The Quisling Orchid Read online

  ‘Mr Strande, please…’

  ‘Do you know where your father is, Brigit?’

  He fumbled between my legs and I snapped to my senses. I grabbed hold of a paperweight and swung it over my right shoulder. It connected, though I wasn’t sure with what. I heard him cry out and stumble backward; he tripped, landing heavily on the floor.

  I was on my feet, holding the paperweight out in front of me with both hands, like a gun.

  Strande was on his knees, doubled over, his chest rattling and blood running from his nose and mouth. ‘You cut me, you… little… bitch.’

  ‘I swear to God I’ll kill you if you come near me again!’ I gave the paperweight a threatening shake. Strande got up, staggered back to his office and closed the door.

  It took a few minutes to get myself together. My right breast hurt; it was probably bruised. My tights were ripped and I’d managed to fold a fingernail back on itself; there was blood running from the cuticle. I drank what was left in the water cooler and wiped my eyes with napkins I found in Rodrek’s desk. I thought Strande might have ripped my dress because I could feel a coldness around my shoulder blade. When I reached round to check for the hole I found the dress wasn’t ripped – it was damp. I used the rest of the napkins trying to wipe my back.

  I thought about calling the police, but Monica doesn’t trust them, and so instinctually, neither do I.

  Strande sat upright when I threw open his door. His shirt was covered in blood and he hadn’t made any attempt to staunch the flow from his nostrils. I’d managed to break one of his front teeth.

  He glared at me then looked down at his desk, rubbing the palm of his hand with his thumb.

  He said, ‘I appear to have misread the situation.’

  ‘Yes,’ I replied, ‘yes, you did.’

  ‘But the offer stands. Tell me where your father is hiding and I will make sure—’

  ‘I want money. Everything in the safe, all of it.’

  He blinked rapidly before narrowing his eyes. ‘You’re blackmailing me?’ he said, loosening his collar. The top button of his shirt popped free and landed on the desk. He looked at it as though he had no idea where it could have come from.

  ‘Empty your pockets.’

  He slid down in his chair and started wheezing, pearls of white sweat already congealing at his hairline. ‘No one will believe you.’

  ‘Perhaps.’ I dipped my eyes towards his wedding ring. ‘But a man like you… I don’t think you can take the chance.’

  There wasn’t much: his wallet, a pair of museum tickets, a small notebook and a silver cigarette case. I took all his cash, even the change, about three thousand kroner all together. And I kept the cigarette case, which seemed to upset him more than the money. ‘That was a present from my wife.’

  I lit a cigarette and gratefully filled my lungs.

  He opened the safe which landed me another thirty thousand kroner, and I took his wedding ring because it was worth more to me than it meant to him.

  ‘Do you know why Norway hates you?’ he asked.

  Fastening my coat and feeling bulletproof, I told him I didn’t care.

  ‘You see, I think you do. Don’t you wonder what makes you different from the descendants of other war criminals?’

  ‘He’s alive,’ I said. ‘He’s alive and he hasn’t paid for what he’s done, so they take it out on us. I expected better.’

  ‘That’s only part of it. Yes, Quisling paid for his crimes, but his atrocities were slow, they were measured, meted out over time. Your father…’ He shook his head. ‘A whole village wiped out in one terrible day. Two hundred men, women and children – gone. He will never be forgiven, and in his absence neither will you.’

  I made for the stairs before he could see me cry.

  ‘Enjoy your life, Brigit,’ he shouted after me, ‘such as it is.’

  Chapter 2

  When I got home I found Monica sitting cross-legged in the middle of the living-room floor. We had furniture, which was something of a luxury for us. Most of the places we rented came with nothing but a single bed and a refrigerator.

  She had a large tapestry resting in her lap, which she was stabbing at with a needle. Her fingertips were covered in tiny red dots and there were more spots of red on her blouse. The tapestry hadn’t fared much better; it was supposed to be a vase of white orchids. Some of them looked decidedly pink.

  ‘You should call if you’re going to be late,’ she said without looking up. ‘I was worried.’

  ‘Problem at work.’ I dropped my coat on the floor – then remembered there were hooks behind the door.

  She looked up with one eyebrow raised and then carried on with her needlework. ‘Were you recognised?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Told you.’

  ‘He had a file on us.’ And if I’d been thinking straight I would have taken it with me.

  ‘A file? From a journalist? Who would have guessed?’ She’d only recently discovered the joy inherent in sarcasm, probably the only thing she’d learnt from me. ‘So did he call you the accursed spawn of a traitor and fire you on the spot?’

  ‘More or less.’ My voice cracked and Monica picked up on it. She stopped torturing the canvas and gave me a long penetrating look. I let myself exhale and took a step towards the kitchen.

  ‘Do you remember Mr Fiske?’ she said suddenly.

  I did. Fiske was a thin ugly whip of a man who rented out a cottage he’d built on his farmland. We’d only seen him twice during our time there: once when we arrived and again, a year later, when he came with a rifle and his son to throw us out.

  ‘That was 1961.’ I couldn’t remember the exact date. ‘Just outside Lesja.’

  ‘It was the Summer of ’62,’ Monica said. ‘And the farm was in Lom, not Lesja.’

  She was right of course. She kept a meticulous mental record of our life as pseudo-fugitives for the book she was planning to write when… Well, I’m not sure when she planned to write it or with what. She even had a title; she was going to call it ‘Repentant’ even after I’d pointed out we had nothing to be repentant about.

  ‘Fiske came to see me the night we left.’

  We hadn’t ‘left’. We were kicked out at gunpoint with the words ‘traitor scum’ burning in our ears. Monica’s sewing became more frantic and even more careless. ‘He said we could stay another week if I did something for him.’

  I remembered returning to the cottage that night. I was excited; I’d made friends, and one of the local boys had asked me to join them on a hike the following day. I’d walked in and the farmer pushed past me on his way out. Inside, I’d found Monica at the kitchen sink, drinking dish soap.

  I thought she’d finally cracked.

  She’d washed out her mouth and spat into the sink. Pack your things, she’d said. We’re leaving.

  ‘Shit!’ Monica dropped the needle and began sucking blood from her thumb.

  I took the tapestry from her and threw it across the room. ‘Give me your blouse.’

  She looked at me quizzically, like the child neither of us had ever been.

  ‘Give me your blouse. If I soak it now I can get most of the blood out of it.’

  ‘There are three types of people in this world,’ she called after me as I went through to the kitchen. ‘Those that hate us, those that don’t care and those that don’t care but think they can use us in return for their silence.’

  I ran water over the spots of blood and prayed she’d stop talking.

  ‘I take it your boss at the Echo was a type three.’

  ‘I didn’t let him near me, if that’s what you’re asking,’ I said.

  ‘Good,’ she said. ‘Because I didn’t let Fiske near me. As well as being ugly, type threes are always liars.’

  I went back into the living room where I found her sewing the tapestry again. She was sitting in the same place, facing the door; it was though the tapestry had leapt back into her hands as soon as I’d left the room. Her skin stret
ched in a translucent layer over her ribs, and her shoulder blades stood proud from her back.

  ‘So you didn’t let that old farmer touch you,’ I said, wondering when she’d gotten so thin.

  ‘Of course not. You remember him; he was disgusting.’ She said this without meeting my eyes. I returned to the kitchen and started wringing out the blouse.

  ‘Self-respect, Brigit,’ she said. ‘It’s one of the things in life we must hang on to.’

  Though honesty wasn’t, it seemed.

  * * *

  She slept soundly that night, while I lay awake facing her, watching the slow rise and fall of her breasts, listening to the purr of her breathing. There were times I thought I was very lucky; not many women get to my age and are still able to share a bed with their mother. Most nights she ran a little too warm for comfort, a by-product of being raised in the mountains she said, so I slept on the very edge of the mattress.

  Sometimes I would lie there and wonder what would happen if we just stopped, if we just turned around and said, Enough. We’re sorry, but it wasn’t us. And it was twenty-five years ago for God’s sake; leave us alone.

  Strande was right. We were hounded because Norway had been cheated of its pound of guilt. My father had escaped, and in his absence we shouldered the blame.

  So we run, and because we run our countrymen find even more reason to despise us.

  But what if we just stopped?

  I switched on the bedside light.

  ‘Brigit? What is it? What’s wrong?’ She drew herself upright and looked at the clock. ‘It’s three in the morning.’

  ‘Do you know where he is?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘You know who. Where is he?’

  ‘What makes you think I have any idea?’ She ground the heel of her hand into her right eye.

  ‘I don’t know. I thought you might be protecting him from—’

  ‘Protecting him? Why would I do that?’

  ‘Out of some misguided sense of loyalty. Or maybe you’ve started to enjoy this running and hiding. Perhaps it’s what makes you feel special – different. Maybe you’ve forgotten what it’s like to just—’

  I wasn’t surprised when she slapped me. I would have most likely done the same. Of course it wasn’t the first time she’d hit me, but it was the first time she’d hit me for something I’d said rather than something I’d done. She clenched her fists and I turned the other cheek. Her frail body trembled as she fought to reassert the indifference she needed to survive.

  I asked again, softly this time: ‘Mother, do you know where he is?’

  She reached for her cigarettes, taking the last one from the pack and lighting it. ‘Do you have any idea how much this country has spent trying to find him? This tolerant, forgiving nation of ours? Three million kroner. Quisling’s widow lived a comfortable, anonymous life while we’re chased and hated and—’

  ‘Quisling was executed.’ I wondered if I’d ever get an answer from her.

  She drew on the cigarette and jetted smoke from her nostrils. ‘What has that got to do with anything?’

  ‘Justice was done. In the case of my dear father, justice is still waiting.’

  ‘And you think that justifies what has been done to us? We didn’t murder Fólkvangr, Brigit.’

  ‘No, we didn’t, but we run and hide as though we did. We’re hounded because we behave as if we’re guilty.’ I took a breath. ‘Because we believe we are guilty.’

  My mother stubbed the cigarette on the bedside table. ‘You’re saying I wanted this life.’

  ‘No. It’s just that you’re used to it. Twenty years ago, the wound was still raw. But now? Norway isn’t hounding us, Mother. She’s just giving us what we want: penance.’

  For a moment I thought she was going to hit me again; her jaw set and her eyes narrowed until I could barely make out the whites.

  ‘So,’ she said finally, ‘guilt is hereditary. Who would have guessed?’ She ran her fingers through her hair and looked at me. ‘You’re leaving me.’

  It wasn’t a question. I half-wondered if it was a request. I swallowed and said, ‘I think we’re out of places to run. And when Norway tires of us, what will we do then?’

  She nodded. I had expected anger, tears, any one of a hundred emotions. There was nothing. ‘Where will you go?’

  ‘To find him.’

  Again she nodded. She beckoned me to come to her. She put her arms around me and kissed the top of my head; her bones pressed into me.

  I said, ‘I’ve never even seen a picture of Fólkvangr.’

  ‘There aren’t many around.’ She relit her cigarette. ‘But as far as I remember, it was very pretty.’

  Chapter 3

  Silje chewed on the end of her pencil, sighed, and put a line through the word festering. She wrote suppurating in its place and drew air through the spaces between her teeth. She exhaled, gasped, crossed out suppurating then wrote festering above it.

  ‘Yes, festering,’ she whispered to herself. ‘“Lillehammer’s festering streets.”’ She groaned and leaned forward, parting her knees further. ‘Do you think…’ She gasped again. ‘Do you think I should have mentioned that I beat her in the pageant?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Oh.’ A spasm of pleasure rattled her spine; she tried to squeeze her thighs together.

  ‘Ow.’

  She said ‘Sorry’ and closed her eyes, leaning back and clawing her fingers into the bark of the chestnut tree. ‘Does it sound mean-spirited?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Mentioning the pageant. It sounds mean-spirited.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Mmm.’ She ran a line through the offending sentence. ‘Though I find it hard to believe people would think that of me.’

  ‘Silje?’

  ‘Mmmm?’

  ‘Silje, is that your notebook resting on my head?’

  ‘No,’ she replied, gently sliding the notebook from his crown.

  Erik swore under his breath and sat back on his haunches, wiping his mouth. ‘I thought you liked it when I did that.’

  ‘I did,’ she said without thinking. ‘I mean, I do. I am just… preoccupied, that is all.’

  ‘Preoccupied with your stupid newsletter.’

  ‘Please don’t sulk, Erik.’

  ‘I am not sulking!’ He jumped to his feet and walked away, distancing himself from her with long, disgruntled strides.

  The late spring had cast a blanket of bloodroot and lilies far beyond the forest, spreading their petals of white across the meadow – which all but smothered his indignation. Silje bit her lip to stop herself from laughing. She pushed her skirts down over her knees and got up from the grass.

  ‘I am sorry,’ she said, chasing after him.

  ‘What for?’

  He was his most handsome when he was angry, which to Silje’s mind was a great shame. Even a mild rage brought colour to his othertimes sallow complexion, a regality to his slightly receding chin. To her shame, Silje often found herself making him angry just to bring a gentle savagery to his bearing.

  ‘For not…’ How to say this, she wondered. ‘For not showing my appreciation.’

  He stopped, mid-stride. ‘Showing your appreciation,’ he echoed. ‘I was attempting to pleasure you, Silje, not mend your gate.’ He turned west, heading for the line of sparse beech trees that separated Fólkvangr from the meadows and the hills. The flowers and the grass faded away, replaced by stony earth and patches of mud.

  ‘Erik, I’m wearing a dress!’

  ‘Then take the path back to the village you love so very much.’ He disappeared into the trees.

  ‘So you’re not even going to walk me home.’

  ‘I could,’ came back his disembodied voice, ‘but I wouldn’t want you to feel the need to show your appreciation.’

  ‘You are being ridiculous,’ Silje shouted, but there was no answer. ‘This is the end for you and me, Erik Brenna. Do you hear me?’

  If Erik did hear, he cho
se not to reply.

  She sighed and pulled her coat tightly around her. Night would fall soon, leeching away what little remained of the day’s warmth.

  The true path to the village, the path suitable for a young lady in a pretty dress, cut through the tree-line at its narrowest point. Silje walked about half a mile before stopping at a knoll covered in lichen. She took off her shoes and climbed to the top from where she could see her village, nestled in a recess of stone and ice, and the town of Bergen at the foot of the mountain. She often came here to write and watch the Allied warships steaming away to patrol the seas around Scandinavia. But today the harbour was empty, save the small, squat lines of Bergen’s tugboats and fishing vessels. Silje reached into her bag and took out the old box camera that had belonged to her mother. She peered down into the viewfinder, focussing on the horizon beyond the harbour.

  She could see smoke, just off to the east. She stood motionless and held her breath. Her heart was racing. As she pressed down on the shutter, the sound reached her, carried on the winds from the sea: a metallic thud, like thunder striking inside a steel box. She put away her camera, slipped her sandals on her feet, and ran down the mountain path as fast as she could.

  * * *

  She stopped to catch her breath where the path widened and Fólkvangr’s plateau began. The track became a cobbled street that ran the length of the village from north to south, beginning just beyond the stone archway and a sign bidding visitors ‘Welcome’. The sign said the population of the hamlet stood at two hundred and three.

  Two hundred and two, Silje thought, if one considers the treachery of Helga Bratvold. She heard bootfalls on the stones and looked to see Jonas Kleppe limping towards her. He carried a short wooden ladder on his shoulder and an oil can swung from a hook on his belt. Mr Kleppe – and he would always be Mr Kleppe to Silje – dressed in a flamboyant tweed oddly matched with black hiking boots and thick woollen socks. His beard was reputed to be the most magnificent across the mountains, the envy of every male villager over the age of fifty. Silje often dreamt of stealing into his home in the dead of the night and spinning his whiskers into yarn.