A House on the Rhine

by Frances Faviell

  “What’s wrong?” she asked fearfully.

  “This is the third one, Krista,” said Pa to the men, “but she won’t know anything about it.”

  “About what?” she asked, staring at the uneasy group.

  “Oh, some silly old belt,” began Anna.

  “One moment, please, let us question her.” The policeman smiled reassuringly at her and held up a narrow black belt.

  “Ever seen this before?” he asked, looking hard at her.

  In astonishment she took it from him and examined it carefully. She had seen it before. But where? She recognized the clasp. It was an automatic catch which came undone too easily for safety. An unusual clasp, although the belt was commonplace enough.

  She looked up to answer, and caught Katie’s eyes hard on her. There was a menace so clear and so insistent in them that she hesitated. Was it the belt from that new frock which Leo had given Katie? Was it? Surely it was too small for Katie. Hank’s face held an anxiety which was unmistakable as she looked at it again.

  She felt rather than saw the fixed watchful faces of the whole family as she handed it back to the policeman. What was it all? Why did they all wait for her answer like this? She saw Katie’s eyes again and she knew suddenly that it was her belt. She took a deep breath. She had lied already. What did another matter? They all clearly expected a denial.

  “No. I have never seen it before,” she said unsteadily.

  “Sure?” persisted the fatherly old policeman. “If you’re not sure, don’t be afraid to say so. It’s important.”

  Hank’s eyes conveyed a warning which was now urgent.

  “I have never seen one like this,” she said faintly.

  “Strange,” said the man as he took it from her. “Your young brother here thinks that one of you—he doesn’t know which—had a similar one.”

  “Children say anything,” declared Moe comfortably. “How can he know? Can you describe the belt your wife is wearing today?”

  The man shook his head, laughing. “But you’re wrong about children,” he said. “They’re very observant.”

  “What’s it all about? Whose belt is it?” asked Krista fearfully.

  “Ah”, said the man in plain clothes. “If we knew that we’d be nearer to knowing who murdered that old caretaker a few weeks back. This belt was found near his body. Under it, in fact.”

  “But why should you bring it here?” insisted Joseph. “Why here?”

  “Because,” said the man slowly, his eyes on Katie who was deadly white, “two youths and a girl were seen, not only near the scene of the crime, but also near this house on the night of the murder. But you were all in bed early that night. Your father says so.”

  He got up. “Well, that’s all then. The boy must be mistaken. After all, boys seldom notice their sisters’ belts.” Robert opened his mouth to speak but Hank growled, “Shut up. You talk too much.”

  They took their leave after apologizing for the lateness of the hour. They had waited for Krista to come in. And she, looking with foreboding from one taut face to another, knew that she had stepped again into an atmosphere so fraught with fear that for her to tell Joseph of her decision now was utterly unthinkable.

  “There are many other families in the village who ride on motor cycles,” said Moe, as she saw them out. “You’d better go and ask some of them.”

  “Of course. It’s a routine check,” said the plain clothes man politely.

  XXVI

  KATIE lived now in constant fear. Always on the defensive, her naturally highly-strung nerves were stretched to breaking point. In her dreams the face of the dead caretaker haunted her, and she would awake terrified and sweating from her unrefreshing sleep. At times, alone in the garden, or sitting by the river, she would have a vision of the tourist’s body washed up in the reeds. Whenever she now saw any unusual object such as a tree trunk or a piece of wood caught in the thick reeds her heart would almost stop beating. Furious with herself for her yellowness she was incapable of overcoming these horrible fancies.

  It was this wretched baby! Soon everyone would know. She was frightened of that, too. Moe would be all right. She would never turn her out. Moe was kind in spite of her rough tongue. But Pa! He would be angry, as Moe had said. She had never seen him so angry as he had been over Hank’s motor cycle. For a long time now, nothing had seemed to move him to such intensity of feeling as Krista. He’d been violent enough over her and her American. She hated Krista. She could scarcely restrain herself from hurting her physically sometimes. Katie was the only one of the family who had resented her adoption.

  In her sharp quick mind she knew that she was not loved by anyone. She got on best with Hank. They understood one another well enough and there wasn’t even a year’s difference in their age. She loved Leo with all the passion of her violent temperament. She had watched with anguish his passion for her fade—then die. He no longer even pretended that he cared at all for her. He wanted Krista now. That was the latest! He had twice asked Katie to bring her along one evening and to get her to join the gang. When, from sheer defence, Katie had angrily refused, he had tackled Hank.

  Hank was taken aback at his chief’s request, but determined that he shouldn’t have anything to do with Krista. The very thought of Leo and Krista maddened him. It was unthinkable. He made no excuses, but merely said bluntly that it was impossible.

  “Why?” asked Leo.

  “She’s different,” said Hank lamely.

  “That’s why I want her,” said Leo. “Why should you care about her? She’s not your sister. She’s nothing to you. Why all this fuss about her?”

  Hank was silent. She wasn’t his sister. That was something which he had just begun to realize. Krista was no blood relation to him. If he wanted her there was nothing to prevent his having her. Nor Leo either. He wondered why the thought of Krista was coming so frequently to his mind lately. Was it because Leo had designs on her? Was it because that young American wanted to marry her? Was it his father’s obsession with her?

  He had noticed that girls in the village had what was a “vogue” with the lads. If one boy was keen on a girl, then invariably, if she was attractive, others were round her too. Was this what was happening to Krista now? He had heard Anna tease her about the young supervisor who always tried to follow her now, had heard her joke about the way men in the tram were beginning to look at her. He had known Krista as his sister always, but the thought of Leo being attracted to her made him begin to think of her in terms which were not brotherly. He had never been attracted to a girl, never. He was over eighteen: it was time he had a girl. In his rather stupid mind he longed for one because he had some idea that it would gain him greater admiration in the gang.

  But the gang did not fit in with Krista. She would be horrified if she knew of it. She was not afraid of him as the younger ones were. He had never harmed her, never. He asked himself why, and simply could not find an answer. She had always had something which instinctively made him want to protect her. Something soft, shy, appealing. She was everything a girl ought to be—and never was. When he thought of the girls in the gang they seemed as far from Krista as if they belonged to another sex.

  When Leo repeated his request that Krista should be brought along the next evening, Hank refused again, bluntly and firmly.

  Leo was accustomed to getting what he wanted. He determined to work on Katie. He called at the house the evening after the row over Hank’s new motor cycle. Katie was in the garden and her eyes hardened at the sight of him. He had put her in this vile position. She was carrying his child and he neither knew, nor would he care, if he did know. She looked at his graceful form as he swung across the grass and came to her in the summerhouse where she sat knitting. She seemed to be for ever knitting. She was expected to make not only her own child’s garments but all Franz Joseph’s jerseys and all the boys’ socks as well.

  Formerly Moe had spent the early afternoons sitting with her under the acacia, also knitting. It had bee
n pleasant with the radio on and someone to chat to. Now Moe went several times a week to visit Rudi, and when she was at home she went to Carola. Katie had to knit alone. Krista and Anna helped her in the winter, but in the summer they had no time. They had their own things to wash and mend. Now she was faced with the prospect of even more knitting—for Leo’s baby. The idea made her so angry that she could scarcely answer him when he spoke to her.

  He noticed her angry face and said, “You don’t seem pleased to see me.” He was piqued. His conceit made him want every woman to desire him. He honestly thought that every woman he met was in love with him—and many were—women much older than he was, as well as younger.

  “I’m as pleased to see you as you are to see me”, said Katie sourly. “What d’you want?”

  She looked into his smiling face and at his pleasantly curved mouth, and longed to poke one of her knitting needles into those deceptive eyes. So pleasant, so attractive; and so utterly ruthless—and she loved him still. That was what made her so wretched. She loved him, really loved him. The Frenchman was all right but it was still Leo.

  “How’s Leila?” he asked.

  “Is that all you’ve come to ask? If so why don’t you go along the river to her cottage and ask her yourself?” she snapped.

  “Steady on, spitfire.” Leo’s eyes narrowed. “I only asked. I was thinking that you’ll have to do the next job, with Trudi away and Leila out of action.”

  He was flicking a stick from the willow across the grass as he spoke. Whenever Katie thought of Leo she saw him with a rope, a coil of something which switched and hurt. The willow wand was pliable and he began stripping the bark from it. He called to Franz Joseph suddenly: “Got a piece of string?” And when the child came back with some he made the wand into a neat bow and another stick into a sharpened arrow. Franz Joseph was delighted.

  “Leila’s better, but her arm’s still in plaster and she’s watched like a hawk by her grandmother. That doctor was very suspicious . . . he’s spoken to the police.”

  “If she’s given anything away—” began Leo in a deadly voice.

  “She hasn’t,” snapped Katie, “but the whole thing was suspicious. They knew her arm had been wrenched—not only the broken one but the other as well. You can’t wrench both falling off a cycle.”

  “Well, that’s settled it. You’ll have to do it.”

  “When?”

  “As soon as Eddie gives the signal. It’ll be easy for you now. Hank’s got his motor bike. He can bring you in.”

  “It’s going to be damn difficult, that’s all I know. Pa’s in a very queer mood lately. He watches us, and he’ll know if we go out. He’s bound to hear the cycle.”

  “Get Hank to leave it in the summer-house; he can get it over the grass quietly enough.”

  “All right,” she agreed finally, “but I don’t like it.”

  “Where’s your lovely foster-sister?” he asked idly, twirling a long grass in her face and infuriating her.

  “Somewhere where you’ll never be,” snapped Katie. “She’s sure to be in church, confessing her sins.”

  “She’s the sort I go for in a big way,” said Leo smilingly. “The pious ones give me the greatest thrill. I adore piety in my women-folk.”

  Katie looked at him. Was he serious? She never knew with Leo, that was the trouble. She had a quick brain, but this lad was too sharp for her.

  “Not that you’ll ever suffer from that,” he finished softly.

  “Suffer from what?” she said angrily.

  “Piety,” laughed Leo. “The idea makes me laugh—forgive me dear Katie, but it’s too funny.”

  Katie pulled a knitting needle out of the stocking she was knitting and jabbed viciously at his face. But he was too quick for her and moved his head, while with his hand he seized the knitting needle and broke it in two. Taking the knitting from her he snapped the other needle in the same way and then tore the garment viciously across, unravelling it as he did so.

  She looked at it lying at her feet and tried to free her hands; and at that moment Krista came in at the gate. She looked from one to the other but passed on into the house with a brief greeting.

  “Why didn’t you say something and make her stay here a moment?” grumbled Leo, releasing her hands.

  Katie, almost sick now with rage and jealousy, said sharply, “You’d better go. Pa’ll be home any minute and he doesn’t like you.”

  “That’s just too bad,” scoffed Leo, “but I came chiefly to see your lovely foster-sister and I’ve seen her, so I’ll go.” He got up. “See you’re ready to be on call. You’ll get the signal as usual. Hank’ll bring you in—there’s no need for me to come for you now. It’ll be your little foster-sister who has me here on tap next.”

  Furious, she struck out at his grinning face, but he was off, and vaulted over the garden fence with the grace of a trained athlete.

  She sat there shaking with rage for a moment, then gathered up the spoilt knitting and the broken needles. Moe was calling her. “Where’ve you been?” she asked. “Here’ve I been getting the meal and calling you. What do you do with all your time?”

  The table had to be laid; Krista was helping with the cooking. Katie took the large pile of plates and began laying them out on the long table. She had an insane desire to fling them all on the floor and run away. But how could she? There was Peppi, and now another one well on the way.

  “Take care how you throw those plates about,” cried Moe, her mouth full of the stew she was tasting. “They’re not potatoes, and go and comb your hair, girl. You look a real slut”. She looked from Katie to Krista as she spoke. Krista had the kind of hair which was never untidy. In rain or wind or after sleep it was still lovely. Katie’s was heavy and ruffled now from her scuffle with Leo. She looked with dislike at Krista. She would like to have thrown a plate at her. She hated her so much that she couldn’t bear to be near her. She carefully laid her own place as far away from Krista’s as possible.

  The Frenchman had returned from France again. As she stared across the road Katie could see him through the uncurtained windows. He seemed to be alone at the dinner-table, and yet to be talking to a lot of guests. She crossed the road after making sure that no one was looking, and crept up under the side window of the room. He sat there in evening dress with a wineglass in his hand. Places were laid for a number of guests at the polished dining-table. Candles were lit and there were roses—red ones—amongst the candles. They were red too.

  He sat at the head of the table and was making a speech. To whom? She stared into the room but there was no one there at all. Katie knew that his latest housekeeper, a widow from the village, had left long ago. It was late for dinner. She stared, fascinated by the man talking to no one. He glanced round the table at the empty places and then raised the glass in his hand and drank. And all the time he was laughing, laughing in a way that held no mirth. The windows were open and she could hear him. But he was speaking in French. She knew a little. Henri had taught her some. Every time he raised his glass he said, “À la Mort, à la mort.” She knew what that meant all right. But the flowery words he used otherwise were unknown to her. She climbed up on the window-sill and suddenly he looked up and saw her.

  “Entrez! Entrez!” he cried mockingly. “Enfin une hôtesse!” He put down his glass and caught her as she swung down into the room.

  “Welcome, my dear,” he cried mockingly again. “Welcome to the party. D’you like champagne?” He put a glass in her hand clinked his with it, and cried again, “To death.”

  “What death?” asked Katie, who swallowed the champagne in one draught, and allowed him to refill her glass. She sat down on his right and began picking up food from the laden table and stuffing it in her mouth. He began to laugh again.

  “It’s funny, really funny,” he said. “I’m drinking to the health of a man whose death I caused today. A German. And now my only guest with whom to celebrate it is a German! Oh, but it’s funny, it’s funny!”

>   “What man?” asked Katie stolidly. She was eating as fast as she could. She was always hungry and never dared to satisfy her hunger lest it drew attention to her condition, still unknown to anyone but Moe and Anna.

  “The man who killed my son,” said the Frenchman. “It has taken me all these years to track him down. But it’s done. Today he was executed. Dead! Dead! Like my son. My little son whom he shot.”

  Katie looked at him in horror. She was not in the least shocked that his son had been shot or that he had caused a man to be executed. But she was suddenly terrified for herself. “Yes,” he went on, drinking again and urging her to do the same. “You can’t escape justice. It catches up with you in the end. And yet . . . and yet . . . d’you know, Katie, I don’t feel any satisfaction that my son is avenged. I vowed to do it. It’s done. But what have I achieved? The death of another, and it can’t bring back my son! Nothing can do that. But I found it out too late. Too late.”

  Katie had got up. Her dark eyes were fixed on him as if she were mesmerised. She had a vision of the dead caretaker, his open mouth and staring eyes. “Stop it! Stop it!” she cried. “It’s horrible! Horrible!”

  She threw her empty glass down so violently that it smashed. She had drunk several glasses very quickly and her head was swimming. She realized that the Frenchman was drunk. Where were his guests? She asked him. “Gone to a better party—to the French High Commissioner’s, where I should be,” he said bitterly, “but I have a guest. A charming one.” He filled another glass and put it to her lips. “Drink, drink to love, my dear. It sounds better for you than death. You’re too young to know that they’re the same.”

  Suddenly he picked up one of the bottles of champagne from the pail of ice on the floor and hurled it out of the window. It crashed against the garage wall. He hurled a second one after it, laughing in that cynical mirthless way which frightened even the hardened Katie. She caught at his arm suddenly and prevented a third bottle from following the others. Everything could be seen through the lighted windows. She blew out the candles. The smell of the hot wax was mingled with the heavy scent of the roses. In the darkness his arms found her. She began to laugh. It astonished her that her own laughter sounded just like his—not really laughter at all. And suddenly she knew why she was laughing like this. It was funny, just as he said. That he should be weeping for his dead son, and she for the man whose child she carried but who did not love her. For she was weeping. This strange laughter; what was it but the echo of agonized tears?