One fine day she and Arne row to Malvika to collect the færing from Adolf, and on the way back Arne asks whether he and his brothers will be paid for their work on Barrøy, in Molandsvika they weren’t given a penny, and barely any food.

Ingrid notes that it has taken him close on a month to bring this matter up. She laughs and says, we will all be paid one day, they are going to sell the fish as early as possible this year, hopefully before it is too late, she has been in Margot’s stockroom and has seen it is crammed full of goods, which presumably are a much stronger currency than money in times like these.

Arne and his brothers will get what they are due.

Then they will collect eggs and sell them too, and eider down, but as usual it won’t be sold for a year or ten, hopefully at the very moment they can get almost as much for it as it is worth. Ingrid’s father knew the price of a finished eiderdown, now Ingrid does too, and never on this earth has there been less equivalence between what a commodity costs and what those who create it receive.

Arne understands this.

Ingrid asks him what his plans are.

Arne is rowing hard and doesn’t want to go into detail, there is something evasive about him, but one thing is sure, they are going back to Finnmark.

His eye is no longer a red beacon, but a piece of matt glass Ingrid has learned how to read. She says there is nothing in Finnmark. He says that if it is as she claims, with regard to money, then that might mean the war will soon be over and then whatever is in ruins now can be rebuilt.

Ingrid says all that about the war ending now is no more than wishful thinking.

“O.K.,” Arne says, continuing to row with his massive arms, and it occurs to Ingrid to ask him when the brothers’ birthdays are. He asks her why she wants to know. No reason, Ingrid says.

Before they arrive on Barrøy she also contrives to ask Arne if he is ready to take on the work of rebuilding the houses in Karvika, after all he is a carpenter, he will get paid for that too, she says.

He asks:

“With money that is worthless?”

Ingrid laughs.

~