by Ursula Hegi
This is how it begins. Again. Between them.
“I want to know what you know.”
“They live with a shipbuilder and a teacher.” Lotte sounds like she used to when they were all still together, joyous and strong. “Their children are grown. They moved out long ago.”
“The parents miss them,” he says cautiously.
She turns to him. “So much devotion waiting for our three when they arrived.”
He shifts closer. Tilts his forehead against hers. “A gift for them to have children in their house again.”
For Lotte he’ll stop resisting, let her pull him inside her illusion. To keep the children from vanishing altogether, he must give them food, clothes, life. He can do that. Still, what keeps him sane is that he knows the difference. He is not about to leap into the sea to find his children. For Lotte, he will imagine colors on Rungholt. Doesn’t the island emerge from the Nordsee once a year? You believe. That is your offering. And if you do that with all your soul, you’ll be with your children again.
She doesn’t stop him when he brings his mouth to her breast, brings himself, and she’s ready, is almost ready for him except he’s sucking so hard that she instinctively slips her thumb into the seal, something she hasn’t done since she loosened Bärbel—the seal of her other babies’ mouths was lighter—thumbnail against her nipple, the fleshy top of her thumb toward her daughter, then the gentle plop of letting go.
—and she’s right back to nursing her daughter—not now not now not—but it’s her husband still at her. She bends her elbows, and when he falls from her, she hinges her fingertips in the wide hollows of her clavicle, her forearms a gate of bones. How foolish to think we can find one another again in the sweet-hidden where our children began.
He’s squeezing his eyes shut—
“Kalle?”
—eyes shut till he can see them again, his children, a string of small shapes fluttering from Lotte’s hand, dancing, except he can’t tell who is next to her, who in the middle, who at the end of this string of shapes that spools and unspools like the strings of kites he built as a boy, silk paper the colors of church windows stretched across strips of balsa wood, bits of cattail fluff knotted into their tails for steadiness.
A kite would have risen.
He moans, and she presses the back of one wrist against his left cheek. It used to ease him, bring him back to himself because that’s how he must have slept in his mother’s womb, curved on his left side, the back of his wrist to his cheek. Moon sculpts the planes of his face. How young he looks, Lotte thinks. How young we were on our wedding day. My sixteenth birthday. He just seventeen. She traces the muscles of his neck and down his sternum where she first traced him when she was fifteen, before they dared touch lower, touch sin. It became their code for wanting.
* * *
When Kalle awakens in his marriage bed, he can’t recall falling asleep, but already he is sleeping again, dreaming of some animal scrambling across his legs. The smell of piss. Kalle stirs, feels the weight shift, the dream shift, wonders if you can smell piss in your dream. And once again he is losing children. Setting them aside for a moment. Forgetting them. Careless.
Light then, slanting through the window, and next to him Lotte, eyes still closed. Nestled against her is their lastborn, spindly legs folded to his belly. Kalle can see the boy pull himself up the railing, scramble across the railing and down to the floor and onto the big bed by himself, burrow between his sleeping parents. No. Lotte, she must have gotten up, walked barefoot across the cold floor to carry Wilhelm here. First, she wraps herself into the puckered robe she keeps on the hook by the door to the Kinderzimmer—children’s room—that Wilhelm used to share with his sisters and his brother, her robe big enough to envelop the boy and herself as she lifts him from his crib and brings him into this bed—
Is that where the boy has been sleeping all those weeks and months I’ve been away? Swinging both legs across the edge of the mattress, Kalle stands, his head low so he won’t hit it against the ceiling that slopes from the peak above the bed. The habit of memory. The habit of rising thousands of mornings with Lotte and keeping my head low.
The boy scuttles to Kalle’s side of the bed, pushes something beneath the pillow—Hannelore’s doll—and plants his stinky rump on the pillow.
“What are you hiding there?”
Sitting like a tailor with his knees out and his heels together, he rocks himself, eyes deep-set in his scrawny face. To think how chubby he used to be. Now the edges of his body draw inward. Kalle’s other children were sturdy at his age.
“If you don’t want me to know what you’re hiding,” he tells Wilhelm, “I don’t mind.” But he does. He does mind.
Forward and back Wilhelm rocks. Listens to ghost-sheep chomp chomp on dike pull fog from ground chomp chomp fog crawls up unhides legs of ghost-sheep unhides bellies.
Forward and back he rocks, just like Martin, Kalle thinks. Soothing himself. Slow. Quiet. But then faster till he bangs the back of his head, mattes his hair. Martin howled whenever Lotte combed out the tangles, though she was gentle; but he’d sit quietly on the knees of his father who eased the tines of a fork into the knots to loosen the pale, straight hair, inhaling Martin’s little-boy smell of sweat and of milk. But Martin stopped rocking himself before he turned one. And now Wilhelm is banging his head, same pale hair. When he sways forward, Kalle slips a pillow behind him to stop him from hurting himself. Startled, Wilhelm halts, wiggles his shoulders to test the softness. Squints at Kalle as if he knew his thoughts. Too thin, too quiet, this one. Kalle’s other children always awoke with some sound—giggling or crying or babbling before language became words. He’d plant kisses on their bellies when he tucked them in at night. How they laughed, especially Bärbel. He has not done this since the wave. Cannot imagine doing this with the lastborn.
He turns from him, scoops yesterday’s clothes from the birch shelves he built along the low walls. Such fine carpentry, the neighbors say. But fine carpentry is child’s work for a toymaker schooled to carve the most delicate details.
* * *
Ahead of him black and white stripes. The zebra. Travelers coming upon the zebra in this haze may think they’ve reached the shore of another continent or wandered into a dream of where they truly want to travel. And what will they think of me? That I’m a ghost come home? A gentle ghost, I hope.
He hopes Lotte will let the zebra stay on Nordstrand, grazing with the sheep, roaming, even if he’s no longer here. But he doesn’t know how to tell her he’ll meet up with the Zirkus again come spring. Not yet.
In March she startles him by asking, “Are you leaving again?”
“Do you want me to leave?”
“That’s not what I asked.” And it’s not even the true question, the question she won’t ask because she shouldn’t have to. Why don’t you stay with me?
“We can write to each other, Lotte.” He wants both, his family and the Zirkus.
Lotte’s eyes go hard. “She’s too old for you.”
“Who?”
“As if you didn’t know.”
“If you want I’ll stay with you—”
“—and with Wilhelm—”
“With you and with Wilhelm … that week in August when the Zirkus comes to Nordstrand.”
“One week?” she shouts. “One week is not staying.”
“One week plus maybe five months in winter. I’ll talk to the Ludwigs about wintering here. More space for our animals than in Emmerich. Farmers can board the animals in their barns and sheds, carpenters can repair the wagon wheels, the blacksmith can shoe the horses and ponies. They’ll appreciate the income, Lotte. I’ve thought about this a lot. If they agree, I’ll set up arrangements for winter training when I come back next August.”
But as March nears April, he doesn’t mention winter training again and becomes so evasive that the unsaid between them fills all space. And she is short with him, so distant that he convinces himself she wants hi
m to leave—that’s why he must leave before she can send him away; and to her it’s obvious that Kalle doesn’t want to stay—that’s why she must send him away. Their last night together, he tugs her nightgown back down, covers her as if he had not been inside her, as if they had not just loved one another. As they lie side by side without touching, it comes to them that they’ve never felt this lonely.
PART SIX
Spring 1879
28
A Balance of Bees and Humans
The beekeeper comes to us with bare arms, sturdy arms. His eyes follow the bees that buzz against our walls and windows, not bashing themselves, but establishing their domain. No net over his sun-browned face. Not even a hat. Such is his regard for the bees, that he will not veil himself when he approaches them. And they know. Their buzzing escalates to welcome him.
“They’ve made your wagon their hive,” he tells us.
“We live in a hive,” Heike sings. “We live—”
“What can you do?” I ask him.
“Get the entire hive out, or it will lure other bees.”
“—in a hive. We live in a hive. We—” Her eyes glisten. “I saw you.”
He looks at her with such kindness that I can no longer smell my fear for Heike.
“I have eyes in my head.” She points two fingers at her eyes.
He smiles, this tall man, points two fingers at his eyes. “I have to be careful so I don’t poke my eyes out.”
“Careful!” She drops her hand. Pulls his hand away from his face.
“Thank you,” he says.
“I saw you. On the bad day. When Hannelore drowned.”
“Yes. That bad day. We were all there.”
And then I know—that early. Because I’ve learned from Herr Ludwig about kindness in men. Not men like The Sensational Sebastian, all flicker and excitement. But men like the beekeeper. With him my daughter will be safe in the world. Because he’ll protect her once I’m dead. Because she’ll be a child forever, excitable, as close to laughter as she is to tears. Because he is the one I choose for her.
* * *
The day he returns for the bees in a horse-drawn buggy with high side panels, I invite him to eat with us in our wagon. When I praise my daughter’s Rouladen—pounded slices of beef rolled around pickles and bacon—her eyes flicker with tears, and I worry she’ll blurt out that Cook has prepared our meal.
Cook likes to tease her about her tears: “Du hast zu nah am Wasser gebaut.” You’ve built too close to water. She’ll kiss Heike’s forehead. “I’ll make you Pfannekuchen.”
Cook takes pride in her cooking. Tripling a rabbit stew into soup by adding water and vegetables. Making cabbage rolls or, when we are flush, goulash with much paprika. Most food Cook cannot chew with her little teeth, soft like a child’s milk-teeth. Still, she enjoys making them for us: Reibekuchen (potato pancakes), Gebratene Würstchen (fried sausages).
To distract Heike, I tell the beekeeper, “Your patience with bees is amazing.”
“Ideally I remove them and keep them alive.”
“Live dowry,” I blurt.
Heike claps her hands.
He laughs, startled.
When he detaches the huge hive, he doesn’t get stung. The bees come with him, willingly, and he carries them to his buggy. To insulate our wagon, Heike and Silvio cut tall bulrush stems from a pond.
“Moses was in a basket made from bulrush,” she informs him, “and he almost drowned.”
“I wonder where you got that story.”
“From your father, Silvio.”
“Are you sure?”
“You know…”
Silvio chuckles. “He told me that same story at least a hundred times.”
“See? You know.” Heike raises a long stem toward his face, tickles him.
They whack the velvet-brown heads against a tree till they burst and collect the white fibers in a sack. Together we seal every crack in the Annunciation wagon.
* * *
We eat dinner at The Last Supper, and when we leave, Hans-Jürgen calls after Silvio, “What are you limping for?”
“I’m not limping.”
“You’re doing a great impersonation of a limping man.”
“Just a grown-in toenail.”
“Let me take a look.”
Silvio shakes his head.
“Big toe?”
“Ja.”
“Which one?”
Silvio kicks an imaginary ball with his right foot.
“You need to relieve the pressure before—”
“It’ll heal by itself.”
“It’ll grow into your flesh. Pus and blood and infection and—”
“Blood poisoning,” Herr Ludwig teases.
Silvio grimaces.
“Amputation for sure.” Herr Ludwig clicks his tongue.
“You’re in a good mood,” says Silvio.
“Let the man look at it, Silvio.”
“He can tell me what to do and I’ll do it myself.”
“You’ll need a sharp knife,” Hans-Jürgen says. “Small enough to cut—”
“I’m not letting you near me with a knife.”
“I said let the man look at it,” Herr Ludwig booms and slides aside on the bench. “Sit here.”
Silvio sits.
“Stretch out your leg,” says Hans-Jürgen.
Silvio crosses his arms.
His father rolls his eyes. “Leg. Not arm. Stretch out your damn leg.”
Silvio stretches out his leg.
Fingers light and fast around his toes. Hans-Jürgen. “Hold still.”
A flicker. Touching in public. Silvio does his best to appear bored. “Just do it.”
Hans-Jürgen is talking with Silvio’s father. Stringy arms, both of them. “If I cut a V shape into the top edge of the toenail, it’ll grow toward that V and—”
“Good,” says Silvio’s father.
“—detach from the sides.” Hans-Jürgen unfolds a pocket knife.
“Just do it,” Silvio growls.
As his father and Hans-Jürgen lean across his toe, shoulder to shoulder, it comes to Silvio that this is what he wants—the not-hiding.
The cut doesn’t hurt; change is instant—like a pinch released—when you’re still hurting but no longer fighting to get free.
* * *
The beekeeper asks us where the Zirkus will be next and bunks with Kalle when he travels to bring us gifts: dried chamomile and fennel; a clay jar with honey.
“Heike admires you,” I lie to him.
He says, “I love how your voice rises at the end of each sentence, and how your eyes are set so far apart.”
“Heike keeps talking about you.”
He describes my face to me as though I’d lived without mirrors. “Such space in the upper half of your face, Sabine. That wide forehead. Slope of your cheeks as if you’re forever exhaling after a long breath.”
A man I would cherish if I were Heike. But I won’t consider him for myself because I’ve chosen him for my daughter, this decent man who’ll honor his promises and his legal duties if he agrees to marry my daughter.
“So lovely and so strong.” He brings the side of his hand close to my face. Draws its outline into the air without touch.
Still, I feel the heat of his skin. I can’t allow myself to think it’s me he wants. That’ll pass once he marries Heike.
“Heike has that kind of face too,” I tell him.
* * *
A lacy bouquet of dried hydrangeas on his next visit.
“The beekeeper brought you Hortensie blossoms.” I hand them to Heike.
“Dead things.” She drops them.
He picks them up. “Preserved. A different phase of their lives. I hang them upside down from rafters to preserve them.”
“I don’t want dead things.” Heike skips away.
While he’s left with the blossoms in his arms.
“My daughter is intuitive … but not always practical.”
Gravely, the beekeeper nods.
“She has so many strengths … fearlessness and charm and generosity.”
“You have those strengths too.”
“Except for fearlessness.”
“I see you as courageous.”
“I pretend to be more courageous than I am.”
* * *
First Sunday of May he brings a crate from the toy factory that Kalle’s friend Köbi was supposed to deliver.
“I told Köbi I was coming this way anyhow.”
Inside the crate: one hundred carved lions; half as many zebras; dancing dogs in tutus; monkeys you can link arm to arm in a chain. The toymakers have also carved animals the Ludwig Zirkus doesn’t own—giraffes and seals and elephants—but will sell at the concession stand.
“I cannot see into my own future,” the beekeeper tells me, “but I can see into yours.”
“And what do you see?”
“That I am there.”
“As my son-in-law.”
He shakes his head, startled. “It’s you I want to marry, Sabine.”
“That would make Heike your stepdaughter.”
“Yes.”
“At the mercy of your new wife.”
“Wait— Who is this new wife?”
“If you and I married—”
“That’s what I want.”
“—and if I died, your new wife could throw Heike out.”
“I don’t want to marry this new wife. She’s mean.”
We both laugh, though it isn’t funny.
We could still stop, but I ambush him. “As Heike’s husband, you’ll be responsible for her.”
“I’ll be responsible for Heike as her stepfather.”
“Until the new wife—”
“Enough, Sabine. Enough now.”
But his kindness is no match for my perseverance, and I reel him in for my daughter. Bait? I don’t know. I’m not proud of that. But I’m not ashamed of keeping my daughter from harm.