The Body in the Fjord

Four

For an instant, Pix thought the swastika had been painted in blood, but as she dashed for the phone to call the desk, she realized it was extremely unlikely. Of course it was spray paint. She didn’t even want to think about a possible alternative. Her call was answered on the first ring, and from the sound of the excited voices in the background—spoken Norwegian played at 45 instead of 33 1/3—she assumed she was not the first to see the gruesome graffiti.

“Hello, this is Pix Miller in room one oh seven. I’ve just noticed a large swastika painted on the front lawn.”

The clerk interrupted her. “Ja, ja, Mrs. Miller. A terrible thing. We are trying to think how to remove it now. Thank you for telling us.” The woman hung up abruptly, obviously very disturbed.

How to remove it? Pix slipped on a sweater and went to the balcony. A knot of people stared at the symbol, some bending down and touching the paint. Then someone on one of those riding mowers came around the corner of the hotel and they all stepped back. The grass was short, but not that short. Mowing removed all but the faintest traces. Afterward another crew raked and removed the grisly grass clippings. Then three people came out with some sort of solution in large pails that they proceeded to slosh on the paint that was left and then scrub with cloths.

Everyone moved rapidly. Guests would be making their way to breakfast soon and people like Jennifer Olsen were probably already up and about for their morning run. Fortunately, the road was behind the hotel—the main entrance was at the opposite end from the large picture windows, as was the dining room.

The phone rang. Pix was surprised and went in quickly. It was the six o’clock wake-up call, the clerk’s voice cheerful. Everything back to normal. Before Pix jumped in the shower, she took a last look outside. Not exactly a bright golden haze on the meadow—there was definitely a reddish cast to the lawn, which nature would soon obliterate.

While she let the warm water hit her full force, Pix tried to think what the act meant and who could have done it. The Germans had used the hotel during the war for some sort of eugenics experiment. This was the most obvious connection. Yet why the protest now? Or had it happened before? Other swastikas? Other reminders? She would ask at the desk. Since she had seen it, she thought she was entitled to ask some questions. As for the who, there was a hotel full of guests and it wouldn’t have been too difficult to slip out when it finally did get dark. Spray-painting the symbol wouldn’t have taken long.

She packed quickly and went across the hall to knock on her mother’s door, noting that Ursula’s bags were already outside.

“Good morning, dear. Did you sleep well?” Her mother looked concerned. She hadn’t asked why her daughter had awakened her the night before in search of the flask, but clearly she hoped for an explanation now.

“Things seem to be happening, but I’ll be darned if I can figure out what any of them have to do with Kari and Erik—or anything else,” Pix said. She told her mother about overhearing the argument while walking among the buildings in the folk museum and the uneasy feelings she’d experienced.

“Then early this morning, when I pulled back my curtains, I saw a bright red swastika painted on the front lawn.”

Ursula gasped. “How strange? Because of Stalheim being used as a Lebensborn home? But if you wanted to make a statement, why deface this beautiful place, and now, after so many years? It seems crazy.”

“Exactly. They’ve managed to get rid of it. I mean, unless you knew it was there, you wouldn’t see it. Well, why don’t we have breakfast. I have the feeling we may need all the sustenance we can get.”

Her mother gave her a slightly sardonic smile. “Don’t wish for things. They might happen.”

After another ample smorgåsbord, Scandie Sights boarded the two buses at 8:15 and proceeded straight down the Stalheim Canyon by way of a series of breathtaking hairpin turns.

“What could this be like in the winter?” Pix wondered.

“Or years ago. This is the new road,” her mother reminded her. They were on Carl’s tourbuss and he had much the same style as Jan, a few well-chosen comments rather than an obnoxious stream of chatter. The Petersons were on the bus, but surprisingly Carol did not bombard the guide with questions as Pix had expected. Carol looked a bit somber, or angry, Pix noticed. A run-in with her new daughter-inlaw? Or had she seen the swastika and been upset? There was no question that word of something untoward had leaked out, and the group was not quite as jovial as it had been the day before.

Pix had asked discreetly at the desk if there had ever been an incident like this before, and, looking shocked at the suggestion, the clerk had replied, “Absolutely not!”

Carl was trying hard to lighten the mood, though. His voice was determinedly upbeat and he smiled with every word.

“Now that we have come down Norway’s steepest road, it is just a short ride through the Nærøy Valley to Gudvangen, where we will meet our fjord cruiser. The tallest mountain you see is called Jordalsnuten. Today with the

sun, it is looking particularly fine, and we have heard a weather report promising several more days of this good weather. We are very lucky, so relax and enjoy the views!”

“We are lucky,” a woman across the aisle said to Pix. “Friends of ours did this very same trip and the moment they hit the west coast, it rained every day.”

Pix had noticed her. She and a man, probably her husband, appeared to be traveling with another couple. They ate all their meals together, sat together, and had been playing cards when Pix had left for her walk the night before.

“My name is Pix Miller and this is my mother, Ursula Rowe.”

“Nice to meet you. I’m Eloise Harding. The man with the video camera glued to the window is my husband, Sidney, and”—she gestured over her shoulder to the seat behind her—“these are our friends, Paula and Marvin Golub.”

She sank back into her seat. Having taken care of the social amenities, she did not appear eager to strike up a lifelong friendship. Pix had more friends than she had time to see, so it was no loss, but she planned to get to know Eloise better. Sidney Harding, she remembered, was the man working for the Norwegian oil company.

The viking fjord cruiser was a nice little boat, not one of the behemoths that provided a maximum amount of tourists with a minimum of fjord exposure. The boat had an upper deck with a small lounge, then on the lower deck, open areas at the bow and stern, separated by a large cabin with a galley and tables and chairs. The group immediately rushed forward to stake out their territories. Carol Peterson commandeered a bunch of chairs on the upper deck; the Golubs and Hardings situated themselves at a table in the middle of the large cabin and started playing bridge. The farmers stood in an uneasy clump at the stern. The Dahl sisters sat in the smaller cabin and took out their handwork. The Bradys went into the large

cabin and grabbed the first table with windows to the side and front. The French cousins made several forays from the top to lower decks before choosing the top, liberally applying sun lotion, closing their eyes to the view, and lifting their faces to the sky. Pix settled Ursula next to a window in the large cabin and then went out to the bow. The only other person there was Jennifer, who was perched like a figurehead, leaning over the water and staring into its depths. Carl had just told them that at this point the Nærøyfjord was four thousand feet deep—and it was by no means the deepest fjord. Pix resisted the impulse to grab the waistband of Jennifer’s jeans. She is not my child, she told herself firmly. She’s an adult. My age.

“You’d never be able to find anything—anything you dropped overboard, that is,” Jennifer commented to Pix.

Pix transferred her camera from her shoulder to around her neck and changed the subject. There was something definitely odd in the way Jennifer had spoken—dreamy, not her usual straightforward speech.

“I knew it would be beautiful, but this is far beyond that,” Pix said. “The water is so green, and look at that waterfall!” She was tempted to go on and on. The mountains were so steep, screeching to a halt at the water’s edge, it was almost as if a line had been drawn, beyond which the land could not go. The same with the sky. The densely wooded mountains soared toward the heavens; then there was a sudden break and the peaks became clouds. The air was so clear that everything was in sharp focus, intensifying the effect. The Nærøyfjord was the narrowest fjord in Europe, and if Jennifer had not been there, Pix would have stretched her arms wide, sure her fingertips would not touch the sides, but still needing to make the gesture.

“Azure.” Jennifer had spoken again and Pix wasn’t sure she’d heard correctly. She moved to the prow and sat down on the deck, next to the woman.

“Excuse me, I didn’t quite hear what you said.”

“Azure—that’s the color of the fjord. It comes from the Jostedal glacier. I’m going there after the tour. The glacial ice is supposed to look blue, but the deposits color the water green. It’s moving, faster than they thought. I read that the little gift shop and restaurant at the foot of it won’t be there in ten years. It’s the largest glacier in Europe, so I thought I should see it. There’s a new glacier center in Fjærland and it’s supposed to be worth seeing, too.”

“It sounds as if you’re enjoying Norway.” And what was not to like? Pix thought as the boat slowly made its way down the center of the fjord, a few tiny farms clinging to the mountainsides, docks and sheds close to the water, all the buildings painted bright red and yellow—most with that typical up-and-down siding, so upright, so vertical. Cows and goats grazed nimbly on the inclines, defying gravity.

“I assume from your name that you are of Scandinavian descent?” she asked after Jennifer had merely nodded to Pix’s previous conversational opener.

“You ask a lot of questions.” Jennifer’s tone was not antagonistic, but back to her normal matter-of-fact way of speaking. Still, it was slightly aggressive.

“I’ve always been interested in people, where they’re from, what they think, what they do.” This was true—and on this trip, more than true—absolutely essential.

“I grew up in New Jersey, but both my parents were born here.” She sat cross-legged opposite Pix. The landscape glided behind her head, a slowly moving backdrop. She picked at a coil of heavy rope on the deck, then turned her gaze full force on Pix. “Like I said yesterday, life’s a bitch. My father was in the Resistance and had the dumb luck to get captured. The Nazis shot him and the rest of the men he was with right where they caught them, in the woods. So much for the Geneva Convention. Then they came for my mother, who was pregnant with me. The Resistance got to her first and smuggled her out of the country. She skied across to Sweden and went by boat to England, eventually ending up in the States, where she

had some relatives. His mother was not so lucky. The Nazis put her in Grini—that was the concentration camp outside Oslo. She died there.”

“I’m so sorry.” The words sounded hollow and inadequate. Pix put her hand on Jennifer’s arm.

“I never wanted to come back here, although my mother was homesick every day of her life. I should have come with her, but I didn’t, and it’s too late now.” Jennifer shaded her brow and looked up. “That must be our captain.”

Pix followed her gaze. She hadn’t stopped to wonder who might be piloting the boat so expertly, but of course there had to be somebody at the helm. He was staring straight ahead, a tall man—a tall man with a bushy black beard. She looked at Jennifer. Her face was wiped of all expression. Jennifer Olsen had cause to hate the Nazis, had cause to want people to remember the atrocities they’d committed. Had she done some artwork last night?

And what was it with all these dark beards?

“I think I’ll stay on board, if that’s all right. I’m a bit tired and I’ve seen a stave church in the museum in Oslo,” Ursula said to Carl. She didn’t mention that she had also seen this very stave church, the Hopperstad stave church, here in Vik, as well as every other one Marit had thought worth a detour.

“No problem, Mrs. Rowe. We will not be too long, and the crew will be back after they pick up some things that have been left here for us.”

Ursula Rowe smiled serenely and watched the group board two buses for the ride to the church. She also watched the two stewards, Sonja and Anders, leave. Then the captain left, too. Immediately, she went to work, starting with the small upstairs lounge. She wasn’t sure what she was looking for. Something out of the ordinary. Something that would mean the tour was not simply a tour. Nothing. She worked her way downstairs, hurrying in case the crew came back early, even though she doubted they

would. Time off was precious, and Sonja and Anders seemed as attached to each other as Kari and Erik—as Kari and Erik had been.

The galley yielded nothing other than the fact that there would be vafler in the tour’s future—a large waffle iron that made the heart shapes was stored in one of the cupboards. There was a small room off the galley with a table and chairs, a place for the crew to relax. Apparently nothing. A few paperbacks lay on one shelf next to a coffee mug. There was a box of brochures and maps. She opened the closet opposite the door. Knapsacks. The guides’ and the stewards’, according to the name tags. Kari’s and Erik’s would have been here. Kari’s and Erik’s knapsacks, which unaccountably turned up in Oslo. She pushed the bags to one side and searched the rest of the small closet. She emerged beaming. So there was something after all. But Pix would have to do the rest.

Voices.

“Do you mind if we smoke?” Anders asked the elderly woman sitting just where they’d left her.

“No, not at all,” she replied.

“Maybe we should open the window. It seems a little stuffy,” Sonja offered solicitously. Mrs. Rowe’s cheeks were red.

“That would be very kind. Thank you.”

“This church dates to only about one hundred years after the introduction of Christianity into Norway by King Olav. He was very convincing, offering a choice between adopting his religion or death. Still, people were not completely sure about this new religion, so they kept some of the old superstitions, like this circle with a cross in the middle. You had to have at least seven of these on the walls or the old gods might reclaim the church. There were no pews or seats in stave churches. Everyone stood, the women on the north side, to protect the men from evil spirits.”

Pix wanted to ask the church’s guide whether this was

because the women were thought to be powerful or expendable, but she was moving on to further details.

“And you have seen the carved Viking ship dragon prows on the roof, another safeguard. Here inside if you look straight up, you will see the roof appears to be the underside of the hull of a Viking ship. These churches are called ‘stave’ churches because of these large pillars holding the roof up. All of the carving and paintings also exhibit the mixture of Christian symbolism and the older Viking traditions. Notice particularly the intricate design around the three doors. Men entered through the front door, women again through a door on the north side, and the priest through this one.” She gestured toward the door. “The exterior porch was used for processions and it was also where the lepers and pregnant women had to stay during the service.”

“Lepers and pregnant women.” Jennifer nudged Pix. “Same ole, same ole.”

“We are very lucky to have this church. Between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, about nine hundred churches were built, but so many were destroyed that we have only around thirty complete ones today. At one time in our history, many people thought the stave churches should be taken down because of their association with the pagan Viking times. Other kinds of churches were built. Just before this one was going to be sold for the wood, an Englishman bought it and saved it. Unfortunately, the owner had already washed the walls to remove the paint, so it is hard to see what it once must have looked like. You have to imagine the bright colors.”

Pix wandered out to the small cemetery. A huge copper beech stood in front, its top branches even with the carved dragon’s heads jutting out from the roof of the church. The spreading branches below cast feathery shadows on the red wood of the church and shaded the tombstones. Some of these had pitched forward, the weathered names faint; others were new and upright, their inhabitants known, the letters still sharply incised on the stone. Bright

bunches of flowers were scattered about in small vases. She wondered how old the tree was, how many interments it had witnessed. In Aleford, antiquity meant 1775. Here, that was only yesterday.

“Wasn’t that interesting? Especially about keeping the Viking ways. Viking is Old Norse for ‘pirate raid.’” It was Marge Brady speaking. She sat down under the tree and Pix joined her. Marge was madly scribbling away in her journal. “I don’t want to forget a thing. None of the guidebooks mentioned that business about the pastor having to take care of his predecessor’s widow. I can tell you that would not go over big at home.”

Pix had missed this. “What was the custom? I was out here.”

“Well, when one died, the new one had to support the widow, so it was easier just to marry her. The woman in that portrait on the wall was married to three pastors; then she died before the last one and he married a seventeen-year-old and it all started over again. I guess it was sort of a career for these women. Do you suppose they still do this in Norway today?”

“I would doubt it. Women—and men—don’t have to worry about a steady income, health care, or old age. I think I’ll go back and have a closer look at that portrait, though.” Pix thought of the portraits of the priests she’d seen, with their wide starched ruffs encircling their throats above their somber black robes. Her friend Faith was married to a man of the cloth, but Tom Fairchild was neither starched nor somber. Nor could Pix see Faith transferred like the parish Bible and Communion silver to Tom’s successor. This old Norwegian custom—was it a reflection of their practicality, frugality, or concern for the widow? Perhaps all three—and besides, having someone around who knew the drill must have been a help to the new pastor.

But she didn’t get a chance to gaze at the portrait after all. They were being urged gently but firmly to get on the buses for a quick ride to a scenic mountaintop viewpoint, then back to the boat.

Sonja and Anders had been busy setting out things for lunch—a huge steaming vat of pea soup, boller—rolls—salad, and plenty of sliced meats and cheese. Ursula sat at a table near the galley and the three were chatting. Like Kari and Erik, these stewards were also students. Sonja had grown up in Undredal. “It is not so far from here. We are famous for our old church. It is the oldest one in Scandinavia still in use. Undredal is a very good place to live, but I will probably stay in Oslo. These villages are very small, you know.”

Ursula did know. She had been to Undredal one spring with Marit and it was tiny—but beautiful. The cherry trees had been in blossom and the church, which only held thirty people, was indeed special. Twelfth-century paintings had been discovered beneath many layers of paint on the walls and restored. There was also an intricate wooden chandelier of stag’s heads, yet what she could still visualize most clearly, and with some amusement, was the pulpit with the inscription informing all who should pass by that it was painted by an Olsen, but above that proclaimed that it had been paid for by Peter Hansen. Marit had pointed it out and later teased her husband about the priorities of his forebearers.

Now Ursula turned to her task as investigator and asked the two young people, “Are you enjoying your jobs? It seems like quite a bit of work, with very little time off.”

“Oh, we don’t mind. The pay is good and we meet so many nice people?” Anders’ voice went up and down in the typical pattern, ending on that questioning note. He continued. “Sonja worked for the company last summer, and when I met her this winter, she convinced me to give it a try, and I’m glad I did. We are seeing more of each other now than we do all year.” He smiled expansively.

“I heard there was some problem with the other stewards on this trip. Did you know them?”

Sonja frowned. “I knew Erik from last summer and met Kari a few times. It’s a sad thing. I don’t know what they could have been thinking of. Erik was not the type to do something like this.”

But Kari was? Ursula caught the unspoken thought and was about to ask, Like what? when the rest of the tour poured into the cabin, famished after a morning of sightseeing. Pix went over to her mother. “Everything all right?”

“Better than that, dear.”

Pix sighed. While she’d been sidetracked by pastors’ wives and carved acanthus leaves, Mother had probably figured everything out.

“We’ll have time for a chat at the hotel,” Ursula said firmly.

“How big do you think it is?” Pix asked. The two women were sitting in Pix’s room at Kvikne’s Hotel in Balestrand.

“Hard to say—and I didn’t have much time to investigate. There were some rain jackets and other things hanging in the closet. I pushed them to the side and moved the Knapsacks. I’d already tapped on the walls of most of the boat—this cane is really remarkably useful—but everything felt very solid, except in the closet. The rear wall definitely sounded hollow, as if there was some sort of compartment behind it.”

“But it could just be that the closet was put in later and fitted to an awkward space. Did you see any way of getting into it?”

“No. There isn’t any light in the closet, and my old eyes aren’t what they used to be. Besides, I’d have needed a flashlight.”

Considering Ursula still did intricate counted cross-stitch without the aid of spectacles, her old eyes were holding up fine. Yet Pix knew what was coming next.

“You’ll just have to get on the boat tonight and see if you can open it. It’s the only lead we have so far.”

This was true. “What made you think there was some kind of hiding place on our fjord cruiser?” Pix also

wanted to add, And why didn’t you tell me? But a mother’s mind often worked in strange and mysterious ways.

“I didn’t think of it until after you all left,” Ursula confessed. Hearing that, Pix felt a bit better. “I stayed behind to have a look around—you probably guessed that—but when I asked myself what I was looking for, a hiding place was the only thing that made sense. What can boats be used for? Smuggling, of course, and Norway has its drug problems, the same as the rest of the world.”

“So, it’s possible Erik and Kari discovered some scheme that involved using the boat to transfer drugs, or”—Pix recalled her mother’s earlier remarks about the Russians—“oil secrets.”

Ursula nodded. Neither she nor Pix gave voice to the corollary—discovered it or were part of it.

“We’d better go down to the lobby and pretend to meet Marit. She must surely be here by now,” Pix suggested.

And she had a lot of questions for Kari’s grandmother.

Kvikne’s Hotel occupied the most beautiful site for lodging that Pix had ever seen. Even the incongruity of the 1877 Swiss chalet style of the original building and the high-rise modern addition could not detract from the breathtaking splendor of the view. She’d begun to think in guidebook language—“breathtaking splendor”; it was hard to avoid superlatives. The hotel was set on a peninsula jutting out into the Sognefjord, and when one was sitting on the long porch in front, as she, Marit, and Ursula were now, one was surrounded on three sides by smooth waters and snowcapped mountains. Off in the distance, the glacier, the Jostedalsbreen, glistened. There were no bad seats in the house.

It was a Swiss chalet by way of Bergen, though, and the gingerbread had a marked Viking flavor inside and out. Carl had announced before they left the boat at the small dock in Balestrand, a few steps from the hotel’s entrance, that dinner would be at 7:00 P.M. “And afterward we will take coffee in the Høiviksalen, famous for the

carvings in the dragon style by Ivar Høivik. The hotel has many fine artworks and interesting objects. Be sure to see the chair where Kaiser Wilhelm was sitting when he got the news about World War One. I think he must have been quite annoyed to have his fishing interrupted. He was a well-known sight in the village here. He used to walk his six dogs, all with bells on their collars, every day himself. When you look at the fjord now, it seems so calm and peaceful, but imagine it in 1914 with the kaiser’s steamer accompanied by a flotilla of twenty-four warships—all just by the dock here.”

Maybe Norway should have KAISER WILHELM FISHED HERE plaques. Pix hadn’t thought much about the kaiser since modern European history at Pembroke, yet his luxuriously mustached face seemed to be before her at every turn. And come to think of it, why were they called kaiser rolls? It was incredible to think of the fjord with all those warships.

“I think we can assume if we talk softly, we will not be overheard out here,” Ursula was saying. They’d ordered coffee, of course. It was impossible to have a conversation in Norway without it, especially before the sun went over the yardarm.

“I’m afraid I don’t have much to tell you,” Marit replied. “The police haven’t turned up any new leads. The only thing they did find out was that a member of the maintenance crew found the knapsacks under the seats where Kari and Erik had been sitting when he was cleaning the train that night in Oslo. It had made the return trip. He turned them in to lost luggage.”

“So, nothing there. Except who removed Kari’s things? Kari, or someone else?” Pix asked.

Marit shrugged.

Pix asked another question. “I know you said Kari was probably calling Annelise, her friend in Bergen, to find out how she was. But could there have been any other reason? Had Annelise ever worked for Scandie Sights?”

“No. Annelise moved to Bergen to take a job at the Vestlandske Kunstindustrimuseum—the West Norway Museum of Decorative Arts. I’m sure if she’d worked for the tour group, Kari would have mentioned it.”

The Museum of Decorative Arts—the one Helene Feld had been so eager to see, the one where she’d spent her time in Bergen instead of sticking to the tour’s itinerary. Pix filed the thought away.

“But what about you?” Marit asked anxiously. “Have you found out anything at all? I feel at times I am going mad. That Kari will walk in the door and that this will be a bad dream.”

Pix and Ursula told her the few facts they’d managed to ferret out—Pix’s conversation with the stationmaster in Voss, Helene’s account of the argument. Pix omitted Carol Peterson’s description of Kari, but she related their other attempts to get information from the guests. Ursula told of the possibility that there was some kind of secret compartment on the boat.

“You have done so well.” Marit was impressed. “Now all Pix has to do is go see what’s in it.”

Pix had been thinking of this very thing. It seemed so simple to her elders. Piece of cake. Let Pix do it. Pix the hund. But it was not simple at all. She’d have to wait until it got dark, which meant another sleepless night, and then she’d have to be sure there was no one else around or likely to come upon her. How could she possibly explain her presence on the boat? Sleepwalking?

They finished with some more random impressions and an account of the intruder on Jennifer Olsen’s balcony at the Stalheim Hotel.

“Oh, and last but not least, when we woke up this morning, someone had painted a giant red swastika on the lawn in front of the hotel, just before you get to the edge of the cliff,” Pix told her. She was amazed to see the powerful effect her words had on their old friend.

Marit looked as if she’d seen a ghost.

“A swastika?” she whispered. “At Stalheim?”

“Yes.” Ursula reached for her friend’s hand. “What’s wrong? What does it mean?”

“I can’t tell you here.” Marit seemed very close to tears. “Meet me in my room. It’s three oh seven.”

Puzzled, Pix and Ursula waited five minutes before crossing the lobby to the elevator. A Japanese tour bus had arrived and the two women were forced to wait for the next elevator. As soon as one had arrived, the group rushed on and there had been no more room.

“The Japanese are perhaps the most polite people on the planet, the most aware of social ceremonies. The only reason I’ve ever been able to come up with for their kind of lemming-like behavior abroad is that they’re terrified of getting separated—or, worse still, getting left behind forever.”

“Like the North Dakota farmers.”

“Precisely.”

Neither woman had referred to Marit since she’d made her dramatic exit.

They exited the elevator into a deserted hallway and quickly went to room 307. Marit opened the door at their knock. She must have been standing just inside.

The room was spacious and had a comfortable sitting area. Ursula drew Marit next to her on the love seat. “Now, what is it?”

“It’s so complicated and it was so long ago. Hans and I were going to tell you; then we thought it better to tell no one. We were trying to erase the past, and you can never do that.”

“What are you talking about, Marit?” Ursula’s direct question hadn’t worked. Maybe a second one would do it, Pix thought.

“The Stalheim Hotel was used in the war for something the Germans called a Lebensborn home. We had nine of them in Norway. They were breeding places for the world the Germans envisioned after the war. We Norwegian women were especially prized because of what they thought was our pure blood. That all the children we pro

duced with their soldiers would be tall, strong, and blond. After the Occupation, German soldiers were encouraged to father children with Norwegian women. It was their duty to the Reich. When they got pregnant, some of the women went to Germany. Some stayed where they were and had the children, yet that was very hard. You have to understand, I make no judgments of them, but others did, often their own parents, and it was terrible for them. Most went to have the babies in these homes.”

“But what would happen to all these babies? Who would raise them?” Pix asked.

“They were sent to Germany or in some cases adopted by parents here, people who were sympathetic to the Germans. We were not all in the Resistance, remember. Quisling had his supporters.”

“Why are you telling us this?” Ursula asked quietly. She had taken her friend’s hand again when they had entered the room, and she still held it.

“After the war, the children who remained in the homes were claimed by their mothers or adopted by Norwegian families. Some of the children who had been sent to Germany were traced by refugee organizations and brought back here for adoption if the mother did not want them, which was usually the case. The fathers, of course, were known only to the mothers, and mostly their names were not recorded. The children were given two names at birth, a Norwegian one and a German one. They used to have mass christenings, twenty-five babies at a time. The babies were well looked after, but it was horrible—the whole idea and raising them like so many prize sheep. There is a story that one of the women soldiers assigned to Stalheim refused to be there and ended up at the bottom of the canyon.” Marit stopped speaking and seemed to be gathering energy to go on. Pix was trying to blot out the image of a body spiraling down, down to the river that looked like a snake.

“Hanna was a Lebensborn baby. She was born at Stalheim.”

“Oh, Marit, you should have told me years ago. It wouldn’t have made any difference!” Ursula cried out.

“I know that, yet Hans and I thought it was something we shouldn’t talk about. Nobody mentioned these children. Of course, our families knew we had adopted a baby. We knew when we got married that we couldn’t have children. The war years were so hard and Hanna seemed like our reward for getting through them. No one asked us where she had come from, and she looked just like us. Not a very large gene pool,” she said, glancing at Pix.

“Did Hanna know?”

Marit nodded. “We were stupid there, too. We should have told her as soon as she was old enough to understand, first that she was adopted and later how—but we waited until she was fifteen. I sometimes wonder about how our memories work. She was eight months old when we got her, but she was always asking questions. Where was she born? Why didn’t we have other children? When we made our first trip to the west coast and came by Stalheim, she was very small, but she cried and said the big mountains frightened her.”

Fifteen, Pix thought. Between the ages of her own Danny and Samantha. The time when adolescents are forming the identities that will travel with them throughout their lives, making the choices that determine the journey’s path. Hanna must have been so confused. To find your mother was not your mother and your father not your father. And later she did virtually the same thing to her own daughter, not providing her with a father, then abandoning her.

“Nothing was ever right after that. We never should have told her,” Marit said bitterly.

“It would have come out,” Ursula said. “These things always do.”

“And Kari?” Pix was asking all the hard questions. “Did she know about her mother?”

“This winter, there was a show about the Lebensborn babies on television. Now fifty years later, it’s out in the

open—all the problems these children have had, how they have searched trying to find out who they are. I wanted to change the channel, but Kari wanted to watch it. I had to leave the room, and she followed me out to the kitchen. Before I knew it, I was telling her everything. I thought she was old enough, that she could accept it. Kari is not Hanna. Emotionally, they are very different.”

“What did she say?” asked Pix.

“She said, ‘Then you’re not really my bestemor?’”

Marit had wanted to lie down and reluctantly they’d left her, but not before she’d told them that Kari wanted to find her mother’s family and that Marit had agreed to help her. “I don’t want another grandmother,” she’d told Marit. “It’s a matter of the truth. I have to find out the truth.”

Pix and Ursula were walking into the dining room at Kvikne’s, passing through several pretty Victorian-style sitting rooms all oriented toward the view and, unlike most Victoriana, comfortable-looking—inviting couches, light-colored walls, and the drapes pulled back. Oil paintings, genre landscapes of what appeared out the windows, hung in tiers on the walls. The surfaces of many of the tables were crowded with bric-a-brac, potted plants, and dozens of signed photographs dating back to the hotel’s early years. In pride of place stood those of the Norwegian royal family, starting with King Haakon VII, the Danish prince Karl, whom the Norwegians elected as their first constitutional monarch when they broke away from Sweden in 1905. He took a Norwegian name and reigned for fifty-two years. His grandson, Harald V, is king now. Small Norwegian flags on silver flag posts stood by the photographs. Bright red, with a blue-and-white cross off center, it seemed admirably suited to its surroundings, streaming out in a long banner from the porch at Kvikne’s, picking up the breeze from the fjord, or flying high in front of most houses all over the country, plus being scattered

throughout Norwegian interiors as an indispensable objet d’art. The Norwegians are exceedingly proud of this flag.

“My God, Mother, did you ever see so much food!” It was the smörgåsbord to end all smörgåsbords. There wasn’t one long table, but many—and side tables—one just for cheese, one for non-alcoholic drinks, a very large one just for desserts.

“Where should we start?” Pix was bewildered, a feeling intensified by the behavior of the diners, who were descending on the food like predators, the only variation being in motion: Some were piling their plates as rapidly as possible; others were circling quietly before pouncing.

“With a seat,” Ursula suggested, and led the way to the tables with the Scandie flags.

“We have the window seats tonight,” Carol Peterson called out triumphantly as they passed. Her table was full. There was to be no tête-à-tête for the newlyweds.

“Would you care to join us?” Louise Dahl asked.

“Thank you so much,” Ursula responded, and motioned toward the groaning boards. “It’s hard to know where to begin.”

“We start with herring, then a plate of other fish—shrimp and laks—there’s also gravlaks here. Do you know what that is? Fresh salmon is cured with dill and a mixture of salt, sugar, and white peppercorns, then placed under a weight for some days and—oh, maybe it’s simpler if I come with you. Everything is delicious and you may not know what it is.”

“I don’t want to trouble you,” Ursula protested.

“It’s no trouble. I want to get some smoked eel before I have my meat course.”

“This is the food we grew up with and we still cook it, although nothing so elaborate as these dishes. Kvikne’s is known for its koldtbord—that’s what it’s called in Norwegian, although most use the Swedish word, smörgåsbord. Anyway, it’s the best food in the world to me! Let Louise show you what to do,” her sister, Erna, advised.

Pix was only too happy. She’d eaten her share of Norwegian food, but this was a whole new level. Even Faith would be impressed by Kvikne’s.

“We start with the herring by itself, because it’s salty and we don’t fill our plates too full, so we can appreciate the flavors.”

And not look too greedy, Pix thought. Nothing in excess.

As they strolled by the tables, Pix was delighted to see how much the Japanese were enjoying all the Nordic variations on sushi.

“After your herring, I’d advise some laks and a little of this smoked eel, which is eaten with a bit of scrambled egg at room temperature. Maybe some shrimp, and the mussel salad looked good.” She then pointed out the enormous variety of cold meats, ranging from pâtés to slices of ham, salami, and roast beef. There were also salats—thinly sliced cucumbers with dill, cabbage with caraway, beets and sardines.

“The last course before dessert is hot. I’m not sure I’ll have more than a meatball—they’re made of veal and beef, bound with egg and bread crumbs, a little nutmeg, and fried in salt pork—but you should definitely have some fiskepudding.”

“Fiskepudding?” Pix had never encountered this particular delicacy before. Some kind of piscatorial Norsk dessert? They did have a sense of humor.

“It’s a bit like a fish mousse. You just have to try it, and be sure to have some of the cream sauce with shrimp on top, and take some tyttebær—lingonberries.”

“Lingonberries!” Pix knew what they were—a kind of small Nordic cranberry. You ate them with reindeer meat.

Louise nodded vigorously. “You can’t eat fiskepudding without lingonberries.”

Pix looked at Louise’s angular body. She would have expected plump Erna to be the one interested in food, but here was Louise, her eyes shining with delight as she contemplated the notion of bløt kake—layer cake—and some kind of fruit grøt—compote—to end her meal. Es

sential Norwegian food names tended to be monosyllabic and atonal: Bread was brød, butter was smør, cheese was ost, steak was stek, and above all, fish was fisk.

“It’s not a combination I would have thought of, but it works,” said Pix after polishing off her fiskepudding, cream sauce, lingonberries on the side. “They are not too sweet, not too tart, and the taste cuts the richness of the fish.” Since going to work at Have Faith, Faith Fairchild’s catering business, Pix had picked up some of the nuances of food pairings, although not even the barest whisper of any food preparation. When Faith had offered her a job, Pix had made it clear that accounts or activities such as counting salad plates would be fine, but not even turning on an oven or stirring a pot. Faith had assured her friend that this was the furthest thought from her mind. She knew the Miller kitchen well, and from the look of Pix’s cupboards, the family could have been mistaken for major stockholders in General Foods, et cetera. Many of the boxes had HELPER printed on the front.

“I’m glad you like it. We make it at Christmas. It was our mother’s favorite dish,” Louise Dahl said.

Ursula noticed the past tense. “Has your mother been gone long?”

The two sisters put down their forks simultaneously. “A year this January,” Erna replied. They both still seemed devastated.

A household of women. Obviously, the two sisters had never married, and Pix had a hunch all three women had lived together.

“Your mother was Norwegian, then? You know so much about the food…” her voice trailed off.

“We are all three born in Norway, but Louise and I don’t remember it very well. This is the first trip for either of us.”

“It’s a shame your mother wasn’t able to go back for a visit,” Pix commented. It had been her experience that every Norwegian-American not only longs to visit the land of his ancestors but considers it a sacred duty, as well.

“She didn’t want to go,” Louise said sternly, and for a moment the conversation came to a grinding halt; then Ursula picked up the ball.

“The newlyweds have disappeared and Mrs. Peterson doesn’t look too pleased.” She laughed.

A cartoonist would have had a fine time drawing the mother-in-law with steam coming out of her ears, arms folded across her chest, jutting elbows like the spikes on a mace. Her voice carried across the room loud and clear. “You know very well what they’re up to, and they can do that anytime. How often in their lives are they going to be at Kvikne’s Hotel? I ask you that,” Roy senior didn’t appear to have an answer and he wisely concentrated on his third helping of dessert.

“I thought they were going for more food. At least that’s where they headed. We might just as well have gone to Thunder Bay like we always do, but I wanted to make this trip special. It didn’t matter how much planning it took, and believe me, I had to give up a lot of things to do all that, but do they care? I ask you…. Roy, did you hear what I said!”

His mumbled reply was inaudible, whether from discretion or cake.

The Dahls giggled appreciatively. “It’s been like this since the beginning of the trip—a contest—and I think Lynette is ahead.”

Pix thought of how the young woman had looked in the sauna at Stalheim and compared her with Carol, who had been going in rather heavily for boiled potatoes over the years. Lynette was definitely ahead in some departments, but the older woman had genetic guilt induction honed to a farethee-well. Pix would still say it was even money.

The Dahls were telling Ursula about their jobs. Erna was a hairdresser and Louise worked as a secretary in a lawyer’s office. The dining room was beginning to clear. Sophie and Valerie walked by the table.

“Dancing in the lounge tonight. You must come,” Sophie urged. “Très amusant, n’est-ce pas?”

Ursula explained in fluent French that her dancing days were over but that she was sure her daughter, la jeune fille, would be tripping the light fantastic. The Dahl sisters also seemed inclined to join the merriment. Although she gave a pleasant nod to Mother’s fait accompli, Pix had plans of her own. Dancing or no dancing, she wanted to work in another sauna. She had to have some time to herself to think about Marit’s revelation, and the macarena was not apt to provide an opportunity for contemplation of this sort.

But first there was coffee in the Dragon Room.

The dragon style harked back to the decorated prows of the Viking ships, translating the fierce beasts and other creatures into romantic works of art, a nostalgic nod to the past. Tapestrylike weavings, more landscapes, and several huge paintings of Norsk legends hung on the room’s warm red walls. But it was the carved furniture, wooden floor, and ceiling that gave the room its particular beauty.

“It’s hard to imagine how someone could have done such intricate work,” Pix said to Erna Dahl. Jennifer Olsen, who had joined them, agreed. “Some people think it’s really tacky—all these dragons and swirls, overdone, but I love it. Only in Norway.”

Erna was apparently about to add her own words of appreciation, having nodded vigorously at Jennifer’s words, when they were distracted by a heated argument behind them. A coffee cup was slammed down on the table, hard. It didn’t break.

“I started with nothing and nobody ever gave me anything. What these young people today want are free handouts. They have babies so they can get money from the government, and nobody wants to work!” It was Oscar Melling and his face was redder than ever. The fringe around his bald head bristled.

“All I said was that the Norwegian health-care system could be a model for us. I’m not talking about welfare,” Arnie Feld protested.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about! That’s your trouble,” Oscar blustered.

Don Brady walked into the fray. “Keep it down, Melling. We’re here for a vacation.”

“Are you telling me to shut up?” Oscar was ready for a fight and even assumed a pugilistic posture.

“Yes, I am!” Don was red in the face now, too. Wives were appearing like magic from their contemplation of carved rosettes.

“Honey,” Marge said to Don, her hand on his elbow as Helene linked her arm through Arnie’s and took a step backward. But equally by magic, Carl and Jan materialized.

“I thought you were going to buy us a beer, Mr. Melling.” Carl stood directly in front of the man, blocking the others.

“We get very thirsty talking all day,” Jan said. Both young men were smiling. Oscar muttered something and left with them, but not before casting a foul glance at his opponents.

“What do you suppose that was all about?” Pix was surprised. The group had seemed so friendly.

“I hate that man,” Jennifer said vehemently. “He’s a bully and would say anything to get a rise out of someone. He’s been a pain since we started.”

The rotten apple. Pix remembered Don Brady’s remark at dinner at the Stalheim Hotel.

Carl was back, working the crowd, a word here, a word there, more smiles all around. At the end of a tour, the guides must have aching facial muscles for days. Jan was presumably hoisting some flagons with the troublemaker. Soon everyone was talking and laughing again. Oscar had been relegated to an anecdote: “The trip was wonderful, except for…”

The Dahl sisters excused themselves to titivate before the ball, or, as Louise put it, “We’ll just go freshen up a bit before the music starts.”

Pix finished her coffee. It was impossible to get a weak cup in Norway, and this should keep her wide-awake for the night’s exploit. Searching their fjord cruiser for drugs or stolen oil-rig plans was not something she wanted to broadcast, however. So instead, she said to Jennifer, “I think I’ll go and see if my mother needs anything, then look in on the dancing. After that, I want to find the sauna. It should be a great one here.” What she really wanted to do was head straight for the sauna, but she wanted to check out who was dancing, and there might be a chance to talk to some of the people she hadn’t been able to talk to yet, or those she wanted to speak to further.

Ursula answered the door. Marit was sitting on the balcony; the flask and two glasses were on a small table. Marit was laughing. Nobody needed anything, especially not Pix. She didn’t even bother to go in.

“God natt, god natt,” Marit called.

“Don’t forget about getting on board the boat” was Mother’s good night.

As if, Pix thought, her children’s speech patterns having long ago invaded her own.