‘Is that so,’ Johann said, fancying that he saw a glint in Ava’s eye as she spoke. He smiled playfully and reached an arm around her. ‘I hope he hasn’t been too charming with you,’ he added as he pulled her to the ground and began to tickle her.
‘Stop it!’ Ava started screaming with laughter. ‘Of course he’s not been charming with me.’ She screamed again. ‘Stop! You know I can’t take it!’
Johann let her go. He rolled back onto the grass and Ava lay beside him with her head on his shoulder, each gazing up at the drifting clouds, which Johann thought were one of the few constants that remained unchanged by and oblivious to the war raging beneath them.
‘I don’t suppose you’ve given much thought to where you’d like to live when the war is over,’ Ava said. ‘I’m sure my parents wouldn’t mind, but we can’t live with them forever.’
Johann didn’t care to think that far ahead. ‘With you,’ he said. ‘That’s about as far as I got. As long as it’s with you, I really don’t mind.’
‘I’ve often thought how nice it would be to live in the mountains. I know the winters would be cold but we’d keep each other warm.’
‘How would I make a living?’
Ava shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I hadn’t thought very far ahead, either. How do you want to make a living?’
The question stumped Johann. In many ways he felt as if he’d been a soldier since the day he could walk. His father and the Hitler Youth had seen to that. Soldiering was all he knew.
When he didn’t answer, Ava rolled on top of him and said, ‘Would you like children?’ With Johann having been away so much since their wedding the year before, she hadn’t raised the question before. ‘Please say you would.’
‘Yes, of course,’ Johann said, smiling. ‘And you can teach them all to play the piano.’
‘And a dog?’
‘I doubt you could teach a dog to play the piano, but you can try.’
Ava slapped him and he laughed. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘and a dog if you like.’
Lowering her head onto Johann’s chest, Ava asked, ‘Do you ever think that if you imagine yourself in the future then that future will come true?’
‘What an odd question. How do you mean?’
‘Well, I’ve been picturing us living in the mountains after the war, with three children and a dog. I think if I keep imagining you there then you’ll come home to me when all this is over and we’ll be happy.’
‘I thought we were happy.’
‘How can I be truly happy when I worry about you so much? After our wedding, when you went back to your soldiering, I cried myself to sleep for weeks. I still do.’
‘I’m sorry, Ava,’ Johann said. ‘I wish it could be different. I wish this war had never begun, but then of course, we might never have met.’ He wrapped his arms around her and held her close as his lips found hers. And in that moment the war became so distant to him that he lost all concept of the fact that he had to return to his unit in just two days. When at last their kiss ended and reality caught up with him again, he added, ‘I’m going to survive this, Ava. I’ll survive it for you, you’ll see.’
‘I believe you will, Johann.’
He felt Ava’s warm breath on his neck as she spoke, and he just held her in his arms. She seemed so fragile to him—so vulnerable. His gaze returned to the clouds, and he wished with all his heart that he could be with her always, to love and protect her, and while he didn’t think it would do much good to imagine any kind of future against such cruel uncertainty, as he closed his eyes he pictured that house in the mountains Ava had spoken of, and the many children he hoped they would have once the war was over.
Chapter Twenty-One
Present day.
Sitting up on the bed in his hotel room next to Jean, having exhausted the limited research he felt they were able to conduct into Ava Bauer, Tayte put his thoughts about her aside for now, in favour of more certain odds of finding some new information useful to his search.
‘Let’s move on to Volker Strobel’s marriage to Trudi Scheffler,’ he said. ‘Without access to Ava Bauer’s vital records, we could be chasing our tails all night looking for the right person. At least Strobel’s and Scheffler’s marriage was notable enough to get a mention online. Supposing for now that Karl had come to believe Strobel was his father, for that to be true Strobel had to have fathered a child. Given that he’d married Scheffler during the war, there’s a good chance she’d be the child’s mother.’
Jean brought up one of the web pages she’d saved from previous searches. ‘There’s a bit about Strobel’s marriage to Scheffler on this website about the world’s most-wanted war criminals,’ she said as she scrolled down to the pertinent information.
Tayte edged closer to get a better look. He scoffed as he began to read. ‘That’s quite an infamous guest list,’ he said, noting the names of some of the more prominent Nazi Party members to have been invited to the Strobel family Schloss for the wedding.