Midnight Train to Prague - Carol Windley Page 0,90
at least one applicant is German.” Magdalena said Franz was never to speak of this again. Anna stared at the black notes of the Czerny study, a cascade of black sixteenth notes that were to race down the keyboard, a phrase played diminuendo and then crescendo, and a final chord, an act of completion. No one, she thought, could keep Franz from doing as he pleased in this matter.
* * *
Franz and Reina were married on a June morning, at the church of Saint Lawrence of Rome on Petrín Hill. The air at that hour was unsullied, infused with light as the sun rose behind a thin veil of mist. Reina wore a blue dress, a hat with a narrow, upturned brim and a little dotted veil, and a double strand of pearls. She carried a bouquet of roses from Magdalena’s rose garden. Before entering the church, Uncle Maximilian had asked Anna’s aunt Vivian if she’d had any news of Tomaš. She said no and gripped Uncle Maximilian’s hand tightly. She was very brave, Anna thought. When people told her how strong she was, she said she was hanging on by the skin of her teeth.
Reina’s family had been unable to travel to Prague for the wedding, due to restrictions on travel imposed following the assassination. But Ivan and Marta were there, as were the owner of the bookshop where Franz and Reina had worked and some of Franz and Reina’s friends from university, the same group that used to meet at coffeehouses to discuss poetry and philosophy.
Anna noticed her father glancing at the painting to the right of the altar, of Saint Lawrence of Rome being tortured to death on a hot gridiron. Being tortured for using the church’s treasure to feed the poor. It was more difficult in this world, she thought, to be kind than to be cruel.
The priest presented Franz and Reina to the congregation, transformed by the sacrament into one flesh.
The sacristan opened the church doors and sunlight poured in, and the organist began playing the recessional, the glorious, irresistibly frenetic music of Bach’s Der Himmel lacht! Die Erde jubilieret. Heaven laughs! The Earth rejoices.
* * *
When Anna was younger, she had believed her grandfather’s spirit lived in the sweet chestnut tree in the garden in front of their house, and Eva Svetlová’s spirit in another tree, and in the tallest tree of all dwelled God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. In a dream she climbed the tree, and Reina stood looking up at her; she shook one of the branches. Come down, she called, or Franz and I will leave without you. We’re taking a steamboat ride on the Vltava, and then we’re going to Kampa Island for a picnic. It will be good, a good time, and you will miss out on it. Anna, listen, don’t make me cross with you.
Reina said, “Anna, Anna, you have to get up now.”
“Go away,” Anna said, brushing a hand across her eyes.
“You were having a dream,” Reina said.
“No,” Anna said. “I was awake.”
Chapter Sixteen
Mr. Aslan came to the house in Zlatá Ulička with some food and a newspaper for Natalia. He wanted to let her know of a new law requiring everyone who was not a Reich German to apply for a new identity card. The law gave her an opportunity to legitimize her presence in Prague, he said. It would allow her to obtain a ration card, and then she could buy food without placing herself, and him, in danger of arrest. She thanked him and said she’d think about applying, but she admitted to herself that the Nazis were never going to give her an identity card. If she went anywhere near them, they’d throw her in prison. She looked at the newspaper Mr. Aslan had left. Der Neue Tag, the official Nazi newspaper in Prague. The New Day was fit only for burning. Its main function was to publish lists of names, the same lists that were posted on street corners and in shop windows. The names of people accused of a crime against the protectorate. She always looked away from those signs, and now she commanded herself not to read the names printed in the paper. Do not read the names, she repeated, but she did read the names and she saw this: Franz Schaeffer, age twenty-two, occupation, factory worker; executed. His address was given; there was no possibility of doubt. She stood, she walked haltingly around