by Murray Pura
“Shh…” she soothed. “Shh, my love.”
“I don’t understand.” He could hardly get the words out. His voice was rough and low, making it difficult to hear. “I don’t understand any of this,” he whispered.
“Sit with me.” She took him to the couch and held him as she spoke, now and then kissing his head and face softly, moving her fingers over his cheeks and through his wet and tangled hair. “The doctor made the diagnosis in the fall. I asked him to keep it in strictest confidence because I wanted the winter to be happy. I wanted you flying, Victoria to be joyful about having her baby in May, and Lord Preston and Edward in London making their speeches. What good would all the moping and fussing have done if I’d announced it sooner, my love? It would not stop the cancer that is all through me. So as long as I could tell everyone it was a bad illness that was hard to treat during the cold weather, I decided to do that.”
“We have to tell Mother and Father,” Kipp choked out. “There may be places we can take you in Paris or Madrid…or in America.” He stroked her hair in a clumsy fashion, his eyes dark. “I will cable Michael and Libby right away. In New York we can—”
“Non, non, Kipp. I told you. The cancer is everywhere. It cannot be cured. It’s not in just one place where you can feel. It’s inside me all over. I can feel it everywhere. It was this way when the doctors discovered it.”
“Chris, I can’t just watch you die in front of my eyes without trying something…without doing something.”
“I want you to love me, and cherish me, and rock me. Trust me, that will be the best blessing.”
“A blessing?” Kipp framed her small face with his damp hands. “How can you say that?”
“Christians say they wish to be with God, oui? But when it comes time to die, they do not want it to happen so soon. If I cannot stay here with a good mind and a strong body, I wish to be with God. It’s better for you, and me, and Matthew.”
“No! No, it’s not.”
“I will become less and less of me, so yes it is, my darling.” She kissed each of his eyes. “That is why I asked Caroline to love you. You will need her after I am gone. You will need someone who loves you. She is someone I trust, and knowing she will be helping you makes this easier for me.”
His body stiffened. “How can you expect me to turn to her, to betray my love for you?”
“You will not betray me. I want you to return her love, to love her. I asked her to let you know she still loves you and will love you when I’m gone.”
“How could you ask her that?”
“I do not want you and Matthew to be alone. And I don’t want you bringing home a woman I don’t know to love you and Matthew. I think a great deal of Caroline. Matthew likes her and he likes Charles.”
“I want nothing to do with Caroline. I feel as if she played with my heart, trying to draw me to her when I still have you.”
“How can she play you if she loves you?” Christelle gripped his face with sudden strength. “Caroline did not want to approach you. She did not want to hurt me or hurt you. She didn’t want to do this for me. I argued with her. I pleaded with her. I cried, yes, until she said she would try. She did not think you loved her anymore.”
“I don’t.”
Christelle smiled softly. “We must be about the truth now, my love. There’s no time for lies. Caroline is a good woman, and it is right for you to love her.”
Kipp’s face grew dark with anger as blood rushed to his cheeks. “No, I can’t. Not now.”
“Kipp, I want you to love her.”
He shook his head. “I can’t accept that.”
“I prayed for you to understand you have this love in you, do you know that? God knew I would be taken early. He knew Matthew would have no mother around and you would have no wife, no lover. I do not want a stranger in my house. I do not want a stranger holding you and saying she loves you when she does not. I do not want a woman I don’t know raising my son. I love Caroline, and you love her. She loves both of us, and she loves Matthew. I see that in her. I want you and Caroline to be with each other when I’m gone.”
“No one in my family will accept such an arrangement, Chris. We don’t have your French way of looking at things, your ability to accept one person loving two people at the same time. I can’t lose you one day and take up with another woman the next. Certainly the Scarboroughs wouldn’t approve either. This wild plan of yours will not work.” He ran his hands through her now silver hair. “What I need is for you to live.”
She put her hands on his arms. “My love, I will not live. Not here on this earth. I will be in a different place. Here, you will need another to hold you. I know you, and I know you need that. So let a year go by if you must, but let the love blossom while you must be apart. People and their foolish notions! Let Matthew play with Caroline’s Charles often. Visit a lot. Make sure there are family gatherings where you can talk discreetly. A year after I am gone, marry her.”
“I won’t.”
“You must! If you love me, you will marry her. I have told you—I trust her. I trust her with you and Matthew. I have said this again and again, and you do not want to hear me. If you love me as much as you say, you will do this for me. You will be honest with yourself and admit the love you’ve always had for Caroline even while you loved me with all your heart. You will put a ring on her finger, cherish her, make a home with her, and create a loving family. If you do this, you will make me the happiest woman in heaven.” She ran her fingers down the side of his face.
She suddenly grimaced and doubled over. Kipp clutched her as well as he could, supporting her through the pain.
“How often is this happening?” he demanded. “Are you all right?”
“Just…just hold me,” she said through gasps. Finally she caught her breath. “It doesn’t happen…that often.”
“You should be in a hospital.”
“No! I do not want to die in a hospital room.”
“They can control the pain much better than anything you or I can do here.”
“I have medications here—opiates. It looks worse to you than it feels to me, I’m sure.”
“So that’s why.”
“Why what?”
“Your calmness. The way your eyes are now and then. I didn’t see it often, but when I did I didn’t know what to think.”
“I have not used large doses. And I have not used some every day. Only recently have I needed more.” She rubbed his arm. “I’m sorry, Kipp. Perhaps I should have told you a long time ago. But non, I did not want you worked up for so many months. Non…”
He kissed her hair and closed his eyes. “You’re so beautiful, love. This is not right. God knows this is not right.”
“Jesus was crucified and died slowly after being whipped, yes? Paul was décapité. Andrew faced crucifixion. Peter a crucifixion also. We are not spared suffering, but it does not mean we are not loved by God.”
“Your calmness confuses me. You’re dealing with something terrible. We can’t keep pretending it’s a winter illness. This is a crisis! We must tell my family.”
“No, it would change everything.”
“You are already sick, and everyone is worried. Do you think letting my father and mother wake up one morning to find you dead is going to bless them or be any easier on them?”
She patted him on the back. “Shh…shh. Matthew needs another hour of sleep or he will be un monstre—très difficile. Hold me more tightly, my love. I like to listen to your heart beating.” She snuggled into him. “Of course you are right. They are family. It is important there comes a day when they will be told. I turn thirty on the second of June. You could arrange a party—a grand party. Everyone will be happy. Everyone will act normally. A few days after that, I will tell the family. Oh, but I do not look forward to them moaning and groaning over me, but I see it must be done.”
“What about your parents?”
“S’il te plaît, amène-les ici pour moi.”
�
��Would they let me fly them to your party?”
“Fly? No. Someone must help them get here on the train or by car.”
“I will take care of that.”
“I want you here with me.”
“I will see to it. Harrison is at the estate in Dover. It’s just a short hop from there. Someone can take him, and he can come back by car or train with your parents. I’ll do anything that will please you.”
“It will please me to have Caroline and Charles here for the birthday also.”
“No.”
She lifted her head. “You said anything.”
“She made me feel like I was betraying our love.”
She held his jaw in her hand. “She reached out to you as I asked her to do, as I prayed for her to do. Now I am asking you for this. Will you bring her and her son to my birthday party? Oui?”
“Chris, I can’t do that—even for you.”
“Will you bring her? Oui?”
May, Pura, Switzerland
Catherine glanced out the window as her son was led about on a tall, white Lipizzaner stallion. The baron kept his hand on the young boy’s leg as he walked beside the horse while Herr Salzgeber, the stallion’s owner and trainer, led the horse along the beach. Behind them Lake Lugano was a blaze of blue and white in the spring sun. She watched for a few moments, smiling. Then she turned and looked at the sheaf of papers on her desk.
Das Wesen des deutschen Geistes ist nicht Gewalt sondern Schöpfung…The essence of the German spirit is not violence but creation, it is not exclusion of the races but inclusion, not fear of the Jew but friendship with the Jew. It is not simply ensuring industrial capitalists have the liberty to generate wealth for themselves, but that those they employ also have the means to secure housing, food, clothing, knowledge, and the assistance of a physician when there is illness or injury. What makes Germany great is a vast and generous involvement with Europe and the human race—not a retreat from the European nations or the peoples of the earth or a desire to make war against them under misguided notions of Teutonic pride and identity.
A hand lightly touched her shoulder. Recognizing the touch, she leaned her cheek against the hand and arm. “As usual, your writing is eloquent,” she said. “I see you took my advice to be more forthright.”
Albrecht, red scarf around his neck even though the day was warm and the house comfortable, sat down on the arm of a couch near her. “Ja, ja. Ich glaube, Sie haben recht. I believe you are right.” He ran a hand through his messy hair and adjusted his reading glasses. “Are you almost done do you think?”
“A few more pages. Why?”
“I have translated my next-to-last chapter for you. I hoped you could read it before dinner.”
“Next to last? Really? That’s quite an accomplishment. Of course I can. Sean only wants me around if he skins his knee.” She laughed as she watched him on the stallion again. “Even then he probably wouldn’t cry out. Instead he’d look to the baron or Herr Salzgeber to help him. Or perhaps he’d simply bite his lip and tough it out.”
Albrecht took a look over the top of his glasses. “It’s true. The boy acts like a ten-year-old who wears a saber at his waist. Your young cavalryman. How he has grown up since February!”
“His grandparents probably won’t recognize him at the birthday party for Christelle. And yet he’s just two.” She leaned back in her chair and gave Albrecht her warmest smile. “I wish you would reconsider. The family has included you and the baron in the invitation.”
He was looking at the chapter in his hand and turning over the pages. “I hope my grammar in the English is correct.” He glanced at both sides of one sheet. “Yes, your sister-in-law’s thirtieth birthday, hmm? She is French and from Amiens, isn’t she? Or somewhere close to Amiens? It is only seven years since the armistice, and France harbors a great deal of hatred towards Germany. I don’t think she will want to see me there.”
“If you knew Chris, you wouldn’t say that. What an amazing soul she is! She loves everyone—yes, even a nasty German such as you.” She kicked him gently with her bare foot. “Please reconsider.”
“We have much to do before my book can be published.”
“A few days at Dover Sky—what will that cost you? Besides, I have two kings I have not played.”
He continued to peer at the pages scrawled with handwriting. “Ah, a card playing reference…Liverpool Rummy or American poker?”
“She has read your book—the one on suffering.”
“What?” Albrecht lifted his head sharply. “Christelle has?”
“Yes.”
“She has not. How could she?” He took off his glasses and stared at her.
“The baron gave my father an English translation of it last year. Chris found it at Ashton Park and read it. She said she liked it very much. Her English is excellent, so she didn’t have any problem understanding it.”
“She read it?”
“Yes! I promise you. She’d be dazzled if her German theologian showed up at her party. Can you imagine?”
“Hmm…that is quite a card to play. What is your other one?”
“Well…me.”
“You?”
She leaned forward and put a hand on his knee. “More than three months we have been together here. I have grown used to all your little habits and quirks, as well as your constant gallantries. And none of them irritate me. I have grown quite fond of them.” She paused and then decided to say it. “And quite fond of you.”
“You have never said a thing about this! I thought we agreed in February we would be good friends and working partners and nothing more during this time together.”
“That’s what we said in February. Now it’s almost June. I’ve decided to change my mind.”
Albrecht put the pages he was holding on the floor. “How much of a change are we talking about?”
“A great deal of change. A sharp change in the weather—and for the better. A distinct change of seasons.”
“You are being as bold as I usually am.”
“Bolder! I guess I have picked it up from living in this chalet with you. If you come to Dover Sky that will tell me I mean something to you too. That I am more than just a friend or working partner.”
“If I come? This sounds very manipulative…almost Machiavellian.”
“It is very manipulative and is bordering on the Machiavellian, I grant you that. But it’s not a game of rummy, professor. The reader of your chapters and the editor of your book has taken a very deep interest in you.”
“As a writer?”
“As a writer and theologian…and a man.”
“We’ve never even kissed.”
“Yes…well…come to Dover Sky with me, and I’ll see what I can do about that.”
Half of his mouth curved upwards. “That sounds like a third card.”
“I suppose it is.”
“An ace?”
“Certainly not a joker.” She patted his knee again and sat back. “Have I thrown you off your game?”
“I admit it will take a great deal of concentration to get back to my final chapter, Catherine.”
“So then it means something to you when I say these things?”
“Means something?”
“It matters to you that I care about you?”
Albrecht gazed at her. “Of course! I’ve always liked you…only there was this sadness in your eyes—you were like a dark moth. I did not know if it could be chased away or by what means a person could help cause it to vanish.”
“So is it gone?”
He nodded. “For the most part. I’m not sure if it was the mountain air, or your son taking to the white horses, or the Swiss cooking and chocolate, or—”
She kicked him with her bare foot, a bit harder this time. “Stop it!” she commanded before laughing. “I’m serious.”
“So am I. All those things bless a person and take one out of tunnels and caves. I’m at a loss to say what I may have done that I had not alrea
dy done to encourage you to be intrigued with me. The same old flirting, the same old teasing, the old-world Prussian charm. Nothing was new here in Pura. In fact, there was less of it because I was so caught up in writing the book.”
“Well, I suppose that was why. I was captured by your devotion to a cause. I was fascinated by what I read, chapter after chapter that you translated into English because you cared so much what I thought. Only an extraordinary man can write this well, this profoundly, this passionately. I have feelings for you because the book allowed me to read your heart.”
“Is this another card you’re playing?”
“It may be another card, but all my cards mean something, Herr Hartmann.” She drew a circle on his pants-covered leg with her toe. “I feel quite like a young woman of twenty-one again when I’m here with you. I wanted to leave a dungeon behind and get out into the light of day, and I did! I thank God in my prayers every night for your invitation to come here. My late husband may be in heaven, but I haven’t been anywhere remotely close—until this winter and spring.” She pushed her toe against his leg. “It wasn’t just the snow and the mountains and the sunshine and fresh air, Herr Hartmann. Or the cooking or the Lindt chocolate. It was you.”
Her eyes took on a golden light Albrecht had never seen.
“I want you to come to Dover Sky, my theologian. I want you to come as my man as well as my writer and my professor. Will you do that? Or is Berlin more important? Is Tubingen more important?”
He breathed out noisily. “What a bomb you drop on my head! I can scarcely think.”
“Good!”
“Good?”
“If I didn’t matter to you one way or the other, what I’ve just said wouldn’t have knocked you off your stride. Is that not true? I care about you, Albrecht. It matters a great deal to me that I see you also care about me. That I affect you.” She stood up. “Come with me, please.”
“Pardon me?”
“Can I make it any plainer? Komme mit, bitte.” She glanced out the window and saw that the white stallion with her son astride was far away, moving along the lakeshore. She held out her hand. “It will only take a moment, and then you can get back to your book.”
