In The Presence Of My Enemies

The guests ran around and sang more songs and played games and fooled around with the Gimpel girls' dolls and toys. When it got late, they spread out sleeping bags on the floor of the front room. Nobody who'd ever gone on a Bund deutscher Madel outing was without a sleeping bag. Francesca and Roxane had theirs, too, even though they weren't old enough to join the organization for German girls.

They might have got into the sleeping bags. The lights might have been out. They weren't going to fall asleep any time soon, though. Alicia's father made a brief appearance, coming halfway down the stairs. "Try to keep it down to a low roar, if you please," he said. He sounded as if he knew that was a lost hope.

They giggled. They gossiped. They told scary stories, which seemed even scarier in the dark. One of Anna's friends had read a translation of "The Telltale Heart." That was good for plenty of goose bumps.

Roxane started to doze. Every so often, she'd say, "I'm awake," in a small, faraway voice. She was still little, even if she would have indignantly denied it.

One by one, the girls did drop off to sleep. Snores replaced Roxane's protests. A couple of the girls Anna's age were snoring by the time Francesca gave in and slept. Alicia wasn't surprised. She knew how stubborn Francesca was.

By two in the morning, snores and deep breathing filled the Gimpels' living room. Alicia's sleeping bag lay next to Anna's. Not only were they best friends, but the party was in Alicia's house. She doubly had the right to be there. Her voice a tiny whisper, she asked, "Are you still awake?"

"No," Anna whispered back, and they both laughed.

"Did you have a happy birthday?" Alicia asked.

Anna nodded. Alicia could barely see the motion. "I'll say," Anna answered.

"Good. I'm glad," Alicia said, and then, "How are…things?"

"Things are all right with me." Anna poked her head up to make sure nobody else was awake and listening. Alicia did the same. She'd been sure Anna would know how she meantthings, and she'd been right. Her friend even used the same word and the same little pause to ask, "How are…things with you?"

"They're not too bad, I guess." But Alicia couldn't leave it at that. She went on, "I think it's harder when other people in the house don't know." She stuck her head up and listened again. This would be a very bad time to find out Francesca was only pretending to sleep.

"I believe that," Anna said. Now she paused before continuing, "Gottlieb told me the same thing once. I was really little when he found out. I was younger than Roxane." She laughed at the follies of her youth. "He must have wanted to kick me a whole bunch of times."

Alicia had wanted to kick her sisters plenty of times. The trouble was, they kicked back. The other trouble was…"It's what you learn in school. It's what you see on the televisor. It's-it's just everything, that's all. I believed all that stuff till I found out." In a tinier voice yet, she added, "Part of me still wants to believe it."

"Oh, thank you!" Anna said. Alicia blinked. Anna explained: "I was afraid I was the only one who thought things like that." They both came halfway out of their sleeping bags so they could hug each other.

Not once, Alicia realized, had either one of them said the word Jew. Even if one of the other girls were listening, she wouldn't know what they were talking about. They were both so very careful. They had to be. If they weren't careful, they were dead. Alicia had known that was what happened to Jews long before she knew she was one.

Anna asked her, "What do you think of the new Fuhrer? "

"I was going to ask you the same thing!" Alicia exclaimed. She liked it when she and Anna thought the same way. Nobody else thought like her, except her father every once in a while. Since Anna had asked the question first, she had to answer it: "He seems…better, anyhow."

"He does, doesn't he?" Anna said. "He talks about how there ought to be laws, not just…the triumph of the will." They'd both seen the film. Everybody saw it, in school and on the televisor. It was old. You could tell when you watched it. But it had a kick like a mule even so.

"You know the lady who made that movie?" Alicia asked. Anna nodded. Alicia said, "She died just a few years ago. She was over a hundred-even older than Kurt Haldweim." She shivered, remembering how she'd filed past the late Fuhrer 's shrunken, wizened corpse as it lay in state in the Great Hall.

"That's scary," Anna said. Now Alicia nodded. Anna went on, "When your sisters…talk about things they don't know about, how do you stand it?"

"I don't know," Alicia answered. "Just after I first found out, it really used to drive me crazy. Now it doesn't, or not so much, anyway. They don't know any better, and they can't for a while. They're too little."