Children of the Promise Read online

  Children of the Promise

  The Complete Series

  Dean Hughes

  © 2012 Dean Hughes.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the publisher, Deseret Book Company, P.O. Box 30178, Salt Lake City Utah 30178. This work is not an official publication of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The views expressed herein are the responsibility of the author and do not necessarily represent the position of the Church or of Deseret Book. Deseret Book is a registered trademark of Deseret Book Company.

  All characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Rumors of War

  Table of Contents

  Rumors of War

  Rumors of War

  Preface

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Since You Went Away

  Since You Went Away

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Author's Note

  Far from Home

  Far from Home

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Author's Note

  When We Meet Again

  When We Meet Again

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Author's Note

  As Long As I Have You

  As Long As I Have You

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Author's Note

  Rumors of War

  Rumors of War

  Children of the Promise: Volume 1

  Visit us at DeseretBook.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Hughes, Dean, 1943–

  Rumors of war / by Dean Hughes.

  p. cm. — (Children of the promise ; v. 1)

  ISBN 1-57345-199-1 (hardbound)

  ISBN 978-1-59038-445-9 (paperbound)

  1. World War, 1939–1945—Fiction. 2. Mormons—History—Fiction.

  I. Title. II. Series: Hughes, Dean, 1943– Children of the promise; v. 1.

  PS3558.U36R86 1997

  813'.54—dc21 96-45548

  CIP

  Printed in the United States of America

  Banta, Menasha, WI

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

  For Kathleen

  Preface

  Most of us know the essential facts of World War II. We are aware of the major combatants and the broad outlines of the battles. But unless we lived through those years, how can we comprehend what the war meant to the people? How can we discover the heart of that tested generation? My attempt, through a work of historical fiction, is to recreate that era by portraying the challenges and change forced upon one American family. The family members are Latter-day Saints, so this book and the sequels to follow it become not only American and world history but Mormon history as well.

  I have tried to be accurate with details. If my characters go to a movie, you can trust that the film they see was really playing at that theater on that date. If I mention snow on Christmas in Salt Lake City, know that I checked the weather conditions for the day. The war news, heard on the home front, I took directly from the newspapers of the time. I have not changed historical events to fit my plot; in fact, at times I had to adjust my story when I discovered information that rendered my outline implausible or inaccurate. The word Jap will probably make you cringe a little, but during World War II it appeared in newspaper headlines almost every day, and ra
cial and nationalistic epithets were part of every soldier’s speech. I have probably softened those usages a little, but I didn’t want to distort history by taking them out.

  I was born in 1943, in the middle of the war, so I have no personal memories of it to rely on. After studying literally hundreds of general and specific works of history, I found that unpublished personal histories were often my most useful sources. I also interviewed many people who were willing to share their memories. I relied heavily, for instance, on the knowledge of Dr. Gene S. Jacobsen. He survived the Bataan “death march” and was held as a prisoner of war in the Philippines and Japan. I read his personal memoir, Who Refused to Die, but I also met with him and raised additional questions. I read other accounts from other prisoners in the Philippines, but I chose to base one of my major plots, at least in a general way, on Dr. Jacobsen’s experiences. Wally Thomas, however, is not Gene Jacobsen. I invented Wally’s responses in the way that a fiction writer always invents—by creating a character and then staying true to his personality.

  The entire Thomas family is fictional. There was no stake president named D. Alexander Thomas in Sugar House in the 1930s and 40s. I based President Thomas’s character on no particular individual. The experiences of the Thomas family are my creation, but I found the roots of that creation in the accounts of real people. I read, for instance, a number of interviews and personal histories of LDS missionaries in Germany before the war. My account of the evacuation of those missionaries in the late summer of 1939 is based on those actual events, but Elder Mecham and Elder Thomas are fictional.

  Sometimes I have chosen to use actual people as characters. Joseph Fielding Smith and J. Reuben Clark are the two most prominent examples. To avoid misrepresentation, I had these characters say things that I took from talks they gave or from accounts in their biographies. The “small talk” is imaginary, as are the scenes in which they appear, but I have worked to portray them accurately.

  I don’t mean to claim that I have done all that I might have done or that I have not slipped up somewhere. I’m certain I will learn from readers that I’ve made mistakes. But I spent all afternoon one day trying to find out what building the English department at the University of Utah was housed in during the period of this novel. I could have skipped over that little detail and I doubt anyone would have noticed, but the truth is, puzzles of that kind are fun for me. I loved immersing myself in the time in every way that I could, and I enjoyed tracing down the details I felt I needed.

  The Second World War has become the “good war” to many people, but not every young man hurried to a recruiting office on the day after the Pearl Harbor attack. Not everyone accepted rationing with a glad heart. Still, it was a remarkable time. In America, a whole generation sacrificed to accomplish a great purpose. But the war also made deep wounds. Families were not only affected by the loss of life, the sacrifice and stress, but they were also pulled in conflicting directions by the tremendous force of societal change. So this novel, and the volumes that will follow, are an attempt to understand an era that became a significant watershed in world history as well as a “refiner’s fire” for the LDS Church and its members. Pioneer Utah was lost forever, and Latter-day Saints were forced into the mainstream of American life. The war, and all that went with it, created a test of strength as mighty as the tests in Jackson County or Nauvoo, or along the trek to the Great Basin. We often tell the stories of the nineteenth-century pioneers, but in the twentieth century there are also epochs of Church history; this series of books will chronicle one of those. My hope is that in looking back, we may turn our hearts—the “hearts of the children”—toward our parents, and that that vision of the past will help us with the trials that may lie in our future.

  A number of people have been helpful to me in gathering information and in bringing this first book to clear focus. I appreciate the use of the archives of the History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and especially the help of Bill Slaughter. I have also spent hundreds of hours in Brigham Young University’s Harold B. Lee library, where I appreciated David Whittaker’s assistance. The Provo City Library was another good source, and the staff was always helpful. Most of the members of the editorial staff at Deseret Book read my manuscript and its revisions, and they pulled no punches in the criticism they offered. Especially helpful were Sheri Dew and Jack Lyon. Ronald A. Millett, president of Deseret Book Company, took the time to read every version of the manuscript and to pass along his advice. A number of friends and family members also read the manuscript and gave me constructive feedback: Kathy Luke, Carolyn Rasmus, Pamela Russell, Carol Robbins, Kathryn Manning, Amy Hughes Russell, Tom Hughes, Rob Hughes, Kristen Shawgo Hughes, Shauna Weight, and David Weight.

  My wife, Kathleen, has been more a partner than an advisor. She assisted me with my research, she brainstormed with me as I developed the plot, she reviewed my outlines, and she read every word of every draft. She got to know the characters and setting so well that she could always help me think through the issues, the plot, and the tone of the book. I dedicated my first book to her many years ago. This, now, is my seventieth book, and Kathy and I have been married thirty years. It was Kathy who supported my decision to give up a tenured university position to become a full-time writer, and so, in one sense, I owe all my books to her. I also owe her for our thirty good years together. For the second time, therefore, I dedicate a book to her. It’s a very small gesture, but I hope symbolic of all I feel for her.

  Chapter 1

  Elder Thomas had looked out the window a dozen times in the past two hours. This time he scanned the horizon, a craggy line of spires and boxy buildings in the hazy fall light. But he saw nothing that was alarming. The nearby Jewish ghetto was unusually quiet. Maybe all the warnings were wrong—maybe the trouble was over.

  And then he spotted smoke—black and boiling. “It’s starting,” he said. “They’ve set something on fire.”

  Elder Mecham pushed backward from the table, his chair making a scraping noise on the hardwood floor. “Where?” he said. And then, in a moment, he was next to Elder Thomas, his bulk demanding its share of the space.

  Elder Thomas pointed at the plume of smoke. It was in the ghetto but rather far off, probably toward the end of the street that people called Judengasse—Jewish Street. The elders lived just outside the ghetto in a seedy part of town where apartments were cheap.

  “It started burning hard, right from the beginning,” Elder Thomas said.

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t think what’s over that way.”

  “Let’s go look.”

  “No. We’d better not.”

  Elder Thomas was the senior companion, the one expected to use wisdom. Out tracting that morning, he had decided—after being warned several times—that he and his companion had better get back to their apartment where they would be safe. Early in the morning, Storm Troopers—the SA—and Gestapo agents had begun ripping apart Jewish homes and businesses and arresting Jews.

  Two days before, in Paris, a young Jew named Hershl Grynszpan had shot a German diplomat named Ernst vom Rath, and now the diplomat had died. No one in Germany knew exactly why it had happened—since information was controlled by the Nazis—but the Völkischer Beobachter, the party-sponsored newspaper, had been full of indignation, and everyone was predicting trouble for the Jews. The talk, however, was strange. People hadn’t told the elders, “I’m furious. I’m going to get those Jews.” They had said, “Be careful. It’s not safe to be out in the streets.”

  “What are they doing—burning people’s houses?” Elder Mecham asked.

  Elder Thomas wasn’t sure. In the ghetto all the shops were operated by Jews, including Brother Goldfarb’s tailor shop. He was a Mormon but formerly a Jew, and he was no longer allowed to live with his wife and daughter. Hitler had passed a law against Jews being married to Christians. Still, Elder Thomas had never thought that the Nazis would start setting fires
. Now he wondered what might be coming—especially for Brother Goldfarb.

  “Come on—let’s go take a look.” Elder Mecham took a couple of steps toward the door.

  Elder Thomas hadn’t moved yet. But he heard himself saying, “Okay. But we’ve got to be really careful.”

  “I’m taking my camera.”

  “No. Don’t do that.”

  “I’ll keep it under my coat. I won’t get it out unless I’m sure we’re safe.”

  This was foolish. But Elder Thomas pulled his own camera from a drawer by his bed, and he strapped it over his shoulder. It was November 10 and not terribly cold, but he walked to the wardrobe and got out his wool coat. As he pulled it on, he said, “We’re taking a big chance. I hope you know that.”

  The truth was, Elder Thomas hadn’t been this excited since the evacuation earlier that same fall of 1938. In September the missionaries had received orders from President M. Douglas Wood to clear out. Germany had lined up troops on the border of Czechoslovakia, and war had seemed imminent. Elder Thomas and Elder Mecham had packed up and caught a train for Holland. And then for three weeks, the missionaries from the West German mission—and from all over Europe—had waited to see whether they would be shipped home. But no one had stopped Hitler; he had gotten his way in Czechoslovakia. The missionaries had returned to their missions, but tension in Europe had remained high, and sometimes Elder Thomas wondered whether he would be able to finish the two and a half years he had been called to serve.

  The elders hurried down the three flights of stairs, taking two steps at a time, but as they pushed through the big outside door, Elder Thomas said, “Okay, slow down. Just walk normally.”

  As they walked, Elder Thomas watched the smoke, gray now, rising in a thick column and then spreading out over the city. Frankfurt was a city of grays and rusty browns—old and worn—but it was beautiful, too, with its ornate cathedrals and its views along the Main River. Elder Thomas had been in Frankfurt only two months, but he had been on his mission over a year. Elder Mecham had come to Frankfurt at the same time as Elder Thomas, in early September, but that had been the beginning of his mission, so his German had not come all that far.

  Elder Mecham was taking long strides, and Elder Thomas kept telling him to slow down. Elder Thomas was not short—about five-eleven—but Elder Mecham was a good four inches taller.