Echoes

“Perhaps your mother and sister would join us for lunch, too?” he asked hopefully. He had no intention of giving up. A war seemed like a small obstacle to him at this point. Beata was too wonderful and magical to lose over something like that.

“I'll ask them,” Beata said quietly. She was going to do more than ask, she had every intention of fighting like a tiger to see him again, and she was afraid she might have to. Beata knew that in her mother's eyes, he would have two major strikes against him, his nationality and his faith.

“Should I call your mother and ask her myself?” He looked concerned.

“No, I'll do it,” she said, shaking her head. They were suddenly allies in an unspoken conspiracy, the continuation of their friendship, or whatever this was. Beata didn't think he was flirting with her and only hoped that they could be friends. She didn't dare imagine more.

“May I call you tonight?” he asked, looking nervous, and she gave him her room number. She was sharing the room with Brigitte.

“We're eating at the hotel tonight.” For once.

“So are we,” he said with a look of surprise. “Maybe we'll see each other, and I can introduce myself to your mother and sister.” And then he looked worried. “How shall we say we met?” Their chance meeting had been fortuitous, but not entirely decorous. And their long conversation had been unusual, to say the least. Beata laughed at the question. “I'll just say you knocked me down, and then picked me up.”

“I'm sure she'll be impressed by that. Will you say I pushed you into the mud, or just that I dropped you into the lake to clean you up after you fell?” Beata laughed like a child at his suggestions, and Antoine looked happier than he had in years. “You really are very silly. You could at least tell her that I caught your arm and kept you from falling, even though I did try to knock you over as I rushed past.” But he no longer regretted it. The minor mishap had served him well. “And you could have the decency to tell your mother that I properly introduced myself.”

“Maybe I will.” For a moment, Beata looked genuinely worried as she looked up at him, somewhat embarrassed by what she was about to suggest. “Do you suppose it would be terrible to tell her you're Swiss?”

He hesitated and then nodded. He could see that his nationality was a problem for her, or she feared it would be for her mother. What was going to be a much bigger problem was that he was a French nobleman and not Jewish, but Beata would never have said that to him. She was cherishing the illusion that since they were just friends, her mother wouldn't mind that much. What harm was there in making friends with a Christian? Several of her parents' friends were. It was an argument she planned to use if her mother objected to Beata having lunch with him.

“I am a quarter Swiss, after all. I'll just have to remember not to count in front of your mother, or I might say soixante-dix instead of septante. That would be a bit of a giveaway. But I don't mind if it's easier for you to say I'm Swiss. It's a shame that has to be an issue for any of us these days.” The truth was that his own family would be horrified that he was making friends with a German girl and, worse than that, was totally smitten by her. There was no love lost these days between the Germans and the French. But he didn't see why he and Beata should pay a price for it. “Don't worry, we'll work it out,” he said gently to her, as she looked up at him with her enormous blue eyes. “It's all right, Beata. I promise. One way or another, we will see each other tomorrow.” He was not going to let anything stand between them, and she felt totally protected as she stood looking up at Antoine. They were nearly strangers to each other, and yet she knew that she already trusted him. Something remarkable and wonderful had happened between them that afternoon. “I'll call you tonight,” he said softly, as she stepped into the elevator, and turned to smile at him as the elevator operator closed the doors. He was still standing, looking at her, as the doors closed, and she rode upstairs, knowing that in a single afternoon her whole life had changed. And Antoine was smiling to himself as he left the hotel.

2

MUCH TO HER CHAGRIN, BEATA WAS NOT PREPARED FOR the reaction of her mother, when she casually suggested lunch with Antoine to her when they got home. Beata said that they had met at the hotel at teatime, had spoken for a short while, and Antoine had suggested they all have lunch the following day. She didn't have the courage to suggest to her mother that she and Antoine have lunch alone. Her mother looked horrified at the suggestion, as it was.

“With a total stranger? Beata, have you taken leave of your senses? You don't know this man. What were you doing that he invited you to lunch?” Her mother looked highly suspicious, she had only left Beata alone for a few hours, and it wasn't like her to have a conversation with a strange man. He was obviously some sort of masher, trying to prey on young girls, and loitering around the hotel. Monika Wittgenstein was not as innocent as her daughter, and she was incensed that this man had made advances to her, and even worse, that Beata seemed to find it appealing. It only proved to her mother that she was desperately naive and still a child. And she assumed only the worst of Antoine.

“I was just having tea on the terrace,” Beata said, looking upset. This had not gone well, and she didn't know what to say to Antoine. “We started speaking, about nothing in particular. He was very polite.”

“How old is he? And what's he doing here instead of in the war?”

“He's Swiss,” Beata said primly. That was something at least. She never lied to her mother, although Brigitte did frequently, and this was a first for her. But somehow seeing Antoine seemed worth any risk she had to take or any breach it involved. In a single afternoon he had won not only her loyalty but her heart.

“Why wasn't he working? What's he doing loitering around a hotel?” As far as Monika was concerned, respectable men worked. They did not have time to hang around hotels at teatime, picking up young girls.

“He's visiting, just as we are. He's here to see his family, because his grandfather just died.”

“I'm sorry to hear it,” Monika said tersely, “and he may be a perfectly nice man, but he is a total stranger. We have not been properly introduced to him by anyone who knows us or him, and we are not going to have lunch with him.” And then as an afterthought, a few minutes later, “What's his name?”

“Antoine de Vallerand.” Her mother's eyes met hers and held them in a viselike grip for a long time. She wondered if Beata had met him before, but there was nothing duplicitous about the girl. She was just young and foolish and naive.

“He's a nobleman,” her mother said quietly, her words full of reproach. And as such, he was not a suitable option for either of her daughters, no matter who he was. There were some lines one didn't cross, and that was one of them. Beata knew what she was thinking, her mother didn't have to spell it out. They were Jewish. He wasn't.

“Is that a crime, being noble?” Beata said a little tartly, but as she looked at her mother, her eyes were sad, which worried her mother even more.

“Have you ever met this man before?” In answer, Beata shook her head, as Brigitte bounced into the room with armloads of her purchases. She had had a wonderful time in the shops, although she thought they were better in Cologne. But at least here in Switzerland they had none of the obvious shortages of war. It was nice to get a break from all that.

“What does he look like?” Brigitte asked, holding up a new black suede handbag and a beautiful pair of long white kid gloves. “Is he handsome?”

“That's not the point,” Beata snapped at both of them. “He just seems like a very nice man, and he invited all three of us to lunch, which was very polite and kind.”

“And why do you suppose he did that?” her mother asked with a look of disapproval. “Because he is dying to meet me and Brigitte? Of course not. He obviously wants to spend time with you. How old is this man?” All her suspicions were on high alert.

“I don't know. Maybe around Ulm's age.” In fact, he was five years older, as she knew. It was the third lie she had told to protect him and their budding friendship. Spending time with Antoine seemed worth it to her. She wanted to see him again, even if it was with her mother and sister, if that was all she could do. She just wanted to spend a little more time with him. Who knew when and if they would meet again.

“He's too old for you,” her mother said bluntly, when in fact her objections to him were in an entirely different vein. But she didn't want to voice them to Beata.

She didn't want to give enough credence to this man's invitation to state what her real objections were, but