Annika Thor - A Faraway Island

“May I please be excused?”

Aunt Märta nods. “All right.”

“Thank you for a nice dinner.”

Stephie puts on her coat and walks down to the beach.

The spring sun has melted the ice during the last few days, and the snow is melting, too, dripping from the boat-house roof. A black-backed gull is crying overhead. “Caw, caw, caw!” He sounds as if he’s laughing at her.

She sits down on the upturned dinghy, gazing out across the water. There are still a few sheets of ice in the inlet. The water glistens, clear blue. Far away, on the other side of the ocean, is America. Will she ever get there?

For the second time, Stephie carries the books back to Miss Bergström, who accepts only the math book.

“Please keep this one, anyway,” she says, passing Ensign Stål back to Stephie once again. “You can read it and return it to me when you’re done.”

Stephie reads a few of the verses in the book, about a long-ago war. It’s not the kind of poetry she likes.

Every day after school when Stephie sees Sylvia, Ingrid, and the three boys who are staying on for extra tutoring, her heart aches. If she had been one of them, wild horses wouldn’t have been able to keep her away from school. As things are, she feels some satisfaction when a spring cold forces her to stay home for a few days.

Because Stephie’s sick, Aunt Märta lets her sleep as late as she likes in the morning. One day Aunt Märta has already left for the village when Stephie gets up. Barefoot, she tiptoes downstairs in her long nightgown.

The morning sun slants in through the window of the front room. Stephie turns on the radio, raising the volume so she can hear it in the kitchen. She slices some bread, and then gets the butter cooler and the milk pitcher from the pantry.

Right in the middle of a piece of music, there is an interruption. First silence, then static, then a solemn voice comes on:

“This is a special broadcast from the Swedish news agency. German troops have invaded Norway and Denmark. Norwegian radio reports that the Germans took control of the Norwegian ports at three in the morning. German battle ships are now in the Oslo fjord…”

Stephie stands still as a statue in the middle of the kitchen floor, pitcher in one hand, butter cooler in the other.

Oslo ’s not far away at all. If the Germans have gone to war against Denmark and Norway, Sweden will probably be next.

When Aunt Märta gets back, she finds Stephie sitting on a chair with her feet tucked in under her, still in her nightgown. Her breakfast is on the kitchen table, untouched. The news broadcast has ended but she hasn’t turned the radio off. Ordinarily Aunt Märta would have been annoyed and scolded Stephie for listening to music.

“You’ve heard?” is all she says now.

“Yes.”

“I found out at the post office,” Aunt Märta says. “It’s awful. Just terrible.”

They keep the radio on all day. Stephie stays in the front room, wrapped in a blanket. Every time there is a news broadcast, they hear how more and more towns in Norway have fallen to the Germans.

“Owing to the danger of deep-sea mines, Swedish fishermen are warned against going into the straits of the Skagerrak, and possibly also the Kattegatt,” a crackling voice announces at noon.

The Diana is out on a long fishing trip, somewhere in the Skagerrak. Uncle Evert and the others aren’t expected home until the day after tomorrow.

“Uncle Evert…,” says Stephie.

“Don’t worry,” Aunt Märta says brusquely, but Stephie sees that her hands are tense, pale fists.

Just as the reporter is describing the ongoing battle between German and British warships in the North Sea, the telephone rings.

“… severe storm, seas extremely choppy…,” the voice on the radio says.

Stephie and Aunt Märta look at each other. Stephie is sure she and Aunt Märta are having the same thought: What if something has happened to Uncle Evert? Aunt Märta gets up and answers the phone.

“Hello?” She listens for a moment, then passes the receiver to Stephie. “It’s for you.”

Stephie exhales. “Hello?” she repeats into the black receiver.

At first all she can hear is sniffling. Then Nellie’s voice:

“Stephie?”

“Yes?”

“I’m so scared. Do you think they’ll come here?”

“I don’t know. I’m frightened, too.”

“Can I come be with you?”

“Just a minute, let me ask.”

Aunt Märta doesn’t mind if Nellie comes over.

Auntie Alma and the little ones come, too. Auntie Alma seems very upset. She and Aunt Märta speak in hushed tones.

“… taken in at some port…”

“… maybe by radio…”

At five in the afternoon the newscaster reports that the Germans have occupied the main post office and the police station in Oslo, and that German aircraft have landed in southern Norway. Aunt Märta turns the radio off.

“I’m going to make some dinner,” she says. “We have to eat, in any case. You’re all welcome to spend the night, if you like.”

They put Auntie Alma and the little ones up in the guest room, and Nellie is supposed to sleep on a mattress on the floor of Stephie’s bedroom. This is the first time in nearly eight months they’ve shared a room.

“Stephie?” Nellie asks when they’ve turned out the lights.

“Mmm?”

“Can I sleep in your bed?”

“I’ve got a cold. You’ll catch it.”

“I don’t care.”

Nellie cuddles up in Stephie’s bed with her. Her feet are icy cold on Stephie’s legs. Stephie puts her arms around her.

“If they come here, what will you and I do?” Nellie asks.

“We’ll move somewhere else,” Stephie replies.

“Where to?”

“To… Portugal.”

“ Portugal,” Nellie says. “It’s hot there, isn’t it? They don’t have snow, do they?”

“Right,” Stephie answers. “Only sandy beaches and palm trees as far as the eye can see.”

“That was what you said it would be like here, too,” Nellie reminds her.

“I remember. I was wrong.”

“Will Mamma and Papa also be able to go to Portugal?”

“I don’t know,” Stephie says. “We’d better go to sleep now.”

Nellie stops talking and turns over. Stephie thinks she’s fallen asleep, but then she hears her sister’s voice again in the darkness.

“Stephie? Just think if the war goes on for so long Mamma and Papa don’t recognize us when it’s over.”

“They’ll recognize us,” says Stephie. “Even if the war goes on for years. I know they will.”

They fall asleep cuddled close together. Like when they were little, in the nursery at home.

Uncle Evert comes home the next evening, earlier than expected. He is pale and exhausted. A fishing vessel from one of the nearby islands was blown up by a mine.

“Six men dead,” Uncle Evert tells them. “It could just as easily have been us. We were only a couple of hundred yards away.”

His hands tremble slightly as he peels his potatoes. Stephie notices and realizes that Uncle Evert is frightened, too.

“Will you be able to go on fishing?” Aunt Märta asks.

Uncle Evert nods. “We can’t stop fishing. We must simply place our destinies in the hands of the Good Lord. And pray for the war to end quickly.”

Stephie tries to say something, but her throat has constricted and she can’t get the words out. She swallows hard.

“Do you have to fish so far out at sea?” she finally manages to ask. “Can’t you stay closer to the coast?”

“We only get the big catches way out. The ocean is full of fish there.”

“And of dangers,” Aunt Märta adds. “Dangers enough without people making it even riskier. That’s a sin.”