Dear Kitty,
Years seem to have passed between Sunday and now. So much has happened, it is just as if the whole world had turned upside down. But I am still alive, Kitty and that is the main thing, Daddy says.
Yes, I’m still alive, indeed, but don’t ask where or how. You wouldn’t understand a word, so I will begin by telling you what happened on Sunday afternoon.
At three o’clock (Harry had just gone, but was coming back later) someone rang the front doorbell. I was lying lazily reading a book on the veranda in the sunshine, so I didn’t hear it. A bit later, Margot appeared at the kitchen door looking very excited.
”The S.S. have sent a call-up notice for Daddy,” she whispered.
“Mummy has gone to see Mr. Van Daan already.” (Mr. Van Daan is a friend who works with Daddy in the business.) It was a great shock to me, a call-up, everyone knows what that means, I picture concentration camps and lonely cells – should we allow him to be doomed to this?
“Of course he won’t go,” declared Margot, while we waited together.
“Mummy has gone to the Van Daans to discuss whether we should move into our hiding place tomorrow. The Van Daans are going with us, so we shall be seven in all.”
Silence.
We couldn’t talk any more, thinking about Daddy, who little knowing what was going on, was visiting some old people in the Joodse Invalide; waiting for Mummy, the heat and suspense, all made us very overawed and silent.
Suddenly the bell rang again.
“That is Harry,” I said.
“Don’t open the door.” Margot held me back, but it was not necessary as we heard Mummy and Mr. Van Daan downstairs, talking to Harry then they came in and closed the door behind them, each time the bell went, Margot or I had to creep softly down to see if it was Daddy, not opening the door to anyone else.
Margot and I were sent out of the room. Van Daan wanted to talk to Mummy alone, when we were alone together in our bedroom, Margot told me that the call up was not for Daddy, but for her. I was more frightened than ever and began to cry, Margot is sixteen, would they really take girls of that age away alone? But thank goodness she won’t go, Mummy said so herself, that must be what Daddy meant when he talked about us going into hiding.
Into hiding – where would we go, in a town or the country, in a house or a cottage, when, how, where…?
These were questions I was not allowed to ask, but I couldn’t get them out of my mind, Margot and I began to pack some of our most vital belongings into a school satchel. The first thing I put in was this diary, then hair curlers, handkerchiefs, schoolbooks, a comb, old letters; I put in the craziest things with the idea that we were going into hiding. But I’m not sorry, memories mean more to me than dresses.
At five o’clock Daddy finally arrived, and we phoned Mr. Koophuis to ask if he could come around in the evening. Van Daan went and fetched Miep. Miep has been in the business with Daddy since 1933 and has become a close friend, likewise her brand-new husband, Henk. Miep came and took some shoes, dresses, coats, underwear, and stockings away in her bag, promising to return in the evening. Then silence fell on the house, not one of us felt like eating anything, it was still hot and everything was very strange.
We let our large upstairs room to a certain Goudsmit, a divorced man in his thirties, who appeared to have nothing to do on this particular evening, we simply couldn’t get rid of him without being rude, he hung about until ten o’clock. At eleven o’clock Miep and Henk Van Santen arrived. Once again, shoes, stockings, books, and underclothes, disappeared into Miep’s bag and Henk’s deep pockets, and at eleven thirty they too disappeared. I was dog-tired and although I knew that it would be the last night in my own bed, I fell asleep immediately and didn’t wake up until Mummy called me at five thirty the next morning. Luckily it was not so hot as Sunday; warm rain fell steadily all day. We put on heaps of clothes as if we were going to North Pole, the sole reason being to take clothes with us. No Jew in our situation would have dreamed of going out with a suitcase full of clothing. I had on two vests, three pairs of pants, a dress, on top of that a skirt, jacket, summer coat, two pairs of stockings, lace up shoes, woolly cap, scarf and still more, I was nearly stifled before we started, but no one inquired about that.
Margot filled her satchel with schoolbooks, fetched her bicycle and rode off behind Miep into the unknown, as far as I was concerned. You see I still didn’t know where our secret hiding place was to be. At seven thirty the door closed behind us. Moortje, my little cat, was the only creature to whom I said farewell. She would have a good home with the neighbors. This was all written in a letter addressed to Mr. Goudsmit.
There was one pound of meat in the kitchen for the cat, breakfast things lying on the table, stripped beds, all giving the impression that we had left helter-skelter. But we didn’t care about the impressions, we only wanted to get away, only escape and arrive safely, nothing else. Continued tomorrow.
Yours, Anne
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I m very glad to Anne
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