The Beachcomber (The Island of Sylt Book 2)

by Ines Thorn

  “What will you do now?” he asked softly, and continued to stroke her back.

  Inga didn’t answer at once. She raised her head and looked into Tamme’s eyes appraisingly, and still found nothing but kindness and empathy. She gathered all her courage. “Lie with me,” she whispered. “Make a child for me.”

  CHAPTER 7

  Jordis still sat with the stranger, putting honey on his wound and laying damp cloths on his forehead. Occasionally, he woke, looked around the hut, asked where he was, and fell asleep again immediately. When he woke, Jordis fed him a fortifying drink of raw eggs with sugar and whatever else she had in the hut. It wasn’t much. She hadn’t eaten in days, and she hadn’t been able to look for mussels either. She desperately needed to go to the beach and see if she could get food from the wreck. The beach overseer still had the area cordoned off, but Jordis knew that at twilight everyone would leave the beach. Or if they didn’t, they’d be there for the same reason.

  It had started to rain. It was a heavy freezing rain mixed with fine crystals of ice. It was probably snowing on the mainland. Jordis put a fresh cloth on the stranger’s forehead and donned an oilskin jacket she’d found on the beach and a sturdy cap coated in pitch to make it waterproof. The oilskin was too large, the shoulders hung to her elbows, and its weight dragged her down, but she still climbed down the dunes to the beach. She saw the figure sitting on an upturned fishing boat only after she’d come quite close. It was Crooked Tamme.

  “What are you doing here at night in the rain?” she asked, sitting down next to him.

  “I’m thinking,” he replied. “I think better on the beach.”

  Jordis nodded. She felt the same way. She got up. “I have to go to the wreck,” she said. “I have nothing left in the house.”

  “You need food for two, don’t you?”

  Jordis recoiled in surprise. “What makes you think so?”

  Tamme laughed softly. “I was on the beach when the ship hit the rocks. I saw what happened. And I know the man who made it to shore isn’t dead.” He looked at Jordis, but in the darkness, his face was inscrutable.

  “What else do you know?” she asked.

  “Well, if the man isn’t dead, he must be somewhere here on the island.”

  “Could be,” Jordis said, inexpertly trying to allay his suspicions. “Still, I really have to get to the wreck.”

  “Wait.” Crooked Tamme stood up and patted the vessel he’d been sitting on. “I’ll help. I have my salvaging rope under this boat. You can wrap one end around your waist, and I’ll hold the other end so I can pull you out of the water if something goes wrong.”

  Tamme reached under the upturned vessel and pulled out the rope. Jordis raised her arms and he wrapped it around her waist, securing it tightly. Then she walked into the water. She’d expected the icy water to take her breath away, but she was wrong. The water was cold, but the air was colder. She swam to the wreck, climbed over the side, and looked around. The ship lay on its side. Jordis had trouble finding her way in the darkness, but she finally found the hatch above the waterline. She pulled the heavy cover aside and climbed along the ladder inside, sideways because of the position of the ship. In a few steps she reached the crew’s quarters. She found a barrel with bread. It was moldy in a few places, but she took as much as she could carry and climbed out of the hatch again. On deck, she found the cookhouse, and in it a thick piece of smoked ham, half a sack of barley, and a cabbage. She opened her sack, packed the bread and the cabbage inside, and tucked the ham under the rope at her waist. She tossed the sack over her shoulder and climbed back into the water. She swam clumsily with one arm, the sack weighing her down. It took all her strength to keep from going under. Crooked Tamme towed her in from the shore, and when she finally reached the beach, she collapsed with fatigue.

  Tamme put a blanket around her shoulders and helped her carry the spoils up the dune to her hut.

  “You can have half of it, if you want,” Jordis said, but Tamme dismissed her with a wave.

  “We have all we need at the moment,” he said. “Unless you have a sip of Branntwein for me.”

  Jordis considered for a moment, and then she invited him into her hut, lit the lantern, and fetched the demijohn of whiskey she had found that summer.

  Tamme had stopped in the doorway and was staring at the bed, where the stranger slept restlessly.

  “So he is here,” he said.

  Jordis nodded. “I trust you, but I don’t want anyone else to know.”

  Tamme’s forehead creased. “Why not? If someone survives the shipwreck, the cargo and everything else belongs to him. Do you want to keep him from his claim?”

  “No. He’s badly hurt. Someone cut his hand off and tried to bury him alive. I’m sure he’d have to face interrogation if it’s discovered that he survived. He was on a man-of-war. I want to protect him.”

  Tamme nodded. “You’re not stupid. You’re protecting the sailor from harm in the hope that he will share everything with you afterward?”

  Jordis shook her head. “I don’t think he’s a sailor. He wasn’t wearing the right kind of clothes. And look at his hand. It’s smooth with clean nails and no calluses. He’s not a seaman. I think he’s someone important. But I don’t want anything from him.”

  Tamme looked perplexed. “Then why do you have him here? It would be to your advantage if he didn’t survive.”

  Jordis looked up. “He’s from Iceland, where my roots lie. He speaks my grandmother’s tongue.”

  Jordis would have liked to explain more clearly, but she didn’t know how to put her feelings into words. It felt as though the Icelandic stranger were a messenger from her mother and her grandmother. She hoped he was someone who would understand her, someone who believed in the runes. She had found a bag of runes in the pocket of his britches. Was he the rune master who would help her to get back her future?

  “Please don’t tell anyone what you have seen here,” she begged Tamme, and poured him a full cup of whiskey. She also took a large swallow. As the strong liquor flowed down her throat, she felt it begin to warm her from the inside.

  “What were you thinking about, outside in the rain at night?” she asked.

  Tamme scratched his chin. “I was thinking about love.”

  “Did you come to any conclusions?”

  He gave a small smile. “Well, I came to the conclusion that you can’t plan love, but it comes and goes as it will.”

  Jordis nodded. She didn’t know if Tamme was right or not. She had been in love only once and had suffered terribly for it. She didn’t believe that she would ever love again either. But if Tamme was right, anything was possible. She briefly asked herself if she still had feelings for Arjen, but the thought was so painful that she quickly focused on Tamme again.

  “Are you still in love with Inga?” she asked him.

  “Yes. But I am only who I am. And apparently, I’m only good enough for emergencies.”

  “What are you talking about?” Jordis said.

  Tamme changed the subject. “It’s late now, or perhaps I should say early. I should go home. I wish you luck, Jordis. Take good care of yourself.”

  With those words, he left. Jordis watched him thoughtfully through the window as he walked away. But then the stranger moved, so she went to the bed and put her cool hand on his forehead. “Your fever has broken,” she said softly in the language of her mother and grandmother.

  The stranger nodded and smiled. “My name is Lian,” he said.

  CHAPTER 8

  For the next few days, Crooked Tamme roamed the dunes and dike looking for mussels and oysters, and collecting the last bits of sheep dung. He was pensive. That was unusual for him. Until recently, he had believed that God had good reasons for making his life the way it was and everything would work out the way it should. But now everything was different. Inga had asked him to lie with her. She wanted him only so she could have a child and the villagers would stop gossiping about her. She wanted him to
lie with her so everyone would think her marriage was in good standing. She had asked him without the slightest regard for what it would mean to him. She had chosen him only because he was a cripple, and she thought he’d accept her for lack of choices. But that wasn’t the way it was.

  Tamme loved Inga and had for a long time. He’d loved her for as long as he could remember. He loved her now, even though she was married to another man. Inga had never even looked at him, not the way a woman looks at a man. He’d once dared to tell her how he felt. Not directly; he had only hinted. But he was sure that she’d understood, even though she had reacted with indignation. And he’d waited, and he’d hoped. Hoped that she would see him as he truly was, just once. Really see him. Not the way one glances at a passing cripple, with distaste and pity, but the way a woman sees a man she knows is interested in her. But Crooked Tamme had hoped in vain.

  The news of Arjen and Inga’s wedding had pulled the rug out from under him. Arjen was his friend, but Tamme had never told him where his heart lay. No one knew. Not even his sister, Antje. He had even managed to congratulate Arjen and wish him luck. He hadn’t understood why Arjen had suddenly chosen Inga. Now Inga admitted that she’d forced Arjen into marriage. Did Arjen have a secret? Had she blackmailed him? He would have liked to ask her, but he didn’t want to hurt her feelings. He didn’t want to hurt her the way she so often hurt him. He hadn’t asked Arjen either. His friend would have told him if he’d wanted to. But Arjen hadn’t.

  Now Inga had asked him to sire a child for her. He felt irritation and anger boiling up inside. She’d never been interested in him, and now she wanted to use him. It certainly wouldn’t be any great effort to do it. But Inga didn’t seem to realize she was treating Tamme more cruelly than he’d ever been treated in his entire life. He loved her anyway. He wanted to lie with her; he had never wanted anything more. But not under these conditions! If he did it, and she actually carried his child, would it not be as though she were his wife, even a little? Or would his love die once he got what he’d longed for? Tamme didn’t know. He couldn’t make up his mind. He would have liked to ask Jordis to cast the runes for him, the way Etta had occasionally done. Once, he’d even dared to ask her about love. Etta had read in the runes that he would marry the woman he loved. It didn’t look that way now.

  Tamme walked across the dike with his hands in his pockets and eyes downcast. He didn’t know what to do. He thought about how his friend Arjen would feel if he slept with his wife. He would be betraying his friend. Or was it betrayal only if his friend loved his wife? It was clear to everyone that Arjen didn’t love Inga. He never touched her; he never exchanged a loving glance with her. Arjen might even be grateful if Tamme fulfilled the marital duty that Arjen had no interest in.

  What should he do? What, by God? He was a proud man. He knew he couldn’t compare to the other men of Rantum; he couldn’t go to sea or even work as a fisherman. But he was still a person with feelings and needs. Should he allow Inga to use him for her purposes? Was there the tiniest glimmer of hope that she might fall in love with him if they lay together?

  Jordis started in surprise at a knock on the door early in the morning. She glanced at Lian with panic, and he rolled himself up in the blankets and lay against the wall, so it would look like Jordis had rolled up her blankets for the day.

  “Who’s there?” she called.

  “Bailiffs. The governor sent us, open the door!”

  Jordis obeyed, opening the door a tiny crack. “What do you want?” she said.

  One of the bailiffs moved closer as though to enter the hut, but Jordis wouldn’t let herself be pushed out of the way.

  “What do you want?” she asked again, a defiant tone in her voice.

  The other bailiff stepped up. Jordis wondered if they were the same two bailiffs who’d burned down her house, but she’d repressed the memories of that terrible day and didn’t know.

  “We’re here by order of the governor. We’re looking for someone.”

  “Aha. Who?”

  “That’s none of your concern.”

  “If you want to come into my hut, then it’s my concern.”

  The bailiff stuck his foot into the door to stop Jordis from closing it. “We know a man survived the shipwreck. We’re searching for him.”

  “Why? You’ve never searched for survivors before.”

  The other bailiff pushed forward. He looked Jordis up and down, took in her slim figure, her bright, silvery hip-length hair, and her bosom, which rose and fell under her thin dress. “Well, we’re doing it now,” he said. The man smiled at her. “We’re looking for a man who was on a secret mission. He was traveling from the Royal Academy in London to Denmark.”

  “Oh?” Jordis frowned. “And you think you’ll find such an important man in my hut?”

  The first bailiff shifted from one foot to the other. “We don’t think he’s here. Who are you anyway? A poor beggar and a witch to boot. But we’ve been ordered to search every house and hut.”

  Jordis laughed brightly and opened the door a little wider. “Then look. See how I live. And ask yourselves if you could stand to spend even a single night in such a hut, and then if that important man would stay here. How do you know there were survivors anyway? Who told you?”

  The first bailiff frowned sternly. “We aren’t allowed to talk about it.” But then he looked at his companion and sighed. “There were letters from the English to the king of Denmark about an instrument that could help determine the outcome of a war. The man we seek is wanted to build the instrument in Denmark.”

  “And you’re asking me about such an important person?” Jordis shook her head in disbelief.

  “Well, he’s Icelandic. You, too, are from Iceland.”

  Jordis put her hands on her hips. “I was born on Sylt. My father was from Sylt. What are you saying?”

  The two bailiffs looked at each other. “We can’t tell you any more,” one said, while the other gazed at his shoes in embarrassment. But Jordis knew what the two of them were avoiding. She was a witch and her house had been burned. It would make sense for Jordis to hate the authorities on Sylt and harbor a fugitive.

  “Fine,” Jordis said, starting to close the door. “You don’t have to tell me anything. And now you’ve seen inside my hut.”

  The second bailiff put a hand on his colleague’s arm. “It can’t hurt to tell her what happened. She wanders all over the island. If she sees something, she can let us know. But only if she knows what to look for.”

  The first bailiff frowned again. “Then you tell her.” He stepped aside, took an apple out of his bag, and bit into it.

  “The man we’re looking for made it to shore. We have a witness. Then he disappeared. We searched for a fresh grave in the dunes. We found one and dug it up, but it was another man, so he must still be on the island. We have orders from Tønder. Apparently, the king of Denmark was expecting him.”

  Jordis regarded the bailiff skeptically. “And if I find him, what’s the reward?”

  “Reward?” The first bailiff looked at the second, perplexed. “A reward?”

  The second bailiff nodded. “A silver piece. It’s a lot of money for a beggar such as yourself.”

  “How will I recognize this man?”

  “He’s tall and blond. He looks like an Icelander. The Danes believe he is responsible for the shipwreck, to keep them from getting the plans for the instrument. He may have used the wreck as an opportunity to escape. But he could also be headed home to Iceland. Do you understand?”

  Jordis nodded. “I understand he was carrying something very important. I suppose it’s really about finding what he was carrying, not him, because there seems to be a substantial reward for it. Probably gold. And you would give me a silver piece if I bring the documents to you? Not the man, but the documents. Is that right?”

  The first bailiff nodded. “Yes, that’s right. It’s the documents we’re after. But it’s also about the man. He’s been missing for almost a wee
k. He should have contacted the governor of Sylt already.”

  The second bailiff took the first by the arm. “Come on, there’s nothing for us to find here,” he said.

  Jordis went back into her hut and closed the door as soon as the men had left. She waited until she couldn’t hear them anymore and then went to the bed and unrolled Lian from the blankets.

  “Did you hear what the bailiffs said?” she asked.

  Lian sat up and cradled his injured arm, pain etched on his features. “They’re right,” he said in Icelandic. “The plans in my pouch are valuable. They’re from an English scientist named Newton. With them, one could build a navigation device that measures distances and directions much more accurately than the cross-staff and astrolabe.” He paused for a moment, gathering his strength to continue. Jordis handed him a cup of water. After he had taken a sip, he went on. “The English Royal Academy didn’t take them seriously. As a navigator, I recognized their value. So I bought them from Isaac Newton.”

  “Why did you get onto a Danish ship with them?”

  “I wanted to return to Iceland. A Danish captain offered me passage. He was sailing from England to Denmark and told me he was going directly on to Iceland from there. He asked me to work as a navigator aboard his ship, saying that my reputation had preceded me. I agreed; navigation is my profession and my passion.

  “Apparently, he’d learned about the plans in England. On the journey, we met another, faster Danish ship at sea, and he told their captain that I had the plans. He had understood their value and wanted to use them. Someone tried to steal them from me twice, but I was able to stop the thief. Then the storm came, and we hit the rocks. But the king of Denmark knows that I have the plans.”

  “Why exactly does the king of Denmark want them?” Jordis asked. “Why are they so valuable?”