The Luck of the Weissensteiners (The Three Nations Trilogy) (42 page)

“Oh I think Benedikt knew him,” Johanna said. “We bought a dining table from him. Well, I always warned Benedikt about this party business but he didn't want to listen.”

“Have you ever heard from Karl and Wilhelm again?” asked Jonah.

“Not for some t
ime. Wilhelm was drafted and sent to Norway. He should still be alive but we have not had any letters from that side of the family for a few months. Berlin has been bombed into the ground I expect. It would be a miracle if they survived,” Johanna said coldly, as if she was talking about a novel rather than real people.

“What
ever happened to Karl?” Jonah reluctantly enquired.

“If I read the code in their letters correctly he was adopted by another Winkelmeier family who claimed it was their
neighbour’s orphaned son. He was sent to the countryside along with most of Berlin's children,” she said.

“So he might be orphaned again and living with strangers?” Jonah suggested.

“Yes, that is possible,” Johanna admitted.

“In that case we have to find him, too,” Jonah said excitedly.

“Yes we do. I will write to Berlin as soon as there is a post
al service again. Jaro, my new boss here, has already said he will help me,” Johanna said.

“You seem more concerned for Karl than for your own children,” observed Halyna cynically but Johanna seemed to take no offence.

“My children were hard work. I hated being their mother,” she admitted.  “Karl was like a grandchild to me, I absolutely adored him. I guess I am better use as a grandmother than a mother. It takes all sorts.”

Johanna asked her boss and admirer to let the three of them stay at the farm. Jaro was happy to fulfil any wish
of his attractive new kitchen maid and said he could do with some extra help on the farm if she wanted them to stay, at least until the end of the harvest season in autumn.

The Russians had already begun to re
turn displaced people from the east to their original home in the Soviet satellite states. This was bound to start in Slovakia soon as well. All Germans – with the exception of some indispensable ones – would be sent away too. There could be a shortage of labour before long.

Alma was relieved about Jaro’s generous
offer. At Jonah's advanced age it would have been difficult to find someone willing to employ him. Now they would have Jaro testifying that they were neither Germans nor Ukrainians who had to be deported. Only Halyna would have to be hidden in case of a search.

Jonah was delighted to have found a safe place so near Bratislava. He decided to go back to Gajova right away and leave word with
his former neighbours for Egon.  Alma urged him to have a rest today but once again there was no stopping him. “The heart wants what the heart wants!” he told her.

On the way to Bratislava he started to feel very short of breath and suffered a dizzy spell that almost made him faint. He briefly sat down but the fatherly duty he felt towards his son urged him soon again on his way. He arrived at the former workshop late in the afternoon and went straight to the old neighbour to inform him of his new circumstances. Nobody answered to his knocking but the door was ajar and so Jonah went inside, making his arrival known by shouting
“Hello!” and “I am coming in!”

He could only see one open door in the hallway, carefully approached it and glanced into the unlocked room. The neighbour who had only yesterday congratulated himself for having been spared by the retribution activities was
hanging by a rope from the ceiling. Someone had painted a swastika on his forehead. Jonah's heart sank. Not because of the shock – he had seen many dead people in Brno and on the way to Bratislava. Almost bereft of sympathy for the executed fascist he was sad that the one person who was most likely to pass on a message to his son had been killed. He felt a short spasm in his chest and had to double over to ease the pain but as quickly as the pain had begun it also disappeared.

Jonah went over to the Svoboda house and knocked. This time a different woman opened the door, presumably the grandmother of the little child from yesterday. He explained his situation to her and told her where Egon could find him should he show up.

The woman nodded without indicating that she had understood or was willing to help. Just as she was about to close the door Jonah told her about the body i
n the house next door.

“Thank you
. I will make sure they take him down before it smells,” she said and then shut the door quickly.

Somewhat dissatisfied with his mission and worried that his son might not get the information he stepped into the workshop and deposited a letter he had written for Egon. On the way home he kept feeling faint and dizzy and had to stop several times. Tomorrow he would take Alma's
advice and have a day of rest – assuming Jaro would allow him to.

Johanna and Alma were very relieved when
he returned unharmed and served him some dinner.

“You look pale,”
Johanna commented. “You must eat. Jaro has big plans for you this week. Since you worked with mechanical looms he thinks you will be an engineering genius.”

“Do you think he will grant me a
rest day? I feel rather exhausted after all the walking,” he asked.

“Now don't be ungrateful.
You have no papers, you speak Slovak with an accent, and you would be wild game on the streets of Bratislava. He took you in regardless. Now don't disappoint him,” Johanna scolded him.

“Of course, you are right. I am being silly
,” Jonah replied.

That night he dreamt about his son. Egon had both hands tied up behind his back and was led through a dark underground labyrinth by a German and a Russian soldier. The march seemed never to end and was following a narrow path between two stony walls. Jonah felt his heart tighten in panic as he followed them at a safe distance. Suddenly the German soldier opened a door ahead of him and the t
hree of them stepped onto a sunlit market square where a group of enraged onlookers waited for them. To the left side of the door was a pyre, on the right side stood a scaffold with a rope. Egon was positioned exactly between those two while the German officer walked towards the pyre and the Russian towards the hanging beams. Suddenly he saw the Countess approaching the shouting and threatening crowd, addressing them in Czech:

“My dear citizen, I am in
a pickle here. My left arm wants to burn this creature for the Jew that he is. My right arm wants to hang him for the war crimes he committed. I am miserable because I can only do one or the other. I ask you citizens, which one shall it be?”

The people shouted
back at her “The rope!”, “The pyre!”, “Hang him!”, “Burn him!”

“You are of no help to me today. We have to find a compromise. I am going to stab him for being a liar,” she said calmly, pulling out a knife. She apologised to the blood thirsty soldiers and walked towards Egon.

“No!” shouted Jonah and charged towards his son. He got there in time to step between Egon and the Countess and just before the blade could pierce his heart he woke up covered in sweat.

He could
not go back to sleep, trying to make sense of his dream. His late wife Barbara had always told him to take dreams seriously and to search for their meanings. Seeing the almost death of his son was too much to even imagine. Egon had to be alive. This dream could not be about his son, it was about the Countess.

Why had she appeared as a murderess when she was the one who had helped Jonah all through the war? Where was all this coming from? As he tossed and turned Johanna woke up several times and feeling guilty f
or disrupting her sleep he left the barn and went for a walk.

Af
ter he had walked a short distance away from the building he felt another dizzy spell and tumbled to the floor. His heart felt as if it was being held and crushed by iron pliers. Panic ridden he tried to crawl back to the barn and call for Alma but his strength left him and as the life ebbed out of him he realised how weak he really was. His determination to find Egon had kept him going beyond the capabilities of his fragile old body and now that he had done everything he could to make contact with his missing son, it was time to pay the price. Before his mind’s eye he saw his late wife standing in front of him and heard her say: “Come along now. You have done enough. Now let the others finish what you have started. Come here. We have been waiting for you! You are free to go!” Only then did he notice another two figures standing next to his wife: The Countess and Egon. He turned around one more time towards the barn where Alma was still fast asleep, then he stood up and ran towards his family in the hereafter.

By the time Alma
found her lover in the morning the body was already cold. Halyna held her friend and let her shed her silent tears. After only a short while Alma pulled herself together, covered Jonah with a blanket and went to the main house to tell Johanna.

“Oh my G
od!” exclaimed her friend when she heard the news. “My poor darling. Come here!” and she hugged Alma for a little while, then she broke free and said:  “Well, he reached a good age all things considered. It is almost a miracle he made it this long.”

“He was
fine. If only he hadn't set his mind on rushing back and forth between Bratislava and here in this heat and all in one day. No wonder his heart gave up,” Alma complained.

“
Maybe it was for the better,” Johanna commented. “If something has happened to Egon – and we must assume that it has – he was spared finding out about it. Losing your child is horrible. When they killed my Maria it was worse than I could ever have imagined. If only I had not seen it. It was worse than when they killed Benedikt. I am glad I don't know what has happened to my other children. If they are dead I would prefer not to know. At least I can cling to the hope that they have found happiness somewhere else and I am a strong and cool headed person. Imagine Jonah going through the same ordeal.”

“You are certainly right there.
He could not have taken it,” Alma agreed.

“Then there are Greta and Wilma, on their way to Paris. He doesn't have to worry about them any more eit
her. I think it was a blessing dying quickly in the middle of the night. I hope that is the way I go eventually,” Johanna continued her insensitive evaluation of the death.

Alma realised that when it came to talk
ing about loss, Johanna was not the best person to choose as a partner. She went back outside and sat with Jonah for a while, until Jaro joined her with one of his helpers and put the body in a grave behind the pear trees.

“I wish we had some Jewish people here to say the Kaddish for him!” said Alma with regret. “He did not believe in it all that much but it was his cultu
re if nothing else. It feels wrong to just bury him like this.”

“There are a few more Jews in the ground next to him already!” Jaro told her. “We hid seventeen of
them under the cow shed. They are gone now but two of them died of natural causes. I am sure they will sing the Kaddish for him,” he said. “Don't worry about that.”

“Did you know a girl called Sarah?” she asked the Slovak farmer.

“Yes, I knew the family. Her father and I argued all the time about the boundaries and stupid things but then we made up and celebrated the harvest together. They should have gone into hiding when they could but they were desperate to hold on to their farm so they missed their chance.”

“Do you know what happened to them after their arrest? Have you heard anything?” Alma dared to ask even though she did not expect to hear good news.

“I am afraid not. After the uprising President Tiso sent most of our Jews to Poland to be killed. I have always thought that since all of them arrived there so late in the war, most of them must have survived. The more time passes since the liberation the more I doubt that the Russians came quickly enough to save them. Nobody knows. It has been a few weeks and nobody has come back. I hope they are amongst the survivors. Some never return to their homes but go on to Palestine or New York.”

“I wish I knew. She was a great woman.” Alma said.

“Johanna thinks so too. You and my cook were good friends I hear. What would you suggest I do to make her my wife? She is so beautiful, it kills me. She knows farm work, she is perfect. I know I am not much to look at and not the youngest either but I have a good heart. She seems to like me but then I am not sure. What do you say?”

“It is a bit
too soon to think about these things. Her husband and daughter only died a little while ago, she will need time,” Alma suggested.

“I know. It is just that I am so smitten with her. She certainly has her
charms despite her grief,” Jaro said laughingly. “Do you think she will take me at all?”

“You better move slowly and carefully with her!”
Alma advised him, “I can let you in on a little secret: She already thinks of your farm as her new home. She is not the romantic type, so don't expect a miracle. In time I am certain she will accept your proposal and it won't come as a surprise; a blind man can tell that you are in love with her.”

“Oh G
od!” Jaro laughed relieved. “I guess subtlety is not my strength.”