Up ahead on the horizon, the steeple of the Perná church and the roofs of the houses on the low hill behind it came into view. Schmidt fell silent. What he was suggesting seemed to her to make the least sense of all. That she, with such a small child, should leave now, when the worst, as it seemed to her, was finally over? Those marauding gangs of Zbrojovka Arms Factory boys and that hell of a camp in Pohořelice? Why should she leave just now? She would go home, back to her own apartment or to some other apartment, to which she would surely be entitled. She, the daughter of a Czech mother, wasn’t about to be intimidated by some unconfirmed reports or by the scorn of a few newcomers. She would stay through the winter to help with the harvest, do the work for which the locals were shorthanded these days—she was, after all, hardworking—and then she would leave for Brno, for home.
“I’m going to go back to Brno.”
Schmidt snorted and slapped the reins against the horses’ backs. The buggy lurched forward, and the horses picked up their pace.
“Stubborn,” Schmidt muttered, and didn’t say another word until they were back at the threshold of the administrative headquarters.
XV
“Just hold on; someone will show up.”
“Yeah, but I’m thirsty.”
“We didn’t come here just to sit around, did we?”
“Easy does it, you’ll work plenty hard; you’ll be glad you had a moment to sit.”
“Hey, look, he’s got cigarettes and isn’t offering.”
“Let me have a cigarette, too, and don’t worry, I’ve got some in my knapsack; you’ll get it back.”
“Don’t tell me he’s going to be a cheapskate, huh?”
“Who was thirsty? I’ve still got some water from Brno. But it’s warm.”
“Need a match?”
“Oh yeah, thanks. I can’t believe I didn’t pack any.”
“Hey, look, another van. There’s going to be a whole crowd of us here.”
“You think they’re from Brno too?”
“What do you mean, too? I’m not.”
“I thought we were all from Brno, where else, right?”
“I’m from Jihlava.”
“Now we’re from Brno, but not that long ago we would’ve still said Frývaldov.”
“The border region, huh? So how come you’re not helping out over there? They must be shorthanded, too, aren’t they?”
“He doesn’t want to go back. We’ve got nobody left there.”
“Do you smoke? Jesus, who’s got cigarettes? Let me have one, too, or I’m going to go nuts.”
“Boy, is it hot.”
“Wasn’t somebody supposed to be waiting for us here?”
“Hey, buddy, don’t you want to take that off? You don’t want to be standing around here all decked out, ’cause who knows how long it’ll be before they come get us.”
“Where do you think they’ll put us up?”
“So, I’m actually from Moravian Wallachia. I was only working in Brno during the war, and then my folks called me and told me to check out the situation here, get the lay of the land. I hear they’re giving away homesteads; first to grab one, gets one.”
“I thought you were here for the harvest brigade, aren’t you?”
“That’s how it’s always been. Some slave away; others take away.”
“What do you think they’ll have us doing? Personally, I don’t know how to do very much, especially if it’s complicated.”
“They’ll teach you.”
“What matters is teamwork, right? Together we’ll manage. The most important thing is to bring in the harvest.”
“Oh no, she finished off my water.”
“You look like you could be a Hubač from Jundrov; you’ve got the same eyes and that nose. Are you related? No? Well, I just wondered, seeing as they disappeared during the war, thought you might know something.”
“C’mon, it’s like you’re in some hick town; are you related to so-and-so or so-and-so, as if everyone’s supposed to know who you mean.”
“It just so happens, sir, that I found my cousin in that car; look, right over here. I hadn’t heard from her all through the war.”
“And why are you here, ma’am? I thought only students were supposed to come, seeing as they’ve got time on their hands now. Wasn’t that what they said? Járo, isn’t that right?”
“I’m sick of just sitting here. I’m going to go ask around, or we’ll be here till the cows come home.”
“Good morning.”
“Hi.”
“Good morning, hello. There’s no one here to meet you?”
“Hello.”
“My God, there are so many of you.”
“You’ve got a nice bunch of us here.”
“Hey, young folks, how come you’re just sitting around?”
“No one’s opening up?”
“They dropped us off here and said this was the administrative headquarters. But there’s no one here.”
“So we’re just waiting.”
“How come no one’s letting you in? Where the hell are they? Yesterday they were crying to the district administrative commission, and now today the ground’s swallowed them up?”
“Could they be somewhere in the fields?”
“They might be out in the fields.”
“The administrative commissioner? Nah. Maybe just running around someplace.”
“That tall guy from Brno went over to that building to ask.”
“Tell you what. Why don’t you all get out of the car, that’s right, and take your knapsacks. Listen up. I have to leave you here, right, that’s clear, I need to get back, but tell you what—I’ll drive around the village and track ’em down for you. The commissioner’s name is Schmidt, got it?”
“He’s German?”
“Well, yeah, he’s German, but he was in the resistance or something. He speaks Czech.”
“The commissioner here is German, huh?”
“Járo, you think we’re going to have to put up with some German giving us orders around here? That’s still allowed?”
“Hey, new guys, anyone got any water?”
“Come on now, kids, get your knapsacks out and pile ’em up. You can’t leave ’em in the car; I’ve got to head back, I already told you.”
“Hey, man, watch it, that was my foot!”
“Kamila, is that really you? I don’t believe it. They said back in March your house got hit? Is it true? And everyone’s all right?”
“Please, kids, settle down for just another minute. As I was saying, I’m going to take a spin around and look for Schmidt. You just wait here and save your strength for the work ahead; you’re going to need it. Schmidt is a skinny guy, angular with dark hair and a mustache, always wears boots; you can’t miss him. And he’s got a pretty little German girl always running around with him. One of them will tell you what to do. For now, just wait here.”
“Do you know if there’s a water pump around here?”
“Nope, sorry, don’t know; I’m from Mikulov. Just dropping you off here.”
“I’m going to go sit by that church over there.”
“All right, kids, do well and see ya.”
“So long!”
“Where the hell is that Schmidt? Doesn’t he know he’s getting his harvest brigade today?”
Gerta was nearing the Rosenbaum manor, pulling a cart loaded with two bags of walnuts. Just the day before, Schmidt had instructed her to pull them out of the storeroom where they kept property confiscated from the Heinz estate, and to bring them over this morning. All around the locked front door of the administrative headquarters, harvest workers were either sitting or standing, their haversacks, knapsacks, and blankets strewn all over the place. The girls were lying on the grass with their pants rolled up, sunning themselves; a few of the boys were smoking on the doorstep. One was trying to peer through the window into the darkened office.
Gerta walked up to the door.
“Good morning. Know whe
re we might find Commissioner Schmidt?”
“Good day. The commissioner’s not here?”
“We’ve been banging away, but we can’t get anyone to come to the door. Neither him, nor some German girl who’s supposed to be helping out around here.”
“Gerta Schnirch, good morning.”
“It’s you?”
“Yes.”
“And where’s the commissioner?”
“He’s not here? That’s strange. Maybe he’s with the machines. They delivered them yesterday from Mikulov.”
“They brought us here from Mikulov, because supposedly you’re short of harvest help.”
“Really? We were just there yesterday, and they told us they were short of help themselves.”
“We arrived by train from Brno this morning. They told us they were all set and drove us here in a truck.”
“I see.”
“So where’s this Schmidt?”
Gerta didn’t know. She hadn’t seen him yet that morning. She parked the cart by the front door.
“Just wait here a moment. I’ll run up to Schmidt’s farm and see if he’s there. Or if he’s with the machines.”
She turned her back on the group and took off toward the church, continuing along a gravel path that went up over the crest of the hill and then veered to the right. She grabbed the handle of the sturdy gate leading into the courtyard, opened the pass door, and stepped through. The courtyard was neat, swept. The doors to the pigsties were all closed, the door to the barn and the door to the shed on the right as well. There was neither a dog, nor a hen, nor a goose, nor even a feather to be seen in the entire spacious yard. Empty. Silent. Gerta entered the swept courtyard and made her way toward the house. She pounded on the door. No sound came from inside. She reached for the handle. The door wasn’t locked, so she opened it and stepped into a dark hallway that led her all the way to the kitchen. Although she had never been here before, she could tell that something felt different. In the room before her there was neither a table, nor a chair, nor a single shelf along the wall, just black smudges indicating where they had been and pale circles where plates had hung. All that remained in the kitchen were the curtains and the flowers in the pots behind the windows. And in the center of the immaculately swept room stood a coatrack, from which dangled a pair of tattered canvas shoes tied together by their shoelaces, slowly twisting in the draft. Nothing more was left of the Schmidts.
Gerta slowly made her way through the whole compound.
There wasn’t a stick of furniture left in any of the rooms. Not a single item. The sun-drenched courtyard was still. Gerta opened up pigsty after pigsty. All were empty. The rabbit hutches, empty. The chicken coop, empty. The shed, empty. The water in the rain barrel under the gutter emptied, the rain barrel empty. Silence. The only sound coming from a distance was the clucking of a neighbor’s chickens.
A tabby cat soundlessly padded across the courtyard. It narrowed its eyes and looked around. When it saw Gerta, it paused for a moment, then quietly continued.
“So you’re the only one they left behind. You must’ve been out on the prowl last night, right?” Gerta laughed and squatted down. The cat, startled by her movement, froze, then scampered off and disappeared behind a wooden shed.
Gerta wondered how Schmidt had managed to pull it off. Could he have talked his Russians into helping him? He and his wife alone couldn’t possibly have managed to load up everything, let alone in a single night, and so meticulously, packing it all away without a trace and whisking it off the premises, leaving not even a wisp of straw behind. With what could he have bribed them? Or had they done it on a lark? Or were they at this very moment lying drunk in Schmidt’s wine cellar? Come to think of it, she hadn’t yet seen a single one of them around the village that morning.
Gerta reemerged from the courtyard, shut the gate behind her, and set off for Zipfelová’s. Whom else would she tell?
XVI
“Well, one can’t just say it like that.” Zipfelová stood, shaking her head, her arms folded on her chest. “Yes, he was local, the whole family, for generations, it’s true. But where he disappeared to during the war and what he was up to before showing up here again so early in May, nobody knows. Where did that story about him being in the resistance come from, anyway?”
“Hell knows,” said Šenk.
“I heard it from Hilda Schmidt. She said he was in the RW, the Republikanische Wehr. That’s what those German anti-fascists called themselves after they escaped from Mikulov,” said Ida.
“He could’ve made his wife spread that story around. But not the village men, and not the Russian unit in Břeclav. Come to think of it, he showed up with that wave of Russians, didn’t he? Didn’t they all seem to know him already, before they made him commissioner?” speculated Zipfelová.
“Please, they just gave it to the first person who asked. Not because they thought he’d earned it. After all, those Russians had no idea about who did what,” Šenk said, shaking his head.
Ida was sitting at the table in the kitchen. She’d been the one to tell Gerta to fetch Hubert Šenk from his fields. Her gaze alternated between him, pacing around the kitchen, arms crossed, and old Zipfelová, who was leaning back against the stove.
“Schnirchová, please sit down. Why are you standing there so awkwardly in the doorway?” Ida said irritably.
“I was just thinking that maybe I should get back to work.”
“You mean to the office? You’re useless there now anyway without Schmidt to give you orders.”
“But the harvest brigade is waiting.”
Hubert Šenk stopped short. “What harvest brigade?”
“A group of people arrived, they said for the harvest brigade, from Mikulov.”
“But weren’t they short themselves over there?”
“They were. But supposedly Brno sent over so many people that they ended up driving some over here.”
“How many are there?”
“About thirty.”
“Well, isn’t that grand,” declared Šenk, his lips spreading into a broad smile. The corners of his mouth turned up, and his eyes crinkled. His face beamed.
Ida couldn’t take her eyes off him. Gerta dropped hers.
“Well now, you hurry on back, so they don’t leave. Or better yet, I’ll come, too, and bring them back to my farm, before the Hrazdíras or the Krupas get their hands on them.”
“And what about Schmidt?” Zipfelová raised her voice and called after Šenk.
“What about him? It’s not like the commissioner’s the most important thing around here.”
“Someone’s got to be in charge, or else those newcomers will clean us out. Those Jech folks just brought in another bunch of relatives, did you hear?”
“I know, but, Auntie, the harvest just started, in case you hadn’t noticed. I’ve got enough on my own plate to worry about, let alone start worrying about others. Let them take their share, as long as they’re fair.”
“It’s a question of what all they’re going to take.”
“Well, hopefully it won’t be too bad,” piped up Ida, the tips of her fingers smoothing the tablecloth.
“I’m going to get the brigaders; harvesting comes first. Schnirchová can take over for Schmidt. Listen to me, if you bungle things or take advantage, I’ll have it out with you face-to-face, you understand?”
Gerta nodded. “And what should I do?”
“Wouldn’t she be more useful in the fields?” Ida asked Šenk.
“No, somebody’s got to watch over the Rosenbaum place. Remember, there’s property from several households stored there. Make sure nothing gets stolen. Schnirchová, keep on top of those records, like you’ve been doing. Be sure you just lend things out, especially machines and equipment, and keep an eye on who takes what, even if it’s for the brigaders. That’ll be one big mess now. First, you’re going to help me get them housed, and then you’ll work on the lending and the monitoring. And whether it’s day or night, if
anyone tries anything, you sound the alarm, is that clear? And also, call Brno, from where they sent us these folks, and report Schmidt missing. And report it to Mikulov as well, as soon as possible. They might still catch him at the border.”
“Catch him?” Ida raised her eyebrows.
“Catch him. Chances are he didn’t just take off for no reason.”
“Probably not, leaving in the middle of the night like that. He might even have been an undercover Gestapo. Maybe when that delegation came over the other day from Mikulov, he got wind they were onto him.”
“Had that been the case, Auntie, they would’ve shot him on the spot. Let it be, and don’t let your imagination run away with you. Who knows how things really were. After all, you know yourself he wasn’t a bad fellow.”
“Was, wasn’t. Up until when? The last time I really talked to him was still before the war. And the war changed a lot of people. Schmidt wouldn’t have been the only one.”
“Oh well.” Šenk shrugged his shoulders, put his hat back on his head, and motioned to Gerta with his finger.
“See you tonight, Auntie, at U Otrubů. They’ve started serving wine on tap again. I’ll let a few more neighbors know. So long, Ida. Schnirchová, let’s go.”
XVII
It was not that difficult. One actually just needed to concentrate a little, grit one’s teeth or, on the contrary, yell out loud, aim, pull the trigger, once, twice, and then check to see if it worked. And then repeat the same steps—again and again, until the deed was done. To kill a person was terribly easy; even she could do it, of that she was certain, which was how she knew that anyone could do it. Not only Jech, for whom it was nothing new. If Barbora hadn’t started crying, if Jech and his two cronies hadn’t shouted so much, if the shelf Jech bumped into hadn’t come crashing down, it all would have happened quietly, with only terse commands, barked orders, and the gunshot itself, and Gerta, still perfectly calm, would have crumpled to the floor, almost as if nothing had happened, as if she had just suffered a fainting spell. That was of course if there was no pain. But even if there was pain, Gerta knew it would only last an instant, a brief moment, after which long-desired peace, silence, and resignation would follow. Resignation, at long last, and a weightless head, through which the agonizing, unbearable trains of thought would finally stop racing. She would be at peace. At last, exactly what for years now—excruciatingly long years—she had been wishing for.
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