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the door. Suddenly all she wanted to do was hurry back to bed and pull the covers over her head.
    “Please, ma’am. Could you open the door?” O’Grady hesitated, as if he knew she was afraid. “We mean you no harm.”
    She sized up the officers. Bundled up in overcoats, boots, and gloves, they didn’t appear to be carrying weapons. In fact the one called O’Grady took off his cap. Snowflakes melted on its brim. She opened the door wider.
    “Thank you ma’am.” They came in and stood just inside the doorway. She closed it and planted herself in front of it.
    “I’m afraid we have some bad news, Mrs. Stern.”
    A steel band wrapped itself around her head.
    “Your husband is Karl Stern?”
    She nodded.
    O’Grady took a breath. It sounded like a sigh. “We responded to a call of an accident in the snow. It was a hit and run. On 57th Street.”
    The steel band tightened. Lena felt rooted to the floor.
    “About an hour ago your husband was walking east on 57th Street. We believe he was coming from the University. That—”
    She cut them off. “What happened?”
    O’Grady looked down, away, then met her gaze. “Your husband was hit by an automobile. The driver must have lost control on the ice. The car hit him broadside. I’m sorry, Mrs. Stern, he didn’t make it. He’s dead.”

Chapter 12

January, 1942—Chicago
    H
ashem
was punishing Lena. He must be. At some point God must have ordained that she would never be happy for long. Was it because of the kisses she and Josef stole behind the trees in the Tiergarten? Because she had survived and her parents apparently had not? Perhaps it was because she hadn’t put enough faith in Him over the years. She had worked to create her own life, her own happiness. It was clear now that God did not approve.
    She endured the funeral, thick clouds of grief fogging her mind. The interment, too. Ursula organized the
shivah
, and for seven days people filed in and out. Compton came several times, sat with her, and held her hand. She didn’t remember his words; all she recalled was that his glasses picked up the reflection of the lamp across the room. The German students from the department, scientists themselves now, came. So did her friend, Bonnie, from the Math Department, and people she didn’t know who said they knew Karl.
    Max couldn’t understand where Papa had gone. He must be hiding, he said, and hunted for him under the beds, in the closets, behind doors. He kept asking her when Papa would be back. At one point he asked,
    “Papa fight war?”
    Lena’s jaw dropped. Max wasn’t even three years old. How was he able to make a connection between the war and his father’s disappearance? She tried to explain.
    “No,
liebchen
. Papa has gone to heaven.”
    “When come back?”
    The lump in her throat was so thick she thought it might choke her. “He’s not.”
    She gathered Max in her arms and hugged him tight. At the same time, she couldn’t help thinking how her life had been marked by momentous yet horrific events. Max was born a few days after war was declared. Now Karl had been killed a few days after Pearl Harbor. What was next?
    Officers O’Grady and Maywood were replaced by a detective accompanied by a man who introduced himself as FBI Special Agent Lanier. Lena stiffened. Probably in his forties, he was short but muscular with wispy blond hair.
    “FBI? Why are you here?”
    He smiled. “It’s just a formality. We keep tabs on everyone at the Lab.”
    “Why?” Lena asked.
    “There are some very special people working there,” he said amiably.
    Lena didn’t respond.
    The detective told Lena they’d canvassed the neighborhood, but no one recalled a car sliding across 57th Street at three in the morning. Everyone had been tucked up in bed. But they would keep looking, he promised. She saw in his eyes he was lying.
    * * *
    The end of the year holidays were desolate. Lena remembered how she and Karl would spend New Year’s Eve with the other