Page 69 of The Girl with a Secret
“Yes, please!” Rosa took the baby gingerly, as she did not have much experience of infants, but as she breathed in his milky scent and saw his beaming, gummy smile, she felt an ache inside her as sharp as a dagger.
Would she ever have the chance to have children, Peter’s children? Or was she being melodramatic, feeling as if she’d signed her whole life away, when she might fail a simple test and be sent back to Cockfosters Camp next month in near disgrace? She had no idea what the future held, but then she never had, all this time, and perhaps she never would;no onewould. She would simply have to take whatever happened as it came.
“He is the most beautiful baby in the world,” she pronounced solemnly as she handed him back, and Zlata nodded in perfect agreement.
“His name is Josef, after Moritz’s father.”
“A very good name.”
The front door opened, and Rosa turned to see her father coming into the room, larger than life as ever, a scarf thrown about his shoulders, his hair rumpled. He checked himself when he saw her, before a wide smile appeared on his face.
“Rosa!” He held his arms open, and as naturally and easily as when she’d been a small child, Rosa went into them.
“Vati,” she whispered, and again she felt the sting of tears. Everything and everyone felt so precious at that moment, so unbearably fleeting. She longed to hold onto it all, to cling to it, and yet already she felt it slipping away from her, every last precious person and thing, as the future continued to loom, unknowable, in front of her.
“How have you come home?” her father asked as he eased back to study her, a faint frown creasing his brows. “You’re all right?”
“Yes,” Rosa replied, as firmly as she could. “I’m off again tomorrow, a new assignment, something dull, no doubt, but I’m afraid I can’t say anything more about it.”
His expression softened, and he pressed his hand to her cheek. “I am so proud of you, my darling.”
“And I’m proud of you,” Rosa told him. “A doctor once again!”
“Yes, well, it was about time, wasn’t it? But you are the one doingproperwar work.” Smiling, he tapped the side of his nose; Rosa suspected he knew more or less what she did, thanks to his own offering of intelligence.
“And you’ve done your bit, as well,” she reminded him. “I wouldn’t be at Cockfosters if not for you.”
“It was a very small part I played,” he replied, “and, truth be told, it was about time that I did.” He paused, his face sagging so he looked every one of his fifty-four years. “I’ve made a great many mistakes, Rosa,” he stated quietly. “You know I have.”
She suspected he was not just talking about his regrettable relationships with Nazis back in Berlin, but also with the various women in the past, the ways he’d hurt both her and her mother. “We all have,Vati,” she replied. “What is important is the choices you make in the future. And I mean it,” she added quietly.
He hugged her again, and then her mother clapped her hands. “We must celebrate,” she proclaimed. “I will use all our ration of butter and sugar to make a cake. Zlata, do we have enough eggs?”
“I think so,” Zlata replied, hurrying to the kitchen.
Her mother was baking a cake? She’d never stepped foot in the kitchen back in Berlin. Some things never changed, Rosa reflected, and other things did… wonderfully so.
In retrospect, the whole evening felt as if it were rose-tinted, surrounded by a sunset glow of poignancy—thebaumkuchencake, one of Rosa’s favorites, and little Josef gurgling happily as he was passed from knee to knee, her parents clearly so content together, in a way they never truly had been before. Moritz got out his violin, and they all danced to a rousing folk tune, with Josef shrieking his delight.
Rosa couldn’t bear for the evening to end, but she knew it had to, and so it did after just a few short hours. She took her leave of her parents early the next morning, hugging and kissing them in turn, along with the Rosenbaums and dear little Josef, and then she headed out to make the eight o’clock train from King’s Cross, wondering, with a pang, when she’d see anyone she loved ever again.
The station was full of soldiers and women in uniform bustling to and fro. Amidst the sound of the trains’ whistles and the cry of the seagulls circling above, tearful farewells and joyful greetings played out on the platforms, a thousand poignant dramas enacted by the hour.
Rosa found the train for Carlisle and took her seat in one of the compartments. A soldier sprang up with alacrity to help her stow her suitcase above.
“Thank you,” she murmured as she sank into the seat by the window.
“My pleasure.” He sat down opposite her with a smile. “Are you going all the way to Carlisle?”
Rosa nodded, even as she thought,And then onto Glasgow… Arisaig… and maybe France?She turned to look out the window to hide the sudden tears that threatened. She’d left everything and everyone she knew and loved behind,again. Back on theSt Louis, when she’d faced the same sort of uncertain future, she’d felt hopeful, determined. She wanted to feel that way again. She would choose to, despite the dangers and the loss.
Rosa slipped her hand into her pocket, her fingers closing around the emerald, savoring its smoothness. She thought again of Peter, working at Cockfosters Camp, determined to rid the world of Hitler’s evil. And Sophie, over in America, doing whatever secretive work she was, maybe even risking her life in some way, and then Rachel, in the Netherlands, fearing and fighting for her life. And Hannah, in France…I am doing good work… It feels more important than anything I’ve ever done.
Yes, Rosa thought, and now she would be, as well. To fight for justice and freedom, to face the future unbowed and unafraid… it was a choice she would make and was already making. Just as she’d once thought of Ernst, of anyone, she, like him, was the sum of her choices—not one misjudgement years ago, but this—here, now. A smile touched her lips as her fingers curled even more tightly around the emerald.
With an exhale of steam into the pale blue sky, the train moved off, heading north, toward her future.
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