Kathleen Creighton - The Top Gun's Return

"What does 'H.W.' stand for?" she asked Sigfrid.

"Hochwasser," he answered unhelpfully, and it was Tristan who provided the translation.

"That's 'high water'-the mark where the water came to in that particular flood year."

Jessie stared at him. "You're kidding. You mean-" She looked at Sigfrid, who shrugged and muttered something, evidently the German equivalent of "C'est la vie."

"The river floods," Tristan said with the same shrug. "It's a narrow valley, and when conditions are right…hey, it's not that big a deal here. They expect it, and cope with it. Like Canadians and snow." He pointed to a marker halfway up the row. "This one, 1954-that must be the one Dad remembers. They lived-" he paused, then gestured toward a pair of windows high in the gable of the Gasthaus , two floors above the door "-right there."

Jessie gasped. "Right here? Your dad lived in this house?"

He gave another shrug. "Might have. I don't know which one, exactly, but he told me after the war his mother worked as a cook in one of the Gasthauses fronting the river, and they lived in a room upstairs." His dark smile flickered. "So at least they never went hungry. In the wintertime he walked to school in Traben-Trarbach. Summers he worked in the vineyards-gave whatever money he made to his mother. He left for Canada the year after the flood. He was eighteen then."

They waved a final goodbye to Sigfrid and went back to the car. There were others out enjoying the brisk sunshine now-a middle-aged woman walking a dog, a young mother with two small children bundled in sweaters and knit caps against the chilly wind. Jessie waved to them and got tentative-and surprised-little waves in return.

At Al Sharpe's suggestion, Jessie had asked the guest house kitchen to pack a small cooler with sandwiches and fruit for Tristan, who was almost constantly hungry and tended, Al had confided to her with a grin, to get testy when forced to wait for his meals. Still feeling the effects of the wine she'd drunk, Jessie wasn't at all hungry and nibbled on a plum while Tris downed a chunk of thick German wurst wrapped in a stubby bun and slathered with hot German mustard. Afterward she tossed bits of the bun to the swans, while Tris leaned on his cane and watched her with unreadable eyes and a crooked smile.

Back in the car, following Sigfrid's directions they turned uphill, passing through a tiny triangular town "square" where a statue of a wolf loomed menacingly from a bed of yellow daffodils. The narrow, brick-paved street wound past slender stone churches with tall slate steeples, and between yellow and white half-timbered houses with carved shutters. Here and there Jessie saw an elderly man or woman out in front of a house tending a postage-stamp-size garden. She waved at them all. In her mellow state she thought the town was enchanting-like a toy village. It reminded her of Disney movies- Pinocchio, maybe.

They found the cemetery easily. It was a rectangular plot enclosed by a thick green hedge located just at the edge of the town, before the vineyards began. Within this secluded lot, separated by immaculate gravel pathways, each grave-site was framed by a low curbing of concrete or stone, and inside each frame was a tiny garden, lovingly tended, with a carved headstone at one end. Armed only with a date, Tristan and Jessie wandered the gravel pathways until they found the gravestone they were looking for. It bore a simple cross, the name Hannah Bauer, and the dates: 1906-1975.

"There," Tris said. "That's my grandmother. Dad's mother."

"She wasn't very old," Jessie murmured. She found the child-size gardens enchanting. Kneeling to touch the fat purple stalk of a hyacinth bloom, she looked up at Tristan, silhouetted against the sky. "Who tends them?"

"The graves? Members of the families, mostly, I'd guess."

"But you don't have any family left here."

"I seem to remember Dad telling me he sends money to the church. They have somebody who takes care of it." His voice sounded faraway. He propped his cane against the headstone and took a throw-away camera out of his jacket pocket, snapped a picture, then dropped the camera back in his pocket. He picked up the cane, plainly ready to move on.

Jessie scrambled to her feet, brushing bits of gravel from the knees of her best gray wool slacks. "Where's your grandfather's grave? Is he buried here too?"

He shook his head. "He was killed in the war. I don't think Dad even knows where he's buried."

"You could probably find out. The government must know. Wouldn't they have some kind of record?" In her enthusiasm she didn't notice how distant he'd become.

"Unless they were destroyed. You have to remember, this country lost the war. Things were pretty chaotic toward the end and for a long time afterward. Anything to do with government or the military was in ruins."

Jessie nodded somberly, but it was a glorious spring day with cotton clouds drifting in a cobalt sky, the scent of new grass and hyacinths perfuming the air. Her head was pleasantly fogged with wine; the horrors of war-all wars-seemed far away.

They got back in the car and, once again following Sigfrid's directions, easily found the road that led to the ruins of the Kloster , which they could see now, rising out of a wooded knoll above the gently sloping vineyards. For most of the way the wide, paved road ran arrow straight between fields of well-groomed vines that were just beginning to send new tendrils curling along their wire supports. Past the vineyards, pavement gave way to dirt and gravel that had been washed and rutted by winter rains, and then that, too, ended at a heavy rope barrier looped between two low posts. Beyond the barrier a grassy track angled upward along the hillside and disappeared into the woods.

Jessie stopped the car with its bumper nudging the rope barricade and peered through the windshield. "Oops-far as we go," she said, but Tristan had his door open and was already maneuvering himself out of the car. She hastily shut off the motor and scrambled after him. "You want to walk up there?"

He paused to look at her. "You want to see it, don't you?"

"Well, sure I do, but-"

"Then it looks like we're gonna have to walk."

"But what about-I mean, are you sure you're up to it?"

"Jessie." His voice was gentle and very soft. "I'm fine."

"But, your knee-"

No longer gentle, he snapped, "Dammit, I said I'm fine. "

But there were no clouds in her sky this morning. She hooked her arm around his and gave it a quick hug, flashed him a grin and in a voice that was pure Georgia, said, "Darlin', am I motherin' you?"

Thoroughly ashamed, Tristan let out his breath in a whispering chuckle, and with it went a little of the tension that had been building in him since the cemetery. Something about seeing his grandmother's name carved in cold gray stone, with pansies and hyacinths clustered all around…He didn't begin to understand the tension, and what's more, he didn't intend to try.

"Yeah, you are," he said, and gave her his poor excuse for a smile.

The fact that it seemed to be enough for her humbled him. She smiled back at him, her nose crinkling across the bridge in that way he loved, and he felt her body snuggle close to him, her breast nudging full and soft against his arm. His heart thumped and his belly warmed, and he eased himself out of her embrace as gently as he could and took her hand instead.

She's more than a little bit buzzed, he thought. And happy. After the fear and tension of the past few days, her happiness-the sparkle in her amber eyes, the glow in her cheeks-made his throat ache. She reminded him of warm, sunshiny things. She was full-blown roses and ripe peaches and hot sand beaches. And he…he was still darkness. He was rain clouds and 2:00 a.m. nightmares and cold empty rooms. Please God, he prayed, don't let me do anything to spoil this for her. Not today.