The Storm Sister

by Lucinda Riley

  ‘Not at all. It will only take a simple “yes” from Willem to crack open the champagne.’

  Ten minutes later, we were all sitting in a cosy candle-lit restaurant. Thom and Willem were hunched over the table, deep in conversation, so I talked to Erling opposite me.

  ‘You were really very good tonight, Ally. Too good to neglect your talent, never mind the actual joy of playing.’

  ‘Are you a musician too?’ I asked him.

  ‘Yes. I come from a family of them, like Thom. The cello is my instrument and I play with a small orchestra here in the city. It’s a very musical town. The Bergen Philharmonic is the oldest orchestra in the world.’

  ‘So,’ interrupted Thom, ‘we can finally order the champagne! Willem has agreed to join us.’

  ‘No champagne for me, thank you. I never drink anything alcoholic after nine o’clock,’ Willem said firmly.

  ‘Then I think you’d better learn how to if you’re moving to Norway,’ Thom teased him. ‘It’s all that keeps us going through the long winters here.’

  ‘Then I shall join you in honour of this occasion,’ Willem said graciously, as a waiter appeared with a bottle.

  ‘To Willem!’ we all chorused, as our food arrived.

  ‘I’m actually feeling much more awake now after a glass of champagne.’ Thom smiled at me. ‘So, tell me more about the connection between you and Jens and Anna Halvorsen?’

  I briefly explained to him the story of Pa Salt’s legacy, which had included Jens Halvorsen’s biography of his wife, Anna, and the coordinates on the armillary sphere that had led me first to Oslo and now to Bergen and the Grieg Museum.

  ‘Fascinating,’ he murmured as he studied me thoughtfully. ‘So perhaps we’re related somehow? Although to be honest, having so recently researched my family history, I can’t immediately see how.’

  ‘Neither can I,’ I reassured him, feeling suddenly uncomfortable that he might think I was some gold-digging gene-stealer. ‘I’ve ordered your book, by the way. It’s being shipped over from the States as we speak.’

  ‘That’s kind of you, Ally, but of course, I have a spare copy at home if you’d like it.’

  ‘Thank you. Or at least I’ll get you to sign mine. Since I’ve got you here in person, maybe you can help me with some details. Do you know what happened to the Halvorsen family in the years after Jens’ biography ended?’

  ‘More or less, yes. Sadly, it wasn’t a pretty slice of human history, what with the two World Wars on their way. Norway was neutral in the First World War, but was hit pretty badly by the German occupation in the Second.’

  ‘Really? I wasn’t even aware Norway was occupied,’ I confessed. ‘History wasn’t my best subject at school. In fact, I’ve never even thought of the effect the Second World War might have had on smaller countries outside the main protagonists. Especially not here, in this peaceful country, tucked up at the top of the world.’

  ‘Well, we tend to learn our own country’s history at school, don’t we? What was yours?’

  ‘Switzerland,’ I chuckled as I looked up at him.

  ‘Neutral,’ we both chorused together.

  ‘Well,’ continued Thom, ‘we were invaded here in 1940. Actually, Switzerland reminded me of Norway when I went to Lucerne for a concert a couple of years ago. And it wasn’t just the snow. They both definitely feel like they have a certain disconnect from the rest of the world.’

  ‘Yes,’ I agreed. I watched Thom as he ate, still trying to work out why he seemed so familiar, and deciding I must be recognising some genetic markers I’d picked up from the photographs of his forebears. ‘So the Halvorsens survived the wars?’

  ‘It’s a very sad story actually, and definitely too complex for my jet-lagged brain to tell you now. We could meet up at some point, though – perhaps tomorrow afternoon at my house? It used to be Jens and Anna’s home too, and I can show you where they lived out some of the happier moments of their relationship.’ Thom raised an eyebrow and I felt a vague thrill that he obviously knew their story too.

  ‘Actually, I saw it a couple of days ago on the way up to Troldhaugen.’

  ‘Then you’ll know exactly where it is. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Ally, I’m for my bed.’ Thom stood up and turned his attention to Willem. ‘Safe flight home to Zurich and I’m sure admin will be in touch with your contract. Call me if you think of anything further. So, Ally, two o’clock tomorrow at Froskehuset?’

  ‘Yes. Thanks, Thom.’

  ‘Fancy walking?’ Willem asked me after we’d said goodnight to Erling, who was driving Thom home. ‘The hotel’s not far away.’

  ‘I can just about manage that,’ I agreed, thinking some fresh air might help my now throbbing head. We strolled through the cobbled streets and emerged at the harbour. Willem halted in front of it.

  ‘Bergen . . . My new home! Have I made the right decision, Ally?’

  ‘I really don’t know, but it would be hard to find a more lovely place than this to live. It’s difficult to imagine anything bad happening here.’

  ‘That’s what’s worrying me. Am I opting out? Running away yet again from what happened to Jack? I’ve travelled maniacally since she died, and now I wonder if I’m coming here to hide,’ he sighed as we started walking along the quay towards our hotel.

  I mentally raised my eyebrows at the fact he’d called his partner ‘she’.

  ‘Or you could put a more positive twist on it and say that you were moving on, making a fresh start,’ I suggested.

  ‘I could, yes. Actually, I wanted to ask you, Ally, whether you’ve gone through the whole “why did I live when they died” thing?’

  ‘Of course I have, and I still am. It was Theo who made me leave the boat we were racing shortly before he drowned. I’ve spent endless hours thinking how I could have saved him if I’d been there, even though I know I couldn’t have.’

  ‘Yes . . . it’s a road to nowhere. I’ve realised that life is just a random series of events. You and I were left behind and we just have to get on with it. My psychotherapist tells me that’s why I have OCD symptoms. When Jack died, I felt I had no control, so I’ve been overcompensating ever since. I am getting better – even that glass of champagne tonight after nine o’clock . . .’ Willem shrugged. ‘Baby steps, Ally, baby steps.’

  ‘Yes. By the way, what was Jack’s full name?’

  ‘Jacqueline. After Jacqueline du Pré. Her father was a cellist.’

  ‘When you first mentioned her, I thought “she” was a “he” . . .’

  ‘Hah! Yup, another form of control apparently, and it works. It’s protected me against any predatory female that comes my way. One mention of my partner Jack, and they back off. I may not be a rock star, but there’s a number of concert pianist groupies hanging around after the performance, batting their eyes at me and asking to see my, er, instrument. One even told me her fantasy was to have me play Rachmaninoff’s No. 2 to her in the nude.’

  ‘Well, I hope you didn’t feel I was one of them.’

  ‘Of course I didn’t. In fact . . .’ We’d paused outside the hotel and Willem looked out onto the calm water lapping gently against the quay. ‘It was quite the opposite. And, as I said to you earlier, my dinner invitation was inappropriate. Typical me,’ he sighed, suddenly morose. ‘Anyway, thanks for playing tonight and I hope we can stay in touch.’

  ‘Willem, it’s me that should thank you. You’ve brought me back to music. Now, I have to go to bed before I curl up and fall asleep on the pavement.’

  ‘I’m leaving first thing in the morning,’ he told me as we walked into the deserted lobby. ‘I have a lot to organise back home in Zurich. Thom wants me to join the orchestra as soon as possible.’

  ‘When will you be back?’

  ‘By November, in time to prepare for the Grieg Centenary Concert. Will you be staying on longer here?’ he asked as we halted in front of the lift.

  ‘I really don’t know, Willem.’

  ‘Well,’ he said, as we
stepped inside the lift and pressed the numbers of our respective floors, ‘here’s my card. Let me know how you get on.’

  ‘I will.’

  The lift stopped on his floor. ‘Goodbye, Ally.’ With a fleeting smile, he nodded at me and stepped out.

  As I switched off my bedside lamp ten minutes later, I hoped Willem and I would keep in touch. Even if I was light years away from ever having another relationship, I liked him. And after what he’d just said, I thought he might like me too.

  36

  ‘Hi there,’ Thom said with a smile as he opened the door to Froskehuset and I followed him inside. ‘Come through to the drawing room. Would you like anything to drink?’

  ‘A glass of water would be fine, thanks.’

  I glanced around the sitting room as Thom went out. It was quaintly decorated in what I was coming to realise was a unique Norwegian style: homespun and very cosy. The room contained a mixture of mismatched easy chairs and a sofa with lace antimacassars laid over its back, set around an enormous iron stove, which I guessed would certainly keep the chill away at night. The one striking object in the room was the black-lacquered grand piano in the bay window, overlooking the magnificent fjord beneath us.

  I went to have a closer look at the selection of framed photographs standing on a rather hideous faux-rococo bureau in the corner. There was one in particular that I was drawn to, of a little boy of about three years old – Thom I presumed – sitting on a woman’s lap by the fjord in bright sunshine. They shared the same wide smiles, colouring and large, expressive eyes. As Thom came back, I could see the vestiges of the little boy in the photograph on his face.

  ‘Sorry about the house,’ Thom said. ‘I only moved back in a few months ago when my mum died and I still haven’t found time to change the decor. I’m more minimalist myself, more modern Scandinavian; this relic of the past isn’t quite me.’

  ‘As a matter of fact, I was just thinking to myself how much I like it. It’s so . . . ’

  ‘Real!’ we both said at the same time.

  ‘You read my thoughts exactly,’ said Thom. ‘Although, as you’re researching Jens and Anna, it’s fitting you should see the original interior before I chuck most of it into a skip. A lot of this furniture was theirs and it’s about one hundred and twenty years old now. Like everything in the house, including the plumbing. They bought the land – or should I say Anna did – in 1884, then took a year to build the house.’

  ‘I’d never heard of either of them before I read the book,’ I said apologetically.

  ‘Well, it was Anna who was the better known of the two in Europe, but, in his day, Jens was quite a big cheese, especially in Bergen. He really came into his own once Grieg died in 1907, even though his music was highly derivative of the maestro and a lesser version of it, to be honest. I don’t know how much you know about Grieg’s involvement in Jens and Anna’s life . . .’

  ‘Quite a lot, having read Jens’ own words. Especially what he did for Anna, recovering her from the lodging house in Leipzig.’

  ‘Yes. Well, as you haven’t had a chance to read my book yet, one thing you won’t know is that it was Grieg who found Jens living with an artist’s model in Montmartre. He’d been abandoned by his patron, the baroness, and was scratching a living from playing the fiddle, mostly drunk and high on opium, as many of them were in the bohemian circle in Paris back then. Apparently, Grieg gave him a severe talking-to, then paid his fare back to Leipzig, and told him in no uncertain terms to go and throw himself on Anna’s mercy.’

  ‘Who told you this?’

  ‘My great-grandfather, Horst, who was told by Anna on her deathbed.’

  ‘So when did Jens return?’

  ‘In 1884, or thereabouts.’

  ‘A few years after Grieg had rescued Anna in Leipzig? To be blunt, Thom, I felt depressed when I got to the end of the book. I couldn’t understand why Anna would take Jens back after all those years of desertion. And equally, now I don’t understand why Grieg would have sought out Jens in Paris. He must have known how Anna felt about him. It just doesn’t make sense.’

  Thom studied me as if turning something over in his mind. ‘Well, that’s the problem with history, as I discovered while researching my family story,’ he said eventually. ‘You get the facts, but it’s difficult to know the actual human motivations. Remember, it was Jens who wrote the biography. We don’t hear Anna’s thoughts on the subject at all. The book was published after her death and was in essence a tribute to her from her husband.’

  ‘Personally, I would definitely have reached for the meat cleaver when Jens slunk back. I thought that Lars, her original fiancé, sounded like a far more appealing option.’

  ‘Lars Trulssen? You do know he went to America and became a poet of some renown? He married into a wealthy third-generation New York family with Norwegian roots and had a brood of children.’

  ‘Really? Then that makes me feel much better. I felt rather sorry for him, but then, us women don’t always choose the good guy, do we?’

  ‘I don’t think I’ll comment on that,’ Thom said with a chuckle. ‘All I can say is that, to the general observer, they remained happily married for the rest of their lives. Apparently Jens was forever grateful to Grieg for saving him from the fleshpots of Paris and to Anna for forgiving him. Certainly, the two couples spent a lot of time together, being almost next-door neighbours. When Grieg died, Jens helped start a music department at the University of Bergen with Grieg’s financial legacy. It’s now the Grieg Academy, and it’s where I studied.’

  ‘I really know nothing of the family after 1907 when Jens’ book ended, and I’ve never even heard any of his compositions.’

  ‘In my opinion, there’s not a lot he wrote that’s worth hearing. Although when I was sorting out his many folders of sheet music that have mouldered away in boxes in the attic for years, I came across something very special. A piano concerto he wrote that, as far as I know from my research, has never been performed publically.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘With it being Grieg’s centenary this year, there are various events taking place, including a major concert here in Bergen to mark the end of the year of celebration.’

  ‘Yes, Willem mentioned it.’

  ‘You can imagine that Norwegian music is very much on the agenda and it would be wonderful to premiere my great-great-grandfather’s work. I’ve spoken to the Programming Committee and Andrew Litton himself – he’s our revered conductor and, at present, also my conducting mentor. They’ve heard the piece which, in my opinion, is stunning, and it’s pencilled into the programme for the concert on the seventh of December. As I could only find the piano music in the attic, I sent the piece off to be orchestrated by a very talented chap I know. But when I got home from New York yesterday, I had a message on my answerphone saying his mother had been taken ill a few weeks ago, and he hasn’t even started on it yet.’

  Thom paused and I could see the disappointment on his face. ‘I really can’t see it being ready for December. It’s such a shame . . . it’s far and away the best thing Jens composed, in my opinion. And of course, to premiere an original work by a Halvorsen who actually played at the first performance of Peer Gynt would have been perfect. Anyway, enough of my problems. What about you, Ally? Have you ever done a stint in an orchestra?’

  ‘Goodness, no. I don’t think my flute playing was ever up to that standard. I’m more of a happy amateur.’

  ‘Having heard you last night, I’d have to disagree. Willem says you studied flute for four years at the Geneva Conservatoire. That’s hardly a “happy amateur”, Ally,’ he chastised me.

  ‘Maybe not, but up until a few weeks ago, I was a professional sailor.’

  ‘Really? How come?’

  Over a cup of herbal tea which Thom had found for me in a cupboard, I told him a potted history of my life and the events leading up to my arrival in Bergen. I realised I was becoming used to repeating it factually, rather than emotionally. And I didn
’t know whether this was a good thing, or bad.

  ‘God, Ally! I thought my life was complicated, but yours . . . well. I don’t know how you’ve coped in the past few weeks. I salute you, I really do.’

  ‘I’ve kept myself busy delving into my past,’ I said tightly, wanting to get off the subject. ‘So, now that I’ve bored you silly with my life, do you think you can return the favour and tell me about the more modern Halvorsens? If you don’t mind,’ I added hastily, well aware this was Thom’s family. I didn’t want him to think I was making any kind of permanent claim on it. ‘I mean, whatever my connection is, it must be to do with the recent past, because I’m only thirty.’

  ‘So am I actually. I was born in June. You?’

  ‘The thirty-first of May, so my adoptive father told me.’

  ‘Really? Well, I’m the first of June,’ Thom said.

  ‘A day apart,’ I mused. ‘Anyway, carry on, I’m all ears.’

  ‘Well’ – Thom took a slug of his coffee – ‘I was brought up here in Bergen by my mum, who died a year ago. Which is how I came to be living at Froskehuset.’

  ‘I’m so sorry, Thom. As you’ve already heard, I know how it feels to lose a parent.’

  ‘Thanks. It was pretty awful at the time as we were very close. Mum was a single parent and there was no dad around to support us.’

  ‘Do you know who he was?’

  ‘Oh yes.’ Thom raised an eyebrow. ‘He’s the blood connection with Jens Halvorsen. Felix, my father, is his great-grandson. Although, unlike Jens, who at least did eventually come back to Anna, my father never faced up to his responsibilities.’

  ‘Is he still alive?’

  ‘Very much so, even though he was about twenty years older than my mother when they met. In my opinion, my father is the most musically gifted out of all the generations of Halvorsen men. And like Anna, my mother had a lovely singing voice. Basically, she went to my dad for piano lessons and he seduced her. She got pregnant by him at twenty. He refused to accept that I was his and advised her to abort me.’