The Book Thief

CONFESSIONS

When the Jews were gone, Rudy and Liesel untangled and the book thief did not speak. There were no answers to Rudy’s questions.

Liesel did not go home, either. She walked forlornly to the train station and waited for her papa for hours. At first Rudy stood with her but since it was a good half-day till Hans was due home, he fetched Rosa. On the way back, he told her what had happened, and when Rosa arrived, she asked nothing of the girl. She had already assembled the puzzle and merely stood beside her and eventually persuaded her to sit down. They waited together.

When Papa found out, he dropped his bag, he kicked the Bahnhof air.

None of them ate that night. Papa’s fingers desecrated the accordion, murdering song after song, no matter how hard he tried. Everything no longer worked.

For three days, the book thief stayed in bed.

Every morning and afternoon, Rudy Steiner knocked on the door and asked if she was still sick. The girl was not sick.

On the fourth day, Liesel walked to her neighbour’s front door and asked if he might go back to the trees with her, where they’d distributed the bread the previous year.

‘I should have told you earlier,’ she said.

As promised, they walked far down the road to Dachau. They stood in the trees. There were long shapes of light and shade. Pine cones were scattered like biscuits.

Thank you, Rudy.

For everything. For helping me off the road, for stopping me …

She said none of it.

Her hand leaned on a flaking branch at her side. ‘Rudy, if I tell you something, will you promise not to say a word to anyone?’

‘Of course.’ He could sense the seriousness in the girl’s face, and the heaviness in her voice. He leaned on the tree next to hers. ‘What is it?’

‘Promise.’

‘I did already.’

‘Do it again. You can’t tell your mother, your brother or Tommy Muller. Nobody.’

‘I promise.’

Leaning.

Looking at the ground.

She attempted several times to find the right place to start, reading sentences at her feet, joining words to the pine cones and the scraps of broken branches.

‘Remember when I was injured playing football,’ she said, ‘out on the street?’

It took approximately three-quarters of an hour to explain two wars, an accordion, a Jewish fist-fighter and a basement. Not forgetting what had happened just days earlier on Munich Street.

‘That’s why you went for a closer look,’ Rudy said, ‘with the bread that day. To see if he was there.’

‘Yes.’

‘Crucified Christ.’

‘Yes.’

The trees were tall and triangular. They were quiet.

Liesel pulled The Word Shaker from her bag and showed Rudy one of the pages. On it was a boy with three medals hanging around his throat.

‘Hair the colour of lemons,’ Rudy read. His fingers touched the words. ‘You told him about me?’

At first, Liesel could not talk. Perhaps it was the sudden bumpiness of love she felt for him. Or had she always loved him? It’s likely. Restricted as she was from speaking, she wanted him to kiss her. She wanted him to drag her hand across and pull her over. It didn’t matter where. Her mouth, her neck, her cheek. Her skin was empty for it, waiting.

Years ago, when they’d raced on a muddy field, Rudy was a hastily assembled set of bones, with a jagged, rocky smile. In the trees this afternoon, he was a giver of bread and teddy bears. He was a triple Hitler Youth athletics champion. He was her best friend. And he was a month from his death.

‘Of course I told him about you,’ Liesel said.

She was saying goodbye and she didn’t even know it.