As she regained her strength, she began taking short trips around the castle, to the stables, the bakehouse, the kitchen garden. It had been so long since she’d been free to walk where she wanted. The openness of the countryside, the smell of summer grasses, the clouds of dust on the road were all suddenly beautiful to her. The war had quashed any romantic notions she once held of the city.

On one of these walks, she came across Herr Muller piling split wood under the eave of a dilapidated outbuilding that had once been the castle brewery.

“Frau Fledermann,” he said, straightening. “Are you well enough to walk all this way? On your own?”

“Of course!” she said through her breathlessness. It had, in fact, been a little far.

“Ah.” Muller looked uncertain. He mopped the sweat off his brow. “Here,” he said, leveling the stack of logs in the wheelbarrow and spreading his jacket over the top. “Sit a minute and catch your breath.”

Light-headed, Benita complied. She could feel the sweat running under her arms and standing at the edge of her hairline. The barrow was in the shade of the building and beyond this, the sun was hot. Two huge dragonflies hung and swooped, attached head to tail, across this boundary of shadow and light.

Muller regarded Benita with concern. His pose struck her as clownish—this large man, peering at her so tentatively.

“I went to Carnival in Braunschweig once,” she offered impulsively. “With my troop—my BDM cluster.” As she spoke, she remembered the parade—the colorful floats of costumed dancers and local school groups, business associations, and social clubs. There were giant papier-mâché caricatures of knights and princesses, tableaus of political figures and folktale characters. And everywhere the smells of beer, crisp potato pancakes, sausages, and sugary donuts. She had gone with a group of classmates and they had schemed to meet their future husbands. Schoduvel, they called Carnival in Braunschweig—“Scare the Devil.” The city had seemed huge and magical and dangerous.

“Ah.” Muller smiled, and Benita felt him relax. He leaned back against the wood he had stacked.

“It was wonderful,” she said. “Did you go every year?”

“When I was a boy.”

“And not after?”

“And sometimes after.” He smiled again, now looking sheepish.

“Of course!” she said. “Why wouldn’t you?! Did you ride the Ferris wheel?”

“Always.”

“It was amazing, wasn’t it?” She remembered the rocking, and the exhilarating sense of danger that was not actually danger at all. “I would have done it a million times if I could.”

“And then come down for a Weissbier and a plate of Kartoffelpuffer.”

“Exactly.” Benita smiled.

Companionable silence passed between them.

“I was the Carnival princess in Frühlinghausen once,” she said.

Muller raised his eyebrows and tipped an imaginary cap, bowing his head. “Your Highness.”

“Did you have one in Braunschweig?”

“The mayor’s wife.” He puffed out his cheeks. “Too fat to ride in the parade carriage.”

Benita laughed. The dragonflies darted into the sun, frightened by the sound.