Chapter Ten Gertrude
Chapter Ten
Gertrude
Four days until the Oceanus is torpedoed
A couple passed by me. The woman was attending to a man who didn’t appear well. The first day at sea could be unsettling for some.
As I climbed the stairs, a well-honed talent for seeing danger had me turning.
I watched the steward and the man round a corner.
The woman’s back was to me, but an uncomfortable sense of familiarity washed over me.
Her dark hair, full figure, and straight shoulders that spoke of confidence all reminded me of Vienna.
She prompted me to think of the black market book broker I’d first met in my great-uncle’s shop years ago.
She’d become a regular visitor by 1938, always with a rare book to sell.
She’d saunter into the shop, wary but full of confidence.
She’d carefully look at the titles first to make sure we were alone.
The woman wasn’t like our normal customers. Though her dark dress was subdued, she favored bright lipstick, and her ringed fingers suggested she lived anything but a restrained life. The Germans didn’t approve of ostentatious women who didn’t fit their idea of chasteness.
On one occasion, she’d moved toward the counter, meeting my gaze with sharp blue eyes. “Is your uncle here?”
“No. Not today.” My uncle was unwell, and he’d said many times now that he was grateful Alfred had asked for my hand and I’d agreed to marry him.
When she grinned at me, I was immediately cautious. My uncle had called her a selkie, but I worried more about the German spies who’d infested the city.
“Good morning,” I added. “It’s been a while.”
“I’ve been on the go. I hear congratulations are in order. You’re to be married,” she said.
My engagement wasn’t a secret, but still I was surprised she knew. “Yes.”
“When is the wedding?”
“Two weeks.” Alfred had insisted I visit an exclusive dressmaker in Vienna.
She’d created a wedding dress fit for a princess, made of silk that was as modest as it was extravagant.
There’d also been fittings for dresses and gowns for entertaining.
It had been a whirlwind courtship, and I still hadn’t processed my good fortune.
“I hear the weather is going to be lovely the following week, when you wed,” she said.
“How do you know that?”
A shrug. “Magic.”
When I’d last seen Alfred a few days earlier, he’d been tense and worried about his business. “I can only hope.”
“Trust me.” And then, in the wake of my silence, she asked, “Would you be interested in buying a rare book?”
Uncle Eric had bought many of the books she’d brought to us, but as the wedding grew closer, his health had also taken a bad turn, and he wasn’t in the shop often.
Alfred had allowed me to stay there, but I sensed that after our marriage, I would have to leave the bookshop behind.
I expected a German soldier or the local police to be waiting outside. But she appeared to be alone.
“We are very careful about what we can buy now.”
She reached into a small sack and removed a thin volume. Its old leather cover was embossed with gold flowers. “I think you’ll find what I have of great value. And the price will be hard for anyone to resist.”
Despite the dangers, I nodded. She set the book on the counter, and I realized immediately that what she was offering was quite rare—a First Folio of William Shakespeare’s works. “Where did you get this?”
She shrugged. “A client.”
Many of the wealthy citizens who’d used her as a broker had long fled the city, been transported, or died. I carefully opened the cover and studied the bold ink. The book had been published in the 1620s. Still fearing a trap, I asked, “Who is the owner?”
“I cannot say. But I can assure you it’s genuine.”
She wasn’t lying. I’d handled enough books to know just from the binding which volumes were genuine and which ones were forgeries. I had special clients who still collected and could sell this if the price was right. “How much?”
Her smile widened. When she named her price, I was hesitant. She’d greatly undervalued the book.
“I am no German or police spy,” she said. “I’m simply a woman looking to make a deal that would help us both.”
Many in the city were struggling now. Food was scarce, the best saved for the Germans and Austrian officials.
“I could really use the money,” she added. “I have never steered you wrong, have I?”
“No. But my uncle likes to make these deals.”
“Then get him. I will wait.”
I suspected she knew my uncle was bedridden. “I’m afraid that I will have to pass.”
“Are you sure? This is a very rare opportunity.”
“Yes.”
“Very well.”
When she’d left the store and vanished around the corner, I’d expected never to see her again.
But three years later, she’d found me by the river.
My body was bruised and my head ached. I’d never questioned how she’d found me.
On that day, we’d struck a different deal, and I hadn’t seen her since I’d left Vienna.
Was I now losing my mind? Was I so worried about Vienna that I was turning strangers into past ghosts?
I climbed the stairs and was slightly breathless when I reached the dining room floor. Following the sound of conversation and clinking silverware, I found a steward standing by the dining room entrance.
“I am late for my seating,” I said.
His gaze bobbed between my face and belly. Whatever practiced rejection he had prepared for tardy diners never materialized. “A seat just opened. Let me clear the place, and I’ll seat you.”
The steward angled his hand toward the dining room. I recognized Dr. Brooks. He and the other man at the table stood.
“Frau Werner, what a lovely surprise. Are you our new dinner companion?”
“I must be.” The steward pulled out my chair, and I sat.
“May I introduce the DuPonts. They’re from New Hampshire.”
“Good evening,” I said.
Both greeted me as I accepted a fresh napkin from the steward. I unfolded it and spread it over my swollen belly.
“Just in time for the first course,” Dr. Brooks said.
The waiters placed bowls of beef consommé in front of us.
“Frau Werner, do you like to play games?” Dr. Brooks asked.
My polished smile was careful, cautious. “Who does not?”
“Excellent. But first, you must eat,” he said.
As we sipped soup from our silver spoons, we exchanged pleasantries. My story was as well practiced as my new name. I was from Innsbruck. My husband had passed in the war. I had a cousin in New York.
The next course was beef tips with a side of rice and green beans. The food was delicious, and it had been some time since I’d eaten in a formal setting. It was oddly comforting and reminded me of dinners with my uncle.
The three discussed their travels, the state of the war, and books.
The locations weren’t all familiar to me, but I’d seen and read enough to know the war was far from finished.
Books were my forte, and I was familiar with all of them, especially the ones now banned in Austria.
When we finished the main course of roasted chicken and then the sorbet, Dr. Brooks took the conversation toward a lighter topic.
“Is everyone ready for a little magic?” he asked.
“Magic?” Mrs. DuPont looked delighted and a bit terrified. “More magical than your wish coins?”
I found the older woman’s childish delight amusing. For all her money and world travels, I suspected Mrs. DuPont had lived a cloistered life in a rarified world.
“Ah, there are all kinds of magic,” Dr. Brooks said. “I would say we are always surrounded by it.”
“Magic? Is that truly real?” Mrs. DuPont asked. “One thing for primitive natives to believe, but we’re educated people.”
Dr. Brooks looked delighted by her curiosity. “I’m here to tell you it’s very real. And it’s very powerful. Do you want to know your future?”
It was a question many had contemplated of late. I had dared not look more than a day or two into the future. Each day brought potential challenges that could end it all for me.
Dr. Brooks shuffled a deck of cards and then divided them into three even piles. “Restack the cards, Mrs. DuPont.”
She carefully lifted the middle pile and set it on the first. The last became the top.
The steward brought the others after-dinner drinks and for me a cup of tea.
Dr. Brooks set three cards face down on the table. Mrs. DuPont shifted closer in her seat. He flipped the first card. It was the Death card.
The older woman paled, and for all that I’d experienced, I felt a chill. Ghosts of the past swirled around. We were crossing waters infested by wolf packs ready to devour us.
“Not to worry,” Dr. Brooks said. “This card simply means change. Your life is about to change.”
The next card was a tower being hit by a thunderbolt. More change, he insisted. The final card was the final word. It was the Sun. “Prosperity.”
Air whooshed from Mrs. DuPont as she sat back. She sipped her drink as if she needed fortification and then, lowering her voice, said, “I hope it means my husband’s ships to England make it there intact. He’s invested everything in them.”
Dr. Brooks tapped the last card, a gold, gleaming sun, before calling the steward over to refill wineglasses. After the steward had filled the DuPonts’ glasses, Dr. Brooks said, “His shipments will be just fine.”
She looked relieved. “Excellent. The food will help those poor, starving people.”
Mr. DuPont looked slightly embarrassed by his wife’s oversharing. “My dear, no one wants to hear our boring news.”
Unrebuked, Mrs. DuPont sipped more wine as she picked up the Sun card. “How do you know the cards have magic?”
“I bought them from an elder in a Roma encampment who insisted they were very accurate.”
“That doesn’t mean anything,” Mrs. DuPont said. “Those tribes can spin all kinds of lies.”
I thought about the kind Roma who sailed the Danube River, and my mother’s love of her family.
Dr. Brooks nodded. “I’ve read the cards for myself dozens of times. They’re always right.”
“And what do they say for you?” I asked.