Deep Sea

by Annika Thor

  “Is Judith here?” Stephie asks.

  “No, she’s not back from work yet. You can wait in the dayroom.”

  Stephie sits down on a hard chair. She hears girls talking to each other, somewhere else in the building. A tall girl comes in to get a book and nods to Stephie.

  “Are you looking for someone?” the girl asks.

  “Yes, Judith.”

  “Oh, are you her classmate from Vienna? The one who lives on an island?”

  “Yes, I am,” says Stephie, wondering what Judith has been saying about her. But the girl gives her a friendly smile before leaving with the book under her arm.

  Twenty minutes later, Judith finally arrives.

  “Judith, you’ve got a visitor!” she hears Susie shout.

  Stephie rises from the armchair just as Judith steps in the doorway, looking surprised.

  “Stephie! What are you doing here?”

  I shouldn’t have come, Stephie thinks. She doesn’t want to see me.

  But Judith walks into the room and takes one of Stephie’s hand in both of hers. Her eyes are bright.

  “I’m so glad to see you! I behaved very foolishly. Can you forgive me?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” says Stephie. “You were right, too, in a way. In fact, I resigned from the church congregation.”

  “You did? Oh, I’m so glad you aren’t mad at me. You’re the only person here I know from home.”

  “Judith,” Stephie asks. “What does abgereist mean?”

  Judith’s smile vanishes. “Your parents?” she asks.

  “Papa. Mamma is dead. She died in June, though I didn’t hear about it until a couple of weeks ago. You do know what abgereist means, don’t you?”

  “Transported,” Judith tells her. “To another camp. Probably in Poland. No letters ever arrive from there. You can’t write or send packages.”

  “What happens there?”

  “I don’t know,” says Judith. “No one knows for sure. All you can do is hope.”

  “Hope for what?”

  “That the war will end. Fast, before they’re all dead.”

  During the last vacation week on the island, the air is cooler, and the blue of the sea is a shade darker. Autumn is approaching.

  On Monday, Uncle Evert takes the Diana out in a convoy with several fishing boats. Fishing together is safest, in case one of the boats hits a mine. That has happened several times this summer, but no one has been killed.

  On Wednesday evening, the boats are already back. All but two. Two boats and their crews are missing.

  “They got shot down,” Uncle Evert tells Stephie. “On purpose. No one, not even the Germans, can mistake a fishing boat for a naval vessel. They’re trying to frighten us. And it’s working. They were so close they could surely see the name and number of every single boat. They’ll get the rest of us next time.”

  None of the boats go out fishing again that week. There are protest meetings on the islands and in the fishing villages along the coast. The boats that were with the two that got shot down change their names and numbers. Although no one is safe in these waters anymore, the risk is greatest for boats whose crews have seen too much.

  “The Liberty,” suggests Uncle Evert. “Don’t you think a name meaning ‘freedom’ would be good, Stephie?”

  Stephie nods. “Liberty’s a good name.

  “Or maybe …,” says Uncle Evert. “Wasn’t your mother’s name Elisabeth?”

  “Yes.”

  “Shall we rename the boat after her?”

  “Is the Elisabeth a good name for a boat?”

  “Yes,” Uncle Evert answers. “A very good name.”

  Stephie helps paint the new name—Elisabeth—in big black letters on the rounded stern. Uncle Evert paints the name of the island and the boat’s number.

  “We’ll go out again next week,” he says. “Those Germans can’t get rid of us that easily. Soon it will be their turn to be afraid.”

  36

  Stephie is standing on a cliff a couple of yards above the sea, in the hard September wind. It makes the water choppy, tearing up waves every which way and leaving a line of white foam along the shoreline.

  She knows quite a lot about the sea now. Uncle Evert has taught her well. The vastness no longer frightens her. She now respects the water’s dark depths, and the quick changes of weather and wind on the islands.

  Nothing will ever be like it used to be. For a long time after she arrived in Sweden, she imagined they would soon be a family again. Mamma, Papa, Nellie, and Stephie. Now she knows that is never going to happen. Mamma is dead. Papa is gone, abgereist. And she is no longer a little girl.

  Sixteen years old. Nearly grown up.

  Her childhood is over.

  She’s already been in high school for a whole month. It’s difficult, and she has to work hard, but she likes it. The girls are more serious than most of her classmates at grammar school were. They talk about current affairs and about what they want to be—teachers, pharmacists, or doctors, like Stephie. One of the girls even wants to be an engineer.

  Every morning, Stephie and May take the tram to school. They bump into each other now and then in the halls, in the schoolyard, and in the lunchroom. After school they usually meet and take the tram back to Sandarna together.

  A high wave tosses a cloud of foam up around her feet. Every seventh wave is an especially strong one, Stephie has heard. Why every seventh? She doesn’t know.

  Along another shore, farther south, the Allied troops are landing in France. A voice on the radio said, “This is not the beginning of the end, but it may be the end of the beginning.” How long is it going to take?

  Stephie sits down, pulling her knees to her chest and hugging them. She rests her chin on her hands. She becomes one with the rhythm of the waves, which helps her breathe more calmly.

  At the far end of the beach, she sees a little figure approaching. After some time, Stephie recognizes Nellie. She’s taken off her shoes and stockings and is wading barefoot in the shallow water, although it is already cold.

  Stephie gets up and waves. “Nellie!” she shouts.

  The wind carries her voice, and Nellie hears, looks up at the cliff, and waves back.

  Stephie sits down again, waiting for Nellie to come along the beach. A stretch of shore is always longer than it appears. There are so many little coves to be walked around, rocks to be climbed over.

  Shoes and socks in hand, Nellie heads up to where Stephie is sitting and drops down next to her. Silently, they look west, at the horizon, where the sea gleams bright silver. Closer to land, it still reflects the lead gray of the cloudy sky.

  “We never made it to America,” Nellie says after some time.

  “No.”

  “You used to tell me about America. About big cities with tall buildings and streets crowded with cars. Do you remember?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “You comforted me,” says Nellie. “When I was little.”

  Stephie looks at Nellie. Her face is grave and open.

  “I’ve been angry with you,” Nellie goes on. “I thought you were keeping me from feeling at home here. I thought you were always nagging, and giving me a guilty conscience.”

  “I had a guilty conscience myself, for failing to take good enough care of you,” Stephie says. “I felt like I was letting Mamma and Papa down.”

  They sit quietly, looking out over the endless sea. Stephie takes Nellie’s hand, and Nellie doesn’t pull away.

  “We’ll have to look after each other now,” says Nellie.

  “Yes,” says Stephie. “We will.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ANNIKA THOR was born and raised in a Jewish family in Göteborg, Sweden. She has been a librarian, has written for both film and theater, and is the author of many books for children, young adults, and adults. She lives in Stockholm.

  A Faraway Island, The Lily Pond, and Deep Sea are the first three novels in a quartet featuring the Steiner sisters, wh
ich has been translated into numerous languages and has garnered awards worldwide. Swedish television also adapted the books into a hugely popular eight-part series. A Faraway Island received the Mildred L. Batchelder Award for an outstanding children’s book originally published in a foreign language, and The Lily Pond received the Mildred L. Batchelder Honor Award.