by Maureen Lang
Then his rigid shoulders went limp; his legs—so strong—seemed unable to hold him. He fell back to the couch, rubbing at his face. From there, he looked up at her at last, and she knew he saw her.
“What—what are you doing, Annaliese? What time is it? Why do you have on your coat?”
“I was going for a walk.”
He looked at the window. “In the dark?”
“You won’t let me go during the day, so I thought . . .”
His lips went tight, but not as tight as they’d been a moment ago in sleep. “It isn’t safe yet.”
She was only a pace away from him, and when he stood, passing between her and the window, his shadow darkened the room altogether for a moment. He went to the door where she’d stood, as if looking to see if she was alone.
“Has Huey returned yet? Bertita said she had a note from him.”
That was news to Annaliese. “No.”
“Go back upstairs. When the sun comes up, you can sit on the porch in the back if you need fresh air. It’s too cold now, too dark.”
She had no intention of settling for such a short leash, but she wasn’t going to argue that yet. “You were having a dream. Do you want to . . . talk about it?”
“No. What I want is for you to go back to bed.” He looked beyond her, to the table next to the couch, the one that had a clock on it. “It’s four in morning. Neither one of us should be awake.”
“Do you have dreams like that very often?”
“Who said I was having a dream?”
“Of course you were dreaming.”
He put a hand to her elbow. “Wait until sunrise; then we’ll go out. The streets are quietest then.”
“They’re quiet now.”
“But not safe. Go upstairs.”
“Christophe. If you claim to have the right to keep me here, even if you think it’s for my own good, then I claim the right to ask you about that dream. For your own good.”
“It might be a fair exchange, if I believed the subject really was for my own good. But I don’t. So good night.”
She remembered something he’d said once. . . . “It had to do with those deaths, didn’t it?”
He stopped, not looking at her, profile frozen. “What deaths?”
“The ones you think you’re responsible for. When we talked about Giselle, you said you didn’t want me to add another death.”
He let go of her elbow, crossing his arms again, now leaning against the doorframe instead of staring at her through it. “All right, then. If you’re so curious, I’ll tell you. But you won’t like hearing about it any more than I’ll like talking about it.” Christophe hesitated then and took another wipe at his brow. He paced away, went to the window, turning his back to her. “It was a dream about the trenches. Battles and guns and ugly things like that.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t worry about what I want to hear. Talk about it anyway.”
He was silent so long, she thought he wouldn’t speak. Then, “In France . . . most of the time out there—at the front—men shot at anything that moved. It was usually dark or dusty or foggy. Most of the men didn’t know if they hit anything or not, but I suppose they must have hit something or so many men wouldn’t have died.”
He pivoted again, this time staring at her. There was something new on his face now, not reluctance to talk but anger. “It wasn’t so unclear from where I sat. For the last six months of the war I was in a sniper’s nest. They didn’t care about my commission or my rank; they put me where they needed me most. Out there, in a place where I could see exactly what I hit. Men, with real faces—just like mine, just like my trenchmates. Faces like my brother’s. Young men who had families waiting for them, mothers who loved them. A wife, a girl. A child. Men who never went home because their bodies were left to rot right where I felled them. Eaten by rats or bugs or the sun. Do you want to hear more? about the smell when the wind was just right? or perhaps about those who moved after I thought I’d killed them, so I had to hit them again just to keep them from their misery? Men, real men, put out of misery like animals . . . not like men God loves.”
Then he sank to the chair behind him in much the same way he’d fallen to the couch just moments ago, head down, arms cradling his forehead. She moved closer but he held up a hand.
“Go away; just go away. . . . Dreaming about it is hard enough. I don’t have to talk about it too. Just go.”
“No, I won’t go. I won’t go away any more than you’ve gone away when I told you to leave me here in Munich.”
Then she was on her knees next to him, her own arms taking the place of his, to take the weight of his head and shoulders against her, to feel the sweat and the tears on his face, to see her own tears mingle with his as they fell. He spoke again, about the faces, about those who saw him but too late, when they were already in his sights, when they knew they were about to be shot and there wasn’t a thing they could do but take his bullet. Young faces—men who, like him, had probably never been loved by a woman, never knew how big the world was, never saw anything beyond their own village or town or city, except that stinking, rotten, rat-filled trench and sandbags and mud and sores and boredom and fear.
Then, as if realizing he’d spoken thoughts he had never shared before, he leaned back and searched her face, perhaps expecting to see the horror of his words reflected on her face.
Annaliese didn’t move, still holding both his hands now that he’d broken from her embrace.
“I think,” he said softly, “that you’ve probably heard enough, at least from someone who is supposed to be protecting you. You probably think I’m the one needing protection, from my own dreams.”
She shook her head. If he thought she believed him weak because of what he’d said, just the opposite was true. “You survived all that. How could I not trust you to keep me—or anyone—safe?”
He lifted a hand to her hair, stroking it once. “Thank you, Annaliese.”
She should leave; she knew she should. She should go back up to her room, not give him any more trouble. She knew—had known all along—that he wanted her to stay inside because it was for her own good. And that was true. If she were honest, she would tell him she was grateful he hadn’t deserted her the way the others had, that if he weren’t here in this house, she would have nightmares of her own. And she’d seen only one dead man, not the scores that he had.
Instead of going or voicing her thoughts, she remembered her childhood dreams where she’d been bold enough to do what her heart wanted her to. In those old dreams, she’d caught his eye and not run away. And now, she did just that. She let her eyes linger on his, knowing her face was more illumined than his, with moonlight through the window behind him. She let her gaze slip to his mouth, imagining what it would be like in just a moment, if he let her kiss him. What it would feel like if he would welcome her.
But instead of waiting until her lips found his, he leaned forward, closing the gap between them, pressing his lips to hers before she had the chance to claim his.
She smiled when they broke apart, and so did he. For a moment he looked as shy as she felt, and she was a child again, wanting to run away. But he looked at her with such welcome in his eyes. Those nightmares from a moment ago might never have happened, the light in his eyes was so inviting.
“That’s one way to banish nightmares,” she whispered.
He nodded but then pulled away. “You should go upstairs, Annaliese,” he said. “I’ll take you outside in the morning if you still want to go. All right?”
She stood, feeling awkward and wondering if the kiss had meant anything at all to him. She had only Jurgen’s to compare it to, and his hadn’t meant anything more than pleasure. If that was all this had been to Christophe, then she wished they hadn’t kissed at all.
24
Christophe did not go back to sleep. Instead, he turned the chair to the window, where he could see a slice of the sky. Those were the same stars he’d watched when he was out there, in France.
They’d looked down on him and the fighting and killing back then, too. Just as they looked down on him now, indifferently, when inside him a battle was raging almost as fierce as he’d fought on any field.
He hadn’t wanted to send her away; he’d wanted to keep her right here at his side, close by. Kiss her again, talk again. Somehow having told her a little of what haunted him hadn’t sent her running off, hadn’t made her think less of him. He knew God had forgiven him for what he’d done out there, but he wasn’t sure anyone on earth could. Especially someone like Annaliese, who’d said often enough that the war had been a weapon against everyone, not just Germany against the Allies, but capitalists against those used as soldiers on both sides.
But he knew if she’d stayed, he’d have been tempted to do more kissing than talking. Was he no better than Jurgen, who did the same thing?
After a while, he went into the kitchen and heated water for coffee. The sun would be up soon, and he hoped Annaliese would return before long, though part of him still feared it might be too soon to let her venture outside, even with him beside her. There might not be chaos in the streets right now, but how easily could it resurface?
Waiting for the coffee, he looked at the door that would swing into the kitchen at any moment, imagining how it would be when she joined him. He would battle not to kiss her again, but he knew they must talk about it. He had to know if his attention meant more to her than whatever considerations Jurgen had sent her way.
Taking a seat at the table, he accidentally jostled one leg, tipping the saltshaker that Bertita kept in the center. It spilled a white circle of granules and for a moment he was taken back to France again. Not to the memories that tormented him in the dark—the ones of his dream—but to another memory he’d nearly forgotten. Suddenly the salt was dried dirt, so often caked along the pillbox walls of the trench. Back then he’d used the tip of his bayonet to draw a line, but now he used his finger. The length of the line always varied, but it was his place on that life line that mattered more. In the trenches, he’d most often imagined his spot toward the end. Now he hoped it was the opposite, with years spread out before him.
“You’re not superstitious about spilled salt, are you?”
He looked up, glad to see the smile on Annaliese’s face. “No, it’s something I used to do.” He rose and poured a cup of coffee for each of them. “You did the same thing my trenchmates used to do when they saw me staring that way. Do you see the line I’ve drawn?”
She nodded, taking a seat opposite him at the table.
“I used to draw in dirt. It’s a life line. In the trenches, I wasn’t the only one wondering how much time I had left. Drawings like this one started more than a few conversations about what was at the end of the line.”
If she guessed why he’d taken the opportunity to bring up God again, it wasn’t clear on her face. She looked from the line to him, her face placid. She took a sip of her coffee, and he wondered if her silence meant God was the last thing she wanted to talk about.
So he waited. Finally she met his gaze and he knew she would speak after all.
“Why do you still want God to be part of your life, Christophe, when you’ve lost more than I have? Your parents, your brother. Everything you suffered in France. And yet you still want to go to church; you still think He loves you. Even after all the things the war made you do.”
“God never stopped loving me, even when I was in those sniper nests. I can say I was just following orders, that I was trying to save my own life, and my trenchmates behind me. That I wasn’t killing because I liked it or even because I wanted to kill someone. War makes sin a complicated business, but if it’s a sin—what I did—then God loves me enough to forgive me.”
She looked away again, and he knew his words hadn’t made an impression—not a good one, anyway.
He tried again. “God doesn’t love me—or you, or anyone—for what we are, what we do or don’t do. He loves you, He loves me, because He can’t help it. He’s love inside and out, in every part of Him. That’s why I still want to think about Him, why I still want to go to church. And why I still want to celebrate His birthday.”
“But He hasn’t given you peace, at least not when you’re sleeping.”
“That’s because this isn’t heaven. I don’t expect things here to be perfect.”
“So you don’t think this world, right now, right here, can ever be a better place, where the rich take care of the poor, where everything is fair? That heaven is the only place for things like fairness?”
He shrugged. “All I know is that a hundred years ago or so, France tried having the workers rule everything and it didn’t end well. Men haven’t changed since then. We’re not getting more noble; we’re still the same. Why should this generation think we could do a better job at fairness?”
“We could try.”
He nodded. “And we should. All of us. Individually, to the best of our ability. I want that too, Annaliese, but I want it to be my choice. I don’t want a ruler of any kind—a peasant or a prince, a Kaiser or a prime minister or even a council—to force me into a definition of fairness. If it’s my choice, my sweat, my money, I know I can be more generous because then I’ll have the satisfaction of doing it myself instead of being told like a child to share.”
“But people don’t want your money—they don’t want charity at all. They want fairness.”
If there had been no awkwardness when she’d first entered the kitchen, it was fully between them now. There was nothing else to do but face it.
“I’m sorry—I didn’t want to argue. I wanted to talk about last night.”
She was already shaking her head, and he knew it was too late—their differences were right there between them again—but he continued anyway.
“I wanted to tell you—” he leaned closer, lowering his voice in case Bertita came through the doorway—“that I’ve never recovered so quickly from one of those dreams, and I have you to thank.”
“I would do anything to help you, Christophe . . . but I don’t think I can. Not enough that it would matter.” She suddenly stood, half a cup of coffee still left at her place. “I intend to go out today. But you don’t have to accompany me, not if you don’t want to.”
He stood too, knowing her sudden coldness was as much because of God as because of him. She was fighting them both. “I said I would take you. They’re marching in the streets for Eisner’s funeral today. It should be safe enough; Huey’s note to Bertita said they know who shot him. It wasn’t about the party or against the councils. Eisner was shot because he was Jewish. By someone half-Jewish, wanting to prove he could shoot another Jew. As insane as that sounds, that’s what happened.”
She clutched the back of her chair. “But that’s . . . Oh, Christophe, that can’t be true. It makes no sense.”
“Not to us, but evidently to the shooter.”
“I’ll get my coat.”
“Wait . . . it’s too early. Sit. Finish your coffee.”
But she just shook her head and fled from the room.
* * *
Still running like a child, even after last night had been a dream come true. At least it had been for her.
Annaliese rushed back to the room she’d been calling a prison; suddenly it was a sanctuary. How much clearer could it be? If Christophe didn’t look down on her views of God, then it was clear yet again he did that very thing when it came to her politics.
Her politics. Her politics? Whatever politics she’d taken on since coming to Munich had been to make up for the wrongs of her father, to take a stand so opposite his that it would ease her conscience and give Giselle’s death meaning. Annaliese had put aside her old faith and taken on a new one—in Socialism.
Jurgen’s faith had once made sense to her, faith in this world and its future. If everyone shared his vision, the world was bound to become a better place. Men, being more good than selfish, would be inspired by their own goodness, and once fairness was within reach, it woul
d stay in their grasp.
Annaliese still wanted to believe that.
But the world had become so awful a place that a man felt driven to prove himself by killing someone just for being Jewish. That was faith of a different sort altogether—an evil kind. It made her want to renounce all faith, to stomp out everything from politics to God, banish faith from every part of society. She grabbed her coat but stopped. Christophe had said it was too early to leave, and he was no doubt right if there was to be a funeral procession. She sat; she would resume her isolation. And later, she would accept Christophe’s company the same way she always had. The way she had before last night, before his kiss had changed everything.
The air was cold but clean, refreshing after the last few days inside. Annaliese set a quick pace away from the house, and Christophe walked beside her without a word.
It wasn’t long before she found a crowd to lead the way to the funeral procession. Thousands filled the streets, not just workers and soldiers who’d followed Eisner, but farmers and mountaineers, too, men and women dressed in their country attire alongside those from the city.
Annaliese followed as mourners passed the spot of that awful day. In her mind she heard the shots again, knowing now what they were. A man shooting Eisner; a sailor with a gun wounding the assassin.
For another kind of faith, one man had killed another.
A bloodstain was still visible beneath a picture of Eisner, a photograph held up by bayonets. She was glad then that Christophe had taken her arm. She needed his strength.
Though she looked at the faces around them, she saw no one she knew among so many mourners. Not Leo nor Jurgen nor any of their bodyguards. Perhaps Christophe knew where they were, but she didn’t ask. She let him lead her away, not caring where they went, whether it was with purpose or not, as long as it wasn’t back to her flat. She wasn’t ready to return yet.
Before long they were at the restaurant, where Mama showed them to a table.
“He couldn’t change things fast enough,” Annaliese said after Mama left soup on the table for them. The small, half-filled bowls seemed ample evidence of why Eisner hadn’t drawn sufficient votes. The blockade was still in place, preventing most imports. He couldn’t get the people and the factory owners to cooperate, couldn’t get their society working again, couldn’t even hope to make an impact on a peace settlement that might be bearable by Germany. There wasn’t enough, not of anything, but especially of what they needed most: jobs and food. “If he’d had more time before the election, more time to fix things, the voters would have kept him in place. And maybe this wouldn’t have happened. Maybe he would still be alive.”
