Four

Before winter set in, workmen and trucks appeared further up the lane from where Anna was living and she realized that the concentration camp was being dismantled. Bonfires flickered through the trees and the trucks carried away loads to be destroyed elsewhere. It had been announced that a memorial was to be erected there and she thought that very soon the beautiful forest would heal its terrible scars.

Every day the weather was getting colder. One morning the forest was covered in hoar frost and sparkled as if every tree had been decked dazzlingly for Christmas. Soon afterwards the snow came and Anna awoke that day to a new vista and the sound of her elderly landlord clearing the steps of snow. She ran to the window and there she stood gazing across at the gigantic cones of snow that now covered every tree in sight. Then she heard sleigh bells and watched in delight as one of the local farmers drove past on his sleigh, the first of many that she was to see in the days and weeks ahead.

As soon as Anna had had her breakfast, she wrapped up warmly in a thick jacket that her aunt had sent at her request, with some other items of winter clothing for her extended visit. Then, pulling her woollen cap well down over her ears, she went outside. The cold air stung her nostrils and nipped her cheeks, but she was so delighted with the glorious scene all around her that she scarcely noticed. Odin, seeing her, began jumping at his leash, eager for a walk, and she released him to let him go bounding along beside her.

She made two discoveries as they walked the lane, which had already been cleared by a snowplough. Firstly, the dry cold did not penetrate her warm clothing and, secondly, the snow did not have the wet texture of the snow she was used to in England, but due to the low temperature it flew up like grains of rice when she kicked it.

She walked as far as Molly’s cabin where she was welcomed in for a steaming cup of coffee while Odin settled down on the porch outside. Later they would go off to learn a Scottish dance new to them under Helen’s supervision. Anna was enjoying the lessons. The war brides had been given permission to hold their lessons in an old shed on the airfield, which was not used by the air force. The Highland music was supplied by a gramophone, Helen having brought the records with her from Scotland.

All the war brides agreed that their first winter in Norway had not been as cold as this one was proving to be. For some time now officers and ranks alike were wearing well-fitting greatcoats and handsome round fur hats with the insignia of the Royal Norwegian Air Force. Pat and Sally took their toddlers, well wrapped up, out on little sleds just as the local people did. Anna decided that one of these sleds, which were sold in the local shop, was just what she needed. She could pull along her purchases whenever foodstuffs were on sale there or elsewhere on the farms, for she had discovered that even a well-gloved hand soon became stiff and chilled to the bone when carrying anything and was agony to thaw in lukewarm water. It would be easier to pull a sledge by straps over her shoulders, even though it would make her feel as if she were ready to accompany Amundsen to the South Pole.

When Fru Dahl, whose daughter did her shopping for her, saw Anna about to set out with the sled, she beckoned to her to wait. A few minutes later, the old lady reappeared with a dog’s sled harness for Odin. Afterwards, to Anna’s delight, he pulled the shopping effortlessly for her.

The daily temperature at Gardermoen began to average well below zero. Soon it was said generally to be the coldest winter in living memory and even Oslo fjord had begun to freeze. Anna’s aunt wrote from England that it was the coldest season that she or anyone else could remember and the whole of Europe seemed similarly afflicted by the merciless weather.

Everything carried on as usual in Norway. Trains kept running and snow ploughs kept the roads clear, although the former were not always on time due to unusual avalanches of snow blocking the lines and having to be cleared. Military flying was often curtailed, for heavy falls of snow were frequent, obliterating everything, but the social life of the airfield continued unhampered and many people went around on skis. Olav and Molly taught Anna to ski and she was quick to learn, in spite of many falls in the process.

It was because she was unused to such cold weather that it played tricks on her. She had been warned never to touch metal outside with her bare hand or else she would stick to it, which she was careful to remember, but she had given up hanging out her washing because it became as stiff as boards in a matter of seconds. One day the local shop had had some jellies for sale and she had made a raspberry-flavoured one, which she put outside her apartment on top of a cupboard on the landing to cool, knowing that it would set quicker there in the unheated area than in her warm apartment. A little later when she was on her way out to visit Molly, she found it had frozen to solid ice, giving her an indication just how cold it could be indoors as well as out when there was no stove to keep everything warm.

Karl Haug had been posted elsewhere and so Anna did not see him more than a couple of times after the night she wished to forget. His gaze had lingered on her and they had spoken, but he had made no attempt to restart what had happened between them.

Another purchase Anna made was a spark. This was a simple form of transport that everyone seemed to possess, for these were everywhere. It consisted of a simple wooden chair fastened on to two metal runners, which extended behind it, and it was on these that one scooted along the icy roads while holding on to the top of the chair, with sometimes either a passenger or purchases on the seat. Anna had come on her spark on the evening she and Molly had decided to go to the airfield cinema to see the Marx Brothers in A Night at the Opera.

‘You sit and I’ll scoot,’ Anna said as they were about to set off. Molly was wearing an ancient fur coat that her mother had sent her. She would not wear it in daylight, having once caught a glimpse of a customer in an Oslo shop mirror and thought what a terrible sight the woman presented in a ginger fur coat and a woolly hat, until she had realized with dismay that it was a reflection of herself.

The runways, illumined by the airfields lights, gave a wonderful surface for a good pace as they swept along between the high banks of cleared snow on either side. They had covered quite a distance when an unexpected happening took place. Two young airmen, bundled up like polar bears in their thick jackets and fur hats, who had spotted them from a distance, came darting forward with a whoop of triumph.

‘Want some help?’ one joked as he and his companion leapt one behind the other on to the runners with Anna, and promptly increased the pace of the spark to a tremendous speed. Molly uttered a piercing shriek, which was drowned by the airmen’s noisy cheering, and Anna clung desperately to the back of the passenger-chair, her cries to slow down unheeded. The runway was skimming away under them until suddenly there was a deafening crack as one of the metal runners snapped. The next moment all four of them were sent flying on to the runway.

Anna felt like a spinning top as she slid across the icy surface. As she sat up, she was relieved to see that nobody was injured. Molly, who was sitting with her legs stuck out in front of her, her fur coat split from shoulder to hem, was laughing helplessly at the stark expressions of the two airmen as they recognized her as the wife of one of their senior officers. It was obvious they had mistaken her and Anna for two civilian girls from the kitchens, homeward bound on the spark.

Molly cut short their apologies as they helped her up, Anna already on her feet. ‘Just find us another spark,’ Molly said in Norwegian, wiping tears of mirth from her eyes, ‘and then I’ll forget I ever saw you.’

They bolted off to do her bidding and returned very soon afterwards on another spark at almost the same speed. They saluted smartly as Anna and Molly set off again, both of the young men still awed by what they had done. Afterwards, on a leisurely homeward run, Molly declared she had laughed far more at them than at the Marx brothers.

It was at this time of freezing temperatures that Anna saw the Northern Lights for the first time. They were pale and wispy, but they were there, brushing long fingers of feathery light over the whole night sky in a way that was both beautiful and strange. She gazed at them in wonder. Then, when it became still colder, and on the nights when the sky was clear of clouds, there were waves of beautiful colours sweeping majestically across the skies.

For some time now the war brides, cooperating with the Norwegian wives, had been planning a big party all together early in the New Year when they had returned from their various Christmas destinations. The husbands would be their guests and any other of the single officers wishing to come with girlfriends would add to the enjoyment of the party. To this aim, the British and the Norwegian wives met once a week to drink coffee and give a regular donation to the funds, which were in the care of Sally as treasurer. Soon a good sum began to accumulate that was well on the way to covering all the food and drink for the evening. The commanding officer had given his permission for the party to be held in the mess hall where once German air crews had been briefed for bombing sorties.

In Oslo the shops had made their premises and windows as festive as possible, and the department store of Stein og Strom had a beautifully decorated Christmas tree that reached through an upper floor almost to the ceiling.

On a shopping trip Anna and Molly found that a great deal of Christmas stock had come in or had been saved for the festive season. There were plenty of pretty tree ornaments to buy, most of them artistically fashioned in paper. At one counter, silk ties were being sold, and after waiting in line for half an hour Anna was able to purchase one for her father-in-law, and Molly bought the same for hers too. There was another long wait to buy some very good costume jewellery, and Anna managed to get a pretty green enamelled necklace for Steffan Vartdal’s housekeeper.

There was one small shop that they always visited ever since Sally had made a very special purchase there for herself. The shop owner had had a sudden delivery of some stock that had been brought personally into the country by a friend from the States. By chance, Sally had travelled into Oslo that same morning and was passing the shop just as the blinds went up to reveal, in a kind of unveiling, a lovely pale-grey coat with a sumptuous fur collar. She had gone into the shop instantly and her purchase of the coat had been a source of wonder for many of the war brides. They could only guess at the price and would not have been able to afford it in any case. Yet, ever since that day of Sally’s good fortune, every war bride going into Oslo would always make a point of looking in that particular window, if only to gaze at the unattainable, but so far there had not been a repeat of that wonderful delivery.

Anna and Molly, having made their usual pilgrimage to look in the window, finished their Christmas shopping by each buying a flowering plant for Aunt Christina, for they knew there was nothing she would like better. They went straight to deliver their gifts to her, always calling on her whenever possible, and as usual she welcomed them warmly and plied them with refreshment.

Anna had been given several good recipes for bread by Aunt Christina, for like most of the war brides she had begun making her own loaves and rolls. There was a bread van that delivered, but often it had run out of supplies before it reached Gardermoen. Anna had had an amusing experience the first time she wanted to buy yeast from the local shop, for she had forgotten her dictionary. So she mimed kneading dough and puffing out her cheeks until understanding dawned on the shop-woman, who was promptly convulsed by giggles that she could not overcome. She was still giggling when she handed over the yeast to Anna, who was equally amused.

Although bread deliveries were erratic, it was never difficult to buy fresh fish. The fish van came every Thursday, the fishmonger hooting his horn at every halt to let housewives know he had arrived. Fru Dahl and Anna were regular customers, for meat was still in short supply and the fish was always the day’s catch and the choice excellent. There were times when Anna thought to herself that she had never eaten so much fish in her life before, even though she had grown up in a seaside town. Once she had remarked to the fishmonger that it must have been a great help for people to have fish off ration during the Nazi occupation, but he immediately corrected her.

‘No, that was not the case. We had to supply daily quotas of our catch to the German troops and there was very little left – and sometimes nothing – for our own people.’ Anna thanked him for enlightening her. There seemed to be no end to the privation that the Norwegian people had suffered during the occupation. Yet nothing had shaken their united defiance.