louder. I took your suitcases upstairs to your rooms.”
“The cake is best warm,” Frau Schulte said. She poured the coffee. For Anna she had a cup of cocoa, frothy on top, with a tiny silver spoon left in the cup, to stir it with.
A girl with a high, round forehead and small glittering eyes like Herr Schulte’s came into the sitting room. “Here is my Irmgard,” Herr Schulte said.
Irmgard wore a cardigan over a checked dress, brown wool stockings. One of her shoes had a built-up sole, and she limped. Frau Schulte said she was to go upstairs and light the fires in the bedrooms for their guests.
Irmgard said she would finish setting the table first. “Did I say at your convenience?” Frau Schulte said.
“Listen to your mother, Irmgard,” Herr Schulte said.
At seven that evening, dinner was served. The first course was chicken soup, followed by roasted pork and noodles, boiled carrots, and cabbage with sour cream and caraway seeds. The only other guests that evening were a couple from Berlin, Herr Doktor Voss and Frau Voss and their baby. Dr. Voss cut his food into small pieces and regarded it suspiciously before putting it in his mouth. Frau Voss mashed carrots and spoon-fed them to her baby, who promptly spit up on her. Frau Voss moistened an edge of her table napkin in her water glass and sponged at her dress.
“He’s a lovely baby,” Anna’s mother said, smiling at Frau Voss.
“He is mischief incarnate,” Dr. Voss said.
After dinner Herr Schulte carried a tray of brandy and coffee into the sitting room. For Anna, he had another cup of hot cocoa, which seemed to her like one cup too many. Frau Voss walked around the room with the baby, who began to scream and push at his mother’s neck. Shush, shush, Frau Voss crooned. The baby was Friedrich, she said. “Our little Fritzi,” Dr. Voss said, adding that little Fritzi was eight months old and cutting another tooth, which meant sleepless nights for his poor, beleaguered parents.
Usually they vacationed in Saxony, Frau Voss said, but what with the war and the baby, they had decided this would be quieter.
“And it is quiet, isn’t it?” Dr. Voss said. “Another storm is on the way, I fear, because I have the most appalling headache.”
Anna’s father said he was sorry to hear that. Dr. Voss shrugged. “How are you in Prague?” he said. “In Berlin food rationing is a nuisance and the blackout even more so, and when you need a taxi, there are none. Damage has been inflicted by British planes, it is true, but nothing we can’t cope with. You know, the English never wanted this war; Churchill pushed them into it. The Americans do not want war either, but President Roosevelt is determined to get involved.” He tamped down the tobacco in the bowl of his pipe and took a book of matches out of his pocket.
Anna’s father began to talk conversationally about skiing, when he was young, in Bavaria, with his brother and sister. His family did also, Dr. Voss said, every December. “My goodness, it just came to me,” he said, slapping his forehead. “I know you, Frau Schaefferová, do I not? Frau Doktor Schaefferová, I should say. We met at a medical conference in Prague. In July 1937, I believe. Please tell me I am correct. Otherwise, I will have disgraced myself doubly. It is Dr. Schaefferová, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Anna’s mother said. “Yes, I remember the conference.”
Dr. Voss stood and bowed and sat down again. “What a great pleasure this is. Just last month I read your monograph on the metabolism of iron and found it brilliant. Lise,” he said, turning to his wife. “Isn’t this wonderful? Dr. Schaefferová is a distinguished member of the medical community. Such a happy accident. A truly great pleasure.”
A burning log rolled onto the tiled hearth and Frau Voss gave a small shriek. Herr Schulte ran to grab the poker. The clock struck nine. Irmgard came in and gathered up the brandy glasses and the coffee service. The baby began to cry. Frau Voss gave him to her husband and said she was going up to their room.
* * *
In the morning, Anna and her mother and father went for a walk in the snow. Her mother said she could not remember meeting Herr Doktor Voss at any conference, in Prague or elsewhere.
“He is not a memorable character,” Anna’s father said.
“Julius, what are we doing here?”
“It’s quiet, the air is fresh;