A Summer In Europe (33 page)

Life was full of so many dualities and inconsistencies.

She shook her head and he sat back down. “I’m sorry, Emerson.” He shrugged and set his fork on the plate. She, too, had suddenly lost interest in the cake.

“It’s quite all right,” he said with a sigh, looking down, his attention focused on something crawling on the ground. “My fault for not remembering what you’d told me.” Then, after another beat, “I don’t always know what I want either.”

“You don’t know what you want to order?” said an amused male voice behind her.
Thoreau
. In front of her, Emerson looked up and stiffened. “Might I suggest some tasty
Wienerschnitzel?
” his brother continued, clearly in the mood for mockery.

She turned to fully face Thoreau, spotting Louisa and the honeymooners trailing several paces behind him. “Oh, hey, there,” she said. “We, actually, just had some cake,” she explained, since Emerson was not quick to offer a reply. She swiped the chocolate smears off her mouth and chin with her napkin. “But we’re done now.”

“And, also, we were just leaving,” Emerson added as he pushed to standing. “Would you like our table?”

“What? No, no. Don’t race away,” Thoreau said.

Both she and Emerson had risen, but Thoreau spanned his arms between them like an eagle, placed his hands on their shoulders and, literally, pushed them back into their seats. He glanced at their two-thirds-eaten cake and raised a brow. “
Sachertorte,
huh? Not as good as you’d expected?”

“No, it was great,” Gwen said loyally. “I guess we just weren’t as hungry as we’d thought.”

Thoreau smirked. “Troubled by indecision, are we?” he mused, although there was a pointedness about it Gwen couldn’t ignore. He gazed speculatively at his younger sibling just as Louisa, Sally and Peter reached them.

Gwen realized she and Emerson hadn’t seen the four of them coming, but that the reverse wasn’t necessarily true. While the others may have been too far back to observe with any clarity, Thoreau had outstripped the rest of his group and had, most likely, seen that almost-kiss. She suspected Emerson realized this as well and pieced together the not-so-subtle insinuations his brother was leveling at them.

“I’m delighted we decided to go to the planetarium,” Louisa said pleasantly. “I haven’t studied astronomy or physics since my first year at university.” She sent Emerson a sheepish grin. “But the night sky is always so gorgeous, and all that talk of black holes and quarks and such is endlessly fascinating.”

Sally was quick to agree, and her husband further observed that it was incredible to think of how much energy was packing into even a small white dwarf and how vast the distances were in our solar system, let alone between galaxies.

“I’ve been a fan of math puzzles and science wonders for almost six decades,” Peter said, “but the idea of a light-year still boggles my mind.”

“Oh, indeed. The universe is simply bursting with paradoxical elements,” added Thoreau. He nudged his brother. “Wouldn’t you agree? Weren’t you just spouting off about
contradictions
the other day? Some
boring
Bohr theory, as I recall,” he said, laughing at his own joke.

Gwen saw Emerson clench his jaw. “Bohr’s principle of complementarity is not what I’d term
boring,
Thoreau,” he said, his expression hard. He turned a softer eye on Gwen, Louisa and the honeymooners, however, and explained that they shouldn’t let its name fool them. “The complementarity principle is actually about contradiction. Some objects have multiple properties that appear to be contradictory. Basically, it’s impossible to view both properties at the same time, despite the way they can coexist simultaneous in nature. You understand the way light can be either a particle or a wave, depending on the situation? Normally, any electron that’s both a particle
and
a wave would seem to be impossible because they’re mutually exclusive. Not true in this case.”

“I would wager
people
are far more contradictory than even light,” Thoreau suggested thoughtfully. Gwen narrowed her eyes at him, and Emerson shot him a look that was just shy of scathing. The others did not appear to notice anything amiss.

Peter nodded at Emerson’s explanation, and asked a few qualifying questions. Louisa bobbed her head in appreciation. And Sally smiled kindly at Emerson and everyone surrounding him.

While Gwen wasn’t necessarily well-versed on the nuances of Bohr’s theory after this one lesson, she had to admit Emerson had encapsulated it well, and Louisa gushed, “You’re such a brilliant teacher, Emerson. I remember some French writer saying that what makes a person a genius is the ability to reduce the complicated to the simple.”

Thoreau seemed to develop a nasty cough at the word
genius.

Emerson thanked Louisa then abruptly stood up. Gwen sensed there was no way his brother would be able to push him down this time. He flagged their waiter, who immediately came to their table with glasses of water for everyone.

Handing several bills to the man, which amply covered their coffee and cake, Emerson smiled tightly and announced that he and Gwen were going to the park and would be taking a taxi back much later. He politely wished them all a good evening.

This plan was news to Gwen, but she played along.

Thoreau, sharp as ever and unusually ornery, went for the parting shot. “Have fun, kidlets,” he said condescendingly. “But do remember,
‘It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.’
Henry David Thoreau.”

Emerson took several strides away from the group, so she thought Thoreau may have succeeded in getting that last word. She should learn never to underestimate the younger of the Edwards men.

After a few additional paces, in a strike so witty and so intentionally ironic, Emerson turned and called over his shoulder. “Brother,
‘I hate quotation. Tell me what you know.’
” He grinned. “Ralph Waldo Emerson.”

Gwen caught the barbed glances between them—this latest skirmish cutting yet another notch in the backboard of their combative history.

Their adventures in Salzburg were not exactly off to an auspicious start.

Hans-Josef, who’d long awaited his morning off in his hometown, put Guido in charge of getting them to and from “The Sound of Music” tour. The tour itself (complete with the lake views from the Julie Andrews version of the film, the tree-lined drives, the lush gardens, the wedding church and the famous gazebo) had been lovely—once they got there. Guido, whose laid-back Italian nature jibed well with the streets and driving customs of Italy, southern France and even Hungary, was not entirely well suited to the precision of a German-Austrian border city. Or, more specifically, to their police force. And with their tour guide absent and unable to insist upon strict punctuality, not only were they late in getting to see the hills coming alive, but Guido also procured a rather pricy speeding ticket.

Gwen, however, was amused by the way Guido laughed at it—once the policeman was well out of sight—and banished the thin paper to a half-folded, half-crumpled footnote in the bottom of his beverage holder.

Hans-Josef, when he rejoined them that afternoon, was less amused. Perhaps it was only on account of his free time having ended, but their tour guide wasn’t in the best mood to begin with and this ticket didn’t help. Looking rather like Liesl’s too-serious boyfriend in the much-beloved musical, he reprimanded their bus driver sternly. Even having Cynthia hanging on his arm and trying to tug him away did not restore his humor with any immediacy.

Richard would have acted like that, too, Gwen realized, having just spent the better part of a half hour comparing the two men in her mind again. Had he been in Hans-Josef’s position, he would not have dismissed the ticket and moved on with the afternoon portion of the tour. No. He would have scolded and grudged and sucked the fun out of someone’s day. Even though she was rarely inclined toward being late herself (and she’d
never
gotten a speeding ticket), she found herself displeased with this trait Richard and Hans-Josef shared. It was almost ... self-righteous.

Thankfully, the beauty of the Alps served to distract her more than once. The hazy shades of alternating blues, greens and whites in the distance. The stunning peaks that looked more like a Universal Studios backdrop than real life. The crispness of the air at high elevation and the chirp of birds calling to others in the flock as if to say, “What a beautiful day! To be young and free and in the mountains!”

Upon returning from their afternoon drive to see the gorgeous alpine vista that was Eagle’s Nest, Gwen found herself nestled between Zenia and Connie Sue on a small café bench in downtown Salzburg, waiting for their tables to be set. It was dinnertime and, while she wasn’t normally overly hungry for any meal, the high altitude must have been playing with her appetite because, for once, she was ravenous.

“Hmm. How much longer do you think it’ll take before they’ll be ready for us?” she asked the older ladies.

“Dunno,” Zenia said, unconcerned. She elbowed Gwen and pointed to a distinguished-looking man in his early fifties—salt-and-pepper sideburns, trim and dressed in a navy sport coat. “I could feast on him, though.
Hello-ohhh!
Captain Von Trapp,” she beckoned, waving an arm at him.

Gwen ducked her head, both out of embarrassment and to avoid getting bashed in the skull by Zenia’s wild swinging. Thankfully, the man soon walked deep into the restaurant, either having not heard Zenia’s call or not thinking she was talking to him.

Connie Sue giggled. “Why, honey,” she said to Zenia, “you gotta be faster than that if you want to hook ’em. If you’re not quick enough to call the tile you want, it’s dead forever.”

Gwen squinted at Connie Sue but didn’t bother to ask. If they were talking about “tiles,” it must have something to do with mah-jongg and, really, she didn’t want to know.

Zenia laughed in response and took on the stagey voice of an actress in a Southern drama. “I don’t want me some old tile someone’s already discarded. Don’t you know I be picking ahead, Miz Connie Sue?”

Connie Sue burst into a fresh round of giggles, her plump body jiggling in delight next to Gwen. Then, as if sensing her confusion, Connie Sue was moved to explain, “Sweetie, in a mah-jongg game, some players allow each other to ‘pick ahead,’ to choose the tiles that they want in the next round, instead of waiting.
We
don’t play that way.” She sent Zenia a pointed look. Zenia was not averse to attempted cheating. “But, for people who do, it’s kind of like predicting the future.”

Interesting concept, but then the rules of mah-jongg were full of quirks and oddities. She remembered something Aunt Bea had told her about the game once and mentioned it to the other women. “It’s mostly a really unpredictable game, though, right? I heard the winning hands are different every year.”

Zenia nodded. “Yep, the winning combinations of tiles change from year to year. They’re on a special mah-jongg card that you can get online or at a store. So, the ‘best’ future for a player changes all the time. Between games. And between years.”

“As capricious as life,” Connie Sue added, and Gwen marveled anew at how well these seniors seemed to handle the fickleness of both the games they’d played and the real world they inhabited. How willing they were not only to take risks but to let the chips of randomness fall where they may. Gwen had never liked the feeling of being in flux, but she figured making peace with it was, somehow, the key to contented longevity.

Hans-Josef appeared before them. “We will eat in four minutes,” he stated, tapping his watch and looking as if he might break into “Sixteen Going On Seventeen” at any moment. Clearly, his good humor had finally been reestablished, no small thanks to the restorative properties of the Alps and a lengthy semiprivate conversation with Cynthia.

“Great!” Zenia enthused, bounding unsteadily to her feet, shackling their tour guide’s wrist with her firm hand and pulling her toward him. “I got a seating request. There’s a man who just walked in. So tall”—she gestured—“with black-’n’-white sideburns and a nice blue jacket—”

“You want to sit at a table near him?” Hans-Josef interjected, having learned by now that Zenia was not shy about introducing herself to any potential objects of her fleeting affection. He tried, unsuccessfully, to get her to release his wrist.

“Why, no.” Zenia grinned naughtily. “I wanna sit
at
his table, preferably on his lap.” She tugged him in the direction of the door. “And you’re gonna help me.”

Hans-Josef’s smile faded to an expression of alarm, and Connie Sue laughed loudly and whispered in Gwen’s ear, “So long, farewell,” as Zenia and Hans-Josef disappeared into the restaurant. Then, after a beat, she added,
“Auf wiedersehen,
good night.”

Gwen shook her head as Connie Sue motioned for her to quickly follow. “Being a tour guide must be a challenging job,” Gwen commented to the older lady, just as Cynthia pushed between them, racing to catch up with her now-agitated Austrian boyfriend and the strong-willed woman who had him in her grasp.

“Any job is challenging if you lack a sense of humor, honey,” Connie Sue replied pleasantly. “We could all use more of that.”

9

Illuminations

Friday–Sunday, July 20–22

C
onnie Sue’s wise words rang true in Gwen’s mind. She mulled them over during their drive through the scenic Black Forest of Bavaria and its neighboring German states—complete with a stop at a Munich
biergarten,
a Würzburg
bratwurst haus
and a Heidelberg
apfelstrudel
bakery—as they approached the French border and zoomed toward Paris.

“Someday you’ll have to come back to Germany,” Emerson told her on the bus as they crossed the Rhine River into the French city of Strasbourg. “To see Mittenwald. It’s a small Alpine town in Bavaria, but it has a great tradition of violin making. It’s quaint. Not too far from the Austrian border.”