Page 365 - The Book Thief

in the Fiedler shelter. In that place, there was only fear and apprehension, and

the dead song at Rosa Hubermanns cardboard lips.

Not long before the sirens signaled the end, Alex Steinerthe man with the
immovable, wooden facecoaxed the kids from his wifes legs. He was able to
reach out and grapple for his sons free hand. Kurt, still stoic and full of stare,
took it up and tightened his grip gently on the hand of his sister. Soon, everyone
in the cellar was holding the hand of another, and the group of Germans stood in
a lumpy circle. The cold hands melted into the warm ones, and in some cases,
the feeling of another human pulse was transported. It came through the layers of
pale, stiffened skin. Some of them closed their eyes, waiting for their final
demise, or hoping for a sign that the raid was finally over.

Did they deserve any better, these people?

How many had actively persecuted others, high on the scent of Hitlers gaze,
repeating his sentences, his paragraphs, his opus? Was Rosa Hubermann

responsible? The hider of a Jew? Or Hans? Did they all deserve to die? The
children?

The answer to each of these questions interests me very much, though I cannot
allow them to seduce me. I only know that all of those people would have sensed
me that night, excluding the youngest of the children. I was the suggestion. I was
the advice, my imagined feet walking into the kitchen and down the corridor.

As is often the case with humans, when I read about them in the book thiefs
words, I pitied them, though not as much as I felt for the ones I scooped up from
various camps in that time. The Germans in basements were pitiable, surely, but
at least they had a chance. That basement was not a washroom. They were not
sent there for a shower. For those people, life was still achievable.

In the uneven circle, the minutes soaked by.

Liesel held Rudys hand, and her mamas.

Only one thought saddened her.

Max.