The mixture was sweet and gritty. But at least the ants weren’t moving. It wasn’t so bad, just as long as I didn’t think about what I was doing.
Quickly we finished the jar.
The syrup seemed to do the trick (or maybe it was the ants…). By the time we’d drunk some hot water and the sun had come up, we felt a bit better and were ready to set off.
We skied on through the morning, with me leading the way. I headed due east, with Father’s button compass tucked in my palm to keep me on course. I was feeling calmer now the turmoil of last night was behind me. And I saw that there was a certain symmetry to what was happening – my father too had been on a secret mission when he died, indeed he was most probably one of the operatives on that earlier attempt on Vemork. Maybe, in some form, he was with us now…
All morning we passed through small patches of pine and spruce. Then, just after midday, we climbed to the ridge of a hill and saw before us what looked like a thick, dark wall of green. Hurrah! It looked like we’d reached the great forests that mark the border between Norway and Sweden. We were near to safety now. But how near? Thirty kilometres? Fifty kilometres? A hundred?
We came to a narrow path between the trees which led us down twists and turns until it dwindled into nothing, and left us tangled up among branches. We took our skis off and pushed on, sometimes walking backwards through thickets. But Lars was struggling. He stopped every dozen steps to lean on a tree trunk until he had recovered enough strength to go on again.
Further into the forest, we came to taller, older trees and the way became easier. For a few kilometres we followed the course of a small stream.
At last we arrived at the edge of a wide clearing, with some cows in a field, a couple of goats tethered up on a hillock and two small plots of cabbages. In the middle of the clearing, some 100 metres away, was a small cottage with red walls.
There were trim lace curtains in the windows and a little line of smoke snaked up from the chimney. It looked very cosy.
“Let’s knock on the door,” I said, moving towards the open ground.
Lars grabbed my arm. “No!” he said, half gasping, half whispering. “It’s not safe!”
I took a breath. It was madness to go on any further with Lars barely able to walk. I looked longingly at the little cottage and…
Aha! I screwed up my eyes, and looked more closely … YES! I felt a surge of relief and I turned to Lars with a huge, idiotic grin all over my face.
“Lars! We’re in Sweden!”
“How d’you know?” He looked at me mistrustfully.
And it was wonderful, just for once, to be able to teach Lars something.
“Two things. Firstly, no Norwegian ever paints their house red.”
“Hmm.” Lars wiped his nose on his sleeve.
“And,” I added, “what’s your eyesight like?”
“It’s good, you know that,” said Lars.
“Well,” I said, “read that sign over there.”
“Stäng grinden,” read Lars. “What does that mean?”
His hand was clearly really bad now – Lars doesn’t usually have to have things explained to him.
“I don’t know what that means,” I replied. “And I don’t care. It could say beware of the bull or close the gate or we eat boys for breakfast. The point is it’s not in Norwegian.”
Suddenly Lars burst into laughter. And so did I. We put our arms round each other and hugged, and as we did so, I thought to myself, Things are changing – I never imagined Lars could laugh.
“Hey, look!” exclaimed Lars.
At the door of the cottage stood an old man in a tweed jacket. He held a pail in one hand and was beckoning us towards him.
Two words came bounding into my mind.
Fresh milk.
And that’s where I am now – sitting on the rag rug by the stove in Mr Lysen’s kitchen. He’s given me some milk and it’s delicious and sweet and still warm from the cow. We’ve had some porridge, too, and I’ve helped him with his chores. Mr Lysen has bound Lars’s hand in a cloth soaked in vinegar. Tomorrow, when we’ve rested, we’ll visit the hospital. It feels so good to be warm and fed and to have someone looking after us for a change.
Jakob P. Stromsheim
19TH JANUARY 1943, STOCKHOLM
We’re here in Stockholm at last! It wasn’t exactly hard to find Freddie’s café. Thanks to Mr Lysen, we arrived in the city with a map, as well as a hearty packed lunch. And when we got off the train we found there were signposts on every corner and friendly pedestrians who stop and direct you. And though it gets dark early in the afternoon, there’s no blackout – I keep having to remind myself that Sweden isn’t at war.
And just as Freddie said, the café had a sign with a little red cat hanging outside.
I pushed open the heavy swing doors. The interior was faded and old-fashioned with padded red leather seats and a dusty chandelier. There were no other customers except a courting couple and a man sitting in the far corner behind a newspaper.
We took a table by the window. I opened the menu for both of us because Lars’s right hand was still wrapped in bandages.
“What’ll you have, Lars? Smoked reindeer?”
Lars smiled and shook his head.
“Never again. You might just as well ask me if I want some moss. Let’s have the pickled eel – I’ve been longing for pickled eel for months.”
Well, there’s no accounting for taste. I ordered and the waitress returned with two apple juices, a fruit tart (for me) and Lars’s plate of pickled eel.
Lars ate clumsily with the fork in his left hand, while I gazed out of the window. In the distance, I saw two figures approaching – one tall and gangly, the other much smaller. The taller figure stopped and stooped down to examine something in the window of a bookshop. The smaller figure tugged at the tall one, forcing him to start walking again.
A minute later, Åse pushed open the swing door. She spread out her arms.
“At last!” she cried.
And we all hugged. Even Lars, after a tiny hesitation, joined in.
Åse noticed Lars’s bandaged hand.
“What happened?” she asked.
“Just a bit of frostbite. The hospital says it’s too early to tell. I may lose a few fingers, but it could’ve been worse,” replied Lars.
“Oh! Can I have a look?” said Freddie. “I’m really interested in putrefaction.”
“Shut up, Fred,” said Åse quickly, and Freddie gave a little shrug.
We sat down and I was surprised to find I felt slightly shy after all our time apart. After everything that’s happened, I didn’t know where to start.
Åse broke the silence.
“Nice seats,” she said, patting the padded leather. “Fred, it reminds me of being in that Bentley with Mr Higgins.”
“What Bentley?” I asked.
“Oh, we were picked up at Göteborg by this nice fellow from the embassy who brought us to Stockholm,” said Åse casually. And as she spoke she moved the pickled eel plate to the other side of the table.
“Are you telling me that you were chauffeured across Sweden!” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. After all that Lars and I had been through, this just wasn’t fair!
“Well, the rest of the journey wasn’t that easy,” protested Freddie. “My shoulder got put out again and they put it back without any anaesthetic.”
And he too, just like Åse, pushed the eel plate away.
“Won’t you try the eel?” I asked. Lars had saved a couple of bits for them. “It’s delicious.”
Freddie and Åse both made faces.
“We’re off fish,” said Freddie.
“I can’t believe you’d ever be ‘off’ any kind of food, Freddie,” I said.
And then they explained. They talked, for ever interrupting and correcting each other, about their escape. At Tønsberg harbour they had crouched in the dark in these huge vats full of old fish waste and slime, and they had heard the German so
ldiers walking up and down the harbour inspecting the boats. Then, after hours and hours, night fell and a fisherman helped them out of the vats and brought them to the tiny hold of his boat. A minute later he slammed closed the hatch and they were trapped again in the dark for a long and rough crossing to Sweden. They both got seasick and huddled there all cooped up with the bits of old fish around them, feeling so ill and wet and cold and miserable that they wanted to die.
When they finished their story, Åse turned to Lars and said, “You’d have hated it down in that hold, Lars! There was barely any air.”
“I’m through with that,” replied Lars purposefully.
Åse looked at him very closely. And Lars, who kept his eyes fixed on the table all the time, explained. He didn’t tell them everything, but he did describe the time in the forest when he watched the German executions. He also mentioned the nightmares he’s suffered and how everything seemed to come to a head in that snow hole in the storm. Ever since that night, he said, his memories were just as clear, just as vivid, but somehow they hurt less. Things had altered and he didn’t know quite how or why.
At this point Lars shifted his gaze to his bandaged hand and smiled a little sadly. “I feel better now,” he said, “and if the price for that is losing a few fingers, I really don’t mind.”
Finally it was my turn. I dug in my pocket and brought out the little button compass, which was now looking even more dented and battered than ever.
I turned it over and showed Åse and Freddie the initials scratched on the back. I explained how it was my father’s compass, and how, by a miracle of chance and fate, Lars had found it in that terrible wood all those months ago and had eventually given it to me.
“Now I know the worst,” I said. “I know how he died. But I do get some comfort from this little compass that has got us over the mountains and into Sweden. Without it we would’ve been lost.” I stopped and glanced round – I knew what I had to say next would sound strange. “I feel it’s brought us good luck. It’s almost as if someone’s been watching over us.”
“And there’s somebody else who’s been watching over us too,” said Åse quietly. She nodded towards the corner of the café.
The man in the corner had put down his newspaper. Sitting there, dressed in a big loose raincoat, was none other than Colonel Armstrong!
He beckoned to us with a finger and we all dutifully trooped over to his table. It may seem ridiculous, but I felt nervous. In a flash, all those weeks surviving up on the Hardanger, the raid, the escape into Sweden and everything else that had happened seemed to vanish from my mind. I felt as if I was back at Drumincraig, just about to be told off for doing something wrong.
“Take a seat,” said the Colonel briskly. “Miss Jeffries, you’re looking very thin. Won’t need a lock pick now, will you? You’ll be able to squeeze through the keyhole yourself.”
Åse grinned. The Colonel lifted one eyebrow, then gave a little cough and continued.
“Now,” he said briskly. “You’ve done well to survive. Nine out of ten. Not ten out of ten because I’m sure plenty of things went wrong up on the mountains that shouldn’t have. Examine your consciences. Did you do well? Have you improved your levels of mental stamina? Your endurance?” He scowled at each of us in turn.
And, as his eyes raked over us, I thought to myself, Colonel, you get ten out of ten for being a curmudgeon. Is he never happy? If I won a battle single-handed against a hundred axe-bearing Samurai he’d still be dissatisfied. If I got ninety-eight per cent in an exam he’d say, “What about the other two per cent?”
The Colonel looked down at his hands and, as usual, they were bright red with cold. He cracked his knuckles. It was a horrible noise and I tried not to flinch. “But as for today, you’re a right bunch of numbskulls!”
“Sir?” I said.
“When you came blundering in here, did you look around you? Of course you didn’t! I was reading The Times, so you should have known I wasn’t Swedish. Nought out of ten for observation. Don’t you think it might have been wise to check up on who I might be before you all started pouring your hearts out?”
The Colonel sighed and cracked his knuckles again for emphasis. “It all goes to show,” he concluded, “that you need more training.”
“More training?” said Åse in a faltering voice.
“You’ll have a little rest first and, heaven knows why, but your families may want a quick glimpse of you too. But we’ll be needing at least a couple of you back soon. Mrs Collins will want to fatten you up like lambs for the slaughter. Also, I have this little project.”
He shot us one of his graveyard smiles.
“And I have no doubt that you will all be volunteering!”
END NOTE
This story is based on fact. Jakob, Åse, Freddie and Lars are entirely fictional, but during the winter of 1942–3 the Allies did secretly send in Norwegian saboteurs to blow up the heavy water supplies at the Vemork plant up in the Hardanger Plateau. This turned out to be one of the most astonishing feats of bravery and endurance by any soldiers during World War II. Thankfully, no one was killed in the attack and, as this book goes to print, some of the saboteurs are still alive today.
Other things have also survived. The spectacles that the Vemork workman mislaid among his papers have been perfectly preserved and can be seen today at the industrial museum in Rjukan. The supplies that were dropped at the parachute jump really were in coffin shaped boxes and the telegram which mentions three pink elephants is also a true fact. Meanwhile, the Imperial War Museum in London has button compasses dating from the Second World War. Sadly all the SOE exploding rats have vanished.
BIOGRAPHY
Amanda Mitchison is an award-winning journalist who has written for British newspapers for many years. She has travelled extensively, especially in the Middle East. Her work has ranged from war reporting to interviewing Hollywood celebrities. Her work for children has been shortlisted for the Blue Peter Book Awards. She lives in Bristol with her husband and two sons.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book has been a team effort from the very beginning and thanks are due to a huge number of people who have helped along the way. Here are but a few:
Keith Miller, former head of weapons at the National Army Museum, talked me through the World War II guns. Paul Cornish, Martin Garnett and Alan Jeffreys at the Imperial War Museum helped with knives, explosives and button compasses.
Trond Bjorli at the Norsk Folkemuseum in Oslo provided invaluable help in finding photographs of Norwegian boys. Tor Nicolaysen, a real outdoorsman who has trekked over the Hardanger Plateau, helped with local wildlife and maps and was very patient as I struggled to find the Norwegian words for “lemming” and “badger”.
Paladin Press very kindly let me use the photographs of the combat knife from Get Tough by Major W.E. Sykes. And I am very grateful to the Scott Polar Research Institute in Cambridge for access to their library.
The television producer Martin Pailthorpe was most evocative about the awful taste of reindeer moss. Adam Chapman and Nick Brown gave useful advice on bears and their habits.
Denise Johnstone-Burt, Ellen Holgate, Louise Jackson and Nic Knight at Walker Books moulded and trimmed the book into shape and did much of the really laborious work behind the scenes. My family was also roped in. My husband Jeremy Bristow, my sister Harriet Mitchison and my cousin Tabby Godfrey read early drafts and helped hugely. My son Teddy, twelve years old at the time of going to print (and a ruthless critic), acted as special advisor.
A very special thanks also to Maisie Dodds, star gymnast and the inspiration for Åse.
Amanda Mitchison
February 2010
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.
First published 2010 by Walker Books Ltd
87 Vauxhall Walk, London SE11 5HJ
This edition published 2013
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Text © 2010 Amanda Mitchison
Illustrations © 2010, 2013 Richard Collingridge
The right of Amanda Mitchison to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, taping and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data: a catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Every effort has been made to trace the ownership of all copyrighted material and to secure the necessary permission to reprint the material used in this book. In the event of any question arising as to the use of any material, the publisher, whilst expressing regret for any inadvertent error, will be happy to make the necessary correction in future printings.
ISBN 978-1-4063-4622-0 (ePub)
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