With their son hugged up against her, she said, “Let’s name him after your father. Let’s name him Bernd.”
***
T hey were all waiting for her in the sitting room, where Opa had been lain out on the table beneath the crucifix. Already, from the top of the stairs, Katharina could see her grandfather was completely altered. The rose-coloured cheeks were chalky and thick with some sort of paste that had been used to cover up the bruises and wounds. One of the women had washed and made him up—Hannelore, maybe? Jutta?—and dressed him in his one good suit. And his shoes. The new boots Florian and she had bought him last Christmas. The ones he’d refused to wear, saying he’d save them for a day when he’d really need them. Would be a shame to bury those now, but she couldn’t just march over there and pull them off, could she? Scold her Opa and ask him, teasingly, what he was thinking?
Katharina descended into the murmuring of women’s voices: Our Father, who art in heaven… Prayers for the dead. Into the hushed clinking of glasses. She turned her head to look at the second table, the one they’d brought in from outside.
There were cups of wine and schnapps glasses scattered across the surface, with two empty bottles and two that were half-full. There were people everywhere, and only then did she scan the faces, some politely, sympathetically smiling and looking away, others nodding at her as if to give her strength or tell her they understood.
Everyone was here. Dr Hanny, Hannelore, the Prieths, Hans Glockner, and the Nogglers. Even the Planggers had come all the way over, and Karl Spinner.
She heard someone mutter, “…farm’s going to outsiders,” and searched the men standing around the oven, but she’d not recognised the voice, and there was a whole group of them oblivious to her. Her chest constricted.
Outside the windows, she could see the visitors who had spilled out into the Hof like an invasion of shadows. She pressed Bernd closer to her as she submerged herself into the lot of them. Jutta, Frau Prieth, Frau Plangger, and Patricia Ritsch were sitting on the stools they’d set up in order to pray around Opa. They stood when she approached, and Katharina looked upon the man who’d been her last anchor in this community.
She felt someone touch her shoulder, and Father Wilhelm offered his hand. Katharina took it and squeezed, and then the procession of condolences started. Jutta hugged her before taking Bernd, thankfully without much comment, so that Katharina could accept the stream of handshakes. Her community. Their valley. Some did not look her in the eye, but offered their hands anyway. She’d not paid enough attention to know who would help her in the future and who would turn against her. And Opa could not help her differentiate between the two now.
Patricia Ritsch stepped up, her own infant, Andreas, in her arms. Of course Toni would name his first son after the freedom fighter.
“They will be famous friends, Katharina, our two boys.” Patricia smiled, and then she must have felt awkward, because she swallowed and looked down, her cheeks flushed.
“They will, Patricia,” Katharina offered. She placed a hand on the woman’s upper arm and squeezed gently. “Thank you.”
Anton Federspiel stepped up, Frau Prieth, the baker, just behind him. Katharina held her breath. Certainly Anton had enough decency not to mention the finances now. She shook his hand, and Anton whispered something about how everything would be all right. Her thoughts whirled with the possible interpretations, but she could not make heads or tails of it. As she greeted Frau Prieth, the door opened and Iris came in, her face drawn and her eyes skittering until they landed on Katharina. Her relief was visible, her look of regret immediate. Katharina’s heart swelled with a tenderness and a dread she did not know she had space for now.
Behind Iris, Toni Ritsch stepped in with his father, so near to Iris that she had to step aside to let them through. The men held a schnapps glass each, Toni’s nose red from obviously too many already. As he passed Iris, Toni eyed her up and down, scowling, swaying a little. As if oblivious to his son’s bullying, Kaspar Ritsch came directly to Katharina and patted her shoulder, telling her Opa would get a hunter’s funeral. He’d arranged it.
Katharina thanked him, and he left her to pray at Opa’s side.
When she looked for Toni, he was hovering near the table with some of the other men, his glass filled with schnapps. He was staring at Iris, and even she could hear him say, “The old man would turn over if he knew the Walscher was here.”
“Where’s his rifle, Kaspar?” Katharina whispered at the old man’s shoulder. “Where’s Opa’s weapon?”
“We recovered it before the carabinieri came,” he whispered back, turning only slightly to her.
“I want it, Kaspar. I want it for protection.”
His was a mix of pity and caution. “We have to turn it in, Katharina. You don’t want to risk having contraband found.”
“Talk to Florian. Invent a story that we didn’t recover it.”
“But when the snow melts… Listen, the carabinieri were already asking Dr Hanny about it.”
“Please. Please talk to Florian.”
Kaspar nodded, but she knew he was not taking her seriously. The thought that Toni, or even Kaspar himself, might squirrel away the rifle for themselves, for their stupid uprising, crossed her mind.
After the Planggers greeted her, Katharina moved from the table to Iris.
“I should not have come,” Iris whispered in greeting, and Katharina took her hand and squeezed it.
“I am glad you did, but maybe you’re right. Please know, I do appreciate it.”
She was relieved when Dr Hanny came to them and gently led Iris to the corner with Father Wilhelm. Iris had two more friends amongst
