Stones From the River Read online

  Trudi nodded.

  “Oh, but that finger was always like that. From when I was born. Just like you—” She stopped.

  “It was always that way?”

  “Always. You can tell a lot by a person’s fingers. Let me look at yours.” She crouched and brought her face close to Trudi’s hands. Her gray hair was stiff and wavy from the beauty parlor. “See those white specks under your fingernails?”

  Trudi looked at her fingernails. They were the color of her skin, only shiny, and some had tiny white spots.

  “That’s how you can tell how many mortal sins people have committed.” Frau Blau ran one thumb across Trudi’s fingernails. “Now with children … until they reach the age of reason, those specks are just a warning of mortal sins they might commit if they aren’t careful. You have… let me see—five altogether. That means you have to choose five times against the devil. Come—” She straightened with a sigh and, still holding Trudi’s wrist, headed for the kitchen. “Let me warm you a cup of milk.”

  Every morning Trudi would wake with the memory of what her mother had said—“When I get back, things will be better between us”—and she’d try to imagine their new lives: her father’s eyes would lose that worry; she and her mother would sit by the river instead of in the sewing room or beneath the house; the three of them would stand in the church square after mass, talking with other families.

  Except, her mother didn’t make good on her promise.

  She never came back.

  And she didn’t recognize Trudi the next time she saw her in Grafenberg. The rattle of her breath forced her neck into an arch on the hospital pillow. Above the metal bed hung a wooden crucifix. Jesus had his fingers spread as if to ward off the nails that held his palms to the cross. It was the only indication of a possible protest: the rest of his body had adapted itself to the shape of the cross as though made for it.

  For over an hour Trudi listened to her mother’s breath, standing frozen, her back to the window, enveloped by the asylum smell of candles and cinnamon. Her mother’s features were distorted with the effort of straining for yet another breath that filled the room and made Trudi feel as though she herself were suffocating. She felt an urgency to know what would happen in her life from now on—every hour, every moment even, because if you knew ahead of time, you could stop bad things from happening.

  When her mother’s dreadful breathing finally stopped, Trudi was relieved at the silence until the nurse bent over the bed to close her mother’s eyelids. The nurse had hairy wrists, and Trudi’s father stopped her by grasping those wrists. Then Trudi ran.

  From the room.

  Down the corridor.

  Past opened doors.

  At the end of the corridor, the nurse caught her by the locked metal gate. Holding Trudi, she whispered words that the girl couldn’t hear because her own breath had taken up the pattern that her mother had abandoned.

  The nurse led her into a green room and made her swallow a bitter green liquid that looked as though it had bled through the green walls. After a while Trudi found herself sitting on a wooden slat seat in the streetcar next to her father, a heavy glow behind her eyes and in her legs. Her father stared straight ahead, his fingers tight on the rim of his black hat, which lay on his knees. When the Schaffner— conductor—came through to collect money for tickets, he had to click the silver change maker that hung on his chest by a leather strap before Trudi’s father noticed him and fumbled for his wallet.

  At some of the stops, people leapt off the streetcar before it came to a full stop. Frau Abramowitz had warned Trudi never to do that. It was dangerous, she said. Her daughter, Ruth, had chipped a front tooth when she jumped from the streetcar, and her son, Albert—who’d jumped that same moment—had fallen on top of her. Trudi rubbed her front teeth. They were smooth and even. “Trudi has good teeth,” the dentist had told her mother. She didn’t like Dr. Beck, who had kinky hair sprouting from his long nostrils.

  At home her father wouldn’t speak to anyone. He sat at the table in the dining room, his hands no longer tight but limp on the polished mahogany as if they contained no bones. Frau Weiler and Frau Abramowitz called the undertaker, chose a coffin and flowers, sent black-rimmed death announcements to relatives and friends.

  When I get back, things will be better between us.

  Trudi had believed her mother.

  Her father took Trudi to the room in back of the cemetery chapel, where the coffin was propped up, but when Trudi looked into the coffin, she had to smile: the woman only resembled her mother a little. Her features were sharp and waxen. She wore a white dress and lay on a white pillow with a white cover to her waist. Like a bride, Trudi thought. The bride’s wrists were crossed on her chest, and three candles in tall holders burned at the head end of the coffin.

  Trudi lifted the cover from the bride’s legs, but before she could touch the left knee and prove to herself that no fragments of stone were hidden beneath the skin, her father pulled her back and replaced the cover. How could he mistake the woman in the coffin for her mother? Didn’t he see? What if her mother had only pretended to die to get out of the asylum and—by some elaborate scheme—had substituted the body of a black-haired bride already dead? Then, surely, she’d let Trudi know soon. All she had to do was wait and check for her mother in the gap below the house, and there she’d be—the scent of strawberry bugs on her fingers, singing “Pants Angelicus” or “Agnus Dei”

  Early the next morning, before Herr Abramowitz left for his law office in Düsseldorf, Leo Montag asked him to bring his camera to the cemetery chapel, and the following day Frau Simon fastened a new black hat with a rubber band below Trudi’s chin, while Herr Blau fussed with the buttons of Trudi’s black coat, which he’d cut down to size from a jacket that his son, Stefan, had outgrown a quarter of a century ago.

  Wreaths and bouquets of roses and lilies covered the earth around the oblong hole into which the coffin was lowered. Some of the war widows had brought their watering cans to sprinkle the flowers and keep them from wilting. Five nuns from the Theresienheim stood motionless, their heads bent while their fingers traveled the strands of their rosaries. From the maple trees, double-winged seeds the color of bones spun sluggishly in the sweltering air.

  As the people of Burgdorf stepped forward—one by one, the women with hats or black scarves knotted beneath their chins, the men in black suits and hats—to drop handfuls of dirt into the grave, they kept glancing toward Trudi, prepared to comfort her if she cried, and when she didn’t, they were baffled but told her that she was a brave little girl. They didn’t know that the roots of her hair hurt, and that each breath clogged her chest.

  Leo Montag stood rigid as if carved into the landscape. Next to him stood one of his comrades from the war, Judge Spiecker. Though the judge was only Leo’s age, his body gave off an old smell that came from somewhere deep inside and traveled on his breath and sweat although he kept himself fanatically clean.

  Swallows and pigeons swayed in the trees and hedges, and the scent of violets from Frau Simon’s perfume muted the smell of the flowers. When Herr Pastor Schüler bent and reached beneath the cuffs of his trousers to scratch himself, Trudi noticed that the skin on his legs was taut and shiny as though the hairs had all been scratched away. Specks of white powder drifted from under his cassock to settle on the polished black tops of his shoes.

  Trudi wondered where the grave with the hand was. Somewhere in the Catholic section of the cemetery, so she’d heard from several people, was the grave of a woman who’d hit her parents when she was a girl. As punishment and as a warning to other children—“Never ever raise your hand toward your parents,”—her hand had grown from her grave seventy years later when she’d died. Though Trudi had never found the grave, she was sure it was there, the hand curled between the shrubs like a blossom, ready to spread into a claw that would seize you if you came close.

  A trick wind lifted the hem of Frau Doktor Rosen’s skirt and shifted through the b
ouquets and wreaths so that—for an instant—they seemed to be sliding toward the hole. Eva Rosen and her two older brothers stood next to their mother, but Herr Rosen hadn’t come with them. He was from a rich old family and seldom left his house. On days when the sun was out—even in winter—Trudi would see him resting on the canvas lounge chair on his veranda, a soft man with receding hair and pink skin, his body covered with a plaid blanket. Some said he was quite ill; others insisted there was nothing wrong with him; yet, they all speculated why Frau Doktor Rosen wasn’t able to cure her husband.

  As the pastor sprinkled holy water into the grave, Trudi hooked one finger into the rubber band beneath her chin and let it snap, again and again, until all she felt was that sting.

  “Don’t hurt yourself,” the taxidermist said and enveloped Trudi’s hand with his warm fingers.

  At the house, as if to make up for Leo Montag’s silence, Frau Blau thanked the judge for coming. “We are honored,” she said. It was her way of acknowledging that the judge was of a better class than most of the guests. She cut pieces of Streuselkuchen for Frau Doktor Rosen and her children, but she reminded Trudi, “Wash your hands before you eat.” When she spit on her ironed handkerchief to clean Trudi’s face, the girl squirmed away.

  The tables were covered with an even larger display of delicacies than on the day of her brother’s funeral, and Trudi took whatever she wanted: three stalks of juicy white asparagus, blood sausage, plum cake, a Brötchen, tomato salad, and two kinds of herring salad—one pink because of added beets. New amber fly strips hung curled above the tables, but already quite a few flies stuck to them. Trudi counted eleven. Two were still twirling their legs. At her brother’s funeral feast, it had been too cold for flies.

  All the guests wanted to talk to her or stroke her hair, and she felt more important than she ever had before. She even received a present—a stuffed white lamb made of real fur—from Alexander Sturm, who owned a toy factory. He had been only fourteen when his father had died as a soldier, and he’d left the Gymnasium to run his father’s business for himself and his older sister.

  Emil Hesping moved through the rooms as if reclaiming lost rights and, like a host, poured Mosel wine for everyone from green bottles he’d brought in a wooden case on the back of his motorcycle.

  The taxidermist, Herr Heidenreich, helped Herr Hansen carry two Schwarzwälder Kirschtorten from his bakery. Propping his cigar against a plate, the taxidermist cut the first wedge of Torte for Trudi. Squatting on his heels, he handed her the plate. His eyes were brown and kind. “You’re lucky to have such pretty hair, Trudi,” he said.

  “Such pretty hair,” the baker agreed and stroked Trudi’s head with the hand that had two fingers missing from the war.

  Although Trudi felt wicked for liking all that attention, she couldn’t stop herself from enjoying it. There was an excitement about all this, something new, unknown. And yet, whenever she recalled that closed coffin, she’d feel something cold rush throughout her body. As long as the coffin had been open, she’d been certain her mother was not the woman inside, but once the lid had been shut, it had been harder to stay convinced.

  She walked past Herr Immers, but the butcher didn’t even see her because he and Herr Braunmeier were busy complaining to each other about something called the Versailles Friedensvertrag—a Schandvertrag, they called it, a disgrace. Then they went on to protest about refugees who took food out of the mouths of decent people, like the Baum family, who had fled from Schlesien and opened a bicycle shop in Burgdorf.

  “Those refugees have no manners, no values.” Herr Braunmeier lit his cigarette. Though he was the wealthiest farmer in town, he stole words when he came into the pay-library. He’d buy his tobacco and linger among the back shelves, where the American Westerns were stacked, his eyes racing down the pages of recent arrivals, his haggard body turned toward the exit as if prepared for flight, his shoulder blades jutting out like clipped wings.

  “They believe they can just move here and we’ll start buying those bicycles like porkchops,” Herr Immers said.

  Since the town had its own complicated class system—fixed boundaries based on wealth, education, family history, and other intricate considerations—the people united against newcomers. Yet, their prejudices were often tested by their curiosity, and many of them had watched outside the shop’s window as the burly Herr Baum arranged his display of four bicycles. Although the bikes already gleamed, he kept polishing them with an oily rag. Beyond the window, in the recesses of the store, stood his wife, frail and silent. On each hip she supported a child. “Twins,” someone in the crowd mentioned, though the boy was larger than the girl. Both had runny noses and were almost Trudi’s age, far too heavy to still be carried.

  Trudi sauntered into the hallway where the coat tree was fat with black summer coats and jackets. She climbed beneath them, but as her fingers parted the layers of fabric, they came up against something that was far more solid—a sleeve that had an arm inside.

  “What’s that?” A man’s voice.

  A woman’s hushed laugh and rose perfume.

  Trudi came out behind the coat tree, where the baker’s wife and Herr Buttgereit were kissing. They pulled apart so quickly that she felt an exhilarating sense of power because she was sure she’d seen something that they didn’t want anyone to know.

  Herr Buttgereit blinked at her. “You shouldn’t sneak around like that, little girl.”

  “Don’t get her all upset now,” Frau Hansen said. “We were looking for my glasses, Trudi. Did you see my glasses?”

  Trudi shook her head and backed away from them. By the kitchen door she stopped. The women were whispering about her mother: they agreed with one another that there had always been a little too much of everything about Gertrud Montag—not just that she laughed and cried too easily, but also that generosity. Frau Simon used the word “poise” for Trudi’s mother. An exuberant woman with beautiful ankles, Frau Simon had red hair that she piled into restless curls on top of her head. If anyone knew about poise, it was Frau Simon—after all, she talked about it constantly and made the most elegant hats in the region. Even women from Oberkassel and Krefeld came to her shop, which was on the first floor of the apartment house on Barbarossa Strasse that she’d bought with her own profits. People gossiped about her because she was divorced and liked to argue like a man, but they agreed that she had a natural eye for fashion and that—even though everyone knew Jews could talk you into buying anything—she refused to sell you a hat if it didn’t look right on you.

  Trudi could tell that the women treated Frau Simon differently: they envied her outspokenness; they tried to get her to flatter them; but they kept her outside their circle. They were like that with Frau Doktor Rosen too, bringing her their respect and illnesses that the nuns could not cure in the Theresienheim, but not their friendship.

  “Gertrud Montag always had poise,” Frau Simon said.

  Frau Buttgereit wondered aloud why, then, Gertrud had agreed to marry Leo Montag. Varicose veins bulged through her support stockings, and her belly was so big that she stood cradling it with her linked hands.

  “It’s his eyes.” Frau Blau sighed and took a long drag from her cigarette. “Leo Montag looks at you with those exquisite eyes of his, and you follow him anywhere.”

  Frau Simon laughed. “At your age?”

  “Any age.”

  “Leo is a saint for taking care of Gertrud those last five years,” Frau Weiler declared. “A saint, and don’t—”

  “I know a joke about a saint,” Trudi announced.

  The women’s faces spun toward her.

  “A joke.” Frau Weiler looked flustered. “This is not a proper occasion for telling jokes.” Her black scarf was still knotted around her frizzy hair that was parted in the center. No one in town could remember having seen all of her head uncovered because she always wore scarves that exposed only the front of her hair.

  “I’d like to hear the joke, Kindchen.” Frau Abramowitz
knelt next to Trudi and kissed her forehead. The collar of her black jacket was made of foxes—little claws and heads that came together in two pointed fox snouts between her breasts.

  Trudi threw both arms around her neck and squeezed hard. The fox fur tickled her chin. She wished she could call Frau Abramowitz by her first name—Ilse, which was so much prettier than Abramowitz—but children had to call grown-ups by their last names and address them with Sie—the formal you. Only children were called by their first names and addressed with Du—the familiar you—by everyone. That was one good thing about being a child. Many grown-ups called each other by their last names all their lives, and if they agreed to switch to first names, they first had to link elbows while drinking beer or Schnaps to manifest the Du.

  “Go ahead, Trudi,” Frau Abramowitz said. “You tell us your joke.”

  “It’s about St. Petrus.” Trudi tried to remember the right sequence of the joke she’d overheard Emil Hesping tell her father last month when he’d come into the pay-library with the news that he’d been promoted to manage a second gymnasts’ club in Düsseldorf. It was larger than the one in Burgdorf and belonged to the same owner who’d talked with Emil about having him open other clubs as far away as Köln and Hamburg.

  “The joke starts with the Virgin Maria,” Trudi said. “She wants to go to earth for three weeks. St. Petrus makes her promise to write every week.… The first week she writes that she saw three churches and two museums. She signs her letter ‘Virgin Maria …’”

  Frau Doktor Rosen, who’d just walked into the kitchen, raised one elegant eyebrow. Eva was holding on to her mother’s belt, her dark eyes watchful. Trudi had seen her many times before—she looked like her mother, with those long wrists and black curls—but she’d never talked with her or stood this close to her. If she could have any wish right now, she’d want to be tall like Eva.

  Trudi looked right at Eva. “The second letter,” she told her, “says, ‘Dear St. Petrus, I took a trip on a train and rode on a ferry boat.’ She signs the letter again with ‘Virgin Maria.’ But the third letter—” She paused, hoping she’d get the joke just right so that Eva would laugh as her father and Emil Hesping had laughed. That’s how she’d known it was a good joke, even though she hadn’t understood what was so funny.