The House by the Lake (7 page)

“Are you okay?” Anna was aware of Wil leaning against his desk in front of her. She was aware of his voice, but the room had turned hazy and fluid, swimming with movement.

“Sorry about that,” she said.

“Stay there a moment. Don’t move.” He left the room.

Anna sat back in her seat. She did feel dizzy. What were the implications of a broken shoulder at the age of ninety-four? Apparently, it wasn’t yet known whether Max would need an operation. The doctor was assessing the situation, and as soon as the painkillers had taken effect, the hospital would carry out a scan. What were the risks if Max had to have surgery?

“Try to relax. Breathe,” Wil said as he reappeared with a glass of water.

“Thanks. I’m fine.” She took a sip, but the room still spun.

“This might help. Our kitchen staff thought . . .” Wil seemed a little embarrassed now. He handed her a small warm towel.

“Oh, thank you,” Anna held it up to her face. It was scented with something familiar—eau de cologne. Max used to buy it for her grandmother.

Anna forced that thought away and looked up at the man standing near her. She would have to calm down. She had always made a point of leading an orderly life, but everything seemed to be spiraling out of control. She was letting Germany get to her. She had to get her act together.

“My grandfather’s had an accident. He’s in the hospital. I should be there. That’s all.” Anna placed the towel on her lap.

“Sorry to hear that.”

She sensed him watching her. “Is it bad?” he asked.

“Fractured shoulder. He might need an operation—but at ninety-four . . .”

Wil was quiet again. When he spoke, his voice was softer. “I brought you these too. They might make you feel better.”

Anna looked up. Wil had a small white box in his hands. He had taken off the lid, and nestled inside was a cluster of perfect-looking chocolates.

“A client makes them. She moved to Berlin recently and we have a standing order now. They’re quite good. If you’d like one . . .”

Anna reached out, and in spite of everything, managed a smile. “Thank you,” she said. For some reason, she felt curious about German chocolate and surprised at a loyalty to Germany that she had never felt before. Was she beginning to feel a little at home in her ancestral country—as well as confused and hopelessly shut out? She put the truffle in her mouth, allowing its smoothness to slip over her tongue.

“This little episode must be costing me a fortune,” she said, a chuckle rising in her throat.

“No charge for fainting—or chocolates.” Something twinkled in his eyes.

Anna felt a renewed determination kick in. She would keep trying. “I know Max’s request is crazy, but don’t you think there’s any chance we could help him a little? His age . . .”

Wil picked up a gold ballpoint pen and rolled it around in his fingers, whirling it so quickly that it became a blur.

“That makes me dizzy,” Anna almost laughed.

“Sorry. Helps me to think.”

So he was thinking about it. Anna didn’t say a thing.

“You could always break in with a flashlight,” he said, finally.

“I could. Always wanted to get arrested in a foreign country.” Anna was beginning to feel a little more like herself. “I’d probably impale myself on the barbed wire though.”

Wil’s brow went up. “Do you know what it is that your grandfather wants? Not that I think there’s any hope my clients will let you in. Just wondering.”

Anna held out the chocolate box, offered one to Wil. He took one. She thought about it. If she wanted Wil to help her, perhaps she should explain. He would have to be bound by some kind of client confidentiality clause—weren’t they all supposed to keep quiet? As long as he didn’t tell the owners.

“Anna.” Wil’s voice interrupted her thoughts.

“Just thinking.”

“You can tell me,” he said. “I won’t pass it on. Not even to the owner. Whatever is said in here is confidential. Always. I would never say anything that you didn’t want me to repeat.”

“Okay, then,” she said, finally. “Max asked me to retrieve an engagement ring . . . he never gave it to someone. In 1940, apparently. Tells me it was the biggest regret of his life. And now, he wants it back. So.”

“You’re joking.”

Anna shook her head.

Wil moved back to sit at his desk. “Okay. Do you know where he left it?”

“His bedroom. I have a photocopied map of the Schloss. And I know which room was his. I could find the room in no time if you let me in.”

He looked at her then, and Anna looked away. She didn’t know why, but she felt compelled to look away whenever she met his eye. She must just be feeling vulnerable after the shock of Max’s news. That would be it.

“I take it the hiding spot is utterly cryptic?”

“Max hopes so.”

“Hmm.”

Anna bit her lip. The taste of chocolate lingered, delicious. “Is there any chance you might change your mind and let me in then?”

Wil inclined his head. “I have been inside the Schloss. Only once.”

“The mayor said that.”

Wil stayed quiet.

“What was it like?”

“Stunning,” he said, putting his gold pen back to rest in its holder. “Beautiful. Unspoiled—which is more to the point. Even though it’s . . . like it is.”

“Imagine having to leave it.”

“Yes. Imagine that.” Wil typed something into his computer.

“I’d love to see inside, engagement ring or not,” Anna started. “I didn’t know anything about it until last week, you see.”

Wil looked up. “Your grandfather never spoke to you about Siegel, Anna?”

Anna shook her head.

He sat back in his chair and studied her again. “Your family was the largest landowner in old Prussia. They had priceless art collections, funded wars—European campaigns such as the Napoleonic Wars. They were bankers. Some of your family’s paintings ended up in major galleries around the world after the Soviet occupation. Your grandfather would have had an incredible lifestyle until . . .”

Anna took in a sharp breath. “Perhaps it’s understandable that he never spoke of it then! The loss . . .”

Wil stayed quiet.

“Do you still have the key?” she asked.

Wil glanced at his computer again. “Just looking at the meetings I have coming up.”

Anna stayed silent. This seemed like the wrong moment to press him further.

“Look, Anna, I can’t believe I’m saying this, and to be honest, I don’t know why I am, but I could try to swap my commitments for tomorrow and take you up to Siegel in the morning. I can get you inside. And, if we can retrieve the ring, perhaps the owners needn’t even know we were there. But you have to understand, you mustn’t say a word to anyone. And I never do this sort of thing. It’s just that . . .”

“Okay,” she said. “That would be . . . very good.” Very good? Lucky English was Wil’s second language!

But he was on to it. “Very good?” He smiled, his eyes playful.

“Just tell me when to be ready. And it would be fantastic,” she added in a rush. “Thank you.”

He kept right up with her. “Nine o’clock tomorrow? Is here good for you?”

“It is.” Anna stood up. Suddenly she felt much better. Surely her news would help cheer up poor Max. All she could do was hope that finding his long-lost ring would give him the strength to get through his recovery.

Lake Geneva, 1934

If anyone had told Isabelle before she came to Lake Geneva that she would feel what she felt now, she would have said that they were mad. But now, sitting on a lawn that ran down to a secluded lakeside beach—the water glowing with the sort of magic light that only appeared in the late afternoon and apparently only in Switzerland—Isabelle knew that all she could do was run with it. Why ever would anyone fight perfection? Why on earth had she given up hoping for its existence?

The friendship that she had formed with Virginia Brooke had swelled into the sort of indulgent affection that she had never experienced with her girlfriends in Paris. Isabelle knew that Virginia understood her. Virginia was fun and open, and utterly herself. There was no pretense about her. She had been quite open about the fact that she wished to avoid leading the sort of life that her family had planned for her. That was why she had chosen to travel, using an inheritance that she had received from her grandfather when she came of age.

Virginia encouraged Isabelle to be herself as well. They had taken to spending most days together, albeit in a big group that consisted of Max and his family, along with several other young people from the hotel who joined their daily outings.

But Virginia always made Isabelle laugh. She seemed, like Max, to sense when Isabelle was quiet or withdrawn, when she lapsed into the thoughts that used to plague her constantly in Paris. Where was her life going? Would she ever be accepted, the granddaughter of one of the most famous demimondaines in Paris . . . a prostitute?

Those things didn’t seem to matter to Virginia at all. When Isabelle had, one evening, finally told her friend the truth about Marthe, Virginia had looked at her, held out a hand, and then laughed. Then she had apologized—she had thought it was going to be something far more dreadful than that.

After that, Isabelle had felt more comfortable with Virginia than ever. She talked freely with the American girl about politics, fashion, men, Paris, art, the future—and her developing feelings for Max.

But still one question hung over her head like a rock on the edge of a precipice. What would happen if she told Max the truth about her grandmother?

He came from an aristocratic family.

They were hardly going to welcome the granddaughter of a courtesan into their midst.

And now it was nearly time for Max to leave. It was nearly time for Isabelle to return to Paris. It was nearly time for all this magic to end.

The only consolation was that Virginia was returning to Paris to stay. She was inordinately excited at the prospect of spending the fall in the world’s most romantic city.

The thought of leaving Max caused Isabelle’s stomach to churn and threatened to spoil her last days with him. Now, he was stretched out next to her on the picnic rug that the hotel had packed for their latest outing. He had propped himself up on one elbow, his eyes focused lazily on Didi and Jo as they fished at the edge of the lake. Max’s boater was tipped at a rakish angle, and one hand rested in Isabelle’s own.

The first time Max had kissed her, Isabelle had nearly died on her feet. They had been dancing on the terrace when they’d been drawn to each other. After dancing, they had walked to a quiet spot at the edge of the lake, Max’s fingers entwined loosely with hers, as natural as could be.

It was one of those dreamy evenings when the pink sunset had lapsed ever so slowly into velvet moonlight, holding only the deepest of promises and secrets. Max had stopped, turned her to face him, and cupped her chin in his hands. As his lips had touched hers, the feelings that had been flickering within her since she first talked to him billowed in intensity, blooming into something so magnificent she felt utterly swept away. One thing had been certain—right at that moment, nothing else had counted.

Isabelle had been fighting with herself ever since, trying to trick herself into thinking that everything would be fine, that she would be capable of returning to her old life when she returned to Paris. Eventually, she had given up. There was nothing she could do about her feelings for Max.

Marthe knew that Isabelle and Max had become good friends, but Isabelle had not confided to her grandmother that she had fallen in love. Men had always been a commodity for her. While Marthe had always preferred the company of men to that of women, Isabelle was pretty sure that she had never let any of them in as a real confidante—and certainly never allowed herself to be caught up in the thrall of love.

Even though Isabelle had tried to make clear to her grandmother that she was less brazen than Marthe, Marthe had always advised independence above all things. Isabelle needn’t worry about money, as she would inherit the apartment in Paris, with all its exotic furnishings and Marthe’s exquisite jewelry collection. These gifts from Marthe’s habitués—some of the most important and powerful men in late-nineteenth-century Europe—were already worth a small fortune, and their value would only increase. Even though Marthe had supported Isabelle’s forays into the world of young men, she always told her granddaughter to keep her head—never let herself fall headlong in love.

And now look what had happened.

Isabelle loved her grandmother’s strength of character and her independent spirit, of course she did. But how would she explain Max to Marthe? What’s more, how would she explain Marthe to Max?

Isabelle sat up and sighed. Her hand slipped out of Max’s. He sat up too, frowned.

“What is it?” he asked.

Isabelle closed her eyes. She often wondered if he knew what she was thinking before she did.

“Nothing,” she said.

But Max wasn’t fooled. “Tell me.”

Isabelle stood up and walked over to the shore. Virginia was leaning against a rock, reading a novel by some American writer—one of the new members of the avant-garde who seemed to have taken over the Left Bank. Marthe always scoffed at them, mocking their desire to live in squalor while posing as intellectuals. Marthe mourned her own era, the turn of the century and the years before that, when life had gleamed with impossible glamour and a dash of devastating theatricality, when Montmartre had been the center of everything, when dance halls and theaters and circuses had reigned. She mourned a time when the city had been filled with images of
les demimondaines
—the Parisian courtesans who were posted on billboards on every street corner—when everything had seemed modern and exciting and possibilities had been endless, until the war happened, until the
Titanic
sank, until everything Marthe’s generation had believed in had been turned on its head.

But then, Max had told Isabelle about his life. His life in Germany that was so vastly different from the world Marthe talked about. The idea of Max’s home in Germany enticed Isabelle so much that she hardly dared to hope or admit to herself how much, one day, she would love to be a part of it all. He talked of winter afternoon teas of home-baked rye bread and jam along with cake topped with sliced apples in the library at Schloss Siegel with his father, whom he called Vati, and his quiet chats with his mother in her writing room, with its view of the lake and the deer park beyond. He described convivial games of billiards with Didi, Jo, and his cousins, snowball fights, nights spent around bonfires in the park, sleigh rides in the whisper-quiet forest, dances in the grand salon with musicians from the Berlin Philharmonic playing Strauss and Schubert for all their guests, family picnics by the lake in the summer, riding expeditions from the old stables where the family coaches were kept, the annual village fair, and ice skating. Isabelle could hardly believe it wasn’t a fairy tale. And then there was Max’s work—learning how to run the estate, working with the villagers, looking after the family and its business, preserving the Schloss—and his dreams of having a family of his own, one day, in a country that was at peace not only with itself, but with its neighbors. Isabelle just listened in a state of wonder. It sounded, to her, like heaven.