That Wild Berries Should Grow (5 page)

When I gave it to Grandpapa he said to Grandmama, “It's from Kurt Roth.” As he opened the letter, his hands shook so that he tore a bit of it. “They have closed his art gallery and taken away all of the paintings.” Grandpapa's face was pale. “What harm could they see in paintings of flowers and trees and sailboats?”

“Kurt always had his own way of painting things. That's what they don't like. Does he say how Ruth is?”

“She has been dismissed from her position with the school. It is becoming too dangerous for them to stay in Berlin. He says many artists have already left. Kurt says there may be a way for him to get out of Germany. He wants to know if we could find him work here.”

“Why do they have to leave Germany?” I asked.

My grandparents had forgotten that I was there. Now they gave me a long look.

“She's too young to hear such things,” Grandpapa said.

“She has already heard them,” Grandmama answered.

Grandpapa sighed. “It is a terrible thing, Elsa, but because our friends, Kurt and Ruth, are Jewish, the German government has taken away their living. Hitler is telling artists what they must paint and writers what they must write. Now it is not even safe for Jews to be seen on the streets. It is hard to remember when we are so comfortable here that people can be so very cruel. Our friends will have to give up their home and everything they own and come away.”

“If they are lucky enough to escape,” Grandmama said. “Write them at once, Carl. We must do all we can to help them.”

Grandpapa sat down at the kitchen table to write his reply. “As soon as I finish, Elsa, you can take my letter into Greenbush and mail it.”

While he wrote, Grandmama bustled about making noodles, folding the dough and chopping it into long strands. Whenever she is upset she cooks something, usually something that takes a lot of pounding or chopping.

When the letter was finished, I took it to the post office. Grandmama had given me some paper to carry it in so I wouldn't get fingerprints on the envelope or smudge the writing. I studied the address as I dropped it into the mail slot. I had looked up Germany once on the map, and I knew how far away it was. I wondered if the letter would get there in time.

Talk

All week long

my grandparents

explain themselves
,

their talk scrambling

my thoughts
.

Tonight I am greedy

for my own company
,

hungry to know

what I am up to
.

When I sit in a room

listening to people

a branch taps at the window

and the tree outside is me
.

Every night after supper is over I settle into one of the big overstuffed chairs in the living room to listen to my grandparents. They talk about how the corn and beans and peas and tomatoes are coming along. They talk about the apple and plum and peach and pear trees. In detail. It is almost as though they are talking the garden and orchard into growing. It seems like all their words will turn into carrots and apples and beans.

They tell me stories about what it was like in Germany. “Christmas was the best,” Grandmama said. “Relatives and friends filled our house. The
Tannenbaum
reached to the ceiling and was lit by little candles. It was decorated with gingerbread and marzipan.”

“What is marzipan?” I asked, already deciding to keep the words “
Tannenbaum
” and “marzipan.”

“Candies made from almond paste molded into wonderful shapes. They are wrapped in gold and silver tinfoil.”

Grandpapa told me about the museums full of great paintings and the concerts and opera. They were all on a beautiful street in the city of Berlin called
Unter den Linden
, which means “beneath the linden trees.”

Some of the stories I had heard before. My grandparents are getting old. I think they want to tell me the stories so that the stories will stay in my head. They hope one day I'll tell them to someone else and the stories will always be remembered.

After a while I got tired of all the talk. I could hear the crickets outside and the rustle of the trees creaking in the wind. My mind flew out the window where no one could get to it. Grandpapa must have seen how restless I was, because the next morning he said, “We have a surprise for you. Tonight they are showing a movie in the town, and I bought you a ticket.”

“But there's no movie house,” I said, suddenly homesick for Detroit's big theaters that are like palaces — all gold with statues and heavy velvet curtains that drag silk fringe.

“They put up a tent on the fairgrounds,” Grandmama explained. “You must remember to take a pillow. The seats are hard.”

“And a flashlight,” Grandpapa added, “for the trip home.”

It was a strange way to go to the movies, I thought, carrying a pillow and a flashlight.

“What are they showing, Carl?” Grandmama asked.

“The girl who sold the tickets didn't know. A western, perhaps.”

I felt important walking into town all by myself when it was almost dark out. I didn't want to be seen carrying the pillow, so I hid it behind a tree where I could get it on the way back. Grandmama had made me wear shoes, and I hid those, too. In some of the houses along the street the lights had already been turned on. People were sitting around their tables having a late dinner or were gathered around the radio. Being able to look into the lighted windows was almost as good as watching a movie.

At one of the houses a man and a woman were rocking back and forth on a porch swing, watching their children playing in the front yard. I thought of my mom and dad at home and my friends who were probably out playing games. They were probably having fun and not even thinking of me. I must have been staring because the children stopped to watch me pass by. If they had asked me to play with them I would have forgotten all about the movie.

When I got to the fairgrounds I saw a huge tent. I joined the people who were crowding into the entrance to find seats on the benches. Hundreds of moths were gathered around the lantern that hung from the ceiling of the tent. In the back of the tent was the motion-picture projector with two thick reels of film. The lantern went out, and the name of the film flashed on the screen. It wasn't a western. It was
Dracula
! There was a lot of applause and whistles and screeches. A couple of parents with young children got up and left in a huff.

Glaring out at us from the screen was Dracula; with a horrible face and teeth like a wolf. There wasn't any sound, just words printed on the screen to let you know what the characters were saying. Something told me I should leave, too. I was sure my grandparents had no idea of what I was seeing. But there was Dracula wrapping himself in his cape and smiling at a lady with long curls, too much lipstick, and a long, white, naked throat. I stayed. I don't know which was the worst part. It was either the blood dripping from Dracula's long teeth or those thuds as they pounded the stake through Dracula's heart. When the picture was over, I was so frightened I couldn't move. The redheaded pest I had seen in town was sitting behind me. “You better get out,” he hissed, “or you and Dracula will be the only ones left.” I gave him a furious look, but I hurried out.

For a couple of blocks it was all right. There were lots of people walking home, and I just stayed with them. By the time I got farther out of town, most of the people were gone. Soon I was the only one. I walked as fast as I could and kept shining my flashlight all around me. In the dark, the familiar road home had disappeared. In the daytime trees lean over you in a friendly way. At night they seem to be reaching out to grab you. I was running so fast that I had a pain in my side. Moths attracted by my flashlight fluttered around me.

Then the second-worst thing happened. A fluttering shape swooped at me. It was a bat. I guess it was after the moths that were flying around my flashlight, but it seemed to be coming right at me. I dropped the flashlight and clutched my throat. It could have been Dracula turned into a bat. The dark shape flew off, and I groped around for the flashlight. Something had happened to it when it fell, and it wouldn't go on.

I kept on running. Then the worst thing happened. I stepped on something lumpy. It was soft, and it moved! I jumped a mile, and whatever it was — a toad or a frog — got out of there. After that, all I remember was racing down the path to the cottage and throwing myself inside the door. “Elsa!” Grandmama said. “What has happened?” She put her arms around me and patted my back. I hung on as tightly as I could. After a while I let go and told them about Dracula.

“It was my fault,” Grandpapa said. “I should have found out what the movie was.”

No one asked me where the pillow was or where my shoes were. I'd get them in the morning. And I decided that the next night I'd stay home and listen to my grandparents' stories.

The Great Lake

Its jeweler's window

offers bright stones
,

wheedles me with shells
.

Its little waves

lick me like a dog
,

sing me to sleep
.

But the selfish lake

never lets me

see the secret

of its other shore
.

The last thing I hear at night before I fall asleep is the sound of the waves slapping against the shore. The first thing I see in the morning is the reflection on my ceiling of sun glittering on the water.

For a long time I was afraid of the lake, but I loved its wide, sandy beach. I'd climb down the stairway to the beach, past the pump house where the water from the lake is pumped up to our cottage, and past the poison ivy. When I first came, Grandpapa showed me the three green leaves you have to watch out for. I forgot all about it, and one evening there were itchy blisters all up and down my legs. Grandmama mixed up baking soda and water and put it on the blisters. After that I was careful to watch where I walked.

You can sit on the beach where the sand is dry and start digging. When the hole in the sand gets deep enough, water creeps into the hole. It's as if the lake is hiding, just waiting for you to find it.

You can walk for miles along the beach. Every few feet you find something to keep. The top of my dresser was heaped with things leaking sand: snail shells to turn into bracelets, gulls' feathers, tangles of driftwood. My favorite finds are the pieces of glass that have been in the lake for years and years. The water and the sand have rubbed all the sharp edges smooth.

I'd see a pretty stone or shell in the lake and reach for it. When a wave chased me, I'd jump back. It was as if someone were offering you a piece of candy and when you put your hand out for it they snatched it away.

Finally I made myself stand there and let the waves wash over my legs and splash my bathing suit. Little by little the lake invited me into it. I got so that I laughed at the waves, diving into them and letting them carry me back to shore. I floated facedown, my eyes open. I watched bubbles gurgle up from clam shells and snails inch along the slippery stones. Minnows came and nibbled at my toes.

I know there will be days when I am still afraid of the lake. Days when the storms come. Days when the waves leap and foam, striking the beach and rushing out again to become more and bigger waves. Days when the fishing boats head for the pier. On those days I'll hurry inside. Then the lake, like a spoiled child, will have everything for itself.

Meyer's Fish House

The

Billy

Boy
in and

the fish hand-

clapping their

tails against the

bottom of the boat;

Mr. Meyer in overalls
,

the knife in his hand
.

The pearl scales fly
,

the little dead pearl

of the eye, the fish

mouth curved in the

sleepy child smile
,

scraps floating

on the water

like a dainty

treat, and all the gulls

that came flying to the party
.

The main street of Greenbush ends at a pier, a long dock that sticks out into the lake. Early in the morning the fishing boats set out from the pier. Late in the afternoon they come back, their decks heaped with whitefish and perch and pickerel. If the wind blows toward the town you can smell the fish long before you get to the pier.

Yesterday Grandmama sent me to Mr. Meyer's Fish House to buy perch for supper. I got there early because I like to watch the boats come in. The first boat in was the
Billy Boy
. It's owned by Billy Harper, who is so tall and so fat there is hardly room for anyone else on his boat. His brother goes out with him, and sometimes his son goes out, too. His son is my age. He's the redheaded pest.

As Mr. Harper was tying up his boat, he called to the other fishermen to ask how many fish each boat had caught. The fishermen like to brag about how large their catch is, but they are careful to keep secret where they spread their nets.

Mr. Harper and his brother carried boxes full of fish, most of them still alive, into the fish house. Mr. Harper's son just stood on the boat looking at me. I thought if I didn't say something his eyes would pop out. “Hello,” I said. “What's your name?”