Chapter 4: 1942

Thump!

Frank Åge hunched his shoulders a bit more and lowered his head. Any lower and his nose would touch his textbook.

Thump! Thump!!

Pretty soon there would be no school, no books, and no more teachers’ dirty looks. But today, February 9^th, 1942, there was still homework. Had he known that the teachers’ vocal anti-Nazi protests would provoke a month-long “holiday” in less than 3 weeks, perhaps Frank Åge would have been less studious. But the light was fading, there was no electricity today, and other than a borrowed Superman comic book (which he had promised himself he would read burning a precious candle when all was winter quiet in the house), all Frank Åge had to preoccupy himself was an ancient Norwegian history textbook.

Thump!! And a groan, the only shout his bed-ridden father could produce.

If he didn’t go up there soon, the widow Jonsson from across the alley would be here scolding him endlessly. Frank Åge sought the lesser of two evils. He dragged his long limbs from beneath the scarred and wobbly table and started up the stairs with the enthusiasm of a man going to his own execution.

“Father, can I get you anything?”

His father could only whisper, but even that stank of evil. “Come in here, son.”

Frank Åge opened the door a crack. The room was dark, but the smell was unmistakable: his father had pissed himself again. He couldn’t do it; he just couldn’t. “Do you need something, father?” he asked from the doorway.

“Get me a beer.”

Yeah right, sure he could scare up a beer in this winter of minus 20 with no power and barely enough firewood to heat the downstairs so the ice didn’t form on the floor. “I’ll go look,” said Frank Åge and closed the door.

His father had been a strong man, never tall, but with arms of steel. Had been a steel-worker, in fact, a smelter. But around the miserable Christmas with neither tree nor presents, old Samuelsen had suddenly not been able to get out of bed. His left hand dangled over the edge of the bed and his voice had been reduced to a hoarse grunt. The left side of his face slacked like a horror movie and his eyes didn’t focus. Frank Åge had brought a doctor who only said “stroke” and left, not asking for money they didn’t have. Since then, Frank Åge had brought him the bed pan and emptied it behind the shed, and fed him as best he could. They had been alone, father and son, for three years since his mother died. And a blessed death it had been – for her – because Petra Samuelsen had known nothing but abuse and disdain from her husband since the boy had been born so weak. One leg shorter than the other and that right eye that never pointed the same way as the left. But Petra had loved her son as only a mother could and her death was a constant ache in Frank Åge’s chest.

He went outside with the brimming, foul-smelling bedpan. Smash! A snowball hit him square on the head and he dropped the bedpan. The contents ran over his shoes before they froze.

“Åge, Åge, sistemann på toget!”

The taunting of the little kids didn’t bother him so much anymore. He was 16 now, had in fact turned 16 two days ago, not that anyone noticed. He was a man. He could quit school, he suddenly realized. He could just walk out the door and leave. The thought was exhilarating – the best thought he had had in months of cold and darkness. Somewhere, there was light; he was sure of it. Somewhere the other men wouldn’t avert their eyes when they saw him coming. Somewhere there would be a girl, a pretty and quiet girl, who would smile at him and let him hold her hand.

“Pissed on yourself, did you? It’s not easy when it’s so small, that’s for sure.” Einar Iversen stood leaning up against the fence, smoking a home-rolled cigarette. Where he got the tobacco in these rationing times, no one knew. Frank Åge couldn’t tell whether what he had said was a slight on his manhood or just a statement of fact in minus 11. He mumbled something.

“What?”

“I said I just tripped.”

He heard laughter. From behind Einar’s trim frame a girl peeked out. An embroidered shawl covered her hair and she had on at least two coats, but she was still skinny. “Frank Åge, are you coming to the dance this Saturday?”

No, he goddamn well wasn’t going to no dance. With his lame leg he could barely walk straight and he had never danced. Even in the bitter cold, his face flushed in shame. The girl trilled out another laugh and tugged on Einar’s arm. “Come, honey, let’s get away from here. It stinks.”

Einar shrugged and made a face at Frank Åge, but he let himself be pulled away for all that. Frank Åge found the bedpan, which had rolled up against a tree, cleaned it with snow and hurried back in to the little warmth there was in the shack.

In the ancient, sooty fireplace was an iron bar that could be moved back and forth. Frank Åge guessed that in the far past, they had done what he was doing now: fill an iron pot with snow and swing it back over the fire to melt. When the water was boiling, he’d put in three potatoes, just three, and one of the rutabagas Fru Maisen had given him. He’d cut them up first; that way they got softer. Then he’d add the tiniest pinch of salt (salt was precious) and, when the whole mess was softened so his father could masticate it, he’d bring half of it upstairs with one of the salted herrings they had left. “Leave,” he thought, “I can leave.”

After they had both eaten, his father finally fell asleep. Frank Åge lit a stub of a candle and reverently pulled out the Superman comic from under his textbooks. Einar had handed it to him only a few days ago, saying “Hey, check this out. I have read it; you’re welcome to borrow it.”

The cover showed Superman in front of the American flag, the proud eagle looking fierce. Frank Åge wanted to postpone the reading and sat staring at the cover for a long time. Was it an eagle? It looked more like a fish hawk. Frank Åge looked at those strong wings. An airplane pilot, he thought. That’s what I’ll be. A bomber pilot doesn’t need legs. The candle stub sputtered. Frank Åge banked the fire and pulled all the blankets and quilts he had over next to the fireplace. He fell asleep thinking of his mother and dreamed of flying.

In the morning, after a meager breakfast of watery oatmeal, he was about to put his textbooks in his bag when there was a knock on the door. He opened it, cautiously. He had never known any good news to come in that way. It was one of his father’s old buddies from the smelter works.

“Hey, kid. Your father up?”

“No, he’s not feeling well.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Are you going out to the lighthouse?”

To the lighthouse? Whatever for? Frank Åge just looked at him.

“Didn’t you hear, kid? A German warship went aground on Hysebåene last night. Stuck in sea ice. Theyre waving flags to signal, guess their radio is out.”

This was the first winter in his 16 years that Frank Åge had known the ice to freeze solid all the way out to Ørneredet. He had seen trucks driving past him on the ice and people had skied and pulled sleds as far out as they could, some to gape and some to fish. He could dig out his old skis and join them.

The hell with school, this was something new. Why didn’t the German fleet come to rescue their own? Didn’t they know where it was?

Frank Åge strapped on his old, wide skis and set out. It was probably 5 nautical miles from him to Ørneredet. It took him two hours, but now he was within close reach of the island. He was a bit nervous about the rocky edges; sea ice was especially treacherous there, but there were several dozen people ahead of him and a huge truck had driven all the way out and up the boat ramp in the island itself.

The warship was huge, bristling with guns. But it was also far away – way out at the Hysebåene skerries. He didn’t have binoculars, but someone lent him a pair. At the railing stood a man in the ugly beige German uniform. He seemed to be directing something. They were running different colored flags up and down the lines. No one knew what they meant and if anyone did, they kept silent about it.

A week went by and nothing happened. The ship was still there, but now less of a tourist attraction. The crew had resorted to throwing bottles with messages into the water. Some of them were found. In the beginning the messages were angry orders, “Get your lazy treasonous asses out here and help us!” Another week passed, and the messages became meeker, “We are running out of food, water, and fuel for the stoves. Please help.”

On February 24, Frank Åge found a bottle himself. He had gone out by himself. Out by the lighthouse he ran into a group of boys from school – he rapidly changed direction. Near the eastern side of the lighthouse, the solid ice was turning mushy and he was just about to turn around and go home when he spied the bottle. He picked it up and put it inside his jacket.

At home, he used up another half candle to pry open the bottle and retrieve the message. It was in German. His German wasn’t very good, but he understood a few words.

Todes – hilfen – tochter.

Something about death, help and ….. a daughter? Meines einliche kind. The message was signed Oberst Gernleitner. There was a woman on board?

All night Frank Åge tossed and turned, wondering what to do. That the soldiers and sailors could freeze and starve to death he had no problem with. Invading bastards. But a girl? “My only child?”

In the morning, he had decided. Blind Olav up the hill had a horse, old and decrepit, that was true, but still a horse. Olav had asked him to come cut some firewood many times, and he hadn’t done it. Now he could say that he would cut several cords for him if he could just borrow the horse for a few hours.

No problem – Olav had no use for the horse this winter. Practically no hay left, anyway. It was as good as sausage, or at least glue.

The rowboat was in the falling-down boatshed. In the freezing morning, Frank Åge hauled the boat out on the ice and fixed a kind of rope around the horse’s neck. After a few false starts, the contraption worked. They made progress across the ice.

Frank Åge and the nameless horse pulled the row boat across the ice. It was early and there was no one out. They reached the end of the solid ice and the beginning of the mushy sea ice. Frank Åge released the horse from its harness; he might be here later or he might not, but either way these were end times. He pushed the boat into the slushy water and got on board.

Rowing was a challenge; he kept hitting ice with every stroke. But slowly, he gained on the huge German warship. He said nothing, just looked up at the railing 20 meters above. A haggard face appeared.

They had nothing to say to one another, couldn’t speak each other’s language, in fact. The face disappeared and reappeared with a rope ladder. He threw it over the railing.  A second figure appeared, small and huddled. The face hugged her and kissed her once and then pushed her to descend the ladder to Frank Åge’s boat. She made the boat and cowered on the floorboards.

Frank Åge turned around. He didn’t understand anything, but it seemed that this Oberst Gernleitner was about to release his daughter to the mercy of the enemy. He rowed and pulled and slowly got the boat back within reach of solid ice. Not solid enough; he couldn’t get close. The old horse, the one who was just about sausage, appeared. Frank Åge threw a rope from his boat to the horse in desperation. The horse grabbed it with his teeth and pulled. As they scraped the ice, Frank Åge grabbed the shivering girl and shoved her onto it.

There was no way to get the boat back on the ice. He left it. Showed her onto the back of the ancient horse and began the long trek home.

*************************

Her name was Lise lotte. After she had thawed by the meager fireplace and he had been able to heat some soup for her, she revealed a head of spun-gold hair, a little face, and eyes that already looked on eternity. Frank Åge kept her downstairs; his father never knew they had a guest.

Days passed, then weeks. Nearly a month after he had rescued the girl a storm came up and when it was over, the proud warship was gone. Lise Lotte looked out the window and cried. Frank Åge did everything he could for her: found her food and chopped firewood with abandon to heat their little nest. She never smiled.

A month later, he was about to fall asleep on the blankets he kept near the fireplace when he felt her nearby. She lifted the blankets and rested beside him. A tentative hand came out and stroked his chest. Frank Åge was paralyzed. Some time in the night, he turned to her and began to explore her tiny body under the coats. Without a word, the two became one by ancient prerogative.

All his remaining life, Frank Åge would remember the month of March, 1942. They woke up together in the morning rolled up in blankets and quilts, his dick hard and she soft, warm, and welcoming. They kept house. He didn’t go to school. With gestures, he forbade her to go upstairs. They cooked soup out of what he could fish and spent the long dark evenings exploring bodies and a few, tentative words.

One day, his father fell out of bed. Frank Åge was out fishing. Alarmed at the noise, Lise Lotte ascended the rickety stairs. The old man was lying on the floor covered in filth. She tried to clean him. He asked her something she didn’t understand.

“Wie bitte?”

His eyes grew wide. “German whore,” he muttered. Lise Lotte fled.

She had to go outside sometime. To the necessary, to the woodpile, or to hang their ragged clothing, freshly washed in the freezing water, on the line. Sometimes a few boys would gather across the fence. They stared at her with malicious intent. Lise Lotte bowed her head and escaped inside as soon as possible. One time there were three of them. The dark-haired boy who seemed sympathetic, the fool they called Gunnar, and the brown-eyed Alexis. They decided something among themselves and climbed the fence. Lise Lotte tried to run to the shack, but they were faster and stronger. They dragged her into the woods.

She never told him, her rescuer. She bled a few days, but she smiled and hinted that it was that time of month. By the end of May, the weather had turned and the days were getting long. Lise Lotte realized that her time of month had not come twice. She was innocent, but no fool. She knew.

That morning, she made Frank Åge her best oatmeal, with a dab of precious butter and salt. He was a man in paradise. The fishing had been good and he had even been able to trade cut firewood for a dress for her. It was blue, with little daisies. After breakfast, he went to sea again.

Frank Åge came back late that day. He had hit upon a school of herring and had hauled the boat full to the gunwales. He had sold almost all of it and had actual coin in his pocket. She would be so proud of him.

Opening the door, he knew something wasn’t right. Something was dangling from the rafters, thin, shoeless feet and something blue with flowers. There were small brown drips on the floor. His heart imploded.

Much later, he cut her down. He laid her on the quilts and blankets they had used for a bed and closed her eyes. In the dark of night, he went out with a shovel to do the worst thing in his life. Up on top of the hill there was a little clearing where he thought the soil would be deep enough. Frank Åge dug with the strength of Hercules. An hour later, he went back down to the shack to collect her. He gently rolled her into the blankets, and for the last time, carried her close to his heart up the merciless hill. The dirt hit her face like thunder. Then he went back home, up to his father’s bedroom, and put a pillow over the old man’s face until he stopped struggling.

The grave remained unmarked. Only Frank Åge knew where it was, and he brought her fresh flowers every Sunday.

Two weeks later, Einar and Lexis showed up while he was chopping wood.

“Where’s your girlfriend?”

Frank Åge only shrugged.

“Tyskertøse,” said Alexis, and spat. “Only good for one thing.” Frank Åge kept chopping. Einar looked a bit shameful.

“We didn’t mean any harm, you know,” he finally muttered.

“Oh, fuck you Einar,” said Alexis. “You had her, too.”

Frank Åge stared at them as realization dawned. “What did you do to her?”

“She had it coming, filthy German whore.” This was Alexis.

“What did you do?” he shouted. “What did you do to Lise Lotte?”

The two shook their heads and walked away. Frank Åge started after them along, long while.

They would die, every one of them. They had killed the only woman he had ever loved and who had loved him back. They would die, and slowly.