“Good day!” Stefan said, removing his hat as they reached the wagon. His smile immediately brightened Elisabeth’s mood.

“Good day,” she replied, smiling back.

Rosina at first said nothing. Instead she stood still, staring at Stefan’s missing arm. Elisabeth nudged her and out flew a “Hello” as quiet as a butterfly, though Rosina’s eyes didn’t move.

Stefan jumped out of the wagon and helped both girls in as best he could. He was finally putting on a little weight, but it would take many meals before he looked like a grown man again.

Georg turned around to see that everyone had found a seat, his face still as usual. Rosina scrambled as far away from him as she could, pushing her spine into a corner of the wagon and pulling up her knees. Elisabeth’s face turned red. Georg snapped the reins and the wagon lurched into motion, the gravel crackling under the wagon’s wheels and the horse’s hooves clip-clopping in a steady rhythm.

“What did you do after church yesterday?” Stefan asked.

Elisabeth told him about Sunday: Maria’s family’s visit, the magazine, and the shoes. She stole a glance at Rosina and then whispered to Stefan, “I think one of my siblings took it and is lying about it.”

“What did you say?” Rosina asked. “I can’t hear you.”

“Nothing for your ears,” Elisabeth said.

Rosina’s eyes narrowed as her gaze traveled between Stefan and Elisabeth. “You said something about the magazine. I know you did. I didn’t steal it.” She stamped her footon the wagon floor, prompting Georg to turn around from his perch on the horse.

Rosina pulled her knees in tighter. “Maybe Georg stole it!”

Georg turned back around.

But to Elisabeth’s surprise, Stefan laughed.

“Isn’t it funny, Georg?” he shouted up to his friend. “The thought of you taking a women’s magazine?”

Georg didn’t turn around but shrugged slightly.

Elisabeth tried to keep a serious face to show Rosina she disapproved of her behaviour, but the more she tried to tighten her lips, the harder it was not to smile: the thought of big, strong Georg perusing a women’s magazine broke through her resolve and she laughed with Stefan. Even Rosina giggled.

                                                                     ...

Elisabeth exchanged kisses with Deaf Lissi, wife to Georg’s brother, Samuel. She wasn’t actually deaf—the nickname had been passed down through the family from an ancestor who had been hard of hearing. But with so many Elisabeths in the congregation and especially in the Schuhmacher family—it was also Mammi’s first name—nicknames helped keep everyone straight. Samuel and Deaf Lissi lived in the homestead on the family salasch.

The homestead on the salasch was similar to houses in the village: white walls and blue gables on the outside and two rooms on the inside with a kitchen in between. However, the back room, instead of being formally decorated to receive visitors, was sparsely furnished and used for tasks like weaving or making brooms. Behind the homestead were the stalls for the cows and horses followed by the smaller ones for the pigs. Konrad-Bátschi’s family raised animals for themselves and to sell at the market on Tuesdays, something Elisabeth’s family couldn’t do with the size of their portion of the land.

However, no German rightfully owned a home and did not adorn it with flowers. A fenced-in garden already beginning to blossom with tiny snowdrops lay in front of Samuel’s home.

Samuel limped as he pulled two horses attached to a plough out of the stalls of the salasch. Elisabeth knew he had had polio in childhood.

“I’m sorry I don’t get to see you often, anymore,” he called to Elisabeth as he got closer, doffing his cap. “But the salasch needs me and my wife now.”

Elisabeth nodded in return. “I understand,” she said, a smile on her face. “The distance from here to the village is too much to travel every day.” Indeed, she already found that the four kilometres to the fields and back took up too much of her day: over two hours.

The animals snorted and neighed, and Rosina rushed behind Elisabeth, who placed her arm around her young sister: horses used to scare Elisabeth, too. As a child, she had even woken up occasionally from a nightmare in which a horse had fallen on her. It had never happened to her in real life but the tall animals, with their barrel-like bodies and long faces, simply scared her then. But she had eventually learned to love them.

“Rosina can help me in the house,” Deaf Lissi offered and held out her hand for her young cousin. Rosina didn’t hesitate to accept.

“We’ll begin ploughing your fields today,” Georg said.

Samuel handed Elisabeth the horses’ reins so he and his brother could inspect the plough and tethers.

The more time Elisabeth spent with Georg, the harder she found it to understand Mammi’s refusal to let him help them. Mammi had even grumbled when Georg, Samuel, and Stefan had shown up last week to transfer her family’s dung pile into a wagon to carry out to their fields. But who else was going to do it?

“Thank you,” Elisabeth said. “You’ve really been a blessing to our family.”

Georg paused for a moment and looked at Elisabeth, but she couldn’t tell what the expression on his face meant. Was he about to smile? His lips tightened slightly as though they wanted to curve upwards. Samuel patted his brother on the back, which brought an annoyed look to Georg’s face. Elisabeth smiled: Samuel had done it once before in front of her and had said that Georg hated it. A moment later, though, Georg’s face returned to its usual stillness that left Elisabeth wondering how much of him was here on earth and how much in heaven.

“I’ll bring out the second plough shortly and then Stefan can help guide the animals,” Samuel said. “My brother inspected it yesterday, so it’s ready to go.”

As her cousins continued their inspection, Elisabeth stroked the horse’s mane, trying to figure out which of her siblings had stolen Maria’s precious magazine. She remembered that Rosina had chosen to knit in the front room, Luki had stepped outside to look after the animals, and Anna had needed the outhouse. All three had gone through the kitchen where Maria’s satchel had lain. Any one of them could’ve taken the magazine. Anna and Rosina had fallen in love with the modern designs. It can’t have been Luki, she thought. He likes Mammi’s shoes.

“Elisabeth?”

She jumped and one horse pulled its head back in response. Stefan had called her. “Yes?” She blushed. “Sorry.”

“Are you still thinking about who took that magazine?”

Elisabeth nodded. “I don’t see why Luki would take it,” she began, continuing her thoughts as though Stefan had heard the first ones. “He says he doesn’t think Mammi should make special shoes. But Rosina wanted to knit squares for them—” Stefan made a quizzical face at the suggestion—“and Anna wants to embroider the shoes, so she would love to study the magazine for designs, but she’s also angry at me for telling her she has to help more. She’s nice to visitors, but to me she’s horrid—she’d steal the magazine just to embarrass me in front of my friend.”

Stefan shrugged and smiled. “I don’t know your brother and sisters well, so I’m afraid I’m not much help. But I’m sure you’ll find it.”

Georg crouched down beside the plough and scraped dried dirt off one of its two shares. “Why is this magazine soimportant?”

His attention to such a topic surprised her. Georg usually spoke only when necessary.

“Aside from the fact that it’s not mine,” she said, “it has pictures of modern shoes in it. I’m certain Mammi could make them, but she wants to uphold tradition.” She described the shoes from the magazine. “And there were also these—I don’t know what you would call them—they go over shoes and have buttons up the side. They go perhaps a few inches above the ankle. They look so...”

“Modern?” Samuel offered as he tugged down on a buckle.

Elisabeth nodded. “Yes.”

The horses moved and Georg pulled his hands back sothey would not be sliced by the plough. Elisabeth stroked the horses’ muzzles and spoke to them to calm them down. Once the animals and tool were still again, Georg continued his work. “I would buy shoes like that for Eva,” he said. “She deserves something nice. I know she would wear them to the dances.”