The Keeper's Son

by Homer Hickam

  A young woman came down the stairs. She was dressed in the old style with the traditional black underskirt that peeked beneath a full skirt hemmed with decorative trim, and a blue vest over a white blouse with puffy sleeves. Black stockings covered her trim legs. When Krebs saw her face, he felt he had never seen a woman quite so beautiful. Her hair was long and golden, braided in the Baltic style, and her face was unblemished, perfect, with a blush of color to her cheeks. Of course, her eyes were as blue and warm as a tropical sky, a gift, it seemed, that God had given to the women of the frigid, northern seas. “Oh, guten Tag,” she said, and looked at Harro for an explanation.

  Krebs stood mute before this angelic vision. Harro said, “This is Captain Krebs, Miriam. He was once a boy here. Captain Krebs, this is Miriam Hauptmann, the house mistress.”

  “When were you here, Captain?” she asked while studying him with those wonderful blue eyes.

  Krebs finally found his voice. “A long time ago. I left when I was fourteen and now I am thirty-three.”

  “Krebs. Yes. I know all about you. You ran away to sea. Father Josef often speaks of you.”

  Krebs could not hide his surprise. “With so many children, I’m astonished he would remember one from so long ago.”

  She gave him his first smile. “I suppose he thought you were special. I know he’ll be delighted to see you. He’s on the mainland and won’t be back until tomorrow. He’s started a much larger orphanage in Kiel. There are so many orphans these days, you know. You’ll stay with us until he returns, of course.”

  Harro said, “I’ll take your kit upstairs, sir.”

  “You are kind,” Krebs said to them both, and thought that it had been a long time since he had witnessed kindness. Sacrifice, courage, bravery, all those things that occurred during war, but kindness? He’d almost forgotten it existed.

  “Captain Krebs,” Miriam said, “would you care for a cognac before dinner? You may need it. You’ll be eating with a dozen squirming little girls and boys who will be so excited you’re here. I’m sure they’ll pester you to distraction.” She gave him another glorious smile, his second. Krebs decided to start counting them, like golden coins of a treasure.

  “A cognac would certainly be welcome,” he answered. “But please, Fraülein, it’s Otto.”

  “Then come, Otto, and sit by the fire and I will pour us both a glass. I suppose technically you should call me Frau. I am a widow. My husband was a soldier in Russia. But please, just call me Miriam. I was a Kind here, too. I stayed on the island after I was married and now I help Father Josef. Do you mind sitting and talking for a while? I imagine you might get bored with a woman who knows so little of your world.”

  Krebs sat, completely under the spell of this gentle and beautiful woman. “I know enough of my world for both of us,” he said. “It will be my pleasure. And I can’t wait to see the little ones. They are my brothers and sisters, after all.”

  For that little speech, she rewarded him with the grand prize, a full grin, before going to the cupboard for the cognac. The war faded in Krebs’s mind, the U-560 all but forgotten. He imagined himself almost happy.

  11

  Krebs woke to a freight train roaring down on top of him. At least that’s what it sounded like. Then he recalled where he was, in the guest room of the orphanage where he’d been raised. There were no trains on Nebelsee but there was the noise of boots thundering up the stairs and down the hall. The door of the room burst open and there stood Father Josef, wild-eyed with a great shout on his lips. “Otto Krebs!” With one long stride, he was across the room. He grabbed Krebs and lifted him bodily off the bed and bear-hugged him and swung him around. “My son, you are a grand sight for these old eyes! God bless you, Otto, for coming home!”

  Father Josef clutched Krebs’s shoulders and pushed him back and forth. Krebs thought the old priest, huge and dressed entirely in black, looked like some giant, run-amok chimney sweep. “Let me look at you!” the priest cried. “Well, a few scars here and there but otherwise a fine-looking man. So, what have you been up to, Otto? Tell me everything!”

  Krebs glanced to the doorway and was astonished to find Miriam Hauptmann standing there. He was also embarrassed because he typically slept in the nude when on land and Father Josef had dragged him out from under the covers without a chance to put anything on. Miriam hid her laugh behind her hands and hurried on.

  Father Josef had seen Miriam, too, and boomed out his great laugh. “Oh, she sees naked little boys all the time,” he said. “Now, Otto, come to breakfast, tell me everything you’ve been doing.” And with that, Father Josef went out, calling to the children to come and eat. “Come on, come on,” the priest cried in a great joyful voice. “Food for all my little girls and boys. What a wonderful day it is, children! One of our boys has come home. Oh, you met him last night, did you, Uschi? Well, all right. Lucky little sweet girl. Come on, come on!”

  Breakfast was wonderful. Krebs sat at one head of the long table, Father Josef at the other. The priest’s great bushy eyebrows danced as he talked to each child. “Now, Gerhardt, that’s my boy, eat up, eh? Mrs. Hauptmann said you play too much with your food. You must eat so you’ll grow up to be big and strong. Ah, Gerda, you are such a pretty girl. Have I told you that lately? No? Well, your face is like the sun rising, sweetheart. As is yours and yours and yours,” he went on, pointing at each child with his spoon.

  At last, he reached Krebs. “Here is your big brother Otto. Tell us, Otto, where you have been and what you have done with yourself since you left us.”

  “I’m a captain of a submarine, Father,” Krebs said.

  “Yes, yes, so I’ve heard. But tell us about your wife and your family!”

  Krebs was aware that every child had stopped eating and was watching him. “I’m afraid I don’t have a wife or children, Father.” The children all looked at one another, their little mouths open.

  Father Josef frowned. “You have had the opportunity to form your own family, Otto, and you haven’t done it?” He looked around at the children. “They are all taught the importance of family. That’s why they are looking at you with such surprise.”

  “Well, you’re my family,” Krebs said, feeling as if he were a little boy again and mildly angry at the priest for picking on him.

  Father Josef wagged his spoon at him. “We need to talk, my son. I can see that.” He looked around the table. “Come on, children. Eat!”

  The boys and girls, after one last, dubious glance at Krebs, got back to their morning porridge. For his part, Krebs decided he would leave immediately after, perhaps, a final word with Miriam Hauptmann. A week later, he realized to his astonishment, he had gone nowhere. In fact, he wished he would never leave.

  “We don’t need much, Otto. There is plenty to eat on Nebelsee, as you well know, especially if you like fish, and of course to live here any time at all is to love fish. And our potato cellar is full. We all share here. Whatever one has, all have.”

  Krebs had just expressed his concern for the well-being of the orphanage and especially for its headmistress, Miriam Hauptmann. “Did they give you anything for your husband?” he asked, meaning the government.

  “No. Nothing. There was trouble with my papers as there always is for orphans.” She looked down as they walked the path that led along the harbor past the eel smokery and the windmill and the Bäckerei just beside it. “Walter tried to straighten it out but he never could. The army authorities are very strict and everything must be just so.” Then she raised her head proudly, as if she’d recovered from a moment of self-pity. “Did Harro tell you my husband’s profession? No? He was a teacher who taught classical literature in the Realschule at Schaprode. He went every day back and forth on the ferry. He loved to teach but I’m afraid he was not very good at it. The boys in his classes often made fun of him because he was so gentle. They would make faces and throw things. They would play tricks on him, put a dead fish in his desk, that kind of thing. It hurt him so much when they w
ere cruel.” Miriam was silent for a time and then said, in a bitter tone, “This is the man they sent to Russia to fight.”

  Miriam’s voice turned to one of resignation. “I saw Walter only once after they took him away. Not here. If he had come back, I would have found a way to hide him. I had already talked to Father Josef on how it might be done. Don’t look so shocked. I would have seen him off in a boat somewhere. But it was not to be. I visited him in Grafenwöhr when he was training there. Walter told me that he hated what they were teaching him but that his instructors considered him a good soldier. Isn’t that odd, that a man can hate something but still be good at it?”

  “It is part of our wonderful German character,” Krebs said ironically. “Soldiering is in our blood.”

  “I am worried about Harro going off,” she said. “I don’t think fighting is in his blood at all.”

  “He will be fine,” Krebs answered, sorry that he had to lie to her.

  “He’s too young. And so very gentle. I think he will find life in a U-boat very difficult.”

  “On the other hand, it may be good for him. He will have to work hard.”

  “They will toughen him, then kill him,” Miriam said, her bitter tone returning.

  Krebs didn’t know what to say since he wholeheartedly agreed it was the boy’s probable fate.

  “If I could wish this war away, I would wish it a million times,” Miriam said. “Even if it were only for a day. Can we do that, Otto? Can we agree between us that there is no war today?”

  Krebs tried to imagine life without the war but finally gave up. “The war will not stop just because we believe it has. It’s not realistic.”

  The path was uneven past the harbor as it worked its way around the bay, and she took his arm to help steady herself. It was the first time she had touched him. He shuddered, not because her touch was unfamiliar but because it felt so very right. Their progress was observed by hundreds of swans bobbing in the harbor, their graceful necks turning as they walked past. It all made a kind of sense. Wouldn’t even birds watch an angel as she walked by?

  Miriam led him off the path, over the grass and into the sand and down to the rocky beach to a tidal pond. When she released his arm, it felt empty. She knelt at the water and with two fingers plucked something from it that was small and dark. She handed it to him, a proud expression on her face. “What do you make of this?”

  He held the tiny, irregularly shaped object. “A stone worn smooth by the sea.”

  “Hold it up to the sun,” she said.

  He did and saw that the “stone” was actually translucent, and golden. “Is this amber?” When she nodded, he said, “I would never have spotted it. Isn’t it rare?”

  “Very. But if you have an eye for it, it can be found all along this coast. A woman in town makes jewelry with gold and amber and shells. Her creations are rather famous. On Saturdays, I clean her house. For my pay, she is teaching me her art.”

  “It does not surprise me that you are an artist.”

  She lowered her eyes. “I am not an artist but I wish I could be.”

  “I suspect you could be anything you wished.”

  Her smile was proof that Krebs had pleased her. “Silly. Pay attention. Now, look at this shell.” She picked a small white shell from the sand and held it out to him. “What do you think?”

  “I think you won’t fool me this time. It is a common cockleshell. There are a million of them on this beach.”

  “That’s true, but this one is as unique as the amber. Try as you might, you can scour this beach and all the beaches of the world and you will not find a single cockleshell that looks the same as this one.”

  He smiled. “And your point is . . . ?”

  “My point is, Captain Krebs, that there is so much in life that we take as common, yet when we think about it, we realize it isn’t common at all. This day, for instance. We shall never know another like it. No matter what we may do, even though we might retrace our steps exactly, another day would not be the same. We therefore must make the most of it, even if it requires that we spin a little fantasy that there is no war.”

  Krebs came to mock-attention. “You have defeated me, Frau Hauptmann. I agree there is no war today.” Relaxing, he took the shell and inspected it. “It is a beautiful and remarkable shell,” he concluded, “but, of course, so is the woman who found it.”

  “Hush, you,” she protested, but rewarded him anew with a glorious smile. “You will have me blushing. My cheeks are always too pink as it is.”

  “I like your pink cheeks.”

  “Oh, you are a bit perverted, then. I look like a chapped German pig much of the time.”

  “If the women in France looked half as good as a German chapped pig, I would have never left.”

  Her expression clouded. “Don’t talk about France. France is for another day. Today, there is only Nebelsee.”

  “You’re right. I forgot. Please forgive me.”

  Her voice became merry again. “Come!” She put her arm in his again and half-dragged him laughing up the dunes back to the path.

  “What’s the hurry?”

  “Silly! I’m hungry. Do you still like eels? Of course you do! What Nebelsee boy doesn’t love eels!”

  “It makes my mouth water just to think of them.”

  “And a good stout Nebelsee beer to wash them down!” she cried to the wind.

  Happy. He kept thinking about the emotion, getting used to it. I’m happy. He let himself be led by the strong, young woman and he wondered if it was possible to always be happy.

  They wanted it to happen, of course. That’s why it did. Father Josef had taken the children on an outing, Harro going along. Miriam and Krebs sat before the fire. He leaned in close to her and couldn’t stop his hands from going around her shoulders. She put her arms around his neck and they shared a kiss. “What is it you want of me, Otto Krebs?” she asked in her direct Nebelsee way.

  “I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “But I seem to be falling in love with you.”

  She did not smile. “You mustn’t. It is too soon, too fast. You have only known me for thirteen days.”

  “The war demands everything to be in a hurry, even love,” he replied, surprising even himself with the intensity of his argument.

  She took his hand and led him upstairs. “I don’t know about love, Otto,” she told him. “But I know too much about being lonely.”

  Her room was bare except for a rude table and a single chair, and a simple bed, covered by a down-filled comforter. Mounted on the wall was a crucifix. As he knelt on the bed over her and slowly removed her clothes, he discovered she was wearing a necklace with a golden cross pendant decorated with a teardrop of sea amber on each of its tips, and a scarlet gem in its center. It was as unique as the woman who wore it, and the day they had shared. “Did you make this?”

  She nodded, her eyes filling with pride.

  “You are a remarkable woman, Miriam Hauptmann,” he said. “Let me love you, even if it is too soon.”

  “All right, Otto.” She put her hand behind his neck and drew him to her breasts. “All right, my little sweetcake,” she said distantly, almost as if she were speaking to one of the orphaned children.

  12

  Miriam and the children had thoroughly decorated the orphanage for Advent. A wreath was on the table with four candles in a nest of fir boughs and two of the candles were lit, signifying the first two weeks of the celebration. In the windows were golden stars hanging by red ribbons. It was the night when Father Josef visited the children, accompanied by the hideous character known as Knecht Ruprecht.

  Ruprecht was just as Krebs remembered him from childhood visits. The bent old man was outfitted from head to toe in black and his face was smudged with coal. He rattled his chains and peeked from behind Father Josef, who stood like some grand archangel in the doorway of the orphanage. It was little Gerhardt’s turn to come forward. Miriam stood behind the boy, her hand on his shoulders to stea
dy him.

  Miriam was dressed in Nebelsee garb: black stockings, a gray smock with a white apron, and a puffy-sleeved, white blouse. Krebs, from his position in a chair by the fire, could not help but recall what a pleasure it was to slowly remove those long black stockings.

  Father Josef snapped a look in Krebs’s direction as if he’d read his thoughts. Then he cut his eyes back to Gerhardt and said, in a stern voice, “Now, Gerhardt, it’s your turn.”

  The little boy’s knees were trembling. “Yes, Father,” he said. Ruprecht danced a grotesque dance and shook his chains, muttering. Krebs recognized him as the little man who pushed a cart around the town square, selling fish cakes.

  Father Josef held up his hand and Ruprecht stopped his dance. “Gerhardt, Ruprecht tells me you sometimes push the other boys and girls when coming to meals. Is this so?”

  “Yes, Father,” Gerhardt answered, close to tears.

  “Will you stop it now?”

  “Oh, yes, Father. I am very sorry.”

  Ruprecht mumbled something unintelligible, then nodded with a final clink of his chain.

  “All right, you are forgiven,” Father Josef said. He reached in a sack and brought out a handful of nuts and handed them to the boy. Then he dug a little deeper and brought out a bright red apple. “You are a good boy, Gerhardt. I love you. We all love you.”

  Gerhardt politely took the apple and managed a quivering smile, then fled when Ruprecht shook his chains at him again. Krebs felt like grabbing the man playing the dirty little devil and tossing him out the doorway.

  Father Josef’s eyes rested on Krebs. “Otto Krebs,” he boomed. “Come you here.”

  Krebs thought about telling the old man to leave him alone, but for Miriam’s sake, he relented. “Good evening, Father,” he said, getting slowly to his feet. His knee ached, but he ignored it. Ruprecht leaped, gabbling, shaking his chains.

  Father Josef frowned through his beard. “How is your soul, Otto?”