‘What did Storheill mean about his reputation?’ I asked.
Clark frowned. ‘Oh, yes, I told you that too, did I? His last words were something about God saving Norway and that I should remember his reputation.’
‘I wondered what he meant by it?’
Clark rubbed his forehead. ‘Out on the ice he had said to me, “Do you know what the old Norsemen said of a man’s life?” I admitted I didn’t and he said, “All men, their kinsmen and their cattle die; but a noble name, praise and reputation are immortal.” It was a curious fancy, don’t you think?’
I nodded and jotted Storheill’s words down. And I remember thinking how difficult it must have been for a man to bury such a reputation as Clark had acquired in life. But then I had not shot a dozen helpless, unarmed men.
I stared at him for a moment and, catching my eye, he said, ‘Perhaps you can save Storheill’s name for him, eh? I should like you to do that.’
‘Of course.’
Then there was just one other question.
‘What about Kurt?’ I probed, anxious not to leave a strand untucked in the last splice he was making of his life.
But Clark shrugged. ‘We never found out. Did the Gestapo get to him before the Russians? Was he implicated in the Stauffenburg Plot alongside Admiral Canaris?’ Clark shrugged again. ‘Who knows? I am inclined to think he was executed in the aftermath of the Rastenburg explosion. We shall never know. Perhaps he escaped then died in the awful mess Hitler left the Germans in…
‘In the end we were unimportant. We were all killed long, long ago. I have been dead ever since I left that beach, but –’ and here he smiled with a quiet haunted certainty that I cannot get out of my mind’s eye – ‘dead men never know when to stop talking.’
* * *
As I left him, I sought out his daughter to let her know I was going. She was still in the garden, where a chill had set in under the shadow of the high holly hedge.
‘Thank you for coming,’ she said simply, removing her leather gardener’s gloves. ‘It is good of you to take the trouble.’
‘It was no trouble,’ I said. ‘I’ll be in touch.’
‘He told you everything, I suppose,’ she said.
‘Yes,’ I said, looking straight at her so there could be no misunderstanding. ‘Everything.’
She coloured slightly and lifted a strand of hair from her face. ‘Did he tell you about the poppies?’
‘That he picked them, yes.’
‘Come, I’ll show you…’
We walked to a small area where a few stones were piled. A small plant of a pale green, with tiny brown seed pods trembled in the chilly breeze.
‘Arctic poppy,’ she said, ‘Papaver dahlianum.’
I tried to equate the tiny plants with the ring of shots echoing about that remote Arctic beach and found that it was beyond the power of my imagination. And then it occurred to me that the act of picking the delicate and frail things had been the last act of an innocent man.
Charlotte walked me to my car, where we shook hands. She was still a handsome woman and her smile was open and attractive. I tried to see her mother in her face but she seemed to bear her father’s features. I wanted to ask her about Magda as a stepmother, whether she had children of her own and how long she had been widowed, but I felt I knew more of her life than I had a right to.
She stood watching me as I got into the car and backed out of the drive. I had the curious sensation that she did not want to lose sight of me, that I bore off something precious to her. Ever since she told me of her father’s death I have wondered how she copes in that remote old house.
First published in Great Britain in 2002 by Severn House Publishers Ltd
This edition published in the United Kingdom in 2019 by
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Copyright © Richard Woodman, 2002
The moral right of Richard Woodman to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781788636209
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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