The Carpenter's Wife Read online

  The screen collapsed into a thin line.

  Tom panted.

  Then he noticed that the little red light on the adult-channel box persisted. The stupid program still ran, costing 16 euros even without anybody watching.

  What now?

  Stark flung himself across the bed, grabbed the phone, and punched the number for the front desk, but nobody answered. Pick it up, man! Pick it up! Where they sleeping?

  “Réception, allô?”

  The Frenchman!

  “Michel! This is four-twenty—“

  “Monsieur Starkah! ‘Arley, ‘Arley. Bonsoir.”

  “Stark, yes… Harley. Michel. Listen, I accidentally set the adult channel in motion. I turned the TV off. I’m not interested in watching the program, but it’s still running. It’s… Can you…”

  “Let me check, sir.”

  After a thick pause of several eternities Michel said, “You are okay, Monsieur Stark. You can watch for three minutes before charges accrue. You are fine. I will switch it off for you.”

  The red light on the box went out.

  “It is off now, sir.”

  “Yes, it is, Michel. Say… can you disable it permanently?”

  “I’m afraid that is not possible, sir.”

  “Just a thought.” It was possible in American hotels.

  “Any further wishes, Monsieur Stark? A fan, maybe?”

  A fan! Why hadn’t he thought of that? Perhaps because here they didn’t have ceiling fans. In Saudi he’d stood under fans all the time. If you were damp, the breeze could chill you down to sub-zero—or so it felt.

  “Yes…” Stark hesitated. “How much would it cost per night?”

  “Thirty euros, sir.”

  Tom suppressed a gasp. Then he chuckled. “You’re taking it from the living, Michel. Thanks, but I think I’ll pass. That was all.”

  “Very well. Good night, Monsieur Stark.”

  “Good night, Michel. Don’t work too hard.”

  Tom replaced the handset with trembling fingers. Then he got up and stood under the shower again.

  5

  Saturday, 5 July 2003, Morning, 83°F/28°C

  Morning had broken, and again the sun ruled supreme. In the sky, there was not a cloud left to zap. Pulling the curtain away, Tom found the city beyond his window baking under a blanket of acidy smog. The air in his room was stifling, lacking oxygen as well.

  He yawned when he returned from the bathroom. Sitting down on the bed, he checked his watch on the nightstand. Almost eight, late enough. He reached for the handset and began to dial.

  “Stark,” said a pleasant female voice, adhering to the local custom to tell your name when you picked up the phone. It was thought of as polite.

  “Morning; it’s me.”

  “Hello.”

  Was that a sigh he’d caught on the other end? “How’s it going?”

  “It’s hot,” she said after a pause.

  “Same here. At least you can open the windows.”

  “You still can’t, huh?”

  “Nope. Same old.”

  When nothing came, Tom asked, “So, what’s new? How are the kids?”

  “Fine.”

  He played with the cord.

  “You didn’t call last night,” she said.

  “Came back late after the meet.”

  “You could have used somebody’s phone at the meeting.”

  He rolled his eyes. “I can’t do that; don’t be silly.”

  “Then you should finally get one.”

  Stark frowned. He eschewed mobile phones, being busy enough without one. And a radical analysis had shown him that most calls weren’t worth the extra cost.

  He ignored her undertone. “I meant to call, but I was busy all day. And when I got to the hotel it was already after eleven. Didn’t want to bother you then.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Tom saw his watch on the nightstand. He took it and crumpled the metal flex band in his fist. He released it, and it went back to its oval form.

  “Something wrong?” he asked.

  A second passed. “No.”

  “You’re sort of monosyllabic.”

  “No, I’m fine.”

  Tom leaned back against the headboard of the bed and held his watch to his hear; the ticking got loud. “Look,” he said, putting the watch down, “a minute on the phone with you here puts the church back by eighty cents”—euro cents—“don’t you want to fill me in on what’s new?”

  “Okay, wait.” After a rustle of static the phone clicked off.

  Tom stared at the receiver. His anger was about to flare when he remembered that she probably meant to call him back from the house. A long distance call cost 2.6 cents per minute when she phoned, not the 80 the hotel charged. He put the receiver down, got up, and paced the floor, praying for the time being.

  After seven endless minutes he scratched his head and called her again.

  “Stark?”

  “Why’d you hang up on me?”

  “Sorry. I thought I’d call you back but couldn’t find the number. Ben must have fed it to the dog.”

  Tom sighed. Ben. Clumsy, lovable, daydreaming little Ben. The Stark’s seven-year-old son was finishing second grade now. She always picked on him. It seemed.

  The number…

  “No problem. Let me give it to you again.”

  He dictated each cipher, waited until she had hung up, and put the receiver down. Thirty seconds later his phone rang.

  “Alright. Now tell me what’s up.”

  She inhaled slowly and said, “The faucet in the kitchen finally died.”

  “Romy…”

  “It’s all chalked up again. I’m cleaning the sieve, but it clogs up faster than you can say—”

  “Sorry about that. I promise, you’ll get a new one.”

  “You already promised me that two months ago.”

  “You’ll get one. I just didn’t get around to picking one up last week. You know how much was going on before I left, you said so yourself. And on top of that I had to sort out Carlos and Maria.”

  “Well, I’ve been washing dishes in the bathroom for the last two days. That’s a lot of fun. Ben’s cracking up watching me.”

  Tom fiddled with the chord, staring at the ceiling. “What about Ben?”

  “His reading is terrible, we’ve worked on it all day yesterday. And you should see his Deutsch exercise book. It’s a disaster, red marks everywhere. And he’s fresh. He pick’s on her”—Sarah—“constantly.” She gave an irritated growl. “You can spank him first thing when you get back.”

  Stark gnawed on his lower lip. “How’s his math?”

  She mellowed. “He was King of Math again Thursday.”

  After a test, the best in class got a certificate that the teacher had made up. Ben was a permanent top scorer. In math. Writing German was different. But the kid was perfectly bilingual at age seven, equally at home in English and German. So was five-year-old Sarah.

  “And how’s the Princess?”

  “Oh, she’s doing fine. She’ll be the main character in this year’s Kindergarten play.”

  “Hey, that’s great. Wow. What are they giving?”

  “It’s called Oma’s Grand Fairy Tales. She’ll be Oma. I already got a granny wig and a handbag from Dagmar. I’ll make her dress this coming week. She’s so cute... But how’s your week? Learning something?”

  “Things you wouldn’t believe.”

  “Really. Like what?”

  Romy knew that her husband hadn’t gone to Munich for the teachings. Many of the problems—mostly with people—which the pastors there discussed he had already solved for his own church. He just wasn’t in a position to share his solutions, he didn’t have a name. Yet. But listening to leader after leader presenting dramatic intra-church situations, Tom realized he was the luckiest man in the bunch. When he shared some of his solutions, the others just creased their lips and looked at him skeptically. No. He wasn’t in a position
to teach. That’s why personal contacts were so important at this time, and that was why he was here. He sought community, friendship. With people like Abe Lincoln.

  “Listen, another pastor and I happened to take a walk in a park yesterday—”

  “So, you did have some time off.”

  “Well, yes. Sure. But let me tell you what we found—”

  “The kids were asking for you.”

  “Ugh. For all practical purposes, you could have called me and left a message. Anyway.” He sat up. “Let me tell you about that creek; I’ve never in my life seen stuff like yesterday afternoon...”

  She was quiet now, listening as he related his experiences in the park. He skipped Tina, but he did speak about the confusion he’d sensed on the banks of the Eisbach.

  “So,” she said after he was done, “I gather, you and your pastor buddy were having fun down there on the fourth of July. Staring at women. In public! Tom, that’s disgusting.”

  His jaw dropped.

  She went on, “If you think I’ll streak through the yard now because you find yourself partial to this kind of stuff, you can forget it.” Their lot was surrounded by a dense hedge of white cedars. “I’m not about to moon anybody. What are you doing down there?”

  “Rom’, get a grip.” He exhaled. “I never said I liked what I saw. Matter of fact, I was appalled, mostly. This agitates me. I just need somebody to talk to about this. And besides, I miss you.”

  “I bet you miss me, buster. But I’m not going to turn into some kind of cheap person for you. You got yourself the wrong girl for this kind of stuff. You better get your act together before you come back here.”

  “Rom’.” He shook his head. “This is going downhill fast. I’m going to put the phone down now.” She tried to interrupt, but he wouldn’t let her. “I don’t need this so early in the morning. Listen, I’ll call back later.”

  “Going back to the park?”

  “Oh, be quiet!”

  “Tom—!”

  “I’m sorry.” He massaged his forehead. “Tell the kids I love them, will you?”

  “Tom…”

  “Bye now.”

  He depressed the lever.

  6

  Saturday, 5 July 2003, Noon, 98°F/37°C

  The morning sessions had passed, the conference was once again in recess, and they decided to go for lunch in The Argentine, a superb steak house with manageable prices in Schwabing, right next to the U6 Gisela Straße subway exit. Coming up, the hands on the round face of the U-Bahn clock signaled a few minutes past 12, and when they entered, the restaurant with its low ceiling and massive beams was filled to overflowing with businessmen and young professionals. But after a surprisingly short time they were seated in a booth surrounded by darkened wood, where the lights were dim and secrets could be shared.

  Abe Lincoln gently shook his head. “The devil always strikes at critical times,” he said, “such as during an important conference. And he always hits low blows.”

  Tom had mentioned the spat with Romy before sinking his teeth into a bite of medium-well done sirloin. Next to it on the plate sat a baked potato filled with sour cream and some decorative salad. The food was delicious.

  “But let me tell you something.” Weiss made a ponderous pause. “I think you don’t listen to your wife.”

  Tom coughed with the meat in his mouth. Then he asked, “You know me that well?”

  Rainer shrugged. “Most men don’t.”

  Stark stared at him, unblinking. “Go on.”

  “There’s a fundamental truth about women,” Weiss said, sawing one of his beef strips apart. “It’s this: There are moments when you can’t toss their every word onto the gold scale. Took me years to learn that. Sometimes women don’t share their opinion when they talk. Strictly speaking, they share their feelings, their mood. In a situation like that you don’t listen to the words she says but to the emotion she conveys.”

  Tom listened.

  “She doesn’t want your answers.”

  “I didn’t have any,” Stark said with an innocent face. “We didn’t even talk about problems.”

  “Anyway.” Rainer’s eyes cast a glance at him that said, Don’t fool me. “I’m talking principle.” He began to munch. “By the way, do you feel your wife is a nag?”

  Tom chuckled. “Now that you mention it…”

  Weiss put the steak knife down and pointed his bony forefinger at him, evoking Uncle Sam. “Your fault.” He munched again.

  Stark digested the stab and then said, “How come?”

  Rainer reached for his inevitable beer mug and asked, “Tell me, when you talked to her, did she complain about something she’d asked you to do and you hadn’t done it yet?” He drank.

  Stark poked around on his plate. “The kitchen faucet.”

  “The kitchen faucet!” Weiss was aghast. He wiped his mouth and sat back with a frown, staring at Tom in disbelief. “The kitchen faucet?”

  Stark shrugged. “The house we rent was built in Nineteen Sixty and the building materials they used weren’t very good, including the pipes, I guess. Now they’re so chalky, they clog up all the time. When they do, there’s not a lot of water coming through. She says she’s been doing dishes in the bathroom.”

  “The kitchen faucet.” Weiss shook his head.

  “In the kitchen it’s the warm water that doesn’t run properly; in the bathroom the cold one doesn’t.” Tom took a swig of his Apfelschorle, a mix of apple juice and mineral water. “For a couple of weeks she’s complained that not enough water is coming through in the kitchen. Looked like plenty to me. She says it’s because the faucet is broke.”

  “And you dismissed her, because you know it’s the pipes, correct? You didn’t even bother to check.”

  Tom drilled his eyes into Weiss’s. “How do you know this?”

  “I’m prophetic.”

  “You’re reading my mail.”

  Weiss sighed briefly. “I’ve been a pastor for over ten years now, and all that time I’ve studied relationships and the differences between men and women. I’m confronted with them every day, and with the problems they generate too. Like right now.” His face took on a wily expression. “I guess that made me prophetic. To a certain degree.”

  “You’re happy with your wife?”

  “Very.”

  “Was it always that way?”

  “No. Actually, the first two years were pretty frightful.”

  “How’d you become happy? She change?”

  “We both worked on our marriage. We were dedicated to it. Been married for twenty years this coming August.”

  Stark was finished with his meal. He pushed the plate out of the way and put his elbows on the table. “Do you believe there’s such a thing as a match made in heaven?”

  Weiss, still busy with his meat, glanced up at him. “You mean, do I believe that there’s a perfect partner for the lonely heart, guaranteeing a stress-free marriage ever after?”

  Tom grinned. “Something like that.”

  “No.” Rainer’s answer had been quick. “The closest to a perfect match would be Adam and Eve. But you remember, she ate him out of house and garden.” He chewed again.

  Tom chuckled.

  “He didn’t divorce her.”

  “He didn’t have a choice. There were no other women—“

  “That’s beside the point.” Weiss washed the food down with a generous gulp from his mug. “He understood that he had a covenant with her.”

  Tom heaved a drawn-out sigh.

  Weiss caught on. His eyes were on the plate when he casually said, “The perfect match… Even if it’s obvious that God has teamed two people up, that doesn’t guarantee that they’ll automatically become happy with one another. They still have to put some serious effort into their relationship.

  “Take Isaac and Rebecca, for instance.” Abe Lincoln settled comfortably into his bench. “When you read their story, there’s no doubt that God had a hand in getting them together
. His fingerprints are all over it. I mean, Abraham’s servant arrives in this strange city Haran, prays, and gets his prayer answered to the letter—in record time. He meets a girl, Rebecca, which meets all requirements of his master and then some. She’s from a good family, Abraham’s own; she’s sugar-sweet, in her prime, a knock-out, has everything going for her. But she still volunteers to join a complete stranger on a journey across hundreds of dangerous miles to a foreign land so she can marry a forty-year-old guy she’s never seen.

  “Think of it.

  “What are the odds? I’m telling you, she was either desperate or God had a hand in it.”

  Tom mulled it over. “Too young for desperation.”

  “See? Only God can work on a woman’s heart like that. Most are singularly obsessed with security—got to honor that need, by the way. But here you find one who acts against the female grain. Very unusual.”

  Abe Lincoln began to gesture. “Now, God brought them together; so, you’d think it’s all hunky dory for them now, all downhill. But it wasn’t. On the contrary. She moves in, and the problems begin.

  “They have two sons, Esau and Jacob, who waste no time and begin to fight in their mother’s womb. They’re born, and then both parents pick favorites.

  “Not smart.

  “After a while Mom decides that wild man Esau isn’t worthy of the inheritance, so she helps her boy, Jacob, to trick Dad into blessing him by lying to him, posing as Esau. Their miserable trick works, and Jacob is now blessed. And rich. But he has to flee, because word gets around that Esau’s so mad, he’s about to kill his brother. So Jacob skips town one night—without his inheritance—and Mom has to go on living with her betrayed husband and with Daddy’s hairy-man, the chest-thumper, until the daylight goes out of her. I’m sure they lived in perfect harmony.”

  Tom’s gaze wandered about on the table; his ears were attentive.

  “I’d say this perfect, God-ordained match had serious problems, wouldn’t you? The Lord God Almighty puts them together, and they mess it up, royally.

  “But there’s hope, even for disaster couples.” His tone revealed that Weiss had given the matter serious study. “Look at David and Bathsheba.”