‘Hello, Papa.’
‘Where have you been, Hanne?’
‘Getting ready for bed,’ I said, easing my feet out of my clogs.
‘But you weren’t in your room.’
‘No, I had to . . .’ I flicked a thumb in the vague direction of our outhouse.
My father lifted a hand to guard the flicker of the candle flame. ‘Put your shoes back on. I need you to fetch Mutter home.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s late.’
‘She’s been late the past two nights.’
‘Ja, exactly. Too late.’ He turned and headed towards the kitchen, the candlelight throwing his silhouette against the walls of the corridor. ‘Go get her,’ he muttered over his shoulder. ‘Bring her home.’
The night had cleared and deepened into delicious cold. At that hour in the village, everything smelled of pickled pork and kitchen fire. I walked a little down the lane and then, when I was sure my father would not see me, turned into our neighbours’ allotment so that I might walk beside the fields. I passed close by the Pasches’ cottage, bending over to avoid being seen through the window by Elder Christian Pasche, who I could hear at prayer within. I pictured his bald head shining in the firelight as he intoned over his Bible, his sons, Hans, Hermann and Georg, slumped and drowsy at the table. The Federschleissen was being held for Elder Pasche’s second bride, a narrow-eyed woman called Rosina with terrible breath and a mole on her forearm that she scratched at during services. Rosina was closer in age to Hans than his father, but as she and Christian were both dour and humourless, the match was generally agreed to be a good one. ‘They will be able to spend many wonderful evenings not laughing together,’ my mother had commented on hearing the news.
I pulled off my headscarf to feel the air against my neck. In the clear light of the rising moon, the shorn rye fields seemed soft and melancholy, the forest upon the eastern rise the only interruption in the otherwise flat, silvered horizon of pasture, field and marsh. Only the spire of the church – locked now – steepled into the sky. Everything else was dull and low-lying, a patchwork of farm ground, whitewash and wood shingle. I had lived in Kay my whole life. I could have paced out each house, orchard and field in pitch-darkness.
I could hear the sound of women’s laughter as I left the fields and turned north towards the Radtkes’ yard. The back door was ajar, offering a glimpse of lamplight and shifting shadows. As I paused by the henhouse to gather my braids back under my headscarf, there was a quiet cough from the side of the building, and I saw Elder Samuel Radtke sitting on his chopping block by the woodpile, smoking his pipe in the dark. He nodded at me.
‘Came by the fields, did you? Good night for it.’
‘Sorry,’ I stammered.
‘She’s put me out for the night. Dog’s inside, though.’ He chuckled. ‘Go on in. They’ve been at it for hours.’ Samuel puffed on his pipe and gestured for me to enter, just as the women burst out in a new wave of mirth.
Inside the women were squeezed shoulder to shoulder around the large kitchen table, cackling hard while their fingers stripped feathers and stuffed the down into clay jars for the new Frau Pasche’s wedding quilt. It took me several moments before I picked out my mother from their midst. She was laughing and, unused to seeing her smile, I was struck anew by her beauty – the painful, astonishing certainty of it. As a child I had not minded when people remarked upon our difference, or had wondered aloud why Matthias, my twin, and not I had inherited her full top lip, her dark eyes and hair. But now, as several heads turned in my direction, I felt again the silent, inevitable comparison and wanted to hide. Here she is, the cuckoo born to a songbird. The odd, unbeautiful daughter.
Mutter Scheck, her round little glasses smudged with fingerprints, nudged Mama. ‘Look, Johanne – your little Johanne is here to herd you home.’
Mama glanced up at me. ‘No, you’ve come too early! I’m not ready.’ Her voice was high and girlish. The women laughed again and I smiled, my throat suddenly, inexplicably, tight with tears.
‘Papa sent me.’
‘What does he want? A bedtime story? Your papa can wait.’
Mutter Scheck snorted.
I noticed then that Henriette and Elizabeth Volkmann were sitting with Christiana Radtke and something in me buckled. I had not been invited. Christiana coloured and the girls smiled at me with tight lips. I wanted to disappear.
Elize Geschke patted the space beside her at the edge of the kitchen table, sweeping the bench free of stray stripped quills. ‘Here, Hanne. Come and sit with me.’