In The Presence Of My Enemies

Heinrich got to his feet and grabbed his attache case. "I'm off," he said. "I'll see you all tonight." Collecting kisses all around, he hurried out the door. It closed behind him. Lise sighed and smiled at the same time. She didn't worry about him running off with Erika Dorsch or anybody else, even if she teased him. He wasn't the sort to leave unfinished anything he started. If his eyes sometimes wandered-well, he was a man. His hands and, more to the point, his heart didn't.

"Come on, eat up," Lise told the girls. "Then get out of your nightgowns and into school clothes. I know you don't have to leave as early as Daddy does, but you can't lie around eating grapes all day, either."

She got giggles from the younger two girls and a disdainful sniff from Alicia, who said, "You've used that one before, Mommy."

Lise wasn't about to put up with literary criticism before eight in the morning, especially when she hadn't finished her coffee (the biggest advantage she saw to not fasting on Yom Kippur was that she didn't have to miss it). She said, "I don't care whether I have or not. It's still true. Get moving."

Alicia was the one she had to bully, the one a bird or a book or anything else might distract from the business at hand. Francesca could barely grunt before ten, but she did what she had to do on automatic pilot. Roxane liked mornings, probably because her sisters didn't.

Lise got them out the door in good time. She always did, and she always breathed a sigh of relief once they were gone, too.Especially today, she thought. The Day of Atonement she wanted to herself. Had things been different, gathering with her fellow Jews would have been sweet. But, though they got together on minor holidays like Purim, they didn't dare meet on the big ones. Someone might be watching, might be listening, might be wondering. You never could tell.

She sat down in front of the televisor. It was off. She left it off, too. She didn't want any distractions, not while she was doing her best to forgive the people who'd troubled her during the past year. In spite of her earlier forgiving thoughts about Heinrich, she wasn't surprised when Erika rose to the top of the list. Lise's smile was slightly sour. Erika couldn't help being what she was, any more than a tiger could.

Things around a tiger had a way of ending up dead. Things around Erika…

Methodically, Lise went through the rest of the list, starting with Herr Kessler, who'd vexed her because he vexed Alicia, and ending with the cleaner who had returned a linen blouse with a scorch mark and without two buttons. Then she took on the hard one she attempted every Yom Kippur: to forgive the German people.

She'd never done it, not in her heart. She'd never even come close, and she knew it. That wasn't only because their crimes were so enormous, either. Worse, they had no idea they'd committed crimes. They were convinced they walked the path of truth and justice and righteousness. If they didn't see they had anything to atone for, what was the point to forgiving them? Was there any? Not that she'd ever been able to see.

This year…This year, for the first time since she was a girl, she wondered. Heinz Buckliger seemed to have some idea that the Reich and the Volk of the Reich didn't come to their dominant position in the world with hands perfectly clean. If the Fuhrer thought the German people stood in need of atonement for some things…Well, how much did that mean?

Buckliger hadn't said a word about Jews, not in his speech on the televisor and not in anything else Heinrich and Walther had been able to uncover. But he had cast some doubt on the overwhelming importance of Aryan blood. And how much didthat mean?

"I want to hope," Lise murmured, to herself and possibly to God. "It's been so long. Iwant to hope."

Willi Dorsch glowered in mock severity-Heinrich Gimpel hoped the severity was mock, anyway-as he climbed aboard the bus that would carry Heinrich and him to the Stahnsdorf train station. He sat down next to Heinrich and demanded, "Well, what have you got to say for yourself?"

Did he know? Had Erika been as forthright as she often was? Or had he just added two and two and come up with-surprise!-four? If he did know, he was going to have to come out and say so. "Well, how does 'good morning' sound?" Heinrich answered.

"It'll do." With a grin, Willi thumped him on the back. "Better than a lot of things you could have told me."

"I'm so glad." Heinrich hoped irony would keep Willi from noticing he was telling the exact and literal truth. Having got away with one question, he tried another: "And how are you today?"

"I could be worse. I have been worse. I probably will be worse again before too long," Willi answered. Heinrich concluded he and Erika hadn't fought during the night. The way things had been going with them, that was indeed something. His friend went on, "How about yourself?"