A Way Through the Sea

by Robert Elmer

  “That’s up to them. You can ask. Elise can come, too, if she wants. I’m just not sure if she does. Ask her at school today.” Peter’s grandfather smiled, then waved Peter out the door. “Out with you now, or you’ll be late for school.”

  “School. Oh, yeah.” Peter remembered that Henrik would be waiting for him by the big Saint Mary’s church, a couple of blocks from school. Now he would have to run to make it on time—as usual. “I’ll be here first thing in the morning. Six o’clock.”

  “Don’t be late,” Grandfather called after him as Peter ran out the door. “Your uncle will be waiting for you.”

  Peter hardly heard. Wait until I tell Henrik and Elise!

  He met up with Henrik at the church, where the other boy was waiting impatiently.

  “What took you so long?” asked Henrik, kicking a pebble down the street.

  “I had to talk to Grandfather about something,” said Peter. “He asked if we wanted to go out on the boat Saturday.”

  Henrik’s eyes grew wide. “No kidding? And it’s okay with your folks?”

  “He said he already talked with them and everything, and that if it’s okay with your parents...”

  Henrik winced. “I don’t know, Peter. But we can try. You know how my parents are. What about your sister?”

  “Did someone mention my name?” said Elise, who had just run up behind the boys on her way down the street. As usual, she had an armload of books, too many to keep in her red school backpack. She had Mrs. Becker, the other fifth grade teacher, in the classroom next to Henrik’s and Peter’s.

  Henrik wheeled around, surprised. Elise usually walked to school with her girl friends. “Oh, it’s you,” he said.

  “Of course it’s me,” said Elise, in a teasing manner. “So what did you mean, `What about your sister?’ “

  “Grandpa just asked me this morning when I was feeding the birds if we wanted to go out on their boat tomorrow,” said Peter. “He said Mom and Dad told him it was okay.”

  “Great!” she said, pulling at the strap of her backpack while she balanced her extra books in the other hand. “But do you think Henrik’s parents will say yes?” She looked quickly over at Henrik, who was kicking the pebble again.

  “Maybe,” said Peter, feeling hopeful. He was already thinking of all the foot long herring his uncle and grandfather sometimes returned with. The little silvery fish were everybody’s favorite, pickled and sliced on dark rye bread. It was something every Dane learned to eat, almost before they could walk.

  “Yeah, and maybe Mr. Jensen will cancel school today and give us a big party,” said Henrik. He was smiling, but he and Peter both knew his chances were slim.

  Elise ran on ahead. Henrik and Peter made it to school—a large, three story brick building on King Street—just as the principal, Mr. Jensen, was closing the doors.

  “Just in time again, boys,” he observed in his big bass drum voice. They made it to their classroom on the second floor just as the bell rang.

  “No party,” whispered Henrik, as they slipped into their seats.

  No sooner had he sat down than Peter began daydreaming of going out on the boat the next day. He still couldn’t believe it—not having to talk his parents into anything. Incredible. The only bad part was not knowing if Henrik was going to be able to come. And what about Elise?

  Their teacher, Mr. Isaksen, began with math, but Peter was already far out to sea, dreaming. Maybe we’ll bring back enough fish to give Mom some extra, too. All the way out there on the water. Feeling the waves. And if I can steer the boat...

  When Peter looked up, everyone seemed to be staring at him. Even Henrik, sitting at the desk just across the aisle, was giving him a strange look.

  “The answer, Peter?” Mr. Isaksen crossed his arms and looked straight at Peter. Behind him, Annelise Kastrup giggled, and he could feel the back of his neck heating up, the way it always did when he embarrassed himself. Desperately, he tried to focus back on the real world, tried hard to think of the teacher’s question, but he was afraid to ask him to repeat it. Something about fish?

  “Umm... one hundred herring?” Peter blurted out before he knew what was happening. Stupid. Why did I say that? Everybody broke out laughing, except Mr. Isaksen. It only made him look even more serious, more stern.

  “That’s enough, class,” said the teacher. He hardly moved his lips, they were so tightly pressed together—kind of like he was doing a talking puppet routine. His look seemed to drill a hole in Peter. “You may think that was a clever answer, Mr. Andersen, but we are talking about fractions today. You will stay after school this afternoon, please, to brush up on the subject, since you obviously need the practice.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Peter, not looking up.

  Peter wanted to melt through the floor, and the back of his neck felt lobster red. Staying after school would only keep him from getting out to the boat and helping get it ready for the next day. He was in a daze all the rest of the morning until lunchtime, but luckily he wasn’t called on again.

  “Where were you during math today?” Henrik asked when they were eating their lunch in the small school auditorium. Elise usually ate with her friends Tina or Susan. “You looked like you were in outer space or something when Mr. Isaksen asked you that question.”

  Peter didn’t know what to say, really. Besides, Keld Poulsen and Jesper Jarl—the two people who gave him more pain than anyone else in the world—were sitting just down the bench from Peter and Henrik. Peter could tell as they scooted over close that they were coming in for the kill.

  “Hey, Andersen,” snickered Keld. “Where did you get the hundred herring from? That was a bird brained answer.”

  He and his sidekick Jesper were real good at making people feel dumb, like now. Peter knew his face was probably going to get red all over again, and then Jesper would chime in for the second punch. Jesper was just as little and skinny as Keld was big and beefy, and he always copied everything Keld did. Quite a team, thought Peter. Obnoxious. Just then Peter was wishing he and Henrik had skipped lunch and headed straight for the yard by the side of the building.

  “Not a bird brained answer, Keld,” said Jesper, sounding like the second half of a bad comedy team. “A pigeon brained answer.” They were just warming up, daring Henrik or Peter to fight back.

  “Hey, who asked you, Jesper?”

  Surprised, Keld and Jesper whirled around on the bench to see who was challenging them. Peter knew the voice without looking up but couldn’t believe it. Elise! She had buzzed in at those two like a hornet, and when the stocky Keld stood up to face his attacker, they were practically nose to nose. But Elise wasn’t going to let anyone get a word in edgeways. With her hands on her hips, she lit into him like a drill sergeant.

  “You don’t know the first thing about birds, anyway,” she said. By now, everyone on that side of the room was listening. Peter guessed Keld and Jesper were as surprised as anyone, including himself. “And if you had any birds, they would probably... probably fly away from you as fast...”

  This war of words might have gotten serious if the school’s air raid siren hadn’t sounded just then, drowning out the rest of what Elise was saying. She looked around the room like the rest of the lunch crowd, as if expecting to see planes through the ceiling. In a moment Mr. Isaksen took charge.

  “Everyone down to the cellar, please,” boomed the teacher when the siren dimmed for a moment. “Line up at the door.”

  Everyone picked up their lunches and started shuffling toward the door, while the wail of the siren went on. They had done this before. But no matter how many times he heard it, the rising and falling wail always gave Peter the shivers. All he wanted to do was plug his ears... and be somewhere else.

  They would spend the next few minutes, or maybe hours, in the school’s cellar until the steady sound of the all clear siren. Actually, it wasn’t too bad because it gave them a chance to read or catch up on homework. No one even cried anymore, the way the younger kids
had during the first one or two years of the war. They just lined up by the teacher with his hand in the air, chattering as if there were no British planes flying over on their way to bomb Germany.

  Peter thought about it, though, and he didn’t like the thought. Only once in a while did bombs fall on their own country, on special German targets. Still, it made him nervous. One thing he was sure of, though: It got very stuffy in the cellar with all the kids down there.

  In all the excitement, Peter had almost forgotten about Keld. The boy was red, as if steam was pouring out of his ears, but he didn’t say a word until he brushed past Peter.

  “When you’re least expecting it, Andersen,” he half shouted, straight into Peter’s ear. Even the constant sound of the siren didn’t drown his voice out. “When you don’t have a girl to stick up for you... you’ll wish you weren’t alive.”

  Peter pretended he couldn’t hear him. But when he looked back to find Elise, she was gone. I’ll thank her tonight, when I get the chance. Actually, except for the fear that Keld would probably jump him in an alley someday and knock him silly, Peter didn’t mind whoever wanted to stand up against Keld and Jesper. It had just surprised him that it was his own sister. Then Henrik brought him back to reality.

  “Come on, Peter,” he said, tugging at his friend’s shirt. “Are you going to stand there dreaming all day? We have to get down to the air raid cellar.”

  The cellar was just like another classroom, really, only there were no windows, and it was only big enough for the whole school—all two hundred kids—to cram into. Peter and Henrik found seats with the rest of their class and took the reading books that were being passed around. It was a spooky feeling being down in the cellar. The sound of the siren somewhere above them made it worse.

  It was a short stay this time, though. They had hardly gotten their books open when the steady all clear siren sounded, and it was time to go back up to their normal classrooms.

  “That was quick, don’t you think?” Henrik poked Peter as they passed back their books. “The Brits must have been just passing through again.”

  “Yeah, they must have,” Peter replied, but his mind wasn’t on air raids. The rest of the afternoon, Peter had to pinch himself a couple of times to keep with it—to not daydream about fishing boats or worry about being attacked by bullies. Only two more hours. He looked up at the clock in their classroom as Mr. Isaksen droned on about a spelling test. Make that two and a half—until school’s out at three thirty. No more bird brained answers. Just stay with it.

  Henrik was waiting in the school yard when Peter finally came out that afternoon. Good old Henrik. He looked as if he was still excited about what had happened at lunch.

  “Hey, that was some speech from your sister, wasn’t it?” Henrik asked as the two jogged along the street. “Elise scared the socks off old Keld and Jesper.”

  “Uh huh.” Peter was thinking about old Keld and Jesper jumping out of an alley, so he kept an eye out as they slowed to a walk.

  “I mean, I was impressed, weren’t you?” Henrik went on. “Did you see the way Keld just stood there and took it, before the air raid? His ears turned beet red.”

  “I saw.”

  Henrik obviously hadn’t heard Keld’s last message, but Peter wasn’t going to say anything else. Maybe Keld will forget all about it, thought Peter, looking carefully around the corner. But maybe not. Anyway, if I’m going to live past today, I had better keep an eye out. They continued on silently until they reached the door to Henrik’s little apartment on Star Street, next door to the neighborhood pawn shop.

  Theirs looked like so many others in the city, a neatly painted narrow black door with numbers and a small brass plate. “E. Melchior.” Henrik took the stairs three at a time, with Peter right on his heels. In the tiny living room, where Mrs. Melchior was folding laundry, Henrik dumped his books on the couch. She looked a lot like her son, or her son like her—dark haired, attractive, with sharp features.

  “Hello, Mother, guess what?” Henrik asked in the same breath.

  “Come in, and don’t leave your books on the couch,” she answered. She smiled at Peter.

  “Mother, Peter’s dad said it’s okay with them. Can I go, too?”

  “If I knew what Mr. Andersen said okay about, I could answer you better,” she said, looking up from a pair of socks she was folding.

  “Oh, yeah,” said Henrik. He was catching his breath. “Fishing. Going out on their boat. Just for a day. We’d be back before dark. Peter’s going.”

  “I’m not so sure, Henrik,” said his mother. “That’s something we’ll have to discuss with your father tonight when he gets home from work.”

  “Thanks, Mother. He’ll say yes, won’t he?” Henrik was a pretty good salesman when he wanted to be.

  “We’ll have to see about that.”

  That’s about what Henrik and Peter had expected, and it was better than a flat out no. There was no time to lose, though, so they ran on to Peter’s apartment, three blocks away, where Peter dumped his books.

  “I’ll be back for dinner, Mom,” said Peter. “Uncle Morten just needs a little help getting the boat ready so we can leave first thing tomorrow morning. So bye.” He finished his sentence as the door slammed behind them. He thought his mother said, “Dinner five thirty.” Something like that. Or was it six?

  Down at the harbor, Uncle Morten had the floorboards of the fishing boat pulled up and stacked all over the wheelhouse, and the engine in the bottom of the small boat was in pieces. Grandfather was there, too, up to his waist in engine parts. He looked like one of those Greek mythological characters, half boat engine on the bottom and half person on the top. His sleeves were rolled up, and his hands and wrists were black with grease.

  “Try it again, Morten,” he said to his son. Peter’s uncle was at the spoked wooden wheel, perched above the engine and balancing on a couple of beams where the floorboards used to be. He punched the big black starter button next to the wheel. Nothing happened. No click, no whir, no sound. Uncle Morten looked up long enough from what he was doing to flash a smile as Henrik and Peter climbed onto the boat.

  “Hey, boys,” he said. “You’re just in time to help us get some things loaded while we fix this starter.” He looked down at his father again. “That is, if we can fix this starter. Think you can go back up to the shed and fetch those three piles of rope by the workbench? There’s a lot more.”

  “Sure,” said Henrik. Peter climbed after him back up the ramp that led down to the boat dock.

  “Hey, these ropes are heavier than I thought,” Peter grunted as they struggled with one pile. The ropes were hard to get a handle on. As his grandfather would say, it was like trying to put socks on an octopus.

  Trip after trip the boys struggled with those piles of rope, and then fishing floats, tools, and extra parts Uncle Morten directed them to bring down to the boat. Elise arrived a few minutes later and helped with a few loads as well. The three of them were picking up the last load in the boathouse when they heard the roar of the boat engine down on the dock. They looked at one another and cheered, then piled everything that was left into their arms. Peter could hardly see over the top of his armload, and by the time they were halfway down the ramp, he heard the engine shut down again. He looked over his load to see a man in a gray uniform standing by the boat. It was not a Danish policeman.

  Without thinking, he froze in fright, and Henrik (with the same kind of load in his arms) bumped hard into him from the rear. In one scary moment Peter felt himself tumbling down the ramp headfirst. They turned into a tangle of arms, legs, a mop, buckets, a piece of rope, and a spare part for the engine, and they couldn’t stop until they were lying in a heap at the German soldier’s mirror shiny high boots. He didn’t move an inch, as if he were daring the boys to crash into him. Elise stood helplessly at the top of the ramp, her eyes wide with horror. At the bottom of the heap, Henrik let out a shriek of pain but stopped abruptly when he saw the German. It sounded as if
a big hand had clamped hard over his mouth.

  Peter didn’t want to look up, but he had to, and he saw a frowning German officer, looking down his nose at a tangle of boys and boat stuff.

  “Who are these two?” the officer demanded. His Danish sounded mainly like German, but Peter could tell he wasn’t fooling around.

  “Just my grandson and his friend,” Grandfather explained. “They’re helping get the boat ready, putting in some supplies. Are you all right, boys?”

  The officer didn’t wait for Peter or Henrik to answer. “I see that,” he snipped. He was probably Uncle Morten’s age, tall, straight, and dark haired. He was standing as if he wore a board under the back of his gray wool uniform. One hundred percent serious. The only thing that looked out of place was his crooked nose, which had obviously been broken somewhere along the line. “Are they regular crew members?”

  “No,” replied Grandfather. “They’re just kids.”

  The two boys untangled themselves and tried to pick up some of the mess, the stuff that was scattered all over the dock. Elise tiptoed quietly down the ramp to help. A mop was floating in the water next to the dock, and she fished it up. Henrik had a strange expression on his ash colored face, and he was sweating like crazy. Peter was pretty nervous, too—even more nervous than the time they had let the pigeons go at the Marienlyst Hotel. He was thinking about Henrik the Jew again.

  Then Peter looked back up at his grandfather, searching for some kind of encouragement. Uncle Morten was behind him, wiping his hands on a rag. He winked at his nephew.

  “So you will report anything you see,” said the officer to the men, still standing in the same spot. “Immediately.” It was not a question.

  “We’ll keep our eyes open. You’ll be the first to hear,” said Uncle Morten. He didn’t sound too convincing. “If criminals are sneaking around, as you say, we have no need for them.”