The Book Thief

THE SNOWMAN

For Liesel Meminger, the early stages of 1942 could be summed up like this:

She became thirteen years of age. Her chest was still flat. She had not yet bled. The young man from her basement was now in her bed.

Q & A

Opinions varied, but Rosa Hubermann claimed that the seeds were sown at Christmas the previous year. The twenty-fourth of December had been hungry and cold, but there was a major bonus – no lengthy visitations. Hans Junior was simultaneously shooting at Russians and maintaining his strike on family interaction. Trudy could only stop by on the weekend before Christmas, for a few hours. She was going away with her family of employment. A holiday for a very different class of Germany.

On Christmas Eve, Liesel brought down a double handful of snow as a present for Max. ‘Close your eyes,’ she’d said. ‘Hold out your hands.’ As soon as the snow was transferred, Max shivered and laughed, but he still didn’t open his eyes. At first he only gave the snow a quick taste, allowing it to sink into his lips.

‘Is this today’s weather report?’

Liesel stood next to him.

Gently, she touched his arm.

He raised it again, to his mouth. ‘Thanks, Liesel.’

It was the beginning of the greatest Christmas ever. Little food. No presents. But there was a snowman in their basement.

After delivering the first handfuls of snow, Liesel checked that no-one else was outside, then proceeded to take as many buckets and pots out as she could. She filled them with the mounds of snow and ice that blanketed the small strip of world that was Himmel Street. Once they were full, she brought them in and carried them down to the basement.

All things being fair, she first threw a snowball at Max and collected a reply in the stomach. Max even threw one at Hans Hubermann as he made his way down the basement steps.

‘Arschloch!’ Papa yelped. ‘Liesel, give me some of that snow. A whole bucket!’ For a few minutes, they all forgot. There was no more yelling or calling out, but they could not contain the small snatches of laughter. They were only humans, playing in the snow, in a house.

Papa looked at the snow-filled pots. ‘What do we do with the rest of it?’

‘A snowman,’ Liesel replied. ‘We have to make a snowman.’

Papa called out to Rosa.

The usual distant voice was hurled back. ‘What is it now, Saukerl?’

‘Come down here, will you!’

When she appeared, Hans Hubermann risked his life by throwing a most brilliant snowball at his wife. Just missing, it disintegrated when it hit the wall, and Mama had an excuse to swear without taking a breath for a long time. Once she recovered, she came down and helped them. She even brought the buttons for the eyes and nose, and some string for a snowman smile. Even a scarf and hat were provided for what was really only a half-metre man of snow.

‘A midget,’ Max had said.

‘What do we do when it melts?’ Liesel asked.

Rosa had the answer. ‘You mop it up, Saumensch, in a hurry.’

Papa disagreed. ‘It won’t melt.’ He rubbed his hands and blew into them. ‘It’s freezing down here.’

Melt it did, though, but somewhere in each of them, that snowman was still upright. It must have been the last thing they saw that Christmas Eve when they finally fell asleep. There was an accordion in their ears, a snowman in their eyes, and for Liesel, there was the thought of Max’s last words before she left him by the fire.

CHRISTMAS GREETINGS FROM MAX VANDENBURG

Unfortunately, that night signalled a severe downslide in Max’s health. The early signs were innocent enough, and typical. Constant coldness. Swimming hands. Increased visions of boxing with the Führer. It was only when he couldn’t warm up after his push-ups and sit-ups that it truly began to worry him. As close to the fire as he sat, he could not raise himself to any degree of approximate health. Day by day, his weight began to stumble off him. His exercise regime faltered and fell apart, with his cheek against the surly basement floor.

All through January, he managed to hold himself together, but by early February, Max was in worrisome shape. He would struggle to wake up from the fire, sleeping well into the morning instead, his mouth distorted and his cheekbones starting to swell. When asked, he said he was fine.

In mid-February, a few days before Liesel was thirteen, he came to the fireplace on the verge of collapse. He nearly fell into the fire.

‘Hans,’ he whispered, and his face seemed to cramp. His legs gave way and his head hit the accordion case.

At once, a wooden spoon fell into some soup and Rosa Hubermann was at his side. She held Max’s head and barked across the room at Liesel. ‘Don’t just stand there, get the extra blankets. Take them to your bed. And you!’ Papa was next. ‘Help me pick him up and carry him to Liesel’s room. Schnell!’

Papa’s face was stretched with concern. His grey eyes clanged and he picked him up on his own. Max was as light as a child. ‘Can’t we put him here, in our bed?’

Rosa had already considered that. ‘No. We have to keep these curtains open in the day or else it looks suspicious.’

‘Good point.’ Hans carried him out.

Blankets in hand, Liesel watched.

Limp feet and hanging hair in the hallway. One shoe had fallen off him.

‘Move.’

Mama marched in behind them, in her waddlesome way.

Once in the bed, blankets were heaped on top and fastened around his body.

‘Mama?’ Liesel couldn’t bring herself to say anything else.

‘What?’ The bun of Rosa Hubermann’s hair was wound tight enough to frighten. It seemed to tighten further when she repeated the question. ‘What, Liesel?’

She stepped closer, afraid of the answer. ‘Is he alive?’

The bun nodded.

Rosa turned then and said something with great assurance. ‘Now listen to me, Liesel. I didn’t take this man into my house to watch him die. Understand?’

Liesel nodded.

‘Now go.’

In the hall, Papa hugged her.

She desperately needed it.

Later on, she heard Hans and Rosa speaking in the night. Rosa made her sleep in their room, and she lay next to their bed, on the floor, on the mattress they’d dragged up from the basement. (There was concern as to whether it was infected, but they came to the conclusion that such thoughts were unfounded. This was no virus Max was suffering from, so they carried it up and replaced the sheet.)

Imagining the girl to be asleep, Mama voiced her opinion.

‘That damn snowman,’ she whispered. ‘I bet it started with the snowman – mucking around with ice and snow in the cold down there.’

Papa was more philosophical. ‘Rosa, it started with Adolf.’ He lifted himself. ‘We should check on him.’

In the course of the night, Max was visited seven times.

MAX VANDENBURG’S VISITOR SCORE SHEET

In the morning, Liesel brought him his sketch book from the basement and placed it on the bedside table. She felt awful for having looked at it the previous year, and this time, she kept it firmly closed, out of respect.

When Papa came in, she did not turn to face him, but talked across Max Vandenburg, at the wall. ‘Why did I have to bring all that snow down?’ she asked. ‘It started all of this, didn’t it, Papa?’ She clenched her hands, as if to pray. ‘Why did I have to build that snowman?’

Papa, to his enduring credit, was adamant. ‘Liesel,’ he said, ‘you had to.’

For hours she sat with him as he shivered and slept.

‘Don’t die,’ she whispered. ‘Please, Max, just don’t die.’

He was the second snowman to be melting away before her eyes, only this one was different. It was a paradox.

The colder he became, the more he melted.