The Hidden Child

Chapter 38

He had been living with them for six months, and they had known that they were in love for three months when disaster struck. Elsy was standing on the veranda watering her mother’s flowers when she spotted them coming up the stairs. And she understood as soon as she saw their grim expressions. Behind her in the kitchen she could heard her mother washing dishes, and part of her wanted to rush inside and make her mother leave, chase her away before she heard the news that Elsy knew she wouldn’t be able to bear. But she realized that it was futile. Instead, she walked stiffly to the front door and opened it, letting in the three men from one of the other fishing boats in Fjällbacka.

‘Is Hilma at home?’ asked the eldest of them. She knew he was the captain of the boat, and she nodded, turning to lead the way to the kitchen.

When Hilma caught sight of them, she dropped the plate she was holding and it hit the floor, shattering into a thousand pieces. ‘No, no, oh dear God, no!’ she said.

Elsy barely managed to catch her mother before she fell. She lowered her on to a chair and held her tight until it felt as if her own heart would leap out of her body. The three fishermen stood awkwardly next to the table, fumbling with the peaked caps they held in their hands. Finally the captain spoke.

‘It was a mine, Hilma. We saw everything from our boat, and we got there as fast as we could. But… there was nothing we could do.’

‘Oh dear God,’ Hilma repeated, gasping for breath. ‘What about all the others?’

Elsy was surprised that even at a moment like this her mother was able to think of the others, but then she pictured her father’s crew in her mind. The men they knew so well, and whose families were about to receive the same news.

‘There were no survivors,’ said the captain, swallowing hard. ‘We stayed there a long time, searching, but we didn’t find anyone. Only the Oscarsson boy, but he was already dead by the time we pulled him into the boat.’

Tears were running down Hilma’s face, and she bit her knuckles to keep from screaming. Elsy swallowed her own sobs and willed herself to be strong. How was her mother going to survive this? How was she herself going to survive it? Her dear, sweet father. Always ready with a kind word and a helping hand. How were they going to manage without him?

A discreet knock on the door interrupted them, and one of the messengers went to open up. Hans came into the kitchen, his face grey-tinged.

‘I saw… that you had company. I thought… What’s…?’ He lowered his gaze. Elsy could see that he was afraid to bother them, but she was grateful that he’d come.

‘Pappa’s boat ran into a mine,’ she said, her voice breaking. ‘There were no survivors.’

Hans’s knees buckled and he wavered for a moment. Then he went over to the cabinet where Elof kept the strong drink and resolutely filled six glasses, which he set on the table.

‘I think we could all use a stiff drink right now,’ he said in his lilting Norwegian, which had become closer to Swedish the longer he’d stayed with them.

Everyone gratefully reached for a glass, except for Hilma. Elsy cautiously picked up a glass and set it in front of her mother. ‘Here, Mamma, try some of this.’

Hilma obeyed her daughter and raised the glass to her lips, downing the drink with a grimace. Elsy looked at Hans, her eyes filled with gratitude. It was good not to be alone right now.

Another knock at the door. This time it was Hans who opened it. The women had started to arrive. All those who knew what it was like to live under the threat of losing their husbands to the sea. They brought food and helping hands and consoling words about the will of God. And it helped. Not much, but they all knew that one day they might need the same sort of solace, and so they did their best to ease the pain of their friend who was now suffering.

Her heart hammering with grief, Elsy took a step back and watched the women flock around Hilma while the men who had brought the news bowed sorrowfully and then left to deliver the news elsewhere.

By the time night fell, Hilma had fallen asleep, exhausted. Elsy lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, empty, incapable of taking in what had happened. She saw her father’s face in her mind. He had always been such a comforting presence for her. Listening to her, talking with her. She had been the apple of her father’s eye. She had always known that. For him, she had been so precious, transcending all else. And she knew that he would have noticed that something was going on between her and the Norwegian boy, for whom he had developed such a fondness. But he had let them be. He had kept a watchful eye on them, giving his silent consent. Maybe he was hoping that someday he would have Hans as his son-in-law. Elsy thought he would have approved. And she and Hans had respected both him and her mother. Limited themselves to stolen kisses and cautious embraces; nothing that would prevent them from looking her parents in the eye.

Now, as she lay in bed staring up at the ceiling, it no longer mattered. The pain in her heart was so great that she wouldn’t be able to endure it alone, and she slowly sat up and put her feet on the floor. There was something in her that still hesitated, but grief was tearing at her, driving her to seek the only relief that she could find.

Quietly she crept down the stairs. She peeked in to look at her mother as she passed her parents’ bedroom, feeling a pang in her heart when she saw how small Hilma looked in that big bed. But she was sound asleep, exhaustion granting her a temporary respite from reality.

The front door creaked faintly as Elsy turned the lock and opened it. The night air was so cold that it took her breath away when she stepped out on to the porch in her nightgown, and the icy chill of the stone stairs almost hurt under the soles of her feet. Quickly she padded down the steps and found herself standing outside his door, hesitating. But that lasted only a minute. Grief urged her to seek solace.

He opened the door at her first knock and moved aside to let her in without a word. She went inside and then just stood there in her nightgown, her eyes fixed on his, without speaking. His eyes silently asked a question, and she replied by taking his hand.

For a short blessed time that night she was able to forget the pain in her heart.