Chapter 5

Sophia settled into her new life in the convent with surprising ease. It gave her everything she had longed for all her life, and combined what meant most to her. She enjoyed her life in community, as she had suspected she would. Living with like-minded women with the same goals was both comforting and exhilarating. She no longer had to hide her religious beliefs, and Mother Regina was a strong spiritual director for her. They spent many hours discussing the religious issues which Sophia had pondered for a lifetime, with no one to share her views and philosophies. She soaked up the Superior's answers to her questions like a hungry plant desperate for water. The religious answers to her deeper unspoken questions were like water for her soul.

She continued to attend dissident meetings when she could get away with it, and only missed a few. It was the one thing she didn't share with the Mother Superior, because she knew she wouldn't agree. But like her role model, Edith Stein, Sophia had strong beliefs about Germany, the war, and the Reich, and the destruction they were wreaking, the people they were destroying and killing, the lives they had shattered. At the meetings, she could speak out freely, without fear of being reported or chastised, or punished, and worse.

Her father came to see her dutifully every Sunday and looked aggrieved when he did. He still couldn't understand why Sophia had chosen a life in seclusion and given up her prospects as a beautiful young woman. It made no sense to him, but she had always been different. He recognized that now. She was even less like her sister Theresa than he had ever suspected. Having a husband and children meant nothing to her. She lived to help others and wished that she could save them all. She had a tender heart, but no wish to give it to a man. She was devoted to the human race as a whole, and willing to sacrifice herself for what she believed. She was a strong, brave woman, stronger than he'd ever known. Her dangerous walk to the Swiss border to save her sister showed him a kind of love he'd never understood and he readily admitted that she was more like her mother than like him. He was a scientist, not a saint, but he thought his daughter was.

Through an old patient of his, who came to visit him unexpectedly, Thomas had news of Heinrich and Theresa. Their baby had been born in Zurich in June, a month early, probably due to the rigors of the walk from Germany to Switzerland. He was a big, healthy boy. They had named him Thomas, after him, which touched him deeply, and he wished that he could see his first grandchild, but there was no hope of it until after the war, if then. Who knew what the conditions would be at the end of the war, and who would win. The British were putting up a fierce fight, but Hitler's war machine seemed unbeatable at the moment, like a man-eating beast devouring whole countries and forcing the population to submit to their rules and beliefs.

Thomas was glad now that Theresa was leading a comfortable, familiar life in Switzerland, and he knew that Heinrich would take good care of her. He was an honorable man. His patient informed him, discreetly, that Heinrich's older brother was helping them. They were living with him for the moment, and at his father's suggestion, Heinrich had had the foresight to place money in Switzerland right before war was declared, so he had funds to rely on. And even if they lost everything in Germany, both brothers would be financially sound afterward, unless the sky fell in on the whole world. But failing that, their investments in Switzerland would protect them. They would lead a very different life in Switzerland now than the people they had known in Berlin, some of whom had lost not only their fortunes, but their lives, their children, their livelihoods, their homes.

It was also a very different life that Sophia was living now with the Sisters of Mercy. Thomas knew that Theresa would have been shocked if she had known, and disappointed for her sister. She had always envisioned both of them married, with children. Sophia had chosen a very different path, and Thomas could only hope that she would change her mind one day. She was still very young at twenty-one to follow such a Spartan path for life.

They were only able to exchange letters with Theresa from time to time, and they didn't dare put anything significant in the letters. Thomas didn't even dare tell her that Sophia had moved to the convent when he wrote to congratulate her about her son and wish them well. He didn't want to bring attention to Sophia. The Nazis were not fond of Christian religious fanatics either, and several members of the church, both priests and nuns, had been arrested and sent to labor camps if they weren't ardent supporters of the Führer. He wanted to be their god, not just their ruler, and punished anyone who disagreed with him. Thousands had been imprisoned for differing political views as well. It was a time to keep your head down, say little, and make yourself as unremarkable as possible, which was Thomas's goal. All he wanted to do was treat his patients and continue the work he had always engaged in. Even more so now, with Sophia in the convent, his work was his only interest, and he only went home to sleep at night. He ate all his meals in the hospital cafeteria. His housekeeper almost never saw him anymore.

One thing Sophia readily admitted was that working conditions at St. Joseph's Hospital were far less comfortable than they had been at her father's ultra-comfortable, luxurious hospital, where they had state-of-the-art equipment, all the supplies and medicine were abundant, surgical conditions were ideal for the physicians, patients, and nurses, and the patients were of the highest caliber, either important military men seeking expert private medical advice in addition to what the army offered them, politicians of high rank, or socialites with wealth and education. Although he hadn't planned it that way, Thomas's patients were the most elite in Berlin. He dealt with educated people, which made his job easier.

At St. Joseph's, Sophia dealt with simpler people who didn't always understand the procedures or their illness even after it was explained to them. Even some of the doctors were less highly trained and were rude to the nurses, and although the hospital was relatively new, some of the equipment was antiquated. The staff had no choice but to overlook the conditions and offer the best care they could in the circumstances. Sophia was deeply shocked by some of the forms they had to fill out, to eliminate an undesirable element of "hopeless cases" according to standards set by the Reich, and not medical practitioners: children who were too ill and had been since birth, some with deformities that could even be fixed, like club feet, which she had seen her father operate on and repair many times in his hospital. Any sign of mental instability or retardation, elderly people showing signs of dementia, however slight. The Führer wanted a perfect race of flawless people and would accept nothing less. Nurses, doctors, and midwives were required to report any deformities or anomalies, mental or physical, "for life unworthy of life," for the good of the Fatherland. The direction and appropriate forms came from the Reich Health Ministry. It applied to all patients, both children and adults. A panel of "experts" would then evaluate each case, and three plus marks on a form was a death sentence, either by lethal injection, or starvation until they succumbed. For adults, they didn't waste time starving them, and administered lethal injections. No anomalies were to be tolerated, no defects, no substandard conditions, even those which might have been cured over time. It was part of a pet program of the Führer's, code-named Aktion T4, designed to purify the master race. He had instituted the program in 1939, only weeks after war was declared, and all medical personnel were ordered to participate. And by 1940, all Jewish patients were removed from all institutions and killed.

Sophia systematically failed to report any malformations, conditions, or anomalies that would draw attention to patients who might be subject to the rule. And she had never been caught so far, for failure to report. She knew that killing patients was frequent in all hospitals in Germany now, including the one where she worked. It was a cruel, inhuman selection process, and not mercy killing as the Health Ministry claimed.

Sophia was outraged every time she heard of one and had tried to erase a red plus on a report she had seen for a bright three-year-old boy who was partially deaf, but the plus sign had been written in red ink and she couldn't remove it. The child had disappeared from the pediatric ward the next day. They hadn't bothered to wait for starvation, and the parents had been heartbroken. They had been told that he had died in the night from a heart defect he didn't have. Sophia was off the night he disappeared. She would have taken him and hidden him at the convent if she could get away with it, but she knew she couldn't, and there were so many patients like him, both young and old, and of all ages. Too many to count lately, as euthanasia was becoming a common, acceptable alternative to treatment, decided by zealous doctors, sometimes even by medical students. It was all about Nazi politics, not humane, compassionate, responsible medical treatment. Coming from her father's highly dedicated, medically advanced private hospital, it was a shock to Sophia, and fanned the flames of her silent hatred of the Nazis. For the sake of the convent, her father, and even her own safety, she kept her views to herself, but they ate her up each time she encountered an inhuman situation, and made her ever more faithful to her hidden group of dissidents.

She was leaving the hospital one evening after her shift. To save gasoline and support the war effort the nuns were driving less than they used to, and the Sisters of Mercy were allowed to take the bus when they left work. Sophia left the bus long before her stop, on a different route, and walked to her meeting on her way home. It was always easy to explain that she had been delayed at work, and the meetings didn't last long. She took a familiar seat at the edge of the room, jotted down a note of something she didn't want to forget, felt someone sit down next to her, saw a familiar voluminous black skirt beside her, and looked up to see Mother Regina sitting next to her, her hands folded in her lap, her gaze straight into Sophia's big green eyes. She didn't know what to say at first. She felt like a child who had been caught stealing or cheating on their homework. She had been lying about where she went twice a week, ever since becoming a postulant of the order.

"I'm sorry," was all she could think of to say at first, and Mother Regina nodded and whispered to her.

"I wanted to see where you go every week, twice a week, on Mondays and Thursdays. I didn't think it was like you to do it to avoid your shift in the laundry." She smiled indulgently, and Sophia decided to open her heart to her.

"This is important to me. It's a moment of sanity in the world we live in now, and knowing that others feel the same."

"Our views in the convent are not so different from yours, Sister. But it would not be wise for us to express them, it might cause pain or danger to others we don't wish to harm."

"Will you forbid me to come here?" Sophia asked her, wanting to be obedient, but not sure she could be on this one important point.

"I want to hear what they say. That's why I came."

The discussions that night were slightly less inflammatory than usual, but painful nonetheless, stories of Jewish neighbors who had been dragged away, their houses burned, their children beaten in front of them, and fathers shot and killed, stories from other cities, Jews being forced to live in ghettos, which were being systematically sealed, and the residents starved, bombed, or murdered, in order to eliminate thousands of Jews at one fell swoop. It was sickening as one listened, and Sophia gave a brief account of the Aktion T4 "mercy" killings she had become aware of, in many cases killing healthy children with problems that could be cured, children who were starved or killed by injection, often Jewish children, but not always.

The Jewish children were deported to die in camps with their parents. The smell of death was heavy in the air by the end of the meeting. Claus cryptically reported six very pleasant trips to the market that week to buy fresh vegetables, which meant something only to the initiated. It meant that six children had been successfully removed and taken to safety, either in hiding, or to another location, by people active in missions to save them, just as he had helped Heinrich and Theresa to escape. Mother Regina asked Sophia to explain it when they left, and she did, and told her about their trip into the mountains to save her sister and her husband in April, when she decided to enter the convent.

She introduced Mother Regina to Claus before they left, and he was intrigued to see her with another nun and wondered if she was under some kind of supervision now. Sophia couldn't explain that the Superior's visit had been a surprise to her too.

"They're all brave people," Mother Regina said solemnly as they walked to the bus afterward. "At another time, I might have called it foolhardy, but we need people like them now, to save those we can, and there are too few. And you want to be one of them? I assume you've done some missions yourself?" she asked Sophia directly. Sophia wondered if she was going to ask her to leave the convent. She didn't want to, but she couldn't sit helplessly by doing nothing either, when the opportunities arose to help someone and they asked her. Particularly Claus. She owed him so much, for her sister's safe escape.

"I would like to," Sophia said honestly. "I've done very little so far, but I help where I can." A bus ride with a child, waiting with them in a dark cellar until other help arrived, taking a child to a nearby city under a blanket in her father's car. She'd had a few missions she had completed successfully, and she wanted to do more.

"You realize that if you take great risks, you put all of the sisters at the convent in danger."

"I do, and I don't want to do that. But if I can help in small ways, I would."

Mother Regina smiled for a moment as she looked at her. "You sound like Sister Teresa Benedicta of the Cross," she said, which was the religious name Edith Stein had taken as a Carmelite. Sophia considered it a great compliment. "Be careful and be wise, for your sake as well as ours. If something happens, there is nothing we can do to save you. The Reich barely trusts us as it is. We can't jeopardize the order for you. Only the brave want to do what you long to do, Sophia. A wise priest once told me that God doesn't canonize the foolish. Be as careful as you can be, and I will pray for you," she said, as they boarded the bus that would bring them close to the convent. They sat side by side. Sophia looked out the window, thinking of what Mother Regina had said. In essence, she had given her blessing to Sophia to continue to attend her meetings, and to do whatever missions they asked her to do, without taking undue risks that would put the sisters in the convent in danger. She knew it would be a fine line, and these were wartime rules, but she was grateful for the freedom, and reached over gently and held Mother Regina's hand. The two nuns exchanged a knowing look and got off at their stop a few minutes later, walking back to the convent. It was everything Sophia had hoped for. She was a nun now, and was free to follow what she believed in, and help wherever she could. To outsmart the deadly Nazis and cheat them of even a single death was her mission, and her reason for living now. Mother Regina had given her an incredible gift. She understood that it was something Sophia had to do. In Mother Regina's opinion, the cause of freedom needed more people like her. Only the brave could do it and Mother Regina was well aware that Sophia was braver than she knew.

The summer seemed longer to Theresa in Zurich than it did to Sophia in Berlin. Mail out of Germany was erratic, but since Switzerland was neutral, eventually letters got through. Heinrich made Theresa use a post office box, in case a letter fell into the wrong hands and the Gestapo instantly had their address. But there was nothing they could do to them here. They had seized everything the von Ernsts had in Germany, all their possessions and valuables, their bank, their fortune, and their home, but Heinrich felt it was a small price to pay for freedom. The greatest loss was his parents. They still had no idea where they had been taken or what had happened to them after their arrest, and Heinrich feared the worst. His older brother Bernhard was not optimistic that they would survive whatever they were experiencing and might already have succumbed or been killed. Neither of his parents was suited to a labor camp, his father with his heart condition, and his mother having been pampered and protected all her life. She came from an aristocratic family as wealthy as his father's, and hardships were unknown to both of them. And what one heard about the concentration camps where Jews and dissidents were being sent was terrifying.

What consoled Heinrich now was the love of his young wife, and the birth of their son Thomas. He was a beautiful blond baby from the moment of his birth and looked like Theresa with the same big blue eyes and ready smile. He laughed and giggled within a month of his birth.

He had been born in a luxurious private clinic in Zurich, similar to her father's hospital, so nothing was unfamiliar to Theresa. The birth had been hard because the baby was big, but she had gotten through it, and was thoroughly enjoying him. As she held him in her arms to nurse him, she thought of her mother and sister, and wished that they could see him, and had been with her at the birth. It had been harder to go through it alone, with only nurses, but after the two-day trek to reach safety in Switzerland, she felt as though she could face anything. She had never been as frightened, or so physically challenged and exhausted, in her life. On doctor's orders, she had stayed in bed for a week after they arrived in April. Thomas had been born two months later, three weeks before his due date. He couldn't wait to be born, and no harm had come from arriving a few weeks early.

Theresa was constantly surprised by how much she missed her sister. She wanted her advice, or to tell her something, and there was suddenly an aching void in her life, balanced by Heinrich and the baby, but a man and an infant were not the same as a sister. She realized now more than ever before how wise and stable her sister was, and what a support she had been to her after their mother got sick, and since she had died. Sophia was always the voice of reason, which had irritated Theresa profoundly in her teens, wanting more freedom, but she saw now the love that had been behind every rule and scolding.

Her father had managed to share with her in a letter at the end of the summer that Sophia had entered the convent after they left. Theresa was horrified by the idea of it at first, that her sister would take vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, which sounded horrible to her, but she realized in some part of her that it suited Sophia, who had been indifferent to material things all her life, and cared more about others than herself. She had lavished that capacity for love on her sister, and would do so now, on the poor, in the hospital where she worked, and on strangers. The concept was totally foreign to Theresa, but she knew it wouldn't be to Sophia.

She worried about her father too, who had no one to take care of him now, with Sophia living somewhere else, although not far away. And she knew how hard their father worked. Like Sophia, he only thought of others, in his case his patients, and not himself. At least he had his hospital to keep him busy, but she was sure he must be lonely now without his daughters near at hand.

Heinrich had just bought them a very pretty house on the lake, which she was decorating lavishly, and he always indulged her. There was a whole floor for the children they intended to have, and an enormous garden. Her dressing room was the size of their bedroom in Berlin. Theirs was not a life of deprivation while they waited out the war in the peace and safety of neutral Switzerland. She had wanted to go to Paris to do some shopping, but the Germans had occupied Paris since June, and it was no longer safe. She was disappointed they couldn't go, and Heinrich and his brother were shocked and saddened that France had fallen, and that others would suffer the losses they had. Jews in France were already being rounded up to be deported, homes and art were being seized, and the country was being plundered. The French had signed an agreement with Hitler, acceding to the occupation and trying to minimize the damage, but Heinrich and his brother were sure the effects would be enormous, and loss of life would follow, as it had everywhere else.

Theresa tried not to think of the dangers of war whenever she thought of Sophia and her father, and instead she kept her warm memories of them close to her heart, as she watched her son grow.

By October, four months after his birth, she was pregnant again, and she and Heinrich were delighted. Their peaceful time in Switzerland seemed like the ideal time to build the family they wanted, in idyllic surroundings, in their new home. Heinrich's older brother was married to a woman with ill health, and they had no children, so they were enchanted to see the babies arrive to bring joy to their lives, and the promise of new life.

The war seemed unreal and very distant to the von Ernsts in Zurich. Looking at the mountains and the lake, it was hard to imagine the hardships and dangers of daily life in Berlin. Even more impossible to visualize Sophia's life as a nun. It all seemed so far away now, and the only reality for Theresa was her baby, her husband who made her so happy, and their new home. And Heinrich kept the ugly details of the war from her whenever he could. She had already been through enough, in his opinion, with their escape to Switzerland. She didn't need to hear the stories he did that weren't suitable for her ears. He wanted her second pregnancy to be even smoother than the first, without the shock of having to flee when she was six and a half months pregnant. And as long as he drew breath, he intended to protect her from any unpleasantness, and treat her like the beautiful jewel she was. It was a far cry from the life of Sister Anne, with the Sisters of Mercy, working among the indigent in a public hospital, attending secret meetings of Nazi dissidents, and occasionally transporting Jewish children a short distance in Berlin or somewhere in Germany to pass them along to someone who would bring them to safety at great risk to themselves, and literally risking death as punishment each time she did. But if Sophia could have seen, or even imagined, her sister's life in Switzerland, she would have been happy for her.