Yesterday Was Long Ago: Part Two Page 16

  Gaby’s days were spent between the Rosattis, who taught her Italian cooking, and Aunt Ingrid, who gave her many tips she herself called, ‘lessons of course’, from the finishing school she attended. There was also the French cuisine to be taught, being completely unaware that Lucas enjoyed the von Waldens’ and Reinhardts’ meals the most, always asking his wife to make him something Austrian. Her newly acquired Italian and French recipes were strictly for their guests, including in-laws who were quite proud of how much they taught Gabriella.

  The baby was due any day now, and on Lucas’ advice, Gaby hired a nice young midwife who took daily walks with her and would stay as long as necessary. The many visits from the Lebruns and Rosattis helped to shorten her otherwise lonesome existence, as Lucas frequently worked overtime. Eugen was put in a home for mentally disturbed children, as he also developed epilepsy and showed many other signs of uncontrollable fits not even his parents were able to handle. It was done two months prior to the birth of the baby, as he greeted his beloved Gaby so exuberantly, the Rosattis were afraid he could possibly harm her or the baby. Isabella prayed every waking hour for a healthy, normal child, while Gaby herself never wasted a minute thinking about it. Presently, both families were trying to find the right names for a boy or girl, although Gaby and Lucas had chosen one the day her pregnancy was confirmed. For a boy, Alfredo Henry, to give both men a part; for a girl, Isabella Marie, as Gaby loved her mother-in-law’s name. She was, therefore, hoping for a girl, expecting to have more grandchildren coming.

  When the following day her first labor pain started, her midwife Susanne, a widow from France, was right at her side, preparing everything for the birth. By eight in the evening, Alfredo Rosatti’s nerves got the best of him and he decided to take a taxi to Lucas’ hospital. Lucas had decided to work a few evenings overtime to spend at least a week with his wife after the birth of their baby. After knocking at his laboratory’s door, Lucas opened it as he was just in the process of leaving.

  “Our Gabriella’s labor pains are just a few minutes apart!”

  Alfredo, having his taxi waiting, couldn’t even finish his sentence when Lucas screamed, “Great! I’ll get her some flowers!” and jumped in his car.

  “My son brings his wife flowers at least two to three times a week,” he told the driver proudly, who only replied, “How nice.” When Alfredo arrived at the second floor, he heard the cry of a baby.

  “Congratulations, Grandpapa!” his wife greeted Alfredo joyfully. “You have another Isabella Marie to cope with. I am so proud she chose my name.”

  “How is our Gabriella?” he asked instantly.

  “Doing great. It was an easy, normal birth. She can have a dozen more!” she jested, thinking, ‘God forbid!’

  “Did you get a hold of Lucas?”

  “Sure did. He was just leaving but screamed to get some flowers first.”

  “Well, one good thing is our florist never minds opening his back door for a good sale. I know it’s going to be something very special,” she replied, waiting for Lucas’ gloating face. Alfredo was permitted to see his first granddaughter.

  “Here. Take your new addition in your arms,” Gaby said happily, seeing his face jovial as never before. “Next time, I promise you an Alfredo Henry,” she proclaimed, while he whispered only, “As long as they are healthy, six girls will be fine with me,” thinking doubtlessly of poor Eugen.

  The midwife laughed out loud. “We were six girls and five boys.”

  “There you have it, Gabriella. What amazes me is her dark, curly hair,” he emphasized.

  “Just wait until she opens her eyes; the deepest and darkest brown you’ve ever seen.”

  “Lucas should be here any moment. He went for flowers first, as you can imagine.”

  “I hope he comes soon as I am very tired.”

  “Then why don’t we let you sleep for a while.” He smiled when Susanne knocked at the door and told him, “Someone is here to see you,” took the baby, laid it in the crib, and told Madame Rosatti to take some well-deserved rest. She neglected to say they were two policemen, fearing the worst.

  “Mr. Rosatti, we assume?”

  “Yes,” said an ashen-faced Alfredo, noticing his wife passed out on the floor.

  “We’re sorry, but Dr. Rosatti died instantly in a car crash. He hit a lamp post trying to miss hitting a woman crossing the street.”

  “Where?” he asked, as if it mattered.

  “Rue de Soupirs. We need you to come along to identify him.”

  “Oh, my God!” he repeated several times. “I am not sure I am strong enough.”

  “Sorry, Mr. Rosatti. You will have to try.”

  Susanne whispered that Gabriella was now sleeping, and she would take care of her until the Lebruns arrived. Alfredo left in the police car minutes before Ingrid and Henry entered the house. The midwife left the door slightly ajar and recognized their happy voices at once. Their beaming faces changed immediately when a teary-eyed Susanne confronted them, putting her finger at her lips and whispering that Gabriella and the baby were asleep. It was an instant surprise after noticing the almost lifeless body of Isabella Rosatti, their faces turning instantly to stone.

  “It’s Dr. Rosatti,” she continued to whisper. “He died hitting a lamp post,” she stammered, still in tears. Ingrid held both her hands to her face and cried, “No… it cannot be!”

  “That fellow always drove too fast and I warned Gaby more than once never to ride with him,” Henry replied, more furious than shocked.

  “Mr. Rosatti just left to identify his body, but mama and baby are asleep, not knowing what happened. Please, Dr. Lebrun, can you help that lady?” he asked, pointing towards Isabella.

  “As a matter of fact, I always come prepared no matter whom I visit,” he grumbled, reaching in his jacket, and took a small bottle and raised her head, waving it back and forth. She opened her eyes slowly and looked, if anything, forlorn. Henry put a finger in front of her mouth telling her quietly that Gabriella and the baby were asleep.

  “But my son is dead, Henry! What are we going to do?”

  “Go on living like the rest of the people who have lost someone they loved.”

  Her mouth was too dry to give him an answer. Susanne brought some water and, with the help of Henry and a still shaken Ingrid, put her on a comfortable couch. “Who will tell Gabriella?” asked Isabella.

  “I will,” said Ingrid sternly, without a moment of hesitation.

  “I think it’s best if we all are very near her,” echoed Henry. “She will need all of us.”

  “That’s how little you know about her strength! That girl has had to prove herself all her life.”

  “But never in a situation like this, Ingrid. I lost a son, she a husband and—”

  It didn’t take Alfredo very long to notice how unsympathetic the police were towards his son’s death. “Or is this all they deal with and, therefore, just another matter of routine?” he thought to himself. Alfredo tried to be strong before they reached the destination of the accident, but his voice was full of emotion. “You know his wife gave birth to his firstborn child just an hour ago. I went to the hospital to tell him all about it. He told me he would stop at the florist to pick up some flowers and I imagine he hurried home.”

  Without any trace of feeling one way or another, one answered rather sarcastically. “Your son was always speeding, even if there was no reason for it. If he hadn’t had the ‘MD’ next to his license plate— though he worked in a laboratory—” he remarked in a cynical tone. “we would have given him a ticket the first time he nearly ran over a woman with a child on each hand. He stopped abruptly within one meter or they would have been buried by now.”

  “I’ll say!” his partner replied. “He had no regard for human life. I guess that’s why he worked with the dead ones.”

  Alfredo was too weak and upset to give him any reply, as they had already reached the destination, with a few policemen and onlookers standing nearby. There was
his son, his head on the steering wheel and a huge bouquet of red roses next to him, completely undisturbed. After signing a few documents, an ambulance was waiting to take him to a funeral home.

  “Take those roses to your daughter-in-law and tell her how lucky she and the baby were, not to be in his car.” Without saying goodbye or that they are in any way sorry, they dropped him off in front of his house.

  “The heartless police dropped me off. Here are the flowers Lucas bought our Gabriella. Somehow, those two sergeants made me stronger, so I will be the one to tell her.” His wife cried even louder as Alfredo told them the policeman’s opinion of their son. It got very quiet and they all heard the baby crying with the midwife consoling her, doubtlessly taking her out of the crib.

  “We all go in. She needs us,” Henry whispered, not being sure if Gaby was awake too.

  The midwife appeared saying, “Madame Rosatti is awake, but now I stay in the living room.” They only nodded and went in, worried about who would speak first. Other than consoling her with ‘it was God’s will’, nothing else was on their minds when they entered together, Alfredo still with the roses tight in his hands. It was Ingrid who went to her bedside, putting an arm around her.

  “Gabriella… we all have to be very strong. Lucas went for those roses… and ended up dead on the lamp post on his regular shortcut through the Rue de Soupirs.”

  “Did he kill anyone else?” was her first stammering and concerned reply.

  “Oh, no!” said Alfredo, a bit cheerful. “The policeman said he tried to avoid hitting a woman who crossed the street without looking.”

  Gaby looked from one downtrodden face to another who still awaited a loud outcry or some kind of weepy reaction, but instead she tried to sit up with everyone jumping to help her. She said quite calmly, “My late darling father told me one time, and mind you he was never overly religious nor ever wrong in anything he said,” She paused, thinking of Bertram. “that there is positively a reason for everything. We should never question God’s will. The way I see it, there are two fine men in Heaven, and I hope they have met.”

  Looking at her newborn baby and suspecting Susanne was somewhere in hiding, she addressed Isabella Rosatti first, who looked the most grief-stricken, and handed her the baby carefully. “Now you two dear Isabellas will have to be very strong,” She smiled faintly while caressing her wet cheeks. “just like I was taught.”

  “I promise.” She started to cry even louder.

  “Alfredo and I gained our strength with poor Eugen.”

  What strength? Gabriella thought but replied, “I know.”

  Ingrid had the very same thought, knowing what Gaby and her family had to endure in Lindenfels, and Astrid came to her mind. “I have to send a telegram to your mother, Gaby. I hope they can make it to the funeral. Astrid and Andreas, I mean.”

  “Uncle Henry, I assume the coffin is kept closed. Tell them to give us a week.”

  “Why that long? Your family and the Rosattis will be here in two days.”

  “But I’d like to be there too. After all, he is, or was, my husband.”

  “Nine days bedrest is a must,” he urged.

  “Then tell me why our servants are working on the third day, regardless of their hard chores. What makes them so different from me?”

  “Your upbringing, Gaby. You played the piano when they plowed the field. You skated and skied when they cut and carried firewood.”

  But her facial expression showed him that she was determined to go. “Please get me Susanne,” she asked Ingrid. “I am not capable of breastfeeding under these conditions. Half milk, half water,” she ordered.

  “That’s what I was thinking,” Susanne replied.

  “Aunt Ingrid, please press those roses in the Jane Eyre book. You are an expert on flower pressing.”

  “Happy to do it,” Ingrid replied, very proud and stoic.

  “It’s the first book Lucas gave me for my birthday.” She looked again at the surrounding family members, still shaken and sad, and said very kindly, “Please go home. I know you all need a good cry by yourself. I have Susanne with me. She promised to stay as long as I need her.”

  Susanne was elated. They kissed her goodbye with their best wishes for a good night’s sleep. There was nothing else to add that would bring Lucas back.

  ∼

  Unlike a Reinhardt funeral, which was, with very few exceptions, a ‘family only’ affair, this one appeared to be one for an important statesman. The Rosatti family closed their restaurants in Locarno with a big sign on the door which stated, ‘Funeral’. Gaby still looked pale and weak, but no one was able to talk her out of attending the long procession.

  While most of the Rosatti women wore their long, black veils almost down to their knees until they reached the cemetery where the condolences took place, Astrid and Gaby wore small brim hats with netted veils which showed their beautiful faces. They were upheld by Andreas in the middle, whose arms were linked in his mother’s and sister’s. There was not a tear on either face, including Ingrid’s. By now, they were all exhausted from crying in their own pillows. Some single Rosattis had thoughts of marrying the young widow, but then again, no one else could compare himself to the late Lucas Rosatti.

  After the usual dinner, for which Alfredo opened his restaurant, a heated argument started among the men, as to why Alfredo bought a German-made car and not a Fiat or Bugatti from Italy.

  “Because they are pieces of junk in comparison to a Mercedes or a Daimler.”

  “I agree with the cars, but don’t agree with your insulting remark towards a Fiat or Bugatti… if one knows how to drive carefully,” retorted his brother Marcello in fury. “I would have bought a Rolls Royce maybe later, but America sends us Fords at a better price.”

  “Thank God those so-called ‘German women’ went home so peace reigns,” Henry Lebrun stated, ready to leave. “But I want to tell you that I am married to a former blue-blooded Contessa von Donat. Yes, a German like her sister, Astrid, who married an Austrian, Baron von Walden. Our Gabriella got the best genes of both families and she proved it during the whole week while under great strain.”

  Alfredo was eager to end the conversation. “Our discussion is closed!” He was more than happy that his relatives departed the same evening on a night train. It would be quite some time before he saw them again.

  Astrid, Gaby, and Andreas cooed over the new baby, and in the presence of Ingrid they discussed Gaby’s financial future. She would receive a monthly pension, and at the age of eighteen was already privileged to get her inheritance. She was pleasantly surprised, as no one had talked to her about it previously. “But I already got a nice dowry!” she uttered, flabbergasted.

  “Oh, that was only part of it,” Astrid said evenly.

  “Then I can keep on living in this nice apartment?” she asked, still astonished.

  “Not only that,” Ingrid answered. “I’ll pay for Susanne as long as you like. It’s a pleasure, Gaby, and there is more where we come from.”

  “I read Germany has a new currency.”

  “It’s about time. They paid for a loaf of bread in millions. It’s the end of the black market,” Astrid replied, hoping Austria’s fate was not far behind. But all their money was in Swiss banks and, thanks to Ingrid and Henry, also wisely invested in real estate.

  It was good to know that Gaby was completely independent from Lucas’ family and, should she ever want to return to Vienna, with all her money she could buy not one but two nice villas. Andreas, too, was happy and decided to make his residency in Lausanne. He would be near Gaby and his little niece Isabella, along with his uncle and aunt, the Lebruns. Eugen, they were told, has to stay in a home, but they visited him on a weekly basis. Life went on as it had to.

  ∼

  After Astrid and Andreas’ return to Vienna, she visited the Reinhardts, told them all there was to tell, and received lots of sympathy from Victoria and Philip, as they, too, loved Lucas.

  Peter, who made his
residency for ‘Dr’ in Salzburg, was heartbroken, not only because Lucas taught him so much, but their friendship was a solid one. Paul returned to Zurich for two years longer to become a ‘Diplom-Engineer’. He loved Switzerland for one thing, also finding the studies much more advanced. The von Walden connection, however, made him always very uneasy, being still convinced that the ‘ugly brat’ was a drunk and easy prey. The rumors were still flying around in his small circle of friends. Even the visit of Rupert Foster had never really changed his mind, though it had made a big impression on Paul’s sister Gisela.

  Blumenfeld and Abbe Koch were forced to go, along with their sons, to court. Among many other accusations was slander. After lengthy questioning by the judge himself, both boys had no choice but to admit their lying. However, on their way home they laid their blame on Bertram and the ‘von Walden trash’ from Lindenfels.

  Sam was another story. Shortly before his departure, he confessed to Ida and Martin Wertheim that ‘once in a while’ he paid a visit to Breuner’s. “A young man like me just couldn’t sweat out his physical desires, and a Jewish girl was out of the question; they would demand marriage. I would have married a girl like Gaby in a second, but she barely even looked at me.”

  “You want to stay in your own religion, Sam,” advised his uncle, but Sam was just not that religious.

  ∼

  Martin Wertheim’s traveling relatives finally went back to America. The arriving letters told them that regardless of their Austrian heritage, America is home for them. All of Europe is nothing but foreign.

  The Wertheims visited Blumenfeld’s hat store after hearing about their day in court. That also gave them the opportunity to tell him that his son Herbert, along with Abbe and their ‘honest’ nephew Sam, were regular customers at Breuner’s.

  “Vienna is the city of prostitutes with all Christian girls. Our Jewish girls would never do that,” Blumenfeld replied proudly. “Which brings me to that von Walden girl—”