She lifted her head after a moment to listen—Frederich’s heavy tread coming up the stairs.
Give her time.
Johann’s sage advice. Johann, who had never lived his life around a woman.
Frederich forced himself not to stop at Caroline’s door, nor did he seek her out the next day or the next. He let more than a week pass because he had thought—hoped—that if he left her alone for a time, she would want to rejoin the family again. But she still kept herself apart from them, hiding in her room, speaking to no one. If she came downstairs at all, it was in the night after all of them had gone to bed. She was eating; his children reported that news to him. She must be getting physically stronger. He could hear her walking back and forth overhead sometimes.
But he missed her, as his children missed her.
No. He missed her as a man missed the woman who was important to him. How was it that he had gotten so used to talking to her—when it seemed as if they had never talked at all? And how many times a day did he have to stop himself from going and asking her what she thought about this or that? The price of corn. The war news. The livestock. Things he should have talked about with other men—with Steigermann, or heaven forbid, Avery.
He made a decision while he was grooming old Koenig. Lise was sitting on the porch nearby, earnestly trying to sew a tear in one of Mary Louise’s dresses and finding the task hard going because Mary Louise still had the dress on.
“Lise, where is your Aunt Caroline?” he asked.
She looked at him in surprise. He knew where Caroline was. Everyone knew where Caroline was. But she was a tactful child. “Upstairs, Papa,” she said.
“Upstairs, Papa,” Mary Louise repeated.
“Stay here,” he said when Mary Louise would have followed him inside, even if it meant dragging Lise and the needle and thread along behind her.
“But, Papa!”
“No ‘buts.’ You stay out here with Lise.”
He went up the stairs quickly, ignoring Beata’s sniff when he passed her in the kitchen. How eloquent were Beata’s disgruntled noises. With one mere sound she could fully communicate how much she disproved of the attention he was paying to his ailing wife.
Caroline’s door was closed as usual. He didn’t knock. He was not worried about whatever state of dress or undress he might find her in. He was her husband. He had delivered her child. She had no secrets from him.
She was sitting in the chair by the window, perhaps reading, perhaps not. He approached her immediately and took the book out of her hand.
“Stand up,” he said.
“What?” she said, not certain yet whether or not she should be worried.
“Stand up,” he repeated, taking her by both forearms and bringing her to her feet.
“Frederich, what—”
He didn’t take the time to explain. He simply lifted her up and carried her toward the door.
“Frederich, put me down,” she said as he stepped into the hall, struggling to get out of his grasp.
“You have been in this room too long,” he said.
“Frederich! Put me down!”
“No,” he said simply, and he kept walking toward the stairs.
“Frederich—Frederich, what are you doing!”
“Trying to keep from falling down the stairs and breaking both our necks,” he said. “Excuse me, Beata,” he said when he reached the bottom. “You are in the way.” He swung Caroline around so that Beata had to duck to keep from getting hit by Caroline’s feet.
Both his children looked sharply around when he stepped out on the porch.
“Papa!” Mary Louise said. “Can’t Aunt Caroline walk?”
“Can but won’t, Mary Louise,” he said, going down the porch steps.
“Damn you, Frederich!” Caroline hissed at him. “Put me down!”
He ignored her, setting her on old Koenig’s back instead. It occurred to him that perhaps she had never sat on a bareback horse, but he was not deterred. “You and I are going for a ride,” he said, swinging up behind her. He kept a firm hand on her to keep her from jumping off.
“I don’t want to go for a ride!”
“I don’t remember asking,” he said.
“Can we go?” Lise asked, shading her eyes from the sun with her hand.
“Not this time,” he said. “You stay here with Beata.”
He turned the horse sharply and headed him away from the house. Caroline was sliding off, but this time it was not on purpose. She had no way to keep her seat but to hang on to the horse’s mane, or to lean against him—which was clearly out of the question. She was not wearing stays. He could feel the warmth of her skin through her dress when he set her in a less precarious position.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked as he turned Koenig down the wooded path toward the church. Her voice sounded as if she might be crying, but her back was rigid with anger.
“There are things I want to say to you.”
“What kind of things?” she cried, startling a blue jay out of a low pine tree.
He didn’t answer her, and she gave a sharp sigh.
They rode for a time in silence. It was cooler in the shade, and even in the wake of her anger, it was not entirely unpleasant, riding with her like this on a slow-moving horse, dappled in sunlight. The air was ripe with the smell of decaying leaves and pungent with smell of injured, living trees where someone had been chopping. And there was her scent—lye soap and clean, sun-dried clothes, and woman. He watched as the patches of sunlight glanced off her hair. Dark hair that wasn’t all dark after all, he noted. It was rich with highlights of red and brown and gold. She had beautiful hair, and once again he fought down the impulse to put his hand on it.
He waited until they had reached the edge of the churchyard before he spoke.
“You don’t ask me anything about the baby,” he said quietly, and she stiffened as if he had physically hurt her. After a moment, she gave a quiet sigh and bowed her head. “Why don’t you ask me, Caroline?”
She shook her head and said nothing.
“It was what you feared,” he went on. “She came too soon, this little girl. She didn’t cry—you know that. You remember that. She didn’t breathe, Caroline. There was no chance for her. I am very sorry for that because I think she would have been very…beautiful. Steigermann—”
He stopped. He could feel her trembling.
“Go on,” she said without looking at him, her voice barely a whisper.
“Steigermann made the coffin for her. He wanted to do that—for you. Avery gave the wood—”
“Avery?”
“He gave the wood—a very fine piece for the making.”
He reined in the horse by the low stone wall and slid off. She kept her face averted when he lifted her down.
“Your little girl is here, Caroline. With Anna. I thought you would want that—”
She looked at him then, disbelieving, her incredulous look wounding him deeply.
“What did you think I would do with your daughter, Caroline?” he asked, gripping her arms. “Do you think I understand nothing? You were too ill to ask. I did what I thought you would want.” He abruptly let her go and moved away from her. “I will wait here,” he said.
She hesitated, then stepped through a broken place in the low stone wall. He watched her walk toward Ann’s grave, tentatively at first, and then with a firmer step. She stood by the graves for a long time, until finally, she reached down to touch the small headstone.
He stopped watching then, moving farther away to leave her to grieve alone. She was so sad. He wanted to do something for her, anything that would make her feel better, but he knew only too well that she wanted nothing from Frederich Graeber. He adjusted old Koenig’s bridle, checked his formerly ailing hoof to see how it fared, speaking to him softly, not realizing that Caroline had returned and was standing close by.
When he looked over his shoulder, she gave a small shrug and crossed her arms over her breasts.
“It’s green,” she said.
“Yes,” he answered, understanding her remark. “William did it—cut the sod to cover the grave. He took it from a meadow on the Holt land—a place you liked to go when you were a little girl, he said.”
“There were…flowers on the grave.”
“Mary Louise and Lise bring those from time to time,” he said. “It’s been more than a month, Caroline.” He watched her steadily. She took a deep quiet breath.
She said something he couldn’t hear, more to herself than to him.
“Are you ready to go now?” he asked, and she nodded. She went to stand by the horse so that he could lift her up again, but she still had that vacant, detached look about her, as if she hadn’t quite agreed that she would be staying in this world and not going to the other.
“There is one other thing,” he said. “If you need to speak to him—to Gerhardt—I won’t keep you from it—”
“No,” she said immediately, finally meeting his eyes. “I don’t need to speak to him. She meant nothing to him. I have understood that for a long while.” She reached out to wind her fingers absently in the horse’s mane. “Was there a…service for her?” she asked, her eyes sliding away from his.
“Yes. Johann said the words. The Steigermanns were there. And your brothers.”
“And you?”
“Yes. Me.”
He didn’t have to say that Beata didn’t come. He moved to her side and lifted her onto the horse. Then he stood on the low wall to climb up behind her. As they rode away, she turned to watch the place where the baby lay as long as she could.
But she didn’t say anything more. The ride back was quiet and undisturbed, and he savored the time with her, letting the old horse find his own way in his own good time.
Caroline.
He wanted to find some words that might help. He wanted to touch her. He did nothing.
“Frederich?” she said as they were about to ride into the yard. She turned around as far as she could to face him. He put his hand on her waist to keep her from falling.
Her eyes searched his. “Thank you,” she whispered.
He didn’t know what to say. He was completely unprepared for her gratitude. He was unprepared even for her acknowledgment of his presence. He said nothing, and she abruptly put her arms around him and pressed her face against his shoulder. “Thank you, Frederich. I won’t ever forget—”
He held her tightly, awash in emotion, afraid that she would suddenly remember who he was and pull away. He touched her cheek with his rough hand, stroked the dark hair he’d been so longing to touch.
“I would do anything for you,” he whispered—in German—because he was a coward where she was concerned and because he needed to voice the thought to himself as much as to her.
He held her, feeling her sorrow and his own, determined to keep her close like this for as long as she would allow it. But the horse pranced nervously, and she abruptly let go of him and slid from his grasp to the ground, hurrying into the house without once looking back.
He sat there, completely overwhelmed by the realization that he couldn’t deny the truth any longer. He cared far more for this exasperating woman than he ever intended, and he wanted her—as a friend, a lover, as a wife.
And now she was grateful to him—her unrelenting grief over the death of her child had made her vulnerable enough to let him see it. Somehow it only compounded his loneliness.
What now? he thought. But he knew. He didn’t want her gratitude any more than he wanted her incredulity that he was capable of behaving as if he were a decent, civilized man.
I should have let Eli take her.
If he had, then perhaps they both would have been out of his life now and he could live in peace.
He gave a sharp sigh and looked toward the house. He saw Caroline moving back and forth in the glow of the lamp in that solitary upstairs room, the place where he was not welcome. And Beata stood watching him from the kitchen window below.
Chapter Twelve
When the dream began, the baby was crying. Frederich had been wrong when she said she didn’t cry—Caroline could hear her so plainly. Her baby daughter was in her cradle there on the other side of the room, and all in the world Caroline had to do was go to her.
But the room changed—doors where there had been none. And people—Johann preparing to read in his book of rituals, and Leah Steigermann dressed in black.
Wrong, some part of her thought. Wrong for Johann to come here with his book. Wrong for Leah to wear mourning. Don’t you hear her crying, Leah?
I’ll get her, she thought. I’ll bring her so you both can see—
She couldn’t move her legs, couldn’t tell where the cradle sat anymore. And the baby cried and cried—
I’m coming! she wanted to say, but she had no voice. Please, little one, I’m coming—
She could still hear her, but now Beata stood in her way and wouldn’t move aside no matter how hard Caroline tried to get past.
Get away, Beata!
Oh, I’m sorry, Beata said quite distinctly. I thought you knew/
And then she smiled—that terrible smile she had—Beata, victorious.
No! I don’t know! I don’t! Caroline tried to say, but Lise came bursting into the room, her hands clasped over her heart, her eyes bright with excitement.
“Aunt Caroline! Papa is going to play again!” she cried, jarring Caroline awake.
“What?” Caroline said, disoriented and still in the clutches of the dream. She tried to sit up, looking wildly around the room, her heart pounding.
Where is my baby?
But she knew instantly. The sun was shining and the birds were singing. And her baby lay at Ann’s side in the German cemetery.
“He’s playing the fiddle again, Aunt Caroline! It’s my birthday present. Any song I want! ‘Old Blue,’ ‘Aura Lee’— anything!”
“What?” Caroline said again, but Lise didn’t hear her. She whirled away, dancing out the door and into the upstairs hallway.
Caroline lay back and closed her eyes.
Lise’s birthday.
She took a deep breath and willed the dream to fade, letting the harshness of reality take its place.
There is no baby. There is nothing.
She had to force herself to get out of bed. She had to force herself to do everything these days. She stood for a long time staring at her face in the mirror. She had to try harder. She was not going to spoil Lise’s special day, and she took unusual pains with her toilette before she put on the stark mourning dress. Three months. One wore black for three months after an infant died. Who decided such things? she wondered, and how could that be enough time when more than a month had already passed and she didn’t even remember it?
Beata was already at work in the kitchen when Caroline came downstairs. She immediately sniffed and turned away. Certainly Beata had cause for complaint. Caroline hadn’t been doing “her job” these past few weeks, and it was clear that—Lise’s birthday or not—Beata was not in a forgiving mood.
She dismissed Beata with a sigh and tried to concentrate on more pleasant things—how proud Ann would be of her wonderful older daughter. The Geburtstagstisch, the birthday table, stood ready near Lise’s chair, stacked with presents from all of them, even the Steigermanns and William and Avery. Caroline added her gift to the pile, a small silver brooch that had belonged to her mother. She had had no money with which to buy a gift and no time, because of her illness, to get anything made. She thought that Lise would like the brooch. It would make her feel grown-up and ladylike.
But it was Frederich’s music that would give Lise the greatest joy. Caroline hadn’t known that he had changed his mind about playing the fiddle for her birthday. He hadn’t said anything about it. Since that day at the cemetery, he hadn’t said much about anything.
The first bawling notes of “Old Blue” came drifting in from the porch, but Caroline made no attempt to go out and join the others. Fre
derich had become stern and cold and German again—at least where she was concerned. She would never understand the contradictions in the man. He had shown her great kindness when she needed it, and if she could believe Leah Steigermann, it was because of his determination that she was even alive. The only thing she really understood was that there had been no change in their arrangement. He intended that she look after his children, but he didn’t want her as a wife.
She looked out the window. Lise sat as close to Frederich as she could without interfering with his playing. He stopped long enough to take a request, then began another song, a waltz that Caroline didn’t recognize. She listened to the haunting, three-quarter-time melody, seeing in her mind’s eye the occasion Lise had talked about, when Ann was still alive and she and Lise had danced around the room to the lilting music of Frederich’s fiddle.
She heard Mary Louise coming two-feet-on-each-step down the stairs. Someone had taken over yet another of Caroline’s duties and dressed her for church—Frederich or Lise, she supposed. When Mary Louise reached the bottom step, she immediately ran into Caroline’s embrace.
“Good morning,” Caroline whispered in her ear, because she loved whispering. Or perhaps Mary Louise had had to tiptoe around so much while Caroline was ill that she hadn’t realized it was all right to make a little noise now.
Mary Louise giggled and leaned back, taking a moment to stare into Caroline’s eyes. Caroline understood the process, the need Mary Louise had to determine whether her aunt would be more herself today or whether she would be crying again.
“Is it my birthday, too?” Mary Louise asked, also in a whisper.
“No, not today. Yours will be here at Christmas time.”
“Is that tomorrow?”
“No, love. About four months from tomorrow. Don’t you want to go listen to your papa play?”
Mary Louise nodded, and Caroline let her go, abruptly turning around, because she felt Beata’s eyes on her. She always felt Beata’s eyes on her.
“What is it, Beata?” she asked pointedly, in spite of the fact that she’d slept too late and she’d let someone else dress Mary Louise for church. It was senseless to expect any kind of truce with this woman.
Cheryl Reavis Page 16