If Miriam were asked to name the time or the day when she fell in love with Avraham Leopold, she couldn’t have done it. Her love for him grew the way a plant does —so slowly you can’t see it but becoming steadily stronger every day until a dazzling flower unfolds. He held her hand as they walked to meals. He sat on the steps during her daily practice sessions. And she sat on the bed in her tiny, curtained home, listening to the lively discussions as he and Abba studied Torah. Their friendship grew until they became inseparable.

By the time Abba was officially appointed to lecture in physics at Leiden University, Miriam and Avi knew they wanted to spend the rest of their lives together. She would follow him anywhere, even to Palestine. She could forget the sorrow of the past, forget her dismal surroundings with Avi beside her. Joyful music now poured from her violin to match the joy that filled her heart. She was in love! There was no other feeling in the world quite like it.

Abba had smuggled money out of Germany, glued between the cover and flyleaf of several of his books. Enough to rent a small, furnished apartment in Leiden. Avi would join them after his records from the university in Berlin arrived. Hopefully he would be granted a visa to enroll in Leiden as an engineering student.

“See?” Abba said as he and Miriam packed their suitcases again. “We’ll flourish once more, my dear one. Your mother will join us in Leiden, and we’ll start all over again —the four of us. Love grows in the most unlikely places, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, Abba! It surely does!” For the first time in over a year, the tantalizing possibility of joy seemed within Miriam’s grasp. She leaned toward it like a flower to the sun.

CHAPTER 7

“How would you feel about welcoming two overnight guests, my dear?” Professor Huizenga asked his wife during dinner one evening. His reddish hair and beard glinted like gold in the candlelight. Ans dined with the Huizengas in their elegant dining room nearly every evening as if she were a family member instead of a mere caretaker. The delicate china, polished silverware, and rich, savory food were welcome reminders of her happy escape from her country upbringing —although she still felt like a farm girl much of the time, in spite of Eloise’s efforts to introduce her to high culture.

“Guests?” Eloise replied. She speared a small piece of potato with her fork. “Who are they, Herman? Do I know them?”

“A brilliant German colleague I once met at a conference in Berlin —”