“How is your father?”
“He’s found work,” Mayim said, forcing a smile. “So that’s something.”
“But…his business?”
“Gone. And the house.”
“He must have retained something. His cash, surely? Some artwork or a property or two?” Lydia pressed, as if the alternative were impossible. Mayim shrugged noncommittally, and we fell into a slightly strained moment of silence. Comprehension finally dawned on Lydia’s face and she gave me the horrified, panicked look of a wealthy woman who had never considered that someone of her social class could ever be penniless.
“I have news, Lydia,” I blurted. She still looked frazzled, but she raised her thin eyebrows in question, and I smiled. “I’m expecting. The doctor says I’ll deliver the baby in January.”
Thankfully, the conversation moved quickly on from that moment of awkwardness, as Lydia predictably squealed. I then carefully managed to tie together two new threads of conversation—baby chat and matchmaking chat, as I discussed the “wealthy, handsome, preferably Jewish” young men Lydia or I could possibly set Mayim up with. I felt so terrible for her and I wished we could set her up with a suitable young man. She desperately wanted a family of her own, but potential suitors in our social circles dried up when her family’s wealth did.
Lydia knew for months that Mayim was living in one of my guest rooms. Maybe now that she knew the truth about Levi’s circumstances, she’d deduce that Mayim wasn’t really staying with me to keep me company while Jürgen went to the university to work on his thesis each day. There were only two bedrooms in her family’s new apartment. Jürgen and I insisted Mayim live in one of our spare rooms when we learned she was sharing a bedroom with her brother, Moshe. We tried to invite the rest of her family too, but they refused.
After we ate, Mayim excused herself to use the restroom, and Lydia leaned forward and whispered with audible shock, “Is it true? They have nothing? How can this be?”
“Levi felt so guilty that his staff was losing their jobs that he was determined to pay out as much of their entitlements as he could. He sold everything they owned, right down to the silverware. He’s working as a clerk for the City of Berlin and they’re living in a Mietskaserne in Mitte.” A tenement building, and in this case, one of the worst in Berlin. “Their situation is very bad, Lydia. Please try to be sensitive.”
“I will. My God, I can’t even imagine what that would be like, and especially for them. How on earth are they coping?”
“Better than you or I would, I suspect,” I admitted.
“I just mean it must be especially hard for them.” She was laboring a point and I didn’t understand why.
“I don’t know what you mean?”
“Sofie, my God. You know how the Jews are. They just love their money.”
The waitress came to clear our plates, so we fell silent, and by the time she finished, Mayim returned. She and Lydia easily slipped back into the conversation about my pregnancy, but I sat in uneasy silence.
Later, we parted at the roadside in front of the café. Lydia kissed my cheek, then Mayim’s, and waved to us as she slipped into the back seat of her car. Mayim and I climbed into mine, and my driver pulled out into the traffic.
“You’re awfully quiet,” she murmured. “Are you feeling unwell?”
“I’m fine,” I told her, forcing a smile. “Just tired.”
Why was I so unsettled by Lydia’s comment? It was a throwaway line, a silly, reductive stereotype that people joked about all the time. I tried to reassure myself that Lydia didn’t mean a thing by it. She wasn’t anti-Semitic. How could she be? She was one of Mayim’s best friends.
Besides, Mayim didn’t even hear what Lydia said, so no harm was done. Not really.
5
Lizzie
Huntsville, Alabama
1950
“I’m already late, Henry,” I said, shifting from one foot to the other as I peered under the hood of my car. “Cal’s going to think I’m not coming. Can you just—”
“Lizzie, I’m working as fast as I can. Would you just—” My brother pressed the heel of his palm into his forehead and took a long, slow breath. “You harping at me isn’t going to make me work any faster.”
“Sorry,” I said weakly. “We fought, that’s all. I really don’t want to go to this thing.”
Henry pursed his lips as he tightened a bolt on my engine with a spanner.