59 
Strangers in Wengen

As if the skies over Switzerland had been roused to blustery fury in response to Amanda’s departure from the Chalet of Hope, within a few hours—as she now rode northward toward Bern and Basel on a course that would eventually take her to France, and just as Father Stein had foretold—great black clouds continued to approach from the south.

It was late in the day when two strangers, whose feet were nearly as cold as their hearts, made their way along Wengen’s deserted main street. They had arrived only a short while earlier on a hired donkey cart whose unbelievably slow pace had infuriated Ramsay nearly to rage. As yet they had not seen a soul.

“This is a small enough village,” shivered Ramsay. “Surely we will be able to—”

He glanced around as they reached a side street.

“There is an old woman up ahead!” he exclaimed, pointing down the lane to his left. “—Hey, Hausfrau!” he called, running forward toward the bent form struggling against the wind with bag in one hand and walking cane in the other.

She continued on, giving no reply or other indication that she had heard a thing, which in this wind she may not have. The ground was frozen enough, however, to make certain the footsteps running up behind her sounded clearly.

Ramsay caught up and ran in front of her to block her way.

“Get out of my way, you young—” she began.

“Didn’t you hear me?” said Ramsay rudely. The long day, intolerable ride, and frigid cold had long since laid waste any patience he might have possessed, which even on his best days was not much. “I’m talking to you.”

“I heard you and I didn’t like what I heard,” she returned in kind, brushing her way past him. But again Ramsay stepped forward and blocked her way.

“Keep your temper, old woman,” he said. “All we want to know is where someone named Reinhardt lives.”

“Mind your own business and leave me be!” she retorted. “The chalet concerns me no more than you do yourself. Now let me pass.”

“What chalet?” said Ramsay.

Bitten by a sudden whim of concern, not so much for the sisters themselves but for any inhabitant of her village over this rude stranger, the reply which now met Ramsay’s ears was more cryptic than he had patience for.

“Ow, there’s chalets here and chalets there,” she said, still struggling to get by. “The Alps is full of chalets.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean nothing, only that you’ll get no more out of me.”

She shoved past again, this time giving Ramsay a sharp whack with her cane.

He winced in pain, his anger now roused to fury. He took yet another step forward, reaching out and grabbing hold of her shoulder. Momentarily, however, he had met his match. She spun around, fire in her eyes, and attacked him with her cane more vigorously than before. A volley of abuse poured from her lips. Before Ramsay knew what was happening, he had received two more blows, one to his shoulder, one to his midsection.

Incensed, he lurched sideways, then grabbed at the swinging weapon. After two or three tries, he latched on to it, wrenched it from her grasp, and threw it across the street. Reacting on impulse rather than thought, the next instant a blow from the back of his hand slapped against the side of the woman’s face.

She fell backward onto the frozen ground with a shriek, more of wrath than pain, unleashing a torrent of profanity at her assailant. Had she possessed the Luger that was inside Ramsay’s coat at that moment, he would have been a dead man within seconds. As it was, the rapid fire of her verbal assault met only Ramsay’s cruel laughter in the howling wind.

“Let’s go, Halifax,” said Scarlino, pulling him away. “You are growing more mad by the second.”

Already darkness had begun to set in. By now the entire Jungfrau region was blowing a tempest and the temperature had dropped ten degrees. The two returned in the direction of the main street.

In the warmth of his own cottage, in spite of the wind Herr Buchmann heard his neighbor’s cry of pain. He glanced out the window, saw nothing, then grabbed his coat and hurried out the door.

It did not take him more than a minute or two to discover Frau Grizzel’s form lying in the street halfway between their two cottages. The tussle with Ramsay, the blow to her face, combined with the wind and the cold, had rendered the poor woman powerless to regain her footing. Had not Herr Buchmann arrived when he did, she would certainly have frozen to death within the hour.

“Frau Grizzel . . . Frau Grizzel!” he exclaimed, hastening forward and stooping down beside her. “What has happened!”

Exhausted, well aware of her danger, and thus feeling an overpowering sense of what had not stirred her heart for years, that is thankfulness, Frau Grizzel was not inclined to hurl unkind and accusatory threats toward both attacker and rescuer altogether as might have been her inclination at any other time. For once she held her peace and allowed the strong arms of the schoolmaster and librarian to assist her.

“It’s some gash you’ve got on your cheek, poor woman,” said Herr Buchmann, pulling her to a sitting position, then managing to get an arm under her shoulder. “We’ll get you to my cottage, where a warm fire and a cup of tea and a dab of salve will help get the strength back in your legs.”

Remarkably, the old woman did not argue. When Herr Buchmann had her on her feet and began leading her away in the direction of his home rather than hers, with his arm still around her to steady her wobbly feet, even then she did not resist.

In truth, for the first time in more years than she could remember, tea and a fire in the company of another human being sounded to her heart as a very balm sent from heaven.