Chapter Eight

HANNA

‘Let's pray for another miracle.'

Hanna settled into her seat a week after Christmas, thankful to have Dieter with her to transport the children. They'd formed an unlikely friendship through working together, and although she was most often working at the hospital as a nurse, they'd been paired together more and more to work in the aftermath of the bombings, when a triage nurse was sent out with an ambulance driver. They were often able to work without talking, understanding what the other needed, and although many of her fellow nurses found Dieter to be overly gruff, she had always appreciated his quiet, practical manner. There was no hint of anything romantic between them, just a deep-founded respect for the work they were doing, and he'd come to be like the older brother she'd never had.

They'd also both experienced deep loss attributed to the war, which gave them common ground, and it was the reason they were both risking their lives to help Jewish children – neither of them felt as if they had anything to lose. With anyone else, that might have felt like a reckless attitude, but they were both determined to save as many children as they could, while they still could.

‘I'm worried we won't be able to do this much longer,' Hanna said. ‘I always pray for the best, but sometimes I wonder—'

‘Whether it's even possible for them to make it to safety any more?'

She sighed. ‘Yes. It doesn't mean I don't want to keep trying, but sometimes I think about all the people involved, all the pieces that have to fit together for this to work. It just seems more impossible with each passing month.'

‘I know. But all we can do is try, which is more than most people are doing.'

‘I wish there was a way to do more, to keep the families together instead of having to send children off on their own like this.'

Dieter grunted in reply, and she took that to mean he agreed with her but had no idea how to do so. Other than hiding more Jews in her own home, Hanna was all out of ideas, too.

They travelled in silence for some time as the ambulance bumped along. There were roads close to the hospital that were littered with concrete, timber, and other parts of buildings from the air raid the previous night, and about fifteen minutes out of the city they passed the smouldering remains of a factory that had been targeted by the Allies. As much as she hoped they would succeed in pushing back the German army and winning the war, Hanna also knew that the factory would have been full of young unmarried women and mothers who had to leave their children home alone or with grandparents to earn enough money to pay the rent, many of them casualties of the bombing.

‘Has there been any word?' Hanna asked, turning her attention back to Dieter. ‘No letters since we last spoke?'

He shook his head. ‘I don't know if she's even alive still. Last time I demanded information, I was told I'd be arrested and taken too if I wasn't careful.'

Dieter's wife had been discovered to be half-Jewish, and they'd arrested her on the street and rounded her up with others who'd lived on their block. That had been two years ago, only months before Hanna had met him and so soon after her own tragedy – when the Nazis were intent on expunging from society anyone who had even a drop of Jewish blood.

Hanna looked out of the window then at a large carcass lying on the grass just outside of the city. It took her a moment to realise it was a horse, and although her first thought was how sad it was to see a magnificent animal lying dead, she also hated that the meat had gone to waste when so many families were so desperate for food. It was so much harder for those in the city, who couldn't hunt or grow their own vegetables to supplement their rations.

‘Do you know what happened there?' she asked as they slowed down.

There were other things smouldering around the carcass, as if it had all recently been burning.

‘They were a gypsy family,' Dieter said, glancing through the window. ‘Most of them were moved on long ago, but these ones appeared last week.'

‘They were all taken?'

‘The story is that a little girl was found talking to them. She was seen patting the horse by a local man, who ran in and saved her. He was lauded as a hero for saving her life, as if they were going to kill her.'

Hanna blinked away tears as she thought of what was happening around her. The cruelty, the depravity of her fellow Germans, their willingness to believe such lies, broke her heart.

‘They shot the horse, the husband and the grandfather, and they set the rest on fire before herding up the women and children.'

‘On a train headed for the camps,' Hanna murmured. ‘If they're even still alive.'

The Nazis hated gypsies almost as much as they hated Jews. As a very young girl, she'd been fascinated with the travelling families when they passed by her country house, often going to visit them under the watchful eye of her mother. She'd sometimes take jam or something homemade to them, and eventually her mother would leave and tell her to run along home after playing. The gypsy children were always easy to make friends with, because they were used to meeting new people as they moved around the countryside. But by the time she was a teenager, going near them had been forbidden, for fear that someone might see her.

‘Do you think it will ever change?' Hanna asked.

Dieter looked across at her, and she could see from the hollowness of his eyes that he was as pessimistic about the future of their great country as she was.

‘There was a time when I did, but I don't know any more,' he said. ‘I want to believe that everyone will come to their senses, but it's as if everyone has fallen for a spell that cannot be broken.'

‘If my sister can change the way she sees the world, then perhaps there is hope for everyone,' Hanna eventually said.

‘You think she'll keep your secrets? You trust her?' he asked.

She nodded. ‘I do. She might still be conflicted, but not when it comes to family. She wouldn't do anything to put any of us in danger.'

Hanna leaned back deeper into her seat, watching the world pass by. Some days she wondered if it was all worth it, but then she'd think about all the children they'd already saved, and all the others still needing their help. Which also made her think about how few of her fellow countrymen or women were doing anything to help those in need. She understood – perhaps she would have been afraid if she'd had children of her own to keep safe too – but it still broke her heart thinking of their acceptance of such cruelty, or simply their indifference to what was happening. But seeing the way Ava had changed, it did give her hope that perhaps others would begin to change, too.

The children in her ambulance now faced a long journey; they had to pass through the resistance network in France and make it to Portugal before they'd be truly safe, but Hanna knew they were doing everything they could to give them a chance. She knew little about what happened once she passed them over, but she knew the city they would be billeted to, and she'd secretly recorded copies of their paperwork to ensure that, one day, it would be possible to find them.

There was only so far they could plausibly take the ambulance, and so they were heading for their usual meeting spot, just far enough out of Berlin on a country road that they wouldn't be seen. Another ambulance always met them, and so long as they all stuck to their cover story, even if they were stopped they knew they shouldn't have any problems.

‘He's just ahead up there,' Hanna said, sitting up straighter as she looked into the distance. ‘Let's get this done as quickly as possible, just like last time.'

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.'

Hanna was pushing her way through the crowd when she heard him mention a child, and it only strengthened her resolve to help.

‘Please let me through, I'm a nurse.'

As she moved past the final person in her way, Hanna stopped, her eyes landing on a little navy shoe that was lying on its side, on the road. She blinked, as a wave of panic ran through her. That was Hugo's shoe, was it not? She'd squished his tiny foot into it only fifteen minutes earlier, had chosen them to match his new woollen coat.

Please, not Hugo. Don't let it be Hugo.

But the moment she saw the child's body, his legs contorted in the most unnatural of angles, she knew. The dead child spoken about so cavalierly was her son. A sob erupted from inside of her as she ran forward, dropping to her knees and falling over the body of her little boy as she listened for a breath, felt for a pulse, tried to frantically locate a heartbeat that would tell her he was still alive, that they'd been wrong.

The child is already dead. The words she'd overheard kept running through her mind as she tried in vain to wake him, before cradling his head, her tears falling on to his too-white skin as she sobbed.

She heard a noise then and was pulled from her grief, looking around and realising that Michael was lying nearby. The moans were coming from him, and as she scrambled over to him on hands and knees, she saw the pool of blood staining the concrete and knew it was coming from his head.

‘Michael,' she whispered. ‘Stay with me, please. I can't lose you, too. Please don't leave me.'

But as she held his hand, gripping his palm tightly against hers as if she could will him to live, she heard the last of his breath shudder from between his lips. And at the same time, she looked up to see the Mercedes pulling away, its angry beeps from the horn dispersing the crowd.

The man who was their Führer's second-in-command had hit a child; a father and his son. And despite telling them all that German children were the most precious things to their nation, they'd driven off without seeming to care about the life they'd taken.

Hanna crawled back to her son, as two kindly older women bent down beside her and tried to offer her comfort, not stopping her as she carried him back with her, collapsing beside Michael as she tried to pull her husband and son into her arms together.

They were only supposed to be going for ice cream. They were supposed to come home to play in the garden together, to lie in the sun and stare up at the blue sky after he'd had his little treat, before she put him down for a nap.

Instead, Hanna had lost them both, and the man responsible had acted as if he'd hit a worthless animal instead of a beloved father and son. How could they have driven off as if nothing had happened? As if they hadn't taken two precious lives? Her darling husband and son, simply walking hand in hand in the afternoon sunshine, their lives snatched away from her without warning.

Hanna wailed, and it was like nothing she'd ever heard before, her cries more animal than human as someone tried unsuccessfully to pull her away from her family and off the road. All she wanted to do was curl up and die with them, to not suffer the pain of going home without them.

Her beautiful boy and darling husband, the loves of her life, were gone.