as she was called, Schloss and her family moved in next door. Between Mira and Hitler, Mira had the greater immediate impact on my life. I was too young to understand politics or the changes that were sweeping the country.

  Mira was my favorite among the girls in my class at Montessori school. Our mothers had been chums at university, and our fathers got on well, so naturally our families spent time together. Mira had curly brown hair, round, rosy cheeks, and blue eyes so dark they were almost purple. Her laugh bubbled up from deep inside her, and the sound of it made me want to do things to make her laugh more.

  On the day the Schlosses were due to arrive, nothing could have coaxed me away from our front window. I clutched the curtains in my fists, opening and closing them like a camera’s shutter. “Mutti, are you certain they’re coming today?”

  “Yes, Peter.”

  “But when?”

  She joined me at the window, peeled the curtains from my sweaty fingers, and opened them wide. “Soon enough. Now leave these be, or I’ll have to iron them again.”

  I obeyed, but without something to occupy my hands, my feet would not be still. When a horse-drawn cart came around the corner, I thought I might explode from the excitement. I pointed. “There! May I go out to greet them?” Then my shoulders slumped in disappointment, “It’s only the dairyman.”

  The dairyman made his deliveries down the block, and a few moments later, a chimney sweep walked by with his long black brush over his shoulder, but these mundane occurrences couldn’t hold my attention. Time inched along. Finally, I heard the rumble of a truck, and a shiny delivery van pulled into view. “Mutti!” I shrieked, “They’re here!”

  “All right, Peter. Calm yourself or you’ll frighten Mira.” Her words had the desired effect, and I held my exuberance in check as she opened the door. Once outside, though, I raced to meet the black taxicab that pulled up to the curb behind the van.

  Mutti called, “Sylvia, you always know how to make an entrance. You couldn’t walk from the trolley stop?”

  Mrs. Schloss’s husband helped her from the taxi, and she and Mutti kissed each other on both cheeks while he reached back and lifted Mira out. “Of course, we’d take a taxi, Elke. It’s a special day. It’s—”

  “Mira Day!” I shouted, and the adults laughed.

  Mr. Schloss set Mira down in front of me, and I grabbed both her hands and jumped up and down with glee. “Now every day is a Mira day!”

  She jumped with me. “And every day is a Peter day!”

  As the movers began unloading boxes and furniture swathed in blankets, Mr. Schloss fished a key from his pocket and hurried to unlock the front door. “Sylvia! Come here, my love.” Mrs. Schloss giggled as he swept her into his arms and carried her across the threshold ahead of the first load of boxes.

  Eager to take part in this moving-in ritual, I lifted Mira and trotted in after her parents.

  My mother called after me, “Careful, Peter! Don’t drop her.” But I knew I wouldn’t. In the empty sitting room, I set her down and we ran in circles, footsteps echoing, until Mutti and Mrs. Schloss shooed us out.

  Mira started upstairs. “Come see my room.” I followed her to the one painted a sunny yellow, with a bank of three windows that overlooked the back garden. “Mutti let me pick out a new coverlet and drapes. They’re pink and yellow striped.”

  I nodded, though I had no real interest in home décor. “That will be nice. Come on! I’ll show you the garden.”

  “Wait. I have to do something first.”

  I followed her into the smaller bedroom next door and watched as she pulled a sugar lump from her pocket, set it on the sill, and opened the window a few inches.

  She gave a satisfied nod. “If I leave this for the stork, it will bring me a baby brother or sister. Gertie did it and it worked.”

  I shrugged— I had no interest in babies, either, and I wasn’t keen to share Mira’s attention. “Let’s go.”

  We ran down the back stairs, dodging the movers and Mrs. Schloss in the kitchen. The Dutch door in the sunroom led to the back garden, where an ancient apple tree spread its branches across both our yards. “Mutti wouldn’t let me climb the tree because she said it wasn’t ours. But it’s yours, so now we can. Do you want to?”

  She nodded, her curls bobbing as she looked at the sky peeking through the network of boughs above us. One large branch dipped low enough to touch the crumbling stone wall that separated her garden from ours, and the whole tree seemed to lean on it, like a person propped up on one elbow. I climbed the wall and pulled her up after me, and together we sat on the branch, swinging our feet.

  “Look!” She pointed. “There’s a secret hiding place. Perhaps the fairies leave things for each other there.”

  I leaned across her to inspect the bowl-shaped indentation at the crux of two massive branches. “Like a post office?”

  “Yes.” Her laugh was pure delight. “A fairy post office!”

  The next day, I left a shiny stone there for her, and the day after she reciprocated with a marble for me. Mira liked to pretend the trinkets arrived by magic, so we never admitted to giving the gifts. Though we believed our perch on that branch was our magical, secret place, we were not invisible to the rest of the world. My father snuck several good photos of us without our knowledge.

  In most of my childhood memories, Vati was behind his camera. He took dozens of pictures at our birthday parties, of us wearing cone-shaped paper hats and blowing out the candles on our cakes. Flashbulbs popped at our evening Chanukah parties as, heads close together, we watched a spinning dreidel, the nuts and chocolates we’d won piled on the table. Backyard picnics, school concerts, hiking trips in the sandstone hills, you name it, he took pictures of it.

  My mother left our photo albums with a neighbor for safekeeping when we had to leave. There’s a chance they survived the war, but I wouldn’t know where to begin to look for them now.

  I didn’t let myself revisit those early memories often, because once I started remembering happy childhood times, my thoughts inevitably turned to the things I wished I could forget.

  ***

  If we had been born in another time, Mira and I might have lived next door to each other until we were grown, and our youthful infatuation might have ripened into something deeper. But we’d been neighbors for only a few years when things began to change in a way that would eventually seal our fate.

  The Nuremburg Laws, passed in 1935, banned Jews from swimming pools, parks, skating rinks, public athletic fields, and cultural events. No more concerts, ballets, or movies. The government said the ban was to avoid the automatic disadvantage that the presence of Jewish children caused for German-blooded children, who suffered because the Jews were doing well.

  Once the government was under Hitler’s control and his propaganda machine began to shape thought and public opinion, few Germans of Aryan descent would stand up for their Jewish neighbors. No one protested when the government stripped Jews of their German citizenship. Without passports, we were trapped in limbo—unwanted
at home, yet unable to leave.

  Our families believed in biding their time until things got better. Shortly before Jews were banned from restaurants, the Schlosses invited us out for an evening of entertainment for Mira’s seventh birthday. Mr. Schloss made a dinner reservation at one of the large hotels in the city center, where an orchestra played for the patrons.

  My seldom-worn jacket and bow tie felt stiff and uncomfortable. The adults ordered oysters and champagne, and Mira and I drank ginger ale with a cherry in it, like a cocktail, and ate bread and butter before the main course. The meal took a long time, and my portion of rack of lamb was far too large for me to manage alone. Though I did not complain, I would have been happier eating Wiener schnitzel and fried potatoes in a wooden booth at the gasthaus in our neighborhood. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had to sit still for so long.

  When the waiter cleared our plates and the adults had coffee and aperitifs before them, Mr. Schloss chucked Mira under the chin. “Someday, we’ll listen to you play your violin here, Liebling.” Mira had been studying the violin for almost a year.

  “Don’t go putting ideas into her head,” Mrs. Schloss snapped, lighting a cigarette and casting him a disdainful glance, “She’s likely not that talented.”

  Mr. Schloss’s face hardened. “She’s only been playing a short while. This is not the time to put limits on her.” He downed the rest of his drink.

  Mira, all smiles a moment before, now looked miserable.

  When I was young, I understood little about relationships between men and women, and I could not fathom why Mr. and Mrs. Schloss bickered so much when they should have been happy together. Mr. Schloss owned a garment factory and claimed that Mrs. Schloss, who was very pretty, was the only advertisement he needed for his ladies’ line. He often bought her jewelry, and they went out to restaurants and nightclubs nearly every week.

  Though my mother was just as beautiful as Mrs. Schloss, she didn’t wear as much makeup and favored simpler clothing. That was fine with me, because dresses like Mrs. Schloss’s would have gotten mussed up when we went on adventures. My parents favored the outdoors and athletic pursuits over restaurants and nightclubs, and we had a grand time camping or skiing on holiday. Mutti and Vati rarely raised their voices to one another, and I could not imagine them saying disparaging things about me when I was listening.

  My mother, in an attempt to smooth things over, said to Mrs. Schloss, “Mira plays beautifully for such a young girl.”

  But Mrs. Schloss only shrugged.

  My father picked up his camera. “Gather around, now. Let’s take some photos to mark this important occasion.”

  “Wait just a moment.” Mr. Schloss pulled a small white box from his breast pocket and presented it to Mira with a flourish. “Happy birthday.”

  She opened it and cried out in delight.

  I leaned over to see a heart-shaped gold locket nestled in the box. The design engraved on the front reminded me of a springerle cookie—a raised heart with crinkly edges surrounded by vines and flowers.

  “Oh, Vati! Thank you!” Mira threw her arms around her father’s neck and he kissed both her cheeks.

  “That’s a grown-up gift.” My mother admired the locket as Mr. Schloss fastened the clasp around Mira’s neck.

  “Likely he spent too much,” said Mira’s mother, before taking a drag on her cigarette.

  “What’s too much for my Mira? Nothing. She’s more precious than gold or jewels.” Mr. Schloss put his arm around his daughter. “Now on with the photographs!”

  As my father readied his camera, a waiter arrived with a large ice cream sundae, piled with whipped cream and alight with birthday candles. When he set it in front of Mira, I could see the flames reflected in her eyes.

  “Say Käsekuchen!” my father called out.

  The resulting photograph showed Mira, all smiles, holding her new locket against her chest as she leaned forward to blow out the candles.

  ***

  Mira and I were not allowed to return to Montessori school after the spring term. We joined other Jewish children who had been in class with us at the new Lehrhaus school in the fall of 1936.

  Jewish students of all ages who were prohibited from attending public schools or universities could go to Lehrhaus. My father, who had been let go from Universitat Leipzig, taught upper school and university-level mathematics and science classes there, and often walked with us in the mornings.

  For a boy who had never felt close to my Jewish heritage, all of a sudden, I was unable to free myself from it. Every new restriction and decree made my world a little smaller, my opportunities fewer. Something that had not mattered at all before was now to blame for the bad things that were happening to me.

  Perhaps I would have borne the changes better if I’d grown up in a traditional Jewish household, but I hadn’t, and now I didn’t know how to ask my parents to teach me about religion and my heritage. I began to question not who, but what I was, and the answer I received from my country’s leaders and its so-called legitimate citizens was that I was Untermensch—less than human.

  Had Mira and I lived in America when we were children, the coming madness would not have engulfed us and swept us away on its unrelenting current, and we would have led privileged lives.

  Our fathers were both college-educated professionals. Our mothers had degrees as well and were accomplished in their own right. Mutti studied ballet as a child and had wanted a career as a dancer, but when she grew too tall, she attended university instead, majoring in art history. Mira’s mother had studied French literature. After graduation, my mother had worked as an assistant buyer in an art gallery, while Mira’s mother had been a proofreader in one of the many publishing firms in the city.

  In those days, most married women didn’t work outside the home, and so our mothers poured their energy into us, taking us to the library, museums, galleries, and concerts—until it was no longer allowed by law.

  Though we both did well in school, my marks were better than Mira’s, only because I recalled everything I heard or read with ease and always got my lessons without having to study hard. It went without saying that my parents expected me to attend Universitat Leipzig, while Mira’s future presumably lay at the famed Conservatorium der Musick.

  ***

  The year we turned eight, we stayed closer to home, and our perch on that curved branch of the apple tree was the perfect place to dream.

  My father had been reading a chapter of Treasure Island with me before bed every night, and I recounted the story to Mira during our playtime. Though she preferred Grimm’s Fairy Tales, she was enamored with the thought of desert islands, buried treasure, and maps with X marking the spot. Once we were well into the story, she brought out her father’s world atlas. Together we’d turn the pages, looking for the best place to bury treasure.

  We chose an island in the Caribbean and Mira drew an X on it in red crayon. I was usually less careful with my possessions than Mira, and I was shocked that she would do such a thing to a book that didn’t belong to her.

  “Won’t your father be angry?”

  She smiled, playing with the locket on its chain. “He’ll never notice it’s there. Now it’s our secret.”

  “Shall we go there someday? Bury your locket with our treasure?”

  “Certainly not! I would never be parted from my locket. We’ll have to bury something else. Besides, we’d have to go to the Caribbean by ship. Perhaps we should plan our first trip somewhere closer.”

  Heads together, we turned the pages, looking at Berlin, Paris, and London. Those were places we had heard of. Our mothers often spoke of the adventures they’d had visiting Paris together while they were university students, and Mira was drawn to the glamour of the City of Light. Mrs. Schloss always wore Evening in Paris perfume, and sometimes she’d dab a little behind Mira’s ears, too.

 
I traced my finger along the route from Leipzig to Paris. “When we get there, what shall we do first?”

  “We’ll go to the Eiffel Tower and ride the elevator all the way to the top. Then we can see the whole city at once.”

  “I’d rather see the races at Le Mans.” My finger diverted off in another direction on the map.

  She frowned as she looked at the page. “That must be hours away from Paris by automobile.”

  “So?”

  “So, I’m the one who’s planning this trip.”

  “Well, plan an extra day or two or I don’t want to go.”

  She sighed and rolled her eyes, then gave me an accepting smile. “All right, fine. Before we go to Le Mans, though, we must spend enough time in Paris to go to the Louvre. Of course, we’ll stay at the Ritz and stroll along the Champs-Élysées. Mutti says that’s the only way to see Paris. Vati will buy me an haute couture gown to wear.”

  Clothes were just as unimportant to me then as they are now, but because of Mr. Schloss’s profession, of course Mira knew about such things. I snorted. “Whatever for?”

  She giggled. “I can wear it when I play a violin concert at the Palais Garnier. You’ll be my escort, so you’ll need to bring a morning coat and a top hat.”

  “No thanks! I’ll be your sound engineer and broadcast your concert all over the world on my shortwave.” I gave my best imitation of a radio announcer. “Ladies and gentlemen, we proudly present, live from Paris, Miss Miriam Schloss, the best violinist in Germany—and all the world.”

  When we grew tired of making plans, Mira leaned over a branch to drop the atlas flat into the grass below. As she sat up, her locket’s chain caught on some rough bark and broke. Mira made a grab for the golden heart as it slid off the chain. She lost her balance and nearly followed it to the ground, but I clutched her arm to steady her just in time. We watched it shimmer in the sunlight and disappear into the grass.