The American Lady(49)

“She’s not in the apartment, and we’ve looked everywhere we can nearby. Where else shall we try?” Marie’s voice was low and troubled when Harold met her at the bar. “She won’t have gone to Pandora, will she?”

“I shouldn’t think so.” Harold seemed distracted. “There’s somewhere we haven’t tried, though. She told me once that she likes to go out on the roof. Because it brings her closer to the stars.”



“My father was a glassblower in Lauscha . . .” Wanda was leaning against the chimney. Her face was gray, and her eyes were glazed. The wind was tugging at the thin fabric of her ball gown and her right foot was planted firmly in a slick puddle, but she seemed not to notice.

Marie looked around, distraught. Was this really Wanda’s favorite hideaway? This horrible place? How lonely she must be if this was where she felt safe!

When they had found Wanda, Marie sent Harold away. She wanted to talk to her niece alone.

Wanda looked up. “My father was a violent man—is that really true?” Tears ran down her face.

Marie felt panic rise inside her. I can’t do this, a voice inside her cried.

“I think everybody has their own different truth,” she said. How hollow that sounded! Shuddering, she remembered how Ruth and Wanda’s argument had ended.

“You want to know why I never told you anything about the man you call your father?” Ruth had asked, grabbing her daughter by the arms so that their faces were only inches apart. Hysteria and despair battled in Ruth’s face, twisting her fine features. “I’ll tell you why: because when you were just a babe in arms, he would have beaten you to death if I hadn’t sheltered you with my own body! That’s the truth about your father.”

At that, Wanda had doubled over as though punched in the gut.

“I don’t believe you. You’re a liar!” she whispered, then ran away, her hands clasped over her ears.

“Ruth and Thomas were young. They were too young to know that they weren’t really suited for one another,” Marie began.

Wanda laughed. She sounded tired. “For eighteen years now I’ve been calling a man Father who isn’t really my father at all—that’s the truth!” She began to cry. “This can’t be true! I . . .”

Marie was afraid that Wanda would shove her away as soon as she put her arm around her niece’s shoulders, but Wanda simply nestled into her embrace.

“I just don’t know what to do . . . Marie, help me!”

And so Marie told her about Lauscha. Wanda’s head lay on her breast and her gown was wet with tears. She stumbled over the words at first, for the memories were rusty, but with every sentence she spoke the past came more vividly to life.

She told her about the three Steinmann sisters, about how they had lost their parents at such a young age. They had been left with nothing, knew nothing of how hard life could be, had nothing but their dreams. Johanna had dreamt of the big wide world. And so she had been the one to go to Sonneberg and work for one of the wholesalers. Marie hesitated again as she told her niece how the man had brutally raped her sister. Wanda straightened up and was just about to ask a question, but Marie put a finger to her lips. Times had been hard for three orphan girls. Then she told her about Ruth, about how she had been so in love with Thomas Heimer, the son of one of the richest glassblowers in the whole village. At the time the three sisters had been hired hands in Wilhelm Heimer’s busy glass workshop, which is where Ruth had met Thomas. They had been truly happy together, at least at first, and the wedding had been a grand occasion.

“Then you came along. He had wanted a son more than anything, and when you turned out to be a girl Thomas just couldn’t forgive your mother. Some men are like that. He drank too much as well, and the marriage went downhill very quickly after that. And then, one night, there was Ruth—scared out of her wits and carrying her little girl and all her worldly goods, standing in front of our family home. Your mother is a very proud woman. She never told us what finally put an end to the marriage. She kept a firm lid on all her suffering. Then when Steven came into her life, he was the fairy-tale prince she’d always dreamt of. You were only a year old when he took the two of you off to America. He had forged papers for both of you, and Ruth was traveling as Baroness von Lausche. Two years later, Thomas Heimer finally agreed to a divorce.” Marie sighed.

Wanda clamped her lips together and didn’t say a word. She seemed amazed, as though she couldn’t believe that what Marie was telling her had anything to do with her mother, the elegant New York society lady who was always so calm and collected.