Dear Jo, I am gradually coming to believe that everything can turn out well for me. But for that I first had to travel to the other end of the empire. If you had not been so insistent, I would not be here today, dear Josephine. I will always be grateful to you for that. For the first time in my life, I am earning my own money. That is such a good feeling . . .
Smiling at her own words, Clara read through what she had written. She could not believe herself how her life had turned around in the few weeks she had been in Meersburg. To get a job in the first pharmacy she visited—she would never have dreamed it possible.
Of course, I miss my children above all else, but I have to be strong. At the moment, there is little I can do about Gerhard and his court orders. It is for the best that I concentrate on creating a secure livelihood for myself and . . .
Clara looked up when a shadow fell across the stationery. It was Lilo, standing beside her with wet hair and a towel over her arm. “May I join you?”
“Of course,” Clara replied happily, and turned to wave over the waitress. But the girl had already seen her boss and hurried over with a breakfast tray specially prepared for Lilo: an apple cut into slices, a slice of lightly buttered brown bread, and a cup of tea. No wonder Lilo was slim!
Lilo nodded in the direction of Clara’s pen and paper. “Another letter to your children? I will bet that your ex-husband intercepts every one of your letters and that the children haven’t read a single line you’ve written.”
Clara’s expression darkened. “I fear you’re right . . .” To distract herself from the depressing thought, she pointed to Lilo’s wet hair. “Is something broken in the bathroom? Did you take a quick wash in the lake?”
“I was swimming,” Lilo said matter-of-factly.
“You were what?”
“Since I don’t have the time for cycling anymore, I go swimming every morning. Half an hour, or an hour if I can spare it. After that, I feel fit for the day,” said Lilo, and took a hearty bite from her slice of bread. “But I was a bit late getting out today. Normally, I make sure I get back into the hotel unseen.”
Clara was speechless. She didn’t know a single woman who could swim. And Lilo talked about it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
“But how do you know how . . . I mean, swimming is not exactly safe. The lake is very deep, I’ve been told. Aren’t you afraid of going under?” And what if a fish started to nibble at you? The thought made Clara shudder.
“Go under? The water holds you up. You float in it. It’s a fantastic feeling!” Lilo laughed. “I’ve got an idea. A little exercise would do you a world of good, too. You spend all your time working, reading, and writing letters, and that’s not healthy. You need exercise and fresh air! And swimming is really very easy.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, I’m the least athletic person in the world!” said Clara, horrified. “Just think of my first attempts to ride a bicycle. I fell so badly that I broke my leg.” If it hadn’t been for that accident, she never would have found herself in the hospital and probably never would have met the young doctor, Gerhard Gropius. Her life would have been completely different.
“Cycling was simply the wrong kind of sport for you,” Lilo said resolutely. “But swimming is harmless, and you don’t have to be athletic to do it. Besides, why else is the lake there? The water is still nice and warm, and you have to make the most of it while you can.” She lifted her cup of tea as if proposing a toast to Clara. “Bright and early tomorrow! Six o’clock at the gate on the terrace, the one that leads to the shore.”
What am I doing here? Clara asked herself while she stood shivering at the agreed meeting place, a towel over her arm, at six o’clock on the dot the next morning. She had to be at the pharmacy at nine, so she could still be curled up in her toasty bed.
Patches of thin fog drifted across the lake, and she could only make out the Swiss shore as a distant hazy line. A light breeze blew over the water, and it was decidedly chilly. Clara pulled her cardigan a little closer. So cold, and she was supposed to get undressed and go into the water? She didn’t even own a bathing suit! And she was afraid of the lake . . . Why had she let Lilo talk her into such a silly idea? She wanted to go back inside.
But just then Lilo appeared, striding along and wearing a huge smile. “We have to go to the right,” she said by way of a greeting, and off she marched before Clara could even object.
After just a few hundred yards, the well-made path that followed the shore away from the Hotel Residenz petered out into nothing. Here, tall reeds and other water plants lined the water’s edge and made it difficult to get through. The path trodden through the reeds by Lilo and perhaps other walkers was so narrow that the women walked single file. Clara’s cardigan was constantly getting caught on reeds poking out into the path. Might as well throw it away as soon as I get back, she thought grumpily. And whenever a water bird, disturbed by their passing, flew out with a shrill cry from among the clumps of reeds, she jumped. Her mood grew worse and worse. She could not see how anyone could freely submit themselves to such tortures every single morning.
After a ten-minute march, the reeds thinned out and they came to a small bay. Lilo stopped and threw her arms out wide. “My very own beach!”
Gravel crunched under Clara’s feet and glittered colorfully in the light from the rising sun. Instinctively, she crouched and picked up a singularly lovely gravel stone. It felt warm and smooth in her fingers. Small waves sloshed onto the shore, almost as if they were stroking it.
“It feels as if we’re the only people on earth,” Clara whispered almost reverently. How warm it was there, where the sun didn’t have to fight the breeze. How silent and tranquil.
The magic of the moment was interrupted abruptly by Lilo, who said, “Come on, get undressed! You can swim naked if you want. No one can see us here.”
Clara looked at Lilo aghast. Naked? She had never in her life undressed in front of another person. Not even Gerhard. “I’d prefer to keep my petticoat on, if that’s all right,” she said with embarrassment.
Lilo shrugged. She undressed, piled her clothes together neatly, and deposited them at the edge of the little bay. Then, stark naked, she stepped into the water.
“You can go out a good thirty feet here and the water will only be up to your chest, so you don’t need to worry. Come on, we don’t have all day.”
With her face turned away toward the reeds in mortification, Clara took off her clothes. But Lilo was not looking at her. With powerful strokes, she was already swimming out into the lake.
Clara dipped one toe in the water to test it. She was surprised to find that it was almost warmer than the air, and so clear that she could see the bottom. Lilo was right—it wasn’t very deep there at all. Clara took a few steps forward and, a moment later, was standing knee deep in the water. Small waves lapped at her petticoat, which clung wet and heavy to her legs. Maybe she would feel better when she was wet all over? Screwing up all her courage, Clara crouched, but when she was completely enveloped in the water, she realized that it was, indeed, quite chilly. Her heart beat harder. It all felt a bit scary.
Before her anxiety could get the better of her, Lilo appeared beside her. “Really, swimming isn’t hard at all. Look, you move both arms like this . . .”
Clara watched her friend carefully. It didn’t look too difficult. With her feet still touching the bottom, she tried to do the same as Lilo.
“Very good! Now all you have to do is take your feet off the bottom and paddle them up and down in the water, like this.”
Clara, encouraged by her initial success, tried to imitate the way Lilo tread water. Clara lifted her left leg. The right stayed on the bottom like lead. And if she raised her right leg first, and then the left?
“I don’t trust myself!” she cried out, giggling hysterically. “Can you still swim if you’re standing on one leg?” If she rowed strongly with her arms and hopped along the bottom with one leg at the same time . . .
Clara had no choice but to overcome her fear and lift both legs. When she could no longer feel the firm lakebed underfoot, she let out a little yelp of fear, but Lilo’s hand held her up securely, and Clara relaxed again. Rowing with her arms, paddling with her feet, and being supported by Lilo, Clara crossed the width of the little bay. Before the water got too deep, Lilo turned around with her, and Clara “swam” back. She tried to say, “This is fun,” but as soon as she opened her mouth for the first word, she swallowed water.
“Well done! You’re a natural at this,” said Lilo when they returned to their starting point. Then she let go of Clara, who immediately poked around for the bottom with her feet. “Now do it without me.”
Clara hurriedly paddled with her arms back toward shore. “Isn’t that enough for today? You already said that I did well for a beginner.”
But Lilo shook her head.
It took a very long time before Clara dared to lift her second foot off the bottom of the lake. But finally, after a lot of frantic squealing, splashing, and swigs of lake water, she managed to do it.
“Now swim! Swim, go, move!” Lilo spurred her on.
And Clara moved. At the start, her arm movements were as hectic as the kicking of her legs. But to her own astonishment, it wasn’t long before her movements became smoother and more deliberate. She didn’t have to splash like a madwoman to stop herself from going under. The water supported her as Lilo’s hand had before.
“This . . . this is amazing!” she said, then coughed out a mouthful of water.
Ten minutes later, both women were back on the shore. Clara felt as exhausted as if she’d just spent hours shoveling coal. Her arms were shaking, and her legs felt like jelly. Yet at the same time, she felt a sense of happiness she had never known before. She actually swam in Lake Constance!
Laughing, she wrung the water out of her hair with both hands. “My skin feels as soft as a baby’s,” she said in astonishment.
“That’s the lake water. It’s a blessing not only for the skin, but for your well-being generally,” Lilo explained as she pulled on her clothes.
For Clara, however, it was a struggle to get out of her wet petticoat before she could get her dress on again. “Next time, I’ll go without my petticoat,” she said, but more to herself than to Lilo, who just smiled.
Respectably dressed again, they stood for a moment longer and looked out over the water, where boats were starting to appear. Fishing boats, but also passenger ferries and a pleasure steamer, its wake churning into large waves. The magical hour in which the lake belonged only to them was over.
“Thank you,” said Clara softly. “Me and swimming—I never would have thought it possible. If you don’t mind, may I come with you another time?”
“What are you talking about?” Lilo frowned. “Swimming is something one should do regularly. The best thing for you would be to swim every day. All the way into November, by the way. The water will get colder week after week, but that will toughen you up! And it frees your head for new acts of courage.”
“New acts of courage? It took all the courage I have just to come to Meersburg, thank you.”
Lilo laughed out loud. “That’s what you think! The lake air doesn’t just free one’s mind; it makes the people around here downright feisty. You’ll surprise yourself.”
Chapter Eleven
In the last days of September and into October, Clara settled more deeply into her new life. Along with her work at the pharmacy and the hotel, Clara went swimming with Lilo in the early morning and passed the evenings reading, with the exception of one night a week. On Wednesday evenings, she went with Elisabeth Kaiser, the fisherwoman she had met on the boat, to sing in the church. The choir was in urgent need of new voices, Elisabeth had said one day as she delivered a supply of trout to Lilo’s hotel. Lilo had immediately begged off—too much work. But Clara had no excuse, and to her astonishment she discovered almost as much pleasure in singing as in swimming.
By mid-October, many guests had departed, and the town grew quiet. The steamboats that carried passengers across the lake almost hourly in summer shut down for the season. The lake turned gray, and only fishing boats dared the choppy early-morning waters. After a week of steady rain, the lake had become distinctly chilly. Driftwood and weeds floated on the rough surface, and the bottom of the lake was only occasionally visible. Clara had to steel herself to get into the water, but within a few strokes she was overcome by the feeling of happiness she felt the first time she went swimming with Lilo.
Every morning when the two women met, they were accompanied to their bay by a sense of wistfulness. Would today be the last time? At the start of November, it came. “That was it for this year,” Lilo announced when they teetered out of the water, covered in goose bumps again. For better or worse, Clara agreed. In recent days, it had taken her a long time to feel relatively warm again after bathing in the lake.
“I’ll miss the swimming,” Clara said.
“What about going for a run instead?” Lilo immediately suggested. “You’ll certainly be warm enough, and you’ll stay fit, to boot.”
In her own way, Clara took up Lilo’s idea. Dressed in her coat and with a wool cloth wrapped around her ears, she went walking every morning: up to the vineyards, along the paths that led through the reeds, or along the esplanade by the lakeshore. Walking like that, taking in the sweeping views across the lake, she felt a calmness, a peacefulness, fill her. Day by day, she felt freer, and she allowed herself thoughts that she had subdued for a very long time. Who was she really, when it came down to it? For many years, she had been the good daughter of Sophie and Anton Berg; she had said and done everything they had asked of her. Then she became the wife of well-known gynecologist Gerhard Gropius and suffered at his hands. And finally, a devoted, self-sacrificing mother. And now? Who was she today, here and now? What was inside her? That was hers to find out.
It was a drab November day, the kind of day that didn’t want to brighten at all, when Clara unlocked the door to one of the guest rooms overlooking the lake. Although it was only three in the afternoon, she switched on the light. Erika, the chambermaid who normally cleaned the rooms in this wing, was in bed with the flu, so Lilo had asked Clara if she could jump in. Of course Clara had said yes. It wasn’t many rooms, and neither the guests nor Lilo minded that she could only tend the rooms in the afternoon.
Calm had settled over the Hotel Residenz, too, and of the forty rooms available, only ten were in use—regular guests who, for various reasons, spent the winter by the lake. One was a writer who wanted to finish the book he was working on in peace and quiet. There was an elderly couple there to escape the bitterness of the Black Forest winter. And there was also an older woman visited often by a Swiss gentleman, who usually stayed the night—Lilo and the workers in the hotel turned a blind eye and went about their business.
Clara had no idea what had moved the woman whose room she was currently cleaning to come for an extended stay at Lake Constance. Besides, she had other things on her mind. The pharmacist’s little boy had spent the entire morning coughing piteously. This did not surprise Clara in the slightest. The old house wasn’t warm enough now that winter had come; despite a fire burning in every room, an unhealthy, cold, damp climate prevailed. The baby needed to see a doctor urgently, Clara had advised his worried parents. But instead of doing that, the pharmacist had cooked up a cough mixture of honey and ribwort that he and his wife had then administered to the child. After that, Clara had not voiced her opinion that it would definitely be for the best if the young family were to find a more comfortable apartment. Was that a mistake? she wondered now, as she wiped invisible dust from the white-lacquered dresser with its makeup mirror. Should she have been more insistent with them? They were
both extremely unworldly in the most everyday matters. A small pot of cream beside a comb and brush atop the dresser caught her eye. “Healing ointment,” it said in black letters on a yellow label. “White lead, camphor, lanolin, and other ingredients,” she read on a smaller label on the back. Strange mixture, she thought, then her thoughts returned to the Weingartens. Maybe it was better if she said nothing. Who was she, after all, to give well-meaning advice to other people?
The next moment, her thoughts were abruptly interrupted when the room door swung open.
“Don’t let me disturb you,” the woman said to Clara. She was around seventy years of age, and she wore a shawl around her shoulders and felt slippers. “We’re playing bridge in the library, and I’ll be gone again in a moment. I just came up to put on a spot of cream.” As she spoke, she opened the pot of cream on top of the dresser and dipped her right index finger in. Then she lifted her hair away from the back of her neck.
“Stop!” Clara cried as she saw the woman’s neck, the now-exposed skin covered with pustules.
The woman paused.
“I do beg your pardon.” Clara paused, embarrassed. “But with your skin condition, that cream is far too strong. You need something gentler, with mild ingredients.” A chill ran through Clara as she spoke, but her face flushed hotly at the same time. What in the world had gotten into her? Just this morning, she was lecturing the Weingartens, and now she was laying down the law for Lilo’s guest!
The woman looked from the daub of cream on her finger to Clara and back. “And how would you know what is good for my skin?” she asked in a haughty voice.
The Queen of Beauty (The Century Trilogy Book 3) Page 8
