I slipped my hand into my pocket, fingering the address and the name Oskar had written down for me the last time I saw him. In the pocket on my other side, I kept his glove. The other I had pressed into his hands on one of our last nights together, when we had held each other close. One day, we would be reunited, just like the gloves.
We would need to ask someone for directions when we got into Narva. I hoped that Oskar’s contact would help us, even though Oskar himself was not escorting us. My fingers tightened involuntarily around the slip of paper. Oskar, where are you?
Leelo gurgled and pointed over Etti’s shoulder at the snow which circled down around us. Etti hoisted her higher up on her shoulder, teetering a little as she tried to balance her knapsack and the child, her boots surging against the mixture of slush and snow. Leelo’s face peeped out between the layers of clothing and shawls we had swathed around her, her big eyes fixed on the street retreating behind us and the tall chimney stacks of the factory.
‘I wish we had never come to Narva.’ Lydia sounded broken. The altercation with Agnese had upset her. I looked over at her, trudging through the snow in Aunt Juudit’s too-big boots. The wind streamed her hair back away from her gaunt face, her sharp cheekbones making her look all the more wolf-like. Despite that, there was an elegance there, a spirit in the thickly fringed blue eyes that was not yet extinguished. No wonder Jakob had drawn close to her. She was everything I was not: warm and open, every emotion etched on her face as soon as it formed. I was a hard, brittle stick, unwilling to bend.
‘We had no choice,’ I said. I was so very weary, and suddenly I was afraid I could not go on. But Lydia beside me and Etti pushing through the sleet with Leelo wrapped around her chest meant I could not stop. I pressed the heel of my palm into my eye, as if I could massage the exhaustion out of the socket. ‘No choice then, and no choice now.’
‘I hope this Heldur has a warm fireplace.’ Lydia shook herself, rubbing her shoulders with her hands.
‘And a gramophone.’ Etti’s comment was so unexpected it made me look up.
She flashed me a smile. ‘I would give anything to hear “L’Internationale” again,’ she added, patting Leelo’s back with her hand.
It seemed so ridiculous and so unlikely, and yet it broke the tension between us. As Etti began to babble, explaining Aunt Juudit’s peculiar habits to Lydia, I let the cold air soak into my lungs, imagining the unimaginable at last: a home, a place we would all be safe until the war ended, whoever the victors might be.
I tried to conjure up an apartment filled with voices – Oskar’s and Jakob’s, Etti’s and Leelo’s. Lydia would sit beside the fireplace; there would indeed be a great one, a huge pyre of logs that burned endlessly. Perhaps we would knit; I could show her at last how to piece together the sections of her mother’s shawl just the way she had asked me to. First, the loop stitch. Then the hook. The lace edges would be sewn separately, dried on the timber frames before we attached them with care. I would let her choose the pattern she desired, though I would secretly hope for the wolf’s paw.
When we were done, I would perform my final trick: I would pull the shawl through the gold ring I had removed from the fourth finger of my left hand. My ring. The one Oskar would give me to replace the small thread fastened there. A shining symbol of hope. The fine-spun lace would flutter, like magic. The test of quality and a knitter’s skill. Lydia would smile.
Narva was teeming with German soldiers. We saw their panzer tanks rolling by and held our breath as they marched in formation through the square and up towards the huge castle overlooking the river, which must be where they trained and exercised.
We kept close to the shadows where we could, trying not to draw attention, Etti wedged between Lydia and myself. The first woman we met did not know where Turu Street was, but the next woman we approached pointed us towards a row of estate houses some little distance away. Heldur’s house on Turu Street was no more than a narrow wedge of whitewashed plaster jammed between two bigger residences. The man who answered my knock was an older gentleman with close-cut hair and pale eyelashes.
‘Are you Heldur?’
‘Perhaps.’ He folded his arms. ‘Who are you?’
‘I am Katarina. These are my cousin and my friend. Oskar Mägi sent us – we are hoping you can help us.’
Heldur did not uncross his arms, nor did his eyes leave my face, but he looked back over his shoulder and called, ‘Kristiina!’
A harassed-looking young woman with a snub nose appeared abruptly at his side. Almost to himself, he said, ‘Make up some beds, girl.’
The woman shot us a curious glance but moved away to do as she was bid.
As her footsteps retreated up the stairs, the man turned to look at her heels disappearing. ‘She’s a good daughter,’ he said. ‘Follow her up. She’ll see to it you are clothed and fed and comfortable.’
He stood back to let us in, then turned away to clomp over to his desk. I felt the cold brush of his dismissal as if he had blown out a candle and left us standing in the dark.
‘Aren’t you going to ask us what we’re doing here? Don’t you want to see – see our papers?’
He shrugged without turning around. ‘I see everything already just as it is. Oskar told you to come see me if you had trouble. You have trouble – or soon will have. You can stay here as long as you need.’
‘Can you – can you pass on a message for us?’ I swallowed. ‘Can you tell Oskar we are here, that we need to leave as quickly as possible?’
The man paused. He straightened up and turned, and the look on his face felt like a slap to mine. ‘I’m sorry to tell you this.’ He drew in a breath. ‘Oskar has… Nobody has heard from Oskar for a month.’
I stopped breathing. It could not be true. Questions burned on my tongue. I tried to speak but only a croak came out.
‘I’m sorry,’ Heldur said again.
Heldur did not know what Oskar meant to me. He could not know we were married, or he would not be speaking in this cold, ruthless way. ‘It’s always possible he has gone back into hiding, into the forest,’ he said. ‘But it seems unlikely he would have disappeared without telling anyone.’
I found my voice. ‘Did he take anyone with him?’ My thoughts swirled with visions of Jakob. Jakob and Oskar, shot through with bullet holes.
‘I can’t say.’ The old man pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. ‘I’m sorry. As I said, you can stay as long as you need to. Oskar told me you might need the services of Jaan’s speedboat.’ His mouth twitched. ‘He comes once a month when the moon is dark. Looks to be the tenth today. So, tomorrow. Would you have me contact him? Will you be ready?’
My mouth was so dry I could not swallow.
‘Yes.’ Lydia took my arm. ‘We will be ready.’
‘So. You are all Jews?’
Heldur sniffed at the food Kristiina had put before him; a square of watery terrine mixed with leftover offal. Etti and I exchanged uneasy glances. Lydia was dangling Leelo while she batted at the orange cat who sat warming himself before the fire. I saw her glance over her shoulder at the front door, as if she expected it to burst open.
‘Not exactly,’ I said.
Heldur grunted. He speared a wobbling piece of terrine onto his fork. ‘It makes no difference to me.’ He chewed. ‘We have had all sorts through here, haven’t we girl? Jews. Gypsies. Once, a Jehovah’s Witness. He had some interesting views, I can tell you.’