Stella

by Siegfried Lenz

  A Norwegian expert opened the conference by welcoming the company in almost melodious English, as “My dear friends and colleagues.” Through his interpreter, he announced the good news that the latest ruling on quotas for herring fishing in the North Sea had had the expected result. This information was received with applause; I got the impression that all present had contributed to the successful outcome. Two more short lectures followed, one given by the Scottish expert, who, speaking with the help of key points he had jotted down, mentioned the precarious state of eel fishing today; he felt obliged, he said, to predict that the eel would soon disappear from our waters if we did not introduce measures to protect it. He blamed this situation not only on unauthorized fishing for eel but also on the changing Atlantic currents that no longer brought us the little elvers from the Sargasso Sea. Stella had to ask what he meant only once or twice; she sometimes got around a problem by paraphrasing his English, as I noticed from her hesitation and the extra number of words she used. The Scottish expert thanked her by making her a little bow and giving her a piece of paper. I assumed it was a written note of appreciation, but later I discovered that the Scotsman was good at doing lightning sketches, and as he spoke had been drawing Stella as a mermaid with a prettily curving fish tail. You looked like some fairytale beauty, Stella, and I would have followed you anywhere, even to the bottom of the sea.

  Later, it was the Scottish expert again who announced a break by pointing to the buffet, its dishes until now covered by cloths, and saying in English, “The bazaar is open!”

  Stella nodded to him, and we went over to the buffet together. She ignored my compliment. As if it were her job, she took my plate and filled it with little tasters. What a spread! There were at least twelve different kinds of herring dishes alone: in aspic, with herbs, smoked, baked, and of course matjes, soused herring. There were also herring fillets rolled up with pieces of gherkin and herring fillets with slices of hard-boiled egg. In addition, there were glistening pink pieces of salmon, fillets of halibut, and dark red diced tuna. Fillets of sole were also on offer, along with rolled fillets of hake and pale pieces of monkfish. In fact, all the bounty of the sea was served up to the fisheries experts of those seven countries, and the absence of eel did not surprise me. Once I bumped into the Scottish expert, who glanced appreciatively at my plate and asked if I was “a native fisherman.” When I said, also in English, “We only fish for stones,” he laughed, obviously thinking it was a joke.

  It did not escape me that he was seeking Stella’s company. Whoever he was talking to, he kept looking past that person or over his head in search of Stella. Over the steamed mackerel that we were eating at a long table, she showed me his lightning sketch; he had drawn her with long hair and large, dreamy eyes, and at the sight of your curving fish tail covered with scales, Stella, I had to touch you then and there. She did not withdraw her hand from mine, but waved casually to a Polish fisheries expert—“Coming, I’ll be with you in a moment.” As she turned away she said to me, “This evening, Christian, I’ll be expecting you, just tap on the window.” And looking down at the witty portrait of herself, she added, smiling, “Come and see me this evening.”

  The fisheries experts enjoyed a musical interlude, welcoming a singer who had been engaged by their chairman. Accompanying himself on his guitar, he sang about their own element, the oceans which were the subject of their longing and their concern, conjuring up the sea and the wind and, not least, an anxious mother waiting for the return home of her nearest and dearest from far away. They clapped in time to the music. Stella joined in, but when several of the fisheries experts later went to the bar, she did not go with them.

  After a short conversation with one of the delegates, who thought he had met me at the Fisheries Biological Institute in Bergen, I noticed Stella was not in the room any longer. I left the Seaview Hotel, walked along the beach, and then down the coastal path at my leisure; I wanted to give her time. Full of anticipation, I decided to talk to Stella about the future, our future, I would tell her my plans for our life together. I had made them without really stopping to think, for I thought I had a right to believe that my feelings would last. So I set off toward Scharmünde. There was a light on in Stella’s room, a little reading lamp, but she herself wasn’t there. I climbed over the low garden fence, slipped in among the sunflowers, and looked in at the kitchen. I saw them both there. Stella was pouring some liquid from a casserole into a small dish, and the old radio operator sat on a bench watching her expectantly. As she worked, she said something briefly to him now and then, as if to calm his impatience. I was surprised by the attentive way her father watched her, particularly when she began cutting bread. It looked like a heavy, farm-style loaf, and she cut off the crusts, pressing her lips together in concentration. She set the knife at a well-judged angle and pressed, pressed hard, sometimes sticking her lower lip out and blowing air up into her face. She placed the bread and the dish in front of her father, sat down with him, and watched him eat. He ate quickly, with what looked like the good appetite or even the greed of old age. Perhaps to commend him, she patted him gently on the shoulder, and when he crumbled his last slice of bread over the dish, she kissed his forehead. The old radio operator reached for her hand, and held it in his for a moment without a word.

  I left my place among the sunflowers, walked around the house, cast one more glance into Stella’s room, and then set off along the path home, in what was now the twilight, at peace with myself and with my intention of writing to her at once to say why I hadn’t tapped at her window after all. I couldn’t; with the picture of that scene in the kitchen before my eyes, I couldn’t do it.

  I was still writing when someone scratched at my door—didn’t knock but scratched, the way dogs or cats do when they want to be let in.

  Sonja was standing outside the door, barefoot and wearing her sleeveless dress. My little neighbor didn’t say hello, she just walked in, as she so often did, and when I said, “You ought to have been in bed long ago,” she replied, “I’m on my own at home.” She came over to my desk, very self-assured, got up on the chair, smiled, and put something down. “It’s for you, Christian. I found it for you.” In front of the photo of Stella and me lay a piece of amber, its edges clouded, but clear and shining at the center.

  “Did you find it on the beach?”

  “It was hanging in a seaweed plant—the seaweed had come loose.”

  I gave Sonja my magnifying glass, and she looked at the amber, examining it very closely through the glass. Of course she knew what could be found in amber, and as if she had been hoping for it, she cried, “Oh yes, Christian, there’s something inside it!”

  The magnifying glass passed back and forth between us. Our search was successful, as we agreed. “A beetle, Christian, a little beetle!”

  “A fly as well,” I added. “They weren’t either of them watching out when the hurricane broke, and now they’re caught in the amber forever.”

  That was enough for her. She was satisfied with my explanation, and was less interested in the captive insects than in the photograph of Stella and me. Picking it up, she said, “That’s your teacher, right?”

  “Yes, Sonja, that’s my teacher, Ms. Petersen.”

  She spent a long time working out what the photo told her, and suddenly asked, “Do you love each other?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Well, if you love each other, Christian, they’re sure to make you repeat a year at school.”

  “Oh, I think I’ll manage to move up, all the same,” I said.

  “I’ll soon have her as my teacher too.”

  “That’s something to look forward to, Sonja. Lessons with her are fun.”

  “Suppose she comes to live here, can I still come to see you?”

  “Always. You can always come to see us.”

  She thought about it, and my relationship with Stella seemed to occupy her mind so much that I was sure there was more she wanted to ask, but then someone calle
d her. I recognized her mother’s voice at once, a shrill, unattractive voice which, I sometimes thought, upset even the waterfowl in the bay. I thanked Sonja for the amber, and promised to keep it next to the photograph.

  Alone again, I took my savings book out of the drawer. It was a long time since I’d touched the book, which had been a confirmation present. It came with the sum of one hundred marks, and now contained two hundred and forty. I decided to draw out a hundred and fifty. I didn’t yet know what I would need the money for, I just wanted to have it with me in case I needed it.

  My father suspected that I had secret requirements of my own. When we were on the barge, I suggested he might pay me more regularly and more generously for my work during the vacation and after school. On our way home together—we were sitting on deck smoking—I asked if we could agree on fixed wages for my work: the expeditions with the Katarina and my work on the barge. He’d never before looked at me with such surprise: surprise and suspicion too. At first he asked, “What do you need the money for?” And as I didn’t answer that question, he asked how much I thought he ought to pay me. I told him I’d be happy with five marks for an expedition on the Katarina, and I thought another five for doing a job on the barge would be suitable. He looked as if he were calculating the sums I’d mentioned; perhaps comparing them with the wages he paid Frederik—and I knew what those came to—but anyway, he didn’t object. After a while he asked, “But I suppose you intend to go on living with us, Christian, don’t you?” The touch of reproach in his voice didn’t escape me, and I couldn’t think what to say in response; I was relieved that he didn’t press further. He looked at me encouragingly, nudged me in the ribs, said, “Come on,” and we landed and walked home the usual way.

  When we were passing the boathouse he put a hand on my shoulder and left it there until we reached our front door. Then he seemed to remember there was something on his mind, something he still had to settle, and we went back to the boathouse. He led me in, and in silence we went over to the ladder that led up to a small loft.

  At that moment I knew what it was: he had discovered my hiding place behind the ropes and nets and bamboo poles, and he wanted me to explain the stuff I was hoarding there. It amounted to a few cans of food, two bags of flour, dried fruit, noodles, and some biscuits. Anyone looking at it was bound to assume I planned to go on quite a long trip. My father pointed to the stock of provisions I had secretly assembled, and said, with pretended admiration, “Well, that should keep you going in your own household for a while, I guess.”

  This time I did think of an answer. I told him there was to be a big class outing, and we were going to stay in tents on a campsite for a few days. He smiled, and I wasn’t sure whether he believed me or not. When we weren’t so close, and he was on his way down the ladder, he came back to my financial suggestion in a casual tone of voice. “That’s all right, Christian, just keep a record of the hours you work.”

  ———

  Frederik always had a hip flask with him; whether he was working on the barge or the tug, whether he was sitting on the bench outside the boathouse or going out to Bird Island, from time to time he would put his hand in his pocket, bring out the flask, and raise it to his lips. It was made of metal in a leather case, and was filled with his favorite rum. He certainly had it with him that afternoon when he overturned the inflatable abeam of the Seaview Hotel in a rising wind, and gave the spectators watching from the wooden bridge an entertaining story to tell about their vacation. I had no doubt the inflatable had been lifted by a wave running under it just as he was about to readjust the outboard motor. He fell in the water, and now he was swimming hard; meanwhile the inflatable was still moving, no longer taking a straight course but turning in circles, some wide, some narrower. In his attempt to grab the ring-shaped line of the inflatable, he was in danger of being forced under. When that happened he dove and moved aside with a few hasty strokes. Sometimes it seemed the boat was deliberately hunting him down.

  Sudden gusts of wind showed that the weather was deteriorating. One of the first fishing cutters coming back from sea turned, got Frederik on board, and took the inflatable in tow. All the cutters were making for the safety of the harbor. The spectators on the bridge dispersed as well, waiters were salvaging sun umbrellas and tablecloths and festoons from the garden cafe of the Seaview Hotel, and two oceangoing cutters that had been fishing for cod arrived in the harbor. Long waves rolled in, rising in the air as if a hand were pulling them up, before showing their full force as they fell and broke. Dark, ragged clouds were driving low in the sky. Suddenly I saw it, I suddenly saw the two-master outside the harbor making for our bay, coming in at a steady speed in a stiff nor’easter. Although I couldn’t read the name of the yacht, I knew at once she was the Pole Star bringing Stella home, bringing her back to me. Then a gust struck her a visible blow, and she ran fast before the wind for a moment with all sail set. She was certainly hoping to come into harbor. I jumped off the bridge, down to the beach, and then ran to the pier. People were standing there too, watching the cutters coming home. Among them was old Tordsen, our unofficial harbor master, as he had not actually been appointed or chosen for the post. Tordsen had eyes only for the yacht. He knew exactly what the crew were trying to do. As if issuing instructions, he muttered words of advice or warning to himself in an undertone. “Take the mainsail in, bring her in on the engine … leave the jib hoisted, just the jib … stay out there and drop anchor.” He was speaking into the wind, cursing now and then, groaning as he followed every phase of the maneuver. I was standing right behind him, I sensed a rising fear in me, and with the fear an unfamiliar pain. I couldn’t make out who was at the helm of the Pole Star, but there were several figures to be seen on deck. Once the yacht threatened to capsize, but a strong gust of wind brought her back on course, and it looked as if she might yet reach harbor at breakneck speed. But suddenly she reared up from the water just where we had sunk our last cargo of rocks, and an unexpected force thrust her over the obstacle she had struck.

  “Idiots!” shouted Tordsen. “You idiots!” But all he and the rest of us could do was watch the bows as they dipped underwater and were thrown straight up again. The yacht seemed to shake for a moment, and then it keeled over at an angle and raced toward the wall at the harbor entrance. Her bows were forced up once more and crashed into the stone wall. The foremast broke and fell on deck, rolling sideways and sweeping two of the figures on deck overboard into the crevice between the harbor wall and the hull of the boat.

  “They’ll be crushed!” cried Tordsen. “Get moving, Christian,” he told me, “fend her off, help them to fend her off.”

  The three of us hung on to the side of the vessel and tried to keep her away from the stone wall as she rose and fell, but we couldn’t keep the side from scraping against the stone as it made abrupt contact. The bows rose again with a grating sound, and when the crevice widened for a moment I saw two limp bodies spinning in the water below me. Climbing down to them was risky. Tordsen waved to a fishing cutter to come over; the fisherman handed us a rope with an iron hook on it—the hook he used for bringing up fish traps that had come adrift—and we carefully set to work with it.

  First we got the hook into a young man’s anorak, hauled him on deck, laid him down, and someone started working on him, pressing up and down on his chest. I wouldn’t let them lift the second body with the hook; I had recognized Stella at once, her mouth open in pain, her hair drifting over her forehead, her arms hanging powerless. I got them to secure me and let me down into the crevice, fending myself off with my legs. Bending low, I grabbed at empty air a couple of times, but finally I seized hold of her wrist, got my arms under her, and at a sign from me they hauled us both up.

  How you lay there on deck, Stella, motionless, arms together. I couldn’t tell whether you were still breathing. I saw that you were bleeding from a head injury.

  I wanted to stroke her face, but at the same time I felt a strange reluctance to touch her, I don�
��t know why. Perhaps because I didn’t want any witnesses to the intimacy of my caress. But that reluctance didn’t last for long. When Tordsen told the fisherman to call an ambulance to the pier at once, I knelt down beside Stella, folded her hands over her breast, and pressed and pumped as I’d seen it done in first aid so often, until water came out of her mouth first in a little stream, then in weaker jets. Her eyes were closed. “Look at me, Stella,” I said, and now I did stroke her face and repeated my plea. “Look at me, Stella.” She opened her eyes, an uncomprehending gaze from very far away rested on me, I went on stroking her, slowly her expression changed, there was something seeking, questioning in it, she was surely searching for something in the depths of her memory. “Christian.” When her lips moved, I thought she spoke my name, but I wasn’t sure. All the same I said, “Yes, Stella,” and then I said, “I’ll get you to a safe place.”

  The two men from the ambulance came along the pier with a stretcher, but once on the yacht they changed their minds. They spread a green tarpaulin on deck, carefully laid Stella on its hard canvas so that her body was entirely enclosed when they lifted her, and then, with a nod to each other, the paramedics took her off the yacht. Stella’s body swayed slightly as they walked; it was hard for me to bear the sight. I suddenly felt as if I were lying in that tarpaulin myself. They put her down beside the ambulance, brought the stretcher up and laid Stella on it, and when they had fastened the safety straps they pushed the stretcher into the vehicle. Without asking permission, I sat down on the folding seat next to her. One of the men wanted to know if I was related to her. “Family member?” was all he asked, and I said, “Yes,” so he left me sitting there very close to Stella’s face, which had now assumed an expression of complete indifference, or maybe resignation. During the drive we kept looking at each other, we didn’t say anything, we made no attempt to speak, one of the men phoned reception at the hospital and said we were on our way. We found that we were expected outside the roofed entrance to the emergency area. A young doctor took over, he spoke briefly to the two paramedics and sent me off to an office, where an elderly nurse looked up only fleetingly from her notepad. As she wrote, she too asked, “Family member?” and I said, “She’s my teacher.” That seemed to surprise her. She turned and looked at me with curiosity. I suppose she hadn’t been prepared for such an answer.