Karl threw down his newspaper and leaped from his chair so swiftly that I didn’t have time to step back. His face, just inches from mine, twisted with icy rage. “Don’t you ever say another word about my mother,” he breathed. “And don’t you ever, ever mention my father and me in the same breath again!” I was terrified of another beating, but it never came. He turned and walked back to his chair as if nothing had happened.
But late that night, Karl came to my room. There was no question of consent or polite formalities. Karl claimed his marital rights, delivering a message clearer than any beating. I would remember it well for the next two years. I was Karl’s possession. I was powerless. He was in complete control.
SIXTEEN
* * *
“You have eaten nothing, Emma. Aren’t you feeling well?” Karl removed his napkin from his lap and laid it on the table, then pushed his plate forward an inch to signal that he was finished eating.
I hated the clock-ticking silence of dinnertime. Karl insisted on eating in the formal dining room, even though there were only two of us. The scent of furniture polish hung heavy in the air, filling the hush between us.
Karl wasn’t one to converse unnecessarily. At home he was so quiet and self-contained that I heard little more from him at mealtimes than the sound of his silverware clinking against the plate. He was very different in his store, of course—much warmer and friendlier with his customers, almost gregarious. I often thought about disguising myself as a customer so that he’d talk to me.
“Emma? Did you hear me?”
Tonight I was the one who didn’t feel like talking. It was October 1924, and I knew that I was pregnant. I was terrified to tell him.
“I’m fine, Karl.”
“Then eat something.”
I stabbed a piece of roast pork with my fork and lifted it to my mouth. I couldn’t get it past my lips. As my nausea rose, I bolted outside to the privy to be sick. We had an indoor bathroom, of course—one of the first in Bremenville—but I didn’t want Karl to hear me being sick. Afterward, I sat on the back porch step, letting the cool fall air revive me. It was filled with the scent of rain. I was surprised when Karl came outside and stood behind me.
“When were you planning to tell me?”
My stomach turned over with fear. “Tell you what?”
“You don’t need to hide it from me, Emma. I know you are in a family way.”
I didn’t reply. I couldn’t.
“You forget, sometimes, that I am an educated man. I know about such things.”
“I don’t forget that you’re an educated man. How can I possibly forget? You won’t let me forget!” My tongue invariably got me into trouble, but I couldn’t help myself. I cringed, waiting for one of Karl’s bitter lectures, but it never came.
“How far along are you? One month?”
“Almost two.”
He paused to light his after-dinner cigar. As the smoke curled around my head, I had to sprint to the outhouse again to be sick. He was waiting for me when I returned.
“It’s senseless to continue like this, Emma.”
“I can’t help it if I’m sick. You make it sound as if I enjoy it.” I might have known he’d be unsympathetic. Stoic, disciplined Karl would put wheels on his deathbed so he could roll himself to work.
“There is a woman who comes into my pharmacy who was a midwife back in Germany. She knows things. Home remedies and such.”
“I’ll be all right. The nausea will probably go away in another month or so.”
Karl grunted a word in German that I didn’t understand and turned to go inside. “When you have cleared away the dinner things we will go to her.”
“Tonight? I told you I’m all right now.”
“Do as I say, Emma.” He disappeared into the house.
I often wondered if he really meant to sound so cold and dictatorial or if it was just his odd German-style phrasing of English. He didn’t have an accent exactly, but whenever Karl spoke, his consonants all seemed to have sharp, pointed edges.
I knew it was useless to argue with him, but I took my time clearing the table, washing the dishes, and drying them instead of leaving them for the maid. Maybe he would change his mind if he saw that I felt better. When I went out on the back porch to shake the crumbs from the tablecloth, I saw that it had begun to rain. The air smelled of wet earth and ozone. It was such a gentle, cleansing rain that I lingered on the porch to watch it. I loved the way each drop glistened in the grass, the way it turned all the muted evening colors a darker shade.
“What is taking you so long?” he asked from the doorway.
Karl hadn’t changed into his smoking jacket but stood in the kitchen doorway dressed in his suit, tie, and waistcoat as if he were going to work. He twirled his hat in his hand, a sure sign that he was impatient with me.
“Emma.”
“It’s raining, Karl . . .”
“I’ll fetch my umbrella.”
The engine purred as the car glided through the streets as slow and heavy as a well-fed cat. We drove through our own neighborhood of vast gingerbread houses with wide verandas and tall trees, then left the gaslit part of town to turn down darker, narrower streets. I heard the bells on the Catholic church strike eight. When we crossed the river, we entered a section of town near the docks with crumbling warehouses and dark alleyways. Mangy dogs moved in the shadows behind barrels and crates. The air stank of dead fish.
“Where are we going? Where does this woman live, for goodness’ sake?”
Karl didn’t answer. A few minutes later, he stopped in front of a tenement house, set the brake, and turned off the engine.
“This is ridiculous,” I said. “The place doesn’t even look sanitary. Why can’t I just make an appointment with Dr. Strauss?” He ignored my question.
Karl got out of the car, walked around the front, and opened my door. Always a gentleman, he took my elbow as he guided me to a set of rickety wooden steps that led up the outside of the building. They were open-backed, and I felt slightly dizzy as we climbed to an apartment on the second floor. I heard the sound of a baby crying and frantic, scratchy music coming from a phonograph that had been wound too tightly. The hallway smelled of burnt potatoes and cigarette smoke.
The woman who answered Karl’s knock looked like a gypsy from the old country, complete with dangling earrings and a babushka on her head. Was she going to read my palm and tell me when the nausea would stop? Maybe she would dangle a pendulum over me to see if the baby was a boy or a girl. What was Karl—an educated man—doing here?
“Good evening, Herr Bauer.”
“Good evening.”
That was it—no introductions, no pleasantries. Maybe Karl didn’t know the woman’s name. She ushered us in as if she was expecting us, and I was relieved to see that her kitchen was clean, even though it was a bit shabby. There was no cauldron in the corner or mysterious bunches of roots hanging from the ceiling. I peeked through an open doorway into a poorly lit parlor with very little furniture. Business must be slow these days for former midwives selling home remedies, I thought. Overall, the apartment gave the impression that it had been knocked askew and was listing dangerously to one side. I would have loved to have put a marble on the floor and watch it roll across the room.
“My wife says she is two months along,” Karl said as he twirled his hat.
The gypsy grimaced. “Not as simple, but still possible. This way, please.”
She led us down a dark hallway to a small room that appeared to be used mainly for storage. Crowded along one wall was a narrow iron bed with only a sheet and a mattress, and beside it a washstand draped with a towel. A row of apothecary bottles with labels from Bauer’s Pharmacy lined a wooden shelf above it. A single bare light bulb hung from the ceiling. Karl moved behind me and slipped my coat from my shoulders.
“Sit here, Mrs. Bauer,” the gypsy said. She indicated the bed.
“Should she undress?” Karl asked.
My hear
t began to pound. “Undress? Why on earth would I need to undress? It’s just a little morning sickness.”
The woman answered Karl, not me. “Yes. There’s a gown on the back of the door.”
“Karl, what is this? What’s going on?” He planted his hands on my shoulders. His dark eyes seemed to bore into mine.
“Emma, you know this child can never be born.”
“What?” I grabbed his wrists and pulled his hands off me.
“You don’t have to be afraid, Mrs. Bauer,” the gypsy soothed. “This won’t take long. You can go home again in a few hours.” She lifted the towel, and I saw a tray of medical instruments on the washstand. Karl took an unmarked bottle from his pocket and slipped it to the woman.
“I brought something to ease her pain.”
“Karl, no!” I couldn’t catch my breath, as if I’d just run up a steep hill.
“You will do as I say, Emma. Sit down on the bed.” He reached for me, but I twisted away. “Emma . . .”
He was powerfully strong, and I knew I could never get away from him once he caught me. I waited until he lunged for me, then brought my knee up as hard as I could into his groin. It was the only way to save my child. Karl groaned and bent double. I leaped past him through the door.
I hurtled down the tilting hallway, threw open the back door, and crashed down the rickety stairs, tripping, stumbling, clumsy with terror. My leg scraped on the rough wooden planks, tearing my stockings. The narrow, thin-soled shoes I was wearing were never meant for running, but I ran just the same.
“Emma! Emma, come back here!”
I heard him calling behind me but I didn’t look back. I ran past the car and down the street, wishing I had paid more attention to where the woman lived. It was very dark now, and raining hard. I had no idea where I was or where the road led, but I didn’t care.
I ran, unheeding, until the street came to a dead end at the river. I nearly wept for joy at the familiar sight of the dark ribbon of water. It was my signpost, pointing me to safety. If I headed upstream, I would eventually come to my father’s church.
I had just slowed to catch my breath, too tired to run anymore, when I heard the purr of Karl’s car, like heavy breathing, behind me. There were no sidewalks, and only a narrow strip of land between the road and the river. He pulled up beside me and leaned out of the open window.
“Where do you think you are going, Emma? You don’t even have a coat on.”
“I’m going home to my parents. You can’t stop me, Karl.” I walked faster but the car kept pace.
“Aren’t you ashamed to do that? Under the circumstances?”
“You’re the one who should be ashamed—plotting to kill an innocent baby! Papa would never condone an abortion, and you know it!”
“I don’t understand. What is this abortion you are talking about?”
I saw then that Karl would deny ever going to the gypsy’s apartment. He would convince Papa that we had simply had a lover’s quarrel—that my pregnancy had made me overly emotional. Papa would side with Karl. Wives were supposed to obey their husbands. Mama had obeyed at the cost of everything she loved. I would get no sympathy from my parents. Wet and cold, I felt as though even nature had turned against me.
“You are shivering. Why don’t you get in the car, Emma?” His voice was as icy as the rain streaming down my back.
“Never. I’ll never go back to that house with you.” I walked for another half a block before I felt the heat of the engine as the car slowly crept up behind me again.
“Perhaps we could compromise,” Karl said. “I will agree to let you give birth if you’ll agree to give it away.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“Certainly I am. I will arrange a private adoption. We will tell everyone there were complications. That it was stillborn.”
I started to run, ducking between buildings and sprinting along the muddy riverbank so he couldn’t follow me in the car. I was terrified that he would get out and come after me. I ran blindly—running, dodging, hiding. I had to get away from him.
When I could run no more, I peered out from behind a parked truck and saw his car in the distance, slowly cruising up and down the streets as he searched for me. He hadn’t left the comfort of his car to pursue me. He must have judged me not worth the bother of getting wet.
I couldn’t decide where to go. Karl would be watching for me at the farm, and besides, I knew Mama and Papa wouldn’t help me. I wandered aimlessly until I came to the railroad tracks and saw the trestle bridge in the distance. I remembered how it had saved my life on the night of the flood when I was a child. Karl would never expect me to cross such a precarious span in the dark—I wasn’t convinced that I could do it, myself. But it was my only hope of escape.
As I started across, gingerly stepping from tie to tie, I realized that my motivation was the same as my mother’s had been—to save my child. No matter what, I would never let Karl Bauer within a hundred miles of my baby.
The area on the other side of the bridge near the mill was a notoriously bad part of town, filled with speakeasies and bootleggers, but it seemed much less dangerous than going home with Karl. I huddled in an alley beneath an empty wooden crate until I was so cold that I began to worry about catching pneumonia. I couldn’t spend the night outside in the rain. For my baby’s sake, I needed to find shelter. My sister Sophie lived on this side of the river, about half a mile up the hill from the mill. I prayed that she would take me in.
“Emma! You are drenched!” she cried when she saw me. “Where’s your coat?”
“I left it behind,” I said, shivering. “Please . . . let me stay with you tonight, Sophie.”
“But what’s wrong? What are you doing here?”
“Karl and I had a fight.”
“Shall I send Otto over to talk to him?”
“No! Please . . . just let me stay the night.”
“Won’t Karl be worried about you?”
“A night apart might do him some good. Give him a chance to cool off, think things through.”
“But surely—”
“If you love me, Sophie, please don’t send for Karl . . . please let me stay!” My teeth rattled from cold and fear.
In the end, Sophie agreed. It was clear that she had misgivings, and that her husband, Otto, had even more of them, but since they didn’t own a car, he was reluctant to go out on such a terrible night. My plan was to get up early in the morning, before anyone else awoke, and hitch a ride out of town.
I spent a restless night on their sofa, filled with nightmares of evil people who were trying to kill my baby. When I awoke the next morning to find Karl standing over me, I thought it was part of the same dream. Then I saw Otto in the doorway and knew he had gone to fetch him.
“Let’s forgive and forget, shall we, Emma?” Karl smoothed his mustache and beard like a cat licking its whiskers. “As the Good Book says we must do?”
Otto and Sophie hovered anxiously, watching. Karl would deny everything that had happened. No one would believe me. A good wife obeyed her husband.
In the end there was nothing I could do but go home with him, playing the part of the dutiful wife. Neither of us mentioned the baby.
“All is forgotten?” he said as he pushed his chair back from the breakfast table. I nodded mutely, unable to look at him. “Good. I must go and open the pharmacy. We will talk tonight.”
But the moment Karl left, I packed my bags and bought a one-way train ticket for as far out of town as my hoarded grocery money would take me.
SEVENTEEN
* * *
1980
Hours later, Emma’s tiny apartment in the retirement home looked nearly settled. Grace felt exhausted, but it was more from the emotional strain of listening to Emma’s story than from the work of unpacking. For the first time, Grace realized the full depth of her mother’s love. What Emma was afraid to risk for her own sake—leaving an abusive husband—she’d done without hesitation for her daughte
r’s sake.
“That’s the most you’ve ever spoken about my father in my entire life,” Grace said.
“Don’t be silly,” Emma said, waving airily. “You must have forgotten, that’s all.”
“No, if you had told me he’d beaten you, I’m sure I would have remembered.”
Suzanne flattened another cardboard box and stacked it by the door with the others. “You said he wasn’t the villain, Grandma, but he certainly sounds like one to me.”
“Does he? I’m sorry if I’ve portrayed him that way. I don’t see him as a villain. He was a victim of his own tragic childhood. It left him deeply scarred. A more contented woman could have helped him overcome his past, but I wasn’t the wife he needed—or expected.”
Emma pulled off the pink scarf and ran her fingers through her silver hair. As Grace studied her mother, she saw that even at eighty years of age, Emma was still an attractive woman. Fifty-five years was a long time to have remained single. The wounds Karl Bauer left on her soul must have been very deep as well.
Grace wanted to ask her mother a question, but she waited until Suzanne took a load of empty cartons to the dumpster and they were alone. “Do you have any plans for tomorrow, Mother?”
“I don’t think so, dear, but I can check. The weekly schedule is around here someplace. Why do you ask?”
“Well, tomorrow is Sunday. Now that you live nearby, I was hoping you’d come to church with Stephen and me once in a while.”
“Ah, Gracie, don’t start with that again,” she said wearily. “I’m too old to change. If going to church helps you, then I’m happy for you. But we’re very different.”
“You’ve been turning me down all my life, and I’ve never understood why. Won’t you at least explain to me why you won’t go?”