I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate. There had to be a way to fix this. I couldn’t do anything to undo what Henry had already done, but there had to be a way to save him from prison, to save Sofie Rhodes for her children…
Maybe I sat there a moment too long, because when I opened my eyes, both officers were staring at me, their gazes narrow.
“Mrs. Miller?” Tucker said slowly. “Is there anything you want to tell us?”
For the first time in years, I thought about my mother and the conversation she and I shared beneath the stars about Henry and Daddy, and strong minds and weaker spirits.
You get the brain you’re given, and it seems to me that those of us who are strong have an obligation to care for others when they aren’t.
My gaze drifted again to the box of evidence in the corner of the room.
I had to protect Henry. I had to help Sofie Rhodes.
I let my gaze linger on the box—long enough that the silence stretched.
After a moment, Johnson rose and walked across the room to the lamp table. He lifted the box up onto the table, peered inside, then looked at me in disbelief.
“Care to explain all this, Mrs. Miller?” he said.
“No,” I whispered hoarsely. “No, I don’t think I will.”
The interrogation room was small, with stark white walls and a large clock over the door. I guessed I’d need a lawyer but I didn’t know what I’d say to him, so I hadn’t asked to call one. Johnson and Tucker were throwing rapid-fire questions at me. I knew all of the answers, but I hadn’t said a word since we arrived at the station.
I felt Mother’s memory so strongly in that room. It was like she was trying to tell me something. I just couldn’t catch it with all of the noise and the guilt and the fear and the confusion.
“Lizzie,” Tucker said, his tone suddenly softening. “May I call you that?” I nodded silently. “The bullets in that box match the type of bullets in the gun we found in Jürgen Rhodes’ backyard. You have the photographs Sofie Rhodes says were stolen from her bedroom. You have a tin of paint that might plausibly have been used to harass those Germans up on Saukeraut Hill. We haven’t charged you yet because we thought you might have some explanation for all of this, but you won’t even try to help us out here. Surely you can see this looks bad?”
“Calvin is out there in the foyer,” Johnson added. “He’s real upset, Lizzie. Why don’t you tell us what happened this morning with Rhodes, and then we’ll let you see him?”
I wanted to make my brother okay but I couldn’t. I wanted to make Calvin happy but I couldn’t. I just wanted to undo what had happened to Jürgen Rhodes—but I couldn’t. I wanted to help Sofie Rhodes, who, in this instance at least, was an innocent mother to innocent children.
I just wanted to make everything better for everyone around me.
I could hear my breathing echoing in that little room—shallow pants that betrayed my panic. The only way forward seemed to be for me to confess to Henry’s crime, but Calvin would see right through that.
“We might take a break,” Tucker sighed, and the two men pushed back their chairs and left me alone.
I stared up at the clock on the wall. It was almost 10:00 a.m., and the second hand kept ticking, even though it felt that time had stopped.
47
Sofie
Berlin, Germany
April 1945
The end was coming closer and the mood on the streets of Berlin was tense. Some people were stockpiling food and ammunition, others were collecting timber in piles in their yards—ostensibly for “summer projects.” Few were willing to admit they were actually preparing to barricade their windows once the conflict reached our streets.
Lydia hadn’t spoken to me since my arrest—not until the phone lines at Nordhausen and Mittelwerk went down, at which point she called and acted as if we were still close.
“Have you heard from Jürgen?” she asked pleasantly.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “No, not for weeks.”
“The last time I spoke to him, Karl said we have to defend ourselves and our homes at any cost and we must fight to the very last. He and I agreed we would never surrender. But…” Lydia cleared her throat. “If he was captured…well, obviously that would be different.”
“I don’t know what you mean, Lydia.”
“The Soviets and the Americans will want our technology. Our knowledge. And God knows the scientists can’t manage their own way from the lunchroom to their desks. They need people like Karl to help them or they’d never achieve anything. And of course they’d take our families too. The men would insist upon it.”