The Wild Girl (4 page)

‘You call almost being eaten by a witch an adventure? Be glad for small mercies, Dortchen, my love, and pass me the salt.’

Dortchen did as she was asked, her mind wandering away into a deep, dark, thorn-tangled forest. She imagined leaving a trail of white stones to help find her way home. She imagined tricking the witch.

Still daydreaming, she began to get down plates for their dinner from the oak dresser. The kitchen was a long, low room, lit by smoky tallow candles and the orange roar of the fire. Heavy beams supported the brown-stained ceiling, with washing lines strung between them flapping with the week’s laundry. Iron ladles and pots hung from hooks from a long oak shelf above the fireplace. The shelf itself held pewter bowls and tankards, and heavy ceramic jars of salt and sugar and oil.

A roasting jack, made of cast iron, stood before the fireplace. A complex set of wheels and pulleys kept the roast turning evenly, its juices dripping down into a pan. Old Marie heaved the roast beef off the jack and onto a platter, her round face red and damp with perspiration, then swung the boiling pot of potato dumplings off the fire. Dortchen hurried to help her, ladling boiled red cabbage into a tureen.

The kitchen door swung open and Mia rushed in. ‘Old Marie, Mother’s having a spasm. Where’s supper? It’s nearly quarter past.’

‘I had trouble with the fire,’ Old Marie said. ‘The wind’s in the wrong quarter.’

‘Father’s furious.’ Mia jumped up and down on one foot, her loops of red-gold hair bouncing. She was eleven years old, the youngest of the six Wild sisters. Everything about her seemed round, from her soft, plump figure to her protuberant blue eyes.

‘Tell your father to try cooking when the wind keeps blowing out the fire,’ Old Marie answered, heaving up the tray with her rough red hands.

Mia gave a snort of incredulous laughter. ‘You tell him! If you dare.’

‘Mia, if you ring the bell, I’ll help carry the food up,’ Dortchen said.

The little girl seized the handbell and rang it vigorously, while Old Marie pushed the door open with her foot and carried out the platter of beef.

‘Where’ve you been?’ Mia caught up the potato dumplings.

‘I’ve been to the palace,’ Dortchen said. ‘Lotte’s aunt works there. We had coffee and cakes.’

‘Did you see the Kurfürst?’

Dortchen shook her head, leading the way down the cold corridor, the tureen of cabbage in her hands. ‘I met Lotte’s big brothers. They’ve come home from university. At least, the second one has: Wilhelm. The other one was in Paris.’ She pushed open the dining-room door with her hip and put the tureen down on the sideboard. Old Marie was laying out the plates on the table.

‘Paris! Did he see the Ogre?’ Mia demanded.

Dortchen nodded. ‘He said that it’s true that he’s short as a dwarf, but he’s so full of fire you hardly notice.’

‘I’d like to see Napoléon one day,’ Mia said.

‘Pray to God you don’t get the chance,’ Old Marie said.

THE WILD ONE

October 1805

Dortchen’s elder sisters came into the room in a swirl of skirts, talking over the top of one another.

‘Supper at last!’ Gretchen cried. ‘I am near ready to faint with hunger.’ The pretty one, she wore her flaxen hair in ringlets, a feat only achieved by the very uncomfortable practice of wearing rags in her hair to bed.

‘Father will not be pleased,’ Röse said with a certain amount of pleasure. ‘It is a sign of a disordered mind to be so unpunctual.’ Thirteen-year-old Röse was the clever one, and seemed to take pleasure in being positively dowdy. Her fair hair was scraped back in a thin plait, and a small book of sermons protruded from her pocket.

‘Why so late?’ Lisette asked. The eldest, and her mother’s prop, she was also the tallest, with a long face and nose and beautiful, long-fingered hands.

‘He’s almost popped all his buttons already tonight,’ Hanne said. She was the musical one, always getting into trouble for singing at the top of her voice around the house.

Dortchen would have liked to have been the clever one, and Mia would have liked to have been the musical one, but with six girls in the family, those roles were already taken by the time they were born. They had become the wild one and the baby, with absolutely no choice in the matter at all.

Dortchen was called the wild one because one day, when she was
seven years old, she had got lost in the forest. She had wandered off to a far-distant glade where a willow tree trailed its branches in a pool of water. Dortchen crept within the shadowy tent of its branches and found a green palace. She wove herself a crown of willow tendrils and collected pebbles and flowers to be her jewels. At last, worn out, she lay down on a velvet bed of moss and fell asleep.

She did not hear her family calling for her. She did not see the sun slipping away and the shadows growing longer. Waking in the dusk, she had gone skipping to find her sisters, her hair in a tangle, a wreath of leaves on her head. Ever since then, no matter how hard she tried to be good, Frau Wild would always say, with a long-suffering sigh, ‘And this is Dortchen, my wild one, always running off into the forest.’

‘You’re too soft with her, Katharina,’ Herr Wild would growl. ‘You should’ve mastered her will by now.’

It was true Dortchen loved to be outdoors. With so many siblings, it was hard to find time to be alone, and the old house was always full of people shouting, arguing, singing, crying, slamming doors, ringing bells or running up and down the stairs. Out in the forest, it was just Dortchen, free as the wind in the leaves and the birds in the sky. Whenever she could, Dortchen would take a basket and go to the forest in search of fallen chestnuts or mushrooms. She would come home in the evening with her cheeks flushed, her lips stained with berry juice, and her head full of dreams.

‘What do we have?’ Gretchen lifted the lid of the tureen and wrinkled her nose. ‘Not red cabbage again.’

Frau Wild drifted into the room, a shawl trailing from her elbows. ‘Girls. The time. Your father.’ She collapsed into a chair.

‘Bad weather ahead. Better batten down the hatches.’ Hanne pretended to swoon into her own chair, her hand held to her temple in mockery of their mother.

‘You couldn’t possibly understand, Hannechen,’ her mother said in a faint voice. ‘Who will your father blame?’

‘Never mind, Mother,’ Lisette soothed her. ‘Perhaps Father hasn’t noticed the time.’

‘He always notices the time,’ Frau Wild replied, one hand pressed against her chest.

The door opened so abruptly that it thumped into the wall. Hanne at once scrambled up and took her place by her chair, head bowed and hands folded. Frau Wild rose to her feet, murmuring, ‘Oh, dear, oh, dear.’

Herr Wild came into the room and stood looking around with frowning eyes. He was a heavyset man, dressed soberly in brown, with grey hair drawn back from his forehead and tied in a queue. In one hand he held a pocket watch.

‘Twenty minutes past the hour,’ he said. ‘Not acceptable.’

Nobody spoke.

‘Katharina, you must keep better order. That servant of yours has no business serving supper at such a late hour.’

Frau Wild hurried into speech. ‘No, sir, of course not. Normally she’s very good. I don’t know what held her up today. Perhaps the roasting jack broke again—’

‘I have no wish to hear excuses,’ Herr Wild said. ‘Where is Rudolf?’

No one answered.

‘
Rudolf!
’ he shouted.

Frau Wild covered her ears. ‘My nerves,’ she moaned.

A few minutes later a young man sauntered into the room. His golden locks were brushed forward in careful disarray onto his forehead, and he had a magnificent pair of gingery sideburns. His tall, athletic figure was squeezed into tight pantaloons and a cutaway coat with two rows of enormous brass buttons. Dortchen wondered where he had got the funds for such fine new clothes. Certainly not from his father.

‘No need to bellow, Father,’ he said. ‘I’m not deaf.’

‘Neither am I, you insolent dog, if that is what you mean to imply. Nor am I too old to tan your hide. How dare you keep us waiting!’

‘I’m not in for supper tonight, Father, I told you.’

Herr Wild pointed to the vacant seat. ‘While you live in my house, you will do as I say. Take your place, or I’ll kick you there myself.’

Rudolf strolled to his spot. ‘I suppose I may as well save my thalers and eat here.’

Herr Wild folded his hands and intoned, ‘Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest, and let thy gifts to us be blessed. Amen.’

‘Amen,’ the girls echoed.

Rudolf sighed and repeated, in a voice of long suffering, ‘Amen.’

‘Sit,’ Herr Wild said and everyone sat.

Herr Wild took a large slab of beef, piled cabbage and dumplings on top, then passed the platter to Rudolf, who served himself, then held the platter for his mother. Frau Wild dithered for a while, trying to choose the slice of meat with the least amount of fat. At last she took one, then added a tiny spoonful of cabbage. ‘My poor stomach can scarcely tolerate it, you know. Such a day I’ve had! I’ve barely the strength to eat a mouthful.’

‘Never mind, Mother,’ Lisette said. ‘Perhaps some orgeat will help.’ She poured her mother a glass of the sweet almond cordial. Frau Wild sipped it with a sigh.

By the time the platter reached Dortchen and Mia at the far end of the table, there was very little beef left. Mia sighed ostentatiously, and Lisette smiled and passed her some of hers. They ate in silence. Rudolf slipped his hand into his pocket and drew out his watch. Surreptitiously, he flipped open the case and glanced at its face.

‘It’s no use thinking you can sneak out once my back is turned.’ Herr Wild spoke without looking up from his meal. ‘I meant what I said, Rudolf. I will not have you gadding about town with those wild friends of yours, drinking and gambling and fraternising with loose women. Going out indeed! You will stay here and study your pharmacology books.’

‘But Father—’

‘Do not argue with me. By all accounts, war is coming and there’ll be money to be made. I need you to finish your apprenticeship and be ready to work by my side. You haven’t time for fooling around, Rudolf. Your Latin is execrable and your knowledge of the pharmacopoeia is weak. Even Dortchen knows more about plant properties than you do.’

‘That’s because she’s always grubbing around in the garden,’ Rudolf said.

‘Which is what you should be doing, not wasting your days going to cockfights and the races,’ his father responded.

‘Well, that’s certainly not where your proper little miss was this afternoon. I saw her sneaking in at ten past the hour. It’s her fault supper was late, so you can jaw at her for a change.’

Dortchen fixed her eyes on her plate.

Herr Wild laid down his knife and fork. ‘Dortchen Wild, were you late coming in this evening?’

Dortchen nodded her head. ‘Yes, Father.’

‘Why? Where were you?’

Dortchen did not reply for a moment, wondering whether it was a greater sin to lie than it was to disobey one’s father.

‘Hobnobbing with that Grimm girl, I bet,’ Rudolf said.

‘I … I did visit with Lotte and Frau Grimm, Father. But I was only a little late, it wasn’t ten past the hour.’ She shot a look at her brother. ‘I was held up. Lotte’s elder brothers had arrived. From university, you know. The biggest one, he said Strasbourg is full of French soldiers. The Grand Army’s on the march again.’

‘Against Austria?’ Rudolf exclaimed. ‘Father’s right, there will be war!’

‘What are we to do?’ Frau Wild lamented. ‘Will the Ogre march on Cassel?’

‘No need to fear,’ Herr Wild replied. ‘The Austrians will soon have the French running with their tail between their legs. Still, there’s no doubt the Kurfürst will be calling up new conscripts. Lucky for you, Rudolf, I can arrange an exemption—’

‘I don’t want an exemption,’ Rudolf burst out. ‘I don’t want to spend the whole war puking and purging and bloodletting and blistering. I want to fight! The best fun to ever happen around here and you want me to stay home swotting up on Latin!’

‘You’re a fool.’ Herr Wild pushed away his plate and stood up. ‘Your first day tending the wounded on a battlefield and you’ll be on your knees thanking the Good Lord that your father is wiser than you are.’

Rudolf stood up too, pushing back his chair so violently it fell over. He left the room, banging the door behind him.

Frau Wild fell back in her chair, one hand groping outwards. ‘My drops … where are my drops? All this noise, my nerves are shattered.’

Hanne hurried to find her mother’s drops while Lisette knelt beside her chair, wetting a napkin to press against her brow.

Herr Wild strode to the door and opened it. Pausing there, he turned back to address Dortchen. ‘As for you, Fraülein, you’ll spend your free afternoons this week doing God’s labour in the garden, and Sunday on your knees reciting your catechism.’

‘But Father,’ Dortchen cried before she could stop herself. As he turned to face her, she faltered. ‘This Sunday is the harvest festival.’ Even as she spoke, she knew it was no use.

‘You may look instead to the sanctity of your soul,’ Herr Wild said, and shut the door behind him.