I read two more books to the children before several parentsbegin stepping toward the door, clearly ready to head to their own homes. My little audience groans when I tell them we’re finished.
“Come back tomorrow if you’d like to hear more,” I say before they disperse. Then I stand to reshelve the wild things.
Lottie steps forward again. “It’s such a joy to see someone who still delights in a good story.”
I smile—that’s me, I suppose, finding meaning and delight in the musings of someone else’s adventure.
“Max reminds me of Josh when he was young.”
“Really?” I don’t mean to sound shocked, but Dr. Nemeth doesn’t seem like the kind of person who would lose himself in the world of pretend.
“He’s changed a lot since Grace died.”
“Grace?”
“His wife,” she says, seemingly surprised that this is news to me.
I collapse back onto my stool, my legs trembling as the weight of her words bear down. The conversations between Dr. Nemeth and me, they’ve been focused mainly on finding Annika and the missing treasure. He’s had no reason to mention the loss of hiswife.
Poor Ella. I never should have criticized Mrs. Nemeth for her daughter’s sadness, like she was my mother abandoning me. Every girl should have a mom to talk to, a woman who cares about what she thinks. Who’s there when her body—or her heart—is hurting.
Who loves her when she feels alone.
“Losing someone changes everything,” I say.
She nods. “Josh is just now starting to live again.”
Ella slips up beside me. “Do you think there are any wild things in Austria?”
“I doubt it.”
She grins. “Except my dad.”
“You’re a blessed girl, Ella, to have a father who loves you.”
When she takes her grandparents to the slide, I lean back against a shelf, processing Lottie’s words. And my heart breaks for Dr. Nemeth. How sad to lose his wife, the mom of their sweet daughter. What appeared to me as cool and calculated is perhaps someone trying to venture back out of his shell.
“Story Girl!” Ella calls, and I watch her lunge down the slide one more time before her grandparents say good-bye.
Hours later, as I’m trying to craft an email to Dr. Nemeth about the woman who called from Idaho, a new message appears on my screen. It’s from Sophie in Vienna.
Unfortunately, I haven’t found any records that mention an Annika Knopf. Austria didn’t have a central birth registry before 1938, but if you know where Annika attended church, you can search for her baptismal certificate, and perhaps a wedding and death certificate through them.
I finally located the photograph that you requested from theNeues Wiener Tagblatt. Attached is the scanned picture along with the caption from the society column.
I click on the first attachment, and the newspaper photograph expands on my screen. Now I know whom this young man is smiling at—a beautiful young lady who’s dressed as if she descended from royalty. The admiration in his face is clear, not a care in the world beyond the woman across from him. I can’t see the front of her face, but her gaze is focused back on him, as if she could spend the rest of the evening dancing in his arms.
If this is Annika... why would she cut herself out of the picture?
I click on the second document. Sophie has circled a paragraph for me.
Maximilian Dornbach and...
My iPad screen seems to gray, and I blink hard, trying to focus again on the second name.
Maximilian Dornbach and Luzia Weiss, Opera Ball.
Maximilian Dornbach. Max. The king of the wild things.
