“It would be good to have the company.”
But I cannot stay up here and hope to have the girls accept me as one of them. “That’s very kind, but I should stay with the others.” As a child, I had always felt more comfortable down in the cabins with the performers. I had yearned to sleep in the women’s quarters, which, despite the too many bodies, smells and noises, had a kind of solidarity.
He nods, acquiescing to the truth in my words. “We’ll pay you thirty a week.” In our circus, money had not been discussed. Wages were paid fairly, with increases over the years. He pulls a paper from the desk drawer and scribbles on it. “Your contract,” he explains. I look at him, confused. With us there had been no contracts—people made verbal agreements and kept them over decades of working together. He continues, “It just says that if you want to leave before the season is over, you will pay us back.” I feel owned in a way I never have before and I hate it.
“Come, I’ll help you get settled.” He leads me out of the house and down the hill in the direction of the cabins. I keep my eyes straight forward, not looking back in the direction of my former home. We near an old gymnasium and my throat tightens. Once my family had practiced here. “They weren’t using it anymore,” he offers, his voice apologetic. But it had been ours. In that moment, I regret the bargain I have made. Working for another circus family feels like treason.
Herr Neuhoff continues on, but I stop in front of the gymnasium door. “I should practice,” I say.
“There’s no need to start today. Surely you will want to get settled.”
“I should practice,” I repeat. If I don’t start now, I never will.
He nods. “Very well. I’ll leave you to it.” As he starts away, I look up from the base of the hill across the valley toward my family home. How can I stay here, so unbearably close to the shadows of the past? I see my brothers’ faces. I will perform where they cannot.
The door to the gymnasium creaks as I pull it open. I set down my valise, twisting my wedding band around my finger. There are a few other performers scattered through the practice hall. Some faces are vaguely familiar, as if from another lifetime; others I do not know at all. At the back of the practice hall by the piano, there is a tall man with a long somber face. Our eyes meet and though I do not recognize him from my circus years, it seems we have met somewhere before. He holds my gaze for several seconds before finally turning away.
I inhale the familiar smell of hay and manure and cigarette smoke and perfume, not so very different. The thick rosin coats the insides of my nostrils and it is as if I had never left.
I take off the wedding band and put it in my pocket, then go to change for rehearsal.
Of course I did not leave him.
I started away from the child, imagining my life just as it had been a few short minutes earlier. The milk truck would go and I could return to my work and pretend none of it ever happened. Then I stopped again. I couldn’t abandon a helpless infant and leave him alone there to die, just as surely as he would have on the train. Quickly I raced to the sour-smelling milk can and pulled him out. A moment later, the engine roared and the truck lurched forward. I clutched the child tighter and he nestled against me forgivingly. His warmth filled my arms. In that second, everything was all right.
The policeman near the train yelled something I couldn’t make out. A second guard appeared on the station platform, holding a snarling Alsatian on a leash. In my panic, I jumped, and the child nearly slipped from my arms. Tightening my hold on him, I ducked around the corner as they raced past me to the train. They couldn’t have possibly noticed one baby missing amid so many. They were pointing, though, from the boxcar door I left open in my haste to my telltale footprints in the snow.
I ran desperately into the station toward the closet where I slept. At the back of the closet there was a rickety ladder leading to the attic. As I reached for it, my foot tangled around a threadbare blanket on the floor. Shaking it off, I started to climb the ladder. But I had only one arm to hold on and I slipped from the second rung, nearly dropping the baby, whose wail rang out, threatening to expose us.
Recovering, I started upward again. The voices grew louder, broken by a sharp bark. I reached the attic, a space with a low ceiling smelling of dead rodents and mold. I hurried through the tangle of empty boxes toward the lone window. My nails ripped as I pried it open. A blast of icy air smacked my face. I leaned forward and put my head through the window, but it was too small. I could not make it past my shoulders.
Below I heard the guards, inside the building now. I pushed the baby quickly through the window and placed him on the sloping, snow-covered roof that overhung the station platform. I steadied him there, praying he did not roll downward or cry out from the iciness against his skin.
I closed the window and hurried down the attic steps, grabbing my broom. As I walked out of the closet, I nearly slammed into one of the guards.
“Guten abend...” I stammered, forcing myself to meet his eyes. He did not respond, but stared at me piercingly.
“Entschuldigen Sie, bitte.” Excusing myself, I walked around the guard, feeling his eyes on me, bracing for his command to stop. I slipped outside and pretended to sweep the coal-tinged snow from the platform until I was sure he wasn’t watching me. Then I raced around the side of the station, staying close to the shadow of the building. I looked up at the low roof, searching for a foothold to reach it. Finding none, I climbed the drainpipe, iciness soaking through my torn tights. As I neared the top, my arms burned. I reached up, praying that the infant was still there. But my fingers closed around emptiness.
My stomach dropped. Had the Germans found the baby? I stretched again, arms straining farther and finding a bit of cloth. I pulled on it, trying to draw the child toward me. But he rolled past my fingertips. I reached for him frantically, grabbing the edge of the cloth diaper just before he fell.
I drew him close to me and scampered down, nearly slipping myself as I struggled to hold on with one hand. At last I reached the ground and tucked the baby securely in my coat. But the Germans were just around the corner, their voices close and angry. Not daring to linger another second, I ran, footsteps breaking the smoothness of snow.
* * *
Hours have passed since I fled the station. I don’t know how many, only that it is deepest night and snowing again, the sky a muted gray. Or it would have been, if I could look up. The storm has grown heavier, though, sharp bits of ice cutting at my eyes and forcing me to tuck my chin once more. I’d gone in the direction away from the hills and toward the shelter of the woods, but the ground that appeared flat in the distance rolls and dips, straining my legs. I cling instead to a smoother path that runs too close to the edge of the forest. I glance nervously at the narrow road that runs parallel to the trees. So far it has thankfully remained deserted.
In the endless blanket of white I imagine our tiny farm, close to the Dutch coast, the air thick with salt and chilled by the North Sea, where I lived with only my parents. Though we had been spared from the air raids that had brought Rotterdam to rubble, occupation had come down hard. The Germans had focused on defending the coastal towns, mining the beaches so we could no longer walk them and billeting soldiers everywhere—which is how I met the one who fathered my child.
He
