She blinked.
“I was going to come to you. I’ve been thinking of you since we’ve arrived.” He kept his voice soft. “How could I not? I’m alive because of you, Frau Steinhauser.”
She drew in a breath and swiped a tear away.
“How I left you,” he added quickly, “without saying goodbye, I apologise for that too. You must realise by now that I had to get back to my family. And I was not safe…” He let it hang there, let her come to the obvious conclusion.
She shook her head. “I’d have never told—”
“No, no, of course not. I didn’t mean to imply that you would. But perhaps, now, we can look back at all this and understand the circumstances, no?”
Katharina hesitated, then gazed at him, but there was none of that longing, that fawning she’d had for him back then.
“I know your concerns about the reservoir,” he said, transforming into the official. “And that is why I wanted to seek you out. I’m glad you came to me. I need your help, Frau Steinhauser.”
“My help?” She scoffed. “How?”
“It’s a complicated issue, these politics. You see, if I don’t have the valley’s support to keep the project within the control of the ministry, MFE—that’s the electrical company—will buy it and build a reservoir that threatens much more than the bit of land my ministry would have to flood. MFE’s purchase would pose a great threat to all of you here.”
Katharina frowned. “Such as?”
“Imagine all of you—including you, in Arlund—relocating to higher ground or somewhere else entirely. They don’t want you here.”
Her look was one of disbelief. “And how am I to help?”
“Tell me who is organised enough here to see my proposals through. There will be a dam here, but how big rests on your shoulders and the shoulders of your people now.”
She pulled back from the table as if she’d touched something hot. “You’re a member of the Fascist party, are you not?”
Angelo shrugged. “I would not be the minister if I were not.”
She pursed her lips, nodding. “And you want names of people who would be organised enough to resist…what?” she said. “A Fascist company? MFE is just another name for Grimani Electrical, is it not?”
He had not counted on her being this well informed.
“The biggest reason people are against the project, Minister Grimani, is because we have been lied to and manipulated, and nobody has come forward to be held accountable for the lies.” She looked hard at him. “For the betrayals. We need someone that we can…face.”
Trust. She wanted to say trust. He nodded. This was not the first time he had been confronted by this.
They both jumped a little when the cuckoo bird sprang out of the clock. It was ten. A door slammed at the back of the dining room, and he heard a woman’s voice—Jutta Hanny’s—saying something about starting the specials. There was a clatter of pots and pans. The annoying hoot of the cuckoo finally stopped, and the clock ticked steadily on. Henri stepped out to take a peek at them, but Katharina raised a hand and shook her head slightly. He turned on a light for them and ducked back into the kitchen.
Angelo pushed his chair back and stood up. “Frau Steinhauser, if you encourage support for the government in advance, it will be of great advantage to all of you. We’re holding a town meeting on Friday. Seven o’clock. Please think about it. I assure you, Frau Steinhauser, I am on your side. I will prove that I am trustworthy and do have your best intentions in mind.” He offered his hand, making her stand up as well.
She hesitated before taking it. Her skin was rough against his palm. She let his hand go as if she’d realised it, and caught her bottom lip between her teeth. When she met his look again, he could tell that she wanted to say something more.
Flashing her an apologetic smile, he opened an arm out so that she had no choice but to follow him out. “You’ll excuse me? I have things I need to do yet. My men are waiting for me.” He opened the door for her, giving her passage to the door.
In the hallway, her hand brushed his arm. “I hear,” she said, “your son is here with you.”
“Yes. Marco.”
When her eyes darted to the door that led from the hallway into the kitchen, his stomach tightened. Go! Please!
“He’s studying?”
Angelo inclined his head. “Engineering. In Bergamo.”
“Like you?” Those dark-brown eyes were on him, determined. “I have two sons. And we have a daughter. She’s sixteen. Her name is Annamarie.”
“Nice. Good.”
“Yes,” she said, but the lightness rang false. “She wants to study pedagogy in Bolzano next year. If we can get the money together, that is.”
“Good luck then.”
Katharina gave him a tight-lipped smile. “Yes, there’s still a little time, I suppose. Trust is what you want? We shall see whether you earn it. I imagine we’ll be seeing a lot more of you around here, and given that, there will be plenty of opportunity for us to get to know one another…” She glanced him up and down. “Again.”
She stepped out, and he waited until the door closed behind her, the bell above clattering.
As he climbed the stairs to his room, he sighed deeply. She had left much unsaid, and he was grateful for that. He would not give her the chance to reveal more. Not, he thought, until he was ready.
Chapter 7
Arlund, April 1937
“W hat are you doing?”
Katharina looked up from the end of the bed, where she knelt before the pine chest. Florian stood in the doorway, holding something. She suddenly remembered how her mother had
