Whisper on the Wind (22 page)

“I shall take your coats,” Isa said, following the Hauptmann’s lead with her usage of the French language.

“Is there no one serving this house?” Herr Lutz asked, also in French, as he unbuttoned his coat.

“Yes, but our housemaid is in the kitchen finishing preparations for our meal.” Need she explain that no one had money to keep servants these days? That it was only Clara’s loyalty—and whatever money she still had left from Isa’s father—that kept her here?

Isa received their coats and went to the closet on the other side of the staircase, where she took her time putting things away. There was no hurry to join the others, at least until Edward arrived.

Genny and Major von Bürkel stood with the visitors when Isa returned to the parlor. The Major spoke in heavy, ugly German, obviously pleased to be reunited with his older friend.

Herr Lutz had a pedantic look about him, like a science professor who could name every law of physics but would be hard-pressed to remember a single student’s name. He was of medium height, with gray hair too long at the back and a beard that needed a trim. Obviously too busy with other matters to tend to something as trivial as his own appearance.

In a bizarre imitation of prewar days, Isa watched the exchange of pleasantries as if this were another dinner party her parents hosted in this very parlor. Isa should be friendly and talkative if she was to play the role her mother had modeled all too often, but how could she? Her mother may have entertained people she secretly disliked, but surely she’d never hosted marauders under this roof.

It was near time to serve and Edward had not yet arrived.

“Have you enjoyed Max’s company since you resumed living here?” the Hauptmann asked, now speaking in French.

Company!
Isa stole a glance at the Major.
Max.
Such a different sound from
Major von Bürkel
.

“He’s been very kind,” Genny said.

Isa was glad Genny had answered for her. Her gaze went once again toward the door. Where
was
Edward?

Clara came to Isa’s side to remind her the meal was ready to be served, and Isa knew she couldn’t stall and in fact didn’t want to. The sooner this was over, the better. Edward would have to join them in the dining room, whenever he arrived.

Among the goods delivered earlier that day had been several bottles of wine, one for each course of the meal and one for an
apéritif
. All, so Clara claimed, from Isa’s own wine cellar. Clara had huffed and puffed all afternoon, in between oohing and aahing about all of the food, especially the fresh dairy.

She and Genny had planned a meal no one had dared dream of for the past two years. Isa had done what she could—which was little, having had no training—but had enjoyed tasting sauces, stealing crisp vegetables, breathing in the scent of fresh dinner rolls all afternoon. It had taken her mind, for a little while, away from fretting over what they’d hidden in the cellar.

Place settings beckoned on each side of the narrow table in the long, dimly lit room. The electricity had flickered all afternoon and so Genny suggested candlelight. Under its gentle glow glimmered china and plain flatware—the silver having disappeared long ago—upon an embroidered cloth, with hothouse flowers set in a small bowl in the center. Candle sconces on the walls made shadows dance behind each place setting. Only one seat, next to Isa’s, was vacant.

Herr Lutz stared at the open spot. “We have set a place for those we remember at war?”

“A nice sentiment,” Isa said, “but we are expecting one more guest. Madame Kirkland’s nephew, Father Antoine.”

“Father Antoine? A man of the cloth?”

Isa nodded. The German’s face revealed little; she couldn’t tell if he was pleased or disappointed to share the table with a priest.

“Yes, quite a young priest, this Father Antoine. I spoke to him the other night.” The Hauptmann laughed. “He said God doesn’t care who wins the war.”

That statement raised Herr Lutz’s bushy brows and Isa’s too. She wished she could have heard Edward speak of God.

“He is a Walloon priest, this Father Antoine?” Herr Lutz asked.

Genny nodded. The false name Edward had chosen left little choice.

“Then he is loyal to the French. When Germany wins the war, the only way to hold on to his faith will be to say God doesn’t care.”

Prickles stiffened Isa’s back.

“Since he is not here to explain the point,” the Major said, “I suppose none of us can ultimately agree or disagree.”

The ringer echoed again. No one had taken their seats, and so Isa excused herself and went to the door. She liked having a duty, especially one taking her from their guests, if only for a moment.

“Oh, you’re here at last! We were starting to worry.”

Edward took off his biretta. “I’m sorry. I was stopped yet again for a search.”

“We’ve just gone into the dining room. I’ll put your hat away.”

They entered the dining room together. The others still stood near their seats and Isa made introductions as she showed Edward to his chair.

“I see I’ve arrived just in time to invite the blessing of the Lord,” Edward said, and Isa couldn’t resist exchanging a pleased glance with Genny.

Edward prayed a brief blessing, a prayer wisely free of reference to the war.

“Before you arrived, we were just discussing you, Father,” the Hauptmann said as Clara served the meal. “And your opinion that God is neither Allied nor Central in sympathy.”

“Quite the contrary, Hauptmann,” Edward said. “I believe we all have a great deal of God’s sympathy. We are, after all, quite pathetic these days.”

There was the barest moment of awkward silence, followed by a laugh from the Major that others soon joined.

“With all respect, Father Antoine,” the Hauptmann said, “why would God have sympathy? for that matter, even give us a thought?”

“The answer is simple.” Edward turned to Clara and took a small portion of the first course of creamed scallops to his plate. “Love.”

That seemed to catch Herr Lutz’s attention. “That’s a rather sentimental answer, even for a man of the cloth.”

“Perhaps,” Edward said, “but it’s also scriptural, so I shall stand by my answer.”

With Edward at her side, Isa found it easier playing hostess. “Tell me, Herr Lutz, how is it that a civilian like you finds himself working at the Kommandantur?”

“My capacity is as adviser between the military and civilian personnel.”

“We were grateful for your help in having my son returned, Herr Lutz,” Genny said.

“I was pleased to be of service.”

There. As far as Isa was concerned, the meal could end immediately, purpose served.

“Where is Jonah?” the Major asked, as if he’d just realized the boy was not in attendance.

“Jonah has gone to live with a close friend of the family,” Genny said. “He misses his friends and asked if he could return to his old neighborhood for a while.”

“So you will be apart from your son after all,” the Hauptmann said.

“He is only minutes away.”

Edward raised his glass of wine. “A bit more accessible than St. Gilles, wouldn’t you agree?”

The Hauptmann did not reply.

“And you, Hauptmann?” Genny inquired. “Are you in Brussels on leave from the front?”

He shook his head. “No, this is now my permanent station. I am needed here. My civilian background is in law, and I work at the Palais de Justice.”

Herr Lutz patted his napkin to his moustache. “It is good of you to invite us here this evening. General Freiherr von Bissing is most eager to improve Brussels society, and it must start with those like you, models of the community.”

“Then you may tell him, Herr Lutz,” Edward said, “he would do best in that regard by stopping the deportations of men from the provinces.”

Isa’s prayer that no offense be taken was as quick as her glance between the two men proving offense had already been exchanged.

Herr Lutz twirled his wineglass between taut fingers, his gaze anything but amused. “There are a great number of unemployed men in Belgium, Father Antoine. Surely since you are exempt from either idleness caused by England’s blockade or deportation itself, you can at least appreciate what the General hopes to accomplish? To spare Belgium more mouths to feed, to improve the economy by putting men to work? To make sure the habit of work is not lost? Idle hands are the devil’s tools, as your brethren remind us.”

Edward’s fork lingered over the steamed potatoes. “As to mouths to be fed, English and American generosity has addressed that. Though for how much longer, who can say, if they determine Germany must take on the burden as punishment for deporting men. And as to improving the economy and addressing idleness, once the men may work for Belgium rather than Germany, you will find them eager to expend the last ounce of their energy.”

“I understand your reluctance toward change. It will take longer than just a few short years for General von Bissing to be appreciated for the leader he is, at least by Belgians. Perhaps not until well after the war.”

“I’m sure we all long for the end of the war,” Isa said.

“Perhaps we should generalize our topic so as not to offend our hostesses.” The Hauptmann glanced Isa’s way first, then settled his gaze on Edward. “Tell me, Father Antoine, what inspired you to take up the priesthood? I myself have always thought of God as nothing more than an illusion.”

“An illusion suggests one has seen
something
, Hauptmann. And as I’ve never seen God, I’m afraid I devote my life to Him based upon something even less than that: pure faith.”

“Life itself points to an evolutionary process,” Herr Lutz said, “one in which there is no need for faith, for man-made religions. Survival of the fittest is a cruel truth, as this war will prove.”

“Do you mean to say war is some kind of biological experiment?” Edward asked.

“It can be broken down to that, of course. For the sake of the species, the less advanced must step aside for the superior. For example, if an engineer develops a machine that is more productive than the one it replaces, he naturally stops using the less-effective machine. So it is with man. The best should be preserved and allowed to impose its orders and social organizations upon the less advanced—to replace or, if need be, destroy them.”

He spoke so matter-of-factly he could have been discussing anything. Anything, that is, except the societies of man—of people, of families, of men and women and children.

“Well,” Edward replied, “you’ve certainly fit man into a machine, haven’t you?”

“What more is he than that?”

“It’s a rather lonely viewpoint,” Isa said, “don’t you think, Herr Lutz? If man is nothing more than a machine, then what is it all for?”

“For the propagation of the race, of course.”

“With or without love,” Genny said. “With or without God.”

“Let me understand correctly.” Edward leaned back in his chair. “Whichever army wins this war will prove that army is on the right evolutionary track? And the army that loses, being unfit, will be destroyed for the
good
of the rest of us?”

“This is only natural, Father Antoine. Biological factors control our destinies, not some distant god who tampers now and then with the little toys he’s made. It is, of course, biologically certain that Germany will win.”

“And if not? If the Allies win?”

The Hauptmann lifted his wineglass. “Then I, for one, would rather die in the melee than live in a world so resistant to natural law.”

“Your views leave little room for human virtue,” Genny said. “If it is only the fit who are destined to survive, then what good is virtue?” She looked at Herr Lutz. “Yet I know you are not without mercy. You were quick to see the injustice regarding my son.”

“Freeing your son was a military decision. I believe the way to win this war is on the battlefield alone. Imprisoning children, deporting women to work camps, sinking ships with civilians aboard—these are not sound military decisions. We might as well do the recruiting for the Allies ourselves with such deeds.”

“And deporting men, tearing them from their families?” Edward asked. “Using them in the war effort against their own countrymen?”

“As I explained already, inviting men to work is a sound economic decision. Men are needed for a variety of work in Germany. We Germans are not the first, nor I’m sure the last, to employ such methods.”

“Have you heard of the painter Paul Gauguin, Herr Lutz?” Edward asked.

Herr Lutz nodded.

“This house once boasted a painting by him.” Edward looked at the blank wall at the end of the room even as Isa glanced his way. All these years he’d been more observant of her home than she’d thought. “It used to hang there, but it’s gone now.”

“Are you suggesting someone stole it?”

“I mention him because I have read a little of his life. He left his family to search for what was called the ‘noble savage.’ The
natural
man, like the one to whom you refer with your biological laws. The one untouched by society’s restrictions, who would, Gauguin thought, display the natural goodness of man, an unspoiled example of individual freedom from laws, from responsibilities, even from God. But all he found were cruelty of a different kind and more death. To his last painting, he was always in search of answers—from where do we come, what
are
we, and to where do we go? I think we all must ask ourselves these questions and ask God to help us find the answers. Because, after all, God
is
searching for those who seek Him, whether we believe it or not.”

“I couldn’t agree more,” Isa said.

21

Some things are best kept at a distance. A German, for example.

La Libre Belgique

“I will get your things,” Isa said as they emerged from the parlor a short while after dinner ended.

The tension had gradually lifted, or perhaps she’d only gotten used to it by the time Clara had served coffee—real coffee—and custard pie sweetened with
sugar
. She rounded the far side of the staircase for the closet in which she’d earlier placed their paraphernalia.