A House of Tailors (8 page)

eighteen

I heard the cart, the horses clopping, the wheels grinding. I bent to look out the window. The cart stopped at the first house, leaving a trail in the mud behind it.

Still barefoot, I ran into Barbara's bedroom to slap her cheeks gently, and then a little harder. “Listen to me, Barbara, stand up.”

Barbara's eyes stayed closed. “Dina?” she whispered. “Hide the baby.”

I slid my hands under Barbara's back. How hot she was! I lifted her slowly until she was sitting, leaning against the pillow. Since I had thrown myself on the couch the night before, a mark had appeared on her forehead.

“We'll trick them, Barbara. We'll try.” I reached for the brush and ran it through her hair: Barbara's shining hair, lank now, hanging in knots, damp with perspiration. How could I ever trick them?

I combed Barbara's hair into loops over her forehead and felt a quick rush of tears as I suddenly remembered Katharina standing in front of the mirror playing with her hair. It wasn't possible to hide the mark completely, but it was the best I could do.

From the window I could see the wagon moving again. I had time to wonder if someone had been taken from the first house as I slid Barbara's feet and legs from under the blanket. Marks there, too, on her ankles, but her skirt would hide them.

I rubbed her legs, wondering if I would come down with the pox. A stab of fear went through me as I thought about the men coming, pulling me out of my bed, dragging me down the stairs and into the cart on a stretcher, never to return from the hospital.

I dressed Barbara, listening to the soft sounds of Maria sucking on her bottle and the wheels outside in the street again. They were at the third house.

Barbara leaned against me. Her voice was a whisper, hard to hear. “Hide the baby.”

I looked toward the crib. Maria, still awake, eyes unfocused. She'd be asleep in a moment. And even if I could hide her, what about the crib? What about the list the men might have telling who was in the house?

I walked Barbara into the kitchen, holding her tightly so she wouldn't fall, and pulled on her apron with its spicy smell of cinnamon. The downstairs door was opening now. Would they start at the apartment on the ground floor or would they come up the stairs and begin at the top? I could hear the rough feet on the steps below, coming higher.

We were next, then.

I looked down at my feet, remembering that my shoes were by the sofa. I leaned Barbara against the sink. “Can you hold on?”

“Hide . . .”

I curled Barbara's hands over the wooden rim of the sink. “Don't talk. Don't turn your head. Just hold on.” I took a step away from her, hesitating, wondering if she could do it.

“Hide . . . ,” Barbara began, but I could hear the noise of heavy footsteps turning up the last stairway. I pulled on my shoes, buttoning the bottom two buttons, no time for stockings, then went in to Maria, almost tripping against the sewing machine in my haste.

I pulled off the old blanket and kicked it under Barbara's bed with my foot, then covered the baby with a clean pink blanket, one I had stitched with rosettes in a pattern across the top the first month I had been here. How sad I had been as I had twisted the ribbon into tiny circles and cut snippets of green for the tiniest leaves.

Would the men be rough with Maria? Would she awaken and begin to cry when she saw those strange faces?

I felt fear in my mouth and my throat, my tongue so dry I could hardly answer as the men pounded on the door.

“Coming. I am coming, sir.” But I knew they couldn't hear my whisper. I walked slowly down the hall and opened the door for them.

They came inside, those big men with dark beards, so big they seemed to take up the whole room.

At the sink Barbara's head was lowered, her hair a veil over the side of her face. Her hands were slipping off the sink and I took a step toward her, leaning against her for just a moment.

One of them motioned to her with his thumb.

“No English she speaks,” I said. “Greenhorn.”

They both laughed; I knew it was because of my own English. But that was all right, as long as they left her alone and didn't make her turn toward them.

“Is there sickness in the house?” one of them asked.

I betrayed Maria with a quick look back down the hall.

They brushed past me and I followed them, standing in the doorway as they looked down at her.

“The baby who waved at herself,” one said. “Such a pity.”

“Pliz.”
I grabbed his arm, almost forgetting how afraid I was of him. I held tight. “We will take care. Her mother and I. The apartment is . . .” What was that word? “Clean. Is so clean. The baby is clean.”

He turned to me and shook his head. “We have to . . .”

I raced on. “She will die in the hospital.”

The man raised his hand and uncurled my fingers from his sleeve. “She has the pox. I'm sorry. I'm so . . .”

A voice came from the kitchen. Barbara.

“What is she saying?” the man asked.

I didn't bother to answer.
“Pliz.”
I was wringing my hands now, blocking the doorway. “We will not move out of this house. We will stay in here with her until she is better or . . .” I was silent then.

They glanced at each other, one of them flipping his finger across the red ribbon. They were sorry for us.

But in the end I think it was not I who saved Maria. She awoke suddenly and looked up at the men and smiled, her small shy smile, the most beautiful smile. I could feel it myself, the sweetness in it, even through the redness, the oozing blisters. Maria, our tyrant!

She raised one little hand in its white cloth, almost as if she'd give them a backward wave; then her hand fell and she closed her eyes. I went to the crib and put my head down on the crib rail, hearing the soft sound one of the men made in the back of his throat. “Like my daughter,” he said gruffly. “No one sick here. A clean house, good careful people.”

They tramped down the hall again, through the kitchen, not even noticing Barbara as her hands slid away from the sink. They had just closed the door behind themselves when she collapsed on the floor in front of me.

nineteen

A week later, in the middle of the afternoon, the Uncle arrived home to find us all asleep, Barbara and Maria in the bedroom, me dozing with my head down on the edge of the sewing machine.

Barbara heard the door close and came out of the bedroom with Maria in her arms. “Lucas,” she said. “You are home.”

He looked from one to the other. Barbara's eyes were huge in her pale face, her hair in a braid down her back, and she was leaning against the wall for strength. Maria was a mass of thick scabs, and it was already apparent that she'd have several pitted scars on her cheeks from the disease.

Lucky, though; she was alive. Lucky they were both alive.

The Uncle gathered them into his arms; then, carrying the baby, he guided Barbara into the kitchen to help her into a chair. He turned to me. “And you, Dina? Sleeping in the daytime with all your energy? Are you sick, too?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I'm fine.” How could I say how tired I was! My legs trembled with fatigue at times as I walked endlessly back and forth at night holding Maria, her arms wrapped around me. I hummed the lullaby Mama always sang, that beloved song, with tears in my eyes for Mama, but loving Maria, determined that she be well.

How could I say that my days were spent helping Barbara bathe and cleaning the dust off the chairs, the table, even the beds? I knew now it was a mistake to have opened the window over the air shaft so that every bit of soot and paper flew into the apartment.

I was tired, too, from running up the long seams on the trousers, and my knuckles were bruised from the finishing work on that coarse material. The week had gone by so quickly, I had spent almost no time working on a new hat for Mrs. Koch's friend.

I was tired, but not sorry!

I went back to the sewing machine and slid in the next two pieces of fabric to be hemmed, half listening to the Uncle as he talked about all he had seen on the way to Lake Placid. “Mountains,” he told Barbara, “not unlike the ones in Breisach. Gentler, though. And I saw a tailor shop, talked to the man who owned it. It wouldn't take much to do the same thing here. . . .” He broke off. “The window is open.”

“So it is,” Barbara said, noticing it for the first time.

I began to sew, the noise of the machine drowning out what the Uncle had to say next.

It didn't drown him out for long. In a moment, he was calling in a voice that I could have heard even on the roof. “Dina!”

I didn't move.

“Where are you?”

I looked up at the ceiling.

“Dina!” he shouted again.

I sighed and got up from the machine to go into the kitchen. “I was suffocating.”

He shook his head. “I thought you were going to take care of everything here.”

I narrowed my eyes at him as Barbara began to talk, to change the subject, while he reached for the hammer to close it again. “I dreamed when I was sick,” she said. “So many dreams.”

“Fever dreams,” he said over his shoulder. “Terrible, I know.”

“Yes.” She ran her fingers along her braid. “I dreamed I was back in my house as a little girl. I dreamed . . .” She smiled at me. “I dreamed of Dina, who washed and dressed me.”

She stretched out her hand. “I know you did that for both of us.”

The Uncle put down the hammer, the window back in place, shut tight; no more grime to come in, and no more air, either. He nodded at me. “I'm grateful for that, Dina.”

I didn't know what to say, but Maria was holding her arms out to me, so I took her from Barbara and balanced her on my hip, rocking just the slightest bit.

“I dreamed that men were in here,” Barbara said. “Men with beards like the giants from one of the Grimm brothers' tales.”

I ran my fingers along Maria's neck, making mouse feet for her. Barbara was right. The men had looked like giants with their black beards.

“I dreamed . . .” Barbara closed her eyes. “Dreamed that I was telling Dina to hide the baby, hide the baby. . . .” She opened her eyes, hesitating. “That was the worst dream of all.”

“Never mind,” the Uncle said, pouring thick hot coffee from the pot on the stove. “It was just a dream.”

I bent my head. “Mousie creeps,” I said to Maria, making her smile again.

17 September 1871

Dear Dina,

Krist and I were married yesterday. It was a beautiful ceremony in St. Stephen's Cathedral, with Krist smiling at me all the while. The whole town was there, dressed in the finery that we had sewed. I carried the beautiful handkerchief you made. And afterward we had coffee and cake and small candies wrapped in foil.

The only sadness was that you were not there, my dear sister, and at the moment the church bells pealed out with joy I thought of you and how much you mean to us. I wonder if you could feel our love across the waves.

All love,
Katharina

Dina, my child,

You would have loved this wedding. Katharina's dark hair looked beautiful under her hat. We covered the wide hat frame with the same gray silk as the dress, adding two large plumes of white, which covered the rim. We spent hours on the dress, as well, pleating the entire bodice and finding the perfect piece of lace for her neck. If only you had been there to take those fine stitches of yours!

I love you, Dina.

Mother

twenty

It was growing colder by the day. I took time to make myself a muff from a small piece of velvet I had found in the Uncle's pile of fabric. I stuffed it with cotton and tucked my hands into it when I went to the park to meet Johann.

“But today it is too cold to stay outside,” he said.

I nodded, disappointed. I thought of not seeing him for the rest of the winter and then reminded myself I was going home one day; better not become too fond of him.

It was hard not to, though. His hair curled down over his forehead, and there were just the beginnings of a dark beard over his lip and his chin.

“There is a bakery nearby,” he said. “It is owned by people from Freiburg.”

“Really?” I said, digging my hands deeper into the muff, hunching my shoulders just a bit against the wind as we walked. “Brooklyn is everything the most,” I said.

He stopped, his hand on my elbow. “What does that mean?”

“In the summer it's the hottest, in the winter, the . . .” I searched for the word.

“Coldest,” he said. “But never mind, we will go to this bakery and sit at a table. We will have chocolate and cookies and I will teach you English.”

“Do you know it that well?” I asked.

He smiled. “You will not know the difference,” he said.

We hurried along, laughing, and slipped into the bakery, where the air was steamy, the chocolate lightened with cream, and the cookies still warm. The Black Forest clock ticked over the counter, the minutes passing quickly as I learned words from Johann and forgot them two minutes later.

He told me more about wanting to be a locksmith, and I told him about Papa. I told him about Mrs. Koch's hat, too, and he said the strangest thing. “Your eyes light up, Dina, when you talk about making the hat.”

“I don't like sewing,” I said.

“I think you do.” He popped the last of his cookie into his mouth. “I think there are parts of it you love.”

“Not those long seams,” I said. “Not the sewing machine. Not the plackets, the zippers . . .” I hesitated, thinking about the hat that was half finished, a flat plate of rose petals shot through with green velvet ribbon. “But the hats . . .”

“You see?” he said, laughing, and reached across to touch my hand. His hand was warm, and I could feel my face begin to flush.

We finished our chocolate, then went back out to the cold again. There was a pale sun over the houses, softening them. And the bare branches made lacy patterns against the walls. I could hear the German band playing even on such a cold day.

I left Johann at the park and went on to our street, feeling strange inside. What would it be like to go home, I wondered, and never see Brooklyn again? What would it be like never to see Johann again?