It Was That Night

by Rikke Barfod

  Granddad’s hand stops mid air reaching for the tea.

  “Why do you say that?”

  I shrug my shoulders. “No reason.”

  “Did Inga say anything?”

  “No. I know, of course, she’s adopted, but why did you not tell her? Why did you wait until she was as old as I am?”

  Granddad starts pouring water in the pot. “Hold it. How do you know that when Inga hasn’t told you?”

  “Umm, I sort of read Mum’s old diary and …”

  Granddad knits his bushy eyebrows. A face can look very disapproving without anything being said. Thankfully he only grunts, “I see.”

  I let out a breath of relief and ask, “So why didn’t you?”

  Granddad is silent for a while. His face crimps together like it always does when he is deliberating. I am at the point of asking him again when he says:

  “I guess it’s time to tell you the whole story. And Inga doesn’t really know it. But it’s difficult. It’s a long story. Damn, this is very hard for me, Claire. You must know that Granny and I had tried for several years to have a baby. Finally, she was pregnant. We were so happy. After having waited for so long, we had our own little boy at last. And the very next day he died.”

  Granddad stops, wipes a hand over his eyes. I hear the pain in his voice.

  “Oh, Granddad I’m sorry. That must have been so awful.” I pat his hand.

  It is true then. Exactly like Mum wrote in the diary. Granddad pauses, relights his pipe, and continues:

  “They did ask me about the baby. I said it had died.”

  He stops. “Sorry I’m telling this really badly. I’m jumbling things together.”

  “The night it happened, Kathrine, the midwife, was in the house tending to Marie who had become very ill after losing our son. It was evening. Suddenly Thomas, the fisherman, stood puffing in the doorway with a strange, dripping-wet woman. He said: ‘It is lucky you are here, Kathrine. This woman is in labour. Can you hide her, Gustav? We can’t take her back to the school. The streets are swarming with Germans’.

  I must have answered him in the affirmative because he brought the woman into the room. I tried to gather my wits and asked: ‘But weren’t they sailing tonight’?

  ‘Gestapo-Lund came. You know the top Danish Nazi in Elsinore. He had somehow got an inkling of something going on tonight. But damn it if we didn’t get them all back to the school without him seeing them. But this woman stumbled in to the water and I think her baby is coming. So, can she stay here’?

  Thomas sounded as if he would rather withdraw with the woman again. She was still leaning heavily on him and was gasping and shivering from cold. The water ran from her clothes. I mostly noticed her eyes, enormous dark, frightened eyes and black wet hair cascading down her back. She was neither small nor tall. At that moment, she screamed.”

  He tells it so vividly. I get the sense of urgency and my head fills with zigzagging pictures of a dark cold night, German boots trampling the streets, people hiding. Granddad stirs sugar in his cup for a long time before he continues:

  “I don’t know how other people cope when they have just lost their longed-for first child.”

  “Granddad, it must have been so hard.” I squeeze his hand again. I feel tears queuing up.

  “It was. I felt like I was in some sort of fog. I remember Kathrine saying something and Thomas asking: ‘Marie’? Even though it’s so many years ago, I still recall the feeling. It was like being hit with a rock in the solar plexus when Kathrine said, ‘..the child didn’t survive. Marie is very ill. Can you fetch the Doctor and the priest, Thomas’? I didn’t understand why she wanted a priest.”

  Granddad’s face looks bewildered like a small child just waking up. I take hold of his hand again. He squeezes it and slowly goes on:

  “I heard the woman whisper something urgently to Kathrine and …”

  The door clicks. Granny comes in.

  “Hi Claire, what are you doing here. Shouldn’t you be in school?” She asks. Then she sees my face. “Claire, what’s wrong?” I shake my head.

  “Nothing’s wrong. I only wish somebody had told me all this before.” Why hadn’t Mum told me?

  “Told you what?” Granny asks. Granddad frowns and throws me a warning glance, but too late.

  “About what happened during the war and …”

  Granny plumps down and puts her hand to her heart. “So it might be Ursula they found,” she says.

  “Ursula? How do you know about Ursula?”

  I have to bite my tongue so the question: ‘Can you see things too?’ doesn’t escape my mouth.

  Granddad interrupts: “Get your coat off, Marie. I’ll make some fresh tea, shall I?”

  “The whole shop was buzzing with the excitement of the skeleton found in the school. It seems that some of the workmen told Mr. Jensen in the shop about it.” Granny sits down. “I guessed it could be Ursula,” she says.

  I’m totally confused. I understand nothing. A ghost grips my hand and says her name is Ursula. Now it seems everyone knows about her. I shake my head to still the thoughts lashing out at each other. Granddad pours fresh tea.

  “Marie, I have been telling Claire what happened That Night. You can hear the rest another time, Claire.”

  Granny looks at my face. She smiles. “It’s fine, you go on. But, Claire, why are you suddenly interested? Is it because of the skeleton?”

  “Yeah, and because I happened to find Mum’s old diary and somehow read the beginning about when she found out she was adopted and …”

  One of the nice things about Granny is that she never shows disapproval.

  “I see,” she says.

  “So, shall I go on?” Granddad asks and pours tea for everybody.

  Granny sips her tea. She nods.

  “Where was I?”

  “About Katherine talking to the woman,” I say.

  “That’s right. Katherine asked her, ‘.. is your name Ursula’?”

  My teacup clatters on the saucer. Granddad continues, “The woman screamed: ‘Nein! Leah’. Kathrine said, ‘Fine Leah, let’s get this baby out.' She helped the woman out of her wet clothes, wrapped her in a blanket and helped her down on the couch, where she had placed an old sheet.

  The woman continued to scream and talk in a strange language. Her arms were flaying about. Kathrine commanded me to sit behind the woman and hold her hands tightly. Kathrine continued to speak soothingly to the woman while she was doing something to her. The woman thrashed around, wailing. She dug her nails into my hands. I had never seen a baby being born. I didn’t know what was happening or where to look. I felt the woman’s hands squeezing mine while she gasped. Suddenly she pushed her feet against Kathrine’s stomach forcefully, then arched her back with a big cry ending in a gasp. Kathrine told her she was doing a good job and just to keep on pressing. The woman screamed again. She squeezed my hand with all her might. Suddenly I saw something dark come out in Kathrine’s hand. A wild salty smell of sea was in the air. The woman relaxed. ‘Is it a girl’? she asked. Kathrine nodded, cut the umbilical cord, tied it and gave me the baby, asking me to find some-thing to wrap it in.”

  Granddad stops speaking. The door creaks open. Somebody comes in. The lights haven’t been turned on and the shadows are creeping out from the corners.

  

  Chapter 7

  Claire

  5th April 1983

  When I see it is Mum, I sigh with relief and throw myself in her arms. She looks around. “Claire, is your headache better? You left some rather interesting books from Mogens’ study in your room. What’s been happening?”

  “Mum, I got scared.”

  “I guessed that when I saw the books.”

  “Mum, it’s because …”

  Granddad interrupts, “Inga, apparently a skeleton has been found in the school …”

  I hear Mum draw in her breath.

  “… and it seems your daughter has been reading your diary.”

 
; Oh, this is terrible. Why did he say that? For a moment I really detest him. Mum looks at me in that way I hate.

  “I’m sorry Mum, I only read the beginning where you found out you were adopted. That must have been so weird.”

  “Weird is not the word I would choose – rather seismic.” Mum smiles wryly. “Still, you know about not reading other people’s stuff. I’m disappointed that you didn’t remember that.”

  I shuffle my feet and look at a spot on the carpet. It looks like a small troll.

  Granny says, “Inga, take off your coat and get a cup. Your father is telling Claire about what happened That Night. You never really heard the whole story, I know.”

  Mum looks indecisive, then takes a cup and sits down. Granddad relights his pipe. He takes a long time fiddling with the matches to get it lit. I still don’t understand what his story has to do with Ursula. Granddad continues:

  “Kathrine put the baby in my arms, while she busied herself with the woman. She told me to find some of Marie’s baby things to wrap it in, and said she hoped the doctor would be here soon.”

  “But who was the baby?” I ask.

  “Wait, Claire. It’s a long story.”

  The images I see in my head are so real. It’s like being there. How come I can see it like I was watching a film?

  Granddad continues, “The baby was so tiny. With long black hair. And a scent of – of baby. I was scared of dropping her as I tip-toed into the bedroom to find a shawl. Granny heard me and opened her eyes for the first time in twenty-four hours. ‘The baby’, she whispered and reached out for it. I wrapped the baby in a blanket, and put it in her arms. I tried to tell her that this was another child. You didn’t understand,” he says, turning to Granny.

  Granny plays with her pearl necklace and shakes her head. “No, I probably didn’t.”

  “Shortly afterwards, you fell asleep with the baby in your arms. You were breathing normally again, and looked as if you might survive. I didn’t know what to do. My son had just died and I was so scared of losing you too, Marie.”

  Granny interrupts, “I didn’t know I was that sick.”

  “Oh, Father,” Mum says biting at her thumb nail.

  “That’s why I let Kathrine persuade me. It was to save your life, Marie.”

  Granny looks as if she is going to burst into tears. Granddad clears his throat. He takes a sip from his tea and continues. His voice has a catch in it:

  “When Kathrine came into the room and saw Granny sleeping peacefully, she said ‘Ah, that’s what she needed.’ Then I thought about the woman, and asked Kathrine: ‘what is happening to the woman, Leah? Shouldn’t she have her baby back’? Katherine answered that the doctor had arrived and was with her. It was touch and go, she said. Then she left the bedroom to go back to Leah. I looked at Granny. She slept, the baby in her arms.” Granddad’s eyes are wet.

  “So what did you do with the baby?” I ask.

  “Ah, this is difficult. When I was asked about Leah, I said that both she and the baby had died. You must remember this was at the end of 1943 when the resistance against the German occupation had started in earnest. We could not risk having a Jewish child in our house. At least that’s what I told myself.”

  “But Granddad who asked? And who was Leah? And how has this got anything to do with Ursula? And who is Ursula, anyway?”

  

  Chapter 8

  Claire

  5th April 1983

  Granddad absent-mindedly lays his pipe down. I sit very still. The pictures from his voice crowd my brain. Why did I never know these things? I thought my family was ordinary – apart from me. What more don’t I know? I take a sip of cold tea. It’s so strong. It splits my head in two.

  “You should have told me all this,” I mumble.

  Granddad picks up his pipe: “The right moment never seemed to come.”

  “That’s right,” Granny says, and re-arranges the cushions behind her back to sit more comfortably. “Maybe I should tell the rest, shall I? I’ll never forget the date. The 1st of October.”

  “That’s Mum’s birthday,” I interrupt.

  “Of course it is. You know, I didn’t know my baby had died. I was so ill. When Granddad told me, I screamed that he was lying. I couldn’t stop screaming. The Doctor came and gave me more injections.”

  Granddad cuts in, “It was touch and go, Claire. Granny’s temperature kept rising. You know this was before one could get penicillin.”

  “What did you use then?”

  “We just hoped and prayed.”

  Mums hand closes in a fist. Her voice is shaking when she says, “I never knew any of this. That you almost died, Mother. Maybe I understand you a bit better now.”

  Granny sips her tea. Her voice sounds somewhat waspish when she says: “There didn’t seem to be an opportunity to tell you the rest of the story. I know we should have told you long before, Inga. I’m still so sorry for the way you found out.”

  I look at Mum. She sits very still.

  Granny resumes: “I remember waking up and seeing Gustav in the bedroom with our baby in his arms. I was still very befuddled. I thought I must have had a nightmare about the baby dying. I asked for him. There he was in my arms, sleeping, the tiny breath rising and falling.

  Later when I saw the baby without clothes, I said, ‘..but it’s a girl. Why did you tell me we had a son, Gustav’? Then he told me the whole story. I asked where the woman was? He told me she got pneumonia and died. The Doctor had done all he could. He ended by saying: ‘So, I thought we should keep the baby, at least until after the war’.

  I felt so ashamed of the happiness inside of me. I had no right to be happy because another mother had died. But I was.”

  Finally, I let the tears spill from my eyes, “Oh, Granny I can’t imagine what that must have felt like.”

  “Gustav told me that he had talked to the priest and the doctor. ‘We’ll just pretend she’s ours. After the war we will make the proper papers,’ he said. I felt like I had been given the most wonderful gift wrapped in golden paper, but I still asked him, ‘..you really mean we can keep her’?”

  I had to ask, even though I thought I knew the answer: “But who was the baby?”

  Granny smiles at me and says, “Don’t you understand, Claire. That baby was your mother.”

  The whole room spins. “But … Mum? Why did you never tell me?”

  I look from one face to the other. Mum’s face has gone white. She is biting her lips together in a thin line. She turns to me:

  “Claire, why did you read my diary? And do you know anything about Ursula?”

  “I’m sorry Mum. I spilt some tea and the flaps of the cardboard box opened, the diary fell out and it got some tea on it and …”

  Damn it. I look at the floor as if there is something very interesting to see there. I don’t want to look at her disappointed eyes. To avoid looking at her I quickly tell her how I dreamt I had to go to school early and look into a cupboard.

  It feels like an icy wind enters the room; both Granny and Granddad draw in their breath sharply. Granny whimpers softly.

  “A cupboard?” Mum’s voice falters.

  “Yeah, but I woke late; and then there was this new girl in class and …” The words pour out of me. I tell her everything.

  Mum was the last person I wanted to tell everything to. She is just too good at getting things out of me. But she always believes me. If it had been Dad, he would be telling me off for lying.

  When I finish, Granny clears her throat, “Inga, don’t you think …”

  “Just keep out of this,” Mum says in very big letters.

  I have never heard Mum talk like that before. I look at Granny and Granddad. Granddad squeezes his pipe so tight I’m afraid he’ll break it. Granny looks as if she’s just seen an enormous black spider crawling up her arm.

  Mum breaks the silence. She says: “Claire, where’s that girl now?”

  “This is the strangest thing, she let go of my ha
nd when Nurse Hansen came and when I looked, she wasn’t there anymore.” I quickly look up at Mum. Then turn my eyes at the floor again.

  “Did you tell anybody that you saw her?” Mum asks and gets up.

  “Just Ellen,” I say, still looking at the floor.

  “I see,” Mum says. “You know what, get your coat, we’ll go back and see if the girl is still at the school.”

  I gape. “Mum what do you mean ‘see’?”

  Mum is buttoning up her coat. “Just what I said.”

  I feel I have to spell it out loud: “Mum, she’s a ghost. You don’t see ghosts, do you?”

  An intake of air like a sob. Granny sits completely still. Her hand on her heart.

  “I understand she’s a ghost. Let’s go.”

  I stare at Mum as if she’s suddenly developed two heads. “Can you see things too?”

  Mum smiles that crooked smile that’s not a real smile. “Sometimes. Close your mouth, Claire, a whole army of flies could fly in. Yes, I too can see ‘things’.”

  “Why did you never tell me?”

  Mum turns to Granny. “You know why I never said anything. And I’m so tired of keeping my mouth shut. For years I’ve been trying to suppress what I see. Now I think it’s time to be who I am.”

  “But my dear…” Granny folds her hands like she is going to pray.

  “I also think it’s time you two stop pretending that what you cannot see doesn’t exist. You know Claire is psychic, just like me.”

  Mum’s face is white; I feel her hands shaking as she propels me out the door. I cast a glance backwards. Both Granny and Granddad sit with their mouths open. Tears are falling from Granny’s eyes. They both look as if a stone just dropped through the roof. That’s what I feel too. Only the stone has shattered my life. The door shuts.

  

  Chapter 9

  On the way back from Granny and Granddad’s my thoughts jolt against each other like branches hitting a window in a storm. There is no room left in my brain to take in what Mum has just said. Mum too is silent. The sand crunches under our feet. Finally Mum says, “Why did you take out those books from Dad’s study?”