Between Two Seas (17 page)

‘Not fit company for his son?’ I ask bitterly. It’s my turn to blush. It’s a shock, but hardly a surprise. He ordered me to stay away from Mikkel and I ignored him. This is the next logical step. I can feel anger towards Mikkel’s father building up in me again. We walk the last few steps towards my wheelbarrow in uncomfortable silence. We don’t look at one another.

‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have told you that,’ Mikkel says at last.

I pick up the handles of the wheelbarrow and give it a vicious shove, imagining Mikkel’s father’s face beneath the wheel.

‘You’d have to explain somehow. Did he tell you why?’

‘No, he wouldn’t say,’ Mikkel replies, shaking his head.

‘Are you going to obey him?’

Mikkel hesitates.

‘You are! Why? Does he beat you or something?’ I ask.

Mikkel nods ruefully. ‘Not often. I usually take care not to give him reason. He’s always been very strict with all of us. He has quite a reputation.’

‘So I’ve heard. Does that mean we can’t be friends any more?’ Even I can hear the forlorn note in my voice.

‘Of course we can still be friends. He hasn’t forbidden me to see you entirely. I just thought, on Sunday, when he was watching, it was better to avoid angering him. Can I push that barrow for you for a while?’

‘If it won’t hurt your hands too much.’

He shakes his head, and I let him take it. I am confused and hurt and it’s making me feel sick. I’ve put up with so much hardship here, and it’s my friendships with Hannah, Peter, and Mikkel that have kept me going. I couldn’t bear to lose him.

Mikkel is not the only person out on the heath today. Sitting in a sheltered hollow, we see a lady sitting at an easel, painting. A little girl, two or three years old, is playing with some shells at her feet. I recognize Anna Ancher and her daughter Helga at once.

Curiosity overcomes my shyness, and I approach her to look more closely at her painting. The Anchers are a class apart, living quietly through winter until the artists from Norway, Sweden, Copenhagen, and even Paris, gather in Skagen for the summer months. The Anchers are well liked. I myself found out how kind they were when I first arrived in Skagen.

Anna Ancher looks up as we approach.

‘Ah!’ she says, and smiles. ‘Marianne, isn’t it? And Mikkel.’

I’m surprised that she remembers my name and instinctively drop a polite curtsey. Then I feel stupid, because that’s an English habit, and not really the Danish way of doing things.

Anna continues painting as she asks me, ‘How have you settled in here, Marianne?’

‘Very well, thank you. I even have work now, for Fru Hansen.’

‘And you’ve learned to speak Danish very prettily too, I hear. Well done.’ She flashes me a quick smile, but I hardly notice. My eyes are devouring the painting of Helga and the way she is delicately touching the colours onto the canvas. What amazes me most is the way she’s captured the sunlight falling onto her daughter. It looks so real. I wonder how she’s done it.

‘It’s beautiful,’ I tell her impulsively. Then I crouch down to speak to the little girl to hide my shyness.

‘How do you like to have a picture painted of yourself?’ I ask her.

She looks at me with the curious, open gaze of childhood.

‘Oh, mother is always painting me,’ she says indifferently.

Anna laughs.

Mikkel has flipped open his sketchbook, and is showing her my drawing of the lark. Anna Ancher looks at it, and then looks eagerly at me.

‘That’s good,’ she says warmly. ‘Can you paint?’

‘No,’ I reply quietly. ‘I’ve never tried.’

‘Do you draw a lot?’ she asks. ‘I’d be interested in seeing your pictures.’

‘I do, but mostly on a slate,’ I tell her. ‘So I’m afraid there’s nothing to show.’

Anna nods, looking disappointed, and turns back to mixing more blue and white on her palette and adding it to the sky. We walk on, and Mikkel pushes the barrow for me again.

When I’m home and Mikkel has taken his leave, I sigh, wrap a large apron around myself, and begin to behead and gut the fish. It’s a smelly, messy job and I loathe it. I know my hands will stink of fish for the rest of the day, no matter how thoroughly I wash them.

I tie the cleaned plaice up on the big wooden drying frame outside the house, and toss the heads and entrails onto the midden heap. A couple of gulls come to squabble over the scraps.

I’m in the middle of hanging up the washing the following morning when a ragged boy appears. He’s barefoot, and has a flat parcel tucked under his arm.

‘
Hedder du Marianne?
’ he asks. Are you Marianne?

‘
Ja, det er mig
,’ I agree, and he holds out the parcel to me. Hastily wiping my wet hands on my apron, I take it, but I wonder if there’s been a mistake.

‘From Fru Ancher,’ the boy enlightens me. ‘She gave me ten øre for bringing it to you!’ And with a delighted grin at the thought of such riches, he leaves.

I carry the parcel carefully indoors, and lay it reverently on the table. It’s wrapped in brown paper and neatly tied with string. Lise is jumping up and down excitedly.

‘Oh, Marianne, what is it?’

Lene looks sourly on, and Lise dances around me. With trembling fingers, I carefully untie the knots and unwrap the paper.

Inside is a beautiful sketchpad. We all gasp in surprise. The sheets of paper are creamy and smooth. I run my fingertips over them in a daze. Wrapped separately inside the parcel are several pencils.

‘She’s so kind,’ I murmur. There’s a little note, handwritten in Danish. I stare at it, without being able to make sense of it for several moments. It simply says,
Til Marianne, med hilsner fra Anna Ancher
. To Marianne, with best wishes.

Lise is already tugging at my hand, wanting my attention: ‘Can I have the wrapping paper, Marianne?’ she’s demanding.

I’m speechless, and can only nod.

I
see Hannah walking quickly towards the house while I’m washing Lise’s hair. My own hair is still drying.

‘What can Hannah be doing here at this time?’ I remark conversationally to Lise, starting to rub her hair dry with a towel. ‘She should be working at the hotel.’

‘Ow! You’re hurting me,’ Lise complains.

‘Go inside now, Lise, and ask your mother to comb your hair,’ I order her, handing her the towel.

My attention is on Hannah. As soon as she sees me looking at her, she breaks into a run, slipping a little in the soft sand.

‘Marianne!’ she calls out.

‘Is something wrong?’ I ask as soon as she reaches me. But Hannah is smiling and her eyes are shining.

‘They want you to come, and you can share a room with me. It’ll be such fun—say yes!’

I give her a friendly shake.

‘Tell me slower, Hannah!’ I ask. Danish can still confuse me when it’s spoken fast.

Hannah takes a deep breath and lets it go, beaming at me.

‘Hr Krøyer arrived in the night, when no one realized he was coming.’

‘Who’s Hr Krøyer?’

‘He’s a friend of Michael Ancher, a famous artist. He nearly always comes here in the summer to paint. Usually we know when he’s coming and the whole town goes to greet him with flowers and music and everything. Only last night, he arrived without warning, and no one knew he was here until he walked into the hotel.’

‘And what does it have to do with me?’

‘He’s brought a French gentleman with him. He’s an artist too. And his wife is with him. She needs a new maid, and she only speaks French. So we thought … we wondered if you’d like to be her maid while she’s here. Because you speak French. She’s very grand, Marianne. She has silk dresses and jewels and lots of luggage.’

‘But I’ve never been a maid. I wouldn’t know what to do.’ The world is suddenly spinning faster. Hannah is so excited, and I’m having trouble taking it all in.

‘She already knows that, and you’d earn a little less to begin with. But the hotel will pay you for any extra work you do. Oh and, Marianne, you can come and share my room at the hotel with me!’

‘Leave here? Really?’ I look around at the squalor and ugliness and think of the beauty of the hotel that I glimpsed last summer. It’s beginning to sink in now. I could leave this house. I’ve been longing to get away since I came.

‘It sounds too good to be true,’ I say.

Lise, who didn’t go indoors as I asked her, has understood enough so that she’s started to cry.

‘Don’t go away, Marianne! Please don’t leave us,’ she begs.

I pick her up and hug her close. I feel guilty that I can go so easily, when I know how much I’ve meant to Lise. But I have to take this opportunity.

‘
Du må ikke græde
, Lise,’ I tell her. Don’t cry. ‘Nothing’s certain yet. And if I do go, it won’t be far. I promise I’ll come back and visit you.’

But Lise is inconsolable.

‘Marianne, the French madame wants to meet you right away,’ Hannah urges. ‘Come on, put on your shoes and come with me.’

I carry Lise indoors to her mother and peel her off me.

‘I have to go to Brøndum’s Hotel,’ I explain to Lene. ‘It seems they might give me a job.’

Lene greets the news with an even more stony silence than usual. I’m not even sure if she’s heard me.

‘You don’t need me any more now,’ I say, unsure whether I’m trying to reassure her or myself. She looks away.

I quickly change my work clothes for my smart dress and brush and pin up my hair. It’s still damp, but I don’t think it shows. At least Hannah didn’t fetch me in the middle of gutting fish.

‘I’m very nervous,’ I confide, as Hannah and I wade through the sand of the main street, heading north to Brøndums Hotel. ‘What if she doesn’t like me?’

‘Don’t worry, Marianne,’ says Hannah. ‘She’ll love you, we all do.’

She stops in the middle of the main street and gives me a big hug.

I feel a rush of affection for her, but she’s already walking on, talking again.

‘We are going to be so busy. They’re expecting lots more visitors. There will be parties and grand dinners and fun.’

A most unwelcome thought strikes me, and I interrupt her in a panic:

‘Hannah, I’m not sure I can remember a single word of French! I’ve filled my head up completely with Danish!’

‘Won’t it come back to you?’ asks Hannah.

‘I can only hope so,’ I say, thinking frantically.

‘
Bonjour, Madame
,’ I say experimentally. ‘
Je suis Marianne. Comment … har De det
… Oh no, that’s Danish. This is no good. Danish words keep getting in the way.’

Hannah points the French lady out to me in the garden and gives me a little push. ‘Go and tell her who you are,’ she says. ‘She’s expecting you. Her name is Madame Perroy.’

Madame Perroy is reclining languidly in a deckchair in the shade, her eyes closed. Her embroidery is lying beside her on the grass. I address her tentatively.

‘
Madame?
’

The lady opens her eyes. They are dark, with long dark lashes. She’s a petite brunette, and my first impression of her is that she’s young and pretty. She’s wearing a pink dress, cut low to reveal as much of her plump bosom as is decent, or perhaps a little more. Her hair is elaborately dressed, and rings flash on the hand she waves sleepily at me.

‘
Ah, vous êtes la bonne?
’ You’re the maid?

‘
Oui, Madame
.’

I drop a curtsey, English style, and the lady nods approvingly.

‘
Très bien!
’ she exclaims. ‘Jean-Pierre!’ she calls imperatively and a man detaches himself from a group of guests and walks over to join us. He’s not particularly tall and is, like his wife, expensively dressed. I look at his handsome face; dark haired with an elegantly curled moustache, but no beard. He looks completely different to the men of Skagen.

Husband and wife are chattering in French together, much too fast for me to follow. After a few minutes, the gentleman turns to me.

‘I am Monsieur Perroy,’ he tells me in French. ‘My wife will be very happy to employ you as her personal maid.’

He takes me aside.

‘We can agree a wage, I think, no?’ he asks. He suggests a sum, and it’s more than I hoped for. I calculate the sum in my head quickly, wondering how long they will be staying here. My heart misses a beat with excitement.

‘Thank you,’ I say with a curtsey and a smile. ‘I accept.’

‘
Très bien
,’ he nods in satisfaction, and we return to his wife.

‘Marianne, you must come to me
tout de suite
.’ At once, Madame insists. ‘For I need someone to do my hair for dinner tonight.’

Her hair looks beautifully dressed already to me, and I hesitate a moment. It seems ungrateful to the Jakobsen family to leave in such haste. They gave me food and shelter when I most desperately needed it. But I’ve worked hard for many months to repay them. I don’t want to offend my new employers.

‘At once?
Mais bien sûr
,’ I say at last, and curtsey again. ‘I just need to pack.’

I find Hannah and tell her the good news. She has anticipated it by begging a couple of hours off to help me move.

‘But first you must come and see our room,’ Hannah tells me, and leads me up several flights of stairs to the hotel attics.

We have a tiny room with a sloping ceiling and a bed to share.

‘Everything is so new and clean,’ I say, admiringly. ‘I’ve never lived anywhere this nice!’ I run my hand along the bed and the wall, hardly able to believe it’s all real.

If I stand on tiptoe, there is a view from the small window down across the garden. Hannah hugs me again excitedly.

‘I’m so glad it’s you I’m to share with! It’s the first year I’ve lived in. Last summer I slept at home still. It’s going to be such fun, Marianne, just wait and see. Company and parties; all the grand visitors. And it’s still only May! We have the whole summer before us.’

I smile at Hannah, enjoying her delight. I’m still in a bit of a daze. But my heart is beating faster and my hands are trembling. I think it must be excitement.