Today, Marianne was hosting a send-off party for the last DPs at the camp, a group of Estonian Jews. This was the camp Ania had first landed in, re-created in the last years as a camp for Jewish survivors. In the beginning everyone had been mixed up: Nazi collaborators thrown into the same dormitories as Polish nationalists, Gypsies, and Jews. Concentration camp guards with former inmates. Thank God they had changed that.

Over the past year, Marianne had completed enough paperwork on the Estonians’ behalf to sink a ship. And her efforts had finally paid off. They were granted entry to the United States.

Signor Carfolo, the International Refugee Organization official responsible for the camp, had been skeptical about the celebration—For such an emotional thing, the last refugees, the final survivors of their small community . . . a party? The man was not very Italian. But Marianne knew that if she planned it, he would enjoy himself.

It was the Tuesday after Ania’s wedding: blustery and cool. Marianne waited at the camp’s front gate for Ania and also for Benita, who had reluctantly agreed to help them set up. The area looked desolate now—the barracks empty except for the building where the Estonians lived, the delousing station long since shuttered and the cook fires replaced by kitchenettes. Good riddance. But today, as Marianne stood in the silence, she missed the old bustle and restless energy. It had served as a physical manifestation of the war, evidence. And now it too would be erased. With the departure of these last refugees, the camp would be demolished and rebuilt as modern apartment-style housing.

What would you think of all this? she asked Albrecht. And Connie. Connie would have been especially disgusted by the town’s proposals. After all, before the DPs, the site had been a Wehrmacht barracks and training camp. Burn the place down, erect a terrible monument, he would have declared. He had never been a pragmatist.

You’re not a real German, Marianne had so often teased him on account of this. He was a romantic and an idealist.

Just as her thoughts turned glum, Marianne saw Ania arrive, driven by Herr Kellerman. Two fine new horses pulled his wagon, but the wagon itself was the same one he had first met Marianne and her children with so many years ago.

“Won’t you join us for the celebration?” Marianne asked as he helped unload the food.

“Nha.” Kellerman shook his head with a sheepish smile and offered no excuse.

“What a feast you have prepared!” Marianne exclaimed, seeing the two cakes her friend had baked. There was a whole pot of sausages, and bread and cheese as well. Ania always knew how to feed a large group. Where did you learn to cook in such quantities? Marianne had once asked. Just instinct, Ania demurred.

“Let’s set up in the library,” Marianne said. “The dining hall is too gloomy for a party. Never mind what Signor Carfolo says. After all”—she turned to Ania slyly—“it’s our library, isn’t it?”