‘Wouldn’t mind a swim in that sea,’ Karl said.
‘As long as you don’t care about being blown to smithereens,’ she said. ‘It’s mined.’
That was them firmly put in place.
Morag caught Jørgen’s eye in her rear-view mirror and grinned. Suddenly, his cares evaporated.
When they got out of the car, the wind had whipped up and spray was blowing up onto the slipway. Shouting over the wind, Morag told them it had recently been built so that the Shetland Bus boats could be hauled in for repair after every trip. A couple of boats were already resting there in dry dock, the decks being scrubbed by men in oilskins and boots.
A garage was the next port of call, where some smaller motorboats were being housed. ‘They’re for when agents need to get between islands,’ Morag said. ‘They never come back, so we need a lot of them.’
‘What do you mean, never come back?’ Jørgen asked.
‘Oh sorry, I meant the boats, not the men! The Germans are onto us now, how we get our agents in or out, and how we do our weapon drops. It’s getting too risky for the big fishing boats to go right into a fjord or harbour, so we thought we’d provide these. The agent zips where he wants to go, and then just dumps the boat.’
‘Meaning you can get to places the Germans would never think you could get to,’ Karl said.
Karl continued to stare at the motorboats until Morag pulled her mackintosh closer round her chest and said, ‘Come on, let’s get out of this wind. There’s work to do.’
She took them into a small joinery workshop. ‘Those boats we just saw? They need their engines protecting for the journey over,’ she said to Karl. ‘The deck often gets swamped, so we make housings for them, to keep the sea out. The boats are no earthly use if the engine’s flooded.’
Another of the men moved aside from the bench where he was sawing, so Jørgen could take a look.
It wasn’t a bodge job, like he expected, but well thought through. The engine was securely mounted in a plywood box, and the propeller shafts stuck out of the box via a watertight membrane, all neat and workman-like. The petrol and water pipes were mounted on a brass plate, and there was an insertion hole for the starter handle that could be sealed with a plug.
‘We need six more of these making,’ Morag said. ‘Jacobsen, will you show these two the ropes?’
Jacobsen, an older man with a bristly walrus-like moustache and rheumy eyes, handed them two brown twill aprons and soon got them working. Jørgen was glad to be busy with his hands doing something practical.
Karl was watching Morag go. ‘She’s not a bad looker,’ he said. ‘A bit stiff though. Might try to take her out for a few drinks, loosen her up.’
‘She probably has to be that way,’ Jørgen said. ‘After all, there aren’t many women here at base, are there? Except the ones somewhere behind the serving hatch in the canteen or hidden away in the laundry.’
Karl leaned in to him and whispered, ‘What d’you say we take one of those motorboats out one day, explore a bit?’
‘Too risky. You heard what Morag said. Don’t want to blow ourselves up.’
‘Aw. Where’s your Viking sense of adventure? Are you a norseman or not?’
‘There’s adventure,’ Jørgen said, ‘and then there’s rank stupidity.’
Karl laughed. ‘Yeah. You could be right. Probably best to try to stay alive now we’ve actually got here.’ He turned back to measuring his sheet of ply.
Jørgen was relieved. He’d had to quash the idea that Karl could well have an alternative interest in looking at the coast. Now he let go of it. Harcourt was right, he must be try to calm down and not be looking for trouble everywhere he went.
A month went by with work in the woodwork shop, and the repairing and repainting of the fishing boats that would go out to Norway next winter season. Jørgen was under a boat with his paintbrush when Morag came to tell him he was wanted at the Mission again. ‘Captain Harcourt wants a word,’ she said.
He wiped his palms down his overalls and hopped into the front seat of the battered old Morris while she drove him over to Lerwick, over rugged brown hillsides dotted with crumbling rock, past abandoned crofts and pylons.
‘Have you always lived in Shetland?’ he asked her. And then cringed, he was sounding like Karl.
She didn’t seem to notice. ‘Yes,’ she said, changing gear, ‘except I went to school in Aberdeen. It’s the nearest place with a school that does Higher School Certificate. I learnt to get rid of my Scottish accent there.’
‘So what made you come back?’
‘Aberdeen’s all right. But I missed the island, and I’ve always felt more Norwegian than English because of my mother. They say Bergen’s nearer Shetland than Aberdeen.’
‘Doesn’t seem like it,’ he said. ‘The journey over seemed long enough.’
She laughed. ‘Rough, was it?’
‘You could say that. I think my stomach’s still in Norway.’
They were coming over the hill now and going down. A mizzle of grey rain had started up again and she put the wiper on.
‘All this must have changed since the war.’ He gestured at the town laid out before them.’
‘Yes. It was much quieter. I used to work in the Post Office here, that’s where I heard about a post in Scalloway as a general factotum. They needed someone fluent in Norwegian, and I thought, why not? And I’ve been with Larsen’s outfit ever since.’
‘Must be interesting.’
‘Hard though, when you send a boat out and it doesn’t come back.’
‘Does that happen often?’
She pulled up. They’d arrived. She turned and looked him in the eye. ‘It’s the weather, more than the Germans. The North Sea in winter’s a cruel master. Our men risk their lives in the biggest seas you could imagine. Sometimes I can’t sleep, thinking of them out there. It’s the thought of them drowning; the thought of falling into those towering waves, of sinking in icy seas and what they must think of in those last desperate moments. Knowing no rescue will ever come.’
‘You’re not being a very good advertisement for it, are you?’
‘Sorry.’ She made a face. Then smiled. ‘You’re right, I shouldn’t have opened my big mouth. I hope I haven’t put you off. Lord knows, we need men who are prepared to do it, even when they know the risks.’
Jørgen found himself about to volunteer, just to see Morag Airdrie smile again. When she smiled, her whole face became mischievously alive. He reminded himself of Astrid, back home in Norway. Get a grip, he told himself. Don’t let yourself be de-railed by the first pretty face you see.
At the Mission Morag showed him into Harcourt’s Office. Today Harcourt was alone, staring gloomily out into the rain. Even though it was summer, the rain still blew across the island in sheets. ‘We’ve had the report back on Karl Brevik,’ Harcourt said, without turning. ‘We’ve found nothing.’
‘Thank God,’ Jørgen said. He let out his breath.
Now Harcourt came to sit down. ‘It was a thorough investigation. His contacts were all double-checked.’ He frowned, shrugged. ‘It could happen, you know, Nystrøm. He could be the only one who got away. And there’s no evidence of him having been anything other than a good police officer before the war. No affiliation to any political party or organisation. And we talked to the Olympic committee; he’s a model athlete. No drugs, nothing like that.’
‘Sounds too good to be true.’
‘Not quite. There was a girlfriend; she claimed he’d blacked her eye, roughed her up. But he said she was making it up, that she was just wanting to get attention from someone with celebrity status. And I can see that might be a possibility with a “name” like him. It had quite a spread in the papers until the Athletic Board had it hushed up. They needed him to be clean for their team.’
So that was it. ‘I thought I’d read something about that.’
‘So now what do you think? You’ve seen more of him than the rest of us. Is he a man you can trust?�
��
Jørgen squeezed his hands into fists. ‘It should be an easy question, I know, but it isn’t. Karl dug me out of an avalanche when he could have left me to die. Yet I’ve never really warmed to him. We rub along all right, but…’
‘You instinct is, that he’s not one of us?’
‘No. I can’t just say that, because I don’t particularly like him. He’s never done anything to me, and he’s always been perfectly polite to everyone else. There are plenty of people I don’t exactly hit it off with, but it doesn’t mean they’re all spies. I guess there’s just something I don’t trust.’
‘We noted your reservations, but I’m afraid we feel they may be unfounded. But I suppose it’s best we err on the side of caution since you obviously feel so strongly. Because of that, we can’t send Brevik to SOE for training, but nor would it be wise to keep him here. Yet the man could be entirely innocent.’ He stood up and paced across the room staring into space. ‘An awkward little conundrum.’
Was Harcourt blaming him? He didn’t want to be responsible for holding Karl back from training because of some unproven feeling he had. ‘I’m sorry, sir.’
‘Best thing would be to get him back to Norway, get them to deal with him.’
Pass the buck, in other words. ‘He told me he wants to join your operations,’ Jørgen said, ‘and was talking about getting on the next boat back. That much I can be sure of, he fancies crewing for the Shetland Bus, and if you’re right and I’m wrong I don’t want to hold him back.’
‘What about you? Will you join us on the operations? They tell me you’re handy on board ship. You have good radio skills but I feel you’re not ready for another W/T job just yet.’
What did he mean? Did he still think of him as too shot with nerves for the job? ‘I did wonder about The Shetland Bus,’ Jørgen said guardedly. ‘You’re right, they’d be looking for me if I went straight back to Norway as a W/T op, so it would have to be an out and return job. Crew or something.’ He didn’t want the man to know how afraid he was of going back.
‘My thoughts exactly,’ Harcourt said. ‘Could be, you’re still not ready. Best take a few weeks to think it over, and let me know your decision at the end of the month.’
Jørgen swallowed. He was ready. As ready as he’d ever be to go back to a place where they shot people like him on sight. But he didn’t want to look like he was ignoring Harcourt’s advice. ‘I’ll think it over,’ he said.
CHAPTER 19
Astrid had been released from prison after a night in the cell, with instructions to report to Falk the following week and every week for the foreseeable future until the trial came. ‘Disobeying State Orders’ was the charge, and who knew what sort of sentence she could expect for that? She’d have to be careful about seeing Herman, and about where she went. She hated this new restriction, and her stomach contracted at the thought of having to see Falk again. She’d sensed suppressed anger in him, and the thought it could blow up at any moment scared her.
What was her life to become, now? She couldn’t go to school, not while Pedersen was still in charge. She’d never go back on her resignation. If there was one thing she was, it was stubborn, and teaching was all she ever wanted to do.
All the way home she looked over her shoulder. Every man behind her became a threat, every curious glance something more sinister.
At the gate, she opened the mailbox to find two letters there. The top one was from Jørgen; she knew his handwriting. Thank goodness; he was still alive. With a quick glance behind, she took the letters indoors, and without even taking off her coat, ripped open the letter.
The few words did nothing to cheer her. So he’d left Norway after all. He’d be in Scotland by now, with the North Sea between them. And from his tone, it sounded as though he wouldn’t be coming back any time soon.
I don’t want you to feel you have to have any ties to me. The Occupation in Norway makes it hard for me to have any certainties about the future.
A hollow feeling in her chest made her put the letter to one side.
Of course she felt ties to him. This bloody occupation.
She pulled the other letter towards her. After reading it, she sat down and raked her fingers through her long fair hair, wondering what on earth to do. The landlord wanted her to vacate the house by the end of the month. A German Kommandant had agreed to take on the tenancy from the first of July, and his rent would be paid by the army.
She gave a groan of frustration. Hadn’t she any rights left? She suspected they couldn’t legally do this, throw her out with so little notice, but now she was in a predicament. She’d already got on the wrong side of Falk, the chief of the quisling police, and now she’d no job, no means of paying rent, and a trial in the offing. Arguing with the landlord would do no good, and she hadn’t the money for a lawsuit, even if she had the grounds for one.
Yet the thought of moving on filled her with dread. Where could she go? With no job, she couldn’t afford anything. The thought of crawling back to Pedersen and signing his teacher’s contract was unthinkable.
She’d have to get some sort of work. Up until now she’d used her savings whilst she kept applying for teacher’s posts, but it was just as she expected. No school would take her without the new union card. She pulled over the newspaper but hadn’t the heart to even look at the ‘Situations Vacant’ column again. The only thing she could think of was private tutoring, but for that she’d need a place to live.
In desperation she wrote to all her teacher colleagues, copying the same letter over and over, explaining her situation. Did any of them know of a room, somewhere cheap, that she could rent?
In the weeks while she waited for replies, Astrid packed up her books and personal possessions. How had she acquired so much stuff? Boxes or crates were scarce these days because people used them for firewood, so she struggled to tie her few essential belongings into bundles using spare bedsheets. She took a long time agonising over Pappa’s stamp collections, an heirloom that she decided in the end not to sell.
But as the month wore on, and the only replies were apologies, she began to feel desperate. Every week as she signed the attendance form at the Police Headquarters, there was a Teachers Union form in front of her on the desk, and every week she studiously ignored it, but it got harder and harder to do so with no work. She took more unwanted clutter to the market, and sold off what she didn’t need. The Occupation meant almost everything was in demand. Simple things like paper, string, or thread for sewing.
Daily she crossed her fingers as she opened the letterbox, hoping not to see the official letter with the trial date. Instead, more replies from her teacher friends, all saying they couldn’t help. No, they were all struggling. They knew nowhere.
Only three days left to find somewhere. Surely it was impossible.
Until finally on the day the trial letter came, she opened a letter from Mrs Bakke.
She had to read it twice before she could take it in.
It’s not much but my sister has a small apartment in a block in the city. She’s got TB and has gone to a sanatorium, in the country. She will be away a few weeks at least. I can give you the key. But obviously, you’ll have to move out when she comes home, and my mother is paying the rent, so might have to stop if it the disease gets worse and goes on too long. But you’re welcome, until you find something else.
Mrs Bakke gave a telephone number and within a few moments Astrid was standing in the red telephone box by the corner of the street and asking the switchboard to get her the number.
Mrs Bakke sounded exactly the same. ‘I left, you know, when you did,’ she said. ‘Good thing my Dagrun’s working. They can’t lay off the dockworkers’ office or we’d all starve.’ She talked a while about the others at the school, who’d stayed and who’d left, as Astrid fed in her precious coins. Karen Baum had told the quisling police that Astrid had helped to organize the petition, in exchange for getting Bo out of the camps. Of course it hadn’t worked. Bo was still th
ere. But at least it explained why Falk’d singled her out.
Eventually Astrid interrupted, ‘I need to be out in a few days, can I collect the key today?’
‘Soon as you like,’ Mrs Bakke said. ‘It’ll be good to have someone to collect the post and keep the place warm.’
Back home, Astrid looked at the court summons with the eagle and swastika on the heading, and slowly, deliberately, tore it into pieces.
Two days later, she surveyed her new apartment. Actually, it was more like a rabbit hutch than an apartment, but at least the odious Falk wouldn’t have her address. She lugged her belongings up to the third floor and plonked them down. A glance out of the only window revealed a rickety iron fire escape and a backyard full of dustbins where mangy cats prowled looking for scraps. The fire escape backed onto a concrete tunnel used as a shelter, but pray God there would be no air raids, as rushing down those stairs in the dark would be lethal.
The next day she scoured the telephone directory for her pupils’ parents, and careful who she approached, wrote more letters offering to give lessons in English, or basic tuition in mathematics, history and geography. She even wrote to Mr Feinberg, but she didn’t expect a reply; she remembered all too clearly he’d asked her to leave them alone.
After a week she had gleaned just two hours a week teaching. Hardly enough to feed herself, now her coupons would be stopping. She was in hiding now, and things would be more difficult. She sat on the floor of the apartment and sighed. People just couldn’t afford to pay for out-of-school tuition. School had been free, and in wartime nobody had money to spare. Not even for their children’s education. It made her angry. The children would be held back without new work to do, new challenges, and a whole generation would be losing out because of this damn war.
It was then she thought of it. If they wouldn’t come to her, then perhaps she could go to them. What if she could prepare some free learning materials, exercises and so on, that children could do at home? She had some of the old textbooks. She could do a series of worksheets, with some resources attached. More fun than the stuff that was in the usual textbooks. For geography, she could include maps, and suggest walks around the city.
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