Chapter 6
6
Inga’s first week working at the American Embassy passed in a blur. She unpacked endless crates of paperwork from the old building and helped set up the new office she would share with Larry. It took Larry forever to make decisions about how best to proceed, wringing his hands and sweating bullets over everything.
Inga soon tired of watching Larry agonize over how to organize the records and took charge of helping him arrange the files in the same manner she used at the Port of New York.
“It’s quite simple,” she explained to Larry. “We’ll organize the files in alphabetical order, then each morning we can retrieve whatever is on the embassy agenda.”
Little did she know that Benedict lurked behind her like the Grim Reaper, waiting for the chance to pounce.
“International diplomacy is not arranged in alphabetical order, Miss Klein,” he snapped out. “I want my office files arranged by diplomatic alliances, with separate files for short-term problems and long-term strategic objectives. Don’t encourage my secretary to emulate your slipshod behavior.”
That was typical of her interactions with Benedict, who was the living embodiment of a prophet of doom. After failing to get her sent back to America, he seemed determined to look down his stern nose at everything she did. He made her first week feel like a month, triggering a round of homesickness for New York so acute she had to fight the temptation to take the earnings from her first paycheck and flee home. Only her loyalty to the Gerards kept her in Berlin.
On Friday evening she retreated to her bedroom in exhaustion, even though it was only seven o’clock. If she had been back home, she’d be going out with Eduardo to Coney Island or sharing a banana split with him in an ice cream parlor. Instead, she curled up alone in her bedroom to write a letter to Delia:
Hello Delia,
I have just completed my first week at the American Embassy in Berlin! Dee, I work in an actual palace that was once owned by a German princess. The first floor has a ballroom, three reception halls, and a kitchen that can cook for hundreds of people. Such a change from the sloppy Port of New York!
I share an office with a peculiar man named Larry, who never stops complaining about this or that, but he’s nice enough. Our desks face each other in a compact room that had once been a storage closet back when the princess owned the palace. Thankfully, I get to be with Mr. Gerard most of the day, taking dictation or handling his calendar.
Mr. and Mrs. Gerard live in a private apartment on the top floor of the palace, while the rest of the staff live at the Alton House and a chauffeur drives us to work each day. We have breakfast and dinner at a cozy table in the kitchen. I’ve made friends with almost all of them, except the grumpy cook and a wet blanket named Benedict, who is the chief of staff.
People claim that Benedict is smart and good at his job, but he rarely says anything. While the rest of us gossip and have fun at meals, Benedict sits at the end of the table and does nothing but listen. Behind his sneaky eyes, he’s constantly finding fault or calculating how to suck all the joy from the world.
The Gerards are famous for entertaining, and one of my jobs is to help arrange parties for high-society people. Can you imagine? Almost every weekend they either have a fancy dinner, a garden party, or a sporting tournament.
Berlin is wonderful, but I’m a little lonesome for New York. Please don’t tell anyone! I even miss baseball. After years of suffering through baseball games with every man I’ve ever courted, I actually long for a lazy Saturday afternoon in the bleachers. I miss the smell of popcorn and the crack of the bat against the ball and cheering my head off with the rest of the crowd. Berlin is far too formal for such frivolity.
The possibility of a war has everyone gloomy and on edge. The ambassador and Benedict think there might be a chance to keep it to a small, isolated conflict between Serbia and Austria-Hungary. The embassy is hosting a garden party tomorrow because Mr. Gerard is determined to keep people’s spirits up. The guest list is filled with artists and aristocrats and “very important people,” as Benedict would say. He warns that I shouldn’t talk to anyone because he thinks I’m stupid and might somehow trigger a war all on my own.
Wish me well. And if I accidentally start a war at Mr. Gerard’s garden party, please remember me fondly.
Inga
Despite her good cheer in the letter to Delia, Inga was mildly terrified of facilitating her first garden party at the embassy. There was no such thing as a “modest garden party” for seventy-five aristocrats, diplomats, and high-profile guests from all over Europe. Larry was on hand to help, but his anxious nerves made things worse. Nevertheless, Mr. Gerard brought Inga to Germany to spread good cheer at the embassy, and it was time to deliver.
Mrs. Gerard would be busy with hostess duties, so Inga’s job was to ensure things ran like clockwork behind the scenes. She and Larry would monitor the party and orchestrate the serving staff. It was the grandest event she’d ever witnessed as an army of caterers took over the kitchen to prepare tiny sandwiches, miniature quiches, and darling teacakes. Towering floral arrangements decorated the patio and an ice sculpture of a swan with outstretched wings had been wheeled into the garden. A string quartet played Mozart while uniformed waiters circulated with flutes of champagne and hors d’oeuvres on silver trays.
Inga and Larry retreated to the salon once the guests had all arrived and been led into the garden. Now their job was to monitor the party through the open French doors and be on hand to facilitate anything Mrs. Gerard needed. A vase filled with gladiolas, gardenias, and daffodils provided a partial screen as they secretly ogled the elegant people swanning about on the terrace, sipping champagne, and talking in low voices. The men wore ordinary suits, but the ladies had on long gowns in silky shades of peach and lilac and aquamarine.
The garden party was as lovely as a painting, and yet something seemed off. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but people weren’t at ease. Nobody was laughing or terribly engaged in conversation. Nobody seemed happy.
Larry agreed. “Everyone is worried about the political situation.” He sneezed, then nodded to a cluster of men huddled near the ice sculpture, and she spotted her nemesis, Benedict Kincaid, looking typically cheerless. “Those men are diplomats from other embassies,” Larry said. “You’ll meet them eventually. Most of them are from the nations doing their best not to choose sides. Look! There’s Claude Debussy.”
Inga brightened at the sight of the famous composer. Who could have imagined that such a giant in the world of music was so short in real life? He looked bored, or perhaps those heavily lidded eyes always made him look sleepy.
Would she ever get used to being around such distinguished people?
Larry sneezed again and apologized for his hay fever. “These gardenias are pure torture,” he said with a nod to the towering floral arrangement they hid behind. “I’ll be lucky to survive the next few hours without fainting.”
“You poor dear,” Inga said. “I had no idea you were suffering from the flowers. Let me move them for you.”
“No, no,” Larry rushed to say. “Mrs. Gerard placed them there herself.”
Inga brushed his concerns aside. “She didn’t know about your hay fever or she wouldn’t have set them here.” It would be easy to move the vase a few yards onto the terrace and spare Larry such misery.
The stoneware vase was heavy as she lifted it, her face plunged into the fragrant petals. Yet she could see well enough through the profusion of blooms as she carried it a few yards outside. There! She found a spot for it on a table where it could be appreciated by everyone.
Benedict sent her a poisonous glance before she scurried back to hiding in the salon. Maybe she’d been in America too long, but she didn’t think appearing at the party for thirty seconds to reposition some flowers had tainted the air with her low-class presence. She felt his glare drilling into her back as she returned to the salon.
“Why does Benedict have to be so grim all the time?” she groused.
“Don’t mind him,” Larry said. “Nobody is happy today. The deadline on the war ultimatum is getting near, so the sword of Damocles is hanging over everyone’s head. We’re all afraid it is about to drop.”
Inga couldn’t do anything about the war, but she could help make this party a success. A grand piano sat unused in the corner of the salon, and it had wheels.
“Why don’t we ask Mr. Debussy to play something for us?” she asked. “We could wheel the piano onto the terrace and listen to something more appealing than the dirge coming from the dreary string quartet.”
Larry twisted his hands. “I imagine Mr. Debussy would prefer to enjoy the reception instead of performing for a crowd.”
“Let’s go see, shall we?” She didn’t wait for him to respond. Mr. Debussy looked as glum as the others at the party, and he could always decline if he didn’t want to play.
She cautiously approached the group surrounding Mr. Debussy, where a Spanish diplomat droned on about the amount of rainfall this summer. That settled it. Anytime the conversation resorted to a discussion about the weather, emergency remedies were needed. When the Spanish diplomat paused for a sip of champagne, Inga inserted herself into the group to speak with Mr. Debussy.
“Sir, we have a piano just inside the salon. If we wheeled it into the garden, would you be willing to play something for us?”
“Ha!” Mr. Debussy said. “I’ve been silently praying that someone would ask. I’d be delighted.”
She flashed a grin to Larry, hovering in the doorway of the salon, then hurried inside to help him wheel the piano onto the terrace. Benedict must have noticed because he blocked the cumbersome advance of the piano before they could get it through the open doors.
“What are you doing?” he hissed.
“Mr. Debussy wants to play for us,” she said. Moving the piano required considerable strength to wheel it through the opening of the salon and onto the flagstone patio, and Mr. Debussy soon joined in to help push it through.
Mary Gerard noticed the commotion and hurried to the salon. Inga silently cringed. She didn’t mind overstepping with Benedict, but perhaps she should have asked Mrs. Gerard’s permission.
“It’s not too late to wheel it back if you object,” Inga hurried to say.
Mary leaned in close to whisper, “My dear, I only wish I’d thought of this myself.”
People began gathering around, some of the ladies even calling out requests.
Rather than play one of his own compositions, Mr. Debussy broke into a fantasia by Rachmaninoff, and it was spectacular. A newfound vitality brightened the atmosphere. Even the leaves stirring in the summer breeze seemed to be part of the magnificent crescendo as the melody enveloped the garden.
“Bravo!” a Russian duke called out from the far side of the terrace.
Inga watched the performance from the open salon doors and couldn’t stop smiling. Guests abandoned their dreary conversations and gathered around the piano. Some of the serving staff began hovering in the salon too. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hear a master at his craft.
Laughter and applause greeted the end of the Rachmaninoff performance, and then Mr. Debussy launched into one of his own compositions. The delicate melody of “Clair de lune” filled the air, the dreamy longing in the music casting an enchanted spell through the garden. Everyone paused to listen. Even Mr. Gerard and his group of diplomats at the far end of the garden turned to listen.
This was the right thing to have done. Anyone who heard Claude Debussy play “Clair de lune” on a warm summer afternoon would never forget it.
Inga was so entranced she didn’t notice the darkening weather until a fat raindrop landed on the flagstone patio in front of her. Then another.
Larry groaned. “Oh boy, here it comes.”
A cool wind gusted through the shrubbery lining the yard, bringing a spatter of heavy droplets pelting the ground. Ladies squealed and dashed for cover.
The piano!
“Oh, Larry, please help me get the piano inside,” she begged, but he’d already fled, both hands shielding his head from the sudden downpour unleashing from the sky. The crush of people came running toward the salon doors, making it hard to fight through them to get to the piano. Somebody knocked over the towering floral arrangement, which smashed against the flagstones.
She ran to save the piano. It was heavy and barely moved an inch as she shoved it toward the open doorway. Benedict appeared, looking furious as he joined her. Rolling it inside was much easier once Benedict’s forceful push got it going, but they were both sopping wet by the time they got the piano through the salon doors.
Inga couldn’t tell if people were happy or horrified. Everyone was talking at once as the rain hissed against the slate terrace. Mary dispatched the servants to fetch every dry towel in the embassy while Inga blotted the piano’s ivory keys with her handkerchief, but it was hopeless. This piano probably cost more than she would earn in her entire life. Could a piano survive getting drenched?
To her delight, Mr. Debussy sat down before the keyboard and commenced playing a lively tune that immediately set the crowd at ease. Some of them laughed, some applauded, while others went directly back to their conversations that had been interrupted by the downpour.
Inga grabbed a stack of towels from a maid and helped distribute them. Nobody was sopping wet except her, Benedict, and the grand piano. She found a spot in the corner to discreetly dry off as the music continued, which sounded different now from what it had been like before the drenching. Some notes sounded clear as a bell, but others had a muffled, discordant quality to them.
“I shall take requests!” Mr. Debussy called out at the completion of the song. Had there ever been a more memorable afternoon? It was a tight fit in the salon, but the rain had injected a bolt of energy and excitement into the group.
Inga twisted her hands as another sour note rose from the soaked piano. Would the instrument sound better once it was completely dry?
Suddenly, Mr. Debussy stopped playing. Chatter among the crowd settled, and Inga looked up, searching for whatever had cast a pall on the gathering.
A man in uniform stood in the entrance to the salon. Tall, grim, and dressed in the uniform from the German Imperial Court. He walked straight to Ambassador Gerard, clicked his heels, and handed him a message.
Mr. Gerard popped the seal and read. Even from across the room, Inga saw the color drain from his face.
“My friends, Germany has just declared war against Russia. Declarations of war with France and Britain are expected imminently.”
A wave of dizziness descended on her. It was happening. Rain and garden parties and ruined pianos no longer mattered because half the world was about to be at war. Benedict had warned them to expect this, but somehow she didn’t really believe it would happen.
The Russian duke strode from the room, his wife trailing behind him. The Germans left too. Mr. Debussy was French, and he joined a cluster of Frenchmen near the far windows to confer.
Already people were retreating to their sides, and the earlier joyful mood of the party vanished. The sunlight was gone, the music over, and she feared it would be a long time before any of them would know such a carefree afternoon again.