Four

BERLIN, 1922

Sol ducked farther below the row of men’s overcoats, watching the girl behind the counter pass a paper-wrapped package to a customer. As the salesclerk’s fingers grazed the elderly man’s hand, Sol was instantly filled with envy at the inadvertent touch. She smiled sweetly and said a few words to the customer before turning back to the cash register to finish recording the sale.

He had first seen the girl nearly a week earlier when he had come to the massive Kaufhaus des Westens to pick up some yarn for his mother. He’d balked at the errand—it was nearly four and even with the days lengthening there was not much time to get ready for the Sabbath and make his way to shul. But his mother had insisted—she and the maid were finishing up dinner preparations and without the yarn she would have no way to pass the long day tomorrow. He wanted to remind her that knitting on the Sabbath was an abomination or, from a less principled standpoint, ask why Jake could not go for her instead. But Jake was not yet home from work, Sol could tell from the quiet that still filled the house. Sol’s own job at the Gemeinde, checking copy for the obituaries and other non-news items to be printed in the Jewish newspaper, had ended at three that day. Having no excuse, he reluctantly set out for the department store, handing a clerk in notions the fistful of marks necessary to buy anything at all these days, as well as the note from his mother specifying exactly what she wanted so he would not, God forbid, get the wrong shade of blue.

Then, as he carried the yarn toward the exit, he first glimpsed the girl at the counter by the front of the store. Initially he kept walking, his neck burning, feeling as though something was stuck in his throat. Then he stopped and turned back. She was Jewish, he was certain of that, though it was often harder to tell with the women now that most had gotten so liberal in how they dressed. This one was different, though, her sleeves a bit longer, blouse buttoned at the collar, with a modesty he found refreshing. Her skirt, he suspected, would be longer than was fashionable too, if he’d been able to see it. And it wasn’t just the tight curl of her raven black hair, which refused to be cowed into the low knot she’d attempted, which signaled her faith. Nor was it the arc of her nose, flanked by dark eyes set just a shade too close, reminding him of a wise owl. No, there was a fearful look, a slight hesitation as she hung back from the other clerks, that told him she was not one of them.

His mind raced as he boarded the streetcar for home and for days after he saw the girl’s face in his mind. “Do you need some more yarn?” he asked his mother the following Friday afternoon, hoping to come up with an excuse to return to the store.

Her brow furrowed with confusion as she patted the still-round skein beside her. “Nein, darling.” Then she smiled, accepting her son’s offer at face value for the goodwill it seemed to convey. “But perhaps some needles.” She reached for her bag, but when she turned back, marks in her outstretched hand, he was already gone.

Sol loitered now behind the coats, purchased needles in hand, watching as the salesgirl wrapped a parcel for her final customer of the evening. Inhaling the dusty smell of fresh wool, he tried to come up with some excuse to inquire about the fine jewelry the girl sold. In earlier years, he might have turned his nose up at the idea of a shop girl, but he had little room for snobbery now that the family was not so well off. And it took experience and a certain poise to get a job at the city’s largest store, especially in such an upscale and centrally placed department.

Not that Sol had ever had the opportunity to consider women in the real sense of the word. Before the war, when he’d been scarcely more than a boy, they were like dangerous animals in the wild, strange creatures to be studied from a great distance. And afterward, well, he’d come back so broken … it was hard to imagine anyone wanting to share the life of a lone Orthodox clerk who lived at home and had nothing.

The girl was packing up her belongings, he could see, closing out her register for the night. He imagined the conversation that he would never have with her, cursing his own lack of nerve.

“Mein Herr,” a voice said behind him as the girl started for the door. It was a salesclerk, nudging him to buy something or move on. Sol did not turn or respond, but started swiftly for the exit. Outside, he looked toward the bus stop at the corner, hoping the girl might be waiting there, but there was no sign of her.

Defeated, he turned away. He had lingered longer than anticipated and it was almost sundown, so he tucked the needles in his pocket to give to his mother later, then made his way absentmindedly toward shul.

Bypassing the streetcar stop, he navigated the busy thoroughfare and made his way across Wittenbergplatz, past the still fountain. The tinkle of piano music spilled forth from the open door of a Kaffeehaus. Sol turned to look through the window at the patrons enjoying their end-of-week gatherings, caught somewhere between envy and disdain. The revelry was unseemly, he thought, in a city where so many people could barely find work, let alone socialize. And it felt forced somehow, like people were acting as they thought they should behave, mimicking what they had read in books or perhaps seen in a movie, if they had been fortunate enough to visit the kino, as Sol had managed twice over the years. In the warmer months, when the outdoor beer gardens drew even larger throngs, he avoided the square altogether.

The synagogue, set at the edge of the Jewish quarter, was a large, opulent structure with stained-glass windows and a gold dome on top. As Sol entered, the other men looked up and nodded vaguely in his direction before turning back to their conversations. They were middle class, mostly, or had been in better times, merchants and tradesmen hailing from the surrounding eastern districts of the city, their work clothes pressed a bit more carefully or perhaps covered with a suit coat for the Sabbath.

They thought him odd, he knew. A lone single man who came to shul every Friday night and Saturday was an anomaly among the younger Jews of their once-affluent section of Berlin. The Reform movement had caught on like wildfire, and most young people attended the more modern temple across town, if they went anywhere. Still others, like his brother Jake, went to the Jewish social club on Reisstrasse, where they did not worship at all, but instead had a meal and then debated politics over schnapps and cigarettes late into the night.

Sol pictured his twin brother’s face as he made his way down the aisle. Jake, who had shaved his beard to a tiny goatee and trim mustache, was too busy for shul. He traveled in a wide circle of friends, many of whom were non-Jews, and spent long hours at his job at the ministry. Of course, he never explained his lack of observance that way. The Sabbath, Jake said, had traditionally been home-based—it was only in diaspora that Jews had felt the need to come together at the synagogue each week. It was infuriating the way he did that, tried to find nuggets from the Talmud to support his modern views, while ignoring wholesale so much of what the holy text required. But Jake had always done what he wanted, and so each Friday he joined their mother for the Sabbath dinner, making conversation with the handful of guests she assembled, before disappearing to the social club or for drinks with God knows who.

What, Sol wondered, fingering the edge of his tallis, would their father have thought of Jake’s lifestyle? But even if he was still alive, Sol likely would not have known. Max Rosenberg had seldom been home and, when he was, had kept his thoughts to himself. Born penniless in a shtetl in Bohemia, Max had spent every waking hour of his life working, building from a single tiny hardware store to a chain, third biggest in Berlin. He had gone to shul dutifully each week when he was in town, not out of a sense of religious obligation but in order to keep the goodwill and patronage of his Jewish customers. No, their father would not have approved of Sol’s own observant lifestyle, with its focus on books and study rather than earning money, any more than he would have agreed with Jake’s social high jinks.

As the rabbi began to chant, a faint scuffling noise came from the rear of the sanctuary. Sol’s eyes darted to the back of the room where a group of men, recent immigrants from the east, shuffled in, clad in work clothes that were crude and worn despite their best efforts to wash the factory dirt from their collars and cuffs. The newcomers had arrived in greater numbers and frequency in recent years, owing to the violence that had worsened under the earlier czarist regime, the harsh economic conditions exacerbated by the war and its aftermath. Their faces still bore the scars of what they had seen, the permanently fixed haggard expressions more telling than anything they could say in their accented Yiddish. Sol doubted that their lives here, living in cramped apartments, often two families to a single room, and working long hours in the factories for little pay, could be any less harsh than in the Pale. But the workers accepted each word or gesture like food offered to a starving man. Berlin’s treatment of its Jews, in Sol’s estimation, was far from perfect, more of a shove than an embrace. But to the immigrants, the city was worlds away from the barbarism of the shtetls from which they hailed, a haven. Here in modern Berlin, they were safe.

An hour later when the prayers had ended, Sol stepped outside, lowering the brim of his hat and raising the collar of his overcoat against the now-frigid March air. He fought the urge for a cigarette, stopped in equal parts by his desire to avoid his mother’s scowl when she smelled the smoke on his breath and the fact that it was Shabbes. The streets were emptier now, and the few passersby moved swiftly, heads low to the wind. Sol paused at the corner to fish some coins from his pocket for the homeless man who sat against a building, a one-legged veteran he had seen there before. The man had to eat, after all, even on the Sabbath.

Walking, his thoughts returned to his father once more. Sol recalled Max as a shadowy figure from his childhood, coming home from work late at night, gone on mysterious travels for weeks at a time. Max worked feverishly, and after he died from an unnamed illness at the age of fifty-seven, Sol often wondered if all of the work had killed him. But the gamble paid off in the pecuniary sense of the word—by the time Max was found slumped over his desk, he was president of a prosperous business and had left his beloved Dora with the comfortable house on Rosenthaler Strasse and what he thought would be more than enough money to see her through her days. It would have been, too, had their mother, naive to begin with and numb with grief, not fallen prey to an investment scam that left her not a year after he had died with a fraction of what he had put away.

Twenty minutes later, Sol entered the house. As he took off his boots in the entranceway, he winced at the sound of laughter that erupted from the dining room. Even as a child, he had felt like his mother’s dinner parties were an affront to the quiet dignity of the Sabbath.

“Sol?” his mother called, hearing the door. He cringed. Usually by the time he arrived home from shul, dessert had been served and the wine-tinged conversation was noisy enough that he could sneak up the back stairs unnoticed. Reluctantly, he walked into the dining room.

His brother was still there, he noted instantly. Sol was surprised. Jake should have been long gone to meet his friends by now. But today he lingered, leaning back, running his hand through hair uncovered by a yarmulke, showing no inclination toward leaving. Then, scanning the guests, he saw the reason Jake was still there: a dark-haired young woman, seated beside him, talking animatedly.

Then she turned toward Sol, and as he saw her face he froze. It was the salesgirl from the department store.

No, it wasn’t, he realized, taking a closer look, his heart still pounding. The resemblance was striking, though. She had the same dark eyes and curved nose, the same full lips and quick smile. But her hair was styled in a short, sleek bob, and there was something about her lipstick and rouge that Sol found garish, her sweater tight and immodest, a style that he knew his girl would never wear.

Still, Sol was intrigued. Jake had never brought a girl to dinner before. Who was she: a secretary from the ministry? But she looked nothing like the dour, frumpy women he’d seen leaving the government building the one time he met Jake outside his office. Perhaps she worked at one of the brokerage houses for the bankers who came in every day from the elegant suburb of Grunewald by bus, the Roaring Moses it was called because of the large number of Jews who rode it. Or maybe she was an artist or performer or didn’t work at all. With Jake, it was hard to say; he traveled easily through myriad groups, slipping from one mantle to the next seemingly without effort. Even as he disdained his brother’s lifestyle, though, there was a part of Sol that secretly wished Jake might for once sweep him up and take him along on the magic carpet ride that was his social life.

“Sit down,” Sol’s mother urged. He peered longingly down the table, wishing that he could squeeze past the others and find a seat down by Jake and the girl, but the guests were packed elbow to elbow and so he reluctantly pulled up the only available chair, a low-backed wooden one, and slid into the space his mother indicated beside her.

Sol studied the remnants of dinner that littered the table, crumbs scattered across the lace tablecloth and fine china. On the surface his mother’s weekly gatherings had not changed—there had been savory chicken with spaetzle, he could tell from the lingering aroma, delicious chocolate tortes for dessert. Only one who had been there years earlier before the war might notice that the cuts of meat were leaner, the wine not so expensive. The dishes, casseroles and stews, were designed to stretch the expensive ingredients, to hide amidst the gravy and starch the fact that there was less.

The guests themselves were changed too—in earlier years, none would have been caught wearing anything but the latest fashion. Now if he looked closely he could see a bit of hand darning at Frau Leifler’s collar, a scuff on the toe of Herr Mittel’s dress shoe where the leather had worn thin. No one, it seemed, had been exempt from the economic hardship that followed the war.

Jake caught Sol’s gaze and raised a hand in a wave that was friendlier than their relationship might warrant, designed for the benefit of the other guests. Sol did not return the gesture, but nodded and then looked away. He could remember a time when they had once been, if not close, at least not as distant as they had become since their lives took such different paths.

Sol surveyed the room. The house had always been Dora’s; even when Max was alive, there was little of their father in the floral upholstery, the too-ornate furnishings. Now, with the passage of the years, there was an unmistakable wornness to it all. The wallpaper had faded and the carpets were frayed at the edges and there was a tarnish to the lamps that no amount of polishing could remove.

Sol’s eyes dropped to the mantelpiece. Between the silver candlesticks and the framed photograph of his parents as young newlyweds, now yellow with age, sat a glass-domed clock. It had been a gift from their father to their mother, brought back from a business trip to the south when Sol was a small child. The timepiece was their mother’s most prized possession; not only was it a memento of her long-departed husband, but it was one of the few gifts picked with thought and care during their marriage by the otherwise preoccupied Max. Dora forbade the maid from even dusting it, insisting on doing it herself each week with a special chamois cloth.

His thoughts were interrupted by rising voices across the table and he lowered his gaze to Herr Mittel, who was engaged in heated debate with a guest Sol did not recognize. The conversation had descended into politics, a debate on why Germany lost the war, what would have happened if it had won. Almost four years after the armistice, it was a popular topic, the speculation seemingly endless.

Inwardly, Sol bristled. Who else here but he had fought and nearly died in the trenches? “If the Jews …” Herr Mittel began. Then he stopped, as though he had forgotten for a moment where he was. Clearing his throat, he continued. “That is, if the foreign populations had fought instead of allying with their interests abroad.”

Sol’s anger rose to full boil. The Jews had fought hard alongside the rest of the German men. One survey he’d read at the Gemeinde said more Jews had fought for Germany than any other minority, that twelve thousand had died. But that report had been buried, not published at the “request” of a government ministry, and so the myth persisted. He looked down the table at Jake, wondering if his brother would correct Herr Mittel. Jake, who worked at the foreign ministry now, knew the older man was wrong. But Jake did not respond. No, of course not—defending the fact that the Jews had served would only point out that he himself had not, make him look cowardly in front of the girl.

Realizing no one else would speak up, Sol opened his mouth to say something, but his mother placed her hand over his, warning him to be silent. It was not politics or even fear on her part—she simply did not want one of her guests to feel unwelcome, or to taint the atmosphere of her party with an awkward moment. Dora Rosenberg loved people and she surrounded herself with company to blunt the force of whatever trauma life threw at her. During the war, she had doggedly persisted, hoarding ration coupons and supplies, holding parties by candlelight when the lighting failed, and starting the dinners in late afternoon when curfews wouldn’t let the guests stay after dark. She clung to them even more fiercely after her husband died and the shelter he built around her began slowly to erode.

The gathering devolved into smaller conversations. Jake’s voice drifted down the table. “As I told the minister the other day …” His comments, though directed at the girl, were loud enough for everyone to hear.

Tuning his brother out, Sol grew more annoyed. Everyone already knew about Jake’s position. He’d begun working for Walter Rathenau years earlier, long before he became foreign minister. The day he’d gotten the job, he ran home from university, breathless. “He’s amazing,” he told Sol. “He’s going to be the German Disraeli, they say.” Working long days with fervent zeal, Jake had gained Rathenau’s favor and ridden his coattails into office as an appointed aide.

“Anti-Semitism in Europe,” Sol heard Jake saying nonchalantly to the girl now, “is nothing but a passing social phenomenon.”

“Passing for about a thousand years,” Sol muttered under his breath.

“What was that, darling?” his mother asked absently, not looking toward him.

Sol did not answer. He had once believed, as Jake did, that they could be counted among their non-Jewish brethren, more alike than different. As a teenager, he’d been as secular as his brother. When the war broke out, he gamely enlisted with his friend Albert, caught up with everyone else in the Spirit of 1914, convinced that Germany was right and would swiftly prevail. Only then was Sol made aware for the first time in his life that he was not like the others. The lone Jew in his unit, he was hazed with a barbarism that he could not have imagined. They pissed in his water canteen and spat in his rations, which he ate anyway because he was close to starving by then and there was no other food to be had. They stole his extra pair of socks and he had gotten frostbite and trench foot and lost two toes on his right foot as a result.

But perhaps worst of all was the isolation. Shunned by the other soldiers, Sol found himself alone in the most desolate place on earth. Even Albert turned his back out of fear, avoiding his childhood friend until the day Sol cradled his head as he died in the trenches of the Ardennes.

And then he’d returned home. He didn’t expect a hero’s welcome—the civilians did not know how valiantly they had fought or the hardships they had suffered. But Sol was unprepared for the bile and recriminations: the Jews, the papers said, had not fought for their country. They had allied themselves with foreign interests, surrendered willingly and stabbed the German soldiers, who had treated them like brethren, in the back. Jewish factory owners were supposedly responsible for the shortages of munitions, food, and other supplies that had resulted in the defeat of Germany. Four years later, idiots like Herr Mittel were still repeating those same insidious lies propagated by the media and politicians in order to further their own interests.

Soon the coffee cups were drained and there seemed to be an unspoken cue for the guests to stand and start for their coats, despite his mother’s protestations that they should stay a bit longer. “We’re going down to hear some jazz,” Jake announced as he reached Sol’s end of the table, already a “we” with the girl at his side.

“Hello,” Sol said to the girl, a shade too loudly, as she started past. “I’m Jake’s brother, Sol.”

“Miriam,” she offered, extending her hand in the modern custom, and Sol, fighting his natural tendencies, shook it.

“You look familiar,” he began and a look of confusion crossed her face, as if their paths could not possibly have intersected. “A sister, perhaps?”

“Leah,” she said, and her voice carried the same dismissive note with which Sol had heard his brother speak about him. “She’s older, works at the KaDeWe.”

“Yes,” he replied quickly. “Will she be joining—”

But before Sol could finish the question, Jake was at Miriam’s side, taking her arm. He clapped Sol on the back a shade too hard. “How’s work at the Gemeinde?” he asked in a way that was meant to illustrate to Miriam the difference between Jake’s important position at the ministry and his brother’s clerical job.

Sol’s mind raced as he tried to think of something interesting to say about his work but found nothing. “We should go,” Miriam said, looking up at Jake.

Sol watched as his brother’s expression changed, and there was a submissiveness there he had never seen before. “Yes, of course.”

He held his breath, waiting for an invitation to join them. He would make an exception, go out on the Sabbath just this once, in hopes that Miriam’s sister might be there. It was worth risking the wrath of God if it meant finding her, for the privilege of basking in the light of those brown eyes. But the invitation did not come—Jake and the girl were already brushing past him, making their way to the door, and in that instant Sol was instantly reminded of the vast gulf between his brother’s world and his own, the places he could never belong, even if he wanted to.

The next morning, Sol set out for shul once more. On the street, he sniffled, his nose tickled by the acrid odor of the ersatz coal everyone burned to keep warm these days. He had slept poorly, dreaming of the evening in the jazz café that had not taken place, a smiling Leah taking his arm the way Miriam had Jake’s, and had awoken strangely warm and empty and exhausted at the same time. His boots scuffed noisily against the cobblestones, carving tracks in the fresh coating of snow that covered the ground.

It was not until he reached the main thoroughfare that he noticed the difference: the street seemed eerily quiet, with a lack of activity more reminiscent of the last few weeks of August, when those Berliners who could fled the city for holiday to the seaside or the mountains, than early March. Inside the synagogue, the change was even more noticeable—the men did not call out to one another as they usually did but clustered in the corners, talking in low voices as if afraid someone might overhear. He stood awkwardly to one side of the room for several minutes, wanting to join in the conversations but not sure how. Nine o’clock, the starting time for worship, came and went, yet the men did not take their seats.

Finally, Herz Stempel broke away from the circle and came to the spot where Sol stood alone. At fifty-four, Herz was one of the younger congregants, less closed off and suspicious of outsiders. “What is it?” Sol asked.

“You haven’t heard?” Sol shook his head. “Rathenau’s dead.”

Sol scanned the congregation in his mind, trying to recall which of the men in the sea of gray hair and beards was Rathenau. Then he realized that Herz was not talking about one of their own but rather about the foreign minister, for whom Jake worked. Walter Rathenau was also a Jew. “How?”

“Shot with machine guns.” A rock pressed against Sol’s chest as the image crystallized in his mind. “Men ambushed his car. That’s all we know so far.”

Jake sometimes rode along with the foreign minister, Sol recalled anxiously. “When?”

“Last night about nine.” Sol inhaled, relaxing slightly. Jake was with Miriam then, on his way to the jazz club.

The rabbi finally signaled the call to worship and Herz retreated. As Sol took his seat, he thought again of his brother. Jake idolized Rathenau, who had mentored him and brought him on board. It was more than just admiration for a single man, though. To Jake, the fact that one of the highest posts in the cabinet was occupied by a Jew was proof that they were fully accepted into German society, that despite the insults and struggles they really were accepted as equals. Did he know yet what had happened?

After the morning service had ended, Sol hurried toward home, his mind still racing. The news of Rathenau’s murder, while surprising, was not entirely a shock. Politics had grown more virulent in recent years and assassinations of politicians, either by the ultranationalists on the right or the extreme socialists on the left, were not uncommon. He remembered Jake describing how the esteemed Doktor Einstein and another man had called on Rathenau and begged him not to take the job as foreign minister on peril of his life. But Rathenau insisted, refusing the bodyguards that would encumber his movements and his ability to do his job. And now he was dead.

As Sol rounded the corner onto Rosenthaler Strasse, an arm shot out of a doorway and grabbed him by the shoulder, dragging him into an alley. He froze, certain that he was being attacked. Frantically, he tried to remember the grappling techniques he’d been taught in military training, but his mind was blank.

“It’s me, Jake.” His brother’s voice broke through the haze.

Sol relaxed slightly. “Rathenau’s dead,” he replied by way of a greeting. The words sounded smug, as if they confirmed everything he had ever believed about assimilation, and his own observant lifestyle choice had been vindicated.

Jake did not answer, but released Sol from his grasp. Sol noticed then the way his brother’s hand shook as he lit a cigarette, the paleness of his face. “I’m sorry,” he added, softening. “I know you liked Rathenau, respected him.”

“It’s not that,” Jake replied, his voice a hoarse whisper. He took a drag from the cigarette and exhaled, letting the smoke unfurl above them. “I think it’s my fault.”

“Your fault?” Sol stared wide-eyed at his brother. “How could you possibly—”

“I was out at a club a few weeks ago. Miri, the girl who was at dinner last night, introduced me to some friends of hers. From the university, she said. We were drinking, talking. I think they asked me questions about the minister, his schedule …”

Sol could instantly picture the scene: Jake, his tongue loosened by too much liquor, boasting about his position, saying more than he should. His stomach twisted. “What about Miri?” he asked, picturing the attractive brunette. “Have you asked her?”

“Gone. I tried to find her this morning but her flat is deserted.” Jake buried his head in his hands and leaned against the doorway. “There will be an inquiry. With the information that was given, it’s only a matter of time before they figure out it was me. What am I going to do?”

Sol summoned his big brotherness, all four and a half minutes of it. “You don’t know that.” But even as he spoke, he realized Jake was right. The government would be looking for someone to blame and the police force was notoriously anti-Semitic. A Jew betraying Rathenau would be a convenient story; Jake, portrayed as a disgruntled subordinate, would make the perfect scapegoat. “You need to get out of the country,” Sol said finally, surprised at his own decisiveness, the certainty in his voice.

A light appeared in Jake’s eyes and Sol could tell he was thinking of the salons of Paris and London and other grand cities, images gleaned from the boyhood stories their father had told of his travels. “East,” Sol added authoritatively.

“East?” Jake’s shoulders slumped as the visions of cafés and social halls evaporated from his mind.

“Yes. It’s easier to cross the border and you’ll be less likely to be noticed. And there are Jews there who will help.” Jake’s brow wrinkled, imagining the shawl-clad immigrants from the Pale. “Papa has cousins near Lodz,” Sol persisted, as if making his case. “Go to them and from there you can arrange a longer journey, by sea to America or somewhere else. I’ve heard there’s a train that goes all the way to China.”

Jake’s eyes danced once more as he imagined more exotic adventures. Then his face fell. “I don’t have the money,” he said, confirming, as Sol had long suspected, that the government job did not carry a paycheck that matched its prestige.

“We’ll figure that out,” he said, trying to sound reassuring. “But you have to leave right away and—”

“Miri,” Jake interrupted. His eyes darted back and forth rapidly. “I have to find her first, make sure she’s all right.”

It was the first time Sol had ever heard his brother express concern about anyone but himself. What kind of hold did this girl have on him after such a short time? Then, remembering the effect Miri’s sister had on him, he understood.

“And perhaps she can provide an explanation, prove that I had nothing to do with it,” Jake added desperately. “Maybe we can even leave together.” Sol wanted to tell Jake that his loyalty was misplaced; Miri had clearly abandoned him, perhaps even set him up. But he could tell from his brother’s stubbornly set jaw that it was futile; he wouldn’t leave without finding her, or at least knowing where she had gone.

Leah, he remembered suddenly. Maybe she knew where her sister had gone. “Wait here,” he instructed Jake and started from the alley, nearly slipping in his haste. Steadying himself, he set off hurriedly down the street.

Twenty minutes later, he barreled through the entrance to the department store, then stopped. Did he actually dare speak with her? But there was no time to lose. He steeled himself, then walked toward the counter. The salesclerk, blond and stout, was not Leah. Of course not. She wouldn’t be here, surely, on Shabbes. And even if she wasn’t observant, she might not be working today. His heart fell. But perhaps a coworker might have her contact information, know where Sol could find her.

He started forward. “Excuse me …” As he neared, he saw a second girl, hunched over a cardboard box. She turned and his breath caught. Behind the counter, as if she had never left, was Leah. She was even more mesmerizing up close, he decided as she straightened. A mix of surprise and delight filled him.

A flicker of what Sol thought resembled recognition crossed her face and for a moment he hoped that perhaps she had noticed him too on his previous visits to the store. “May I help you?” she said, and her voice, which he had imagined so often in his mind these past few days, was even more lyrical than he had dreamt. But her tone was formal, as though she were speaking to anyone.

He stifled his disappointment. “Leah,” he blurted, and the girl seemed so taken aback that he wondered if he had made a mistake. “You are Leah, aren’t you?”

“Yes.” She blinked, as if unaccustomed to being known. “Have we met?”

“No. I’m acquainted with Miri.” She looked annoyed then, having been asked too many times about her sister by young men, he suspected. “She’s a friend of my brother, Jake.” Leah’s expression relaxed slightly. “Do you know where I can find her?”

“She’s left,” Leah replied evenly, her eyes narrowing. It seemed to Sol then that he might spend his entire life watching her face. “On holiday, she said.” Her emphasis on the last word made clear that she did not believe her sister’s story.

“Do you know where she’s gone? So that I might tell Jake,” he added quickly.

“I would think that he should already know,” she retorted, and whether Leah was just being protective of her younger sister or was aware of what had happened, Sol could not tell, but he knew she would say nothing further.

“I’ve seen you working here before,” he ventured. “But I would not have thought today …”

“I don’t normally work Saturdays,” she replied, a touch of defensiveness creeping into her voice. “But the other girl called in sick. I didn’t have a choice.”

No, he agreed silently, forgiving her transgression more readily than might be expected, given his steadfast beliefs. Principle had to give way to practicality on occasion, if one hoped to keep working in this economy.

She was watching him, he noticed then. Her gaze held his without wavering and there was a spark of interest there that he had never seen before—from anyone. Adrenaline surged through his veins and, pushed forward by it, he took a deep breath. “What time do you finish working?” he asked, the words tumbling out atop one another. “Perhaps—”

“Leah,” the other salesclerk called, interrupting before he could finish his invitation for coffee.

“I have to go,” Leah said, glancing over her shoulder nervously. “But I’ll tell Miri that Jake asked for her. If I see her,” she added, then turned away.

Sol fought the urge to call after her, then stopped, knowing further conversation might put her job at risk. The momentary surge of confidence receded and he walked quickly from the store. Outside, he shivered, cold and lonely once more.

As he headed back to Jake, his mind raced. He had done it, spoken to Leah, perhaps even laid the groundwork for future encounters. Then, remembering the purpose of his visit to the store, his heart sank a little. He was no closer to finding Miri for his brother. She was gone; he was sure of it. And he had to persuade Jake to leave, now. His brother needed money for the journey, too, and the meager amount he saved from his job at the Gemeinde would come nowhere close to being enough.

Perhaps Mutter … he thought, then stopped. Telling their mother was impossible—she’d have too many questions, and would insist that he stay. Surely her boy, her beautiful Jake, could never have done such a thing and the world would see if only he explained. No, she wouldn’t understand, and even if she did, she did not have that kind of cash. Dora had a houseful of things she treasured but individually none was worth much.

Except the clock, he remembered suddenly. He pictured the domed timepiece that sat on the mantel. A treasure, his father called it more than once, when no one but Sol seemed to be listening, proud of the bargain he’d wagered. He had bought it from a provincial clockmaker who was unaware of its full value, which had surely increased with time.

Inside, the parlor was quiet, the smell of eggs from breakfast lingering in the air. He paused to listen for their mother who, God willing, should still be at market with the maid if the lines were long. Then he rushed into the dining room, where the silver from the previous evening’s meal lay neatly stacked and polished, waiting to be put away. Reaching the mantelpiece, he stopped. Beneath the glass dome the four pendulums of the clock rotated in one direction, then stopped and continued in the other direction on their endless journey.

Sol hesitated, picturing the clock on the mantelpiece for generations to come, his mother showing it to her grandchildren. (He was surprised that in the vision, the children were his, girls with dark curly hair and close-set eyes.) She would be devastated to find it gone. But Jake needed to go, and this was his only hope. He grabbed the clock and carried it out under his jacket.

He walked back down the street as quickly as he could without attracting attention, and slipped into the alleyway where his brother crouched low to the ground, smoking another cigarette. “Miri?” Jake asked hopefully, standing up.

Sol shook his head. “I spoke to her sister. She’s left the country for good. Leah didn’t know where.”

Jake’s face sagged and Sol felt a stab of guilt at the lie. But Jake would never leave if he held out hope of finding Miri. “Here.” Sol produced the clock.

Jake paused, and for a moment Sol expected him to object. But his brother, never one to question what was given to him, took the clock. “If Mama asks …” Jake began, then faltered. Then without another word, he turned and ran.

“Auf Wiedersehen,” Sol said under his breath as his brother disappeared around the corner. Jake had not, he realized, even bothered to thank him.

He started slowly back toward the house. From the foyer, he could hear two voices, his mother’s high-pitched and the maid’s higher, back from market, recounting the previous night’s festivities as they put away the silver. There was a pause in the conversation, a moment of silence followed by a scream. Steeling himself, Sol walked toward them.

“Gone,” his mother said simply as he entered the dining room, and for a minute Sol thought she was talking about Jake. But Dora had gotten so used to her sons coming and going it would be days until she remarked upon the lack of Jake’s shadowy presence, the fact that his bedclothes seemed undisturbed. “The clock is gone.”

“Ja, Mutter.” He faltered as the moment he had waited for his entire life unfurled before his eyes. Now he could tell her Jake had taken it, vilify the golden child who was no longer here to defend himself and finally claim his rightful place as the favored son. But then he saw Jake in the alley, vulnerable and helpless, and he could not bring himself to do it. It was best if their mother knew nothing when the police came asking questions about his whereabouts anyway. “I saw that the latch to the back door was open this morning so I expect someone may have broken in and snatched it.”

Her complexion paled. “We were robbed?” she asked, disbelieving.

“I don’t think it was that serious. More likely someone who saw the door left ajar and seized the moment. Nothing else was taken. But I’ll report it to the police first thing.” He watched remorsefully as a torrent of emotions washed across her face, shock then sorrow and anger. But her expression soon slackened to one of resignation. The clock was her most beloved possession, but in the end it was only an object and no one could afford to get very attached in these troubled times. The blow of Jake’s unannounced departure would come much harder and he was grateful that in the moment she did not ask.

There seemed to be nothing more to say, so Sol started up the stairs. As he reached the landing, optimism surged through him suddenly. He had done it—helped Jake and taken the clock and gotten away with it. And after Shabbes he would stop by the department store to see if Leah was working again, follow through on his invitation to coffee. He didn’t require an introduction now. For years the notion of someone who might share his life had been a concept so foreign and remote he’d scarcely entertained it. But now as he saw Leah’s face in his mind, new possibilities stirred inside him.

Sol pictured Jake running with the clock and recited silently the prayer for safe travel, while half suspecting that it was better than his selfish, mercurial brother deserved. But there was no need to be petty—he was here in Berlin and Jake was not, and the house and the family and all of this would be his for the rest of his life.