Hanna
At breakfast, Ruby says, “I had the weirdest dreams last night! But I don’t think any true loves were involved. What about you?”
Naturally, my Midsummer night’s dreams were of Euan. While Per was my first love, our true loves are the ones who stand the tests of time.
It was Euan who always kept my demons at bay, and since he’s been gone, some of those demons have been encroaching again. I miss him terribly, my husband, my prince, my rescuer, so I tell her about how I first met him when I came to Shetland, all those years ago…
*
Liv and Erik’s wedding was a quiet affair, our celebrations muted by the war and the absence of people who should have been there—Pappa, Mamma, Per, our other friends from Narvik who had either been killed in the bombing or fled the burning town as we had done.
The talk, behind closed doors, was of those who’d left Norway altogether, escaping across the sea in fishing boats to Britain.
I was preoccupied, too, with a message I’d received.
When the last delivery had been made to the hut under cover of darkness, the man named Janssen had come back to give me my instructions.
I was to be given special training. I should pack a bag for an absence of about a month and be ready to go on a trip in the second week of May.
I tried to put thoughts of the journey to one side as I helped Liv prepare for the ceremony in the Terlands’ house.
She stood before the mirror in her bedroom, wearing the dress she’d sewn, embroidering it with images of wildflowers.
It was simple white cotton, with just a little trimming of lace at the neck and cuffs, which Erik’s mother had managed to procure.
She sighed. “Do you think it’s all right?
It’s very different from what I’d imagined I’d wear on my wedding day.
I wish we’d been able to save our bunads and the crown.
” When the house in Narvik was destroyed, we’d lost our traditional dresses, and the silver crown Mamma had worn when she married Pappa.
“You look beautiful,” I said, as I slid in another hairpin to secure the coronet of daisies we’d made instead, weaving the flowers among tendrils of honeysuckle. She wore her hair loose, letting it tumble down her back in blond waves.
We heard fiddle music floating up from the street below. “It’s time,” I said.
“Wait,” she said. “Just one more thing…” She took a couple of paper clips from a drawer and slipped one onto the collar of her dress, then did the same to mine.
She laughed at my expression of surprise.
“You haven’t heard, living as you do in such splendid isolation, but it’s what we’re doing.
All over the country, we’re wearing a paper clip as a symbol of togetherness. ”
“I love it,” I said. “What a clever idea.”
“Just keep it hidden if you see any police. Herr Terboven’s cronies take a dim view of such acts of defiance.”
I smiled, fingering the paper clip. It was such a tiny thing, and yet it stood for so much. I was thinking of other acts of resistance, too, about which Liv knew nothing.
I followed my sister downstairs, and we joined Erik and his parents in the small procession of close friends following the fiddle player to the church.
After the quiet ceremony, a surprise awaited the newlyweds at the church door.
The children from the school had gathered to cheer them, flinging handfuls of barley and rye grains into the air for Liv to try to catch, ensuring a happy future for the couple.
An accordion player gave a rousing rendition of “Come to the Wedding,” with which the children joined in lustily.
As I watched my sister stoop to hug her pupils, I hoped she and Erik would have a family of their own before too long and thought of what a wonderful mother she would make.
After the wedding meal was finished and the last crumbs of cake eaten, I took my leave.
I hugged Liv fiercely and whispered to her, “I’m going away for a few weeks.
Don’t worry if you don’t hear from me, or if you visit the fishing hut and I’m not there.
I’ll send a message on the milk boat to let you know when I’m home again. ”
She pulled back, and her brow furrowed into a worried frown as she scanned my face. “What are you doing?” she asked, keeping her voice low.
“It’s nothing you need know about,” I told her. But I took the paper clip from my collar and handed it to her. “Keep that for me, until I return.”
She looked down at the little piece of bent wire in the palm of her hand. “Please, Hanna, don’t do anything dangerous, will you? I couldn’t bear to lose you, you know.”
I placed my hand over hers, folding her fingers closed. “I’ll never be parted from you, Liv, you know that. It’s just for a little while, I promise.”
As I started the engine and steered the boat away from the jetty across the fjord, I turned to wave at the wedding party.
Liv stood a little apart from the others, the lace on the sleeve of her long white dress fluttering in the spring breeze as she raised her hand in reply.
For a moment I was tempted to turn back.
But then Erik stepped up to stand beside her, and I saw him put his arms around her, drawing her close.
I swallowed the lump in my throat and turned to look ahead, letting the wind dry the sudden tears that spilled from my eyes.
Back at the hut, I took off the bridesmaid’s dress Liv had made for me and hung it carefully behind the curtain in the sleeping area.
It was already late but, before I went to bed, I stepped out onto the balcony to watch the sunset.
Beyond the skerries, the sky was aflame.
Out there, past where the mountains trailed their fingers into the sea in a scattering of islands, away across a darkening ocean, there lay another country, one not held in the grip of an invader.
A lonely gull swooped overhead. It was flying that way, toward the fiery glow in the west, and I wondered whether that was where I was bound, too.
I didn’t have to wait very long to find out.
*
I was told the crossing to Shetland by fishing boat would take several days.
First, I was instructed by Janssen to get the milk boat to Svolvaer.
The harbor there was as full of fishing boats as I remembered it from a visit years before, but it was overshadowed by a strong German presence.
Machine gun nests perched on strategic points around the harbor’s edge, and two huge cannons dominated the hilltop above the wharf, where the factories ruined in the raid just a few weeks before were already being rebuilt.
Being there, under the watchful eyes of the German guards, suddenly brought home to me the risks I was taking.
The crossing to Shetland would be dangerous enough.
But even if the boat made it safely over the sea, would I be capable of doing whatever they had in mind for me?
I knew nothing about what awaited me there and had no idea what my training might be.
For a moment, a wave of fear made me want to flee, retreating to the isolation of my hut.
But it was too late to turn back now, I told myself sternly.
I was doing this for Per, and for all the others who had given their lives in the fight for freedom.
I picked up my bag and walked along the jetty, making my way past the fish market to a checkpoint where another machine gun stood.
The soldiers there gave my papers a perfunctory glance and waved me on.
I continued up the main street, past the council offices where red and black flags hung, so large and heavy that the sea breeze scarcely troubled them.
It was easy to find the café on Fiskergata, as instructed.
I ordered a coffee and asked the man behind the counter whether he had any skolebr?d. He shook his head. “Not today, miss. But if you take a seat over there in the corner, I’ll bring you your coffee in a minute.”
As I took off my coat and hat, pushing my bag well beneath the table so it wouldn’t be obtrusive, another man pulled out the chair across from me and sat down, saying, as if we were old friends, “There you are! Did you manage to get the shopping?”
He set down the newspaper he was carrying and lit a cigarette, making a good job of looking at ease, even when a couple of German soldiers came and sat at the table next to ours.
I forced myself to control the trembling of my hands as I picked up my cup and took a sip.
Once we’d finished our coffee, he helped me on with my coat and picked up my bag, ushering me back out into the street with an arm around my shoulders.
We turned into one of the side streets and, glancing back to make sure we were alone, he said, “I’m taking you to a guesthouse, where they’ll give you some lunch.
You leave tonight. I’ll come back for you at four this afternoon—we need to get you on board the fishing boat while the German patrols are out of the harbor.
You’ll be leaving after midnight, though, once they’ve come back in for the night, so be prepared for a few hours’ wait in the hold.
” He smiled. “I hope you don’t mind the smell of herring barrels and engine oil, and the witty repartee of Lofoten fishermen. ”
“I’ll feel quite at home,” I assured him.
At the guesthouse steps, he handed me my bag. “See you at four, then. I suggest you make the most of the comforts here. You won’t be seeing a bath or a bed for a while.”
He walked away quickly, and by the time a woman answered my knock on the door, he’d disappeared around another corner of the street.