CHAPTER 6
Katy
F astening her cloak around her neck, Katy slipped back through the door that led to the offices and basement staircase. Gunther stood with his hands in his trouser pockets, casually leaning against the wall next to the stairs. He’d been staring off down the hallway, but he turned to her with a smile when the door creaked open.
“Finally ready?” he asked cheerfully as he approached her. His eyes twinkled at her, mitigating any offense she might have taken at his words.
Patting her hair, Katy replied, “Oh, I forgot to slip into the ladies’ powder room first. You wouldn’t happen to have a mirror nearby, would you?”
Gunther merely shook his head at her. “Your hair looks fine, and you know it. If you keep looking for excuses to delay our departure, I will be forced to believe you never had any intention of keeping me company this evening.”
His scrunched eyebrows and slightly downturned lips expressed woefulness so perfectly, she might have bought it if not for his eyes. They laughed at her behind his perfectly crafted expression.
“You found me out,” Katy sighed. “This has all been a ploy to break your heart. But I suppose it would have been more effective to never come back, wouldn’t it?”
“Probably,” he laughed, his eyes sparkling. He moved his arm behind her as if to guide her with a hand on her back, but he quickly dropped it and offered his elbow instead. “Now, if you’re done stalling…”
For a moment, she pretended to pout, but then she relented and wrapped both hands around his forearm, giving him a wide smile as she did so. He gazed back at her, eyes soft and only the barest curve at the corners of his lips. Old feelings, long pushed to the side in favor of reality, stirred to the surface as she met those deep eyes of his.
Was she sure they were the eyes of a stranger?
“Weren’t you the one complaining of delays?” she forced out after a few breaths.
The right side of his mouth curved up farther, and the twinkle returned to his eyes. “Quite right you are, Miss. My apologies.” He waved his right hand down the hall. “Come, let us be off.”
Katy was pleased to discover that this hallway was better lit than the one in the basement, even though it shared its practical style. It was also fairly short, quickly dumping them into an alley on the side of the theater.
If it were summer, it might have been light enough to see by the sun. Being later in the year, the sun had long since disappeared behind the horizon. The moon had not yet risen, so only the light from the gas lamps on the main street nearby filtered through the alley to their position.
With it came the rattle of carriage wheels on the cobblestones, the whinnies of restless carriage horses, and the low rumble of many voices as the theater attendees exited the building and either found their waiting carriages or set off on foot for their homes. Casting a glance toward the front of the building, Katy could see a line of conveyances blocking the alley and wondered how far down the street it stretched.
Gunther flipped the hood of his cloak up and led her in that direction. “It would be more pleasant to avoid the mess, but I’m afraid the other way is a dead end.”
Katy covered her mouth with her right hand and gasped. “You’ve already dragged me into an alley! You dishonest cur!”
Laughing from under his hood, he merely patted the hand on his arm and kept pulling her toward the street. They soon rounded the corner, blending seamlessly into the stream of people headed away from the theater. Feeling chilled, Katy pulled her own hood over her head, although she didn’t draw it forward as far as Gunther had.
“Where are we heading?” Katy asked. Not being familiar with the city, she didn’t even know what direction she was facing. “You seem to be in quite a hurry to get there.”
“Somewhere less crowded,” he replied. He glanced down at her. “Unless you prefer to have private conversations on a busy city street?”
She tapped her chin with a finger, pretending to think. “Flussendorf has a shortage of busy city streets. However, I did have a heated argument with two of my friends in the middle of the market a couple of months ago.”
“How did that turn out?” She couldn’t see his eyes, but his mouth was stretched in a wide grin.
“I will grant that somewhere less crowded would have been preferable,” she said loftily. Then the memory of that afternoon crowded in, and her face fell. Babette hadn’t spoken to her for an entire week. And Fritz…
Gunther turned a corner and finally slowed his stride as they passed onto a narrower street with fewer pedestrians and no carriages. The gas lamps were also less frequent, but the pockets of shadow didn’t worry Katy while she was on Gunther’s arm.
Perhaps the pockets of shadow should have worried her because she was on Gunther’s arm. It had been less than an hour since they’d first met.
“In that case, I believe I will proceed with my plan to secrete you away before provoking you further.” She could hear the smile in his voice, and she tried to focus on that. The argument was in the past. Right now, she was walking with this nice young man for the first and only time. She was determined to enjoy it.
He led her across the road, then through a small wrought-iron gate bisecting a tall, stone wall. On the other side was a small park. The dormant grass crunched under her feet and most of the trees were bare due to the season, but the small night noises of the city were muffled inside the walls.
He closed the gate behind them, then turned so that they faced each other. His hood was still up, but she could make out his twinkling eyes beneath it.
“So tell me, Katrin-who-argues-in-the-street, what about you drives away the men around you?”
Her jaw dropped. “Excuse me?”
Tapping one finger on his chin, he looked up at the stars. “I can only assume there must be some defect, else someone as beautiful as you would have been snatched up long ago. Yet you do not appear to be unkind, nor unintelligent – leaving aside the decision to walk with me – so what other explanation can there be but that something is wrong with you? Surely not every man in your village is either blind or a fool.”
Katy’s eyes stung at the light-hearted accusation. His words mirrored the questions she often asked herself, but that didn’t give a stranger the right to voice them.
She had thought he wanted to walk with her. Instead, he was mocking her.
“No, they aren’t,” she snapped. “Obviously, I’m the blind fool. Good night.”
Spinning on her heel, she took one forceful stride toward the gate, blinking furiously, but he reached out and grabbed her hand, pulling her back.
“Let go of me!” She tried to jerk her hand free, but he was stronger than he looked. “I should never have agreed to come with you.”
“Do you know the way back to your inn?” he asked. To her great annoyance, she could hear a barely suppressed laugh in his voice.
“I’ll figure it out,” she growled. “Now let—me—go!”
He reeled her back in. “I’m sorry; I was only teasing. I didn’t mean to offend. Forgive me?”
As she was resisting returning to him, she glared up into his face. His warm brown eyes laughed at her. “Why should I?”
“I promise to walk you back whenever you want, as long as you answer my question first.” He pressed his free fist to his heart. “Actor’s honor.”
She raised a skeptical eyebrow as she tugged against his grip. “They have that?”
“Ouch.” Wincing, his fist changed to gripping the cloak under it. “You wound me, fair Katrin.”
Fair Katrin , her memory echoed.
Katy gave her head a shake to clear it. There was nothing unusual about the words. Anyone might say them. But…
“You’re right,” she said softly, the fight draining out as she dropped her eyes to the ground. “It’s my own fault.”
“How so?” Gunther lightly squeezed the hand he still held. “Despite my teasing, I struggle to believe you become less desirable upon greater acquaintance.”
“You haven’t met my father,” she grumbled under her breath.
Gently taking her other hand, he drew both up to his chest. She kept her eyes lowered, resisting the pleasant feel of his large hands encasing hers by reminding herself of the impropriety .
“And you haven’t met mine,” he murmured. “If someday you do, I sincerely hope you won’t judge me by him.”
“They don’t judge me by him. They simply don’t want to tie themselves to him.”
She could see his downturned lips out of the corner of her eye. “And so no man in your village has made you an offer?”
“No man in my village has even asked me to walk with him, except one. And he only asked once.”
“Why?”
Tilting her head back, she traced the patterns of the stars winking at her from the dark night sky, trying to calm herself with the familiar constellations. She took a deep breath to steady her voice. “That argument I mentioned?” She swallowed. “It was about… him .”
“The man you walked with?” he asked, his voice laced with confusion. “Why were you arguing with your friends about him? Do they not think he is worthy of you?”
“No, they think Fritz is great,” she replied, smiling slightly.
“Then you were arguing over him?”
She shook her head. “The argument wasn’t about Fritz.”
“Then who—” He paused, cocking his head as he watched her for a moment. When he glanced down, she realized that her left hand had slipped out of his and was playing with her bracelet again. “Oh. The man you were looking for tonight.”
Katy nodded, still not meeting his eyes.
“What was his name? He might be a member of my acquaintance.”
“I thought you weren’t a noble,” she replied, narrowing her eyes at him.
“Doesn’t mean I don’t know any.” He grinned at her, one of his mischievous ones, but she couldn’t see enough of his eyes to tell if they matched.
Pursing her lips, she looked away again. “I can’t remember.”
For a few moments, the low hooting of an owl in one of the nearby trees was the only sound above the muffled city noises. Then Gunther finally echoed, “You can’t remember.” There was a frown in his voice as he took a step back. “If you can’t remember his name, how could he be the reason your Fritz won’t walk with you?”
“If you enjoyed your time in your little village so much, why can’t you remember where it is?” she shot back.
“I—” He cut himself off, the muscles in his jaw twitching. Scowling, he looked away. “I have often asked myself the same question. I have no explanation.”
“Then don’t tell me that I can’t be so intent on finding a man whose name I can’t remember that it drives away the few men who might be interested in me!” She jerked her other hand out of his and spun away.
“How long have you been searching for him?” Gunther’s voice was back to a careful curiosity.
Katy crossed her arms over her chest and kept her back to him. “I haven’t. I don’t know where to look.” She glared at the stars. Taking a deep breath, she added, “But it’s been about six years.”
“Six—six years ?” he spluttered.
Whirling, she retorted, “You wouldn’t wait six years for something you wanted?”
His face softened as she locked eyes with him. “If I could, I would wait forever.” Then his mouth puckered. “But six years. You couldn’t have been more than—”
“Fourteen,” she answered. “I was fourteen the last time I saw him.”
“You formed such a strong attachment so young?” He sounded skeptical.
Finding she couldn’t continue to stare into those intelligent eyes, she looked away. “He was a good friend,” she said defensively. He was a stranger, but he was less judgmental than her family and friends. Maybe that was why the old thought slipped out. “Maybe if he’d at least said goodbye, told me he wasn’t coming back and why, instead of just disappearing …maybe then it would be easier to forget him.”
A slight breeze fluttered the edge of her cloak, pulling it away from her face and then sending it flopping back again. Gunther took one of her hands and gently tugged her farther into the park. When they were under the shelter of the trees, he reached up and lowered his hood so that she could see his entire face.
“Do you want to forget him?” he asked.
Katy looked up at him. His eyes, so often filled with a light-hearted twinkle, appeared completely serious. She wasn’t sure what to make of his somber expression. Like Fritz, did he fear rejection because of the faceless man from her past?
Except Gunther had clearly stated that this would be the only time they walked together. He knew she wouldn’t be returning to Himmelsburg, and he wouldn’t be traveling to Flussendorf. So why the concern?
Perhaps he simply had a good heart, even if his humor could be insensitive. Threads of memory played through her mind, whispering that she had once known someone else with a heart like his.
Perhaps he wasn’t the man she had been looking for. But perhaps he should be.
Katy shoved the thought aside. No, he shouldn’t; he was out of her league.
“I don’t know,” she finally replied. “He was a good friend. But…at times, I find myself wishing that I could move on.”
“I still think the men in your village are fools.” He lightly caressed her hand with his thumb. His forehead wrinkled as his eyes traced her face. “Are you sure we haven’t met before?”
“Are you sure you’re not a noble?” she riposted. “Because that’s the only missing man from my past.”
He laughed. “Alas, while I aspire to be noble, I am not, in fact, a noble.” As she smiled back at him, the amusement melted from his face. “But right now, I wish I was.”
The same breeze that had played with the hood of her cloak now lifted the hair that fell across Gunther’s brow. His brown eyes seemed to search hers before his right hand slowly lifted and brushed her cheek with the back of his fingers, the touch feather-light. Katy caught her breath, unable to scold him for the forward action. There was a strange feeling in her chest that she couldn’t identify, and she knew her cheeks were as red as an apple.
Like throwing open the curtains in a dark room, his entire demeanor shifted. Transferring his weight onto one leg, he leaned back and shoved his hands in the pockets of his trousers, letting his shoulders droop as an easy smile spread across his lips. “You’re from Flussendorf?” he commented lightly. “That’s on the Felsig, isn’t it?”
Katy didn’t answer for a moment, taken aback by the rapid change in conversation. “Yes, it is. My home sits on the bank.”
“What’s it like living that close to a river?” he asked, eyes wide and voice alight with fascination.
“Noisy,” Katy laughed. “But I much prefer the roar of the water through the rapids to the sounds of the city.”
Gunther lifted his eyes to look past her, his attention appearing to drift to another time and place. “I imagine it smells better, too. I don’t notice it while I’m here, but I remember thinking how much fresher the air was in the village.”
“Why don’t you go back?” For the air. For the girl.
He gave her a sad smile. “How could I? I can’t remember where it is. ”
“Then why don’t you visit some other village? Or move to one, since you don’t like the city?”
Gunther was already shaking his head. “I can’t. And I don’t dislike the city; it is simply that I also enjoyed the village.”
“Isn’t there one close enough that you could live there and come to the city when necessary?”
He hesitated. “I suppose that could work for some people. But it’s more complicated than that.”
Of course, Katy thought, glancing over his fine clothes once more. Even if he wasn’t a nobleman, young people who dressed like that usually had less freedom in certain areas than those who didn’t.
“But enough about that. Tell me about your family. What do they do? Do you have siblings?”
The starlight was brighter away from the gas lamps on the street. Enough to see the outline of his features and some of his expression, but little enough that she could convince herself of tenderness in his gaze.
“I thought we were walking?” Katy prompted. Motion would make it harder to get caught up in his eyes. She hoped.
Taking the hint, he offered his arm again. As they began strolling through the trees, she told him bits and pieces of her life in Flussendorf. She left her father out as much as possible, speaking mostly of her friends, sisters, and mother. If Gunther noticed the omission, he didn’t comment on it.
She took a moment to enjoy the soft smile on his face as he angled his head toward her, listening to a tale of Liesl letting the sheep out of the pen and the entire village trying to round them all up again.
She’d told Fritz to ask her for another walk because he was nice, she kind of liked him, and she knew she needed to move past her unresolved feelings.
But she wanted Gunther to ask her again because he was kind and full of life, she enjoyed his company and the feel of his solid arm under her hands, and he made her feel like moving on was possible.
“Our cousin threatened to never come back for shearing again after we finally got the last sheep in the pen,” she laughed. “I think that was the true reason Liesl has been extra careful ever since.”
“Never come back?” Gunther asked, raising an eyebrow.
“He lives in Himmelsburg now,” she explained. With a chuckle, she added, “Liesl was heartbroken when he left.”
“Are you going to visit him while you’re in the city?”
“I spent yesterday afternoon with him once he was free. Angelika and I are returning home tomorrow, but I might drop by his gate for a quick goodbye first.”
Gunther tipped his head back to look at the sky. “His gate. Is he a member of the guard?”
“He is,” she answered with a nod.
Dropping his gaze back to her face, he smiled and rested his hand over her hands where they clutched his arm. “I’m glad you were able to see him again. But sad that you will be leaving my fair city so soon.”
“Me, too.” She smiled back, then said, “But enough about me and my peasant life. Tell me more about you.”
“What is there to tell? I live on the stage and to sing with every breath I take.”
Katy nudged him with her shoulder. “I had that figured out. Tell me about your family. Where do you live?”
“In a house that is much larger than we need with more servants than I know what to do with.” He nudged her back. “My mother has a flair for the dramatic – which I am sure surprises you – and my father orders everyone about as if he is the king himself in his own castle.”
Giggling at these descriptions, she asked, “What about siblings?”
His face fell. “Just the one sister.”
They walked in silence for a few minutes. “How did she die?” Katy ventured in a quiet voice. Gunther simply shook his head, a troubled expression on his face.
The owl hooted again, farther away than she’d heard before. In a tree nearby, she traced the path of a small animal by the skittering of its claws on the bark. Otherwise, the air was mostly still, the sounds of the city decreased to such a low murmur she could barely hear it.
“I suppose you should take me back to the inn now,” Katy reluctantly said. “It’s getting late.”
“What if I don’t know the way?” he replied with a hint of worry. The thin crescent moon gave off just enough light to betray the twinkle in his eyes.
“And you talk about honor,” she chided gently. “Then since you are a liar, I’ll just have to leave you here and find someone who knows the city better,” she breezily told him as she raised a challenging eyebrow.
He leaned in, his face so close she could feel his breath on her cheek. The rustle of his clothing was loud in the silent night. “No one knows this part of the city better than me. But I might get lost along the way.” He waggled his eyebrows. “Distracted by my beautiful companion and all.”
Unnerved by his proximity, Katy pulled back a little. “Gunther, if you—if you don’t take me back right now, I’ll—”
He straightened, eyes dancing, and steered her in the direction of the gate. “Fear not, fair Katrin, you’ll be there before you know it, safe and sound.”
“I’d better,” she grumbled.
Despite his teasing, Gunther led her by a direct route to the front door of the inn where Angelika had a room. “I guess this is it,” Katy said slowly, turning to face him .
He nodded as he pressed one hand to his chest. “It must be, fair Katrin, for I am but a poor prisoner of my city, as you are of your river-side village, free of it though you may be for a short while.” Lifting one of her hands to his lips, he smiled serenely as he continued. “If you should ever grace our fair capital again, it shall be my greatest pleasure to see you at my theater once more.”
At first, she thought this glib speech was proof that he was less affected by their time together than she was. Clearly, she needed to put it behind her. But then she noticed his eyes.
There was no light in them.
“Gunther?”
“Yes?” He gave her that same serene smile.
“Are you all right?”
“Of course. We knew from the start that this couldn’t continue past tonight.”
Maybe she was wrong. Maybe his hood was hiding it.
“Oh,” she said, swallowing her foolish disappointment. “ Wel l, that’s—that’s—I’m glad that you’re—Goodbye, Gunther.” Unable to pretend she didn’t care, she spun away from him and reached for the door handle.
A warm hand grabbed hers, lightly tugging her back. “Katy, wait.”
Katy?
Hey, Katy?
She kept her face lowered, still facing the door. It was a common nickname.
“I mean, Katrin,” he corrected himself. His voice was earnest. “I know that your family depends on you.” When had she told him that? He must have picked it up from her stories. “If you can’t make it back, don’t let me hold you back from living your life. It’s…it’s all right if you forget about me.”
Promise you won’t forget me ?
Without turning, she asked, her voice shaky, “Why? Are you going to forget about me, too?” Just like he did?
“Never.”
It was barely more than a whisper, but she couldn’t pretend she’d imagined it.
He squeezed her hand before releasing it. She listened as his footsteps traveled along the stones of the walkway, then disappeared down the road.
When she could stall no longer, she turned the knob and entered the inn so she could face Angelika’s wrath. But in her mind, she heard the echo of his final whisper.
Never.