The Book Thief Read Free Page A

the dirty, fogged-up window of the train whenthey boarded just before midday. In the written words of the book thief herself, the journey continued like
everything
had happened.
    When the train pulled into the
Bahnhof
in Munich, the passengers slid out as if from a torn package. There were people of every stature, but among them, the poor were the most easily recognized. The impoverished always try to keep moving, as if relocating might help. They ignore the reality that a new version of the same old problem will be waiting at the end of the trip—the relative you cringe to kiss.
    I think her mother knew this quite well. She wasn’t delivering her children to the higher echelons of Munich, but a foster home had apparently been found, and if nothing else, the new family could at least feed the girl and the boy a little better, and educate them properly.
    The boy.
    Liesel was sure her mother carried the memory of him, slung over her shoulder. She dropped him. She saw his feet and legs and body slap the platform.
    How could that woman walk?
    How could she move?
    That’s the sort of thing I’ll never know, or comprehend—what humans are capable of.
    She picked him up and continued walking, the girl clinging now to her side.
    Authorities were met and questions of lateness and the boy raised their vulnerable heads. Liesel remained in the corner of the small, dusty office as her mother sat with clenched thoughts on a very hard chair.
    There was the chaos of goodbye.
    It was a goodbye that was wet, with the girl’s head buried into thewoolly, worn shallows of her mother’s coat. There had been some more dragging.
    Quite a way beyond the outskirts of Munich, there was a town called Molching, said best by the likes of you and me as “Molking.” That’s where they were taking her, to a street by the name of Himmel.
    A TRANSLATION
Himmel = Heaven
    Whoever named Himmel Street certainly had a healthy sense of irony. Not that it was a living hell. It wasn’t. But it sure as hell wasn’t heaven, either.
    Regardless, Liesel’s foster parents were waiting.
    The Hubermanns.
    They’d been expecting a girl and a boy and would be paid a small allowance for having them. Nobody wanted to be the one to tell Rosa Hubermann that the boy didn’t survive the trip. In fact, no one ever really wanted to tell her anything. As far as dispositions go, hers wasn’t really enviable, although she had a good record with foster kids in the past. Apparently, she’d straightened a few out.
    For Liesel, it was a ride in a car.
    She’d never been in one before.
    There was the constant rise and fall of her stomach, and the futile hopes that they’d lose their way or change their minds. Among it all, her thoughts couldn’t help turning toward her mother, back at the
Bahnhof
, waiting to leave again. Shivering. Bundled up in that useless coat. She’d be eating her nails, waiting for the train. The platform would be long and uncomfortable—a slice of cold cement.Would she keep an eye out for the approximate burial site of her son on the return trip? Or would sleep be too heavy?
    The car moved on, with Liesel dreading the last, lethal turn.
    The day was gray, the color of Europe.
    Curtains of rain were drawn around the car.
    “Nearly there.” The foster care lady, Frau Heinrich, turned around and smiled.
“Dein neues Heim
. Your new home.”
    Liesel made a clear circle on the dribbled glass and looked out.
    A PHOTO OF HIMMEL STREET
The buildings appear to be glued together, mostly small houses and apartment blocks that look nervous .
There is murky snow spread out like carpet .
There is concrete, empty hat-stand trees, and gray air .
    A man was also in the car. He remained with the girl while Frau Heinrich disappeared inside. He never spoke. Liesel assumed he was there to make sure she wouldn’t run away or to force her inside if she gave them any trouble. Later, however, when the trouble did start, he simply sat there and watched. Perhaps he was