The Last April Page 5

  “Hysterical, not nervous,” Tante Klegg said. “Had you been nervous, you would have watched the barn when I entered it, you would have watched when I left. You would have found methods to protect yourself. You did none of these things. You are not nervous. You are hysterical.”

  Tante Klegg’s tone made the word “hysterical” sound like the word “useless.”

  Alina’s lower lip trembled. “You are so harsh.”

  “Try living with her,” Gretchen said.

  Tante Klegg ignored them, dropping Gretchen’s dress into the bucket beside the stove.

  “What is that?” her mother demanded. “It is filthy. Get it out of my house.”

  Gretchen frowned at Tante Klegg, begging. She knew where Tante Klegg had found that dress, somewhere in the stall with Karl. Gretchen felt her face inflame.

  If only Alina had left! Then Gretchen could explain she had not changed in front of Karl, that she was not loose. She had thrown the dress near the stall so if someone wandered into the barn, they would not notice it. Seeing the dress in Tante Klegg’s hands made Gretchen think she should have thrown it in the old pig sty.

  Alina leaned forward, trying to see around Gretchen. “It looks like…” She glanced at Gretchen and fell silent.

  “It is Gretchen’s dress.” Tante Klegg’s tone was matter-of-fact.

  Gretchen sighed. The adventure was over, having not lasted long in the first place. Once again, everyone would blame her for everything. Alina would have to know the secret now. Gretchen would have to fight to keep Karl again.

  Alina frowned at Gretchen, but directed her question at Gretchen’s mother. “Mütter, what was Gretchen’s dress doing in the barn? That is an odd place to keep clothing.”

  Gretchen’s mother lifted a shoulder and sipped her water. “I do not explain her. You know that.”

  “This must be why Gretchen is wearing her best dress,” Alina mused. “Gretchen never wears her Sunday best, even for special occasions.”

  “That’s not true,” Gretchen protested. “I wore it six days ago.”

  “Sunday was six days ago,” Alina said.

  Tante Klegg picked up the water pail. “This is a family matter, Alina. Do not concern yourself.”

  Gretchen watched her aunt, too afraid to ask, too annoyed to object.

  “Gretchen’s clothing is a family matter too private for me to concern myself about?” Alina asked. “I’m practically her sister; I’m Werner’s…” Her lip trembled again, accompanied this time by tears.

  “Gretchen, go to Werner’s room,” Tante Klegg said. She placed a pot on the stove and went through the motions of stoking the flame. “Return with pants and a shirt. Suspenders if you find any.”

  “Are we washing early?” Gretchen asked, delaying the inevitable.

  “Is that blood on her dress?” Alina asked, standing from her seat. “Gretchen, why is there blood on your dress?”

  Alina looked at Tante Klegg. “Why do you want her to get Werner’s clothing? Has my Werner returned?” The hope in her voice made Gretchen cringe.

  “It is not Werner who needs the clothing,” Tante Klegg said, her face red from stoking the flames. She straightened and turned, hands on her hips. Gretchen never liked when Tante Klegg stood like that. It meant she was about to say something certain to make Gretchen’s life that much more difficult.

  “It is for a soldier, but not Werner,” Tante Klegg said. “Gretchen found him.”

  Gretchen’s mother inhaled, her nostrils flaring. “Edelgard! You have no right to do this.”

  Tante Klegg was impassive as she filled a pot with water to soak the bloodstained dress. “I will not repeat the past,” she said to no one.

  Alina rounded on Gretchen. “A soldier! You found a soldier! Was he in Werner’s volunteers? Has he news of Werner? What does he know of soldiers returning home? Why is he in the barn?” She grabbed Gretchen’s hands from across the table. “You must tell me everything.”

  Gretchen squirmed.

  “Yes,” her mother taunted. “Tell her everything. What is his name?”

  Gretchen swallowed. “Well… I call him… Karl…”

  Her aunt dropped the pot on the stove and her mother hissed. “You call him Karl?” her mother turned an unseemly shade of purple. “That is our papa’s name, you little…”

  “Adelaide,” Tante Klegg said, whipping around from the stove.

  “Oh, Karl, that is a good strong name for a soldier,” Alina interrupted with an annoying little sigh. “He knows of Werner’s return, he must! Why else would he come to your farm?”

  Gretchen closed her eyes. “His… we had to bandage his head. It affects his mind. He… doesn’t seem to remember things.”

  Alina frowned. “Is he dangerous?”

  Gretchen shook her head, having no idea.

  “When will I meet him?” Alina asked, looking from one woman to another.

  “Not today,” Tante Klegg said. “He needs to rest.”

  Alina nodded. “Poor soul.”

  “You have no idea,” Gretchen said. She narrowed her eyes at Tante Klegg, wondering what her aunt would say next. She hoped it would be to tell Alina to get out.

  One thing was certain, and that was when Alina left, all Grove City would know Karl was at their farm.

  Who knew how long Karl would stay in Grove City? For all they knew, he would escape at the first opportunity. He might have left already.

  “We will see you at church tomorrow,” Tante Klegg said to Alina, ushering her from her seat.

  “Oh yes, yes!” Alina said. She waved to Gretchen. “I am so happy for you, meine kleine schwester. It brings me hope that my Werner will return to me!” She flounced from the room, curls bobbing and petticoats swishing.

  “Tante Edelgard Klegg,” Gretchen whispered, her temper flaring, “what have you done?”

  Eight

  Saturday, 15 April 1865 / Grove City, Ohio

  Karl gnawed on the dried corn he found in the chicken coop. He figured the corn was worth getting his hands scratched by the aggressive chickens. His stomach gurgled, and the cow harmonized with it. Sitting with his legs outstretched, his toes knocked together. He cupped the small fistful of corn in his shirt and spit out a hard kernel butt.

  He stared at the barn door, his jaw aching. Tante Klegg had been so swift to lock him in the barn again. Not that he could have stopped her. He could not stand without shaking.

  Karl wondered if anyone “back home,” wherever that was, missed him. It had been the norm in Camp Chase to have a woman waiting. All the prisoners whined and pined after their girls. The girls who got away, the girls who never made up their minds, and the girls waiting for their return.

  Karl did not have those emotions, which he trusted more than his memory. He figured if he could not remember proposing, he would remember loving. No fresh, expectant face came to mind when he had lain in bed those long days and frigid nights last winter in prison.

  Not that it mattered now. Whether someone waited for him or not, he now had a captor younger than he was. His captor’s mother thought he had killed the president. His captor’s aunt was equal parts mystic and militant. And they locked him in their barn.

  Karl slowed his chewing, allowing his saliva to moisten the kernels. He studied the barn door, not sure what mechanism locked him inside and not sure when they would return. He sighed.

  From one prison to another, this one was far more comfortable. At least here he could cuddle into the straw, scratchy though it was. A breeze whistled through a crack in the log wall, providing slight relief from the humidity. All in all, it was an improvement over the stuffy, fevered prison full of moans and dying and death.

  “Don’t know why I have to give him these,” Gretchen said, sounding martyred just outside the door.

  Karl straightened, upsetting the corn to the dirt floor. He brushed his hair back and rubbed his face with the hem of his shirt. Blast it if he was not going to try to look presentable.

  G
retchen yanked the door open, almost right off its rusting hinges. “Here,” she said, throwing clothes at him. “Put these on.”

  Karl studied the dark pants and white shirt in his lap. He could tell he would need to roll the pant hems. “Thank you.”

  “Thank my aunt,” Gretchen said. She slumped against the door frame and crossed her arms. “She wants you to clean yourself and come to the house for supper.”

  “Why?” he asked.

  Gretchen waved her hand, motioning she did not know and did not care. She disappeared, and for a moment Karl thought she left the door open for him to escape. She returned lugging a bucket of water with a ladle.

  “I don’t want to be here anymore than you want me here,” Karl said. “But I got no place to go, and I can’t keep going on what I got.”

  “You’re staying,” Gretchen said. She handed him a ladle of water and watched him guzzle it down. “And you’re coming to eat dinner with us while we figure this out.”

  Karl rubbed the clothes in his hands. Gretchen had done a lot for him. She had brought him into her family home without approval from her aunt and mother. She had hid him from sight when danger arose.

  “Whose clothes are these?” he asked.

  “My brother’s.”

  Karl wished he had not gulped the entire ladle of water. “Sorry. Which battle?”

  Gretchen’s expression soured. “My brother’s coming back any day now. If you don’t want clothes or food, then you can just sit here in the dark until we’ve decided what we’re doing with you.”

  “No, wait. Don’t leave me in the dark!” Karl cried as Gretchen swung open the barn door. He held his palm to his throbbing head and whimpered.

  Gretchen stopped, her hand clenching the handle. “Someone knows you’re here.”

  Karl rubbed his forehead. “Who?”

  “Alina, the pastor’s daughter.”

  “Why was the pastor’s daughter at your house?”

  “She’s supposed to be my sister-in-law,” Gretchen said through clenched teeth.

  “Supposed to be?” Karl asked.

  “When my brother returns, they’ll marry.” A breeze blew the skirt around Gretchen’s ankles. “I don’t know what you look like under all that dirt and blood. Use that water to wash up. There’s a rag on a hook in the corner.”

  Karl glanced where she said the rag hung. “Near about killed myself trying to get this corn from the chickens. Would rather not tempt fate too many times in a day.”

  Gretchen stomped to the rag, snatched it from the hook, and threw it in Karl’s lap with her brother’s clothes. “I’ll be outside.” She slammed the door behind her.

  Karl drank a good amount of the bucket. He let the water run down his neck, figuring he was not about to keep the clothes he was wearing, anyway. It was a wonder how clean the water felt, even in the dark. There were no maggots or twigs or any such debris to pick out. Just clean and wet. He rubbed the water onto his skin with a tender touch because bruises were everywhere. He peeled off his torn jacket and sour shirt, slathering the water up and down his arms and chest.

  “Better wash that head wound,” Gretchen called through the door. “Your temple’s covered in blood. My mother won’t eat if she has to stare at it.”

  Karl complied. He was unsure he got it all, but his head did feel less sticky. Fire ran from his shoulder to his fingertips when he tried to slip the cotton shirt over his head. He gasped through the pain.

  “Doing all right in there?” Gretchen asked.

  “Never you mind.” He leaned back, panting from the exertion. “Don’t you dare come in here. I ain’t done yet.” He tugged at his pant buttons and kicked them off so he could wash his feet.

  “You’re out of your head. Why would I come into the barn when you’re naked?”

  “I’m not naked,” Karl grumbled. He yelped when the door opened. “I’m not dressed, either!”

  “Well then, don’t make it sound like you’re ready!” Gretchen slammed the door shut again.

  Soon enough, Karl had the pants on and rolled the hems so they did not drag beneath his feet. He knocked on the door.

  “All right,” he said when Gretchen opened it, “take me to your aunt.”

  Nine

  Saturday, 15 April 1865 / Grove City, Ohio

  “I cannot say what angers me more. That Alina was so excited about this criminal, or that she forgot Mr. Lincoln with such ease!” Gretchen’s mother slammed a tin plate down on the table in front of Karl. He jumped, but otherwise kept his hands in his lap and was careful not to look anyone in the eye for too long.

  Karl sat at the table in the kitchen with Tante Klegg beside him and Gretchen opposite him. The kitchen air was humid. The mouthwatering smells of roasted chicken and pickled onions chased his thoughts away.

  “The child has to hold onto hope of Werner,” Tante Klegg said.

  “Our world is ending!” Gretchen’s mother said, taking her seat and snatching her spoon. “The president has died at the hands of a Confederate! What will we have, four more years of war? Will my husband and son never return? All we’ve talked about is this waste of a man!” She gestured at Karl with a dismissive flick of her wrist.

  Karl said nothing. Gretchen had warned him not to speak. Her mother was one bad piece of news away from harming herself or someone else. Karl poked at the onion in front of him, his appetite evaporating the longer Gretchen’s mother spoke.

  “But Mama,” Gretchen said, “our world hasn’t been as we knew it for years. It may never go back to the life we knew, especially if Werner and Papa don’t return, or if they come back diff—”

  Gretchen’s mother slapped her so hard that Karl winced in sympathy. “Never,” her mother said, “say those words. How you are a daughter of mine, I will never know.”

  Gretchen narrowed her eyes, trying to hide the tears lurking behind her lashes. She watched her mother turn her attention to her plate as if she had not struck her child.

  Her mother ate her pickled onions with a slow grace that made Gretchen want to shove that spoon down her throat.

  “His name is Karl, then?” Tante Klegg said, redirecting the conversation. She dipped her bread into the onion juice and took a healthy bite. “I thought he did not know his name? Perhaps you learned his name while undressing in his presence?”

  “What are you talking about?” Gretchen’s mother said, glaring at Tante Klegg. “What are you suggesting?”

  Gretchen dropped her fork with a loud clatter. “I didn’t—he didn’t—he was out cold! You know that.”

  “You do not know that,” Tante Klegg said. “You have compromised yourself, and our family name.”

  “I kicked him in the side, and he didn’t even twitch. He didn’t see anything. You didn’t see anything!” Gretchen rounded on Karl, whose complexion dropped from a bright red to a sickly pale.

  Karl rubbed his side. “Explains why my ribs hurt…”

  “You’re out of your mind,” Gretchen said to Tante Klegg. “How can you think me changing in the barn is worse than keeping him captive until proven innocent? We won’t know if he killed the president until he remembers.”

  “How can you compare this at all!” her mother scoffed.

  “And?” Tante Klegg said, stabbing her chicken. “Has he remembered? Is his name Karl?”

  “He… agreed his name was Karl when he woke,” Gretchen replied.

  “He agreed? You mean you gave him a name,” Tante Klegg said. “You gave him the name of your grandfather. How could you?”

  “There was blood at his temple. You saw it,” Gretchen rushed to say. “He hurt his head and can’t remember things. He agreed Karl was fine since he has no name.”

  Her mother snorted. “He thinks his name is Karl, he does not know his name. What else does he not know or remember?” She sawed the side of her fork into the overcooked chicken. “Killing the president? Fleeing the capital?”

  “Would it make you feel better if I locked him up again?” G
retchen said.

  Her mother rolled her eyes. “He is no danger to me right now, sitting here, this little weakling. It is only if someone sees him here with us. Tell me, Gretchen, Edelgard, why I have not run to the authorities to report this man yet.”

  Karl shrank in his seat.

  “Because you would sentence us to prison with him,” Tante Klegg said.

  “For holding him hostage? We would be American heroes, not villains!”

  Tante Klegg remained unconvinced.

  “We cannot keep him long,” Gretchen’s mother warned. “The neighbors will wonder.”

  “Alina was happy to assume she knew the whole story,” Tante Klegg said. “Others will do the same.”

  The sisters fell silent, their stormy expressions continuing the argument.

  “Ma’am,” Karl ventured, “I don’t remember much of anything, if that’s a comfort.”

  Gretchen’s mother stared at him, her face changing colors while she struggled to find her words.

  “You said he’s my responsibility,” Gretchen said. “What does it matter what his name is? I’m taking care of him.”

  “There are things you do not understand, meine kleine trottel,” her mother said in saccharine tones.

  Gretchen stiffened. Karl assumed it had something to do with her mother’s condescending tone.

  “We left Germany to avoid these political happenings,” her mother continued. “Shooting leaders of nations! We left Europe because of such upheavals. America is not supposed to behave like this!”

  “Mama, you are hysterical,” Gretchen sighed.

  She grabbed Gretchen by the jaw, her fingers pinching into Gretchen’s cheeks. Gretchen whimpered as her mother jerked her forward so they were nose-to-nose.

  “You listen to me,” she said in a low, dangerous voice. “Who will be president now? Who? Johnson, who everyone hates? Seward, if he lives? This nation will fall, and you stand before me telling me I worry too much, that I should not care the enemy sleeps in my child’s bedroom.”