The Glassblower (17 page)

“So you’re enjoying yourself at last! I thought I’d never see a smile.” Thomas’s breath stank of beer and the hand he cupped around her chin was unsteady.

“I’m tired. I want to go home,” Ruth yelled in his ear. “Home,” she said again, seeing that he couldn’t hear her.

At last he seemed to catch on, but as he got up, he staggered so wildly that Ruth had to catch hold of him. She drew him aside.

“I think we should put off our little plan for another time!” she yelled in his ear. But when she turned to leave, Thomas grabbed her by the arm.

“A deal’s a deal. Don’t you go thinking you can talk me out of it again,” he slurred. He stumbled and Ruth staggered a little. “You’ll see. I’ve got everything ready. It’ll be so
rrr
omantic!” Cackling, he rolled the
r
the way the Italian migrant workers on the railroad used to do.

“You’re hurting me,” Ruth said, digging her fingers into his hand to free herself. He couldn’t possibly believe that she was going anywhere with him tonight. Not when he was as drunk as this.

“Maybe you need to treat her right for a moment!” Sebastian called out. “Some women want that sort of thing.”

“I can give it a try.” Instead of letting her go, Thomas put his other arm around Ruth’s waist and began to dance about in the narrow space between the table and the bench.

Ruth realized that he no longer even knew what he was doing.

“Let me go this instant,” she hissed, still trying to avoid making a scene. Thomas stumbled again, this time backward onto the table, almost pulling Ruth down with him.

Ruth felt a surge of panic rising within her.

“Hey, Thomas Heimer,” came a voice from behind her.

It was Peter. He looked down contemptuously at the man sprawled backward on the table.

“Even if you and Ruth are engaged now, that doesn’t give you the right to mistreat her. If she wants to go, you let her go. And you do it right now!” Peter looked as though he meant every word. Thomas released Ruth’s arm.

She didn’t know where to look. There was such eager anticipation on the faces all around. As though they were enjoying the spectacle.

Ruth had never felt so humiliated in her whole life. But all the same, she wanted everyone to see how well suited she and Thomas were to each other. She wanted the other women to envy the future Mrs. Heimer.

After that it all happened much too fast: Thomas swung his fist and hit Peter. Later, Ruth would still wonder how he had even managed to do such a thing in his condition. Peter hesitated for only a moment and then hit back. The women leapt aside, shrieking. The other men’s eyes gleamed, and suddenly they decided that someone had knocked over a beer, or jostled them, or simply looked at them wrong—and those became reasons enough for a brawl. Without any warning, it was in full swing.

30

“So how was your sister’s engagement? Or rather, I should ask: How was the May dance?”

Johanna had hardly taken off her jacket and Strobel was already hurling questions at her. Usually he wasn’t the least bit interested in what she did in her free time in Lauscha, so she was not ready for his interrogation.

Strobel sniggered. “Let me guess,” he said, putting his finger to his lips in an exaggerated gesture. “The music was awful, the dance itself was provincial, and everyone was horribly drunk by the end. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that the engagement was a fiasco because the groom-to-be was drunk!”

Johanna’s cheeks flushed.

“If you really must know, it was absolutely horrid! I’m sorry I even went,” she said vehemently, as though Strobel had talked her into it. She tried to ignore the look on his face, which unmistakably said
I told you so
. The best thing was to forget the whole weekend as quickly as possible.

“Did Mr. Woolworth come in the end?”

Strobel nodded. He had the look of a cat that’d gotten into the herring tub on the sly.

“Here’s his order. It must be dealt with today.”

Johanna reached unsuspectingly for the list, a standard form that detailed the articles a client wanted, the suppliers, prices, and delivery deadlines. She found herself holding not one sheet of paper but three, and one more had dropped to the floor.

There was no way that all this could be just one order.

She picked up the sheet that had fallen and gazed at the pages incredulously. Dolls, toys, glassware, wood carvings—this man Woolworth seemed to want everything they had to offer. She swallowed when she saw what was written on one line.

“Five
hundred
Parisian dolls?”

Strobel grinned in response to her astonishment.

Johanna leafed through the list, reading each item silently to herself. When she looked up again, her face showed a whole range of conflicting emotions; she was speechless at the quantities involved, baffled by some of the wares on the list, and shocked at the final cost. She had to check three times before she could accept the sum involved. Holding the sheets in her hand, she went across to the catalog table and sat down.

Strobel followed her and sat down too.

For a moment Johanna struggled to collect herself. When she looked up and said, “Why wasn’t I here? Woolworth must really be a man of great standing. Who else could be sure of selling such quantities?” She pointed quite at random at a line of the order.

“Two hundred Sonneberg dolls, the ‘babe-in-arms’ model. Heinrich Stier will weep tears of joy when we give him the order.”

“I told him from the start that he’d score a success with that style of doll,” Strobel said dismissively. “Where else in the world do dolls have that same rosy glow on their little faces? Nowhere!” he said, answering his own question.

“His visit must have lasted for hours. Did Sybille Stein manage to come by and look after you? And his assistant? Did h
e . . .
” She flushed at the thought that it should have been her job to make coffee for the American customers.

Strobel interrupted her with that odd laugh of his. “If I were to tell you every detail of my client’s visit, which I will grant you was certainly quite remarkable, then we would be sitting here just as long as Woolworth and I sat together.” He took her hand with his bony one.

She was just about ready to let him call her “My dearest Johanna,” thinking that she would get to hear one or two anecdotes, but then Strobel said, “You never get a second chance in life!” He sighed, then clapped his hands together theatrically. “If I had not considered your presence in Sonneber
g . . .
”

Johanna wished fleetingly that Strobel had simply ordered her to stay, rather than letting her take the time off. Then she scolded herself for such childish thoughts. She had no choice but to sit there and hear him preach about missed opportunities and making the wrong decision. But she consoled herself with the fact that at least he had let go of her hand.

“Oh and by the way, I will be gone for two weeks at the beginning of June—that is, if my travel plans do not conflict with your own calendar,” he added, with more than just a touch of sarcasm. “You will deputize for me while I am away. We will discuss all further details when the time comes.”

Johanna’s first impulse was to say, “I can’t. I don’t know nearly enough about the business. And besides, I don’t dare!” Instead she nodded obediently. She wouldn’t be so quick to refuse any more of the chances he offered.

While Strobel welcomed new clients and helped them with their orders, Johanna was busy all day with the Woolworth order. All of the pieceworkers and suppliers whose articles Woolworth wanted had to be notified. Strobel had a system for this, and Johanna entered how many pieces of every style each supplier had to deliver with the prices and the deadlines. She had to be absolutely sure not to mix up any names or item numbers. To her, this work was pleasure rather than business. Every form she filled came with a name, a family, a story of its own. By the time she had finished, she had written out one hundred and thirty individual commission sheets. That would give a lot of families work for the next few months, she told herself happily. She could hardly wait to give the sheets to the messenger women to take round to the villages.

While almost every household in Lauscha made money by blowing glass, in Sonneberg they earned their daily bread by making dolls. And just as with the glassblowing, here, too, there were specialists for every step in the process: One man would spend his days fitting the glass eyes into dolls, though the eyes themselves were made in Lauscha. The next man painted lips in just the right shade, while another painted eyelashes and eyebrows on the bare faces. There were also seamstresses, knitters, shoemakers, and handbag makers—all for the dolls. Though Strobel insisted that Sonneberg dolls were world famous, the doll-makers hadn’t had an easy time of it in recent years. The French were pushing their way into the market by ordering porcelain heads from Sonneberg and then having female convicts finish the dolls for no wages. The foreign competition made an order of this size all the more important for the local doll-makers.

There was plenty of Lauscha glassware in the Woolworth order too. Not for the first time, Johanna thought what might happen if only she could persuade Peter to put his glass animals into Friedhelm Strobel’s hands. They would very likely be setting off for America as well. But no, Peter had dug in his heels. “Your Mr. Strobel is far too fine for a raw beginner like me. No, no, I’ll take them to another wholesaler,” he had answered, ignoring Johanna’s argument that Strobel had already helped more than one unknown artisan get his start in the business.

But then she realized that there was another name missing from the list. Johanna’s mood brightened. “At least old Heimer won’t be cluttering up foreign shelves with his gimcrack,” she muttered to herself somewhat spitefully.

The day’s customers had brought him a good deal more business, and Strobel was in an expansive mood at supper. He had ordered the housekeeper to serve fish in a green herb sauce. Then he opened a bottle of champagne to go with it. If he were to be believed, rich people all over the world drank practically nothing else. He had sent Johanna down to the cellar on occasion to fetch a bottle when there were important clients visiting, but she herself had never tasted this luxury before.

Cheered by her long day’s work and relieved that Strobel was not angry at her, she took a long sip. The champagne tasted a lot like white wine, though muc
h . . .
bubblier. Feeling the thousands of bubbles bursting on her tongue, she laughed.

“Ruth would certainly like this! She’s always had a taste for the out of the ordinary.”

Strobel laughed too, but a moment later, he said, “My dear Johanna, you really must stop comparing yourself to your sisters all the time. You are not like them. I am quite sure that this past weekend was ample proof of that.” And with that, he went about skillfully filleting his fish.

Embarrassed, Johanna took another sip, but the bubbly suddenly tasted sour. Had Strobel already heard rumors about the fistfight? Or was he perhaps clairvoyant?

Strobel lifted the backbone out of the fish and set it on the side of his plate, then went on, paying no attention to her evident disquiet. “Often enough we allow a sense of obligation to force us to do things we have no desire to do on our own. In your case, I am of the opinion that you should gradually stop playing nursemaid to Ruth and Marie.”

Johanna looked up.
What would Peter say if he ever found out that he and Strobel actually agreed on something?

“But who’s to say that isn’t my purpose in life? I’m the eldest, after all, and that means I am responsible for my younger sisters.”

“There are other ways to accept responsibility,” Strobel retorted, raising his eyebrows. As always when he wanted to make a point, he leaned over the table. His breath smelled of fish and parsley sauce.

“Your purpose in life is not to serve others. Your purpose is to lead. You should not run around after your sisters all the time—rather
they
should run after
you
! Just look at yourself: you are a strong woman. But if you jump to attention every time Ruth or Marie or anyone else whistles for your help, you simply make yourself ridiculous.”

What did Strobel think he was doing, shoving his nose into her affairs like this? She didn’t like the way he talked about her sisters either. But if she were honest with herself, she often felt silly for scurrying faithfully off to Lauscha every weekend. She said, “Perhaps you find it ridiculous that I love my family. But I can’t change that. After all, I’m just a simple village girl. And I’m not as strong as you say. If I were, your clients wouldn’t like it. Men prefer women who smile nicely and agree to everything, do they not?”

“That may be true for the common herd,” Strobel said dismissively. “However, there are also true connoisseurs who are man enough to want to take on a strong woman. And I’m not just talking about business her
e . . .
” he added, drawing out his words.

The conversation had taken an unpleasant turn. At the very least, it was becoming personal. Embarrassed, Johanna picked at her fish, which lay untouched on her plate. There were a thousand questions she wanted to ask about his travel plans, but she didn’t know how to change the subject. “Most men don’t care for it when a woman has opinions of her own. Never mind a strong will,” she replied sharply.

Strobel shrugged.

“As I have said, there are men, and there are men. I like it very well indeed when a woman shows her dominance. In my experience, a man may even find great”—he hesitated for a moment, as if looking for the right word—“pleasure in submitting to such a woman. Putting himself into her hands. Of course both the man and the woman must show certain qualities, but this is not quite so rare as you may think. The phenomenon can even be found in many works of world literature. Perhaps I should give you one such work to read.”

His mood brightened suddenly. “Yes, that’s an excellent idea,” he said, greatly pleased with himself.

Johanna frowned. What on earth was Strobel talking about? She cleared her throat and pointed at the fish with her fork.

“Perhaps you could show me again how to get the bones out? Otherwise I’ll be sitting here till midnight with this plaice!”

Strobel watched thoughtfully as Johanna vanished into the dark hallway.

She had shied away so quickly when the conversation became personal that he had no doubt that she was still a virgin. All the same, he was certain that she had at least an idea of what he had been talking about.

He poured himself more champagne but did not drink it. His thoughts were so tantalizing that he needed no further stimulation.

Johanna, his assistant. And his key to freedom.

In less than three weeks it would be done; he would travel to B. while his business thrived under her care. He shifted about on his chair in a fever of anticipation. A kaleidoscope of gruesome yet gorgeous visions unfolded before his mind’s eye. In his eagerness he didn’t even notice at first that some of these images were of Johanna and no one else. Then he heard himself laugh.