dropped this spring.Greta came with towels and a large bucket of water; she wanted to wash Katyaâs and Gerhardâs feet, as she had already done for Sara and her little brothers, who were now tucked in bed. Katya stood in the bucket up to her shins in soapy water, her feet warmed instantly, this nightly ritual of foot cleansing always making her feel that the day had been a good one, making her suddenly need to pee.
That night she lay awake between Sara and Greta, the excitement of having arrived still too strong to allow sleep. Her father, Uncle Bernhard, and her grandfather talked in the parlour over the heavy ticking of a Kroeger clock. She felt watched over by the portraits of Schroeder ancestors, men whose images were set in matching oval frames which hung on a wall beside the bed.
The portrait nearest to the door was the oldest, a painting of Wilhelm Schroeder, whose ancestors had suffered persecution in the seventeenth century. One of the Flanders Schroeders had a white-hot bolt pushed through his tongue for having publicly testified to his faith. The bolt had been passed on from one generation to the next, but where it was now, her opa couldnât say His family story was a common one; most Mennonite families had similar stories, an ancestor who had sung hymns while burning on a pyre, another who was thrown into a river to be drowned, a woman who was lashed to death by a whip, stories that had either been passed down from generation to generation, or recorded in a book of Mennonite martyrs.
The Schroeders eventually wound up in the Vistula Delta south of Danzig, in time to help drain the marshlands, where over half of them died of swamp fever. The place Wilhelm Schroeder lived was called Krebeswalde, south of Elbing. It was there that Plautdietsch, a language adopted from the Western Prussians, became the common language of Mennonites. The colonists lived behind the dikes and canals they laboured over, praying that the waterwheels they built would drain the fields in time for spring planting. Wilhelm leftKrebeswalde at a time when, out of fear and envy, the Mennonitesâ right to purchase land was being threatened. A man named George von Trappe came calling, sent by Catherine the Great to convince the Plautdietsch speakers to settle in Little Russia. Wilhelm was among the first to go. He was the one who had first told the story about giant men whose wide trousers were used for storing watermelons, which eventually was told to Katyaâs grandfather, who had passed it on to her.
Wilhelm Schroeder didnât look like an adventurer. He had a soft look. His eyes were turned away from the portrait painter as though he were shy, or didnât want to be thought proud. His beard was illuminated and made his face seem blurred round the edges, and his expression indecisive. Or perhaps here was a man whose kindness would prompt him to say the soup was tasty when the cook had forgotten to salt it.
The middle picture was a photograph of a man named Johann Schroeder, the son of Wilhelm. Unlike his father, Johannâs features were crisp and clearly defined. He looked directly at the camera, appearing confident without being taken with himself. His small compressed mouth was set in such a way that implied a forced sternness, such as would be required of a teacher, which was what heâd been. He left Rosenthal for the Mariopol district north of the Azov Sea when there came a need for a teacher. The land in the new daughter colony, Bergthal, was fertile and promising. It also had a high outcrop of rock, which proved to be a valuable source of stone for the foundations of their house, and for object lessons in religion studies:
You are my rock and my fortress. A man builds upon a solid foundation, which is Jesus Christ our Lord
.
Bergthal was where Katyaâs grandfather had been born, he being the subject of the third portrait. Her opa had a similar softness as his grandfather, and a long, white, flowing
That night she lay awake between Sara and Greta, the excitement of having arrived still too strong to allow sleep. Her father, Uncle Bernhard, and her grandfather talked in the parlour over the heavy ticking of a Kroeger clock. She felt watched over by the portraits of Schroeder ancestors, men whose images were set in matching oval frames which hung on a wall beside the bed.
The portrait nearest to the door was the oldest, a painting of Wilhelm Schroeder, whose ancestors had suffered persecution in the seventeenth century. One of the Flanders Schroeders had a white-hot bolt pushed through his tongue for having publicly testified to his faith. The bolt had been passed on from one generation to the next, but where it was now, her opa couldnât say His family story was a common one; most Mennonite families had similar stories, an ancestor who had sung hymns while burning on a pyre, another who was thrown into a river to be drowned, a woman who was lashed to death by a whip, stories that had either been passed down from generation to generation, or recorded in a book of Mennonite martyrs.
The Schroeders eventually wound up in the Vistula Delta south of Danzig, in time to help drain the marshlands, where over half of them died of swamp fever. The place Wilhelm Schroeder lived was called Krebeswalde, south of Elbing. It was there that Plautdietsch, a language adopted from the Western Prussians, became the common language of Mennonites. The colonists lived behind the dikes and canals they laboured over, praying that the waterwheels they built would drain the fields in time for spring planting. Wilhelm leftKrebeswalde at a time when, out of fear and envy, the Mennonitesâ right to purchase land was being threatened. A man named George von Trappe came calling, sent by Catherine the Great to convince the Plautdietsch speakers to settle in Little Russia. Wilhelm was among the first to go. He was the one who had first told the story about giant men whose wide trousers were used for storing watermelons, which eventually was told to Katyaâs grandfather, who had passed it on to her.
Wilhelm Schroeder didnât look like an adventurer. He had a soft look. His eyes were turned away from the portrait painter as though he were shy, or didnât want to be thought proud. His beard was illuminated and made his face seem blurred round the edges, and his expression indecisive. Or perhaps here was a man whose kindness would prompt him to say the soup was tasty when the cook had forgotten to salt it.
The middle picture was a photograph of a man named Johann Schroeder, the son of Wilhelm. Unlike his father, Johannâs features were crisp and clearly defined. He looked directly at the camera, appearing confident without being taken with himself. His small compressed mouth was set in such a way that implied a forced sternness, such as would be required of a teacher, which was what heâd been. He left Rosenthal for the Mariopol district north of the Azov Sea when there came a need for a teacher. The land in the new daughter colony, Bergthal, was fertile and promising. It also had a high outcrop of rock, which proved to be a valuable source of stone for the foundations of their house, and for object lessons in religion studies:
You are my rock and my fortress. A man builds upon a solid foundation, which is Jesus Christ our Lord
.
Bergthal was where Katyaâs grandfather had been born, he being the subject of the third portrait. Her opa had a similar softness as his grandfather, and a long, white, flowing
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