Almost Autumn Read online

  EINAR WAITS IN THE DOORWAY AS HERMANN climbs the stairs. He holds a glass in one hand and a cigarette in the other, a grave expression on his face; he doesn’t smile when he catches sight of Hermann, not like usual. Hermann can feel the blood pumping through his veins. He had bounded up the stairs, taking three steps at a time as if he couldn’t get over the threshold soon enough, couldn’t close the door to Einar’s apartment behind him with enough haste, couldn’t wait to be there, inside, the door locked, invisible to the outside world.

  The two policemen on the tram must have come from the police headquarters; the sight of their uniforms had made him feel sick and he’d started to sweat in the overcrowded carriage. He had overheard the sound of conversation behind him, a meter, two maybe, raucous, jovial. One had seemed so familiar, there was something about his voice—he had turned his head slowly, had immediately recognized the profile, his jacket straining over his portly stomach, that day he was supposed to meet Ilse, it had to be the same man. Hermann began to feel sweat droplets pearl at his hairline, his palms clammy; his hand slipped from the loop he grasped and for a moment he was left swaying unsteadily on his feet as he attempted to maintain his balance. The sweat trickled and his pulse began to thud, his muscles tense, his stomach churning; the person next to him jostled against him, the high-pitched squeal of the tram tracks drowned out the sounds around him, he had to get off, and fast. The tram stopped at Palace Park. He pushed his way through the bustling gaggle of passengers, his arms straight out in front of him as if he were slicing his way through the group, forcing his way to the doors. Once outside he took great gulps of air, in, out, he may no longer be on the tram but it was still there, perfectly stationary behind him at the stop. He started walking toward Solli Square without looking back. The tram rolled past him and he marched as fast as he could along Bygdøy allé with brisk steps—the lactic acid burned in his muscles as he rang Einar’s doorbell, the same three short, sharp blasts he always gave to signal his arrival, the building door opened and it was only then, poised before the curved staircase, that his heart began to resume its normal rhythm once again, as if it had been in hibernation since the tram journey and had copious missed beats to catch up on.

  Einar lets him into the apartment and peers at him as he takes off his jacket in the hallway.

  “What is it?” Hermann asks him.

  Einar takes a long drag of his cigarette, momentarily pausing with the smoke in his lungs before releasing it into the air.

  “They’ve introduced the death penalty,” he replies.

  “What?”

  “The death penalty.”

  The words hover in the air as if suspended between them as they stare at each other.

  Einar takes a sip from his glass, smacking his lips as the brandy glides down his throat.

  “What now?” Hermann asks him.

  Einar takes another drag, blowing smoke rings into the air. His face is unexpectedly illuminated by a crooked smile.

  “We carry on,” he says. “We risk our lives, but damn it, we carry on regardless.”

  He shrugs his shoulders and makes his way down the hall toward the yellow room where they work.

  Hermann has been to see Einar several times a week lately. They work in the yellow room, listening to news broadcasts from England at low volume on the wireless that Einar has managed to keep hidden in a box. They each note down what is said, the voice on the radio speaks quickly, and when the broadcast ends, Hermann sits down at the typewriter. They work all evening. On many occasions he has stayed all night. He has his own space in the red room, as long as there isn’t anybody else there who needs it. Occasionally Einar has guests, that’s what he calls them; I have guests, he says, nodding toward the red room. Einar’s guests tend to stay for a few days, a week at most, and then they vanish. There are all kinds of people, young, old, men, women, sometimes a group and sometimes just one person. Einar has a lot of contacts, he’s always ready to take a telephone call, arrange papers, help someone one step further in their journey. His only requirement is that his guests keep quiet, don’t look out the windows, and never, under any circumstances, tell anyone that they stayed with him.

  “So tell me, Hermann, have you spoken with the young Ilse Stern yet?” Einar asks when they’ve settled down to work in the yellow room. He always calls her that, “the young Ilse Stern.” Hermann shakes his head.

  “No,” he replies, “I don’t know what to say to her.”

  Einar laughs.

  “Women trouble,” he chuckles. “Possibly the only kind of trouble that I don’t have to contend with.”

  “You should be glad about it too,” Hermann tells him.

  He exhales, groaning slightly.

  “And what about at home?”

  “Still skeptical about the art thing,” Hermann says, rolling his eyes.

  “Good,” Einar says. “That’s a good thing.”

  Ilse. The young Ilse Stern. Hermann hasn’t managed to bring himself to speak to her yet. He has thought over and over again about what he might say. At times he’s considered telling her everything: what had happened that day, exactly why he couldn’t make it; he’s imagined himself pleading with her to hear him out, purging himself of all of his secrets—at least then there would be one other person in the world who’d know what he was involved in. But he can’t, he knows that, and he sits and mulls over all of his options. What would Ilse believe, what did she want to hear? It’s been a long time now, days have turned into weeks and it might even be best just to allow the passing of time to continue, best to stay silent, cross his fingers, hope that she might forget.

  They work late into the evening. Hermann’s head throbs as he pulls on his jacket in the hallway. Einar opens the sliding door leading to the parlor, vanishing into the dark room and swiftly reappearing with a painting in his hands.

  “Just some old nonsense I threw together,” he says, handing it to Hermann, “but it might help you to have something to show for your efforts when you get home.”

  Hermann looks at it. A watercolor, a landscape in pinks and grays, and in the center of the picture is a bridge, fading into the distance, growing smaller and smaller as it extends into the background.

  “So, we’ve been working on perspective, have we?” Hermann asks.

  “That sounds about right,” Einar chuckles, opening the front door.

  It’s cold and dark outside. Hermann walks quickly. He longs to be at home. Home. In his bed, sinking into nothingness beneath the sheets.

  SONJA LEANS HER BACK AGAINST THE COLD cellar wall, squeezing her eyes closed again to adjust to the dimly lit room. All the building’s residents are tightly packed in the space, a gathering of the underworld, poised and ready for the chance to clamber back up to ground level once again. There are only two lights, both situated in the middle of the room, lighting up the earthen floor, their feet, their faces lingering partly in darkness. They’ve been down here so many times now, it is almost as if they have their own reserved seats. In the farthest corner of the cellar they’ve created a little area with some benches. They carried down the ones that usually sit in the backyard in the summer, and there are bottles of water and other supplies in case they should find themselves confined there for an extended period of time.

  They had done what they always do when the air raid siren sounds. They had picked up some extra clothes and a few blankets and had made their way down to the ground floor, opening the cellar door and scrambling down the steep staircase. She and Ilse had gone first, followed by their mother and then by their father, who carried Miriam in his arms. Several of their neighbors were already down there. Ole Rustad had lit the lamps. He’s sitting next to Anna now, his large hand resting on her swollen belly. It can’t be many weeks before the baby is due. Anna moans softly, reaching for the small of her back. Their two daughters, Karin and Lilly, sit by Miriam. All three draw pictures, utterly absorbed by what they’re doing. Their mother had stored some colored pencils and paper in
the cellar to help Miriam pass the time and to stop her from feeling afraid. The three girls are sitting on the bench pushed up against one wall, leaning on a chest that they use as a makeshift table.

  There are eight apartments, two on each floor, and everyone from the building is assembled in the cellar. No, actually, not all of them. Dagny Larsen from the first floor isn’t there, Sonja can see that now. Dagny danced and sang at the German Theater down on Stortingsgata. Once, back in spring, Sonja had seen a man in uniform enter the building; he had smiled and stridden into the apartment on the first floor. Rumors spread to the floors above faster than the smell of fresh bread: Dagny Larsen had a German companion.

  The cellar is silent tonight. Nobody utters a word, not even a whisper. Ilse sits hiding her face behind a book, making a show of reading the pages, while Hermann is seated on the bench opposite them, his shoulders hunched, his head resting in his hands. He looks up at Ilse. The new family from the fourth floor are huddled together in the far corner. Sonja hasn’t said a word to them since they arrived, she hasn’t greeted them at all. Whenever she has happened upon them they’ve looked the other way, hurrying in or out with brisk steps. According to Ingeborg they’re on the other side. It was as if the whole building and its residents had undergone a change after the family had moved in; everything had grown quiet. In the past it had been quite nice in the cellar. Ole Rustad used to tell jokes, the ridiculous kind without any point or purpose, but everyone had laughed all the same. Now there’s nothing to be heard, just silence. Seconds and minutes pass them by in the cold, damp space.

  Her mother sits with a book in her lap, The Forager’s Guide to Free Foods in the Wild; she looks as if she’s carefully pondering the contents. They had tried planting in the backyard, digging up the dirt around the washing line poles to make space for something that might have become a little vegetable garden, but it was too shady; the sun barely managed to peek over the rooftops before disappearing once again behind the buildings that flanked their own; nothing to speak of had thrived in that little patch of earth. Her father sits by her mother’s side, his eyes closed. Very suddenly they both look old. There’s something about them, her mother’s expression, the small wrinkles on her forehead, her father resting his head against the cellar wall. She can picture their expressions when she breaks the news about her plans; her father’s eyes, dark, desperate, her mother’s tearing up, maybe, or flashing with anger, the pitch of her voice increasing until it becomes a high screech, reproachful, filled with accusations, think of your father, for God’s sake think of your poor father.

  Sonja hasn’t said anything, not yet. The right moment just hasn’t come along, she hasn’t figured out the right words to use, doesn’t know how to start, how to lay everything out. But she does have news.

  She had been nervous on the day that she went to the theater. She had neatly folded and wrapped her costume in brown paper. A secretary in a tight-fitting suit and small, round glasses had greeted her, smiling, and had asked Sonja to follow her to the sewing room. Mr. Østli was waiting there, she explained; he was in charge of hiring.

  They ascended a carpeted staircase and entered the sewing room. Inside the room were rows and rows of sewing machines, boxes of bobbins, a whole wall of fabric rolls, and in one corner Sonja could see an actor being measured up as he hummed aloud to warm up his voice. The light beamed in through the oval windows, and a sweet aroma of perfume and theater makeup filled the air. A few of the seamstresses glanced in her direction as she entered. Helene stood behind a table and measured out a length of red velvet material, nodding encouragingly at Sonja as she passed.

  Mr. Østli was sitting behind a desk. Without looking up he asked her to sit down, and the secretary quietly left the office. Sonja placed the package in her lap; her palms were sweating, she felt the brown paper soften beneath her clammy fingers, Mr. Østli seated opposite her, immersed in a stack of paper. He looked young, younger than she had imagined, his dark hair neatly combed and flat against his head, his face narrow, his nose straight. A half-smoked cigarette lay in an ashtray, a thick veil of smoke rising from within.

  “I hear that you are looking for work,” he said, his gaze still fixed on his papers. “What prompts you to choose the theater, may I ask?”

  “It’s my dream,” Sonja said, her tone so assured that she surprised even herself; it suddenly seemed so simple, so obvious, self-evident. “I have my papers here.”

  She opened her purse, taking out her course qualification documents and placing them on the desk.

  Mr. Østli glanced at them briefly before pushing them aside. Finally he looked up at her. He remained motionless, gazing at her.

  “May I offer you a cigarette?” he asked, smiling and presenting a packet with a white cigarette poking out from within.

  Sonja reached out, took it, Mr. Østli stood up, retrieved a lighter from his jacket pocket, leaned in toward her; she could feel his breath against her forehead as he lit her cigarette.

  “May I ask how old you are, Sonja?”

  “Almost nineteen,” she replied, but as she uttered the words she felt the smoke clog her throat; she leaned forward and coughed, tears blurring her vision.

  Mr. Østli laughed.

  “I could tell at once that you weren’t a smoker,” he said. He took the cigarette from her, promptly stubbing it out. Leaning against the desk, he cocked his head to one side with a broad smile.

  “We could use more seamstresses,” he said. “But I can’t take on anyone new before the first of December. At that point we’ll begin making preparations for the upcoming performances.”

  He leaned toward her and took her hand, which still rested on the brown paper package, his own hand large, his palm dry.

  “How would that suit you, Miss Sonja? You are a miss, aren’t you?”

  Sonja nodded.

  “But what about the sample, don’t you want to look at it?” Sonja asked, withdrawing her hand from his and starting to untie the twine that had held the parcel together.

  “I’ve no doubt that you are an outstanding seamstress,” Mr. Østli told her. “You can leave the sample costume here with me. The first of December, are we agreed?”

  He held out his hand, nodding toward the package in brown paper.

  “We can take care of the paperwork when you begin,” he said, placing the parcel on a shelf behind his desk. “Now! I think you ought to go out and celebrate your new employment.”

  He strode over to his office door and opened it.

  “You are a very pretty young woman, Sonja. I am most certain that you will brighten up our sewing room.”

  It had been nothing like what she had expected it to be; she had prepared answers to all manner of questions, readied herself to sit and brag about her achievements. Now her sample costume lay on a shelf; he might never open the package to look at it. For a long while she sat on a bench in the park outside the theater, empty, exhausted, joyful, afraid; feelings whirled around inside her, thudding, father, mother, the sewing room and its plethora of fabrics, the carpets, the oval windows, the shop—the words she’d have to utter at home.

  Sonja can sense it, just how tired she is; her eyelids feel dry, her temples throb. There aren’t many hours left before she’ll have to be up and about again. She rests her head on her father’s shoulder, takes in his smell, his presence, his distance. He places an arm around her, patting her gently, like a child, just like he’s always done. She jumps when the signal sounds. They’re out of danger. They can make their way back up to their apartment. Drowsily they climb the steep cellar stairs, up to the third floor and into the apartment, her mother and father to their divan in the living room and she, Ilse, and Miriam into their bedroom.

  Sonja lies awake; she can hear Miriam and Ilse, soft sounds as they gently exhale in their sleep. The light is on in the living room, her father is sitting in the armchair. She ought to just get it over with now, go to him, confess everything, face the inevitable. He’s sitting out there, she co
uld just get up and out of her bed, it’s no distance at all. Sonja turns over to face the wall, pulling the bedsheets tight around her and curling her legs up under her. The pattern on the wallpaper, the light that frames the open door into the living room, she can hear him flipping through the pages of a book, then placing it down on the floor, stretching. He puts out the light. Footsteps over to the divan. The darkness makes the apartment so quiet, tightly sealed.

  IN THE AFTERNOON ILSE BUMPS INTO Hermann in the passageway. Her mother’s high-pitched screeches are entrenched in her memory, firmly embedded and pounding away, she just has to get out, down to the bridge by the river.

  But then there he is, Hermann Rød, larger than life and standing before her very eyes. He’s on his way in, she’s on her way out. The front gate clangs closed behind him. He almost seems to jump at the sight of her, plunging his hands inside his coat pockets, his shoulders suddenly hunched, avoiding eye contact. More than anything Ilse wants to stride right past him, she’s not ready for this, not now, she feels jittery, on edge, but she stops, her body seizes up, everything tenses.