Page 28 of The Banned Books of Berlin
Los Angeles, October 2024
Maddie asked Daniel to drop her off a block away from her house the next morning. She knew if her mother saw them together that questions would be asked. Inevitably, questions were asked anyway.
‘So what is it?’ Sharon demanded as soon as Maddie walked through the front door. ‘Have you lost your job? Are you sick, or pregnant? You look even more tired than usual.’
‘Nothing like that,’ Maddie replied, taking off her coat and slinging it over a chair. ‘I just want to talk to you both.’
‘Let the poor girl sit down,’ her grandfather said, patting the couch beside him, and Maddie gave him a grateful hug.
‘How are you?’ she asked. ‘And Eva? Still having fun discussions about death?’
‘I’ll pour the coffee while you catch up,’ Sharon said. ‘Are you hungry? I have fresh bagels too.’
‘Ravenous,’ Maddie replied. ‘Fill me in, Gramps.’
‘Well, we’ve moved on from funeral arrangements,’ he said. ‘Eva’s been tracing my mother’s history.’
‘OK,’ Maddie said, though a pang of alarm had shot through her stomach. ‘Tell me more.’
‘So she’s traced the Amsel family in Berlin,’ he said. ‘At the address you found on that old suitcase? There was a census in Germany in 1925, and they’re all there: Freya’s mother, who was called Ingrid, and her father, Ernst, and her older brother, Otto. She and Otto were schoolkids then, and her mother is listed as a dressmaker and her father a house painter. Solid working-class folk.’
‘That’s so interesting,’ Maddie commented, keeping her voice neutral.
‘Just wait,’ Gramps went on. ‘There was another census at the beginning of May 1933 and by then, the household had changed. Ingrid Amsel was no longer living at that address, and neither was Freya. Her father and brother were still there, though, with a maid called Hedwig Müller, and a lodger by the name of Walther Grube. Eva’s trying to see if there’s a death certificate for Ingrid Amsel. I remember Mom telling me her own mother had died relatively young. Isn’t it amazing what you can find out on the internet these days?’
Sharon was back with a tray and fussed about for a while, handing out coffee, bagels with smoked salmon and cream cheese, plates and paper napkins.
‘Well, that’s kind of why I’m here,’ Maddie said, when they were relatively settled. ‘Sit down, Mom. Nobody needs black pepper and this is important.’
‘Sorry, I’m sure,’ Sharon said, perching on the edge of a chair. ‘Go ahead, then.’
‘This is a long story, so prepare yourselves. You might find it hard to take in – I did, at first.’ Maddie took a deep breath, squaring her shoulders. ‘This is your mother’s story, Gramps. So we know Freya Amsel went to America in 1938, but she didn’t go straight there from Germany. In 1933 she went to England with her friend, Violet Framley-Chambers, to work as a kitchen maid at the family home, Beechwood Grange, in Oxfordshire.’ She heard a sharp intake of breath and looked up to see Gramps staring at her, coffee cup poised halfway to his mouth.
‘Freya stayed there for five years,’ Maddie went on, ‘learning English and saving her wages. Then in 1938, Adolf Hitler annexed Austria. She realised war was coming and there was every chance the Germans would invade Britain, too, so she left for California, to join the love of her life, Leon Kohl – or Leonard Cole, as he was now known. He’d emigrated to the States back in 1933 and become a permanent resident by then.’
‘Don’t we know most of this already?’ Sharon asked, picking crumbs off the rug.
‘As I was saying, war broke out in Europe in 1939,’ Maddie continued, ‘and the United States came to help the Allies at the end of 1941, after the attack on Pearl Harbour.’
Sharon sighed. ‘Thanks for the history lesson.’
Maddie ignored her. ‘In 1942, Leonard Cole went to work for the US military against the Nazis in France. He was an invaluable asset, being a native German speaker, and managed to infiltrate the highest diplomatic circles. And while he was in France, he met up with Violet Framley-Chambers again, who was living there as a member of the Resistance. They’d been lovers in Berlin and they must have rekindled their affair, despite the fact he was now married to Freya.’
She gave Gramps a rueful smile, but he only shook his head and said, ‘Passions run high in wartime, it’s inevitable. People live for the moment when they don’t know what the next day will bring.’
‘How did you find all this out?’ Sharon asked, curious at last.
‘Because I’ve been in touch with the Framley-Chambers family,’ Maddie replied. ‘I had a Zoom chat with Felicity Chambers a couple of days ago. She’s great, I love her. Anyway, Felicity’s husband, Henry, is the son of Nigel, who was Violet’s nephew.’
Sharon shook her head. ‘You’ve lost me now.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ Gramps said impatiently. ‘Go on, Madeleine.’
‘Well, Leonard was tragically killed in France in the summer of 1943, as you’re well aware. He’d been betrayed by an American double agent who was also working for the Nazis, and was lured to a remote spot and shot in the head. Not long after that, Violet was sent back to England.’ Maddie hesitated for a moment, then forged ahead. ‘Because she was pregnant.’
The room became utterly silent. Nobody moved. Maddie could hear the grandfather clock ticking away in the hall.
‘Violet gave birth to a baby boy,’ she continued eventually, balling a paper napkin tight in her fist, ‘at home, Beechwood Grange, on the fifteenth of November 1943. She called him Robert.’
‘Dear Lord in heaven!’ her mother cried, jumping to her feet. ‘Are you serious?’
‘Sharon, sit down and shut up,’ Gramps ordered, in a voice Maddie had never heard him use before.
‘But the story doesn’t end there,’ she went on. ‘Violet survived the war, returning to France as soon as she could while Robert stayed behind with a nanny at Beechwood Grange. They had hot and cold running servants in those days, I gather.’ She didn’t dare look at Gramps. ‘But tragically, Violet fell seriously ill in 1946. When it became obvious she was going to pass away – sorry, Gramps – when it became obvious she was going to die, Violet wrote to Freya, asking her to come back to Beechwood Grange one last time. Transatlantic flights were just beginning and she wired her the money for a plane ticket. So Freya came back to England, met little Robert and understood immediately what had happened. Violet didn’t need to explain. He looked so like his father, you see.’
Maddie took a sip of water, her mouth dry. ‘And here’s the most extraordinary thing: Violet asked Freya to adopt Leon’s child and bring him up as her own. She knew her son would have a miserable life in England, with both his parents dead and his father a German into the bargain. Her family was cold and unloving, according to Felicity, and would probably have put Robert in an orphanage. Violet’s two brothers had been killed in the war but her sister, Annabel Covington, already had a son, Nigel. As Robert was illegitimate, there was no question of him being in line to inherit the house or title, and the family would have seen no reason to keep him around. He’d have brought them nothing but shame.’
Maddie took Gramps’ hand and squeezed it. ‘So Freya went home to California,’ she finished, ‘and took Robert with her.’
There was nothing more to be said. Even Sharon, mercifully, stayed quiet.
After a minute, Gramps got to his feet. ‘Would you excuse me? I’d like a moment to myself.’ He left the room, not looking at either of them.
Maddie and her mother sat in silence for some time.
‘Oh, my Lord,’ Sharon murmured at last, shaking her head. ‘Oh, my Lord! So Dad’s real mother was this Violet something Chambers, who was brought up in an English stately home? She was my grandmother, then? Are you absolutely sure?’
Maddie nodded. ‘Felicity emailed me copies of his birth and adoption certificates. It’s all true, Mom. I can prove it.’
A smile crept slowly over Sharon’s face. ‘Wait till my book group hears about this.’
‘Jeez, Mom,’ Maddie exclaimed. ‘You are such a snob!’
She went through to the back yard, to find her grandfather by himself on the bench, staring into space.
‘OK, Gramps?’ she asked, sitting beside him and squeezing his hand again.
He nodded, though there were tears in his eyes. Maddie pretended not to notice, looking away as he took a spotted handkerchief from his pocket and blew his nose.
‘What a woman,’ he sighed, shaking his head.
‘I know,’ Maddie said, though she wasn’t sure to whom he was referring.
He turned to her, his eyes shining. ‘Can you imagine the courage it must have taken to fly across the ocean to Europe in 1946, return with a child she didn’t know and bring him up as her own? The child who must have been a constant reminder of her husband’s infidelity? And for her to never make that little boy feel less than special, but to love him with her whole heart and give him the most wonderful life he could ever have imagined?’
‘Don’t, Gramps,’ Maddie said, her voice breaking.
‘What a woman,’ he repeated. ‘God, I was lucky to have her. When I think how things might have turned out … She might not have given birth to me, but I was blessed to call her my mother.’
He put his arm around Maddie and drew her close. ‘Thank you, darling. You’ve done more for me than you could ever imagine.’