A House on the Rhine

by Frances Faviell

  The policeman had said that the news was a tremendous tonic for the whole country. It was a sign that they were recovering their former place in the world of sport. The other would follow, was following, he said. He was far more tolerant than Joseph, who was grateful to him, but horribly ashamed. Moe got them to bed. She was upset too, but she would not let Joseph see that she was. Anna dealt ruthlessly with the twins; she was disgusted, and thankful that Krista was at a cinema with the younger boys.

  After the policeman had gone, Joseph and Moe had the first interchange of words on the subject which had lain silently between them all these weeks.

  “We can’t go on like this,” he said heavily. He had not been able to trust himself to speak to her after Franz Joseph’s revelations that she now went down the road to Frau Fischer’s to visit her lover. He had been so outraged that he had just taken himself off. Now he saw that things couldn’t be for ever pushed away. He must have it out with her.

  “Look at what’s happening to the boys!” he said. “I’ll never touch another drop of spirits from this evening onwards.”

  “Joseph!” she cried, “d’you really mean that?”

  He asserted that he did. “I’ve been drinking to escape from all this mess we’re in,” he said roughly. “And you—what you’re doing—is that for the same reason?”

  Was it? She didn’t know. But she answered “Yes” mechanically when he pressed her.

  “You’ve got to stop it!” he shouted violently. “You can’t really care for a boy like that! It’s ridiculous.”

  She studied him carefully. He wasn’t so lifeless as he had seemed. When he was roused like this his face was as hard as granite. It was a strong face but lately it had been as devoid of vitality as Rudi’s was devoid of character. She sat there now, thinking what a splendid man she could make from the two of them. Each had what the other lacked. It would have been easy to lie now but she was truthful. She did love Rudi no matter what Joseph said. She loved him. She saw his faults; his weakness, his cowardice, his leaning on her, his desire for her warmth and assurance. But when she thought of his childhood, his adolescence, of all that he had told her of his unhappy life, she understood it in some maternal sort of way. And he gave her something, something she needed.

  “What d’you get out of it?” Joseph demanded angrily again. She wanted to shout “Love! That’s what I get. Love, affection, pleasure. Things you never gave me, never even considered as a possibility for me”. But she said carefully that Rudi treated her as a person, not just as a housewife, a mother, an everyday necessity to be made use of and regarded as such. Joseph stared at her as if she were mad. Did she think she was a young girl to have these silly ideas.

  “But that’s what a woman is meant for,” he said in genuine astonishment. “Didn’t we marry for exactly those reasons? That you should look after my home and bear and tend my children?”

  “That was years ago,” she said bluntly; “I was only eighteen. We change, all of us. Times change. Women are not as stupid as they were. We want to be ourselves, not just part of a man’s life.”

  He looked at her in stupefaction. “You’ve been listening to all these silly talks on the Woman’s Hour,” he said bitterly.

  “What if I have? It helps to get the potatoes peeled. Nothing stays the same. It can’t. I’m sorry I’ve wronged you but you’ll never understand.” She had burst into tears, a thing she did so seldom that Joseph knew she was genuinely moved.

  “I’m no good at words,” he said gruffly, “but I thought of you night and day all those years I was away. What’s happened to us? What?” And when she didn’t answer but just sat there with set lips he went on, “Carola started it all. You were knocked sideways by that and I wasn’t kind enough. I should have been especially good to you then. But I’ve changed too. You’re right. We change. There are so many things I can’t forget. Things in the war. Things I saw—and did. They haunt me. They blind me to everything else. And now I see it all coming back again. It’ll all happen again with rearmament and newer, more terrible weapons. War’s like time, it repeats itself. You can’t get away from it. Did you hear what that policeman said? The other will follow! Once we get an army it will all start again!”

  He put his head in his hands but she had seen that look of helpless acceptance again on his face. She hated it and she hated his absorption in politics. It was all this silly rubbish at the works which depressed him. That Peter; he was always working Joseph up about something the Government was doing or about to do.

  “What’s the good of concerning yourself with all these matters?” she urged. “They only make you miserable. Why can’t you put it all out of your mind. Forget it all.”

  “Can you?” he demanded.

  “Yes,” she said decidedly. “For me every day is a new life. It’s the only way. I learned that during the war, in that bunker. It was the only possible way to endure it.”

  “I can’t do that,” he said heavily, “I’m too old, I suppose.”

  They went to bed. Not together. But there was a better feeling between them than for a long time. She had the strong intuition that he had forgiven her, that it would not be long before he asked her to resume their normal life again. Did she want that? She was indifferent. That was the truth. But it would be better for everyone if he forgave her. She saw that. She pushed away the absolute despair which the thought of never seeing Rudi again evoked in her. There was always something. One couldn’t have everything. Some women managed it. But not her sort.

  At breakfast next morning Joseph was gentler than he had been for a very long time. The small children were excited about the policeman having brought the boys home last night. Hank was sullen and silent. The twins were ashamed and very apprehensive. Had they known it, so was Hank. What would Leo say to this? Had they let out anything dangerous last night? Pa had a new air of authority too. Did he think that their lapse last night gave him the right to lecture them like this? Hank stood it only because he was not sure whether anything damaging had come out last night. He had to find out. He accepted Joseph’s angry remonstrances quietly. For the moment, that was all. Let him wait. He forbore to argue or to apologize. He just said nothing. The twins were upset. The police! They had been brought home by a policeman! Visits from them in the past had invariably meant trouble. For bicycles without lamps, for riding on footpaths and numberless small but punishable incidents. Katie started to defend Hank and the twins by saying that they had learned to get drunk from Pa. Moe shut her up instantly and fiercely. She was not going to have the new atmosphere between her and Joseph spoiled by a brawl this morning.

  Later in the morning a message came from next door that Moe was wanted on the telephone. She knew at once that it was the hospital. They often sent messages through the British house. Hank was always furious when this happened. He would get them a telephone of their own soon, he boasted. It wasn’t shortage of money which prevented his getting it now, it was the number of lines and instruments installed for the damned Occupation which kept so many German families without one. Moe always laughed. Telephones were not for them she retorted. Why, who would use it? She had never used one in her life until Carola was taken ill. She hated the thing. It usually meant bad news. Lately she had admitted its uses. She could ring Rudi up at his work if necessary from the public call-box outside the post office.

  Apprehensively she went next door. The sister in charge of Carola’s ward wanted to know if she would come this afternoon at two o’clock. It was very important. She asked frantically if the child were worse and received a non-committal answer that she was not to worry. But she did worry. She felt sick with anxiety as she went back.

  As she hurriedly got ready to go to the hospital she thought all this over. She had pleaded with Joseph for leniency for the boys. Why, it wasn’t so long ago that his own skittles team had won the match for the whole district and he had come home as merry and as noisy as the boys. Had he forgotten that so quickly? This victory was a great event
in the minds of lads keen on sport. Surely they could be excused for once.

  Katie was out shopping. The child Peppi was playing on the floor in the kitchen. She thought he looked much happier when his mother was out. He was growing into a pretty boy with those large mournful eyes and his dark olive skin. His baby hair was changing from gold to a darker shade now. It had the curious mixed look which some women had from dyeing theirs. This coming child of Katie’s! It wouldn’t be so bad if the girl liked children, but she didn’t. It was horrible. When Katie came back, she told her abruptly about the hospital telephoning.

  “I expect she’s worse,” Katie announced. There was no commiseration in her voice, and she regarded her mother curiously as she said it. It was extraordinary that Moe was so fond of this child Carola. She doted on her. Just as Pa doted on Krista. Katie considered them quite objectively as people. She hadn’t the slightest feeling for either of them. But she admired Moe. She liked her assurance, her air of being ready for anything. Joseph she despised.

  At the hospital Moe was asked to wait a little. In reply to her frantic question, whether she had been summoned because Carola was worse, she was reassured. What was it then? Was it the question of the Confirmation again? Or were they just putting her off, and Carola was really worse? As she sat in the waiting-room her hopes rose and died a thousand deaths. At last the sister came and took her to the door of the ward. It was not visiting day. That was why she was so apprehensive. Sister put her head round the door. “Ready?” she called.

  “Yes, she can come in,” came the voice of Sister Ruth.

  “Shut your eyes,” said the sister gently; “shut them tight and don’t open them until I tell you.”

  In a sweat of real fear Moe did as she was told.

  “Look, look now, Moe,” came the soft little voice of Carola.

  She opened her eyes. Carola, in a wheel chair, was facing her in the centre of the ward. She was dressed in a pink jacket and a shawl covered her legs. She looked frighteningly small and frail in the great chair. But her smile was heart-breaking as she slowly and with a tremendous effort held out both arms to her mother.

  “You see?” cried the nuns round her chair, “she can raise both arms, and now Carola is going to give you a surprise, aren’t you, Carola?”

  Several doctors were standing there watching. One of the nuns removed the shawl from the child’s legs. Moe drew in her breath sharply—she drew it with such difficulty that it was painful. Carola’s wasted legs, as thin and pathetic as her sticks of arms, were strapped to iron supports.

  She gave a cry and moved towards the child.

  “Wait,” said a doctor laying a restraining hand on her arm.

  “Come, Carola.” The other doctors had lifted the child from the chair. They each took one of her hands.

  “Steady,” said the doctor standing beside Moe. “Now Carola, try, try now. Walk to your mother, try as we have been showing you all these weeks. Come.”

  The child stood poised, wavering, when the doctors let go of her hands. In her eyes was a terrible determination. The fear of falling was visible on her white face but her eyes, fixed unwaveringly on Moe, were brilliant.

  Moe stood motionless. She couldn’t move or say a word. She knew she should be encouraging Carola but the shock and relief were too great. With an effort in response to the doctor’s low words she held out her arms.

  “Come, my darling, come to Moe.” Her voice was so gentle that her neighbours would not have recognized it. Her family knew it as reserved only for Carola. Katie had heard it like that when she had listened at the keyhole during those long afternoons in the lodger’s room.

  At her mother’s voice Carola took two steps forward. They were lurching, unsteady steps, but they were steps.

  “Splendid, come on . . . come on,” urged the doctor standing by Moe.

  Carola paled, the fear of falling was now dominant. Tiny beads of sweat dripped down her face. The effort was agonizing. There was absolute silence as the child gathered up her strength again. The children in the beds round the side of the ward were watching breathlessly. Suddenly she took three quick unsteady steps and fell with a little cry into her mother’s arms.

  Moe clutched Carola to her. Sweat ran down her face as well as the child’s, and one of the doctors mopped his brow. Sister Ruth took Carola gently from her mother and put her back in the chair. She lay back absolutely exhausted but triumphant at her feat.

  “It’s a miracle,” breathed Moe. She was weeping unashamedly now. “It’s a miracle.”

  “She did it herself,” said the doctor who had stood with Moe encouraging the child, “with patience, determination, and courage. She was determined to walk. Determined to surprise you. She has been trying for weeks now, but she wouldn’t let us tell you. She’s been having under-water treatment and it’s had amazing results. But the real recovery has been achieved by Carola. From her sheer determination to come home to you. Carola’s a brave girl. Isn’t she, children?” He appealed to the children watching open-eyed.

  “Yes, yes,” they cried.

  “And you must be as brave and as patient as she is and you’ll all get better too,” he continued.

  “And will she really be able to come home?” asked Moe eagerly.

  “Not yet,” he said quietly, “but she will eventually. It won’t be so very long now. She’s got to walk without those supports first, and that’s where you can help us. You can give her the incentive for that extra effort which she can’t make for anyone else. You’re tremendously important to Carola. Her recovery is largely due to you.”

  Moe could not speak. The praise of the doctor was sweet to her. Sweeter still were those words, “You’re tremendously important to Carola.”

  “She’s one of the most lovable children I’ve ever treated,” he said. “Are all your children like this one?”

  Were they? Had they been? Anna had been lovable. The twins were lovely boys, always had been. Katie never. She considered them one by one. Robert was docile and sweet. But there was a reason for his being different, and perhaps for her not liking him as much as the others. Krista was not hers. No, the pick of the whole bunch was this small, frail thing with the gold hair and huge dark eyes. She had pulled at Moe’s heartstrings ever since she had been born.

  “On Sunday will you bring Pa?” Carola asked.

  Moe nodded. If she had to carry Joseph herself she would get him here on Sunday. These days he never wanted to visit this child. Couldn’t bear to see her lying there. Now it would be different. He would see her standing on her feet, a thing they had never thought to see again.

  Moe tried to thank the specialist as she said good-bye to him.

  “Don’t thank me,” he said, “God has given her back to you. We never thought she would walk again. I may as well tell you that.”

  A celebration followed, with cakes and sweets for the children. Carola sat in state as hostess. The nuns had invited everyone who had helped in the child’s treatment, the doctors, masseurs and nurses. It was wonderful, and Moe came in for a lot of interest and praise. The thin child in the next bed to Carola’s, her special friend, was wheeled out next to the hostess’ chair. “I won’t want Carola to get better too quickly,” she said to Moe. “She’ll go away, and I’ll be left here all alone.”

  “You’ll get better too,” said Moe quickly.

  “Oh, no,” replied the child, “I’m a hopeless case, I heard them saying so . . . my mother doesn’t come any more. She can’t stand it. I have to stay here until I die.” She stated it as a matter of fact. Moe was shocked, but more shocked that there was no denial from anyone.

  XXIII

  IN THE tram on the way back Moe met Father Lange. She began to pour out her news about Carola. But he knew all about it.

  “I go there every week,” he reminded her gently, “and I knew that you were going to get a surprise today.”

  He knew of her devotion to this child. God sometimes worked things out in a strange way. Perhaps thi
s child was to be the one thing which would save Moe. He asked her whether she would now agree to the child’s confirmation. Mightn’t they wait until Carola could walk unaided up the church at home? asked Moe eagerly. He smiled, understanding her wish for this miracle to be viewed by the whole village. Very well, he concurred, they would wait. Suddenly she said abruptly, “You’re a good man, Father. I’ll try to be better. I will, truly. You’ve been so good to Carola,” and before he could tell her that it was God whom she must please and not him, she was gone from the tram.

  She had been away from the house for almost four hours. The hospital was over an hour’s journey. When she got in she saw that Joseph was at home. She went up to him at once, full of delight to tell him about Carola, to where he was standing in the yard staring at a new motor cycle which was flashing in the sun. The boys had told him that the machine belonged to Hank. When she eagerly spoke to him about Carola he was scarcely listening and made no comment.

  “Where’s Hank?” he demanded, cutting her short.

  “Call him,” she said tartly. She was bitterly hurt at his lack of interest in her news.

  Hank came strutting in. He was now quite unabashed about last night. He had decided that the policeman knew nothing. They had given nothing away. When one came to think of it, it was very funny to have been brought home tenderly by one of the blasted police. If only the fool had known that all three of them were members of a dangerous gang. Why it was damned funny! It had been a glorious evening last night. He didn’t regret it at all. His only regret was that his head had ached all day. But everyone at the repair station was suffering from the same thing and allowances had been made.

  Joseph wasted no time. “Whose machine is this?” he snapped.

  Hank looked boldly at his father and said rudely, “Mine, of course, whose did you think it was?”

  “Where did you get the money?” demanded Joseph.

  There was a pregnant silence, then Hank laughed. “Saved it,” he said loudly.