Shanghai Shadows by Lois Ruby

began racing through the worst of the story, waving his sketching pencil like a baton. “We are millions of Jews in Poland in nineteen thirty-nine. One minute we are under Russian occupation; the next, under German control. Suddenly in our own homeland we are not welcome.”
    â€œYes, I know.”
    â€œDo you?” He looked at me crossly. “But you are here with your family.”
    â€œThat should make me feel guilty?” I immediately regretted the words.
    â€œNot guilty. Lucky,” he said with a sigh, then jumped up and began pacing the empty café. Mr. Bauman discreetly stepped into his back room and pulled the threadbare curtain. “Nearly every Polish Jew is gone, or crowded into ghettos. The lucky ones, they escape to Russian Lithuania, with Germany pounding at their door.” From the windows: “In Lithuania we cannot live, either, but what choice do we have?”
    My tangle of hair was escaping the red ribbon I’d worn for Dovid.
    â€œThere we are, trapped in Lithuania,” Dovid said, “maybe ten thousand of us. The Russians do not understand why we want to leave, and the Germans, they do not yet have Lithuania, thank God.”
    â€œWhy did you want to leave, Dovid?”
    â€œWhy? Because survival is better than death.” His words were slow, careful. “Who knows what is the right thing to do? The Russians say we are crazy to want to leave, and since we are crazy, what will they do to us? They will send us to Siberia for the cure.”
    â€œThe cure meaning what? Exile?”
    â€œIf we live long enough. Death in the frozen land otherwise.”
    â€œAnd I thought we were miserable here in the damp winters? Human beings can’t survive in temperatures like that, can they?”
    â€œOutside, not for more than a few minutes at a time. So night and day we Polish Jews argue—is it better to try to leave? The Russians call this treason. For treason also they will send us to Siberia. Or is it more dangerous to stay in Lithuania and take a chance Hitler will not find us?”
    I felt my chest tighten, and to cover up, I scooped some of the tea leaves back into my own cup and got up to pour hot water onto the soggy leaves. I returned to the table, and Dovid went on with his tale as if I’d not even moved.
    â€œIf we can scratch together the money, and I can sneak it into the Soviet Intourist office, and if the Russian official does not steal the money and send me anyway to Siberia—”
    Just then Erich burst into the café. He always arrived like a freight train rumbling into the station. “Thought I would find you here.” He jumped back, startled to see Dovid and me with our heads leaning toward one another across the table, nearly touching, and my finger hooked through the handle of Dovid’s teacup. Such an intimate picture we must have painted, like the sophisticated man and woman who’d captivated me in that café so long ago—but younger, hungrier.
    Erich glared at Dovid. “Come, Ilse, we have work to do.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN
    1943
    Erich and I ducked into the doorway of Ping Low’s Apothecary, and he pulled out another letter on the familiar creamy stationery.
    May 12, 1943
    Mr. Wang Choi Sing
    International Agriculture Cooperative
    Shanghai, China
    Dear Sir ,
    I trust my name is known to you, as my late husband maintained vast farmlands in our home province of Hunan. He has recently joined the ancestors, and I am left a widow in my declining years .
    An associate of my husband’s has assured me that we might jointly prosper in the enterprise of producing sunflower honey. I, myself, shall not soil my hands with such labors, but those in my employ are loyal trustees. Thus, I should like to order a Shanghai Beehive sent to me immediately at my Foochow Road address for careful perusal. If we are satisfied, we shall increase the order to our mutual advantage .
    As my resources are