From Bad to Wurst (3 page)

They followed behind Wally without jockeying for position or cutting each other off, which made me question why they couldn't do that
all
the time. Mom locked her hand around my arm, excitement oozing from her every pore as she burdened herself with my well-being. “Can you manage baby steps, sweetheart, or should I request a wheelchair?”

“If you'll allow me, Margaret.” Etienne laid claim to my other arm. “I'll be happy to relieve you of duty for the rest of the day.”

“Nosiree,” said Mom, tightening her grip. “When I make a commitment, I follow through.”

“I insist.” He smiled, favoring her with a dose of Old World charm that affected the average woman like catnip affects cats.

“Nonsense. We're good. Aren't we, Em?”

Mom had apparently developed an immunity to Old World charm.

“I suspect Wally could make good use of your people skills in the Prince Ludwig room, Margaret.” Etienne gave my arm a gentle tug in his direction.

Mom tugged me back toward her. “You're much more diplomatic than I am—you go. I'll stay with Emily.”

“You have a better touch with grief-stricken people, Margaret.” Right, toward Etienne.

“No, I don't.” Left, toward Mom.

Feeling like the proverbial wishbone from the Thanksgiving Day turkey, I decided to end the tug of war before someone yelled, “Close your eyes and make a wish.”

Or was I confusing wishbones with birthday candles?

Uh-oh. Maybe my brain was more addled than the CT scan had indicated.

“Enough already!” I said, wrenching my arms free. “Geesh.” I glanced from one to the other. “Trust me. I'm not unappreciative, but there's gotta be a better way. Can we compromise? Like, say, Etienne runs ahead to join the guests in the Prince Ludwig room, and Mom and I follow behind at a more leisurely pace?”

Mom cleared her throat and snorted delicately. “Isn't that what I just suggested?”

“Are you sure this is what you want to do?” Etienne asked me, sounding perplexed.

“Yup. That'll work. But before you head off, you need to refresh my memory about something. Do you remember how long the doctor said we should wait before we…you know”—I lowered my voice to a whisper—“resume normal marital relations?”

Stuck between an inhale and an exhale, Etienne broke out in a fit of wheezing that had him thumping his fist against his sternum to clear his air passages. Mom froze on the spot, speechless and red-faced, her eyes popping out of their sockets as if they'd been inflated with helium. “Alrighty then,” she tittered nervously, because if there was anything that could force Mom to run from a room, it was the thought of having to listen to another human being talk about that most forbidden of all subjects: S-E-X.

“The two of you must think I'm so selfish,” she blurted, aiming herself in the direction of the Prince Ludwig room. “Now that I think about it, Wally's people skills really are far inferior to mine, so I'll just scoot down there to help out. Those poor grief-stricken souls deserve a huge outpouring of sympathy and support, and no one can dole it out better than I can.”

Abdicating any further claim on my arm, she launched herself toward the meeting room as fast as her feet would fly. Etienne hazarded a smile. “She does make a habit of fleeing when the conversation turns to seemingly indelicate subjects, doesn't she?”

“Thank God. How would we ever deal with her if she wasn't so predictable?”

He studied my face for a long moment before trailing his finger down my cheek. “Tell me honestly, do you feel up to facing the masses or would you rather go back to the room?”

“I'll go back to the room after the meeting. We can't abandon Wally. No matter how good he is at what he does, he might need reinforcements. My legs are still a little rubbery, but I'll be okay if I can sit down.”

Cupping his hand around my elbow, he guided me around the front desk and down the long corridor toward the Prince Ludwig room. “Since when has your grandmother resolved her issues with your mother by throwing you under the bus?”

“You noticed the tire marks, did you?”

He laughed. “For an octogenarian, your grandmother seems to enjoy living quite dangerously.”

Maybe
too
dangerously. She never should have sicced Mom on me; that was a no-no. So she and I were going to have words, and my nonprofessional prediction was that she wasn't going to like them.

three

The heartache in the
Prince Ludwig room was palpable.

Guests were clustered in small groups around the perimeter, speaking in hushed tones, tissues in hand, dabbing their eyes. Quiet weeping. Loud nose blowing. Earnest hand squeezing. I scanned the area in search of Zola, desperate to speak to her privately, but I caught sight of her red hair at the opposite end of the room, about as far away from me as she could possibly be.

I was encouraged to see that my guys were making the rounds with Astrid's friends, offering sympathy and remaining respectfully low-key. Even Bernice was displaying a level of decorum that was remarkable for Bernice. Not only did she seem disinclined to badger any of the bereaved guests into taking pictures of her, she was actually offering tissues to guests who needed them. Truth be told, I wasn't sure if this was a random act of kindness or an optical illusion.

Mom was practicing her people skills by giving everyone in the room a big squishy hug. She could have limited it to band members only, but to her way of thinking, overkill was a much less grievous sin than discrimination.

The only guest who wasn't engaged in conversation or offering unsolicited hugs was Dad, who occupied a chair in the last row of seats at the back of the room, happily detached from everyone while he studied the floor.

Wally hurried over to us, clipboard in hand. “I received a text from Astrid's brother. He's wondering if we could pack up Astrid's belongings and carry them back to the States with us. I told him it wouldn't be a problem.”

“I'll take care of it,” said Etienne.

“What about her accordion?” I looked from one man to the other. “Did it survive the blast in one piece?”

Wally's expression went blank. “I didn't see an accordion—not that I had time to look. Was her instrument case the big rolling silver thing that looked like it was on the cutting edge of spaceship technology?”

I nodded. “It's the last thing I remember seeing before I blacked out.”

He jotted a note on his clipboard. “I'll track it down. I should think her family would want that back, too, if there's anything left of it. So where's the best place to start an inquiry about a missing instrument case? Local authorities?”

Etienne quickly leaped into former police inspector mode. “Why don't you let me handle the missing accordion? I might be able to navigate the police system a little easier than you.”

Wally nodded. “No complaints from me there.”

“In fact, while you're calling your meeting to order, I think I'll make a few inquiries at the front desk to get the ball rolling.” He gestured toward the orderly rows of folding chairs before us. “Can I offer you a seat, Mrs. Miceli?”

Talk of Astrid's accordion case caused a sluggish synapse to fire in my brain. “Where's my shoulder bag?” I clutched my shoulder in search of the strap, startled that it had taken me this long to realize it was missing.

“Your dad recovered it after you collapsed,” said Wally. “He gave it to your gramma for safekeeping.”

“OhthankGod.” I blew out a long relieved breath. “My whole
life
is in that bag. Did you realize it was missing?” I asked Etienne.

“I never gave your bag a passing thought, bella. I'm afraid worry overtook my awareness of fashion accessories.”

Aww. I swallowed around the lump in my throat, forcing myself not to burst into tears again.

Crisis averted, Etienne ushered me to the aisle seat in the front row, then headed out to the reception desk. Wally took up a position in the front of the room. “I apologize for the interruption, but would all of you be kind enough to find a seat?”

Sniffling. Shuffling. Chair scraping. Mom claimed the chair beside me, beating Margi out by a nose, but Nana had obviously decided to keep a low profile because she'd grabbed a chair at the far end of my row, a location so distant, if we were in Iowa, we'd refer to it as the “back forty.”

Wally squared his shoulders, eyes somber, voice subdued. “Speaking on behalf of Emily, Etienne, and Destinations Travel, I'd like to express my deepest sympathy to all our musicians on the loss of your colleague. I know Ms. Peterson was an esteemed member of your group. I've heard you compare her musical ability to the accordion virtuoso on the old
Lawrence Welk Show
.”

“Myron Floren,” said a woman with a nasally voice.

“She was better than Myron Floren,” insisted a male guest. “Her fingers were so nimble, she could practically tie them in knots.”

“It helped that she was double jointed,” snuffled a man behind me.

“And not only that,” agreed another man, “her motor skills were so highly developed, she could work the bellows, play the keyboard, and hit the bass buttons with a blindfold tied around her eyes. Our audiences loved that routine. They always rewarded her with a standing ovation.”

“And a tip jar full of five-dollar bills,” added the woman who talked through her nose.

“I don't know how our band can survive without her,” lamented a man whose voice trembled with emotion. “On so many levels, Astrid was one in a million.”

More sniffling and nose blowing. I angled my chair around slightly so I could see the entire room.

Wally regarded us, a questioning expression on his face. “Would the remaining members of her band like to join me up front to share a few of their favorite Astrid memories with those of us who never got to know her?”

Whispers. Throat clearing. Chair creaking.

“That's mighty nice of you to ask,” said the man whose voice still shook with emotion. I glanced toward the center of the room as a big, burly guy with a white Santa Claus beard and apple cheeks stood up. “We'd like that.”

He gestured to several others as he snaked his way across the row of folding chairs. Up popped three more people, two men and a woman, who followed him to the front of the room. They huddled together in an awkward clump, looking out at the rest of us with red noses and bloodshot eyes.

“Would you mind re-introducing yourselves to the group?” asked Wally. “I know everyone attended the meet and greet, but no one ever remembers names, so repetition helps.”

Breaking out of their huddle, they rearranged themselves in a line that I suspected would mimic the way they appeared on stage. The burly guy with the shaky voice lifted his hand in greeting. “Otis Erickson. I'm on tuba.”

“Hetty Munk,” said the woman beside him. “Clarinet.” She was dressed in the same traditional long skirt and fitted bodice that Astrid had been wearing, but there was less of her to fill out the blouse. Her brown hair was shoulder length and stick-straight, with bangs that practically fell into her eyes and a neck whose sagging flesh was falling victim to gravity.

“I'm Wendell Newton.” The man next to her bobbed a head that was so shiny, it reflected a glare from the overhead lights. His face was Happy Face round. His upper lip lay hidden beneath a fastidiously trimmed salt-and-pepper mustache whose waxed ends curled onto his cheeks. He reminded me of the guy on the orange Chance cards in Monopoly, only without the tuxedo and top hat. “I play trumpet.”

“Gilbert Graves,” said the final musician. “Trombone.” He was thin and small-boned, with horn-rimmed glasses and thinning bowl-cut hair that gave him the look of an aging Prince Valiant. He had computer geek written all over him, although with his knee socks, leather breeches, and waistcoat, he and his fellow band members could probably do double duty as figures on the dancing platform of a cuckoo clock. “We've been playing together in our oompah band for going on a dozen years now. Astrid's the one who thought of the idea after her husband died. We call ourselves the Guten Tags, which means ‘good day' in German, so we're the ‘Good Days,' which is weird in English, but Astrid liked the sound of it, so that's what we went with.”

“Astrid could be very persuasive,” said Wendell.

“But in a nice way,” Otis explained. “She was tact personified. Never bossy. Always putting everyone else first. Happy all the time.” His lips started to quiver. “So…so willing to please.” He swiped tears from his eyes and blew his nose into an oversized handkerchief.

“We entered kindergarten together over sixty years ago,” sniffed Hetty. “I spilled milk all over my lunch, so Astrid offered to share hers. Peanut butter and grape jelly on white bread. From that moment on, we were like sisters. Right up until this morning.” She inhaled a calming breath and blinked away tears. “I've lost so much more than the driving force of our band.” Her voice swelled with emotion. “I've lost my best friend.”

Otis draped his arm around her shoulders as she pressed a tissue to her eyes.

“So what's going to happen now?” called out another guest from the audience. “We've already missed our time slots at the Hofbr
ä
uhaus. Should we cancel the rest of our scheduled appearances?”

“That's a decision the remaining band members will have to make,” said Wally. “We can continue with the present schedule, or if you think that might be too difficult emotionally, we can simply tour the rest of Germany and dispense with the musical element.”

“It's going to be pretty hard for the Guten Tags to continue,” admitted Wendell. “Without the accordion, we won't get the rich, full-bodied sound we're accustomed to. It'll throw everything off.”

“We'll get booed off the stage,” sobbed Hetty.

Another voice sang out from the audience. “If the Guten Tags don't play, I think it's only fair that the rest of us don't play either. Not the Little Bitte Band or Das Bier Band or the Brassed Off Band.”

Gasps. Murmuring.

“Is that really fair?” asked a woman who was sitting two rows back. “We've been practicing for so long. Would Astrid have wanted all of us to throw in the towel because of her absence?”

“Astrid was the most unselfish person on the planet,” asserted another man. “She would have wanted the show to go on no matter what.”

“I disagree,” said the woman with the nasally voice. “We'll be disrespecting her memory if we march up on stage and act as if nothing happened back there on that street.”

Harrumphing. Snorting.

Wally glanced at the audience and shrugged. “This isn't up to me, but I'm the one who'll have to make the phone calls if you decide to cancel, so I encourage you to arrive at some kind of consensus.”

A hefty man in a red waistcoat stood up. “I say we cancel.”

Head bobbing. Tepid clapping.

Another guy in a green vest and suspenders rose to his feet. “I say we continue.”

Osmond shot out of his chair, arms raised in a V as he waved his forefingers to indicate the tally. “One yea, one nay. Do I hear two? We're at one, going for two. Who'll make it tw—”

Alice grabbed his belt and yanked him back down to his seat.

Oh, God.

Mom bent her head toward me, confiding under her breath, “Someone should tell Osmond to tone down this election silliness. He needs to understand that you and Etienne
don't
have time to humor every guest stricken with an obsessive-compulsive disorder.” She patted my hand with motherly affection. “By the way, there's a slew of guidebooks and magazines in our rooms, so if you'd like yours alphabetized, I'll be happy to oblige. It'll take me less than twenty seconds, and I guarantee the sense of order will leave you feeling even more tingly than a spa treatment.” Her face glowed at the prospect.

My mom. Under the mistaken impression that the pot calling the kettle black actually referred to cookware.

“We should take a vote to see where the majority of us stand,” suggested the man in the green vest.

Hetty held up a finger. “Hold that thought.” She gathered Otis, Gilbert, and Wendell into a tight circle, and after a minute's worth of whispers, sighs, and grunts, they turned around to face the audience again.

“We've arrived at a compromise,” she announced. “We knew Astrid better than any of you, so please believe me when I say she wouldn't have wanted you to miss out on the musical experience of a lifetime. That's why we think the rest of you should follow through with your appearances as scheduled.”

“And what about you?” asked a man from the audience.

Otis swiped moisture from his cheeks with a beefy hand. “The Guten Tags are gonna sit this one out. And before you go getting all riled up about our decision, I've got two things to say. First: Hetty and us guys will pay all the respects necessary to Astrid's memory, so we don't want you thinking you're giving her short shrift. And second: the four of us can't perform without an accordionist, so that's all she wrote. We couldn't play even if we wanted to, but we'll be real happy to listen to the rest of you up there on stage.”

Shocked silence filled the room, broken by a single clap of approval that was followed by another and another until all of us were on our feet, applauding the Guten Tags for the selflessness of their gesture. Otis's nose turned red with embarrassment. Hetty's eyes sparkled with unshed tears. Gilbert and Wendell clasped hands as if congratulating each other on the wisdom of their decision.

I had to hand it to them. Given their disappointing change of circumstances, they were being extraordinarily gracious. Back home we call that “Midwest nice.”

“That settles it then,” said Wally when the applause died down. “We'll continue our schedule as planned, and the only detail we'll change is that the three remaining bands will have more playing time. Is everyone agreed?”

“Hello?” A man in a navy blue business suit stepped into the room, accompanied by a man in an even more conservative black suit. “Please forgive the interruption. May we come in?”

The Guten Tags shuffled out of the way to allow the newcomers center stage. The suits shook hands with Wally before the navy suit addressed the audience. “Please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Dieter Dangler, and I am manager of this establishment.” His words were clipped and precise, with barely a trace of an accent. “This is Egon Seiler.” He nodded to the black suit. “Assistant to the mayor of Munich. He has come to deliver a message from the mayor.”