The Storm Sister

by Lucinda Riley

  ‘The poor darling! Horst, you and Pip take our other guests through to the drawing room. And Bo,’ she said, gesturing to a chair that stood by the telephone in the hallway, ‘sit down and I will take a look at your injuries.’

  ‘My mother is a trained nurse,’ Pip explained under his breath to Karine as they followed Horst and Elle along the corridor. ‘No doubt at some point you will hear the story of how she fell in love with my father while caring for him after an appendix operation.’

  ‘She looks a lot younger than him.’

  ‘She is, by fifteen years. My father always said he got himself a child bride. She was only eighteen when she got pregnant with me. They adore each other really.’

  ‘Pip . . .’

  He felt Karine’s slim, sensitive fingers on his arm. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Thank you, from all of us.’

  That evening, after the doctor had been called to dress Bo’s wounds and an appointment made at the hospital to check whether his elbow was fractured, Bo was helped upstairs by Elle and Astrid and put to bed in Pip’s room.

  ‘Poor boy,’ said Astrid as she came back down to prepare dinner and Pip followed her into the kitchen. ‘He is simply exhausted. Your father has told me a little of what is happening in Leipzig. Can you pass me the potato scraper?’

  ‘Yes.’ Pip did so.

  ‘They are all refugees rather than three friends coming to visit Norway?’

  ‘They are both, I suppose.’

  ‘And how long will they be staying?’

  ‘The truth is, Mor, I don’t know.’

  ‘They are all Jewish?’

  ‘Karine and Elle, yes. Bo, I’m not sure about.’

  ‘I admit, it is difficult to believe what is happening in Germany. But believe it I must. The world is a very cruel place,’ Astrid sighed. ‘And Karine? She is the girl you have told us so much about?’

  ‘Yes.’ Pip watched his mother continue to peel the potatoes as he waited for her to comment further.

  ‘She seems full of life, and very bright. I’d imagine she’s quite a handful on occasion,’ she added.

  ‘She does challenge me, certainly. I’ve learnt a lot about the world,’ Pip said, a hint of defensiveness in his voice.

  ‘Just what you need – a strong woman. What your father would have done without me, the Lord only knows,’ Astrid said with a laugh. ‘And I am proud of you for what you have done to help your friends. Your father and I will do what we can to support them. Although . . .’

  ‘What, Mor?’

  ‘Your generosity has relegated you to the sofa in the drawing room until Bo is recovered.’

  After dinner on the terrace, overlooking the glorious fjord beneath them, Elle went upstairs to check on Bo, who had been taken supper on a tray earlier, then she retired to bed. Horst and Astrid announced that they too were turning in for the night and Pip heard their quiet laughter as they mounted the stairs. As he’d watched the tension slip away from his friends’ faces over dinner, he had never felt prouder of his parents or more thankful to be in Norway.

  ‘I should go up too,’ said Karine. ‘I’m exhausted, but it is just too magical a view to waste. See? It is almost eleven at night and there is still light here.’

  ‘And the sun will be up long before you tomorrow. I told you it was beautiful here,’ Pip said as she stood up from the table and walked across the terrace to lean over the wooden railing, which formed a barrier between the house and the endless pine trees tumbling down the hills towards the water.

  ‘It’s more than beautiful . . . it’s breathtaking. And not just the scenery. Your parents’ welcome, their kindness . . . I feel overcome by it.’

  Pip took her in his arms as she cried quiet tears of relief on his shoulder. She looked up at him, her eyes searching his face.

  ‘Tell me I never have to leave.’

  And he did.

  Horst drove Bo and Elle to the local hospital the following morning. Bo was diagnosed with a dislocated elbow and compound fracture and remained there to have an operation to reset it. Elle spent the next few days at the hospital with him, which left Pip free to show Karine the delights of Bergen.

  He took her up to Troldhaugen, Grieg’s house, which was only a short walk from his own and had become a museum. And he watched her delight as they visited the hut perched on the side of the fjord where the maestro had written some of his compositions.

  ‘Will you have one of these too when you are famous?’ she asked him. ‘I can bring you sweetmeats and wine at lunchtime and we can make love on the floor.’

  ‘Ah, then I may have to lock myself in. A composer must not be distracted whilst he is working,’ he teased her.

  ‘Then I may have to take a lover to while away the lonely hours,’ she shot back with a wicked smile, then turned to walk away.

  Laughing, Pip caught up with her and wrapped his arms around her waist from behind, halting her progress. His lips sought out the tender curve of her neck. ‘Never,’ he whispered. ‘No one but me.’

  They took the train down into the town, strolling through the narrow cobbled streets and stopping at a café for lunch so that Karine could have her first taste of aquavit.

  They both giggled as her eyes watered and she pronounced it ‘stronger than absinthe’ before promptly asking for another. After lunch, he took her to see the Nationale Scene Theatre, where Ibsen had once been the artistic director and where Grieg had conducted the orchestra.

  ‘Now they play at their very own venue, the Konsert-palæet, where my father spends a large part of his life as first cellist in the orchestra,’ he added.

  ‘Do you think he could get us both employment, Pip?’

  ‘I’m sure he could put in a good word for us, yes,’ he said, not wishing to dampen Karine’s enthusiasm by telling her there wasn’t – and never had been – a female member of the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra.

  Another day they took the Fløibanen – the tiny funicular railway – up to the top of Fløyen Mountain, one of the seven imposing peaks that surrounded Bergen. From the viewing platform there was a spectacular vista of the city beneath them and the sparkling fjord beyond. Karine sighed in pleasure as she gazed out over the railings.

  ‘There surely cannot be a more beautiful sight in the world,’ she breathed.

  Pip loved Karine’s genuine enthusiasm for Bergen, given that her dreams had always hitherto focused on the far larger goal of America. She asked Pip to start teaching her some basic Norwegian, frustrated that she couldn’t communicate with his mother without a translator present.

  ‘She has been so kind to me, chérie, I wish to tell her how I appreciate it in her own language.’

  Bo returned to the house, his right arm strapped tightly, and the evenings were spent outside on the terrace having dinner, after which an impromptu concert would ensue. Pip would seat himself at the grand piano in the drawing room, with the doors onto the terrace thrown wide open. Depending on the piece, Elle would play her viola or flute, Karine her oboe, and Horst his cello. They played everything from simple Norwegian folk songs that Horst patiently taught them, to pieces by the old masters such as Beethoven and Tchaikovsky, to more modern compositions from the likes of Bartók and Prokofiev – although Horst firmly drew the line at Stravinsky. The wonderful music sang down the hills to the fjord. Pip’s life became a harmonic conjoining of all he loved and needed and he was glad that fate had brought his friends to Norway.

  Only late at night as he lay there shoehorned into a makeshift bed in the room he now shared with Bo, longing for Karine’s sensual, naked body beside him, did he reflect that nothing was ever completely perfect.

  As a balmy August drew to a close, there were serious conversations to be had amongst the Halvorsen household about the future. The first was between Pip and Karine, late one night on the terrace after everyone else had retired. Karine had at last received a letter from her parents, who had decided to stay in America until the storm clouds of war had rumbled past. Ka
rine’s parents advised her not to travel back to Germany for the new term. Equally, they thought it unnecessary for their daughter to make the long and expensive journey to America right away, given she was safely tucked away in Norway for the present. ‘They send their love and thanks to your parents,’ Karine said, folding the letter back into its envelope. ‘Do you think Horst and Astrid will mind if I stay on longer?’

  ‘Not at all. I think my father is a little in love with you. Or at least, with your oboe playing,’ Pip said with a smile.

  ‘But if I am to stay on here, we cannot continue to impose on your parents’ hospitality. And I miss you, chérie,’ Karine whispered as she snuggled into him and delicately nipped his ear with her teeth. Her lips searched for his and they kissed, before Pip broke away as a door opened upstairs.

  ‘We are under my parents’ roof, and you must understand that—’

  ‘Of course I understand, chérie. But perhaps we could find our own place together here. I long to be with you . . .’ Karine reached for his hand and put it to her breast.

  ‘And I with you, my love,’ Pip said, gently manoeuvring his hand away lest anyone caught them unawares. ‘But even though my parents can accept many things that others in Norway would not, any suggestion of sharing the same bed whilst we are unmarried – whether under their roof or ours – would not be acceptable. And disrespectful of all they have done for us.’

  ‘I know, but what can we do? This is agony for me.’ Karine rolled her eyes. ‘You know how I need that part of our relationship.’

  ‘As do I.’ Pip sometimes felt as though he was the female and she the male with regard to their physical union. ‘But unless you are prepared to convert from your faith in order to marry me, then this is the way it is in Norway.’

  ‘I must become a Christian?’

  ‘More accurately, you would have to become a Lutheran.’

  ‘Mon Dieu! That is a high price to pay for making love. In America, I am sure there are no such rules.’

  ‘Maybe, but we’re not in America, Karine. We live in a small town in Norway. And however much I love you, to blatantly live with you under the noses of my parents is something I just could not do. Do you see?’

  ‘Yes, I do, I do, but to convert . . . well, it would be a betrayal of my people. Yet my mother was a gentile before she converted to marry my father, so genetically, I am only half-Jewish. I must ask my parents for their opinion. They have left the telephone number at my father’s gallery for emergencies and I feel that this is one. And if they agree, can we marry soon?’

  ‘I’m not completely sure of the rules, Karine, but I think the pastor would need to see your baptism papers.’

  ‘As you know, I have none. Can you get it done here?’

  ‘You would do that? Be baptised a Lutheran?’

  ‘A few drops of water and a cross on my forehead does not make me a Christian in my heart, Pip.’

  ‘No, but . . .’ Pip felt she was rather missing the point. ‘Apart from us being able to make love, are you sure you wish to marry me?’

  ‘Forgive me, Pip,’ Karine said, smiling. ‘My need to answer the practical side of things has overruled the romantic part of our conversation. Of course I wish to marry you! So I will do what is necessary to make it happen.’

  ‘You would really convert for me?’ Pip was overwhelmed and touched. He knew only too well what her heritage meant to her.

  ‘If my parents agree, then yes. Chérie, I must be sensible. And I am sure any god – whether yours or mine – will forgive me, given the circumstances.’

  ‘Even if I’m beginning to think you only want me for my body,’ Pip teased her.

  ‘Probably,’ she agreed equably. ‘I will ask your father tomorrow if I may make a call to America.’

  Pip watched as Karine left the room and thought how she constantly blindsided him with her mercurial temperament and quixotic train of thought. He wondered if he would ever truly understand her complexity. At least if they were able to marry, he’d never find himself bored in the future.

  Karine’s parents returned their daughter’s call the following evening.

  ‘They have agreed,’ she said sombrely. ‘And not just so that I can marry you. They feel I would be safer taking your surname, just in case . . .’

  ‘Then I am very happy, my love,’ he said, sweeping Karine into his arms and putting his lips to hers.

  ‘So.’ Karine pulled away from him eventually, the expression in her eyes lighter. ‘How soon can it be arranged?’

  ‘As soon as you meet the pastor and he agrees to baptise you.’

  ‘Tomorrow?’ she said as her hand travelled towards his groin.

  ‘Be serious,’ he chastised her, groaning at her touch then reluctantly removing her hand. ‘Are you happy to stay here in Norway for now?’

  ‘There are worse places to make a life, and for the present, we must take one day at a time until we know what will happen. You know I love it here, apart from your horrible language, of course.’

  ‘Then I must try to find immediate work as a musician to support us. Either in the orchestra here, or perhaps in Oslo?’

  ‘Perhaps I too can find work.’

  ‘Maybe you can, when you have at least learnt more than the words for “please” and “thank you” in our “horrible” language,’ he teased her.

  ‘Okay, okay! I am trying.’

  ‘Yes.’ Pip kissed her on the nose. ‘I know you are.’

  Astrid cooked a celebration dinner for the six of them when Pip and Karine announced that they wished to marry.

  ‘Will you and Karine settle here in Bergen?’ she asked.

  ‘For now, yes. If you can help us find musical employment, Far,’ said Pip.

  ‘I can certainly make enquiries,’ replied Horst, at which point Astrid stood up and clasped her future daughter-in-law in her arms.

  ‘Now, that is enough about practicalities. This is a special evening. Congratulations, kjære, and I welcome you to the Halvorsen family. I am especially happy as I believed that we would lose Pip and his talents to Europe or America. And you have brought our son home.’

  Pip translated his mother’s words and saw tears in her eyes, and in those of his wife-to-be.

  ‘Congratulations,’ Bo said suddenly, toasting them. ‘Elle and I hope to follow your lead soon.’

  Astrid, who knew the pastor of the local church well, went to talk to him. Whatever she said to him of Karine’s Jewish heritage, she kept to herself, but the pastor agreed to baptise her immediately. The Halvorsen household attended the short service, and later back at the house, Horst drew Pip aside.

  ‘It is a good thing that Karine has done today, in more ways than one. I have a friend in the orchestra who has just returned from playing in a concert in Munich. The Nazi campaign against the Jews is growing apace.’

  ‘But surely it will never touch us here?’

  ‘One would think not, but when a madman has caught the attention of so many, and not just in Germany,’ Horst added, ‘who knows where it will all end?’

  Soon afterwards, Bo and Elle announced that for now, they too were staying in Bergen. Bo’s plaster had been removed, but his elbow was still too stiff to play the cello.

  ‘Both of us are praying it will recover quickly. He is so very talented,’ Elle confided to Karine in their shared bedroom that night. ‘All his dreams depend on it. For now, he has found himself work at a chart maker’s shop in the harbour. There is a small apartment above it which we have been offered. We have pretended we are already married and I will clean for the chart maker’s wife.’

  ‘You can both speak enough Norwegian to do this?’ Karine asked her friend jealously.

  ‘Bo is a fast learner. I just work hard. Besides, the chart maker is German, which as you know is a language we both speak quite well.’

  ‘And will you marry for real?’

  ‘We long to, yes, but we must save the money. So for now, we must live a lie. Bo says the truth belon
gs in a heart, not on paper.’

  ‘And I agree.’ Karine reached her hand across to Elle. ‘Promise we will remain close when you move into the town?’

  ‘Of course. You are my sister in all but name, Karine. I love you and cannot thank you and Pip enough for what you have done for us.’

  ‘And will we too soon have our own roof over our heads?’ Karine asked Pip the following morning, after telling him Elle and Bo’s news.

  ‘If the interview tomorrow goes as I hope, then eventually yes,’ Pip agreed. Horst had secured him an audition with Harald Heide, the conductor of the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra.

  ‘It will, chérie,’ Karine reassured him with a kiss, ‘it will.’

  Pip was almost more nervous when he arrived at the Konsert-palæet than he had been when he’d auditioned for a place at the Conservatory. Perhaps, he thought wryly, it was because this time his performance had consequences in the real world, whereas back then he’d been a carefree youth with no responsibilities except to himself. He made himself known to the woman in the ticket booth, who led him down a corridor and into a spacious practice room, containing a piano and stacks of music stands. He was soon joined by a tall, broad-shouldered man with merry eyes and thick dark-blond hair, who introduced himself as Harald Heide.

  ‘Your father has certainly praised your talents on more than one occasion, Herr Halvorsen. He’s clearly delighted to have you back home in Norway,’ he said, shaking Pip warmly by the hand. ‘I understand that you play both the piano and the violin?’

  ‘That’s correct, sir, although piano was my main instrument when I studied in Leipzig. I hope to become a composer one day.’

  ‘Come then, we will begin.’ Herr Heide gestured to Pip that he should take a seat at the piano, while he himself sat down on a narrow bench that stood against one wall of the room. ‘Whenever you’re ready, Herr Halvorsen.’