The Book Thief Part 46

"Do you have any cigarettes? Maybe we can sell some."

Liesel wasn't in the mood for this. She spoke quietly enough so that Mama wouldn't hear. "I don't steal from my papa."

"But you steal from certain other places."

"Talk a bit louder, why don't you."

Rudy schmunzeled. "See what stealing does? You're all worried."

"Like you've never stolen anything."

"Yes, but you reek of it." Rudy was really warming up now. "Maybe that's not cigarette smoke after all." He leaned closer and smiled. "It's a criminal I can smell. You should have a bath." He shouted back to Tommy Mller. "Hey, Tommy, you should come and have a smell of this!"

"What did you say?" Trust Tommy. "I can't hear you!"

Rudy shook his head in Liesel's direction. "Useless."

She started shutting the door. "Get lost, Saukerl, you're the last thing I need right now."

Very pleased with himself, Rudy made his way back to the street. At the mailbox, he seemed to remember what he'd wanted to verify all along. He came back a few steps. "Alles gut, Saumensch? The injury, I mean."

It was June. It was Germany.

Things were on the verge of decay.

Liesel was unaware of this. For her, the Jew in her bas.e.m.e.nt had not been revealed. Her foster parents were not taken away, and she herself had contributed greatly to both of these accomplishments.

"Everything's good," she said, and she was not talking about a soccer injury of any description.

She was fine.

DEATH'S DIARY: THE PARISIANS Summer came.

For the book thief, everything was going nicely.

For me, the sky was the color of Jews.

When their bodies had finished scouring for gaps in the door, their souls rose up. When their fingernails had scratched at the wood and in some cases were nailed into it by the sheer force of desperation, their spirits came toward me, into my arms, and we climbed out of those shower facilities, onto the roof and up, into eternity's certain breadth. They just kept feeding me. Minute after minute. Shower after shower.

I'll never forget the first day in Auschwitz, the first time in Mauthausen. At that second place, as time wore on, I also picked them up from the bottom of the great cliff, when their escapes fell awfully awry. There were broken bodies and dead, sweet hearts. Still, it was better than the gas. Some of them I caught when they were only halfway down. Saved you, I'd think, holding their souls in midair as the rest of their being-their physical sh.e.l.ls-plummeted to the earth. All of them were light, like the cases of empty walnuts. Smoky sky in those places. The smell like a stove, but still so cold.

I s.h.i.+ver when I remember-as I try to de-realize it.

I blow warm air into my hands, to heat them up.

But it's hard to keep them warm when the souls still s.h.i.+ver.

G.o.d.

I always say that name when I think of it.

G.o.d.

Twice, I speak it.

I say His name in a futile attempt to understand. "But it's not your job to understand." That's me who answers. G.o.d never says anything. You think you're the only one he never answers? "Your job is to ..." And I stop listening to me, because to put it bluntly, I tire me. When I start thinking like that, I become so exhausted, and I don't have the luxury of indulging fatigue. I'm compelled to continue on, because although it's not true for every person on earth, it's true for the vast majority-that death waits for no man-and if he does, he doesn't usually wait very long.

On June 23, 1942, there was a group of French Jews in a German prison, on Polish soil. The first person I took was close to the door, his mind racing, then reduced to pacing, then slowing down, slowing down ....

Please believe me when I tell you that I picked up each soul that day as if it were newly born. I even kissed a few weary, poisoned cheeks. I listened to their last, gasping cries. Their vanis.h.i.+ng words. I watched their love visions and freed them from their fear.

I took them all away, and if ever there was a time I needed distraction, this was it. In complete desolation, I looked at the world above. I watched the sky as it turned from silver to gray to the color of rain. Even the clouds were trying to get away.

Sometimes I imagined how everything looked above those clouds, knowing without question that the sun was blond, and the endless atmosphere was a giant blue eye.

They were French, they were Jews, and they were you.

PART SEVEN.

the complete duden dictionary and thesaurus featuring:

champagne and accordions-

a trilogy-some sirens-a sky

stealer-an offer-the long

walk to dachau-peace-

an idiot and some coat men

CHAMPAGNE AND ACCORDIONS.

In the summer of 1942, the town of Molching was preparing for the inevitable. There were still people who refused to believe that this small town on Munich's outskirts could be a target, but the majority of the population was well aware that it was not a question of if, but when. Shelters were more clearly marked, windows were in the process of being blackened for the nights, and everyone knew where the closest bas.e.m.e.nt or cellar was.

For Hans Hubermann, this uneasy development was actually a slight reprieve. At an unfortunate time, good luck had somehow found its way into his painting business. People with blinds were desperate enough to enlist his services to paint them. His problem was that black paint was normally used more as a mixer, to darken other colors, and it was soon depleted and hard to find. What he did have was the knack of being a good tradesman, and a good tradesman has many tricks. He took coal dust and stirred it through, and he worked cheap. There were many houses in all parts of Molching in which he confiscated the window light from enemy eyes.

On some of his workdays, Liesel went with him.

They carted his paint through town, smelling the hunger on some of the streets and shaking their heads at the wealth on others. Many times, on the way home, women with nothing but kids and poverty would come running out and plead with him to paint their blinds.

"Frau Hallah, I'm sorry, I have no black paint left," he would say, but a little farther down the road, he would always break. There was tall man and long street. "Tomorrow," he'd promise, "first thing," and when the next morning dawned, there he was, painting those blinds for nothing, or for a cookie or a warm cup of tea. The previous evening, he'd have found another way to turn blue or green or beige to black. Never did he tell them to cover their windows with spare blankets, for he knew they'd need them when winter came. He was even known to paint people's blinds for half a cigarette, sitting on the front step of a house, sharing a smoke with the occupant. Laughter and smoke rose out of the conversation before they moved on to the next job.

When the time came to write, I remember clearly what Liesel Meminger had to say about that summer. A lot of the words have faded over the decades. The paper has suffered from the friction of movement in my pocket, but still, many of her sentences have been impossible to forget.

A SMALL SAMPLE OF SOME.

GIRL-WRITTEN WORDS.

That summer was a new beginning, a new end.

When I look back, I remember my slippery

hands of paint and the sound of Papa's feet

on Munich Street, and I know that a small

piece of the summer of 1942 belonged to only

one man. Who else would do some painting for

the price of half a cigarette? That was Papa,

that was typical, and I loved him.

Every day when they worked together, he would tell Liesel his stories. There was the Great War and how his miserable handwriting helped save his life, and the day he met Mama. He said that she was beautiful once, and actually very quiet-spoken. "Hard to believe, I know, but absolutely true." Each day, there was a story, and Liesel forgave him if he told the same one more than once.

On other occasions, when she was daydreaming, Papa would dab her lightly with his brush, right between the eyes. If he misjudged and there was too much on it, a small path of paint would dribble down the side of her nose. She would laugh and try to return the favor, but Hans Hubermann was a hard man to catch out at work. It was there that he was most alive.

Whenever they had a break, to eat or drink, he would play the accordion, and it was this that Liesel remembered best. Each morning, while Papa pushed or dragged the paint cart, Liesel carried the instrument. "Better that we leave the paint behind," Hans told her, "than ever forget the music." When they paused to eat, he would cut up the bread, smearing it with what little jam remained from the last ration card. Or he'd lay a small slice of meat on top of it. They would eat together, sitting on their cans of paint, and with the last mouthfuls still in the chewing stages, Papa would be wiping his fingers, unbuckling the accordion case.

Traces of bread crumbs were in the creases of his overalls. Paint-specked hands made their way across the b.u.t.tons and raked over the keys, or held on to a note for a while. His arms worked the bellows, giving the instrument the air it needed to breathe.

Liesel would sit each day with her hands between her knees, in the long legs of daylight. She wanted none of those days to end, and it was always with disappointment that she watched the darkness stride forward.

As far as the painting itself was concerned, probably the most interesting aspect for Liesel was the mixing. Like most people, she a.s.sumed her papa simply took his cart to the paint shop or hardware store and asked for the right color and away he went. She didn't realize that most of the paint was in lumps, in the shape of a brick. It was then rolled out with an empty champagne bottle. (Champagne bottles, Hans explained, were ideal for the job, as their gla.s.s was slightly thicker than that of an ordinary bottle of wine.) Once that was completed, there was the addition of water, whiting, and glue, not to mention the complexities of matching the right color.

The science of Papa's trade brought him an even greater level of respect. It was well and good to share bread and music, but it was nice for Liesel to know that he was also more than capable in his occupation. Competence was attractive.

One afternoon, a few days after Papa's explanation of the mixing, they were working at one of the wealthier houses just east of Munich Street. Papa called Liesel inside in the early afternoon. They were just about to move on to another job when she heard the unusual volume in his voice.