“Not on your life.” His carriage return hit Evelyn in the hip.
She pressed the back of her hand to her forehead. “My poor little heart is wounded.”
Keller laughed. “Beat it, sister.”
Gladly. Across the room, Mitch O’Hara beckoned to her.
She grinned and joined him at his desk.
O’Hara pulled over a chair for her, always a gentleman. Pushing sixty, he’d reported the news in every major city around the world. Too bad he’d turned down Norwood’s job. For O’Hara, Evelyn would be willing to stay within the lines—on occasion.
“What’d you do, Ev?”
He was the only person she let call her that. “Nothing. I got to Vienna before Norwood did. And I called here first, you know that. I tried to get into the press conference but was turned away. If any of you fellows had done the same, you wouldn’t have been summoned to Berlin.”
O’Hara scratched at his gray mustache. “You’ve only been in Germany six months.”
“Seven, and two years in Paris before that. And I did my stint at the copy desk in New York.”
He dipped his chin, his silvery-blue eyes fixed on her. “You’re still paying your dues.”
Her lips wanted to pout, but she restrained them. “My dues are twice as high as a man’s.”
“Yes, and the penalties are twice as high as a man’s. It isn’t right, but that’s how it is.”
Evelyn’s jaw worked back and forth, and she glanced to the closed office door. “Norwood’s going to edit the heart out of my story. I should be free to write how I want.”
“You are.” O’Hara tapped his pen on Evelyn’s wrist. “And ANS is free to fire you. And the Nazis are free to kick you out of the country if you make them look bad.”
“It isn’t hard to do.”
He chuckled. “True.”
Evelyn drummed her fingers on the red leather purse in her lap. “Getting expelled from Germany might not be so bad. Dorothy Thompson was expelled, and she’s more famous than ever.”
“She was famous to begin with, established in her career. You’re in your early twenties.”
“Late twenties.”
He laughed and leaned back in his chair. “I’ve been married long enough to know that only a very young woman will argue that she’s older than people think.”
Evelyn had to laugh too.
“You can do it, Ev.” O’Hara rested his elbow on his desk. “You’re a good writer, you’ve got the nose for news, and you’ve got drive and gumption in spades. Just keep your head down and try—please try—to follow the rules. The Nazis can do far worse things than expel you.”
“I know,” she said with a sigh. Her rights as an American citizen wouldn’t do any good if she met with a fatal “accident” staged by the Gestapo.
She stood and slung her purse strap over her shoulder. “Thanks for the pep talk. I have a train to catch. Norwood wants me to interview exchange students, pat the hands of the Ivy League mommies and daddies, let them know their little dah-lings are safe and happy in their junior years abroad. Softball assignment.”
O’Hara picked up a half-eaten apple from his desk and grinned at it, then at Evelyn. “You look like the kind of gal who knows how to play ball.”
“Yes . . . ?”
He mimed winding up for a pitch. “What do you do with a softball, Ev?”
She returned his grin threefold. “Hit it out of the park.”
TWO
LUDWIG-MAXIMILIANS-UNIVERSITÄT
MUNICH, GERMANY
MONDAY, MARCH 28, 1938
Peter Lang removed the wax cylinder from his Dictaphone, slid it into its cardboard tube, and wrote a number on the tube. “Sehr gut, Fräulein Wechsler. You made good use of the winter semester in your junior year abroad. Your German has improved much since I saw you in September.”
“Danke schön.” The Mount Holyoke student fiddled with a light brown curl. “I look forward to your class next semester.”
“Starting a week from today.” Peter shook her hand. “Thank you for helping with my research.”
“I’ll help in any way I can. Auf Wiedersehen.” She left Peter’s office, sending a smile over her shoulder.
At his desk, Peter checked his research log. With the thirty-four American students about to enter their second semester at the University of Munich and the following year’s class which would arrive in the fall, he’d obtain plenty of data for his dissertation.
“Guten Tag, Peter.” Professor Johannes Schreiber entered the office. “Wie geht’s?”
“Sehr gut, Herr Professor.” Peter shook the hand of his favorite professor from his own junior year in Munich. The man had lost some hair since then, but he’d kept the same warm smile. “Only three more recordings to make. The students have been generous with their time on their semester break.”
Professor Schreiber fingered the flexible steel tubing on the Dictaphone’s mouthpiece. “I’m glad, but I wish your research were more conventional. I fail to see how this will improve language learning.”
Stifling a groan, Peter straightened books on his desk. “I’ve found it helps if a student listens to himself and then to proper pronunciation. Also, I can compare recordings before and after the semester to show the effect of my teaching methods.”
“Your methods.” Professor Schreiber rubbed his chin and frowned at the machine. “Students learn best from immersion.”
“Naturally. That’s why my research compares my students at Harvard who did not have the benefit of immersion with the students here who do. That’s why I met this class in New York and recorded them before they sailed to Hamburg. I also recorded Harvard students with a different instructor—”
“It isn’t too late to find a new approach. You are here for a year.”
Peter drew a deep breath. Without Professor Schreiber’s blessing, he’d never receive his PhD. “What if I help Hans-Jürgen?”
“My son?”
“Ja. His English is good, but his accent is . . . not.”
The professor got a faraway look in his pale blue eyes. “I would like him to study in England or America.”
Peter spread his hand on the cool black Dictaphone case. “If I can improve his accent, may I continue my work?”
A smile dug into one cheek. “He is fond of you.”
“And I am fond of him. Do we have a deal?”
“Very well. Now you have a reporter visiting, ja?”
“Ja. A favor for a friend.”
After the professor departed, Peter checked his watch. Three minutes if she were the punctual sort. He closed his log and filed it away.
Poor George. He’d called to say he’d given Peter’s number to a firebrand female reporter who didn’t know her place. George was heaping on assignments to keep her out of trouble.
“Good luck.” Peter closed his file drawer. By definition, troublemakers made trouble.
“Entschuldigung?” A slender brunette knocked on his open door. Not a pretty woman, but . . . arresting. “Professor Peter Lang?”
“Just Mr. Lang until I receive my doctorate,” Peter said in English, and he strode over. She had a firm handshake born of working in a man’s profession, no doubt. “You must be Miss Firebrand.”