Marit was completely stunned. The man she had turned her anger toward, whom she had accused of being as spineless as a boiled potato, was part of the Resistance?
"You won't be comfortable," he explained to everyone, "but whatever happens on deck, you must all remain below—and absolutely silent. Am I clear?"
Marit tried to catch up with all that was coming to light.
"There's no time to waste. Let's board the bus," he said. "We'll ferry out in the dinghy to the trawler."
The Shetland Islands were over three hundred kilometers away. It was stormy, the worst kind of weather and the wrong season to make that kind of voyage.
Marit's mind buzzed with questions, but this wasn't the time to ask them. She understood the risk of making any more noise than necessary. But what about Mama and Papa? Was she to leave Norway and leave them behind? Then she remembered. She grabbed Bestefar's sleeve.
"There's a soldier—a Resistance soldier—in the barn loft. He's wounded. I've been hiding him. If we don't go back for him, the Gestapo will find him."
"In the loft? Our loft?" Bestefar said. His silence was filled with foreboding. "If we go back for anyone now, we risk the whole mission."
"And if we don't, he'll die. We can't leave him!" Marit headed toward the door. "I'm the one who told him to hide there. I'll go."
Bestefar glanced around, as if weighing the value of his cargo. "Not alone," he said. "It's better if I join you. We must hurry. The rest of you—row out and take your places in the boat's hold. Ingeborg, guide them. We'll return quickly, God willing. If anything should happen to us, get word to Einar. He'll know what to do." Einar, Marit knew, was another local fisherman—apparently working, too, for the Resistance.
Marit forced herself to leave Aunt Ingeborg and Lars. She had to help Henrik.
Heads tucked, she and Bestefar braved the pelting sleet.
"Shouldn't we stay in the ditches?" she whispered.
He shook his head. "They're accustomed to seeing me at this hour. If we're stopped, let me do the talking."
No sooner had they rounded the first bend than lights bore down on them from behind. Marit scuttled out of the way, but not before a truck splashed past her, then squealed its brakes to a stop. She and Bestefar continued walking until they were alongside the vehicle. Its window opened, and a flashlight blinded them.
Marit covered her eyes with her mitten, hoping to keep from giving away her dread.
"What are you doing out past curfew?"
"I'm sorry, sir," Bestefar said. "I had to check on my fishing boat. The bilge pump has not been working, and I had to make sure she wasn't taking on water."
The light fell squarely on Marit. "And you?"
"She's my granddaughter."
"Nei!" the soldier shouted, and with a swift motion through the open window, hit Bestefar across his face with a pistol.
Bestefar stumbled back. Marit gasped, but held herself still.
"She must answer for herself," barked the soldier.
If she didn't speak up this time, Marit was certain the soldier would hurt Bestefar far worse than he already had.
"The night is so awful," she said, "I didn't want Bestefar to be out all alone. He didn't want me to come, but I followed him."
The soldier humphed. "To have such devotion, old man. You're lucky."
"Ja," Bestefar said. "Marit is my pride and joy."
Despite the bleak situation, she tucked away his words.
"Get home quick, before your luck runs out." Then the Nazi soldier motioned to the driver, and the wheels churned forward, kicking up a spray of freezing water. The wind whined and churned up the sea so that it roared against the shore below. Marit and Bestefar pressed home, nearly at a run, without a word. Some encounters were too close to even speak about.
The barn and farmhouse sat dark and lonely. Marit opened the barn door, and Bestefar followed her inside. She clambered up the loft ladder. "Henrik! We must get you out of here."
The loft was silent.
"Henrik?"
She fumbled in the darkness and found him. She removed her mittens and reached out to touch his face. The moment her hands touched his nose and forehead, she gasped. His skin was stiff and cold. Lifeless. She leaned forward and touched her head to his chest, hoping for the sound of a faint heartbeat, the slightest breath of air. But she was too late. Her efforts to save him had not been nearly enough.
She had failed him.
She eased his stiff eyelids shut with her fingertips. Though her throat ached, she whispered, "God natt." Good night.
Then she nearly stumbled down the ladder, her chest shuddering.
"Marit," Bestefar said, catching her.
The low moan of a wounded animal rose from her core. Her legs buckled, and as she slid to her knees, Bestefar pulled her into his arms and held her up. Though she had barely known this soldier, his death seemed to embody all the losses, all the sacrifices being made across Norway. Somewhere, Henrik had a mother and father who would cry when they learned the news—if they ever learned of their son. Maybe he had a brother, or a sister, or even a girlfriend. "I tried—but it wasn't enough," she cried, her tears flowing into Bestefar's wool jacket. "I should have asked you to help, but ... he's dead."
For a hurried moment, he wrapped her in his sturdy arms and whispered rapidly in her ear. "How could you have known? I've done my best to keep you unaware. Even scared off your well-meaning friend. You did what you could."
"Oh, Bestefar." She cried harder. "But we can't leave his body to rot or be found by the Gestapo."
"We can't bury him, Marit. There's no time."
"We could take his body with us and give him a proper burial."
"No. A dead body in tight quarters puts the living at risk."
He was right. Face wet with tears, Marit brushed past Bestefar. "I'll be right back."
"Marit!"
She raced past him out of the barn and into the farmhouse. Without taking off her boots, she flew upstairs and straight to the storage chest. The moment she lifted the lid, the sweet cedar filled her nose as she tore through tablecloths and runners to the soft wool of her bunad at the bottom. She couldn't let the Gestapo find it and burn it. She'd take it for Aunt Ingeborg's sake—for her own sake.
She flew down the stairs, stuffing the bunad inside her jakke.
In the kitchen, a meow startled her.
"Tekopp!" Marit cried. She wanted to bring the cat along, for Lars's sake. She could tuck him in her jacket to keep him quiet, and besides, even if he got loose there was nothing unusual about a cat roaming the harbor. She reached down, scooped him up, and tucked him in her jakke along with the bunad.
With a sense that hours had passed instead of seconds, Marit hurried down the stairs with her cargo, said a silent goodbye to the old farmhouse and her brave soldier, and fled.
Chapter Twenty-Six
The Shetland Bus
Marit caught up with Bestefar outside the barn, and without a word, they hurried toward the road, ducked low, and sped through the water-filled ditch. If they were stopped this time, there would be no second chance.
As they neared the boathouse, the gleaming eyes of headlights swung toward them from the Nazi headquarters. Bestefar grabbed her arm and pulled her with him to the soggy earth. Breathless, Marit rolled onto her back, careful not to squash Tekopp.
Lights cut a hazy path through the darkness and drew closer with the slow approach of wheels rolling over the wet road. For a moment, lights lit the air just above her nose. All she had to do was lift her hand and she would give them away. She remained motionless in the ditch's shadows, trying not to breathe.
Wind swooped down on them. Sleet stung Marit's face. Water seeped through the back of her jakke and sweater and iced the small of her back. Tekopp began to squirm and wiggle. Marit held him more tightly. But the tighter she gripped him, the more he dug his claws into her skin and struggled to escape.
"Yeeoooow!" he complained, but Marit held him harder.
The light and wheels stopped, and then the vehicle backed up in their direction.
"Let him go," Bestefar whispered fiercely.
Marit released her grip and Tekopp sprang from her coat. He bounded over her chest, his claws raking her neck as he fled.
A door opened. "Halt! Was ist los?" A second door opened and boot heels sounded on the road above. Another light swept back and forth.
Her heart thudded louder with each passing second.
Up on the road, a set of boots pivoted, then stopped.
The light paused in its sweeping search.
The soldier laughed, then said something more in German.
Footsteps sounded, the door shut, and wheels splattered mud as the vehicle moved slowly forward, dragging the light away with it.
A welcome darkness covered them, and their only companion was once again the wind. They held still. Silently, Marit chastised herself for trying to bring Tekopp. Finally, Bestefar stirred. In haste, they closed the remaining distance.
Aunt Ingeborg waited behind the boathouse door. "The soldier?" she whispered.
Bestefar shook his head, and Aunt Ingeborg seemed to understand.
Life vests on, they piled wordlessly into the rowboat. Bestefar rowed quietly to the trawler, and Marit hoisted herself up the rope ladder behind Aunt Ingeborg.
Once aboard, Bestefar motioned to the hold and whispered, "The rest are below?"
Aunt Ingeborg nodded.
"Good," he said. Then he pointed Marit to the wheelhouse that sheltered the steering wheel and controls. Teeth chattering, she was wet clear through and colder than she'd ever been. From the shelter of the small wheelhouse, she watched Bestefar as he secured the dinghy to the line, lifted anchor, and single-handedly hoisted a sail to half-mast.
The wind howled outside the wheelhouse and whined through its cracks. It couldn't be a worse time for leaving. Then she realized, on the contrary, maybe this was the best kind of weather. The Germans wouldn't want to be out on the water in such a storm.
As soon as the sail rose partway up the mast, the wind turned on the canvas and pressed the trawler toward the waves. Marit hung on to the handholds inside the wheelhouse as the boat tilted. Bestefar squeezed in beside her, his slicker rain-drenched.
"We can't afford to start the engine in the harbor," he whispered. "Someone could hear—even in this wind."
They skimmed out of the safety of the breakwater. When they crossed into open water, Bestefar gave her the wheel. "Keep it steady. See where the compass is? Just hold it there on course."
Then he bustled outside again, dropped the sail, and returned to join her in the wheelhouse. He throttled the engine forward. The engine caught and hummed, but out of the sheltered harbor, the wind drowned out the trawler's usual tonk-tonk-tonk noise.
Like a madman, the wind rocked their cradle. Rain drenched the wheelhouse windows. Now, finally, it would be safe to talk.
"I'm sorry, Bestefar," she said, certain that the wind drowned her voice to anyone onshore. "I didn't understand you. When you turned in your radio, I thought you'd given up completely."
"I lied," he said heavily. The lines and creases in his face had multiplied, and beneath his eyes, his skin was dark with worry. "I gave up the one radio, but I still have another disguised as a tackle box—here on the trawler."
"Oh, but I thought ... I was so angry at you for—I'm sorry."
Then he explained how he'd initially intended to stay clear of getting involved. But when the Resistance came to him and asked him to fix a boat engine, he did what he could, and his involvement grew. He'd helped transport shipments of arms for the Allies and captained a boatload of agents and soldiers into Norway, "right under the noses of the Nazis," and this was his third trip of transporting refugees.
"So that's why you were gone so long at times."
He nodded. "And your soldier?"
In turn, she told him how she'd stumbled across Henrik, hid him, and tried to finish his mission by delivering the compass. "On the way back, that's when the wind caught us—"
"All the more reason to get you off the island. People have a way of talking, especially when under pressure by the Gestapo. This war, it changes people—and not always for the better."
Outside the wheelhouse, boat lines that should have been secured suddenly danced in the darkness like angry white snakes. "Bestefar, look!"
"Stay here," he ordered, "and keep your hands on the wheel. Keep us pointing southwest." He stepped out again into the night.
Shivering, Marit watched the compass and turned the wheel back and forth to counter the force of waves and wind. The compass needle careened west, then south, but each time, she brought it back halfway between the two points.
Waves crested higher than the gunwales. Maybe this whole trip was a suicide trip, an escape from the Nazis only to be swallowed by the sea. Finally, Bestefar returned again, dripping wet. His wrist was chafed and bleeding.
Bestefar took the wheel. "Takk. Now get below with the others." He pointed to the hatch midship, which usually held a full day's catch of fish. "And hold on to something as you cross that deck!"
Blinking back blowing rain and salt water, Marit bent low and steadied herself by gripping the boom, which was now secured, its sail down. At the hatch on deck, she knocked and the square door opened.
"Quickly. Don't let in rain," Aunt Ingeborg called.
Arms caught her and directed her feet. She squeezed down alongside two bodies—Aunt Ingeborg's and Lars's—and the rest, sitting or lying down in the hold.
"I brought the bunad." A chill had settled deep in her bones. Her teeth chattered and her mouth had grown stiff with cold. "I wouldn't let the Nazis have it."
She couldn't see her aunt's face, but in the few seconds of silence that followed, she knew Aunt Ingeborg was pleased. "Oh, Marit." A hand reached over—a welcome comfort of softness and calluses.
"You have so much to tell me," her aunt said. "But not now. We should try to sleep."
Silence enveloped them and the air reeked of fish. Later she would explain everything to her aunt, but for now, Marit was drenched and bitterly cold. Wedged between bodies, she closed her eyes. Eventually she warmed, and lulled by the rumbling engine, she slept.
More than once during the night the pregnant woman retched in the darkness. Someone must have found her a bucket, because the hatch opened, something clunked on deck, and then the hatch closed again. "I'm sorry," the woman said.
"No need to apologize," Aunt Ingeborg replied.
Marit tucked her nose inside her sweater, which helped only somewhat, and managed to go back to sleep. Though she didn't know the stories of the other passengers or why they were fleeing, she understood they were all in danger—and that they were drawn together as close as family in the belly of the boat.
Sometime around dawn, Marit guessed, Aunt Ingeborg woke everyone. "Listen!"
Before Marit opened her eyes, she jumped up and bumped her head.
"Everyone—stay below," Aunt Ingeborg ordered, then lifted the hatch slightly.
Through the crack, Marit glimpsed the dusky gray sky and a low-swooping plane coming from the north. It droned closer and dropped lower until it was nearly upon them. If the boat was shot to pieces, it would become their coffin. God would have to protect them. They were only a fishing trawler alone on a vast sea—no match for Nazi bomber planes.
She and Aunt Ingeborg watched as Bestefar slipped from his wheelhouse and ducked beside an overturned wooden barrel, its lid askew. "The barrel doesn't contain herring or extra fuel oil," her aunt explained, "but guns and rifles."
"How do you know?" Marit asked.
"I know."
Droning low, the plane approached, drawing closer and closer. As it did, Bestefar reached into the barrel. But to Marit's relief, the plane turned sharply away and then flew off into the charcoal sky until it was no longer visible. The pilot must have thought they were a simple fishing boat.
"Thank God!" Aun
t Ingeborg shouted. She dropped the hatch, and darkness and the damp, sharp smells of fish, fuel oil, and vomit engulfed them again.
"I can't stay down here," Marit said. She pushed open the hatch and scrambled onto the deck. "And Bestefar needs help keeping watch."
"Marit!" her aunt warned.
"I'll stay out of sight in the wheelhouse," she called over her shoulder. She didn't want to disobey her aunt, but this time Bestefar needed her.
All morning and afternoon, Marit helped Bestefar keep watch for approaching German planes. If one were to come too close and open up on them with gunfire, he'd be ready beside the gun-filled barrel. He might be able to inflict some damage in return, and Marit would keep the boat on course.
The storm had passed, settling into a steady drizzle. Winds blew across giant swells, and their mood grew more confident as they traveled southwest. When a spray of water shot into the sky, not far from their boat, Marit panicked. From her nightmares, her first reaction was—kraken! But she knew she wasn't being logical. It was far worse. "Submarine!" she yelled to Bestefar.
"Marit!" He laughed beside her in the wheelhouse. "Have you forgotten where you're from? Look again!"
A pod of humpback whales spouted from their air holes, then arced ... rising, rising from the surface—one, two, three—until their mighty tails swept upward, revealing light-patterned undersides as they dived. For a time, the whales paralleled the trawler, as if keeping watch over them. All too soon, they veered away, and gulls followed in their wake.
"Marit, until we reach Scalloway, I need an extra set of eyes."
Long after sunset and late into the night, eyes straining with fatigue, Marit kept watch for planes, boats, or mines that might have drifted off course into open water. Several times, Bestefar motioned for her to go below, but she shook her head. She refused to give up her post. Bestefar couldn't navigate and keep watch for so many hours all alone.
The Klipfish Code Page 13