Number the Stars by Lois Lowry Page A

swim.”
    â€œIt’s cold even then,” Mama said. She looked around. “You didn’t see anyone, did you? You didn’t talk to anyone?”
    Annemarie shook her head. “Just the kitten.” Ellen had picked it up, and it lay purring in her arms as she stroked its small head and talked to it softly.
    â€œI meant to warn you. You must stay away from people while we are here.”
    â€œBut there’s no one around here,” Annemarie reminded her.
    â€œEven so. If you see anyone at all—even someone you know, one of Henrik’s friends—it is better if you come in the house. It is too difficult—maybe even dangerous—to explain who Ellen is.”
    Ellen looked up and bit her lip. “There aren’t soldiers here, too?” she asked.
    Mama sighed. “I’m afraid there are soldiers everywhere. And especially now. This is a bad time.
    â€œCome in now and help me fix supper. Henrik will be home soon. Watch the step there; it’s loose. Do you know what I have done? I found enough apples for applesauce. Even though there is no sugar, the apples are sweet. Henrik will bring home some fish and there is wood for the fire, so tonight we will be warm and well fed.”
    â€œIt is not a bad time, then,” Annemarie told her. “Not if there is applesauce.”
    Ellen kissed the kitten’s head and let it leap from her arms to the ground. It darted away and disappeared in the tall grass. They followed Mama into the house.
    That night, the girls dressed for bed in the small upstairs bedroom they were sharing, the same bedroom that had been Mama’s when she was a little girl. Across the hall, Kirsti was already asleep in the wide bed that had once belonged to Annemarie’s grandparents.
    Ellen touched her neck after she had put on Annemarie’s flower-sprigged nightgown, which Mama had packed.
    â€œWhere is my necklace?” she asked. “What did you do with it?”
    â€œI hid it in a safe place,” Annemarie told her. “A very secret place where no one will ever find it. And I will keep it there for you until it is safe for you to wear it again.”
    Ellen nodded. “Papa gave it to me when I was very small,” she explained.
    She sat down on the edge of the old bed and ran her fingers along the handmade quilt that covered it. The flowers and birds, faded now, had been stitched onto the quilt by Annemarie’s great-grandmother many years before.
    â€œI wish I knew where my parents are,” Ellen said in a small voice as she outlined one of the appliqued birds with her finger.
    Annemarie didn’t have an answer for her. She patted Ellen’s hand and they sat together silently. Through the window, they could see a thin, round slice of moon appear through the clouds, against the pale sky. The Scandinavian night was not very dark yet, though soon, when winter came, the night would be not only dark but very long, night skies beginning in the late afternoon and lasting through morning.
    From downstairs, they could hear Mama’s voice, and Uncle Henrik’s, talking, catching up on news. Mama missed her brother when she hadn’t seen him for a while, Annemarie knew. They were very close. Mama always teased him gently for not marrying; she asked him, laughing, when they were together, whether he had found a good wife yet, one who would keep his house tidier. Henrik teased back, and told Mama that she should come to Gilleleje to live again so that he wouldn’t have to do all the chores by himself.
    For a moment, to Annemarie, listening, it seemed like all the earlier times, the happy visits to the farm in the past with summer daylight extending beyond bedtime, with the children tucked away in the bedrooms and the grownups downstairs talking.
    But there was a difference. In the earlier times, she had always overheard laughter. Tonight there was no laughter at all.

8
There Has Been a Death
    Through a