Wolfgang stood at the foot of Jesse’s bed the next morning and watched the doughy farm boy stare at Ray’s vacant bed. Wolfgang had checked Jesse’s records before starting his rounds or playing the first song on his request list. Jesse was twenty-five years old. One of five brothers. Born in Louisville but currently living just north of the river in southern Indiana. Wolfgang knew that the Klan was heavily entrenched in Indiana; one in every four men supposedly wore the white robes.
“He died on my doorstep,” Wolfgang told him.
Jesse’s eyebrows furrowed. “He was a good kid, Father. I prayed for him last night.”
He’s mocking me
, thought Wolfgang. Wolfgang cleared a divot of snow from the footboard of Jesse’s bed with his fingers and flicked it to the floor. He hoped Jesse’s tuberculosis spread painfully and quickly.
What
an
odd
feeling
for
a
man
of
medicine
and
God,
he mused. Unfortunately, Jesse appeared stronger than the day he’d arrived. The fresh air was helping.
Wolfgang just smiled. “Rest up,” he said and walked away.
***
Determined to take advantage of the sunny weather, Wolfgang scheduled another rehearsal that day. He wheeled Frederick out to the fourth-floor solarium so he could get some air and be closer to the music.
The musicians’ sense of ensemble reflected their growing camaraderie, and with the addition of Cecil on the clarinet and Beverly on a second violin, they played like five functioning chambers of the same heart. The choir’s quality had increased tenfold just by the addition of Herman’s booming voice, which gave the others the confidence to sing even louder. Herman—without his fork—was allowed out of his room for the first time in several days and stood in his typical spot away from the rest of the choir.
“Herman, why do you insist on standing away from the group?” Wolfgang asked him before rehearsal had started.
“I don’t want to catch their TB,” Herman said.
Wolfgang stared up at him, wondering if he’d crack a smile. He did not.
Anne Barker arrived ten minutes into rehearsal. “Room for another?” she asked.
“Of course.” Wolfgang walked her over toward the women’s section beside Susannah. Anne Barker apparently knew her music. Her voice was soft, overshadowed by the rest of the women, but she already knew most of the pieces. Her smile was a pleasant addition to the chorus, and her arrival at Waverly had made her husband less belligerent. He was by her bedside every day, and often Wolfgang had seen them laughing.
They were barely over their allotted time when the choir suddenly stopped.
Wolfgang turned, his arms still in midair. Dr. Barker stood behind him. He was staring at his wife in the crowd. “Shut it down, Dr. Pike.”
“But—”
“Shut it down.” His voice was somber, his eyes sad. For once Wolfgang didn’t argue. Dr. Barker held out an envelope. “This came today from the diocese.”
Wolfgang took the envelope and waited until everyone had left before opening it.
February 1st, 1929
Dear Dr. Wolfgang Pike,
The diocese has learned of certain activities on your part deemed deceitful and unethical as pertaining to the Catholic Church. We have received word that you have been performing the Sacrament of Penance and saying Mass in the name of Christ without the authority to do so, and, on occasion and with witnesses, given communion to fellow Catholics under the impression that you are a Catholic priest. We have been in contact with the abbot and monks at the abbey at Saint Meinrad in regard to your status as a student, and although they explain your importance as a doctor at the Waverly Hills Tuberculosis Sanatorium and admit that they allowed you access to their books and vestments during this horrible epidemic, they couldn’t deny the fact that you have not been to the abbey in years, nor could they, with any confidence, say that you would ever return. Although we don’t like to deny anyone what they consider to be their calling, we feel it is within our rights to remove you from any further positions within the Catholic Church should we learn that your behavior continues and you have not enrolled “officially” at the abbey by the end of the month.
Yours in Christ,
Father Reinhart, assistant to Bishop Floersh
Diocese of Louisville
Wolfgang’s hands shook as he lowered the letter. The concert was only a couple days away. It was mid-February. He had only two weeks on the hillside.
***
The pressure to finish his requiem was now magnified, bearing down on him that night. Every so often Wolfgang glanced over his shoulder at McVain, who appeared asleep. Occasionally McVain’s eyes opened, watching Wolfgang or staring out toward the woods.
Wolfgang’s couch had remained empty ever since the kiss, and Susannah had only spoken to him in fits and starts, mostly about work, nothing meaningful. He contemplated telling her about the letter but dreaded the actual conversation. He’d decided to wait to tell anyone, just in case he found a way out of it. How could Dr. Barker do this to him? A fellow doctor? He was trying to deceive no one. He was simply filling a void, hearing confessions, and helping to ease peoples’ souls before they passed away.
McVain startled him by calling out from his bed.
“Where is she?”
Wolfgang touched the pen to the paper. “Who?”
“Who do you think? Susannah.”
“She went home early. She felt tired.” Wolfgang returned to his work. He began to play again, stopping every so often to jot down notes. Ten minutes later, when he looked over his shoulder, McVain sat with his knees propped up below the sheets as if hiding something in his lap. Wolfgang quietly lifted off the piano bench and hurried to McVain’s bedside. McVain was slow in shoving an envelope under the sheets.
“What do you have there?”
McVain scowled. “Nothing.”
“Looks like a letter.”
“Speaking of letters, what did yours say?”
“Church business, McVain, which means none of yours.” Wolfgang sat down on the chair beside the bed. “You’ve been here for how many weeks without getting one piece of mail? Who’s it from?”
McVain pulled the letter out from under the sheets. The envelope looked as if it had been through hell getting into his hands. The penmanship on the front was curvy and elegant. McVain held up his left hand, showing Wolfgang the nubs. “You wanted to know how I lost my fingers?”
“It has something to do with that letter?”
“Long story.”
“I’ve got all night.”
***
In May 1918, just before Wolfgang came home from the seminary for the summer and met Rose, Tad McVain was dodging bullets in Europe and praying to God every night to keep him safe. He had a wife at home in the States. He had a bright career; before the Selective Service Act had taken him, he’d been making his name as a pianist and composer. He’d begun to garner acclaim, not only in his country, but also from other countries around the world. He prayed every night for the Lord to keep his hands safe.
The Germans were closing in on Paris, breaking the French line to pieces. McVain was in the Third American Division, sent to defend the Marne, up to Chateau-Thierry to fight under French command. Chateau-Thierry was a nice river town thirty-five miles northeast of Paris. When McVain’s division arrived, most of the citizens had fled. But by the time McVain stepped onto the abandoned streets of the small town that would endure forty-one days of continuous fighting, he had already mentally checked out. Months of killing and trying not to be killed had all but locked him up. He moved around stone-faced and answered no one. He smoked constantly. His hands trembled so violently that he struggled to even aim his gun. Twice he’d frozen during combat, tempting fate as the Krauts closed in, only to be saved by his fellow soldiers.
“McVain…” They called out to him. “McVain…”
A buck-toothed soldier from Iowa they called Jaw Scratcher dove and knocked him out of the way of enemy fire on day five of the fighting. Jaw Scratcher lay on top of him in a ditch. “McVain? You froze out there, man. Gonna get yourself kilt.”
“But I’m a pianist.”
“Not no more, piano man.” Jaw Scratcher helped McVain up and handed him his gun. “Now snap out of it and start killin’ some Krauts.”
McVain did kill another Kraut that day and he killed him good. The poor boy had red hair like McVain’s and was probably only eighteen or nineteen years old. Younger version of himself, thought McVain. They both drew their weapons, but McVain shot him first. When he got close, he saw blood gurgling from the boy’s neck. But he was still alive and choking up blood. McVain looked down on the boy, hoping he would hurry up and stop breathing. God damn it, he was looking right at him and trying to talk, but he couldn’t on account of the gurgle. It was a sound McVain would never forget, and he had to end it as soon as possible. He pulled the German boy by his arms over toward a wall of rubble. He knelt beside the boy and took out his knife. He entertained the notion that he was killing his German twin. Before the idea grew legs, he slit the boy’s throat, and the boy didn’t try to talk anymore. Bullets whizzed by and bombs exploded. Blood spread from the boy’s body, but his arms and legs still moved. McVain sat next to the German boy and gripped the kid’s hand. He held it until the boy had completely stopped moving.
“McVain,” someone called out. “The fuck you doing?”
Another called out, “Holding that Kraut’s hand. McVain…”
McVain dropped his gun on the slain boy’s chest and walked back through the fighting, oblivious to the passing bullets, ignoring the men around him calling his name. He took his helmet off and concealed his hands inside it as he instinctively ducked and moved back toward base.
He never fell asleep that night. Just smoked one cigarette after the next, and half of them were wet and tasted like trash. But he smoked them to help calm the trembling in his hands. Every day he fought cautiously when everyone else around him was brave. Then the Germans were threatening their position and McVain’s division was called to the west bridge to make a stand. But McVain had seen too many limbs blown off. He’d had too many friends come back with massive head injuries. He didn’t want to fight anymore. So he ran.
They’d been fighting on the outskirts of Chateau-Thierry, so he hurried back to the abandoned town and ducked inside a small stone house. He cowered in the dark corner of a back bedroom that smelled musty. He listened to the fighting in the distance and flinched every time a shell exploded. Light flashed against the walls, flashing and fading, flashing and fading…
Eventually the fighting died down, like rumbling thunder moving away. The room was pitch-black. He dropped on the bed against the wall. The sheets were tousled, as if the former occupant had left in a hurry. Somehow he dozed off—with his pistol on his lap. He awoke a few hours later with a fuzzy glow inside the room. He aimed his pistol at it, and the tremble immediately started again with his hands. He doubted he could have even hit his target if he’d tried. Standing right there in the middle of the room was a woman holding a candle. A French woman with short dark hair and dirt on her face. She was pretty, probably in her twenties, and she wore a blue dress and no shoes. The candle shook in her grip as she stared at McVain’s gun. Tears rolled down her cheeks.
McVain lowered the pistol and waved her closer. She hurried to the bed, buried her head in McVain’s chest, and started crying. He rubbed her back and rested his chin on her head, and for some reason wondered if Jaw Scratcher was dead.
He moved his lips next to her ear. “Shhhhh. It’s gonna be okay.” He wondered if she’d lost her husband, or parents, or siblings. Or possibly even her children? She appeared old enough to have had them. McVain leaned back against the headboard and accepted her weight against his. She nestled her head beneath his shoulder and then fell asleep while he stroked her back and hair. He looked at his hands, which were still stained from the German boy’s blood. So much dirt and grime under his fingernails. He blew out her candle on the floor and closed his eyes. He fell asleep again to the imagined sound of a piano.
McVain loved his wife, but that life seemed so out of touch with his current reality that he’d convinced himself he would never see her again. The Unites States might as well have been on another planet. That night he cheated on his wife. Being close to the French woman was the only thing that made sense to him. Part of him wondered if what they’d done during the night had been a dream. Visions of her moving on top of him swarmed into focus. Her hair tickling his cheeks. Her breasts pressing against his chest. And when the sun shone through the window, he noticed that she was naked under the sheets and his shirt was off. She kissed McVain on the cheek and then hurried from the room. Cabinets opened and closed in the other room, and moments later she returned with a bottle of wine, a block of moldy cheese, and some stale bread. She slipped back into her dress and they ate like they were starved.
She couldn’t speak English and he couldn’t speak French. They communicated with their eyes and with their hands, and when they finished eating they continued what had been started in the middle of the night. They made love to block out the sound of warfare in the distance, and he discovered every inch of her body. Under her left breast she had a small birthmark that looked like an apple. She giggled silently when he acted like he was playing the piano on her bare back.
The second night she pulled him from the bedroom and led him out into the street, where a mangy dog hurried by, chasing a squirrel. She took his hand and ran him across the street and into a stone church with heavy wood doors. It smelled of incense and candles even though it hadn’t been occupied for weeks. Their laughter echoed. She took him to the back of the church and lit a candle next to the altar. There in the shadows was a piano. She sat on the bench and played for him.
She wasn’t very good, but McVain could tell it helped to quell her fears, and the sound of the piano nearly brought tears to his eyes. She was an angel who had stolen him from the worst hell he could have imagined. He never knew why she’d stayed in town. He knew nothing about her, yet he knew enough to trust her. She patted the bench beside her and scooted over to give him room. He believed that God had answered his prayers.