A Song for Summer

Since it was obvious that both Juan and Fr@aulein Waaltraut, like the tinned mango shards from impoverished African countries, belonged to Hallendorf's tradition of succoring the needy irrespective of worth, Ellen continued to be surprised by the wooden table scrubbed to whiteness and the pots and pans scoured and neatly stacked. Clearly there was someone else working down here and presently she found her; not in the kitchen itself but in the scullery, washing up the breakfast things.

Ellen came on her unobserved and as she watched, her spirits rose. The girl was very young--not more than eighteen--and dressed in a spotless dirndl: a blue sprigged skirt, a pink bodice, a white blouse. Her blonde hair was pinned neatly round her head, she was small and sturdy and she worked with a steady rhythm and concentration, as though what she was doing was ... what she was doing, and nothing else.

"Grass Gott," said Ellen, holding

out her hand. "I'm the new supervisor --my name is Ellen."

The girl turned, wiped her hands. "I'm Lieselotte," she said--but as she dropped a curtsy Ellen had to restrain herself from rushing forward and taking the girl into her arms. For this might have been Henny, come back from the dead: Henny as she had been in her own country, wholesome, giving and good.

"Tell me, Lieselotte, was it you who boiled the eggs and made the poppy seed rolls on Sunday?"'

Lieselotte nodded. "Yes. I am not supposed to cook, I'm just here to clean and wash up, but on Sundays Fr@aulein Waaltraut isn't here and--"' She flushed. "It's difficult. I am thinking of giving in my notice."

"Oh no!" Ellen shook her head with vehemence. "You can't possibly do that. Don't even think of it. From now on it is you and I who are going to do the cooking."

The girl's face lit up. "Oh, I love to cook. Everyone thinks Austrian food is heavy and greasy, but that's only bad Austrian cooking. My mother's omelettes are like feathers and her buttermilk is so fresh and good."

"Your mother taught you to cook, then?"' "Yes."

"And do you have any brothers and sisters? We shall need some help because I have to work upstairs as well."

"I have two sisters. They wanted to come but my mother thought it wouldn't be good ... they're young--

and sometimes the children behave so badly."

"Well, anyone would behave badly if they had to eat fishbone risotto," said Ellen. "I tell you, Lieselotte, we're going to transform this place."

"But," the girl looked towards the kitchens where an altercation was beginning between Juan and Fr@aulein Waaltraut, "how will you ...? He has nowhere to go and she is related to the mayor."

"I think perhaps Juan could teach pottery. And --well, I shall think of something. Now, here are the menus I thought offor next week--but I'd like to use as much local produce as possible. I expect you know people who would supply us?"'

"Oh yes. Yes." She smiled.

"But they do not live in Abyssinia."

In Gowan Terrace, Ellen's mother and her aunts missed her more than they could possibly have believed. The house without her seemed empty, silent and cold. If Dr Carr had scarcely noticed, in her busy life, the flowers Ellen had brought in and arranged, she noticed their absence. Below stairs, the cook reverted to boiled fish and virulently coloured table jellies, and the man who came to help in the garden dug up Ellen's peonies and destroyed the clematis.

Not that the sisters didn't keep busy. There were more meetings than ever: meetings about the disenfranchised women of Mesopotamia, about mathematics teaching in communes and free contraception for prostitutes. But even the meetings were not quite what they had been--they were briefer, there were fewer young men, and the sandwiches sent up by the cook were so unappetising that they abandoned them and settled for digestive biscuits.

It was different, however, when one of Ellen's letters arrived from Hallendorf. Then Dr Carr and her sisters allowed special people to stay behind after the chairs were cleared and the lantern slides put away, and the letter was read not only to initiates like the "aunt" who ran the Left Book Club Shop or the former headmistress of Ellen's school, but to others--even men--who had a record of good work for the causes. And among these was Kendrick Frobisher.

Kendrick had made himself so useful in Gowan Terrace, addressing envelopes, sorting slides and fetching leaflets from the printers, that he could not really be left out of anything as enjoyable as reading the next instalment of life at Hallendorf. It was true that Annie (the one who was a Professor of Mycology and therefore saw things dispassionately) had voiced her doubts about the advisability of this.

"He's very much in love with Ellen; don't you think it might encourage him to hope if we invite him to what are, in a sense, family occasions?"'