would never regain consciousness.
Sheldon sat on the bench next to Trevor. There was nothing he could do for Saul — the son who had once stood on his lap to study his nose with the intensity of a scientist, and had put his fingers in his father’s joyful tears.
He watched passively as the boat rounded a bend towards a line of wooden rafts. He opened his eyes wide as machine-gun fire from those same rafts started pelting the hull.
As the bullets came in, the Monk let go of the wheel.
Trevor, who was already coiled, sprang forward and grabbed it, steering them directly towards the first raft at ramming speed.
The Monk impassively walked to the bow of the boat, stood upright at the prow, and then raised his arms like a Brazilian cliff diver, or Jesus and the criminals on their crosses.
Ritchie eviscerated one of the rafts with the M60. Splinters and the red spray of blood made a small cloud around it as the base broke apart.
Herman worked on Saul, Trevor piloted the boat, and the Monk stood there, untouched by man or movement as Saul bled.
This was Sheldon’s last vivid image in the dream. It was the one that woke him that night to talk with Mabel and ask his question. The one he still wakes with in the mornings. Somehow, the events of that day are not clear to him beyond this point. He knows the boat made it to safety. Saul was evacuated to Saigon, and died in the hospital. The letter was mailed as promised, and Rhea received her name. Trevor and Herman stayed on the boat until the end of their tour, and then went home.
The Monk never got shot. But one day, in another battle, he allegedly dived into the river and never came back up.
Chapter 10
They approach the small village of Flaskebekk over the port side, and Sheldon sails as close to the coast as he dares. He figures the coast guard won’t be interested in a small craft skirting the shore, and that the physical dangers are minimised in case something goes wrong. The weather is not going to change, and the current is not strong.
He has no idea, of course, what is under the surface, but one of the great benefits of the jon boat is its shallow draught. While not an especially seaworthy boat, it is an easy one to pilot.
The rifles he needs are named Moses and Aaron. The cannons they are named after, according to the guidebook that Sheldon leafs through on the voyage, are located at Oscarsborg Fortress on an island not too far ahead, called Sondre Kaholmen. Evidently, on 9 April 1940, the Germans sent a 14,000-ton warship called the
As the ship came into the sound near Drobak, Colonel Birger Eriksen and the few men under his command engaged the
As the ship burned on, the secret torpedo batteries on the island fired, sinking her and all hands from a range of only five hundred metres.
It is argued that Oscarsborg gave the government enough time to escape and form a resistance in exile that put Norway officially in the Allied camp. Norway soon fell to the Nazi invaders, and the puppet regime took over. Seven hundred and seventy-two Norwegian men, women, and children, who were Jewish, were rounded up by the Norwegian police and the Germans, and deported. Most were sent to Auschwitz.
Thirty-four survived.
Few of the Norwegian police received any punishment, and some were even kept on to retirement. The Holocaust itself was not on Norwegian university curricula for decades after the war. It took more than fifty years for Norway to build a national memorial commemorating the events, and a few more before the Norwegian Centre for Holocaust and Genocide Studies was opened.
The entire event, it seemed to Sheldon, was spoken of as though by witnesses, not participants. And where Norwegian actions were suspect, they were too easily dismissed in the easy memory of victimhood.
‘The question,’ Sheldon says aloud and looking south towards the Oscarsborg fort, ‘is whether we have enough gas to get there.’
The day draws on and on, and the sun never seems to move. Sheldon has never felt time pass so slowly. The entire journey from Oslo to just north of Drobak is less than seventeen nautical miles, but time and distance on the water are a property of mind.
They sail for four hours before the small engine runs out of gas.
They drift for thirty more minutes as the rising tide brings them gently to shore in a small, rocky bay surrounded by evergreens.
Sheldon considers the line of sight of passing boats, and ties the jon boat off at an angle where it will attract the least attention.
If it were made of wood, he would have sunk it.
If he’d had the strength, he would have pulled it to shore and hid it.
If he’d been younger, he would have plunged a knife into the heart of the attacker and saved the boy’s mother.
But things are as they are.
Once safely on shore, with everything removed from the boat, Sheldon is winded. ‘Aren’t you going to say anything?’ he asks Paul. ‘You can even hit me if you want. I deserve it. I’m sure I do. I should have called the police the second I heard the fight upstairs. Never even occurred to me. Didn’t cross my mind. I was too superior to the whole thing. I figured I knew what was what, and that this was all just going to play out with your mother running down the stairs and out to where someone else would look after her. I didn’t open the door for her. I opened it for me. Out of spite. To prove to everyone that this is what you’re supposed to do. Eighty-two years old, and I still think there’s an audience for my actions. Can you believe it? I’m playing to an audience that died fifty years ago. I should have called the police, and if we’d been lucky they would have showed up on time.’
Sheldon is taller than the boy, but he does not actually tower over him. Right now, he is slightly stooped and weary from the voyage. His back curves. They become almost the same height, and Sheldon tries to look him in the eyes.
‘Is it a coincidence,’ Sheldon asks, ‘that the older we get, the more we actually look like question marks? What I mean to say is this… I’m sorry. My best never seems to be very good. I’ve had a couple of moments. Not so many, though, when you consider how many chances I’ve had. I even missed Saul’s birth.
‘I don’t want to turn you in yet, do you understand? What if that guy is your father? He was in your apartment at all hours of the night, from the sound of things recently. He was probably there a lot. A boy like you doesn’t go mute all of a sudden. You had to learn this. You’ve probably been terrorised for ages. I could drop you off and then he could rush out and say, ‘My son, you found my son,’ and then I’d be handing you into the clutches of your mother’s killer. What kind of a friend does that?’
Paul listens. Sheldon does not know why.
‘You hungry? You must be famished. Let’s go borrow some food.’
Paul does not take Sheldon’s hand, but he does follow. They move slowly, because the long hours of sitting have hurt Sheldon’s lower back. Sharp pains jut down his left leg with each step, and he readjusts the satchel over his shoulder.
‘Let’s call it a day. We’re going over there.’
Sheldon extends his right hand and points to a lovely blue house close to the water. They are walking south, the fjord to their right. On the coast is a private metal pier for a boat that is not there.
