Shanghai Shadows by Lois Ruby

doesn’t know what she’s doing. She’ll keep her mouth shut. I can handle her.”
    â€œWell! When have you been able to do that ?”
    â€œShut up, Ilse.”
    I looked Rolf right in the face. “I guess you’ll just have to drown me in the Whangpoo after all because I know too much, huh?”
    â€œAre you insane, Ilse? Keep your stupid mouth shut,” Erich warned.
    I put my hand out to silence him. It glowed white under his flashlight. “I’m old enough to know what I’m doing.” Erich’s flashlight jumped around until it fell steadily on Rolf’s hip. A gun! I didn’t bargain for a gun!
    Puddles pooled under my arms. Streaming through my mind at lightning speed were images of Vienna and the life we Jews left behind: our home and Pookie and Grete and her family, maybe dead by now. The scene changed violently to fierce Japanese guards booting and spitting on the Chinese whose country they’d taken, and stripping all of us of our metal, our cooking fuel, our gasoline, our bread, and our dignity.
    In the split-second it took these pictures to cascade through my mind, my resolve hardened. “I want to help. I can. I’m quick and smart.”
    â€œYou think we need you ? A snively girl who hides under a bench?”
    â€œYou do,” I said confidently. “I can’t blow things up, or drive a truck, or carry four hundred pounds of explosives, but I can sneak around and bring you valuable bits of information.”
    Erich was shaking his head.
    â€œWho’d suspect a girl?” Brave words. My voice wobbled. I couldn’t hold it together much longer, but in that one frantic moment, I knew I had to work for the underground.
    Last chance. My eyes were fixed on that gun at his hip, as I stuck my hand out to Rolf. It branched out there, small and steady, totally alone.
    He paused, considering the options. “Depends on what Gerhardt says.” Keeping his boot on my foot, he leaned over the railing and shouted down, “Hey, Gerhardt, better come up here.”
    I moved only my eyes to watch Gerhardt run up the clanging steps. Spotting me frozen in Erich’s spotlight, he started laughing. “I knew you’d be back, Miss Shpann.”
    Rolf’s shoulders went limp with relief. He stepped back, and I wiggled my foot. Nothing broken. Rolf swaggered a little, clearly trying to look much more important than he was. “Just yesterday you were telling us we needed somebody skinny to slip through the cracks.”
    â€œYeah,” Gerhardt said, “she’s a runt, all right.” I was surprised to see that my hand was still sticking out when he grabbed it in the big mitt of his own hand, shook it vigorously, and said. “Welcome to the team, Shpann Number Two.”
    I was in! I glanced over at Erich and saw two messages in his eyes: You did a crazy, stupid thing, Ilse , along with, I’m proud of you, little sister .
    Liu slid silently away.

CHAPTER EIGHT
    1942–1943
    Mother and Father were sitting at the table when I burst into the apartment, gasping for breath. Also, Dovid was there, which caught me by surprise. It wasn’t his time. I immediately smoothed my hair and bit my lips to give them some color. Odd that Father didn’t let go of Mother’s hand. Erich and I almost never saw them touch when they were awake, even though we knew they loved each other. But to be holding hands in front of a stranger? Unheard of. Something was terribly wrong.
    Erich? I’d just left him with Gerhardt and the others. What could have happened in twenty minutes? “What is it?”
    News far more urgent than our family troubles. Father said, “Hitler is gassing people in Poland. Dovid has heard.”
    I jerked my head toward Dovid. “Gassing?”
    â€œAt deportation camps in Chelmno, Belzek, Sobibor,” Father said. “Hundreds of thousands already. Not only Jews. Gypsies,