Free What Love Sees by Susan Vreeland Page B

the garden for the girls leaving, and Miss Weaver gave a speech about the value of culture and the need to stay alive by continuing to learn and to experience all they possibly could.

    Jean listened intently, feeling as though Miss Weaver was speaking especially to her. At the first cocktail hour back home, she repeated it to Father. In the same breath she added, “and Miss Weaver has more space this summer. She always takes five girls to Europe and she only has two so far. It’s an educational experience.”
    She heard him light his pipe. “Europe. Well. What countries?”
    “Mainly Germany. Austria and Italy, too, and maybe France. But Miss Weaver likes Germany best. She always says ‘The roots of western civilization penetrate deep in the Teutonic world.’” Jean pulled in her chin and mimicked Miss Weaver’s deep voice, stretching out the “o” in roots and trilling the “r.”
    “Seems a suitable finishing off. You worked hard. We’ll see.”
    “There’s only one thing.”
    “What’s that?”
    “I’d be a bother to the other girls. And if I’m alone, Miss Weaver will drag me through every museum and explain every painting inch by inch.”
    It was a little easier speaking to Father now. She heard him pouring another drink. Evidently, he was thinking. Time to be quiet and wait. Things had to settle with Father on his own terms.
    Two days later at breakfast he asked, “Who was that girl with you at Camp Hanoum, the one you liked so much?”
    “Do you mean Icy Eastman?”
    “Is that the one who always described everything for you?”
    “Yes.”
    “Have you kept in contact with her?”
    “Oh yes. We write letters, and she came to my birthday party last year.”
    “What’s she doing now?”
    “Working at a bank. She lives in Litchfield.”
    “Why don’t you call her up today? If she can take off from work, I’ll send you both to Europe.”
    “Oh, Father, do you really mean it?”
    “Wouldn’t say it otherwise. And Lucy too, if she wants to.”
    “Oh, thank you, Father,” both girls chorused in their rush around the table to hug him.
    “Don’t ambush me from both sides.” He chuckled. “Can’t a man eat his breakfast in peace?”
    Mother cleared her throat. “What about the trouble there?” she asked. “You know on the radio they say there were civilians murdered in Madrid, nuns and children and—”
    “Irrelevant,” Father declared. “Weaver isn’t taking them to Spain. That’s just a rumor anyway.”
    “I hope you’re right. But in Germany there were troop parades.”
    “Those bluffs strutting around Europe are only putting their manhood back together after losing the war. Let them,” Father said. “Why shouldn’t they go?”

Chapter Eight
    Miss Weaver and five girls walked the cool, dim passages of Cologne cathedral.
    “Our footsteps echo.” Arm in arm with Icy, Jean knew she didn’t need to say it. Undoubtedly Icy was aware of it, too.
    “Can you feel how big it is in here?” Icy asked.
    “Not exactly, but sounds come from a long way off.”
    “The ceiling seems a mile away. It has stone arches, kind of pointy, and they cross.”
    “The stone even smells damp. Are we passing a window?”
    “Yes. A tall one. The stained glass glows like jewels. How’d you know?”
    “I just had an eerie feeling of light or something.”
    Suddenly, the organ began, a sustained full chord. Instantly, Icy and Jean stopped. Sound filled all space. Jean turned around. “Where are the pipes? I can’t tell.”
    “Behind us.”
    The resonant chords and ranks of voices bounced off the vaulted ceiling so that the music, overlapping measure upon measure, lost its distinctness.
    “Don’t you feel small?” Lucy asked, catching up behind them.
    “That’s by design,” Miss Weaver said. “Gothic church architecture was calculated to minimize the individual and maximize the loftiness of orthodoxy. Easier to mold the illiterate into obedience.”
    LCW had something to say about