Between Two Seas

by Marie-Louise Jensen

  ‘Yes, please. I should like that very much. Perhaps we could go down as far as the post. I have a letter to send to England now I finally have some money.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ promises Mikkel. ‘You did well today,’ he admits. ‘I was surprised. Boats must be in your blood.’

  ‘Yes, I think they must be,’ I agree quietly.

  NINETEEN

  April 1886

  I awake at first light, which is early now that we’re in April. The days are lengthening. I have to get up to prepare breakfast for Morten and Jakob before they go fishing. Their team is working on the west coast at the moment. I ease myself out of bed, trying not to disturb Lise or her sisters. But this morning she must be sleeping lightly, because she wakes at once.

  ‘Try and go back to sleep,’ I whisper.

  I shake the boys awake and then go out to the kitchen. Lifting the turf I laid over the embers last night, I painstakingly feed and gently blow on the glow until I have a small fire. It’s a good morning when the fire lights easily.

  ‘Må jeg hjælpe?’ asks Lise. Can I help? She’s already out of bed.

  ‘Shhh!’ I hush her. ‘Don’t wake your mother and sisters yet. You can break up the bread,’ I tell her, passing her a stale rye loaf. I pour water into the pan from the jug, and put it in front of her. She pulls the bread into chunks with her small fingers and drops it into the water, while I slice the dried fish for the midday meal and put it in water to soak. It is wonderful to have enough food in the house again after the months of hunger we endured.

  ‘Don’t throw the bread in, Lise,’ I remind her as the water splashes right out of the pan.

  When she’s finished, I add some ale and put the pan over the fire to bubble gently. It makes a thick, sour gruel, which we eat some mornings for our breakfast. When money is very short we have to make do with dried or salted fish only. The gruel is more filling.

  It’s a relief not to be standing ankle deep in water in the kitchen any more. There have been many days over the last few weeks when I had to do just that. Now the water levels have dropped and the sand floor is merely damp. The advantage of the high water was that I learned to row. I’m proud of my rowing skills.

  Morten and Jakob stumble out into the tiny kitchen, fully dressed, rubbing their eyes and yawning. They eat their breakfast standing up, shovelling the hot food into their mouths as quickly as possible, because dawn is turning the sky grey in the east. They set out barefoot for the west coast. Like most of the poor families in Skagen, they can’t afford boots or waterproofs, but work up to their chests in seawater all year round, dressed only in thick, hand-knitted woollens. Often the fishing is done at night. It’s a wonder to me they keep healthy.

  ‘Come and help me put away our bed, Lise,’ I urge, as soon as I hear the baby crying and the other children stirring.

  ‘God morgen, Lene,’ I say as I see she’s awake. But Lene chooses to ignore me today.

  After breakfast, once the older girls have gone to school, I spend a couple of hours mending everyone’s clothes. I look longingly at my embroidery, but that will have to wait until the chores are done.

  At noon I fry fish and wrap them for the boys to eat.

  ‘I want to come with you,’ Lise begs me. ‘I don’t want to be left behind with mother.’

  I hope she didn’t overhear that.

  ‘It’s too far to the west coast, Lise,’ I tell her. She hunches an angry shoulder and stalks off behind the house.

  Taking the wheelbarrow from the shed to bring the boys’ share of the catch back in, I head for the west coast. In fine weather, it’s one of the pleasantest parts of the day. There’s also always the hope I’ll see Peter out fishing, but today I don’t.

  I find the fishing team on the beach sharing out the morning’s catch.

  ‘Frokost!’ Lunch, I say to Morten and Jakob as I hand over the food.

  ‘Tak,’ Morten replies, as he loads the barrow with their share of fish.

  Pushing it back home is hard physical work, but I’ve got stronger through the spring.

  On the return journey I spot a figure with binoculars lying in last year’s dead brown heather. It can only be Mikkel.

  Glad of the excuse to rest, I abandon my wheelbarrow and pick my way through the heather towards him, wary of adders.

  ‘Hej, Mikkel!’ I greet him.

  He rolls over to look at me, a finger on his lips and I approach as quietly as possible until I am crouching beside him.

  ‘Can you see the larks? They are full of joy that the spring has come at last!’ Mikkel whispers, his face shining with pleasure.

  I smile at him.

  ‘I’m very well thank you, how are you?’ I respond.

  Mikkel looks puzzled.

  ‘I didn’t ask how you were, did I?’

  ‘No, but as you haven’t seen me for over a week, it would have been polite,’ I remark.

  Mikkel merely grins and turns back to the larks.

  I can hear them singing before I see them. Mikkel is right. It’s a clear song, ringing with joy.

  He points out the tiny brown lark to me as it spirals up into the sky. It is hard to believe such a big song can come from such a small bird.

  ‘Would you like a turn with the binoculars?’ Mikkel asks. ‘Here. You focus them by turning this,’ he explains. I notice his hands are raw and cracked, and have been bleeding.

  ‘Your poor hands!’ I exclaim.

  He whips them out of sight, and I understand he doesn’t want to talk about it.

  I turn away and look through the binoculars. It takes me a few moments to find the lark. I catch my breath, as I realize I can see every detail of its markings; it looks so close I could touch it.

  Mikkel is sketching it as I watch. His drawing isn’t bad.

  ‘Can I have a go?’ I ask longingly.

  Taking a last, long look, I hand over the binoculars and sketch the bird. It feels good to have a pencil in my hand again. As I try to capture the essence of its shape and markings, I become completely absorbed, forgetting where I am.

  ‘Superb, Marianne!’ breathes Mikkel. The scent of the heather and the sound of the lark’s song return as his words reach me. ‘I wish I could draw like that.’

  ‘I’ll try and teach you,’ I promise, handing back the sketchbook regretfully.

  I get up, brushing bits of dried heather from my skirt.

  ‘I haven’t seen much of you,’ I say, trying not to make it sound like a complaint. ‘Have you been busy?’

  Mikkel’s face darkens.

  ‘My father decided it was time to have another go at making a fisherman of me.’ He gets up too, and the pleasure that lit his face while he was watching the lark is gone.

  ‘And has he succeeded?’ I ask cautiously.

  ‘Hardly. I was shouted at for not rowing strongly enough. And when I was helping with the nets … ’ Mikkel falls silent, scowling at a memory.

  ‘Tell me?’ I encourage him.

  ‘The nets tear my hands and the salt water burns them. I was trying my best to ignore it, I really was. Pulling hard on the nets. Not hard enough for my father though. He kept taunting me. Comparing me to Christen, my younger brother. Reminding me that he’s two years younger than me, but already doing the work of a grown man.’

  Mikkel pauses again, audibly grinding his teeth.

  ‘So I pulled even harder. And slipped. I was standing up to my waist in water at the time, so I went right under. I swallowed seawater. My father practically hauled me out of the water by my hair. And he forced snaps down my throat. He knows I hate the stuff. It made me choke and I was sick. Over him, of course. He sent me home in disgrace and that was that.’

  ‘I’m so sorry! You should have told me before,’ I say, but I can see in his face why he didn’t. He’s ashamed of his failure. ‘I’d hoped to speak to you on Sunday after church,’ I add.

  Mikkel looks embarrassed.

  ‘Believe it or not, my father has ordered me to spend less
time with you in future. He doesn’t think you are … well, he doesn’t want me to see you as much.’ Mikkel’s words are filled with a cold anger.

  ‘Not fit company for his son?’ I ask bitterly. It’s my turn to blush. It’s a shock, but hardly a surprise. He ordered me to stay away from Mikkel and I ignored him. This is the next logical step. I can feel anger towards Mikkel’s father building up in me again. We walk the last few steps towards my wheelbarrow in uncomfortable silence. We don’t look at one another.

  ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have told you that,’ Mikkel says at last.

  I pick up the handles of the wheelbarrow and give it a vicious shove, imagining Mikkel’s father’s face beneath the wheel.

  ‘You’d have to explain somehow. Did he tell you why?’

  ‘No, he wouldn’t say,’ Mikkel replies, shaking his head.

  ‘Are you going to obey him?’

  Mikkel hesitates.

  ‘You are! Why? Does he beat you or something?’ I ask.

  Mikkel nods ruefully. ‘Not often. I usually take care not to give him reason. He’s always been very strict with all of us. He has quite a reputation.’

  ‘So I’ve heard. Does that mean we can’t be friends any more?’ Even I can hear the forlorn note in my voice.

  ‘Of course we can still be friends. He hasn’t forbidden me to see you entirely. I just thought, on Sunday, when he was watching, it was better to avoid angering him. Can I push that barrow for you for a while?’

  ‘If it won’t hurt your hands too much.’

  He shakes his head, and I let him take it. I am confused and hurt and it’s making me feel sick. I’ve put up with so much hardship here, and it’s my friendships with Hannah, Peter, and Mikkel that have kept me going. I couldn’t bear to lose him.

  Mikkel is not the only person out on the heath today. Sitting in a sheltered hollow, we see a lady sitting at an easel, painting. A little girl, two or three years old, is playing with some shells at her feet. I recognize Anna Ancher and her daughter Helga at once.

  Curiosity overcomes my shyness, and I approach her to look more closely at her painting. The Anchers are a class apart, living quietly through winter until the artists from Norway, Sweden, Copenhagen, and even Paris, gather in Skagen for the summer months. The Anchers are well liked. I myself found out how kind they were when I first arrived in Skagen.

  Anna Ancher looks up as we approach.

  ‘Ah!’ she says, and smiles. ‘Marianne, isn’t it? And Mikkel.’

  I’m surprised that she remembers my name and instinctively drop a polite curtsey. Then I feel stupid, because that’s an English habit, and not really the Danish way of doing things.

  Anna continues painting as she asks me, ‘How have you settled in here, Marianne?’

  ‘Very well, thank you. I even have work now, for Fru Hansen.’

  ‘And you’ve learned to speak Danish very prettily too, I hear. Well done.’ She flashes me a quick smile, but I hardly notice. My eyes are devouring the painting of Helga and the way she is delicately touching the colours onto the canvas. What amazes me most is the way she’s captured the sunlight falling onto her daughter. It looks so real. I wonder how she’s done it.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ I tell her impulsively. Then I crouch down to speak to the little girl to hide my shyness.

  ‘How do you like to have a picture painted of yourself?’ I ask her.

  She looks at me with the curious, open gaze of childhood.

  ‘Oh, mother is always painting me,’ she says indifferently.

  Anna laughs.

  Mikkel has flipped open his sketchbook, and is showing her my drawing of the lark. Anna Ancher looks at it, and then looks eagerly at me.

  ‘That’s good,’ she says warmly. ‘Can you paint?’

  ‘No,’ I reply quietly. ‘I’ve never tried.’

  ‘Do you draw a lot?’ she asks. ‘I’d be interested in seeing your pictures.’

  ‘I do, but mostly on a slate,’ I tell her. ‘So I’m afraid there’s nothing to show.’

  Anna nods, looking disappointed, and turns back to mixing more blue and white on her palette and adding it to the sky. We walk on, and Mikkel pushes the barrow for me again.

  When I’m home and Mikkel has taken his leave, I sigh, wrap a large apron around myself, and begin to behead and gut the fish. It’s a smelly, messy job and I loathe it. I know my hands will stink of fish for the rest of the day, no matter how thoroughly I wash them.

  I tie the cleaned plaice up on the big wooden drying frame outside the house, and toss the heads and entrails onto the midden heap. A couple of gulls come to squabble over the scraps.

  I’m in the middle of hanging up the washing the following morning when a ragged boy appears. He’s barefoot, and has a flat parcel tucked under his arm.

  ‘Hedder du Marianne?’ he asks. Are you Marianne?

  ‘Ja, det er mig,’ I agree, and he holds out the parcel to me. Hastily wiping my wet hands on my apron, I take it, but I wonder if there’s been a mistake.

  ‘From Fru Ancher,’ the boy enlightens me. ‘She gave me ten øre for bringing it to you!’ And with a delighted grin at the thought of such riches, he leaves.

  I carry the parcel carefully indoors, and lay it reverently on the table. It’s wrapped in brown paper and neatly tied with string. Lise is jumping up and down excitedly.

  ‘Oh, Marianne, what is it?’

  Lene looks sourly on, and Lise dances around me. With trembling fingers, I carefully untie the knots and unwrap the paper.

  Inside is a beautiful sketchpad. We all gasp in surprise. The sheets of paper are creamy and smooth. I run my fingertips over them in a daze. Wrapped separately inside the parcel are several pencils.

  ‘She’s so kind,’ I murmur. There’s a little note, handwritten in Danish. I stare at it, without being able to make sense of it for several moments. It simply says, Til Marianne, med hilsner fra Anna Ancher. To Marianne, with best wishes.

  Lise is already tugging at my hand, wanting my attention: ‘Can I have the wrapping paper, Marianne?’ she’s demanding.

  I’m speechless, and can only nod.

  TWENTY

  May 1886

  I see Hannah walking quickly towards the house while I’m washing Lise’s hair. My own hair is still drying.

  ‘What can Hannah be doing here at this time?’ I remark conversationally to Lise, starting to rub her hair dry with a towel. ‘She should be working at the hotel.’

  ‘Ow! You’re hurting me,’ Lise complains.

  ‘Go inside now, Lise, and ask your mother to comb your hair,’ I order her, handing her the towel.

  My attention is on Hannah. As soon as she sees me looking at her, she breaks into a run, slipping a little in the soft sand.

  ‘Marianne!’ she calls out.

  ‘Is something wrong?’ I ask as soon as she reaches me. But Hannah is smiling and her eyes are shining.

  ‘They want you to come, and you can share a room with me. It’ll be such fun—say yes!’

  I give her a friendly shake.

  ‘Tell me slower, Hannah!’ I ask. Danish can still confuse me when it’s spoken fast.

  Hannah takes a deep breath and lets it go, beaming at me.

  ‘Hr Krøyer arrived in the night, when no one realized he was coming.’

  ‘Who’s Hr Krøyer?’

  ‘He’s a friend of Michael Ancher, a famous artist. He nearly always comes here in the summer to paint. Usually we know when he’s coming and the whole town goes to greet him with flowers and music and everything. Only last night, he arrived without warning, and no one knew he was here until he walked into the hotel.’

  ‘And what does it have to do with me?’

  ‘He’s brought a French gentleman with him. He’s an artist too. And his wife is with him. She needs a new maid, and she only speaks French. So we thought … we wondered if you’d like to be her maid while she’s here. Because you speak French. She’s very grand, Marianne. She has silk dresses
and jewels and lots of luggage.’

  ‘But I’ve never been a maid. I wouldn’t know what to do.’ The world is suddenly spinning faster. Hannah is so excited, and I’m having trouble taking it all in.

  ‘She already knows that, and you’d earn a little less to begin with. But the hotel will pay you for any extra work you do. Oh and, Marianne, you can come and share my room at the hotel with me!’

  ‘Leave here? Really?’ I look around at the squalor and ugliness and think of the beauty of the hotel that I glimpsed last summer. It’s beginning to sink in now. I could leave this house. I’ve been longing to get away since I came.

  ‘It sounds too good to be true,’ I say.

  Lise, who didn’t go indoors as I asked her, has understood enough so that she’s started to cry.

  ‘Don’t go away, Marianne! Please don’t leave us,’ she begs.

  I pick her up and hug her close. I feel guilty that I can go so easily, when I know how much I’ve meant to Lise. But I have to take this opportunity.

  ‘Du må ikke græde, Lise,’ I tell her. Don’t cry. ‘Nothing’s certain yet. And if I do go, it won’t be far. I promise I’ll come back and visit you.’

  But Lise is inconsolable.

  ‘Marianne, the French madame wants to meet you right away,’ Hannah urges. ‘Come on, put on your shoes and come with me.’

  I carry Lise indoors to her mother and peel her off me.

  ‘I have to go to Brøndum’s Hotel,’ I explain to Lene. ‘It seems they might give me a job.’

  Lene greets the news with an even more stony silence than usual. I’m not even sure if she’s heard me.

  ‘You don’t need me any more now,’ I say, unsure whether I’m trying to reassure her or myself. She looks away.

  I quickly change my work clothes for my smart dress and brush and pin up my hair. It’s still damp, but I don’t think it shows. At least Hannah didn’t fetch me in the middle of gutting fish.

  ‘I’m very nervous,’ I confide, as Hannah and I wade through the sand of the main street, heading north to Brøndums Hotel. ‘What if she doesn’t like me?’