Page 117 of Hell to Pay

I stood, and both men stood with me. Joe said, “I’ll walk you.”

“It’s only back to the bakery,” I said.

“Still,” Joe said. “I’ll walk you.”

We headed back. The snow was coming down harder now, and I hurried. I didn’t have boots, but the BDM shoes were really very stout. Joe said, “I didn’t realize he’d be giving you the third degree.”

“Well, he can’t have a compromised interpreter, can he?” I said. “That would do nobody any good. Wait in the shop, please.” I brushed past Frau Adelberg and ran upstairs to my room, where I took something from between the pages of my diary. I should have hidden it with the rest of my treasures, but I hadn’t been able to bear leaving it under the floorboards, and had told myself—possibly falsely—that it couldn’t endanger me. I put it carefully into the inner pocket of my coat, ran downstairs, and rejoined Joe. “Ready,” I told him. “Let’s go.”

By the time we got back to the brewery, I was breathless. Captain Harper stood politely as I approached the table, and I kept my head high as I removed my coat—not rushing, for a princess doesn’t rush—and laid it over the back of my chair. Then I sat down, reached into my coat pocket, and handed him what was inside.

“This,” I said, “is why my father wasn’t called up.”

The captain didn’t blink, and he didn’t look away as most did at sight of my father. He studied the photo of my parents at their wedding with care, looked at me, then looked back at the photo. “He won the Blue Max,” he said. “As well as the Iron Cross First Class and quite a few other decorations.”

“Yes,” I said. “He was an aviator, and a brave man. The bravest man I ever knew.” The tears were right there again, but I refused to let them fall.

“Your mother was very beautiful,” he said. “You’re like her.” He didn’t say anything about my father’s burns. What was there to say?

“I believe I’m more like my father,” I said. “In character. My mother was gentle, and very kind.”

“And you’re not?”

“No,” I said. “Not particularly gentle, no. Though I hope I’m not unkind.”

“Well, you’re certainly direct.” He handed the photo back to me, and I restored it to its pocket. It was a little creased now, after so long out of its frame. “And your family was also very wealthy, I take it. Aristocratic, maybe?”

“Maybe,” I said. “But as you know, there is no aristocracy in Germany anymore, and in any case, I’ve left my home and can’t return.”

“I imagine so,” he said. “The Russians seem to bear their grudges for generations.”

“Not every country is as young as the United States,” I said. “You must forgive us our history.”

He raised his glass with a smile. “Touché. So the English comes from … what?”

“From Nanny Carlisle and Miss Franklin. My English governess. I know a great many English nursery rhymes, too. I feared I would have to use them all when I was trying to convince Staff Sergeant Stark’s compatriots to rescue him from my house. Or does one teach such things to spies?”

“Not to eighteen-year-old spies,” he said with a little smile. “I doubt there’d be time.”

“Anyway,” I said, “the war is over.”

“One war is, anyway,” he said.

I looked up fast. “The Russians.”

He made a noncommittal gesture. “I’m in the business of suspicion, Fräulein Glücksburg, and young men can be a little … blinded at times.”

“Alas,” I said, “I’m no Mata Hari.”

He smiled. “Oh, I think you have potential. And there’s one thing that still confuses me.”

“Yes?” I tried to say it coolly—or maybe I shouldn’t be cool; would an innocent woman be cool? Would she cry, perhaps?I’d have to take my chances, because I couldn’t be other than what I was, and I refused to be cowed.

“It’s the baking,” he said. “I can’t square the baking with that picture, with the English, with the books. I just can’t do it.”

“Bread was very hard to get,” I said, “toward the end of the war.” Who was this man to question me? I hated having to answer him, but for Joe’s sake, I must. “We had supplies—my family had supplies—because we had sources in the countryside.”

“Aha,” he said, and pointed a jovial finger at me. “The sources in the countryside. For wheat and fuel oil, maybe?”