She picked the scattered pages off the floor, locked them in her desk, and never read a word of them.
Miep Gies was a secretary in Otto Frank's spice business. From 1942 to 1944 she quietly carried food, books and news to eight people hidden behind a bookcase in Amsterdam — and remembered their birthdays.
After the arrest in August 1944 she gathered Anne's papers, meaning to return them when the family came home. A colleague wanted to read them. She refused: even a child has a right to privacy.
Only later did she realise what that choice had done. The diary named addresses of other Jewish families they were helping. Had she read it, she would have had to burn it.
She lived to 100, spent sixty years refusing to open the diary, and always downplayed her role. "I am not a hero. I did what any decent person would do."
Sometimes the most extraordinary lives are built on ordinary decency.