TheBanyanTree: EDIE & BILL

[Sharon Mack]

This is a ruff draft of one story I would like to write about my mother
and father.  It is their beginning.  They have so many stories and I
would like to tell them.  I am having a difficult time (emotionally and
otherwise) so I am posting it and would appreciate any comments and
suggestions.  


EDIE & BILL


The war had ended and Edeltraut left her home behind.  She could hear
the guns and bombs to the east and the rumors were that the Russians
were on their way in, coming from that direction.  Rumor was the
Americans were coming into the country from the west.  It was clearly
understood that when your nation was defeated, you DID not want to be in
a town that the Russians were coming into.  They wore the banner of
'Allies' but only because they were aligned with the United States. 
They were greatly feared by the German citizenry, now a defeated
nation.
 
With one suitcase, a friend and her sister, Edeltraut moved west,
starting out on foot.  They were cold and frightened but they pressed on
knowing that staying could mean torture, rape or even death.  Along the
way they found a myriad of jeeps, tanks and other military vehicles left
where they had stopped along the side of the road, all out of gas.  Jews
were let out of the small wayside interim camps and left to roam the
streets of the towns where no food could be found and shelter was
damaged or destroyed by the bombs that had been dropped prior to the
invasion by the Allies.  People moved in small groups to large crowds,
trying to get away.  Only the old and disabled were left behind to face
the horror of a Russian takeover.  The American or English zones were
their goals.  Those were the safe havens, where a human being was
treated like a human being.
 
With a few stopovers and some rides that they were able to hitch the
three women finally made it to the English Zone.  Seeking work and a
place to stay, they rested for a month or so before pressing on.  Munich
now was their goal.  It was a city they knew. The three women had often
visited there in their youth with their families, and as good as the
British were, it was said that the Americans were even better.
 
Finally, after many days on foot they reached Munich at last, too weary
to even celebrate the fact that they had made it safe and sound. The
only work available to the German women was housekeeping.  Greta,
Edeltraut's friend and fellow traveler, found work in the barracks for
the non-commissioned officers, Edeltraut and her sister for commanding
officers and their families.  Edeltraut's position was in a large
beautiful house with a wide winding stairway made of deep rich cherry
wood.  The Colonel and his wife and their Boxer named Freundlich
(meaning, Friend) were the only inhabitants. The work was light and the
Colonel and his wife treated Edeltraut kindly.  Freundlich fell
instantly in love with the beautiful young woman and refused to leave
her side.  He crowded into her small closet of a room and demanded most
of the single sized bed.  He sat at her side during all of her meals
begging with a single paw left lightly on her thigh.  Freundlich waited
for Edeltraut every morning after his walk with his Mistress just so he
could make the rounds of the great beautiful house with her. He waited
patiently as she cleaned and cooked and hung the laundry to dry.  His
greatest treat was when they walked together in the beautiful streets of
Munich in the evening after Edeltraut had finished for the day.
 
One day there was to be a fancy cocktail party for all the 'Big
Brass.'  Edeltraut didn't know much English but she understood
'brass.'  She could see how nervous her Mistress was and quickly went to
work trying to calm the woman's fears.  Edeltraut's family had hosted
many such parties for her Father's and Uncle's business partners and
associates.  She had watched Anna, their maid do it a million times
growing up and had even helped when she was younger, before she had been
allowed to actually attend the beautiful parties.
 
Soon it was time for the guests to begin to arrive.  Edeltraut was sent
upstairs to dress.  Freundlich as usual trotted along behind her afraid
he would miss out on something.  Unfortunately Edeltraut found the dog
had napped at some point in the day on her freshly pressed uniform.  It
was creased and wrinkled and had boxer hair all over the smooth black
cloth.  Quickly Edeltraut gave the uniform a good brushing but the
pressing took longer than she had expected.  Soon she could hear her
Mistress's nervous anxious voice coming from the back stairs.
 
"Edie," as they had dubbed her,  "Edie, please hurry.  The guests are
arriving.  Come down the front stairs and get their wraps, please. 
They're piling up on the divan in the hall.  Hurry!"
 
As soon as Edeltraut could run a brush through her hair she ran down
the hall to the stairs.  As she was hurrying down the stairs a young
officer came through the front door.  He wore no coat, just his
Eisenhower jacket over his uniform and Garrison cap.  Snow had gathered
on his shoulders and around the edges of his hair.  Edeltraut stopped,
she couldn't move.  Suddenly he looked up.  When he saw her he removed
his cap and nodded.  His dark eyes took in her frame and scanned her
face, and then....then he smiled a slow easy smile.  Edeltraut smiled a
hesitant smile back.
 
In seconds (which seemed like minutes) he was gone, swept away by other
guests.
 
"Edie...come on, please, help me with these coats."  Edie's mistress
handed her a heavy load of damp coats as soon as she descended the
steps.  "Edie?  Are you all right?  You look like you've seen a ghost? 
By the way, where's Freundlich?  I don't want him down here.  Put him in
your room so he's out of way.  After you've hung up the coats in the
guest room, come down and help me with drinks, then you can pass the
hors d'oeuvres......Edie?  Did you hear me?
 
Edeltraut came to her senses and nodded.  Quickly she turned and headed
for the stairs again to rid herself of the heavy damp burden and to put
Freundlich away in her room.  She couldn't get the man's face out of her
mind.  It was his eyes.  They had smiled with his mouth.  Suddenly she
had the strangest thought.  It came from nowhere, totally unbidden.  She
suddenly knew that she was going to marry that man.  Edeltraut laughed
out loud.
 
***********************
 
Bill Atherholt was the handsomest man at the party.  All the
officers' wives said so.  Every chance they got they tried to
engage him in conversation.  Bill Atherholt was a good man and a good
officer.  All of the top Brass said so.  They liked having Bill on their
team in whatever project they had going.  He was young, smart and
diligent and had a way with his troops.  He would go far.
 
The Colonel came over to greet him, hand outstretched. "Bill, good to
see you.  Did you have any trouble finding the place?  Beautiful, isn't
it?  Go on over to the bar and Margaret will see to it that you get a
good stiff drink."
 
Bill took the outstretched hand and nodded, "Sure is...what do you and
Margaret do with all this space?"
 
"Throw big parties!"  They both laughed.
 
The night stretched on and Bill found himself searching for the young
woman he had seen on the stairs.  He wondered who she was and to whom
she belonged.  Was she a guest servant hired for the night or did she
work here as a permanent employee?  He wanted to see her again.  He
wanted to meet her.  As soon as he could he tried to make his way to the
kitchen.  Maybe he would find her there helping to prepare food for the
guests. 
										
  
The kitchen was empty.  The bright lights showed plate after plate of
food but no one was there.  Bill turned around and walked back to the
front stairs.  He decided he would ask the Colonel after the party who
she was.  Now he couldn't wait for the night to end.

*************************

Epilogue:

My mother told me that my father did, indeed, ask the Colonel about her
and after only a few days she found herself in his arms.  She said that
when he kissed her goodnight they couldn't part.  They kissed and
kissed and kissed.  The next day, when they met again they laughed. 
Both of them had sore lips from the night before.

No one minded that the young lieutenant dated the beautiful German girl
but when he said he wanted to marry her, everyone came against them. 
The Colonel and his wife called my father into a secret meeting trying
to dissuade him from marrying a German.  My mother sat on those great
stairs where she had first seen my father and wept into Freundlich's
strong back.  When my father emerged from the secret meeting she could
see that he was weeping, too.  He told my mother to go upstairs and pack
her things.  She left with him that day.  They never parted.

They would eventually marry and he would take her and their small
daughter to America where they would have four more children and share
their lives for fifty-two years.  They passed away a few years ago a
mere three years apart.  My father died first of cancer.   Just before
my mother passed away she had a stroke.  When we visited her one sunny
afternoon, we found her looking quietly out the window of her hospital
room.  The sky was blue and the clouds were moving swiftly across the
sky.  

As we stood at the foot of her bed, she suddenly smiled and for one
lucid moment she reached out her hand toward the window and called my
father's name, "Billy!  She said softly,  "Hi, Billy."  Her
voice was as young as the sky was blue.

She died a few weeks later.