My Enemy's Cradle Read Online Free PDF

anyone?
    We found a bistro and drank beer and ate fried flounder, and then a cake with cherries. We talked about nothing troubling, as if we had laid our problems beside us like shopping parcels: Anneke told me about Kees, the baker's son, who had just gotten his first bicycle, and I told her about Mrs. Schaap's little red and white chickens, who were refusing to lay. After dinner, we lingered over coffee. I think both of us knew that night might be the last for such things.
    Finally Anneke began to talk about Karl. He was more passionate, more mature than the boys she had dated before. A man. If he hadn't been sent away, she said, they might have worked this out. Because he loved her. But he had to keep his promise.
    I felt so grieved for her, knowing the truth, and feared this would show. "I need to tell you something," I said. "I went to speak to Karl this morning."
    Anneke froze, startled.
    "He wasn't there," I said quickly. "But I spoke to two of his friends. He was gone already. The orders to leave came earlier than he'd thought. He was very upset; he didn't want to leave you. He told them that." I would have said anything to ease her pain.
    She looked at me, her expression unreadable, and turned toward the window. "Well."
    And then it was time to go home, both of us knew. As we left the bistro, a soldier stopped us on the pretext of asking if we had a light. Of course he was really just drawn to Anneke. All men were. She ignored him, keeping her eyes on the street, but he was reluctant to let us go. He was Austrian, he said. He had been a teacher. He played the piano. "Do you know where I could find music here at night?" he wanted to know.
Will you come listen to music with me?
his eyes ached to ask Anneke.
    Anneke turned her head away and stepped past him to leave, but I could see that tears gleamed.
    She was quiet on the train back, but I could tell she wasn't afraid. The worst had already happened. My uncle's reaction would be meaningless in the face of what she already had to carry.
    He was waiting for us in the hall.
    I'd expected him to be furious; his temper flew to extremes. But his face was cool, and when he saw Anneke, his eyes filled with something worse than anger.
    She took a step toward him. "
Vader?
" It was the smallest of voices.
    He threw up his arms to ward off her embrace and twisted his head away. "Stupid whore!" he spat. "You are not my daughter."
    My uncle delivered each word as deliberately as a blow, and each one found its mark. Anneke wrapped her arms around her belly—how quickly the body knows where it's most vulnerable.
    "You are not my daughter!" he repeated. Then he took his coat from its peg and stormed out.
    My aunt stood by and let him go. She only put her arms around Anneke. "It's all right. He's just upset now."
    It was not all right. I opened the door and called to him from the step, enraged. "What kind of a father would call his daughter a whore? What kind of a father would walk out on her?"
    Even under the thin moonlight, I saw his face darken in rage. "You are not my daughter, either. Remember that."
    "I'm glad of it!" I cried. "You're worse than no father at all!"
    "Cyrla, no!" My aunt pulled me inside.
    I hated my uncle for the look I saw on Anneke's face. I followed her up to our room and watched her carefully, wishing I could think of something to erase it. Something to make her look proud again. We pulled our nightgowns out from under our pillows and undressed without a word.
    Finally, when we were in our beds, I broke the silence. "Tell me how it feels. Tell me how to do it."
    "How what feels? Oh!" She laughed. "You won't need instructions,
katje
! Your body will know what to do, and your heart."
    "I know what to do, Anneke ... I want you to tell me
how
to do it."
    "Really, you'll know." Anneke paused and stroked her curls from her forehead. I knew instantly that Karl had done this. "It will feel as if your body has always known how to make love, was born to do it, but