"We had a short circuit last evening, and on top of that the guns kept banging away all the time. I still haven't got over my fear of everything connected with shooting and planes, and I creep into Daddy's bed nearly every night for comfort." That is how Anne's entry for March 10, 1943, begins. This kind of remark recurs at intervals through the diary, but it would seem that eventually the inmates of the "Secret Annexe" did become accustomed to the situation. After all, two years in hiding is a long time, and they knew that the Allies were advancing and the situation of the Nazis was deteriorating. By the time the diary ends, in August 1944, Anne had every reason to be optimistic, and she was even thinking about going back to school.
By the time they were arrested, the occupants of the "Secret Annexe" no longer seriously thought that they would be discovered. Although they had been frightened at the beginning, they had become used to their situation and hoped to continue in that way until the war ended. The news from the various war fronts was very good, and it was obvious that the Nazis would be defeated. If the discovery had only come a little later, if the group had not been included in the last shipment of people to leave Westerbork, if Anne had not been sent first to Auschwitz, and then to Belsen, who knows what might have happened?
