The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

brown-shirted extremist members of the NSDAP (otherwise known as the Nazi Party)
had marched down Munich Street, their banners worn proudly, their faces held
high, as if on sticks. Their voices were full of song, culminating in a roaring
rendition of
“Deutschland über
Alles.”
“Germany over Everything.”
    As always, they
were clapped.
    They were
spurred on as they walked to who knows where.
    People on the
street stood and watched, some with straight-armed salutes, others with hands
that burned from applause. Some kept faces that were contorted by pride and
rally like Frau Diller, and then there were the scatterings of odd men out,
like Alex Steiner, who stood like a human-shaped block of wood, clapping slow
and dutiful. And beautiful. Submission.
    On the footpath,
Liesel stood with her papa and Rudy. Hans Hubermann wore a face with the shades
pulled down.
    SOME
CRUNCHED NUMBERS
     
    In 1933, 90 percent of Germans showed unflinching
     
    support for Adolf Hitler.
     
    That leaves 10 percent who didn’t.
     
    Hans Hubermann belonged to the 10 percent.
     
    There was a reason for that.
    In the night,
Liesel dreamed like she always did. At first, she saw the brownshirts marching,
but soon enough, they led her to a train, and the usual discovery awaited. Her
brother was staring again.
    When she woke up
screaming, Liesel knew immediately that on this occasion, something had changed.
A smell leaked out from under the sheets, warm and sickly. At first, she tried
convincing herself that nothing had happened, but as Papa came closer and held
her, she cried and admitted the fact in his ear.
    “Papa,” she
whispered, “Papa,” and that was all. He could probably smell it.
    He lifted her
gently from the bed and carried her into the washroom. The moment came a few
minutes later.
    “We take the
sheets off,” Papa said, and when he reached under and pulled at the fabric,
something loosened and landed with a thud. A black book with silver writing on
it came hurtling out and landed on the floor, between the tall man’s feet.
    He looked down
at it.
    He looked at the
girl, who timidly shrugged.
    Then he read the
title, with concentration, aloud:
“The Grave
Digger’s Handbook.”
    So that’s what
it’s called, Liesel thought.
    A patch of
silence stood among them now. The man, the girl, the book. He picked it up and
spoke soft as cotton.
    A
2 A.M. CONVERSATION
     
    “Is this yours?”
     
    “Yes, Papa.”
     
    “Do you want to read it?”
     
    Again, “Yes, Papa.”
     
    A tired smile.
     
    Metallic eyes, melting.
     
    “Well, we’d better read it, then.”
    Four years
later, when she came to write in the basement, two thoughts struck Liesel about
the trauma of wetting the bed. First, she felt extremely lucky that it was Papa
who discovered the book. (Fortunately, when the sheets had been washed
previously, Rosa had made Liesel strip the bed and make it up. “And be quick
about it,
Saumensch
! Does it look like we’ve got all day?”) Second, she
was clearly proud of Hans Hubermann’s part in her education.
You wouldn’t
think it,
she wrote,
but it was not so much the school who helped me to
read. It was Papa.
People think he’s not so smart, and it’s true that he
doesn’t read too fast, but I
would soon learn that words and writing
actually saved his life once. Or at
least, words and a man who taught
him the accordion . . .
    “First things
first,” Hans Hubermann said that night. He washed the sheets and hung them up.
“Now,” he said upon his return. “Let’s get this midnight class started.”
    The yellow light
was alive with dust.
    Liesel sat on
cold clean sheets, ashamed, elated. The thought of bed-wetting prodded her, but
she was going to read. She was going to read the book.
    The excitement
stood up in her.
    Visions of a
ten-year-old reading genius were set alight.
    If only it was
that easy.
    “To tell you the
truth,” Papa explained upfront, “I