Max in the House of Spies, page 5
Max found this sudden optimism highly disturbing, while Stein said, “He looks like he’s just invented a new form of torture.”
Stein wasn’t far off.
“We’re going to review geography this period,” Master Yarrow announced, still rocking and smiling. “The history of Great Britain is recorded in the names of its counties, towns, and cathedrals . . . Bretzfeld!”
The sudden use of his name made Max feel like a bucket of water had just been dumped on his head. Also like a bucket of water had just been dumped on his head, everyone had swiftly swiveled around to stare at him.
“Yes, Master Yarrow?”
“Will you come up to the front of the class, please?”
“What would happen if you just ran out of here?” Berg asked. “Would they stop you?”
Max had been wondering the same thing. But he pushed himself up and out from behind his desk and made his way to the blackboard, where Master Yarrow continued to anticipate with pleasure whatever was about to happen.
“Herr Bretzfeld,” Master Yarrow began, and all the boys gave a dutiful snicker. “Have you studied any English history in your Nazi schools back home?”
Sometimes, a question is asked that assumes so many things that it lands on you with the weight of an iron stove. How could Max even begin to answer this question? Max’s school hadn’t always been a Nazi school—though all schools were Nazi schools now. Yes, they had studied some English history—but mostly it was about how the English were trying to destroy Germany and turn it into a colony like Rhodesia or Jamaica. Max wasn’t sure that was true and he certainly didn’t want to go into it now.
Max shrugged. “Not much, sir.”
“Not much,” Master Yarrow mused. “Of course not. Too busy goose-stepping and saluting Hitler, I imagine.”
“You think he wanted to salute Hitler, you jerk?” Stein shouted.
“Did you really learn to goose-step?” Berg asked, referring to the ridiculous form of marching that Nazi soldiers did in military parades, pointing their toes out with every step.
“No,” Max replied.
Master Yarrow was writing on the board now. “Let’s start with the basics, then, shall we?”
In big white letters on the board he had written WORCESTERSHIRE.
“Right,” he said, turning back toward Max and wearing that small, creepy smile again. “You’ve heard of this place, right?”
Max had not. He shook his head.
Master Yarrow frowned at him indulgently. “Please read it out for the rest of the class.”
Max squinted at the word. “Wor-sess-ter-shire?”
Suddenly there was an explosion of laughter from the room.
Max spun around. Everyone was laughing at him. Even David. Had he pronounced it that badly? He looked in confusion to Master Yarrow. Yarrow was grinning. “Try again, Bretzfeld.”
Do I have to? Max wondered. But he obeyed: “Wor-kess-ter-shire?”
Another explosion of laughter, louder this time.
Max looked desperately at Master Yarrow.
His teacher said, “It’s Woostersher, Max.”
Max couldn’t help himself. He pointed at WORCESTERSHIRE. “That is pronounced Woostersher?”
Yarrow failed to suppress a smile. “I’m afraid so, Max. Let’s try another one.”
He wrote on the board: LEOMINSTER.
Max winced before offering, “Leo-minster?”
The boys slapped the tables as they guffawed. Stein grumbled, “It’s really not that funny.”
“That’ll be Lemster, Max,” Master Yarrow informed him.
“You know, in German,” Berg said, “when we want you to say a sound, we spell it out. And if we don’t want you to say a sound, we leave it out. Here, it appears to be the opposite.”
“All right, one more,” Master Yarrow was saying as he scratched long white letters onto the chalkboard. They read: GODMANCHESTER.
Max’s face must have looked as pained as he felt, because Yarrow said, “C’mon Max. You’re a clever boy, aren’t you? Give it a try.”
Max stared at the name like he was going to choke on it.
He sighed: “God-man-chest-er?”
Sudden howls of laughter erupted from all over the room. David was howling loudest of all.
Max threw up his hands. “How do you say it?”
Master Yarrow was now cackling, doubled over with his long thin hands on his knobby knees. He managed to collect himself long enough to say, “It’s Gumster, Max.”
And then he went back to laughing in the refugee boy’s face.
Max just stared at GODMANCHESTER and wondered how on earth you could get Gumster from that combination of letters.
* * *
—
That afternoon, in Mr. Ken’s car, Anthony said to Max, “What’s a Yid?”
David cut in, “It’s what they call Jews like us, Anthony.”
Anthony thought for a moment. “So I am a Yid?”
David looked at Max, suddenly unsure.
Max had heard his people called too many awful things back in Berlin to even remember them all. And he had asked his parents the same question, a hundred different times in a hundred different ways.
So Max told Anthony what his papa always used to tell him, translating it into English as best he could: “We are Jews, Anthony,” he said. “They call us names when they want us to feel weak. But we are not weak. We are tough. Tougher than they are.”
Anthony nodded and turned to gaze out the window at the traffic. After a few moments, he turned back to Max. “Why do they want us to feel weak?”
David and Anthony waited for Max to say something. As if Max would have the answer to the question that both of these boys silently asked themselves every day at school.
But Max didn’t know.
He only wished he did.
CHAPTER
Ten
Thursday afternoon was the first “station” of the new term: trials for the second form rugby team.
Max stood at the edge of a field in a leafy park near the center of London, a few minutes’ walk from the rest of the school. Victor Square looked like any other park in London, except this one was private, owned and used exclusively by St. West’s.
The boys stood in a line along the edge of the field. Max was next to the only boy who stuck out more than he did: Harold Wadia, who had light brown skin and black hair, and whose grandfather was apparently the Cotton King of Bombay. Max was secretly hoping that Harold would be his friend. It was not at all clear that Harold hoped the same thing.
In addition to being their teacher, Master Yarrow was also the second form rugby coach. He kicked at some pigeons that had congregated on the field. “Avaunt, ye filthy flying rats!” he snarled. Then he turned to the boys. “Now, who will do St. West’s proud at the opening day ruggers match against the Harrow boys?”
Every hand went up. Except for Max’s.
“No, not all of you,” said Master Yarrow. “That’s for certain.”
Master Yarrow began to stroll down the line of boys. “Mr. Bonner! What happened yesterday?”
“War was declared, sir!”
A pit formed in Max’s stomach. Germany had invaded Poland on Friday. By Sunday, Great Britain and France had declared war on Germany. Mr. Montagu had announced the news triumphantly at their Sunday luncheon. Ever since, Max had been trying his very best not to think about the fact that the country he was in and the country his parents were in were now at war.
“Indeed!” bellowed Master Yarrow. “War was declared! And who will win the war?”
“Britain, sir!”
“Specifically, Bonner, who will win this war?”
“Uh . . . we will, sir?”
“You will! Boys like you!” Master Yarrow barked. “Your elder brothers, your fathers, your uncles, and you! Who is the greatest race on earth?!”
“The English!” the boys shouted. Except for Harold, Max noticed.
“Who conquered America, China, Africa, and India?”
Harold winced.
“The English!”
“Who liberated the fields of France, when the vicious German polluted it with his poison gas?”
“The English!”
“And who shall put the filthy Krauts back in their place again?”
“The English!”
“It starts on the rugby field, boys. It ends in the streets of Berlin!”
“Huzzah!” the boys cheered.
Max did not cheer. He was imagining a battle in the streets of his hometown, his parents peeking out from their windows as tanks blew holes in the buildings across the way.
“Did he just call us Krauts?” Berg asked. “How offensive! I don’t even like sauerkraut.”
“Which is strange,” said Stein, “because you smell like it.”
Master Yarrow said, “So try your hardest! Best boys will make the first team, but effort will get even you gormless gits on the second! And failing that, there are always the colors!” Which elicited a chuckle, just as it had done on the first day of class.
Max leaned over to Harold. “What are ‘the colors’?”
Harold whispered, “The school flag. It’s large and pink and you don’t want to bear the colors.”
Max said, “Got it.”
The trial began with Master Yarrow hurling a rugby ball out into the middle of the pitch, at which point two boys ran after it and pummeled each other until one of them got the ball and ran back to the sideline.
Harold began speaking to Max again, quietly and urgently. “Now, listen to me. You have to fight back. If someone throws an elbow, you throw one, too. Do you understand me?”
Max nodded. His legs were shaking as he watched a large boy get pummeled in the face by a really large boy.
“What is that child doing to that other child?” Berg shouted.
“I think he’s trying to kill him,” Stein suggested.
“And don’t cry,” Harold added. “That’ll just make it worse.”
“What if I cry now?” Max asked as blood began to run down the side of large boy’s face.
Master Yarrow scribbled in a notebook. Then he blew his whistle. “Wadia! Bonner!”
Harold sprinted out into the field. Since Bonner was round and short, with short and round legs, Harold easily got to the ball first and scooped it up. But as he turned to run to the sideline, Bonner stuck out a foot and tripped him, and then jumped on Harold’s back. Harold tried to wriggle out from under him, but Bonner put an elbow in Harold’s neck, grabbed the ball, scrambled to his feet—placing a sharp cleat on Harold’s spine—and then hustled back to the line.
“Very good!” Master Yarrow barked.
“If that’s ‘very good,’ I’d hate to see what felony assault looks like,” Stein muttered.
“I think it looks like that,” said Berg.
Harold returned to Max’s side, trying to rub the spot on his back where Bonner had cleated him, but it was just beyond the reach of his fingertips.
“Are you all right?” Max asked.
Harold nodded curtly and managed to say, “ ’Course. Fine.”
The whistle blew. “Circuitt! Herr Bretzfeld!”
Max froze. The ball was flying into the field, and Circuitt was sprinting after it.
Max knew what this was. This was Circuitt’s opportunity for revenge.
“Go!” Harold hissed.
Max forced himself to run out into the field. Circuitt had already collected the ball.
“Just let him have it!” Berg told Max.
“Yeah, who wants a dirty, sweat-covered pig’s bladder anyway?” Stein asked. “It’s all his!”
Max slowed down, happy to take Berg and Stein’s advice.
But Circuitt was not running back to the line.
Max stopped.
“Come on, Bretzfeld!” Circuitt called in a singsong taunt. “I’m waiting!”
“Let him wait!” said Stein.
Max slowly walked toward Circuitt.
“HUSTLE!” Master Yarrow called. Max ignored him.
Circuitt grinned as Max approached.
Five yards away. Three yards. One.
Then, in a quick burst that surprised even Berg and Stein, Max lunged and grabbed the ball before Circuitt knew what was happening.
Max turned and sprinted for the sideline, the ball cradled under his arm.
Suddenly Max had the impression that a small bus had fallen on top of him. He could not breathe. He was gasping. He panicked. No air.
And then he felt something hot by his ear.
It was Circuitt’s mouth.
Max heard, “You should have stayed in Germany, Yid. Hitler knows what to do with your type. He’s not all wrong, is he?”
And then Circuitt was up, with the ball, and sprinting back to the line. The whistle blew. Master Yarrow was writing in his notebook.
Max came back to his place.
“Don’t cry,” said Harold.
Max’s shoulders were going up and down.
“Just remember, you’ve got it lucky,” Harold went on.
Max turned to him in disbelief.
“Don’t give me that look,” said Harold. “If you can just keep your mouth shut, you look rather English, don’t you? Eventually, they’ll forget about you.”
Max’s expression changed. Harold was still speaking, but mostly to himself now:
“They can’t forget what I am. And they won’t let me forget.” Then he seemed to remember that Max was there. “Just keep quiet and they’ll let you alone eventually.”
Max, trying to control his ragged breath, said, “I am kind of sick of keeping quiet.”
Harold raised an eyebrow. But Max didn’t notice, because he was gazing across Victor Square—at a pack of pigeons, pecking at the wet slate sidewalk beyond the wrought iron fence.
* * *
—
The tryouts had ended, and the boys were heading off the field. But Max hung back.
“Excuse me,” he said to Master Yarrow.
Master Yarrow was studying his notebook. Without looking up, he said, “You won’t be making the team, Herr Bretzfeld. First or second.”
“Of course,” Max replied. “But I was thinking that, to show how much I want to support St. West’s, I could try to bear the colors?”
Stein said, “What?”
“He wants to wave the flag during the games?” Berg said. “I think that’s what that means.”
“I know what it means,” said Stein. “I don’t understand why he would want to do that.”
“Me neither,” Berg agreed.
Master Yarrow seemed to be having the same thought. He’d lowered his notebook and was gazing down at Max. “You want to be color-bearer?”
“Yes sir.”
“You do realize that might bring you in for a bit more . . . ah . . . attention . . . than you’re already getting, don’t you? Just trying to look out for you, Bretzfeld. It is rather a large pink flag.”
Max straightened up. “I want to show everyone that I am here for the school! I am proud of the pink!”
Master Yarrow failed to hide a sudden smile at Max’s terrible English and misplaced enthusiasm. “All right, then. The colors are yours. They’re in the shed at the end of the fields.” Master Yarrow pointed.
“And I can practice, yes?” Max asked. “Perhaps early mornings, before first period?”
“Practice? Carrying the school flag?”
“I don’t want to make a fool of myself.”
Master Yarrow looked down at Max pityingly. “Good luck. And sure, Max. Feel free to practice.”
Max smiled, nodded, and hurried after the other boys.
CHAPTER
Eleven
That night, around the dinner table, Mr. Montagu was beaming. “My boy, my eldest son, making the St. West’s rugby team!”
“It’s the second squad, Dad,” David reminded him. “Let’s not make a big deal out of it.”
Mrs. Montagu laughed. “Oh, I’m sure we will be making a big deal out of it!”
Mr. Montagu wasn’t listening, as usual. “I was on the second squad at St. West’s! Nothing to be ashamed of! Very respectable! Wait till I tell Uncle Ewen!”
“He was on first squad, wasn’t he, Dad?”
“Sure he was! So what? He’ll be thrilled! We’ll all come to the big opener against Harrow, won’t we? A family affair!”
“Did Uncle Ivor make the team?” Anthony wanted to know.
“Ivor?” Mr. Montagu laughed. “No, no, table tennis is his sport. If you can call it a sport.”
Max got up his courage. “I didn’t make the team either,” he said.
Mr. Montagu made a sad face that couldn’t have been less believable if it was painted on. “Quite a disappointment for you, Max, I’m sure. But there’s always next year!”
“You’d never even heard of rugby until a few weeks ago, isn’t that right?” Mrs. Montagu added kindly. “You’ll learn, Max. Not to worry.”
“I am not worried,” said Max. “I volunteered to be the color-bearer!”
Mr. Montagu dropped his fork onto his plate. The clatter was so loud, and the room was so suddenly silent after it, that Mrs. Henshaw the housekeeper stuck her head through the swinging door from the kitchen to see if everything was all right. She caught one glimpse of the adults’ faces and disappeared instantly.
“You volunteered?” David exclaimed. “To be color-bearer?” He let his head fall so far it nearly landed in his asparagus. “This is going to be awful.”
“I think it’s a lovely idea!” Mrs. Montagu replied, rallying. “That’s the way to show school spirit!”
“Good on you, Max,” Mr. Montagu agreed, trying to follow her lead. “We can’t all be sport stars, can we? Best to find a place for yourself and excel in that.”
