A Romantic Historical Novel
A bittersweet romantic war story in the tradition of A Farewell to Arms, Gone with the Wind, and The English Patient. When Ursula von Schattenberg-Wenzler, better known as Uschi, became engaged to dashing German fighter pilot Martin Hinterhofer, everyone thought she had made an incomparable match. Then she fell in love with Julio Romero, a charming Spanish musician with a dark secret. How would Martin take it? And what would become of Uschi’s brother Albert, whose mind had been seriously impaired by the horrors of the war he had experienced? This romantic historical novel is set in WWI Europe, where Uschi encounters eccentric bohemian artists, authoritarian professors, gutsy soldiers, and other intriguing personages in her quest to heal her brother’s mind and fulfill her own desires.
Excerpts:
Ursula didn’t answer for looking at the model, who wore only a narrow flap to cover his private parts. He appeared in his thirties, his pasty skin slightly blemished on his long bony frame. His narrow, stubbly face looked bland and unremarkable, though pleasant enough in expression, and his lank, colorless hair needed combing. Yet the students seemed to regard him in all seriousness; there was safety in those ribby and creamless contours.
”That’s Walther,” said Herr Eber. “He’s a painter, but he models on the side. The guitarist is Julio Romero from Barcelona. I discovered him playing in Café Stefanie and fell in love with him–so to speak. I don’t have him here but two or three days a week because the girls try to flirt with him, and I can’t afford it anyway. You won’t mind having him here, Uschi?”
”No, he’s very attractive…but I won’t flirt with him.” Ursula’s face flooded with warmth. Calling him attractive was like calling Russia big, she thought. Or Professor Kuhn a nincompoop.
”You’ll probably hear some wild stories about him if you hang around the coffee houses long enough,” Herr Eber chuckled. “But don’t believe everything you hear.”
”Oh, I never listen to gossip,” Ursula said with a little shrug, “unless I’m simply bored beyond ALL endurance.”
Herr Eber laughed out loud, attracting a few glances. “Tell you what,” he said, “sit for both Intermediate and Advanced classes, and I’ll give you your pay and lessons with my beginners. You did mention you’d had drawing lessons?”
”Yes.” Ursula allowed herself to glance at the guitarist again. Julio wore a colorful shirt open at the throat and black trousers, and his dark hair was thick and curly. He played a motif, a sad-sounding melodic figure, which he repeated and varied. Then suddenly he played the same phrase in a major key, adding a note not related to the key in which he had been playing. The music had an eastern, nocturnal pathos Ursula could almost taste and smell.
Then he looked at her and stopped playing abruptly, staring at her as though she had begun to levitate. It was not mere admiration; she was accustomed to admiring stares. Nor was it a lustful look. It was more as if he had known her in another life.
They ended at the Café Paschal, one of the coffee houses frequented by artists and students who loitered about in shabby paint-smeared clothes. Many were engrossed in earnest conversation, others reading Simplicissimus or other periodicals. Few of them looked like the carefree bohemians Ursula had always pictured; even their laughter had a breath of wormwood in it, cynically self-conscious. The smell of cigarette smoke hung in the air like a cloud. From an adjoining room the click of billiard balls could be heard, a melancholy sound somehow. In a far corner stood a small platform with an unoccupied stool, and over the counter hung a sign painted with art-nouveau letters that read WISDOM STRICTLY PROHIBITED HERE!
Ursula wondered from which tar pit the coffee had been dipped, but she did not comment aloud. She listened to the conversation around her as they sat crowded at a round table.
Sonia said, “In Berlin they’ve been shooting communists right and left. It’s not enough Russia has surrendered, now we have to obliterate every noble, vital thing she stands for in this country as well. Let’s face it: we’re going to the capitalist dogs on a downhill pull.”
Robert said, “I’ve been commissioned to do a piece for a soldier’s grave. It’s come to a nice pass when one has to make one’s living off the dead. But come to think of it, that’s how I got my start, designing tombstones.”
Walther said, “Do you know that in America they don’t put anything in their coffee, they drink it black as the bottomless pit? Did you ever hear anything more barbaric?”
Julio was silent, but he smiled at Ursula, seeming slightly dazed. She wondered about the terrible things he said had taken place in Barcelona. What were those things? And why was he in Germany? Surely Paris would have suited him better. She contemplated the strangeness of fate.
Yellow Rose Publications 