The Sound of Light, page 31
“And yachts, rowboats, whatever could sail. Hundreds, thousands of Danes working together.”
“It’s incredible.” But Else’s fingers tangled in her lap.
Any day now, Else’s name would rise to the top of the priority list, the weather would permit the RAF to fly, and Mr. Kramer would send for her. She had to tell Laila, and yet again she had to keep a secret from her.
Laila patted Else’s hand. “Anytime you knit your fingers, I know something’s on your mind.”
Else flattened her hands on her lap. “I’m going to the United States.”
“You are? You said it was impossible.”
Else shrugged one shoulder, reminding herself what she was allowed to tell people—and what she wasn’t. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you why, but I could leave any day.”
Laila’s dark eyes dimmed. “I should be happy for you.”
“Why?” Else raised half a smile. “I’m not happy for me. I’ll miss you so much.”
“You’ll write—often?”
“Yes. Often.”
“I—I should go do laundry.” Laila’s gaze darted about. “Are you coming?”
“Not yet. I need some time alone.” So did Laila. Else recognized it in her restless behavior.
After Laila left, Else stood with her briefcase over her shoulder.
Should she go for a walk? It didn’t appeal.
Little did.
Leafless trees bent over the canal, drooping branches into the water. Ferryboats and rowboats plied the waterway. Between two trees stood a smooth rock.
Else sat on the rock with her legs tucked beside her. She pulled the Havmand figurine from her briefcase, gave it a kiss, and cradled it in her lap. Then she opened Hemming’s journal and lost herself in the pages.
Svend insisted she keep Hemming’s things for now. After the war, she would return the journal and Bible, but she’d keep the Havmand.
Time passed, and she kept turning pages, filling her mind with Hemming’s personality and wisdom.
Her mourning deepened as she turned to his final entry. Only three blank pages remained, as if his journal and his life had run out simultaneously.
He’d known his life would be short. He’d often said so in the pages.
Else savored the last line. “The night was pure gold—the moon, the reflection on the water, the love inside me, and the goodness, the rightness of living for others, not myself.”
His voice—she could practically hear it.
“What a beautiful sight.” A man’s voice rose from the middle of the canal. “The Little Mermaid herself come to Swedish shores.”
He sounded like Hemming, and Else flicked up her gaze. No, just her imagination playing tricks on her. A dark-haired man in a rowboat tipped his homburg to her.
A flirt. Just what she needed when she was grieving a true hero.
Else dropped her gaze to the journal.
But . . . the man had spoken in Danish.
He cranked the boat into a turn, rowed in her direction, and glanced over his shoulder at her. “I am much changed . . . min elskede.”
Hemming? The word lodged hard in her throat. It couldn’t be. Yet the torso, the shoulders, the arms—like Hemming, except encased in a tailored black overcoat.
The boat ground to shore about six feet from her, and the man pushed himself out using a walking stick and stretched to an impressive height. A white cast covered one foot.
It couldn’t be. It couldn’t. Else gripped the wooden figurine in one hand, the journal in the other, the only remaining pieces of Hemming. Or were they?
The man doffed his hat and met her gaze with Hemming’s deep-set blue eyes. Dark hair. No beard.
Hemming was in prison about to be executed. Hemming stood in front of her—alive.
Two truths that were mutually exclusive. But in this case, only one could be true.
“Hem—Hem—you—”
“I’m alive.” He sank to his knees before her.
The journal and figurine fell into her lap, and she lifted one shaking hand and touched his cheek. Warm, scarred, bruised, his upper lip a bit misshapen, with a dark mark slashing across. But alive. Alive. Her Hemming.
“How? How?” Her arms crept around his neck, and she pulled him close. He felt real. He felt alive, and her hands roamed over his back to verify it. “But you were in prison. How? How did you get out? How did you get here?”
“My shipyard friends broke me out of the prison van with my father’s help, then I rowed to Sweden. The physicians put me in the hospital for a few days, but I broke out so I could find you.”
Later, Else would need more details. Right now, she needed to process the truth that he lived, the impossible truth.
“Svend took me to your apartment. Laila brought me here and pointed you out from the bridge. There you were, sitting on a rock like the Little Mermaid. I wanted to see you from the water, so I grabbed a boat. But that’s enough storytelling. I just want to look at you, hold you.” Hemming pressed his forehead to hers, and his eyes swam. “Are you—are you still mine?”
How could he ask such a thing? She set the journal and figurine on her briefcase, and she slid off the rock to kneel in front of him, and she took his face between her hands, and she kissed him as gently as her overflowing heart allowed.
His sigh brushed past her lips. He embraced her, practically lifting her from her knees. And his kiss—oh, surely his lip would split again.
He didn’t seem to care. And how could she turn down such an offering?
She caressed his face, the roughness of his cheek, the line of his unfamiliar jaw, the curve of his ear, the pillar of his neck.
All too soon, he pulled back with a wince. “That was worth it.”
A spot of red pricked his lip, and she yanked out her handkerchief and dabbed at it, as her gaze roved his changed image. “Your hair. Your beard.”
“The brown will grow out. The beard—it might not grow back.”
Her eyes filled. “Your leg? What did they do to you?”
His gaze darkened to midnight blue. “They can no longer hurt me.”
The memory of their last encounter slammed into her. “But I can. I can hurt you. Oh, darling. I was so wrong. You had to stay in Denmark. Of course, you did. It’s who you are. I—I read your journal, and it’s clear to me. I hope you don’t mind that I read it.”
Hemming’s lips parted. “You did take it. The journal.”
She pointed her gaze at the leather book. “That Monday when I came home, Fru Riber sent a signal to the Gestapo. I ran up for my suitcase and remembered what you said about your trunk. Sure enough, she’d gone through your things. I took the journal, your Bible, and this.” She plucked up the Havmand figurine.
Hemming sat back on his heels, and his eyes stretched wider and wider. “I—I forgot about that.”
“I ran out the back door, but they followed me. I hid overnight in the library and missed our rendezvous. Then you went back, and you—” Her voice broke.
He captured her hand in both of his, her hand holding the merman, and his gaze grew stark and wide. “If they’d found this . . . Else, the Gestapo ransacked my room that night. If they’d found my Bible with Mor’s name. If they’d found this figurine. They—they could have linked the Havmand to Lyd-af-Lys that very night. They could have raided the villa while all of us were there. They wouldn’t have arrested just me.” Now his voice cracked.
Laila. The Thorups. The four refugees. As well as Hemming. “Oh my goodness.”
“You saved them all, my brave, brilliant, beautiful . . .” His cheeks puckered, and he pulled her hard into his arms. “I love you so much.”
“Oh, Hemming. I love you too.”
He fingered a lock of her hair. “You can call me Henrik now. Or Henning. Or Hemming.”
“You do look more like a Henrik now.” She stroked his maroon necktie.
He sighed, pulled back, and tipped his head toward the boat. “I’ll end up back in prison if I don’t return this rowboat soon. Come with me?”
“You stole it?”
“Borrowed, and for a good purpose.”
“Careful, or your illegal ways will become a habit.”
His eyes grinned. He grabbed his walking stick, pushed up to standing, and reached his hand to her.
After she stashed the journal and figurine in her briefcase, she took his hand and stood.
He helped her into the rowboat, climbed in, and used the oar to shove off.
Then he rowed, those delicious arms doing what they did second best—after holding her. His gaze settled on her, even more delicious, but then he puffed out a loud breath. “We have something to discuss. I met with Svend this morning, and he introduced me around. They’re sending me to London. We’re working on a way to get you there too.”
Else cringed. She was already scheduled to go to London—then the US.
His brows tented in concern. “They want me to work with Christmas Møller at the BBC and make broadcasts as the Havmand.”
Her heart strained, but she said what was needed. “That’s perfect. I’m so proud of you.” It truly was perfect.
“Now to get you there. I’ll sneak you in my suitcase if I must. I can’t bear to be apart from you.”
“Oh dear.” Else worked her lower lip. “I—I don’t want to be apart either, but I’m going to America.”
“America?” He paused mid-stroke. “How did you manage that?”
How could she keep secrets from him? But she had no choice. “I’m not allowed to tell you why I’m going or what I’ll be doing. I’m so sorry.”
For some reason, that made him smile. “Continuing your clandestine ways, I see.”
“But in America. Oh, why did I agree? I don’t want to be away from you.”
“America.” He resumed rowing, and his eyes narrowed. “Let me work on that. The Ahlefeldts have connections, and I know people.”
Wouldn’t that be wonderful? To be together with him? Not in danger. Not hiding their love. Could she let herself dream?
Hemming pulled the rowboat beside a pier among half a dozen rowboats, and he whipped a rope around a post.
Then he knelt before her and scooped up both her hands, his eyes alight. “Dr. Elsebeth Jensen, will you marry me?”
Else gasped. For months, she’d struggled with the concept of marrying a man who could barely read—and then embraced it. Now a nobleman knelt before her, a learned man. But under the polished clothes and speech lay her darling Hemming.
She lifted his hands and kissed them, her heart brimming. “Baron Henrik Henning Havmand Hemming Andersen Ahlefeldt—as soon as I can, I will gladly marry every single one of you.”
He chuckled. Then he burrowed his hand into her hair and gave her kisses, over and over, from every single one of him.
51
HMT AQUITANIA, NEW YORK HARBOR
MONDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1943
As Else fastened one button on her overcoat, Henrik unbuttoned another. He repeated the process until his wife unleashed the melody of her laughter.
She twisted away. “We’ll never leave the cabin at this rate.”
“That’s my plan.” He wrapped his arms around her and burrowed in her neck.
Else chuckled and pushed away from him. “You have duties here in New York, Baron Havmand, and so do I.”
Henrik released his hold. But only because the accommodations in their hotel would be far more . . . accommodating.
“I do hate to leave.” Else straightened her hat. “I can’t imagine a sweeter honeymoon.”
Henrik slapped on his fedora. While the Aquitania had been constructed as a luxurious ocean liner, she’d been painted dull gray and stripped of all niceties for her duties as a troopship.
Even before the war, the cot would have been too narrow for him alone, much less for him and his wife. Yet the ravine between their cots couldn’t be borne.
“Back in America.” Else’s gaze seemed distant and sad.
Henrik handed over her briefcase. “We’ll make new friends, but no one can replace those we’ve left behind.” It had been difficult to leave Stockholm so soon after his reunion with the Thorups, the Østergaards, and Laila.
Else gave him a brave smile and shouldered her briefcase.
In Stockholm, Henrik and Svend had met with Danish leaders and American officials. They’d decided Henrik would work with the Danish legation in the United States to raise funds for the resistance and serve as a voice for the Free Danes.
Strings had been pulled—snapped, really—and they’d placed Henrik and Else on an RAF Mosquito bound for London, then the HMT Aquitania bound for New York.
In London, telegrams had flown back and forth to the US. Else had notified her family of her imminent arrival, and Henrik had told his friend Peter from Harvard, although wartime necessitated omitting ship names and dates.
On Thursday, Henrik had an appointment in Washington with Henrik Kauffmann, the Danish ambassador to the US and an outspoken proponent of the Free Danish movement. Meanwhile, Else had her own secret meetings. Details were scarce, but she would be shuttled to some laboratory. He might not see her often for the duration, a common hardship for couples during wartime but a hardship they could bear.
“I’m ready.” Else picked up one suitcase.
He picked up the other. He should have carried both, but he couldn’t. With his grandfather’s walking stick in hand, he led his wife into the passageway and up the staircase.
Henrik needed surgery. His stubbornness had delayed it and might cripple him forever in his right foot, the physicians had warned him with grave faces.
But they’d wanted to hospitalize him for weeks. How could he? He had important plans. Marrying Else, for one.
He held open the door to the main deck for his wife.
In the Mosquito, he’d asked when she wanted to get married. After some dithering, she’d admitted she’d marry him “tonight if we could.”
They couldn’t, but they’d arranged the ceremony in London within days.
The deck teemed with men, and Else took Henrik’s arm.
Most of the passengers were American servicemen, wounded in action and sent home for rehabilitation. Some were US airmen who had finished their “combat tours” and were coming home for rest and recreation before returning to their aircraft.
But other civilians sailed too.
Niels Bohr, his twenty-one-year-old son, Aage, and a handful of scientists stood at the rails, surrounded by bodyguards. Else gave the Bohrs a little wave.
An empty spot at the rails beckoned to Henrik. They set down their suitcases, and Henrik put his arm around the hollow of Else’s waist.
In the chill, damp air, the New York skyline rose to the low clouds.
“There she is.” Else pointed ahead. “The Statue of Liberty. She’s never meant more to me.”
And to the servicemen on board. Some cheered and hollered and clapped each other on the back. Some watched in hushed silence.
Henrik leaned close to Else’s tasty little ear. “Will they throw me overboard if I say I prefer another statue of a lady overlooking the water?”
She pressed her ear up against his lips and laughed. “I won’t let them.”
He tweaked her earlobe with his lips. “I feel so much safer.”
Then he rested his cheek against the crown of her hat and studied the giant maiden striding toward them, her chin determined, her eyes offering hope.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, Den Lille Havfrue gazed with shoulders bent from longing and loss. “Both women speak of sacrifice, don’t they? Of giving oneself for higher ideals.”
“They do,” Else said. “Oh, Hemming! You could use that in your speeches.”
“I could.” The idea raced and wove together. Two nations, two women, divided by an ocean, united by ideals. Ideals not fully reached, not by any means, but ideals to strive for, and in striving for, to sometimes achieve.
“You, my Lille Havfru”—he pressed a kiss to her temple—“are brilliant.”
Else held Hemming’s arm as they made their way along the deck to the gangway at the tail end of the jostling, grinning crowd.
With a fresh haircut, most of the brown had disappeared from Hemming’s blond hair. His sores and scabs had healed, although scars remained, would always remain. In his overcoat and fedora, he looked breathtakingly debonair.
But still her Hemming. She’d tried calling him Henrik, even Henning. But Hemming stuck. He didn’t seem to mind.
When they reached the gangplank, Hemming ushered her before him, and she headed down the jangling path. A Red Cross table at the base greeted the servicemen, but only a few civilians awaited. How could they when no one could communicate when they’d arrive?
“It can’t be,” Hemming said.
“Hmm?” She looked over her shoulder.
He stood still, staring down at the dock. “It can’t be.”
“Henning!” a man called, echoed by another male voice, “Henning!”
A grin broke out on her husband’s face, and he laughed and waved. “It is. Peter Lang—Paul Aubrey.”
“Your friends from Harvard?” Else sought the source of the voices.
A bespectacled blond man in an Army officer’s cap and olive drab overcoat waved, as did a dark-haired man in a gray coat. Two smiling women stood beside the men.
“How did they know?” Else asked.
“I have no idea.” Hemming motioned her onward. Down on the dock, he clasped the hand of the Army officer. “Peter Lang. How on earth did you know when my ship was coming?”
“That’s my doing.” The brunette by his side tipped up a mischievous smile. “I’m a reporter. I have my sources.”
“My wife, Evelyn,” Peter said.
“I’m pleased to meet you.” Hemming turned to Else with a smile warm with pride. “May I introduce my wife, Else.”
Else greeted the Langs and shook hands with them.
“Paul Aubrey.” Hemming gripped hands with the dark-haired man, who wore a giant smile. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“It’s good to see you, Henning. It’s been too long. And this is my wife, Lucie.”
“Lucie?” Hemming’s lips warped in a small frown, then he smiled and shook the hand of a petite lady with light brown hair and a dreamy expression.
“It’s incredible.” But Else’s fingers tangled in her lap.
Any day now, Else’s name would rise to the top of the priority list, the weather would permit the RAF to fly, and Mr. Kramer would send for her. She had to tell Laila, and yet again she had to keep a secret from her.
Laila patted Else’s hand. “Anytime you knit your fingers, I know something’s on your mind.”
Else flattened her hands on her lap. “I’m going to the United States.”
“You are? You said it was impossible.”
Else shrugged one shoulder, reminding herself what she was allowed to tell people—and what she wasn’t. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you why, but I could leave any day.”
Laila’s dark eyes dimmed. “I should be happy for you.”
“Why?” Else raised half a smile. “I’m not happy for me. I’ll miss you so much.”
“You’ll write—often?”
“Yes. Often.”
“I—I should go do laundry.” Laila’s gaze darted about. “Are you coming?”
“Not yet. I need some time alone.” So did Laila. Else recognized it in her restless behavior.
After Laila left, Else stood with her briefcase over her shoulder.
Should she go for a walk? It didn’t appeal.
Little did.
Leafless trees bent over the canal, drooping branches into the water. Ferryboats and rowboats plied the waterway. Between two trees stood a smooth rock.
Else sat on the rock with her legs tucked beside her. She pulled the Havmand figurine from her briefcase, gave it a kiss, and cradled it in her lap. Then she opened Hemming’s journal and lost herself in the pages.
Svend insisted she keep Hemming’s things for now. After the war, she would return the journal and Bible, but she’d keep the Havmand.
Time passed, and she kept turning pages, filling her mind with Hemming’s personality and wisdom.
Her mourning deepened as she turned to his final entry. Only three blank pages remained, as if his journal and his life had run out simultaneously.
He’d known his life would be short. He’d often said so in the pages.
Else savored the last line. “The night was pure gold—the moon, the reflection on the water, the love inside me, and the goodness, the rightness of living for others, not myself.”
His voice—she could practically hear it.
“What a beautiful sight.” A man’s voice rose from the middle of the canal. “The Little Mermaid herself come to Swedish shores.”
He sounded like Hemming, and Else flicked up her gaze. No, just her imagination playing tricks on her. A dark-haired man in a rowboat tipped his homburg to her.
A flirt. Just what she needed when she was grieving a true hero.
Else dropped her gaze to the journal.
But . . . the man had spoken in Danish.
He cranked the boat into a turn, rowed in her direction, and glanced over his shoulder at her. “I am much changed . . . min elskede.”
Hemming? The word lodged hard in her throat. It couldn’t be. Yet the torso, the shoulders, the arms—like Hemming, except encased in a tailored black overcoat.
The boat ground to shore about six feet from her, and the man pushed himself out using a walking stick and stretched to an impressive height. A white cast covered one foot.
It couldn’t be. It couldn’t. Else gripped the wooden figurine in one hand, the journal in the other, the only remaining pieces of Hemming. Or were they?
The man doffed his hat and met her gaze with Hemming’s deep-set blue eyes. Dark hair. No beard.
Hemming was in prison about to be executed. Hemming stood in front of her—alive.
Two truths that were mutually exclusive. But in this case, only one could be true.
“Hem—Hem—you—”
“I’m alive.” He sank to his knees before her.
The journal and figurine fell into her lap, and she lifted one shaking hand and touched his cheek. Warm, scarred, bruised, his upper lip a bit misshapen, with a dark mark slashing across. But alive. Alive. Her Hemming.
“How? How?” Her arms crept around his neck, and she pulled him close. He felt real. He felt alive, and her hands roamed over his back to verify it. “But you were in prison. How? How did you get out? How did you get here?”
“My shipyard friends broke me out of the prison van with my father’s help, then I rowed to Sweden. The physicians put me in the hospital for a few days, but I broke out so I could find you.”
Later, Else would need more details. Right now, she needed to process the truth that he lived, the impossible truth.
“Svend took me to your apartment. Laila brought me here and pointed you out from the bridge. There you were, sitting on a rock like the Little Mermaid. I wanted to see you from the water, so I grabbed a boat. But that’s enough storytelling. I just want to look at you, hold you.” Hemming pressed his forehead to hers, and his eyes swam. “Are you—are you still mine?”
How could he ask such a thing? She set the journal and figurine on her briefcase, and she slid off the rock to kneel in front of him, and she took his face between her hands, and she kissed him as gently as her overflowing heart allowed.
His sigh brushed past her lips. He embraced her, practically lifting her from her knees. And his kiss—oh, surely his lip would split again.
He didn’t seem to care. And how could she turn down such an offering?
She caressed his face, the roughness of his cheek, the line of his unfamiliar jaw, the curve of his ear, the pillar of his neck.
All too soon, he pulled back with a wince. “That was worth it.”
A spot of red pricked his lip, and she yanked out her handkerchief and dabbed at it, as her gaze roved his changed image. “Your hair. Your beard.”
“The brown will grow out. The beard—it might not grow back.”
Her eyes filled. “Your leg? What did they do to you?”
His gaze darkened to midnight blue. “They can no longer hurt me.”
The memory of their last encounter slammed into her. “But I can. I can hurt you. Oh, darling. I was so wrong. You had to stay in Denmark. Of course, you did. It’s who you are. I—I read your journal, and it’s clear to me. I hope you don’t mind that I read it.”
Hemming’s lips parted. “You did take it. The journal.”
She pointed her gaze at the leather book. “That Monday when I came home, Fru Riber sent a signal to the Gestapo. I ran up for my suitcase and remembered what you said about your trunk. Sure enough, she’d gone through your things. I took the journal, your Bible, and this.” She plucked up the Havmand figurine.
Hemming sat back on his heels, and his eyes stretched wider and wider. “I—I forgot about that.”
“I ran out the back door, but they followed me. I hid overnight in the library and missed our rendezvous. Then you went back, and you—” Her voice broke.
He captured her hand in both of his, her hand holding the merman, and his gaze grew stark and wide. “If they’d found this . . . Else, the Gestapo ransacked my room that night. If they’d found my Bible with Mor’s name. If they’d found this figurine. They—they could have linked the Havmand to Lyd-af-Lys that very night. They could have raided the villa while all of us were there. They wouldn’t have arrested just me.” Now his voice cracked.
Laila. The Thorups. The four refugees. As well as Hemming. “Oh my goodness.”
“You saved them all, my brave, brilliant, beautiful . . .” His cheeks puckered, and he pulled her hard into his arms. “I love you so much.”
“Oh, Hemming. I love you too.”
He fingered a lock of her hair. “You can call me Henrik now. Or Henning. Or Hemming.”
“You do look more like a Henrik now.” She stroked his maroon necktie.
He sighed, pulled back, and tipped his head toward the boat. “I’ll end up back in prison if I don’t return this rowboat soon. Come with me?”
“You stole it?”
“Borrowed, and for a good purpose.”
“Careful, or your illegal ways will become a habit.”
His eyes grinned. He grabbed his walking stick, pushed up to standing, and reached his hand to her.
After she stashed the journal and figurine in her briefcase, she took his hand and stood.
He helped her into the rowboat, climbed in, and used the oar to shove off.
Then he rowed, those delicious arms doing what they did second best—after holding her. His gaze settled on her, even more delicious, but then he puffed out a loud breath. “We have something to discuss. I met with Svend this morning, and he introduced me around. They’re sending me to London. We’re working on a way to get you there too.”
Else cringed. She was already scheduled to go to London—then the US.
His brows tented in concern. “They want me to work with Christmas Møller at the BBC and make broadcasts as the Havmand.”
Her heart strained, but she said what was needed. “That’s perfect. I’m so proud of you.” It truly was perfect.
“Now to get you there. I’ll sneak you in my suitcase if I must. I can’t bear to be apart from you.”
“Oh dear.” Else worked her lower lip. “I—I don’t want to be apart either, but I’m going to America.”
“America?” He paused mid-stroke. “How did you manage that?”
How could she keep secrets from him? But she had no choice. “I’m not allowed to tell you why I’m going or what I’ll be doing. I’m so sorry.”
For some reason, that made him smile. “Continuing your clandestine ways, I see.”
“But in America. Oh, why did I agree? I don’t want to be away from you.”
“America.” He resumed rowing, and his eyes narrowed. “Let me work on that. The Ahlefeldts have connections, and I know people.”
Wouldn’t that be wonderful? To be together with him? Not in danger. Not hiding their love. Could she let herself dream?
Hemming pulled the rowboat beside a pier among half a dozen rowboats, and he whipped a rope around a post.
Then he knelt before her and scooped up both her hands, his eyes alight. “Dr. Elsebeth Jensen, will you marry me?”
Else gasped. For months, she’d struggled with the concept of marrying a man who could barely read—and then embraced it. Now a nobleman knelt before her, a learned man. But under the polished clothes and speech lay her darling Hemming.
She lifted his hands and kissed them, her heart brimming. “Baron Henrik Henning Havmand Hemming Andersen Ahlefeldt—as soon as I can, I will gladly marry every single one of you.”
He chuckled. Then he burrowed his hand into her hair and gave her kisses, over and over, from every single one of him.
51
HMT AQUITANIA, NEW YORK HARBOR
MONDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1943
As Else fastened one button on her overcoat, Henrik unbuttoned another. He repeated the process until his wife unleashed the melody of her laughter.
She twisted away. “We’ll never leave the cabin at this rate.”
“That’s my plan.” He wrapped his arms around her and burrowed in her neck.
Else chuckled and pushed away from him. “You have duties here in New York, Baron Havmand, and so do I.”
Henrik released his hold. But only because the accommodations in their hotel would be far more . . . accommodating.
“I do hate to leave.” Else straightened her hat. “I can’t imagine a sweeter honeymoon.”
Henrik slapped on his fedora. While the Aquitania had been constructed as a luxurious ocean liner, she’d been painted dull gray and stripped of all niceties for her duties as a troopship.
Even before the war, the cot would have been too narrow for him alone, much less for him and his wife. Yet the ravine between their cots couldn’t be borne.
“Back in America.” Else’s gaze seemed distant and sad.
Henrik handed over her briefcase. “We’ll make new friends, but no one can replace those we’ve left behind.” It had been difficult to leave Stockholm so soon after his reunion with the Thorups, the Østergaards, and Laila.
Else gave him a brave smile and shouldered her briefcase.
In Stockholm, Henrik and Svend had met with Danish leaders and American officials. They’d decided Henrik would work with the Danish legation in the United States to raise funds for the resistance and serve as a voice for the Free Danes.
Strings had been pulled—snapped, really—and they’d placed Henrik and Else on an RAF Mosquito bound for London, then the HMT Aquitania bound for New York.
In London, telegrams had flown back and forth to the US. Else had notified her family of her imminent arrival, and Henrik had told his friend Peter from Harvard, although wartime necessitated omitting ship names and dates.
On Thursday, Henrik had an appointment in Washington with Henrik Kauffmann, the Danish ambassador to the US and an outspoken proponent of the Free Danish movement. Meanwhile, Else had her own secret meetings. Details were scarce, but she would be shuttled to some laboratory. He might not see her often for the duration, a common hardship for couples during wartime but a hardship they could bear.
“I’m ready.” Else picked up one suitcase.
He picked up the other. He should have carried both, but he couldn’t. With his grandfather’s walking stick in hand, he led his wife into the passageway and up the staircase.
Henrik needed surgery. His stubbornness had delayed it and might cripple him forever in his right foot, the physicians had warned him with grave faces.
But they’d wanted to hospitalize him for weeks. How could he? He had important plans. Marrying Else, for one.
He held open the door to the main deck for his wife.
In the Mosquito, he’d asked when she wanted to get married. After some dithering, she’d admitted she’d marry him “tonight if we could.”
They couldn’t, but they’d arranged the ceremony in London within days.
The deck teemed with men, and Else took Henrik’s arm.
Most of the passengers were American servicemen, wounded in action and sent home for rehabilitation. Some were US airmen who had finished their “combat tours” and were coming home for rest and recreation before returning to their aircraft.
But other civilians sailed too.
Niels Bohr, his twenty-one-year-old son, Aage, and a handful of scientists stood at the rails, surrounded by bodyguards. Else gave the Bohrs a little wave.
An empty spot at the rails beckoned to Henrik. They set down their suitcases, and Henrik put his arm around the hollow of Else’s waist.
In the chill, damp air, the New York skyline rose to the low clouds.
“There she is.” Else pointed ahead. “The Statue of Liberty. She’s never meant more to me.”
And to the servicemen on board. Some cheered and hollered and clapped each other on the back. Some watched in hushed silence.
Henrik leaned close to Else’s tasty little ear. “Will they throw me overboard if I say I prefer another statue of a lady overlooking the water?”
She pressed her ear up against his lips and laughed. “I won’t let them.”
He tweaked her earlobe with his lips. “I feel so much safer.”
Then he rested his cheek against the crown of her hat and studied the giant maiden striding toward them, her chin determined, her eyes offering hope.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, Den Lille Havfrue gazed with shoulders bent from longing and loss. “Both women speak of sacrifice, don’t they? Of giving oneself for higher ideals.”
“They do,” Else said. “Oh, Hemming! You could use that in your speeches.”
“I could.” The idea raced and wove together. Two nations, two women, divided by an ocean, united by ideals. Ideals not fully reached, not by any means, but ideals to strive for, and in striving for, to sometimes achieve.
“You, my Lille Havfru”—he pressed a kiss to her temple—“are brilliant.”
Else held Hemming’s arm as they made their way along the deck to the gangway at the tail end of the jostling, grinning crowd.
With a fresh haircut, most of the brown had disappeared from Hemming’s blond hair. His sores and scabs had healed, although scars remained, would always remain. In his overcoat and fedora, he looked breathtakingly debonair.
But still her Hemming. She’d tried calling him Henrik, even Henning. But Hemming stuck. He didn’t seem to mind.
When they reached the gangplank, Hemming ushered her before him, and she headed down the jangling path. A Red Cross table at the base greeted the servicemen, but only a few civilians awaited. How could they when no one could communicate when they’d arrive?
“It can’t be,” Hemming said.
“Hmm?” She looked over her shoulder.
He stood still, staring down at the dock. “It can’t be.”
“Henning!” a man called, echoed by another male voice, “Henning!”
A grin broke out on her husband’s face, and he laughed and waved. “It is. Peter Lang—Paul Aubrey.”
“Your friends from Harvard?” Else sought the source of the voices.
A bespectacled blond man in an Army officer’s cap and olive drab overcoat waved, as did a dark-haired man in a gray coat. Two smiling women stood beside the men.
“How did they know?” Else asked.
“I have no idea.” Hemming motioned her onward. Down on the dock, he clasped the hand of the Army officer. “Peter Lang. How on earth did you know when my ship was coming?”
“That’s my doing.” The brunette by his side tipped up a mischievous smile. “I’m a reporter. I have my sources.”
“My wife, Evelyn,” Peter said.
“I’m pleased to meet you.” Hemming turned to Else with a smile warm with pride. “May I introduce my wife, Else.”
Else greeted the Langs and shook hands with them.
“Paul Aubrey.” Hemming gripped hands with the dark-haired man, who wore a giant smile. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“It’s good to see you, Henning. It’s been too long. And this is my wife, Lucie.”
“Lucie?” Hemming’s lips warped in a small frown, then he smiled and shook the hand of a petite lady with light brown hair and a dreamy expression.
