Duxford Airfield (the band) Pt. 07

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ANDREA THE GLADIATOR:

: The Countess of Knoff, Ovia Veerle Knoff, 1890 - 1968?

Very little is known today of Ovia Veerle Knoff. She is believed to have been born in the Dutch East Indies in April of 1890 as Ovia Veerle Wasser - (later to acquire the unofficial title of Countess and surname of Knoff).

Early Years:

Ovia Veerle Wasser was the youngest of seven children born to Gunther and Vera Wasser. Gunther Wasser was affiliated with the famed, Knoff Armaments' Company, founded in Germany in early 1859.

In the fall of 1897, Wasser received a substantial promotion within the company hierarchy and moved his entire family to Hamburg Germany when Ovia was 7 years old. Aside from his high position within the Knoff Armaments' Company, Wasser had large holdings in mineral mining and Railroads' throughout central Europe. He also had direct access to many of his high-ranking peers in public office.

Grammar School and Adolescence:

Born of privilege, Ovia Veerle Wasser attended the finest schools in Europe and proved to be an exceptionally gifted child pertaining to literature and music, she played several instruments but greatly excelled at the Grand Piano and later composed during a brief time for private audiences of the wealthy elite, she also wrote music herself. Rare, for a young woman of her time, Ovia shot skeet and was an excellent horsewoman, spending several hours each day alone on horseback, when possible.

Viewed as extremely physically attractive, she strongly rebelled against a prearranged marriage that is believed to have been between her and Karl Werner in 1906 when Ovia was 16 years old. Werner, a 46-year-old German industrialist, was said to have been left standing at the alter, publicly humiliated.

Some experts believe that the failed wedding had been prearranged to combine the power and wealth of the Knoff Armaments' Company and Werner Industries, - if in fact, it had been Werner that Ovia had been destined to marry, sources aren't completely clear on the groom's actual identity.

Also among the dignitaries in attendance during the failed wedding was Germany's, Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse. It was later written that the Kaiser, apparently somewhat intoxicated at the time, scathingly referred to Ovia as "The Countess of Knoff" in a sarcastic reference to the Knoff Armament Company and implying that Ovia was volatile and not worth having as a wife. This unofficial title followed Ovia for the rest of her life and she was said to have had a seething dislike for both the Kaiser and the bogus title which he had bestowed upon her.

After the failed union between Ovia and the perceived Karl Werner, the entire Wasser family disinherited Ovia and never communicated with her again, leaving her humiliated and penniless.

On a footnote: Some historians believe that Ovia had been mute, yet it is unclear whether or not this condition stemmed from birth or was some form of PTSD, possibly stemming from the public humiliation of Germany's Kaiser during her failed wedding or the rejection of her biological family. Some sources speculate that Ovia had been beset with a severe speech impediment and simply chose not to speak, often conversing with others by pen and paper.

Early to Middle Age:

Little is known of Ovia Veerle Wasser between the years 1907-1915. After her failed wedding and family disinheritance, it is believed that she toured as a pianist within a performing circus act, traveling throughout Europe for several years. Somewhere close to this time she also began a serious relationship with a soldier in the German Army whose identity has been lost to history. Allegedly, the couple had planned to be married at the end of World War I, which was now raging across Europe. The soldier, whose identity is not known, is believed to have been killed in fierce combat during the coinciding time of the infamous "Fokker Scourge."

Among scholars, speculations have always persisted that the German soldier, a machinist by trade, had suddenly and unexpectedly been sent to the front lines in France, upon direct orders from German High-Command. Entering combat, the machinist had been killed in battle a mere day later.

In 1916, at 26 years of age, Ovia Veerle Wasser married and became Ovia Veerle King, when she married Isaac Joshua King, a 51-year-old Englishman and former Cattle baron, then living in Odessa Texas. In 1890 King had struck oil and abandoned the cattle trade in favor of developing more petroleum wells. It is unclear how the couple became acquainted or exactly when Ovia arrived in North America.

Many historians see these two events as having a striking parallel to the Biblical telling of "Bathsheba." With the death of the forgotten soldier having made Ovia Veerle Wasser single and unmarried, yet again, she was conveniently available for King's courtship and eventual marriage to her. Ovia later presented Isaac Joshua King with two sons, Phillip, in 1917 and David, in early 1919.

Evidence suggests that the marriage was less than ideal, with King having a live-in mistress on the premises and Ovia apparently taking many lovers, herself.

1918 At War's End:

With the Armistice signed, German documentation revealed that Isaac Joshua King had consorted with German diplomats between the time of 1915 and early 1918. This documentation presents the case that the Imperial German Navy had secretly planned to convert the majority of their Battleship fleet to oil-fired boilers in place of coal, thus greatly reducing refueling times within port.

This same documentation also gives evidence that Isaac Joshua King had agreed to supply Germany with that oil. A Senate hearing, accusing him of treason, was scheduled and King was to appear in early 1919 but he mysteriously vanished before he could be sequestered.

Some scholars believe that French Nationalists were responsible for assassinating Isaac Joshua King and his mistress while they were aboard King's own private Pullman car, along enroute to the Senate hearings. However, some experts strongly refute this claim and insist that King and his mistress went into hiding with their untold millions. In either case, Isaac Joshua King was never seen again, after 1919.

1920 - 1949:

Ovia Veerle Wasser, now Ovia Veerle King, was permitted to keep her husband's oil leases and mineral holdings yet she continued to find herself plagued by the Kaiser's age-old title of "The Countess of Knoff." The so-called "Countess of Knoff" was snubbed by the social elite of society for the rest of her life. There were also ill feelings toward her which undoubtedly stemmed from her late husband's secret dealings with Germany during the war.

During the decades that followed, she became a self-taught and ruthless businesswoman within the oil industry, refusing any and all offers to sell her leases. Many of her competitors became wary and increasingly intimidated by her sporadic behavior and hardline business practices.

During this time Ovia also began to embrace her age-old and hated title of, The Countess of Knoff, and had her surname legally changed to Knoff. Some historical experts believe this change in attitude was in morbid reflection of Ovia's increasingly cynical outlook and hardened demeanor.

When war with Germany broke out again, in 1939, Ovia's youngest son, David, flew to England to stand against Hitler. In 1941, Ovia received an urgent telegram informing her that she was soon to become a grandmother. Her youngest son David; then begged Ovia to ship the girl from England and care for her and the would-be child until his return.

The results of this telegram or any actions taken by Ovia are obscure to history and nothing is known of the English girl or her soon-to-be child.

David King survived the war but was later killed in a plane crash in 1949. Not much is known about David King or his Military Service, he apparently Served under a different surname than King, undoubtedly to avoid the ridicule of his father's treason, twenty years earlier. David's wartime exploits have fallen into the pages of time and obscurity, unheralded.

The Countess of Knoff mourned her son's loss in private.

1950-1968?:

With untold wealth generated by the rich Texas oil fields, Ovia Veerle Knoff slowly became a recluse and refused to communicate with members of the press, preferring to stay within the confines of the heavily guarded oil leases which she lived upon. Ovia had many live-in servants as well as her oldest son, Phillip, who was still living at home with her and apparently a special needs adult to some degree. The state of his condition is not known.

It is believed that Phillip died of natural causes in April of 1964, at 47 years of age, having never left the guarded oil field property during his entire life. After the loss of a second son, Ovia Veerle Knoff is believed to have sold all of her holdings within the oil industry yet she remained on the private property of oil leases until her death which is speculated to have been in May of 1968 when she was 78 years old. The cause of her death is believed to have been chronic alcoholism. She had not left the property for the last 30 years of her life.

Ovia Veerle Knoff is presently buried in Odessa Texas upon these same oil field leases, she now rests between her two sons, Phillip and David:

"...Holy fuck" I sighed, quickly pushing myself away from Andrea's laptop and standing up as I closed my eyes.

...I grabbed my windbreaker and went out the hotel room's door and into the hallway in haste. A minute later I was outside and headed along the sidewalk of the adjacent street to the hotel. I walked briskly and breathed deeply as reflections of the Countess's tintype flashed through my mind. Somehow, the spooky tintype seemed to be even more haunting to me now, after reading the online dictionary's account of her life.

Even her name and title seemed to throw chills into me now...

"The Countess of Knoff"

I continued breathing deeply and kept walking....Looking upward at the sky, it appeared that we might have rain later in the day...

...Andrea had risen early this morning and was presently somewhere within the city, astride the recumbent bicycle that I had just purchased, and Helen was enroute to pick up Lita, their mutual friend. All four of us were going to spend the weekend together.

As I continued walking, I suddenly realized that a few tears were streaming down my face which I was unable to understand, at first.

The online dictionary's last paragraph now flashed through my mind again...

- Ovia Veerle Knoff is presently buried in Odessa Texas upon these same oil field leases, she now rests between her two sons, Phillip and David:

Christ, it's been a hundred years since any of that happened, and I never even knew any of those damn people. Why should I suddenly give a fuck about any of this? I asked myself sarcastically as I kept walking and wiped my eyes.

Deep down I knew the answer to my own question but I remained defiant for the moment and increased my pace on the sidewalk.

...I was presently trying to run away from myself again and I knew it.

(sigh)

I walked briskly for ten or fifteen minutes, oblivious to everything else around me. Approaching a cross street, I slowed my pace and pulled out my phone, hitting the second number on speed dial.

" - Hey, Tim, I was just about to call you. How you doing, buddy?" the voice asked.

"Not worth a shit, I just got knocked over with emotion," I said, with more tears coming now as I closed my eyes.

"...Mom?" Ricky asked.

"Yeah" I gasped into the phone.

"Me too, Tim. It was hard going back to the old neighborhood again, last week, but Harland went with me and I think it helped me, to go back" Ricky said quietly.

"Really, it helped?" I asked, unsure.

"Yeah, it helped me let her go onward now, Tim" Ricky answered quietly.

I lost my composure for a few minutes, saying nothing. My little brother stayed on the line with me and even though he was hundreds of miles away, I still felt his presence beside me.

"...Tim, you love Andrea, but part of your problem right now is that you're completely saturated with estrogen. You've been hanging around with two chicks for weeks now and you need some time, doing guy stuff. Why don't you fly home for a few days and we'll grab Myron and go fishing again?" Ricky asked.

"God, I'd love to, Ricky, but I won't be able to for several days yet. We have to go meet some oil executive big-wigs on Monday and then go through this fuckin' mansion again, looking for clues. I promised to see the ladies through all that horse shit - yeah you're right, Ricky, I'm soaked with estrogen, I think" I replied, my mind suddenly wandering all over the place and bouncing from one thought to the next in no logical order.

"I think the proper term is - pussy whipped, Tim" Ricky replied bluntly.

...I suddenly closed my eyes and started laughing at the brutal honesty within Ricky's reply. Ricky started laughing now too and together my little brother and I shared a full minute of gut-shaking laughter that only brothers can understand.

"Mom never liked that term, - pussy whipped" Ricky reminded me.

"I know" I replied, openly laughing again now and covering my face in recollection of our mother.

"I'm at work right now, brother, I'm pulling a nineteen-fifty Ford transmission and I need to let you go for now. You gonna be OK?" Ricky asked.

"Yes, thank you for picking up the phone, Ricky, I'll be OK now. - Hey, see if they could use another part-time hand" I quickly interjected.

"I will, and call again tonight if you need to," Ricky said.

"I will, hugs to Brenda!" I answered.

My little brother and I clicked off and I put my phone back into the pocket of my windbreaker....I suddenly realized that I was now sitting upon a small concrete wall next to the sidewalk. I had no recollection of jumping up here...

I continued sitting on the wall for several more minutes, just feeling relief flood over me from having talked with Ricky, and - as someone had once said "A problem shared, is a problem halved." I couldn't agree more.

As I continued to sit, I kept an eye out for Andrea, wondering if I'd see her riding the recumbent bike now. I said a silent prayer for my wife's safety on the bicycle and spent several minutes just thinking about her.

I now sat, just watching the late morning traffic travel by, but no one in the vehicles even appeared to notice me.

I, again, thought of Andrea and suddenly realized that one of her all-time favorite songs had been playing inside my head for the last two weeks without me even being conscious of it. Amidst all of the chaos which had been whirling around within my mind during the last ten days, the song had been playing within the background of my mind and I hadn't even been aware of it until this very moment...

I closed my eyes and shook my head slightly, in frustration.

...Within the last ten days of our lives, we had attended Danny Wickersham's funeral, had our photograph splattered all over The International Monitor, and also discovered that we had been willed a one hundred and thirty-year-old Victorian mansion that had once belonged to The Countess of Knoff, whom none of us had even heard of before.

...Yet, all the while, the song had been playing in the back of my mind, slowly but surely, ever increasing in volume. The song which I couldn't shake, even if I had wanted to, was "Don't Stop Believin'" by Journey.

I really wasn't a huge fan of Journey. To be honest - Don't Stop Believin', was a song that I neither liked nor disliked - it was just a song to me. Yet, with the knowledge that it was one of Andrea's favorite songs, meant something to me.

One thing that the song did hold true for me was gut-level sincerity and raw emotion. The song was real and had been sung from the heart, it was powerful.

- Just a small town girl, living in a lonely world, she took the midnight train going anywhere...

My own emotions seemed to toy with me now and a single tear went down my cheek as I suddenly recalled looking into my mother's eyes...

...Maybe I was simply mourning the loss of my mother again right now, or maybe I was feeling the loneliness that The Countess of Knoff had once experienced, after all, she had been a real person at one time. Maybe I was still struggling with the feelings that I wasn't good enough for Andrea and that someday she'd wake up and leave me...

...Maybe I was just unsure of where my life was heading right now, with retirement looming.

Maybe Ricky was right, maybe I simply needed to have a fishing pole in my hand and be around a bunch of guys that were just like me, for a while.

Maybe everyone gets lonely and confused sometimes; like I was right now...

Maybe it was alright to just sit and be still for a while, and not have any of the answers.

...Directly across the street from me was a McDonald's restaurant. I sat where I was for several more minutes, just staring at the building and golden arches. Finally, I shrugged off the feelings of melancholy and pulled myself to my feet again as I made my way across the street and over to the restaurant in search of a cup of coffee.

Entering the building, I noticed that the place was almost empty and I soon had a cup of steaming brew and a nice quiet booth all to myself. Early birds had already left a few ravaged newspapers upon the table which I paid little attention to, preferring instead to just stare out the large windows with my coffee in hand.

...Andrea's favorite song descended upon me once more.

...Just a city boy, born and raised in South Detroit, he took the midnight train, going anywhere...

- My phone suddenly pinged with a text message from Helen Lunsford: "Want to meet at McDonald's?"

The text message also included a small cartoon character rolling on the floor and laughing. I quickly looked all around me now and noticed Helen and a dark-haired girl sitting on the farthest side of the restaurant.

Helen smiled and waved her hand overhead as if hailing another ship in the far distance upon the high seas.

Picking up my coffee, I made my way over to the ladies and held out my right hand in greeting.

"Tim Donovan, Andrea's husband!" I said smiling as I shook Lita's hand.

"Lita Romano, please join us," she said smiling back and gesturing toward a vacant seat.

...I surmised that Lita was close to fifty, with olive skin and shoulder-length black hair, she was gorgeous...

I half-hugged Helen and then sat down, opposite the ladies.

"...Tim, are you alright, honey? You look a little drained for some reason. Did you sleep OK last night?" Helen asked; concern showing in her eyes.

"Just need a little coffee, is all, Helen," I said, waving my cup in front of me and winking.

"McDonald's coffee does wonders for the soul" Lita interjected with a nod.

"Yes, it does" I acknowledged.

"Your bride should be at the hotel in a few minutes, she just texted me. Want to ride with us and head back over there now, Tim,?" Helen asked, looking at her phone.

"I'd love to" I replied, standing again.

...The ladies and I got into the rental car and began driving the short distance back to the hotel with Helen at the wheel and me in the rear seat.

Turning to face me, Lita explained that she had just, within the hour, arrived in Odessa and left all of her things in Helen's room. Lita explained that she would only be with us for the weekend and was going to sleep in the spare bed in Helen's room.

I was happy that Helen's friend had come to spend time with us, I knew that her visit would do Helen a world of good. The fog was beginning to lift in Helen and she had been smiling a lot more within the last few days.

Helen had a beautiful smile.

During the short drive the three of us talked affably, but to be completely honest, I was still on autopilot and not really listening to any of the conversation. Earlier this morning, my mind had already begun to drift, as it so often did whenever I was perplexed about something, and right now I was restless and frustrated again with all of the Danny Wickersham nonsense that we'd been through during the last ten days.