It bothered him, more than he cared to admit. His father had never allowed a servant — Gastarbeiter or not — to enter their family house, even though his wife had had enough children to qualify for one. The poor girl might be a servant, but still… she didn’t deserve to be treated like a slave. And yet… there was nothing he could do.
“I shall withdraw for the night,” the farmer said. “Heidi, bring the gentlemen blankets and pillows.”
“Of course, father,” Heidi said.
She shot Kurt a look — she’d been shooting him looks all evening — and then turned and hurried out of the door. Kurt honestly wasn’t sure what to make of her. No girl, at least in his experience, had ever been so forward, certainly not with him. Gudrun would have been grounded for the rest of her life if she’d acted like that — Kurt dreaded to think what their parents would have said, after they found out. But Heidi seemed to live by different rules.
The farmer rose and made his way slowly out of the room. Horst watched him go, then glanced sharply at Kurt. “Be careful,” he muttered. “You don’t want to get her pregnant.”
Kurt looked back at him, feeling his cheeks flush. “We’re not going to do anything,” he protested. “I don’t understand…”
“Be careful,” Horst repeated. “I’ll explain later.”
Heidi returned, carrying a pair of large blankets and pillows. They looked rough, compared to proper bedding, but Kurt had plenty of experience sleeping in foxholes. Pillows and blankets would be practically paradisiacal, compared to cold ground and open air. She spoke quietly to Horst, telling him where to find the bathroom, then started to organise the blankets on the floor.
“You were born in Berlin,” she said. “What’s it like?”
“It’s just like any city,” Kurt said. He wasn’t a virgin, but the way Heidi was moving was incredibly distracting. There was just something about her that drew him to her, even though she wasn’t quite the ideal of German womanhood. He’d never seen a girl so muscled in his entire life. “Far too many people to be comfortable.”
“Nothing like a farm,” Heidi said. “What’s it like?”
Kurt considered his answer for a long moment. “Very different from a farm,” he said, finally. “I had to go to school… did you go to school?”
“I had a day or two every week at the village,” Heidi said. She looked down at the wooden floorboards for a long moment. “That was enough for me, according to father. My brothers didn’t get much more until they joined the Hitler Youth.”
Kurt smiled. “There are giant shops where you can buy anything you like,” he said. “And cinemas and countless places to go…”
“With a girl,” Heidi said, deadpan. “Have you taken many girls to the cinema?”
“No,” Kurt said, feeling embarrassed. He’d dated a few times, but never seriously. He hadn’t even lost his virginity until he’d gone to the brothel, after his promotion. “Life in the city isn’t that free.”
“A pity,” Heidi said. “I saw a movie reel once about a city. It looked like paradise.”
“Here might look like paradise too,” Kurt said. He frowned. “How are things out here?”
Heidi sighed. “I don’t know how we’re going to get through the next year,” she admitted, reluctantly. “Father keeps telling me to keep my chin up, but…”
She shook her head. “We need my brothers back if we are going to plant anything,” she added, bitterly. “Or we have to hire workers from the east…”
“Or bring in more slaves,” Kurt said.
“I don’t know if we can trust them,” Heidi said. “There are only two of us here. And if we can’t meet our quotas…”
Kurt frowned. “What happens if you can’t meet your quotas?”
“I’m not sure,” Heidi confessed. “We might lose the farm. Or someone might be allocated to work here. Or…”
“I see, I think,” Kurt said.
He felt a sudden stab of sympathy for the younger girl. She wanted to stay on the farm. He couldn’t imagine her having any problems finding a husband in Germany East; she was pretty, smart and knew everything about working on a farm. And it probably wouldn’t have been hard for her to leave the farm, even without her father’s permission. No, she wanted to stay on her father’s farm…
Would she inherit? Kurt didn’t know. In Germany Prime, the father’s possessions would go to his sons — there were limits to how much could be passed to the daughters. But in Germany East, who knew? He had a feeling the land might go to whomever could work it.
Horst returned to the room, wearing a faded brown bathrobe that looked two sizes too small for him. Heidi glanced at him, then motioned for Kurt to follow her. There was no sign of the farmer — or the serving girl — as they walked down the short corridor and into a small bathroom. A steaming bucket of warm water sat next to the bathtub.
“We don’t have running water out here,” Heidi said. She smiled, oddly nervously. “The visitors we get from the cities always comment on it.”
“There’s hot and cold running water in Berlin,” Kurt said. He’d never really appreciated what a luxury it was until he’d gone into barracks, where spending more than a minute under the water was bound to attract the wrath of the Scharführers. “I always loved standing under the shower.”
Heidi nodded as he turned to face her, then moved forward and kissed him, hard. Kurt suddenly found himself torn between his body, which was reacting in all sorts of ways to the beautiful girl in his arms, and his mind, which insisted that kissing her back was a very bad idea. But it seemed a small concern, a very small concern, when she was alive and warm and…
He kissed her back, feeling her shuddering against him. His hands roamed over her dress, feeling her muscles moving as she stroked his back. Her tongue flicked in and out of his mouth as his fingers fiddled with her dress, eventually allowing it to fall to her waist; her breasts bobbled free, jutting out firmly and pressing against his chest. She didn’t need a bra, part of his mind noted as his fingers started to stroke her breasts; her fingers were fiddling with his belt, trying to undo it…
Somehow, he pulled back. “Your father,” he said. He grunted in shock as she pulled him back, her hands reaching into his underwear to take hold of his cock. “What… what will he say if he catches us?”
Heidi’s face flickered with… irritation. “Nothing.”
Kurt stared at her. He knew precisely what his father would have said — and done — if he’d caught Gudrun making love to a stranger. Gudrun wouldn’t have been able to sit comfortably for a week, while the stranger would have been pitched out of the house… if he hadn’t been arrested and hauled off to jail. He couldn’t believe that any father, anywhere, would turn a blind eye. Hell, he doubted his father wanted to think about what his married daughter did with her husband.
“I’ll be leaving tomorrow,” he said. It wasn’t easy to turn her down, not when he could see her bare breasts and her hand was holding him, but somehow he mustered the will. “I can’t leave you here.”
Heidi let go of him, her face cycling through a bewildering series of emotions. Tears formed at the corner of her eyes, genuine tears. Kurt felt an odd stab of guilt, realising that he’d humiliated her by turning her down. And yet… he couldn’t just sleep with her, then leave her behind.