The American Lady(57)

“After all, they have to live off something, don’t they? And this way at least they are helping the sick, rather than having to bow and scrape to commercial tastes—the way some of us have to,” she added, still smarting over her recital at Ruth’s party. “They recently built a very modern dance studio at Monte Verità—I’d love to see it one day!”

“It does sound magical,” Marie said, realizing once again that the world was getting smaller all the time. The distances were shrinking. Apparently it was nothing strange to end up in New York because you’d won a bet. Or to go all the way to Switzerland to visit a dance studio.

When she asked Franco later about Monte Verità, he laughed.

“Have I heard of it? Who hasn’t? They’re all nudists and long-haired dreamers! But the people of Monte Verità aren’t quite as pure as they profess to be. Everybody in my line of business has heard the stories about how the tavern keepers in Ascona never sold so much wine before those eccentrics arrived! The competitors in nearby towns are quite envious.” When Marie looked baffled, he explained. “My dear, when nobody’s watching, they come down from Monte Verità to the village to have a square meal and a drink or two! Is it any surprise? A few glasses of red wine always help if you’re seeking wisdom!”





17

She was in love and she was discovering new worlds of art. Despite all that, Marie kept her promise and told Wanda about Lauscha and her real father. Sometimes she just perched on the edge of Wanda’s bed for a couple of minutes before rushing off to meet Franco and told a quick tale of village life, leaving Wanda impatient for more. She loved her aunt’s stories, the more the better. “Didn’t you say that it was time I heard everything?” she said whenever Marie tried to hurry these visits along.

And so Wanda learned that her father was a talented glassblower and that he still liked to drink, though he was no longer the wild lad he had been in his youth. He was hardly seen down at the village tavern anymore, for now he did the lion’s share of the work for his family. When Wanda asked why that was the case, Marie held nothing back. Wanda deserved to hear the whole truth.

How her father’s younger brother, Michel, got so drunk one night that he trapped his foot in the rails on the Sonneberg-Lauscha line as a train was approaching and couldn’t get free in time. It was his bad luck that he lost his right leg, the leg that a glassblower uses to work the treadle on the bellows and control how much air mixes in with the gas flame. From that day on, there was one fewer glassblower at work in the Heimer household.

“Michel used to make eyes at me—I think I was eighteen at the time—and we met up a few times. But I was only interested in spending time with him so that I could pick up a few tricks of the trade,” Marie admitted, laughing.

Wanda’s other uncle, Sebastian, had left Lauscha immediately when he found his wife Eva naked in bed with his father, Wanda’s grandfather, and he never came back. Eva had stayed with Wilhelm, and they now lived together as man and wife. Wilhelm was an old man and in very poor health. Marie doubted he would survive the next winter.

Wanda was astonished. It was all so scandalous! She would never have believed that her relatives in the old country could get up to such mischief.

When she asked Ruth about Eva, her mother replied, “That Eva always was a snake in the grass. The only thing that surprises me is that it took her so long to start playing around behind Sebastian’s back. I can well remember the way she flirted with the old man! Those two deserve one another!”

Wanda wanted to know more, but Ruth wouldn’t go into detail. She didn’t like the way Marie was dishing up old gossip, and she told her so straight out.

“Do you think you’re doing Wanda any favors by telling her about that den of vipers?” she snapped at Marie. “None of them wanted anything to do with her—why should she care if the old man’s taken to his bed with gout or arthritis?” Then she rounded on Wanda and accused her of caring more about a crowd of complete strangers than she did about her nearest and dearest. About her father, for instance.

Wanda knew that Steven was suffering. He took her sudden interest in Lauscha to mean that she no longer felt anything for him. Which was nonsense, of course. He was her daddy despite everything, surely he realized that! But she couldn’t tell him herself, so none of them quite managed to say what they really meant. Ruth tried her best to act as though nothing had ever happened, Steven thought that he had lost his daughter, and Marie suffered terribly from having been the one to start the whole dreadful business. And Wanda? She didn’t know which way to turn.