“I know; I know.” Avi held her as she wept. “But they’re right, Miriam. If we’re apart, there’s a better chance that one of us will survive. We can’t let Elisheva grow up in constant fear this way. She isn’t able to cry or run or play. She’ll have a better life, a safer life, with Ans’s family. And we’ll know where to find her when this war is finally over.”

“I don’t think this war will ever be over. The Nazis are going to hunt us down until the day we die.”

“But at least our daughter may live.”

If she didn’t let Elisheva go, she might lose her forever. If there was any chance at all that her daughter would survive, Miriam had to take it. She asked Eloise for paper and a pen and sat down in the office to write two letters. She could hear Avi’s soft voice as he played with Elisheva in the hallway outside the room and her daughter’s delighted laughter as she took toddling steps, clinging to her papa’s hand.

Tears spotted the paper as Miriam wrote first to Ans’s mother. When she finished, Miriam wrote a second letter to her daughter:

Darling Elisheva,

From the moment you were born, you’ve been our joy, our life. Saying goodbye and letting you go is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. But there is no other way for your father and me to save you. The only chance you’ll have to be safe, to live, and to grow and become a woman someday is to release you into another mother’s loving arms. You’re much too young to understand these dark times and the painful choices we are forced to make. Many good, loving people are giving their lives to free the world from the evil that is causing our separation. People have risked their lives to save our family, and I pray that we can find a way to thank them.

If we meet each other again, dear Elisheva, the day will be as joyous as the day you were born. If we don’t see each other again until the World to Come, please remember your father and me from the photographs in this album and know that we love you with our very life and with our every breath.

May God be with you, my beloved child.

Your loving mama

Miriam tucked the two letters inside her photograph album, planning to send it and her grandmother’s silver candlesticks with Elisheva.

“Do you think God has abandoned us, Avi?”

“No, don’t ever think that. See how He has provided for us through the Huizengas and Ans and her parents? Never doubt His goodness. And don’t ever give up hope.”