Svend had told Henrik more than was probably wise—Henrik carried reports from Danish military officers on German troop dispositions, fortifications, ship movements, and airfields. Svend gave those reports to the British.
Henrik had been ordered not to read the papers. If Svend’s sources were revealed, the men would be arrested and the Germans could roll up the entire intelligence ring. Henrik might only serve as courier, but a single error on his part would cause inestimable damage.
He opened Mor’s Bible, not only to rationalize his presence in the church but also for nourishment.
Before the occupation, he had attended church only when Mor insisted, and after her death, not at all. But when he became Hemming, he had nothing to fill his lonely evenings except her Bible. At first he’d read out of boredom, then with blinding pain, but a pain that propelled him, like the pain from rowing, knowing victory lay at the end.
When he finished reading the book of 1 Peter, he packed the Bible in his satchel and left.
Outside, the thatcher was still thatching and the gardener had moved to another hedge. Henrik put on his cap, mounted his bicycle, and pedaled toward Vedbæk. The Søllerød church made a good drop site, only a five-mile bicycle ride from Lyd-af-Lys, and in a church where no one knew him.
Henrik rode past homes, some whitewashed with thatched roofs and some painted in brilliant colors with tile roofs. He passed through rolling countryside, through a dark tunnel of beech trees in the Trørød Forest, and into the town of Vedbæk. When he turned onto the coastal road, Lyd-af-Lys rose before him.
Built by his great-grandfather in the 1880s, the stately white Italianate villa with a blue tile roof stretched along a rise.
Henrik coasted through the gateway in the stone wall. No rake leaned against the wall, the signal Thorup would send if Far visited. Considering Far had never liked the villa and hadn’t set foot on the property since Mor’s death, Henrik could secretly claim it.
He rode behind the house, below the window of the opulent suite he’d once occupied. Now he slept in a little room in the cellar, where lights wouldn’t alert the neighbors to the presence of the heir.
Henrik parked his bicycle and crossed the lawn down to the boathouse and pier. Sunlight beamed through a hole in the clouds and lit up waters ruffled by a chilly wind.
He could almost hear Mor’s laughter.“I love the light on the Sound, don’t you, my little Henning?”
He had. He always had. Together, he and Mor had played with the phrase “the Sound of light.” In Danish,sund af lys. But Mor loved the dual meaning of the wordsoundin English—for a strait and for noise. Choosing the latter, it became Lyd-af-Lys.
Far had scoffed. “Light doesn’t make a sound.” While his love for Henrik left no room for leisure or failure, his love for Mor had at least humored whimsy.
Henrik shook his head and continued on his way.
With her love of wordplay, Else Jensen would enjoy hearing how the villa received its name. What an unusual young woman. Although she had some of the awkwardness often seen in the exceptionally intelligent, she had none of the arrogance.
Lately, she’d simplified her vocabulary with him. Not to make herself more appealing, as Fru Riber had so rudely suggested, but out of consideration. As someone who struggled to restrain his vocabulary every waking moment, he appreciated her effort.
Henrik entered the boathouse, filled with the smells of varnish and wax and wood and rope.
Thorvald Thorup polished the hull of the ocean scull. “God dag, Hemming.”
“God dag,Onkel.” They pretended Hemming Andersen visited his aunt and uncle each weekend in case anyone asked the Thorups about their visitor. It had taken time for all three of them to adjust to addressing each other in such a familiar way.
Since Mor’s death, only the Thorups remained at Lyd-af-Lys, with Janne to keep the house and Thorvald to tend the grounds and boats.
Thorup raked back blond hair dimmed by gray. “The wind’s still high.”
Henrik pulled the weighted waterproof metal case from under a tarp and unlatched it. Three weeks of messages lay inside, and he added the new batch from his satchel. “It’s been too long since I made a run. I’ll take the risk.”
Thorup muttered his objections, but Henrik ignored him. He latched the case shut and tied the attached rope to an eye on the bow of the scull below the waterline. If a patrol boat approached, Henrik could heave the case overboard, then haul it back in when safe.
Thorup tossed aside his rag. “Hungry?”
“For Tante Janne’ssmørrebrød? Always.” Fru Thorup created the best open-face sandwiches, piled with delicacies.
“Janne found those books you wanted.”
“Excellent. Thank you.” Each week he exchanged books from the library at Lyd-af-Lys to fill his evenings. His only other outlet for his intellect was the leather journal he kept locked in his trunk at the boardinghouse.
“Physics?” A note of disgust twisted Thorup’s voice.
Henrik laughed. “A physicist and a mathematician live in my new boardinghouse, and I’d like to understand their discussions better.”
