unwahrscheinlich kam es ihr in dem Augenblick nicht vor, dass Julien, der Architekt, mit den Hinterlassenschaften ihres Großvaters in Kontakt gekommen war. Schließlich war er ein Cousin zweiten Grades. Trotzdem kam es ihr in diesem Augenblick wie ein kleines Wunder vor, eine Öffnung in ein Gelingen, das gerade noch so unerreichbar schien. Wenn Julien eine der Skizzen Hans Albrechts besaß und sie ihm so lieb war, dass er sie mit sich trug – war er dann womöglich ähnlich fasziniert von ihnen wie sie? Wäre eine Zusammenarbeit beider nicht erfolgversprechend, bei den unzähligen zahlungskräftigen und einflussreichen Arbeitgebern, für die er seine raffinierten Gartenanlagen schuf? Als Madeleine ihren Cousin darum bat, einen genaueren Blick auf die Kohleskizze in seinen Unterlagen werfen zu dürfen, reichte er sie ihr mit großer Bereitwilligkeit. Sie hätte schwören können, dass es sich um eines der Bilder ihres Großvaters handelte. „Die Abitursarbeit meiner Tochter“, meinte er zu ihr. „Unglaublich. Ich weiß nicht wo das Kind das Talent her hat“. HER ATTENTION WAS DRAWN TO A PIECE OF PAPER ON THE DESK. Monika thought she recognized the unmistakable artistic handwriting of her grandfather, Hans Albrecht, who had gone missing in the war, a talented amateur painter who had drawn Bedouins in charcoal as a Wehrmacht soldier in the occupied territories of Africa, on the sketch by the landscape architect with whom she was discussing the renovation of her parents' house. Hans Albrecht's sketchbooks had found their way back to Germany, but he himself, sadly, had not. She had tried to publish these pictures, which she found remarkable, expressive sketches in deep black tones on badly damaged rolls of paper that may once have been wrapped around cable drums, depicting the emaciated faces of African Berbers, but no one was interested in them. Nor for the story of her grandfather, who had tried to give an identity to the people whom the German army had brutally destroyed. Even this biography, which she found remarkable, met with disinterest today, and her master's thesis in art history on her grandfather's work was rejected. She now thought she recognized the same deep black chalk marks, uniquely characteristic hatching and glazing in the horticultural architect's sketchbook. Was this a delusion, was she beginning to hallucinate, was her concern for the fate of this Hans Albrecht, whom she had never known, becoming her own fate? Well, it didn't seem entirely unlikely to her at that moment that Julien, the architect, had come into contact with her grandfather's legacy. After all, he was a second cousin. Nevertheless, at that moment it seemed like a small miracle to her, an opening to a success that had seemed just out of reach. If Julien had one of Hans Albrecht's sketches and loved it so much that he carried it with him, was he perhaps as fascinated by them as she was? Wouldn't a collaboration between the two be promising, given the countless wealthy and influential employers for whom he created his sophisticated gardens?
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