The Puzzle King (32 page)

She wondered what had become of Oliver. He’d probably found someone else to install in that Park Avenue apartment. Had he lost all his money in the Great Depression? Was he still married? He wouldn’t have aged well. He was probably balding and puny. Not like Karl, who was as vigorous in middle age as a man twenty years his junior.

But most of all, she thought about Edith. She remembered the hair pillow Edith had sent her and the story behind it. Edith seemed to be falling in love with Werner Cohn and was happier
than Seema had ever known her. This was no place for Edith. No place for a young couple in love.

F
ALLING IN LOVE
made Edith jumpy. She had trouble swallowing her food and sleeping at night. Every time she thought about Werner, she lost her concentration and her head would spin. Sometimes she felt so overwhelmed by her emotions she thought she might topple over. That’s when she’d close the door to her room, sit on her bed, and allow herself a good cry.

“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?” asked Seema a few days later, when Edith was home one weekend for one of her breaks. Edith tripped over her words as she answered: “He makes me laugh so much, and we talk about all sorts of things I never could talk to boys about. His parents never really wanted a child. His father works all the time and he never sees him. And his mother. She’s a real social butterfly, out every night. He said he’s never had anyone to talk to until he met me. Isn’t that sad? And sweet? The other night, we both started singing ‘Mack the Knife’ in the middle of the street, and he started acting out the song, looking all sneaky and sadistic. It was adorable. And Seema, I know you’ll want to know this. He is a great kisser,” she said, her voice just above a whisper. “You know, some men have really soft lips. You wouldn’t know to look at them, but… oh, and he has the strongest hands. Isn’t it strange that we grew up in the same town and never met until you introduced us? Also, I like that he’s older. Four years is a big difference. He’s so much more sophisticated than I am… has so much to teach me.”

Falling in love also made Edith beautiful. All the weight she’d put on at gymnasium dropped away. Her body was lean and athletic and, Seema imagined, as eager to play at sex as she was
at any sport thrown at her. How could this boy not fall in love with her?

Late that same night, Edith showed up in Seema’s room just after she’d come home from a date with Werner. “Seema, I have a big favor to ask of you.” She held her hands folded in front of her chin. “Werner’s coming to dinner at our house tonight. My mother’s cooking.” Seema had to laugh at the way she unintentionally rolled her eyes when she said this. “Please come. Bring Karl. Just come, please, please.”

“Tell you what, I’ll not only come to dinner, but I’ll come early and give your mother a hand,” said Seema. Edith threw her arms around her, kissed her on the mouth, and said, “I love you so much. What would I ever do without you?” So many people in Seema’s life had done fine without her. That Edith felt she couldn’t was one of the miracles of her life.

That night, Frederick brought home a piece of veal from the shop. Seema helped Margot fix dinner and get dressed. As she tucked some loose pieces of hair behind Margot’s ears and put some rouge on her cheeks, she studied her face. Margot caught her sister staring at her and offered up a smile that obliterated the strain. “Of all of us,” said Seema, “you are the real beauty.” Margot shook her head and knotted her brow. “Nonsense. I’ve become an old hag. I know what I look like.”

“Tonight you are beautiful,” said Seema. “And your daughter is bringing home a man. Who knows, she may even be bringing home your future son-in-law.”

Margot went inward for a few moments.
I mustn’t do anything to spoil this evening
, she thought. “A reason to rejoice. Now wouldn’t that be something!”

Karl brought two bottles of wine, as he had in the past. They
drank them both as they devoured the roast, which Margot had cooked until it was moist and tender. Her potatoes were perfectly fried, and the dash of paprika she added at the end made them look festive. Through most of the dinner, Margot focused on her hands as if willing them not to blunder. Edith kept her eyes on her mother, praying that she not say anything inappropriate. Seema watched Edith and hoped she would quit chattering and answering the questions that were put to Werner. Frederick carved the meat, poured the wine, and made himself useful without saying much to anyone. Werner never took his eyes off Edith, and Karl never took his off Werner.

It was Karl who finally got Werner to speak for himself. “So, we’ve heard Edith’s version of your life story,” he said. “Tell us, what’s yours?”

“Mine isn’t the kind of life filled with stories,” said Werner with a laugh. “My father works round the clock at the store, and I am working there now trying to learn everything I can. That’s how I met Seema, when I was assigned to jewelry for a few weeks. That is my story, I suppose. My father wants me eventually to manage the store. I love to travel. I have spent several summers in Switzerland and, let me think, oh yes, one more thing. I love music, all kinds of music.”

Karl leaned back in his chair. “So if you didn’t have this
store
hanging around your neck, what would you really like to do with your life?”

Werner raised his eyebrows, caught off guard. “It’s never been an option. I have no idea.”

“Oh Werner,” Edith couldn’t help herself. “Tell them what a clever writer you are. He wrote for the school newspaper, and even drew cartoons like Uncle Simon.”

“Ah, an artist at heart then?” asked Karl.

“Not really, I just draw silly things. And the school paper, well, Edith exaggerates a little.” He turned toward her and smiled as if exaggerating was the most adorable thing anyone had ever done. “That was years ago and only for a little while.”

“Werner got thrown out of school once, because he and some friends wrote up a whole newspaper making fun of all the teachers and the headmaster,” burbled Edith. “He drew caricatures of all of them and even wrote some funny poems.”

Karl laughed and clapped his hands together. “A subversive one. I knew it had to be something like that. People who say they have no stories to tell are the ones who have the best tales to hide. Do you still draw in your spare time?”

“No, that’s all over with. I’m a businessman now,” said Werner.

“A businessman with his head in the clouds,” said Karl, not unkindly. “What does your father think of that?”

Werner shot Edith another look. “My father has his feet firmly planted on this earth. I think he’d be horrified by the notion that his son dwelled elsewhere.”

Edith looked around the table. He was so clever, her Werner. Now it was obvious to everyone.

The other highlight of the evening occurred long after they’d finished the second bottle of wine and right before Karl and Seema said it was time for them to go. The conversation turned to Passover, which was only two weeks away. “You’ll be coming to our house for the Seder, won’t you, Seema?” asked Margot. Her words were memorable because they were the only ones she spoke that evening, and because of the response they provoked from Seema.

“I don’t think so. I’m no longer a Jew. I’ve become an official Catholic.”

They had accepted the fact that Karl wasn’t Jewish, but this was something else. Margot folded her hands in her lap. Frederick lifted his eyes from the coffee he was pouring, and Werner kept his on his plate, not daring to look at anyone. Only Edith spoke up. “Why did you have to go and convert? Who cares if you’re sort of Catholic or really Catholic?”

Seema turned to Karl, who cleared his throat before talking. “Surely you all know what the atmosphere is like these days.” Margot and Frederick stared at each other as if Ernst Licht had passed before them. “In light of what’s going on, and that she is seen in public with me and I am something of a known commodity in this town, we thought it would be for the best.”

Seema was aware of how formal and jarring Karl’s words must have sounded. She leaned in to the little group around the table, which, for better or worse, was her family. “We must all think about what to do,” she said, urgently. “Frederick, who knows how long you will be welcomed at the shop. And Edith, there are some schools in Berlin that are already closed to Jews. Werner, your father owns a business. The chancellor frowns upon Jews who own businesses. I’ve been thinking about writing to Simon and Flora. You know, they have always wanted you, Edith, to come and stay with them. Maybe now is the time.”

Edith looked from one parent to another. Margot stared down at her hands. Frederick, in an uncharacteristic flair of temper, pounded his fist on the table so hard that the dessert plates bounced, and everyone jumped. “Nobody goes anywhere,” he said. “We are Germans and Germans do not desert their country just because it happens to be going through hard times. As long as I am the man of the house, that is that.”

As her father made his pronouncement, Edith turned to Werner.
I am going nowhere without this man
, she thought. And
from the way his eyes lingered on her, he seemed to be thinking the same thing.

T
HREE DAYS AFTER
the dinner, Frederick went to work at seven-thirty, as he had every morning for the past sixteen years. His boss, Gustave Reinhart, greeted him at the door. He spoke in a monotone as if reciting from a script: “Good morning, Frederick. I am sorry to inform you that this store, in accordance with the rules of the government, no longer employs Jews.” He turned away from Frederick as he said the word “Jews.” He was a short pear-shaped man who managed to block the doorway.

“I’ve come to work here every day for sixteen years,” said Frederick. “Does that not count for anything, Gustave?”

Intentionally, Frederick had chosen to address his boss informally, although up until now he had always called him Herr Reinhart.

Reinhart’s cheeks turned pink and his eyes darted away from Frederick’s. “Please, don’t make this harder,” he said, moving aside so that Frederick could pass. “I am only doing what I must. You may gather your things. I have packed them up; you’ll find them on your shelf in the back.”

When Frederick went to retrieve his smock, his knives, and his knife sharpener, he found a large sack with his name on it. It was so heavy that he could barely lift it. It gave off a familiar bloody odor and Frederick feared that Reinhart had piled together a sack of bones in order to humiliate him further. But when he peered inside, he could see beautiful cuts of lamb and beef and pieces of chicken. He tried to catch Reinhart’s eye to thank him, but Reinhart jerked his head and flicked his hand. “Go now,” he said. “Quickly.”

Only when he got home did he discover that Reinhart had also stuffed as many notes as he could between the breasts of chicken, loins of lamb, and shoulder cuts of beef. It was more money than he had ever seen in one place and, he figured, enough to keep them going until well into the new year. “You see,” he said to Margot, who was not able to speak when he gave her the news. “They’re not all bad.”

The letters came sporadically, but when they did they were terse and self-conscious. Even Edith’s letters, usually sprawling with run-on sentences and funny little drawings, felt labored.

When Seema wrote, she never failed to mention Karl.

Everyone in Kaiserslautern knows him for the wonderful stories he writes in the newspaper. He is the pride of our town. And those who don’t know him for his writing recognize his beautiful German-made car with the unusual horn that goes,
Tee-poo-peep-pa, tee-poo-peep-pa
. Honestly, you’ve never heard anything like it.

She told them about the operas they attended, and in one letter she mentioned how she and Karl had gone to see Margot and Edith and Frederick after church one afternoon.

Edith is very excited about her wedding. So squirmy and filled with romantic plans. She never stops talking.
Werner this and Werner that. She reminds me of you, dear Flora, before you married Simon.

Edith wrote of nothing but her upcoming nuptials.

The wedding will be on Sunday, September 22. My mother is working her fingers to the bone on the old Pfaff. She wants to make my dress long sleeved, but I want sleeveless with a matching shawl. More elegant, don’t you think, Aunt Flora? There will be a reception in Werner’s home. Have I told you about his house? It’s one of the biggest in Kaiserslautern. It is built around a courtyard where the reception will be held. The floors are marble and there is a winding staircase that leads down to it. Can you imagine me as a bride? Oh, I wish you could be here. Even my parents are excited. Ever since my father retired, things have been very peaceful at home. Werner’s parents have been so kind. His father owns the department store here and works very hard. He is getting some rest after his journey, but I’m sure he will be back to work soon. Werner’s mother takes me shopping at the finest stores doing what she can to make sure that her daughter-in-law is the model German wife. And then there’s Werner. I can’t wait for you to meet him. Uncle Simon, he’s clever the way you are, and Aunt Flora, he has such wonderful taste. He bought me the most beautiful watch for my birthday. It’s silver with little diamonds around the face. We will be taking our honeymoon for six weeks beginning in January. We start in Palestine then go to Venice, Paris, and finish in Marseille. Do you think there is any chance
you could meet us in any of those places? Please think about it. That would be the most wonderful thing in the world.

They had only one letter from Margot announcing that Edith was getting married. She, too, mentioned Frederick’s retirement and said,

Having Frederick around has done wonders for the mood around here.

Simon would scrutinize each letter, searching for clues in what was and wasn’t being said. There were plenty to be found. In the notebook that he kept about his family, he began a separate section under the words
Flora’s People
. Each person had her own page. Under
Seema
, he noted:

The pride of Kaiserslautern. Why?