Read Underground Soldier for Free Online Page A

of thousands of us. On both sides.”
    “And without any warning either,” said Margarete. “They shipped out all of the Germans in our town. We were sent to a holding camp to be evacuated — and we were the lucky ones. Some were shipped to labour camps. Some went to Germany. Our family was sent here.”
    “What about the people who were here before?”
    “The Poles? They were taken away. We replaced them.”
    Helmut nodded. “We got to this house, and there was still food on the table. Children’s clothing was scattered on the floor in Martin’s bedroom.”
    “What happened to them? The Polish families?” I asked.
    Margarete looked away. “They were sent to the Soviet Union.”
    A flash of memory — That grave in the forest overflowing with corpses. A bit of paper written in Polish script fluttering out of a dead woman’s coat … I knew what might have happened to the families. They certainly weren’t given the newly-vacated German homes.
    “Those mountains in the distance,” I said. “Are those linked to the Carpathians?”
    Helmut slowly turned the pages of the atlas. “This map shows it better.”
    He angled the book so I could see the map more easily. “Here we are, and here are those mountains.” He pointed to a hook-shaped cluster of mountains farther south and east. “The ones we see in the distance — to the southeast? They’re on the western edge of the Carpathians.”
    “I need to get there,” I said.
    “But they’re hundreds of kilometres away,” said Margarete.
    “And you’d be hunted down long before you got there,” Helmut added.
    “I need to try.”
    “Stay here until the spring,” said Helmut. “The weather will be kinder. You’ll be stronger.”
    They looked at me in silence. The clock above the mantle ticked.
    Then a car horn blared outside and Margarete jumped up so quickly her chair toppled over. “Martin! Home for a visit.” She ran over and pushed me towards the pantry. “Hide!”

Chapter Eight
Martin
    The pantry door closed, plunging me into darkness. I stood, not daring to breathe. Sounds trickled through — a chair set upright, tea splashed into the sink, the squeak of the kitchen door, the rustling of a paper bag.
    A man’s voice said, “Mutti, Vati, it’s so good to see you. This is for you.”
    That voice. It sounded so familiar. Where …? No, it couldn’t be …!
    I knew I was taking a risk, but I opened the pantry door just a crack to see if I was right.
    My heart stopped. Standing there with a paper bag in one hand, hugging Margarete and Helmut, was Officer Schmidt from my labour camp! Strutting, power-hungry Officer Schmidt. This man was their son Martin?
    I sneaked the door closed. If Officer Schmidt saw me here he’d shoot me on the spot. I was plunged once more into darkness.
    My knees felt weak and I grabbed a shelf. All these days that I had been fattening myself up and letting my wounds heal, I had been sleeping in the bed of a monster. This same man had selected young children in our camp to be killed, others to be worked to death. And he had seemed to enjoy it. How could gentle people like Margarete and Helmut have given birth to someone like him?
    If he caught me, he would shoot me. At least Margarete and Helmut would not be in danger — not from their own son. Would they? I lowered myself to the floor of the pantry. Using my hands to gauge what was around me, I cleared a spot in the back corner and shuffled into it. I pulled a burlap sack of rice in front of myself.
    The pantry door was still open a crack, so even from my hiding spot in the back, I could hear the conversation.
    “Sit down, son,” said Helmut, in a voice that to me sounded falsely hearty. “Mutti and I were just having a glass of tea. Would you like some too?”
    “I’ve brought you some freshly baked cherry buns,” said Martin. There was the rustle of a bag being ripped open. “What about some of that cherry vodka I brought you last time? The two would