Free The Wake of Forgiveness by Bruce Machart

did.
    The only child of the wealthiest man in town, Elizka had made use of her advantages. During the war, when enrollment fell and the University at Austin had opened its doors more readily to women, Elizka had left Praha for three years of book learning. When her mother fell to a crippling stiffening in her hands and feet, she came home before graduating to assist in the woman's care and ended up managing her father's business interests instead. She had a knack for numbers and negotiation, and once, when Karel had asked when she planned to settle down, Elizka Novotny had pulled a wisp of curls from the corner of her wet mouth and said, "I am settled. I didn't grow Daddy's business just to marry some dirt farmer who expects me to hand over the reins so he can make a wreck of it."
    Now Karel gave her a wink, handed beers to the Knedlik boys, and turned toward the music. On a stage of pine planks laid over railroad ties, the five-piece band had come out of their suitcoats, and there was sweat showing beneath the arms of the bandleader's shirtsleeves and wicking into his vest as he kept time to the music with his foot. He handled his accordion with an oddly orchestrated violence, and when he stomped his boot heel sharply through a three count, the horns and drums met him on the third beat, striking up another polka.
    Bohumil Novotny buttoned his suitcoat and made his rounds, shaking hands with his fellow townsmen before begging their pardon to carry a plate of food home to his ailing wife. When Father Petardus rose from a table in the back and raised his empty glass, wishing the parishioners a pleasant night, the band kicked into a droll march as the pastor walked for the doors to make his exit. The onlookers hooted and slapped at their thighs, the older among them throwing themselves forward until the laughing turned to wheezing and hacking.
    Karel, for all his talk, spent most of the night on the perimeter of the dance hall, moving with the Knedlik boys in tow between the long tables, introducing them to the folks he knew while young suitors reached for the hands of their sweethearts and husbands danced with their wives, stirring the baby powder that had been sprinkled on the hardwood flooring to make shoe leather cooperate with the slide steps of the occasional waltz.
    The hall had gone ripe with the smells of spilled beer and sweat and the lingering, fatty spices of the sausage and onions that had been served before the band had tuned up. Throughout the hall, between songs, rose frequent outbursts of laughter and the ivory clicking of dominoes being shaken between hands, but it was the music Karel wanted, and the band kept it coming while he drank and smoked and took a seat across from the Knedlik brothers near the door.
    The boys took long drinks from their pilsners, but only Raymond studied Karel from over the rim of his glass. Joe kept his eyes on the table, his mouth pinched up between drinks like he'd been trying the whole of his short life to wash one bitter taste from his mouth with another.
    Karel tapped his toe in time with the music and sat back in his chair with a groan. He hadn't found time to eat, what with all the commotion, and now his stomach was a sour swirl of beer and corn whiskey. "So, you boys in need of work?" he said.
    Raymond smiled and licked a trace of beer suds from his upper lip. "It could be. You in need of help?"
    There was a commotion on the dance floor, and Karel looked out to find a young girl sprawled out on her back beneath her red-faced dance partner, who was struggling to bring himself back upright after their tumble.
Hell, boy,
someone called out.
It's a dance, not a circus!
    Karel turned back to the twins, who were chuckling into the foam of their beers. "I might could use a hand or two," he said. "Your folks is gone then? I didn't hear."
    "Ashes to ashes," Raymond said, and then his smile turned in on itself at the corners of his mouth. "Mother was a good woman. Deserved better than