The Ring

by Steel, Danielle

  Wiedershen, Maximilian. Good luck. They shook hands firmly as Max fought back tears. A moment later Walmar left them, and Ariana stayed for only a few minutes. But before she left him to go to dinner, Max reached out for her and they kissed.

  Dinner passed with the utmost propriety, except for Gerhard, who shot small breadballs at Berthold's retreating back. Reprimanded by his father, he grinned and shot one a moment later at his sister's back.

  We're going to have to send you back to Fr+nulein Hedwig for your dinners if you continue to do that.

  Sorry, Father. But despite his friendly chatter, he was unable to rouse either his father or his sister to a great deal of conversation, and eventually he, too, fell silent as he ate.

  After dinner Walmar retired to his study, Ariana to her bedroom, and Gerhard to his pranks. She wanted to return once more to Maximilian, but she was afraid to. Her father had insisted that they must take no more chances of drawing the servants, notice. Max's escape depended on no one's knowing where he was, and their safety on no one's knowing where he had been. So she sat in her room for hours, and dutifully, at ten thirty, as per her father's orders she turned off her lights. But silently she waited thinking, praying, until at last she could bear it no longer, and at twenty minutes after eleven, she tiptoed softly down the stairs until she reached her mother's door.

  She let herself in without a sound and found him waiting, as though he knew that she would come. He kissed her long and hard this time, holding her tightly until she could barely breathe. They kissed for one last long moment, and then buttoning his coat around him, he pulled away. I have to go now, Ariana. He smiled softly. Take good care, my darling. Until we meet again.

  I love you. It was the merest whisper, as much spoken with her eyes as with her words. God be with you.

  He nodded, the briefcase with the priceless paintings hidden in newspapers at the bottom clutched in his right hand. We'll meet again after it's over. He smiled as though he were going to the office. Maybe in New York.

  She giggled softly then. You're crazy.

  Maybe. And then his eyes grew serious. But I love you, too. And it was true. She had touched him, come to him in a moment when he needed a gentle friend.

  And then, saying nothing further, he tiptoed softly past her to the door. She held it open, locked it behind them, and waved one last time as he tiptoed softly down the stairs. She quickly took refuge in her bedroom, and then at last she heard the sound of her mother's car driving swiftly through the gate.

  Auf Wiedersehen, my darling. She watched from her window and stood there for almost half an hour, thinking of the first man she had ever kissed and wondering if they would ever meet again.

  Chapter 10

  There was nothing evident in her father's manner the next morning that would have led anyone to suspect that something was amiss, nor in Ariana's when they shared breakfast. And that afternoon when the chauffeur reported solemnly that Frau von Gotthard's old Ford had been stolen, Walmar immediately called the police. The car was found later that evening, abandoned near the train station and unharmed. And it was slyly but amusingly suggested that Gerhard had been the culprit and had gone for a little ride. The police attempted to conceal their amusement, and Gerhard behaved with appropriate outrage when he was called. But the matter was left to the family to handle, the police were thanked, and the car was put back in the garage.

  But I didn't take it, Father! He blushed hotly, standing facing Walmar.

  Didn't you? Well, in that case, then I suppose everything is all right.

  But you think I did!

  It doesn't matter. The car is back in the garage. Please see to it, however, that neither you nor your friends attempt to ' er ' borrow ' your mother's car again. It was an attitude he detested taking, but there was no choice. Ariana understood it clearly, and she attempted to console Gerhard as she ushered him from the room.

  But it's so unfair! I didn't! And then he stared at her. Did you?

  Of course not. Don't be silly. I don't know how to drive.

  I'll bet you did!

  Gerhard, don't be silly! But suddenly they were both laughing, and they walked arm in arm up the stairs to their rooms, Gerhard convinced she'd done it.

  But despite Ariana's jovial manner with her brother, Walmar saw that there was something much amiss. She was more quiet than usual in the mornings, and when she returned from school or her volunteer work in the evenings, she disappeared immediately into her room. She was difficult to draw into conversation, and at last, a week after Max had left them, she sought her father alone in his study, and her eyes were washed with tears.

  Have you heard anything, Father? He knew instantly. It was just as he had feared.

  No, nothing. But we'll hear. It may be some time before he's settled enough to let us know.

  You don't know that. She sank into a chair beside the fire. He could be dead.

  Perhaps. His voice was sad and soft as he watched her. And perhaps not. But, Ariana, he is gone now. Gone from us. To his own life, wherever that will lead him. You can't hang on to him. We are only part of the old life he has left. But it frightened him to see her, and the next words escaped him before he could make them stop. Are you taken with him, Ariana?

  She turned toward him, shocked at the question. She had never known her father to ask something like that. I don't know. I ' She closed her eyes tightly. It's just that I was worried. He could have ' She blushed faintly and stared into the fire, unwilling to tell him the truth.

  I see. I hope you aren't. It's difficult to dictate these things, but ' How could he tell her? What could he say? In times like these it is best to save our loving for a brighter day. In wartime, in difficult circumstances, there is a sense of romance that is often unreal and may not endure. You may see him again years from now and find him quite different. Not at all the man you remember from last week.

  I understand that. It was why she so carefully avoided any involvement with the wounded men at the hospital where she worked. I do know that, Father.

  I'm glad. He sighed deeply as he watched her. It was another turning point for him. Yet another fork in their ever more treacherous road. It could also be dangerous to love a man in Max's position. Now he is fleeing, someday soon he could be hunted by the Nazis. And if you attach yourself to him, they could hunt you, too. Even if no harm comes to you, the pain of it could destroy you, as in some ways the pain of losing Sarah almost destroyed him.

  How can they punish people because of whom they love? She looked angry. How can one know beforehand which is the right side and which the wrong?

  Her childish question, so na+>>ve, yet so right, brought the memories of Kassandra flooding back ' he had warned her ' she knew '

  Father? Ariana watched him search himself. He seemed a million miles away.

  You have to forget him. It could be dangerous for you. He looked at her sternly and her eyes never wavered from her father's.

  It was dangerous for you to help him, Father.

  That's different. Even though, in a sense, you're right. But I'm not tied to him with that same bond, the bond of loving. And then he looked at her more closely. And I hope neither are you.

  She didn't answer, and at last he walked to his window looking out over the lake. He could almost see the Grunewald cemetery from his windows. But in his mind's eye, he saw her face. As she had looked when he had warned her. As she had looked the night before she took her life.

  Ariana, I'm going to tell you something that I never wanted to tell you. About the price of loving. About the Nazis ' about your mother.

  His voice was a gentle, distant sound. Ariana waited, baffled, staring at her father's back. It is not a judgment I make of her, or a criticism, I am not angry. I am not telling you any of this to make you feel ashamed. We loved each other deeply. But we married when she was very young. I loved her, but I didn't always understand her. In some ways she was different from the women of her times. She had a kind of quiet fire in her soul.
He turned to face her then. Do you know that when you were born she wanted to take care of you herself, not to have a nurse? It was unheard of. And I thought it was silly. So I hired Fr+nulein Hedwig, and I think something happened to your mother. After that she always seemed a little lost, He turned away again, silent for a moment, and then he went on. When we had been married for ten years, she met someone, a younger man than I. He was a very famous writer, he was handsome and intelligent, and she fell in love. I knew about it almost from the beginning. Perhaps even before it began. People told me they had seen them. And I saw something different in her eyes. Something excited and happy and alive again, something marvelous. His voice grew softer, And I think, in a way, it made me love her more.

  The tragedy of Kassandra was not that she was in love with a man other than her husband, but that her country had fallen into the hands of the Nazis, and the man she loved so desperately was a Jew. I warned her, for her own sake and for his, but she wouldn't leave him. She wouldn't leave either one of us, in fact. In her own way she was loyal to us both. I can't say I ever really suffered from her attachment to this man. She was as devoted as she had been before, perhaps more so. But she was equally devoted to him. Even when they stopped publishing his work, even when they shunned him, and at the last ' His voice cracked and he could barely go on. Even when they killed him.

  She was with him the day they took him. They dragged him from his house, they beat him, and when they found your mother, they ' beat her ' they might even have killed her except that she thought to tell them who she was so they left her alone. She made her way home. And when I got here, all she could talk about was that she had disgraced me and how afraid she was that they would hurt us. She felt she had to offer her life to secure ours ' and she couldn't live with what they had done to him. I went to a meeting for two hours, and when I came home, she was dead. In the bathroom of her rooms down the hall. He waved vaguely toward the rooms Max had occupied only a week before.

  That, Ariana, is the story of your mother, who loved a man the Nazis wanted dead. She couldn't bear the pam of the reality they had shown her ' she couldn't live with the ugliness and the brutality and the fear' . So he turned to face his daughter "in a sense they killed her. Just as, in a sense, they may dare to kill you, if you choose to take the risk of loving Max. Don't do it ' oh, God, please, Ariana ' don't ' His face sank into his hands and for the first time in her life Ariana heard her father cry. She went to him, trembling and silent, and held him tightly in her arms, her own tears falling onto his jacket as his mingled with the gold dust of her hair.

  I'm so sorry ' Oh, Papa, I'm so sorry. She said it to him again and again, horrified at what he had told her, and yet for the first time in her life, her mother had become real. Papa, don't ' please ' I'm sorry ' I don't know what happened ' I'm so confused. It was so strange having him here in that bedroom ' in our house, hidden, frightened. I wanted to help him. I felt so sorry for him.

  So did I. Her father raised his head at last. But you must let him go. There will be a man for you one day. A good man, and I hope the right man, in better times. She nodded silently as she dried a fresh cascade of tears.

  Do you suppose we'll ever see him again?

  Perhaps one day. His arms went around his daughter. I hope we will. She nodded and they stood there, the man who had lost Kassandra and the little girl she had left him with instead. Please, my darling, be careful now, while we're at war.

  I will. I promise. Her eyes turned up toward his then as she bestowed on him a tiny smile. Besides, I never want to leave you.

  But at that he laughed softly. And that, my darling, will change, too.

  Two weeks later Walmar got a letter at the office. It had no return address and contained a single sheet of paper with a hastily scrawled address. Max was in Lucerne. It was the last that Walmar von Gotthard ever heard of him.

  Chapter 11

  The summer passed uneventfully. Walmar was busy at the bank, and Ariana was busy at the hospital three mornings a week. With school no longer an obstacle, she had more time for her volunteer work and more time to run the house. She and Gerhard and her father went on a week's holiday to the mountains, and when they returned, Gerhard turned sixteen. His father announced with amusement on the morning of his birthday that now his son was a man. That was apparently also the opinion of Hitler's army, because in the desperate last push of the fall of 1944, they were drafting every man and boy within reason. Gerhard received notice that he was being drafted four days after the birthday that he and his father and sister had celebrated with such glee. He had three days to report.

  I'm don't believe it. He stared at the notice over his breakfast. He was already late for school. But they can't do that ' can they, Father? His father looked at him gloomily.

  I'm not sure. We'll see.

  Later that morning Walmar visited an old friend of his, a colonel, and learned that nothing could be done.

  We need him, Walmar. We need them all.

  It's that bad, then?

  It's worse.

  I see.

  They had discussed the war, the colonel's wife, and Walmar's bank for a few moments, and then resolutely Walmar had gone back to his office. As he sat in the back of the Rolls-Royce driven by his chauffeur, he pondered what he had to do. He would not lose his son. He had lost enough.

  When Walmar got back to his office, he made two calls. He returned to the house at lunchtime, extracted some papers from the wall safe in his study, and returned to work. He didn't get home that evening until after six, and when he did, he found his children upstairs on the third floor, in Gerhard's bedroom. Ariana had been crying and Gerhard's face was filled with fear and despair.

  They can't take him, can they, Father? Ariana believed her father was able to move mountains. But her eyes held little hope. And neither did Walmar's when he answered softly.

  Yes, they can.

  Gerhard said nothing; he only sat there, stunned at what had befallen him. The notice still lay cast open on his desk. He had read it a hundred times since that morning. Two other boys in his class had also received their notices. But he had said nothing of his own. His father had told him to remain silent, lest there be something that he could do. So that means I'm going. He said it in a dull, flat voice and his sister gave way to fresh tears.

  Yes, it does mean that, Gerhard. Despite the stern voice he eyed his children gently. Be proud to serve your country.

  Are you crazy? He and Ariana stared at their father in shocked horror.

  Be still. On his last words he closed Gerhard's bedroom door. With a finger to his lips, he urged them closer and then whispered softly, You don't have to go.

  I don't? It was a jubilant stage whisper from Gerhard. You fixed it?

  No. Walmar shook his head seriously. I couldn't. We're leaving.

  What? Gerhard looked shocked once more, but his father and sister exchanged a knowing glance. It was like Max's flight only a few months before. How will we go?

  I'll take you into Switzerland tomorrow. We can say that you're sick here at home. You don't have to report until Thursday that's not for another three days. I'll take you over the border and leave you with friends of mine in Lausanne, or in Zurich if I have to. Then I'll come back for your sister. He glanced gently at his daughter and touched her hand. Perhaps she would see Max again after all.

  Why doesn't she come with us? ' Gerhard looked puzzled, but his father shook his head.

  I can't get everything ready that quickly, and if she stays here, they won't suspect that we're pulling out for good. I'll be back here in a day anyway, and then I'll leave with her for good and all. But you're all going to have to be absolutely, totally quiet about this. Our lives depend on it. Do you understand? They both nodded.

  Gerhard, I've ordered you a different passport. We can use it at the border if you have to. But whatever you do in the meantime, I want you to look resigned to going into the army. I even want you to seem pleased. That also means in this h
ouse.

  Don't you trust the servants? With all his sixteen years Gerhard was still naive. He overlooked Berthold's preoccupation with the Party, and Fr+nulein Hedwig's blind faith in Adolf Hitler.

  Not with your lives.

  Gerhard shrugged. All right.

  Don't pack anything. We'll buy everything we need there.

  Are we taking money?

  I have money there already. Wahnar had been prepared for years. I'm only sorry that we waited this long. We should have never come back from vacation. He sighed deeply, but Ariana tried to console him.

  You couldn't know. When will you be back from Switzerland, Papa?

  Today is Monday. We leave in the morning ' Wednesday night. And you and I will leave on Thursday night after I go to the bank that day. We can say we're going out to dinner, and then we will never come back. It will take a little maneuvering to get the servants to think Gerhard reported to the army without saying good-bye. As long as you keep Anna and Hedwig out of Gerhard's rooms tomorrow and Wednesday, we can just say he left too early Thursday morning to see anyone at all. If you and I are here, no one will suspect anything. I'm going to try and be back in time for dinner.

  What have you told them at the bank?

  Nothing. I won't have to explain my absence. There are enough secret meetings going on these days that I can easily cover myself there. All right, both of you? Is everything clear now?

  The war is almost over, children, and when it ends, the Nazis will pull everything down with them when they go. I don't want either of you here for that. It's time for us to go. We can pick up the pieces later, Gerhard, meet me in the caf+! around the corner from my office at eleven in the morning. We'll go to the train station together from there. Is that clear now?

  Yes. The boy looked suddenly grave.

  Ariana? You'll stay up here tomorrow and look after Gerhard, won't you?

  Absolutely, Father. But how will he leave the house in the morning without being seen?

  He'll leave at five before anyone gets up. Right, Gerhard?

  Right, Father.