Echoes

In the end, it was February when Antoine received a letter that made the decision for them as to where they would go. A friend of his from Saumur, the cavalry academy where he had trained in the military, wrote to him and said that he had bought a splendid Schloss in Germany for pennies, and it had remarkable albeit crumbling stables. The friend's name was Gérard Daubigny, and he wanted to rebuild them. He was going to restore the Schloss for himself and his family, and he wanted Antoine to take charge of the stables and do whatever he deemed necessary to rebuild them, fill them with the finest horses money could buy, hire trainers and grooms, and run them. He knew that Antoine was an incomparable horseman and an equally talented judge of horseflesh. He knew about the injury to his arm, and Antoine had assured him that it didn't hamper him. He was able to use it adequately, although it had never healed completely. As a result, he was even more adept with his right one, enough so to compensate for his crippled left arm.

Coincidentally, the Schloss Gérard had bought was near Cologne, and although Beata's family had shown no sign that they would welcome them, it was always possible that if they lived nearby, they might relent eventually. And perhaps in time, some rapprochement could be encouraged. But the proximity of the Wittgensteins did not influence Antoine's decision. The salary Daubigny offered him was irresistible, and it was a job he knew he would enjoy. There was supposedly a lovely house on the grounds, which Gérard offered him. It was big enough for all three of them and several more children. Antoine accepted the offer by the end of February, and agreed to arrive at the Schloss in early April. It gave Antoine time to wrap things up at the farm, and do all he could to help Walther. The home the Zubers had given them for more than two years had literally saved them. Without them, Antoine and Beata wouldn't have survived the war, or certainly not together, nor would they have been able to marry when they did, or provide a home for Amadea. Both of them had been left penniless when their families banished them. And now, the job Antoine had been offered in Germany would save them.

Beata spent many nights before they left the farm teaching Antoine German, although his employer was French. But the grooms and trainers he would have to hire and the builders he would use for the restoration would all be German. He needed to know the language, and he was not overly skilled at it. But by the time they left, he was nearly fluent. And they had long since agreed that Antoine would speak to Amadea in French, and Beata in German. They wanted their daughter to be completely bilingual. And in time, Beata was determined to add English. If they could afford it once in Germany, Beata wanted to hire a young English girl to help her, so Amadea would also be fluent in English. She and Antoine both agreed that languages were always useful.

Their financial situation was far from secure, although the salary he'd been offered was respectable. And the job he was going to was something Antoine loved and did well. The opportunity they'd been offered was a great blessing. And Beata was thinking of doing some sewing for some of the elegant women she had known, if they were interested. And she hoped that, in an indirect way, it might be a conduit back to her mother.

Antoine also mentioned that Madame Daubigny had a great deal of money. It was undoubtedly her money that Gérard was using to do the restoration of the Schloss, as he had very little himself. He was from an aristocratic family that had been impoverished even before the war. Véronique's family had a considerable fortune. And Gérard had promised Antoine he could buy all the horses he wanted. They were starting a new life.

The Daubignys and Beata had never met, and they had no idea who she'd been before she married Antoine. She and Antoine discussed it and decided it was simpler if they didn't know she'd been Jewish. It was a piece of her history, and theirs, that they decided to keep to themselves. They felt private about that, and their family difficulties before they married. Without the Wittgensteins in their lives, there was no need to explain that Beata had been born Jewish, and she certainly didn't look it. Nor did Amadea. She was as blond and blue-eyed as babies came, and she had perfect cameo features like her mother. Beata's fam-ily's rejection of her was still a source of great sorrow and shame to her, and she didn't want anyone to know.