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“Don’t apologize, dear. Guardian angels deserve remembrance. If it gives her granddaughter peace, I will tell you anything.”
Notebook in hand, I settled into my accent chair where I could still soak in the sunlight. “Did you know Grandpa Warren well? I’m struggling to understand how what happened, happened. Thought if I knew his past, it’d explain what he’d become.”
“Gen never said? No? Ah, always was difficult for her to reconcile; didn’t acknowledge weakness, your grandmother. Everything was always fine, doing fine, going to turn out swell. Warren didn’t get the help he needed soon enough and the pair of them were too proud to ask. Help might’ve saved your family. I lost a nephew to early onset dementia a few years ago. Awful, awful disease, but your grandfather in his prime was a fine fellow. Quiet. Kept to himself, but so kind. I know you won’t want to hear it because of the end, but, oh, he spoiled your mother and you kids.”
I snapped the plastic clip off my pen. “He was an Allied soldier, right? A member of one of the first units into Dachau?”
“We didn't see him that day; and if we had, we would never have known in the confusion. The men who came, I didn't believe they were real until I reached though the fence and rubbed the wool of a soldier’s sleeve between my fingers and felt his dirty nails touch my cheek. I saw in his eyes the reflection of us gathered skeletons and fainted away on the spot. Warren met your grandmother in the town as we left. He had given her bread. She fed me and a stray cat she’d been taming and asked if the Americans would give her a job as a translator. For days he brought us what food he could spare, until he had to leave for his next assignment. He could not get her a job, but with his help we contacted my cousin who agreed to take us home to Greece. Did you know your mother met your father while on a vacation to visit me? Oh, your grandparents were furious! Private charter to Mt. Athos, cruising past ancient monasteries and all she wants to explore is the captain’s son.”
“Yeah, Grandpa Olexei planned to take the fam for a tour when my sister and I were old enough to appreciate the scenery but young enough not to run away with boys.”
Elfrie sighed. “Knowing their fates, I still struggle to believe what happened. The man I knew would never have done such a thing. He loved your grandmother, sure as your grandmother loved him. After what we endured, I thought their hope for the future was beautiful. He met us in Thessaloniki, proposed, and whisked her and your mother away to Arlington.”
However kind he’d been, he ended a monster. Mom's birth certificate rested on my lap. There was no death certificate for the victim of a rogue werewolf. "I’ve found records with Gram’s belongings. My mother's birthday is too early for Grandpa Warren. Do you know who got her pregnant?”
Elfrie paused so long I asked if she was still there. “Oh, sweetheart, I'm sorry.”
“Please.”
“She'll be rolling in her grave.”
She very well might have been. I rubbed my healing thigh, a good reminder to reach out to Caelan’s range instructor. A revolver wouldn't stop the necromancer's minions, but Ingraham Hayes was mortal. “Listen, Elfrie, someone's asking me to come home. Being the last leaf on my branch of the family tree, I’m struggling to verify the connection.”
“Ignore them, sweetie. That branch was cut before you were born. You may be a sapling, but you are your own tree.”
“Why?”
“Had the winds of war not blown her astray, Gen planned to leave the family farm to become a film noir actress: the next femme fatale. The family hated her decision. And all I knew of her, she was so kind! One day I asked, ‘Gen, How could you play a dangerous woman?’
‘I’m an actress, Elfrie,’ she’d replied. ‘I can play anyone.’”
“She wanted to be an actress?”
“In all but title she was, Marcy! She was a phenomenal impressionist and spoke with the flair of a summer breeze.”
“Quick right to the end,” I agreed.
“But a fox in her prime. I tell you, Marcy, her wits kept us alive in Dachau and on the road to Greece. No wonder Warren fell hard and fast. He wasn’t alone, either. Rumor was she transferred from Auschwitz after winning the favor of a German physician with a single kiss. This was bullshit. I have seen the scars on her body; she gave more than a kiss.
But despite what her body had suffered, she arrived in Dachau and gave us strangers her love. In Gen’s eyes everyone was her mother, sister, cousin, daughter, aunt. She wanted to survive but she wanted you alive, too. After I had been trapped in the nightmare for so long, she made me believe in daylight again.”
I closed my eyes in the sun. “Would you tell me about her?”
“We worked in a factory making uniforms for German troops. My hands were not so good. I cut my thumb, got an infection, and worked even worse. She stormed the supervisor’s office and convinced him to save my hand so I would not be put out of work. Whatever she did, Gen captivated him. She was thin but he made sure she never became a skeleton. He would give her gifts, an ounce of sausage and a piece of bread or stale pastry that she would sneak back to us.
Gen would not talk about the things he did to her and we did not ask. She told me, after the Americans came, he was found dead alongside several soldiers, torn to bits by machine gun fire.”
“Do you have his name?”
“Johannes. First or last, I don’t recall. You could search factory records, but many were destroyed. Gen would’ve remembered. She remembered everyone. Even in her final years she could tell you the names of the people who died and what the cause was, things I have forgotten though I too saw their bodies carried to the crematoria. She had an elephant’s love of her herd, and the capacity and tragedy of great memory.”
“Oh.”
As if she’d sensed my sadness, a hopeful tone entered her voice. “Your mother was not your grandfather's daughter, but he gave her a father’s love. He couldn’t have children, you see, but his bitterness disappeared the first time he held your mother. I did not believe anything in this world could have made him a happier man, then your mother had Rhetta and you.”
No matter its golden rays and bright intensity, the sun could not warm my cooling smile. I dabbed a tissue against my eyes and changed the subject, asking Elfrie about her impending grandchild and her life after the war. We'd talked a good half hour before she mentioned needing to change for dinner.
“One last, odd question before we go: did Grandma ever compare Warren to a wolf? Like a nickname or personality traits or anything? She had written a few letters that may have been to Gramps, but that’s my educated guess.”
