Grinning broadly, Johanna set off back to Strobel’s. What a shame that Ruth and Marie hadn’t been here with her.
“So? How was your first trip to the emporia?” Strobel asked her that evening.
“Very nice,” Johanna answered noncommittally. She had almost put the new dress on to wear at supper. But Strobel might think she was doing it on his account.
Strobel chuckled. “I admire your ability to dissemble, my dear! But you can’t fool an old fox like me. There’s a sparkle in your eyes that tells me you were unable to resist temptation.”
Johanna frowned, but when she saw his grin, she found herself smiling as well.
“All right then, you’ve found me out. I really enjoyed my little outing.”
Strobel looked as pleased as if he’d just closed a sale.
Johanna thought for a moment, then asked, “Why do you find it so important that I go shopping?” When he didn’t answer at once, she thought aloud. “I mean, you’re my employer. There’s no reason for you to be so generous with your time and money . . .”
“No, no, no! You don’t seriously imagine that I care whether you had a nice time?”
Johanna swallowed, suddenly afraid that she would make herself look ridiculous, or that Strobel would poke fun at her.
Friedhelm Strobel leaned across the table. “You are a beautiful woman. And you are also clever. What you lack—I will speak bluntly here—is a certain finesse. Not just in how you approach my clients, but also in how you carry yourself.” He stood up and walked around her chair, looking her up and down as he did. “Just look at yourself! Your dress looks as though a cobbler made it in his spare moments. The material is so rough that I shudder to think what it must feel like on your skin.” He shivered in exaggerated disgust. Then he pointed a finger at Johanna’s head.
“And there—not a comb, not a clasp, not a sparkle to be seen! And it would do you no harm to visit a hairdresser. After all, your hair has a natural shine. God knows, we can’t compare Sonneberg to such fashionable cities as Paris or Milan, but there is no need for our womenfolk to walk around in sackcloth and ashes.”
“Well thank you for all this!” Johanna shot back. “And there I was thinking you had employed me for my looks.” For all the sarcasm in her remark, she swallowed hard nevertheless. She took a sip of red wine and tried not to let her irritation show. She couldn’t appreciate just then that Strobel was simply giving her his usual sales pitch—a mix of give and take. She could hear only his criticism and not his compliments. No finesse and a clumsily sewn dress—Ruth would have been livid! Her sister was fiercely proud of her skill with the needle.
Strobel took Johanna’s hand almost as soon as she put her glass down. “I apologize if I have hurt you with my remarks. That was not my intention.”
Johanna sat frozen, waiting for the opportunity to snatch her hand away, while Strobel talked on. “I am expecting some important customers in the coming weeks. Businessmen who are at home in the world’s greatest cities. The competition does not sleep, not even here in Sonneberg. If the other wholesalers are not to knock me off my perch, I must always be on the alert. And in this regard, an elegant and worldly assistant can be of great help.” He fell silent.
Johanna stared sullenly ahead. Despite herself, she saw the same image in her mind’s eye that she had seen when Strobel first made his offer after Father died; herself, elegantly dressed in blue velvet, a pencil in one hand and a leather notebook in the other. A smile crept into the corners of her mouth. Well, she was a little closer to that picture now that she had bought the new dress.
Strobel was watching her carefully. “How others perceive us is entirely up to us. A man is what he makes of himself. He can be treated with respect and goodwill, or he can be crushed underfoot like a worm. If you want to be successful in the world of trade and commerce, then you must look successful. It rests in your hands. Do you understand what I mean?” he asked insistently.
Johanna nodded. In fact she only understood part of what he was saying. She—Johanna Steinmann from Lauscha—successful? But even if she couldn’t quite say what Strobel was going on about, she had begun to glimpse the bigger picture. His criticism had woken something inside her for which she had no name.
Others would call it ambition.
From then on Johanna went shopping in Sonneberg at least once a week. She decided that this new habit of hers had much less to do with Strobel’s urgings than with the fact that she liked to look around the shops and admire the window displays. Of course she didn’t always buy something; she was far too frugal for that. But most weekends she brought a little something home with her, a bag of coffee for Ruth or a few colored pencils for Marie. She bought Peter a thick notebook so that he could keep a record of how many glass animals he had sold, and although he grumbled something about “not needing that sort of thing” Johanna knew that she saw a gleam of pleasure in his eye.