She mumbled to the roof beams that tomorrow she would row to the main island, buy some food, get a cat and find out what had happened.

She could feel from his arm that he was nodding.

She asked if he understood and decided he did.

She said cat and meowed. He said Koshka and she could feel his smile against her fingertips. She ordered him to stay in the hideaway she had made and not to leave whatever he heard, shots or screams, he was to lie low from the moment she closed the door to the moment she opened it again, it might be a few hours, half a day at most. He said spasiba and cat and hideaway.

~

Ingrid thought she had everything under control when she hoisted the sail and glided over to the main island in the thick drifting snow, filled with hope that she could rid Barrøy of mortal remains and suspicion, a hope only the occupying forces could realise, if she played her cards right.

She moored as usual below the trading post, ran up to the village noticing not only an unaccustomed stillness, but that some of its fundamental essence had been ripped away by force, guards, vehicles, horses, an emptiness caused by something she was unable to put her finger on.

In the store she heard from Margot that British planes had sunk a German troop carrier a few miles further south. Hundreds had been killed, maybe thousands.

Ingrid said:

“Hva?”

Yes, Margot had heard about it from her son, who delivered goods to the Fort at the north of the island.

“War thar soldiers aboard?” Ingrid said.

“That’s hva they seid.”

“German?”

Margot said yes, and her expression changed, she scrutinised Ingrid’s face, and Ingrid was no longer in control of matters; she asked if the camp behind the school had been abandoned. Margot said most of them had moved to the Fort, where the radio, the P.O.W. camps and the artillery positions were, but the Kommandant is here today.

Ingrid blinked and looked around. She asked if Jenny and Hanna still had any cats.

Margot said that was probably all they had, this mother and daughter, with whom Ingrid had salted herring since she was a young girl and who lived in a grey cottage north of the canning factory.

But when she left the store, her unclear mission faltered again, then she strode up to the camp behind the school, where she was stopped by a uniformed guard. She said she had to speak to the duty officer. He squirmed and said in broken Norwegian that this was not possible.

Ingrid said Tote Tote and flashed the fingers of both hands twice.

He lit a cigarette and stepped up close to her, made a few menacing gestures and fired off a tirade of searching questions, of which she understood not one word.

She repeated Tote Tote and held up her fingers again.