Another Me Read Online Free PDF

where you’re going!” I cried.
    Something was pressed into my palm, and then he was gone. I opened my fingers to find a tiny piece of rolled-up parchment. I knew that only one person would be sending me notes. It had to be Elena. I tightened my fingers around it without showing it to anybody.
    The smell of cholent greeted us as we arrived home, making my mouth water.
    “Lunch will be ready in a few moments,” Mama said. “Before we eat, Natan, could you please pick some herbs for me in the garden?”
    In addition to weaving beautiful tapestries, helping Papa with his cloth trade and taking care of our family, Mama was also well versed in the healing arts. She grew herbs and other medicinal plants in a small patch of green at the back of our house. Some of the herbs were so hardy that they sprouted through the snow. Mama ground them up, boiled them and mixed them with secret ingredients to turn them into potions and poultices for members of our community. She was respected far and wide as a healer.
    I told her that I would get the herbs and hurried to the garden. I made sure that nobody was around before I unrolled the parchment. It was short and to the point:
    Must meet you tonight!
    The usual place when the clock strikes twelve
.
    Yours
,
    E
    This was the first time Elena had written to me. What could have happened that she had to see me so urgently?
    I knew it wouldn’t be easy to leave our house at midnight. The hatred against us had increased with the growing rumors that Jews were responsible for the plague. In response, our city government had sent armed sentries to guard both ends of Judenstrasse.We were told that this was done for our own protection, but the sentries didn’t allow anybody to leave the street after curfew.
    In spite of the risks, I was determined to go. If Elena needed me, there was no other choice. I knew I wouldn’t be able to figure out a way to elude the sentries, so I hoped that I’d be lucky and not meet them.
    I waited until my family was asleep before I wrapped myself in my warmest cloak against the bitter cold and slipped out of our home, quiet as a mouse. I was careful to press myself into the shadows as I made my ghostly way through the darkness. I didn’t come across the night watchman, but as I approached the end of the street, I heard voices. I stopped, melting into the building behind me. There were two sentries leaning against the wall of the house on the corner, across from the half-open gate that marked the street of the Jews. I stood there listening to them, my heart beating so loudly that I was amazed they couldn’t hear it. The men were drinking, laughing, clinking their cups of ale. The curved blades by their sides glistened in the darkness.
    The cathedral bell rang twelve times. I was late. Elena would think I wasn’t coming, but I had to bide my time until the sentries were ready to leave. It seemed like hours but it must have been mere minutes until the taller sentry put away his cup.
    “Time for our rounds,” he said to his companion. “You go left and I’ll go right.”
    The second man wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “All right, all right. But I don’t know why you care so much what happens to these damned Jews.” The first sentry snorted. “I couldn’t care less what happens to them! The sooner they depart to hell, the better I’ll like it. What I do care about is the money the Ammeister is paying us to guard them. So let’s go!”
    As soon as they left, I went through the gate and broke into a run for Elena’s house. She was waiting for me, her pale, anxious face barely visible in the darkness. She drew me into the kitchen building.
    “I was afraid you wouldn’t come,” she whispered.
    I touched her shoulder. “Nothing will keep me from you. Not all the sentries in the city. But what’s wrong? Why did you send for me?”
    “I overheard my father talking to the Ammeister, Peter Schwarber. He told Papa that an assembly was held in the