The girl awoke and began fussing, then grabbed the crucifix hanging around Katharina’s neck. After she set the child down, Katharina went to the fountain and splashed cool water on her face. At the sight of the window boxes, she realised she’d forgotten to water the geraniums, which were wilting in the unseasonable heat.
With a bucket in hand and a blanket in the other, Opa came out of the workshop. His cough had returned, rattling within him like loosened gravel rolling down a slope.
“I’ve pulled some of the softer apples out,” he said when he caught his breath again. “They won’t make the winter. Thought you’d make a cake tonight.”
“That, and something for your chest.” She pulled the pouch away from her side and held up the hare. “I’ve got something too.”
He glanced at her middle. “Your husband should be doing that kind of work, not you. Gives him a feeling of self-worth, a tie to the land.”
“Now, Opa,” she started, but he walked away, muttering that he was going to Graun.
“Been two weeks since anyone’s picked up the post,” he tossed over his shoulder.
She would go, she wanted to say, but voices from behind the house stopped her from calling after him. Florian appeared with Toni Ritsch. She hung up the hare before greeting Toni and asking about Patricia.
“She’s fine,” Toni said. “The baby is keeping her busy. Spirited boy. We’ve named him Andreas.”
“A fine name. Tell her I’ll stop in tomorrow and help her.”
“We’re negotiating the bull,” Florian said. Though he smiled, he gave her a look that signalled he was not pleased about the business.
Toni rubbed his beard and nodded at the hare. “Looks like dinner. I should make my way home.”
“Nonsense. It’s early,” Florian said. “Come in and have some refreshment.”
“I won’t change the conditions,” Toni said. He turned to Katharina. “Florian’s showing me new ways to earn money. Told me about his mother’s house in Nuremberg and the rent he’s earning from it. It’s a good idea. Think I’ll do something similar. We Ritsches have lots of property, and we could build something to lease out. Maybe even to some Italians. It’s time I got something back from them. I’ll show them what bauernschlau means.”
Katharina glanced at Annamarie. Nobody—not even Florian—knew her daughter’s real ethnic background, and the way people talked about the Italians, she would do anything to keep it that way.
“And the terms of your bull have now changed?” she said. “Is that why you two are still negotiating?”
Toni at least had the decency to look sheepish. “It’s the economy—”
“Indeed, Toni. Just that. And loyalty. My grandfather and your father go a long way back. There are certainly some things that have not been squared away over the years.” She knew about how Opa had lent the Ritsches money when Kaspar had fallen on bad times, and Opa had never asked for a single Heller back. “We’re not Italians either, Toni. We’re your neighbours. Remember that as you negotiate.”
Florian clapped Toni on the shoulder. “Let’s go in and have a glass. We’ll just talk, and then you can think about it.”
Katharina watched the men go into the house, remembering how Toni and his friends had once forced her and the other schoolgirls to climb the Planggers’ tree so that they could look up their dresses. Patricia had refused to do it, and Toni had pinned her down on the ground. Their saving grace had been the call of a farmer looking for one of his sons.
“Florian,” she called after them, “where’s my father’s knife? I need to dress the hare.”
Her husband returned to her and lowered his voice. “You want to tell me about those dues owed now?”
“I’ll tell you what kind of a neighbour you’re dealing with,” she whispered. Just the least of the worst. “A few years before my mother passed away, we used to have hares in the hutches out back. My mother went to feed them one day and found one that had died, of old age, we supposed. She buried it out in the meadow somewhere.
“Toni’s dog dug it up and left it on the Ritsches’ front stoop as a gift. When Toni found that hare, he brushed it off, got it as clean as he could, and went and put that dead animal back into the hutch, like nothing happened.”
“No,” Florian said, eyes wide, clearly stifling a laugh out of respect. “Tell me he didn’t.”
Katharina nodded. “My mother, bless her soul, went out to feed those hares the next morning. When she saw the one that had returned from the grave, her heart dropped into her pants. We all came running at her screams.”
Florian coughed into his collar, his shoulders shaking, and Katharina felt a laugh rising in her as well.
“Did he ever admit it?” he asked.
“Kaspar had to.”
He sucked in a deep breath, trying to put on a straight face. “I understand.”
“Now you know what kind of people he is.”
He held out her papa’s knife to her. “You’ll tell me the other things later.”
“Oh, I certainly will.”
She took the handle and started to dress the hare.
***
T oni and Florian were still discussing cattle and properties in the sitting room when Opa returned from Graun. Katharina folded the apples into the cake batter as he greeted Toni first, and then, as a way to apologise for his earlier brash comments, she supposed, Opa said something about the delicious smells from the baking hare before handing her a small package.
“This came for you.”
It was the size of a book and posted from Bolzano. Katharina knew what it was but pretended to be surprised.
“Well, open it.”
“When I’m done with
