The Flower Shop (The Seed Traders' Saga Book 2) Page 19

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Kuno Sonnenschein went to sleep that night for the last time, and for all time.

  Ernestine’s scream the following morning rang through the hallway, and it was not long before all the residents of the house had gathered at Kuno’s bedside. Bewilderment, horror, disbelief. Ernestine shook her husband’s lifeless arm, telling him not to make such undignified jokes. Flora promised that she would never, ever mention the language of flowers around him again if he would please, please wake up.

  Only when the doctor that Friedrich sent for confirmed the death of the master of the house—heart failure, nothing unusual in men of Kuno’s age, sadly—did the terrible truth begin to seep into the consciousness of the family.

  In the days that followed, the bell over the shop door did not stop ringing. Else Walbusch, Gretel Grün, and many other neighbors came to express their condolences.

  Flora’s hands trembled as she tied the wreath for Kuno’s funeral. The winter sun gleamed through the window, its rays falling directly onto the counter where Flora worked. For a moment that went on uncannily long, it seemed to Flora that Kuno was watching her from heaven as she worked. Just as he taught her to do, she checked that every little twig was cleanly tied to the one beside it.

  She was in the process of attaching a bouquet of white roses to the wreath when the mailman arrived with the latest issue of Die Gartenlaube. The moment the mailman was gone, Flora broke down sobbing. Kuno would never know what became of the prisoner in his beloved serial.

  Sabine stared at the mountain of potatoes she still had to peel. Potatoes for lunch, potatoes for dinner . . . if it went on like this, she’d have potatoes growing out of her ears. But better that than nothing to eat at all. She sighed deeply. As she picked up her knife again, a shadow appeared in the doorway.

  “Flora!” A sudden jolt ran through Sabine. Good gracious, was it so late already? She hadn’t even put on the potatoes to boil.

  “I closed up early,” said Flora, dropping onto one of the chairs. “There aren’t any customers anyway.”

  Sabine gazed at the potatoes. Another one of those days . . .

  In the time following Kuno’s death, Flora had felt that the reticence of his old customers was a sign of piety. But now three weeks had passed and still no one came.

  “No customers, no income, it’s that simple. And I don’t have any more money to buy flowers.” Flora sighed. “When the first flowers start to bloom, which won’t be all that long now, then I’ll probably have no choice but to sign on at Flumm. I might as well close up the shop now and look for work as a maid somewhere.”

  Sabine raised her eyebrows. “What does your husband have to say about that?” She nodded toward the front room.

  As he had every evening, after returning from the Trinkhalle, Friedrich had gone straight in to see his mother. Since her husband’s death, madam had lost her voice. It made no difference what any of them tried; so far they had been unable to rouse the widow from her cocoon of grief. And while it was very nice of Friedrich to lavish so much care on his mother, Sabine wondered whether his wife didn’t deserve a little attention, too?

  “Friedrich . . . hasn’t been much of a help to me at all.” Flora laughed sadly. “When spring is here, the people will be more interested in flowers again, he says.” Her eyelids fluttered as she stared at Sabine. “And what if they aren’t?” She threw her hands over her face, and her body shook with sobs.

  Helplessly, Sabine stroked her friend’s back.

  “What kind of silly creature am I? Since when did crying make anything any better?” Flora gulped.

  Sabine held out an apple for her. “Eat something. When I see how pale and wretched you look, I get truly scared.”

  When Flora just shook her head, Sabine picked up a knife and sliced the apple into chunks. Then she fed Flora as she would a small child. After a little while, she saw some color return to Flora’s pallid cheeks.

  “I think it’s about time you began to tell your mother-in-law about your concerns. I mean, doesn’t she have a right to know how serious things are?” Time to recover from the shock of her husband’s death was one thing, but couldn’t Flora and Friedrich see that Ernestine was only sinking deeper and deeper into her grief with every passing day?

  “When money was tight in the past, madam at least helped me to bring some variety into what I serve. But right now, she doesn’t seem to care how I get by with the little bit of money your husband gives me.” Sabine heaved the pot of potatoes onto the stove.

  “Ernestine is grieving so deeply. How can I burden her with anything else? And quite apart from that, how could she, of all people, help me with the shop? As for the housekeeping money, I can give you something. My mother gave me a bit of money when I got married. Friedrich doesn’t know anything about it, and my mother said I should put it away for a rainy day.”

  “Well, today is looking rather rainy, I must say!” said Sabine, and laughed. “I hope you really can spare a little.”

  A smile crossed Flora’s face, and then she jumped up and returned a short time later with a large leather drawstring purse. When she had given Sabine a few coins to bolster the housekeeping money, the maid returned to the stove in a lighter frame of mind and speculatively stabbed a potato.

  “It’s always the same worry: money, money, money! You need a goose that lays golden eggs, or to win a million marks in the casino. Then I’d bake a chicken for you every day, and ham and pies as well. No more turnips and potatoes every day.” With a sigh, she replaced the lid on the pot.

  Instead of answering, Flora stared at the purse in her hands.

  “The casino . . . it would be worth a try.”

  “Are you out of your mind? Good gracious, Flora, I was making a joke! Please tell me you’re not seriously thinking about taking your good money and—” Sabine broke off abruptly when she saw the look in Flora’s eye. She knew that sparkle only too well: it appeared whenever Flora got an idea into her head that nothing could shake out again.

  Wearing one of Ernestine’s hats with the brim pulled low over her eyes, and with Ernestine’s black shawl around her shoulders, Flora hurried through the narrow streets in the direction of the casino, her purse held firmly in her hand.

  She had only two hours. If she could be back home again for dinner, Friedrich would not even know she had left the house.

  She peered along the alley ahead. The weather was bad, and most people were indoors. Only Sabine’s friend, the butcher Semmel, was in sight, carrying a bucket across his courtyard. Two stray dogs were jumping around him. I hope he doesn’t recognize me, thought Flora anxiously.

  Just then, he looked over in her direction. He nodded a curt greeting, then turned away to deal with the persistent dogs.

  Had he realized who she was?

  Two hours. After that, she would either be a well-off woman without a worry in the world, or . . .

  Two hours to make her fortune in the casino. It would be enough just to double her money. She would, of course, give part of it to Sabine, and she would use the rest to buy beautiful flowers.

  The Conversationshaus came into view, and Flora’s daydreams dissipated in the wintry air.

  Two hours. And she had never even seen the inside of the casino.

  Summoning all her courage, Flora pushed open the door to the gaming room.

  For a while, she simply drifted aimlessly around the cigar-smoke-filled room. There were no more than two-dozen guests present, primarily older men, although there were also several women drinking sparkling wine and waggling fans.

  Relieved not to see a familiar face among them, Flora found herself behind one of the roulette tables. The game did not appear particularly complicated. While the players were busy placing their jetons, the croupier set the roulette wheel spinning. Then he flicked a small ball in the opposite direction. “Rien ne va plus!” he called to no one in particular, and the players gathered around the table seemed to hold their breath. The ball rolled
and rolled, then hopped and jumped for a few seconds. Only when it finally settled into one of the small compartments did the croupier call the winning number and its color.

  After she had watched for a while, she decided to try her luck. Guessing the right number in advance seemed to her a great risk, but she was willing to try her luck with choosing a color.

  Red was the color of the most beautiful tulips in Gönningen, and her favorite roses as well. Red was also the color of love.

  “Faites vos jeux,” said the croupier, his expression impassive.

  With trembling fingers, Flora opened her purse and laid all her jetons on . . .

  “Red!” She was so excited that her voice almost broke.

  Dear God, please, please . . .

  With her hands clasped as if praying, Flora held her breath and stared at the rolling ball.

  Dear God, please, please . . .

  Black, red, black . . . The ball slowed down, popped into a black, jumped on, clattered its way over several numbers until finally settling on . . . red!

  “Numéro trois, rouge!” The croupier pointed his rake at the number three.

  Flora could hardly believe her luck. She gaped in disbelief at the jetons that the croupier pushed her way. She could exchange them for cash at the cashier at any time, he said helpfully.

  It was as simple as that? A few breathless moments and she had doubled her money.

  After all the sadness and all the worry, luck was finally smiling on her. Flora felt it deep inside. She’d be stupid not to try one more time . . .

  “Red!”

  It worked again. The ball dropped into twenty-three red.

  “The girl has a lucky touch,” remarked the man beside Flora, clapping his hands appreciatively.

  “Beginner’s luck,” murmured a man across the table.

  Flora beamed. So much money all at once! When she told Friedrich . . . but of course she could not do that.

  While the other players were busy with their own bets, Flora thought feverishly. So much money, so easily earned. But easy come, easy go, they said . . . Should she really risk it a third time?

  “Mesdames et messieurs—faites vos jeux, s’il vous plaît!” The croupier was already setting the wheel in motion.

  Flora took a deep breath. Why not? Red was her lucky color.

  “Red!”

  Either God was not a gambler or he was not present in Baden-Baden that day.

  The ball stopped on black.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Ernestine never had considered seriously that she might one day have to go on living without her husband. If she ever found herself drifting into such grim thoughts, she had always pictured Kuno at her grave: the way he laid flowers, and the way he used a small hoe to keep her last resting place free of weeds.

  Kuno’s death, therefore, came as even more of a shock to her. He was not young, of course, and not in the best of health. And Kuno had always been somehow old. Even when he was courting her, there had been something wooden about him, and he had been sickly back then, too. At the start, she had been sympathetic toward him for his weak constitution, but at some point she had stopped paying it much attention. Instead, she ran his household as best she could.

  And this was the thanks she got . . .

  Ernestine bit her teeth together hard.

  She was sitting in the dining room, as she did every morning. Not because she felt particularly at home in there. The opposite, in fact, was true. The sight of Kuno’s empty chair was almost more than she could bear. But it was no better in the bedroom, where it still smelled of him, or in the ironing room, where his suits hung beside the door.

  Ernestine stroked her fingers tenderly over the arrangement of dried flowers. Even in these cold months, Flora thought to decorate the table with flowers. It was also Flora who tended Kuno’s grave—since the funeral, Ernestine had not been back to the graveyard. Others believed her grief was too great, and Ernestine let them believe it.

  The truth was that her anger was too great. She did not want to lay eyes on Kuno ever again, not even on his grave.

  How dare he leave her alone?

  Ernestine glared in fury at the chair on which Kuno had sat for years.

  He had not even left a will. The lawyer that she and Friedrich had visited, however, had told them that even without a will, not much would change for them.

  Sneaking away like that, without a word—that was no way to behave!

  When she thought about it, though, hadn’t he spent his life in much the same way? Always wanting his peace and quiet to read his newspaper. Bismarck and the emperor—oh, Kuno knew all about them. He could talk about all that with Schierstiefel for hours at a time. But other conversations were far less important to him. Couldn’t he have spoken to the manager of the Conversationshaus just once? Perhaps their flower shop could have been the one to decorate its halls.

  When they were first married and had opened the shop, many ideas of that sort had gone through Ernestine’s mind. She would gladly have brought a little momentum into the new business. But all Kuno wanted, even then, was his peace and quiet.

  “Don’t worry your head needlessly! Don’t interfere!” His words from that time still echoed in her ears.

  And at some point, Ernestine had bowed to his will and spent the subsequent decades under the assumption that as a woman, it was only proper to stay in the background when it came to business matters. But when she had visited Gönningen, she had begun to have her doubts—Flora’s mother and the other women most definitely did worry about the business! They did interfere. They did not let their men drown in despair and apathy . . . as she had done.

  Ernestine gave herself a shake, as if someone had dropped ice down her back. She had never had much interest in wealth, but a little more money would have been nice.

  Her eyes automatically turned to the drawer in which she kept her housekeeping money. She did not need to open it to know how little was inside. But no, “don’t worry your head!”

  How were things supposed to go on? What were they supposed to live on?

  With her head propped on her hands, she watched Sabine come in to set the table for lunch. One soup bowl for each of them, no more.

  She knew that Friedrich meant well, sitting with her for hours and holding her hand, but it was not helpful. He was a good son, but his salary was not enough to feed an entire family, a fact that he seemed unaware of, just as he seemed unaware that Flora was consumed with worry. She moved through the house like a shadow of herself.

  It was not Flora’s fault that the business was doing so poorly. The blame for that lay squarely with Else Walbusch and the other women, all indifferent to their plight, none of them willing to trust the girl to tie a beautiful bouquet.

  And all Friedrich had to say was “Things will turn for the better.”

  Ernestine sniffed. That was the kind of talk she would have expected from Kuno.

  If there was one thing she had learned in her life, it was that absolutely nothing would turn for the better if no one lent an active hand.

  She had to speak to Friedrich. And to Flora and Sabine. Ernestine prayed to the Lord above that she would not start to rail against Kuno when she did.

  As if to practice, she cleared her throat.

  A short time later, the family sat together for lunch. Without warning, Flora blurted, “If something doesn’t change soon in the shop, we’ll be forced to close.”

  Friedrich went on spooning his soup into his mouth without looking up.

  Flora went on. “Now that Kuno’s regular customers have deserted us, we have only one chance. We must win the tourists as customers! And the only way to do that is with the language of flowers. I know Kuno had no interest in that because he was afraid he would just be confusing our customers. But—”

  “And he was right, wasn’t he?” Friedrich interrupted her.

  “Just listen to what I have in mind first. You know the notebook I’ve been keeping. I’ve got so mu
ch information in there now that it will be easy for me to go through and choose the loveliest symbolic meanings. If I write my own flower primer, so to speak, and have it printed . . .”

  Friedrich slapped one hand against his forehead theatrically. “Now I understand. Today is April first!” He laughed out loud.

  Ernestine looked at him reproachfully. Couldn’t he see how serious Flora was?

  “Friedrich, this is not a joke!” Flora cried. “Not at all. I’ve already written home about it. Seraphine would be prepared to help me and would even come to Baden-Baden. Of course, it would not be a real book, but more of a booklet. But with Seraphine’s illustrations, it will certainly be very lovely. And it won’t be a problem to fund it. Uncle Valentin wants to pay for the printing. He says we should print more than I had in mind, because they would also be a useful aid for selling seeds. Friedrich, I’d finally have something special to offer the people who come here for the season.”

  Friedrich laid his soup spoon aside with a loud clack. “You seem to have thought this through very carefully. But did it occur to you to talk your plans through with me before you started getting everyone else you know involved? And, if I may be so bold, I daresay that the language of flowers might not be as special as you seem to think. And that you are willing to hurl us into debt for it . . . well, I don’t think that’s good at all.”

  Flora looked at her husband with embarrassment. “Debt? But—”

  “Enough!” Ernestine shouted.

  Flora’s and Friedrich’s heads jerked around.

  Ernestine glared angrily at her son. “It’s shameful how little trust you put in your wife! If Flora thinks her flower booklet is the right thing to do, and if her family is willing to support her with it, then we will certainly not set any obstacles in her path. Or do you want to take over the running of the shop yourself?”

  Friedrich shook his head in confusion. “That’s out of the question, of course. I just meant—”

  “Then good,” Ernestine interrupted him. She turned to Flora. A smile played on her thin lips.

  “Your aunt Seraphine is welcome here anytime, if she doesn’t mind that things are a little basic just now.”