The Storyteller (13 page)

“So the little queen climbed the ladder—the lighthouse keeper helped her up the wooden rungs—and she saw the black ship anchored far away. But she also saw something else. She saw a dark, narrow rowboat approaching the white beach, a boat in which a man with dark clothes was sitting, all alone. He gazed at the rose island with longing in his eyes, but he couldn’t manage to get his boat any closer than it already was.

“‘There is somebody,’ the little queen said, ‘who needs my help.’

“And she climbed down the ladder and ran over the island, down to the beach, as fast as she could. For she had a good heart, a heart made of diamond. When she stood on the white beach, she saw that the rowboat was delicately decorated: there were flowers carved into the dark wood, and the stern had a golden tip. Strange, the little queen thought, how the beautiful boat didn’t fit with the old sweater and fleece-lined vest of the man who was rowing it.

“‘Can I help you?’ the little queen shouted. ‘Surely the two of us can pull the boat ashore!’

“‘I don’t think so,’ the man replied sadly. ‘This island holds something against me and my rowboat. It’s as if the current wants to keep us from getting any closer … I guess I have to be content just to sit here and look at the island.’ Suddenly, he sighed. ‘It would be much nicer, though, if I had someone to sit with me.’

“‘I’ll sit with you for a little while!’ the little queen said and started wading out into the water. ‘Take me with you, as you row along the shore!’

“‘Oh yes, come with me!’ the man said happily. And he helped the little queen into the boat.

“‘Sit here on this bench …’ He stroked his blond mustache and rolled up his sleeves, and then he started rowing. The boat
shot forward like an arrow, but it also seemed to move away from the shore. ‘That’s the current,’ the man said. ‘It wants to push us away …’

“‘Little queen!’ someone shouted from the beach. ‘Little cliff queen!’ It was the lighthouse keeper—and the rose girl. They were standing on the beach, waving.

“‘Wait!’ the little queen said. ‘Maybe they want to come with us.’

“The man shook his head. ‘No,’ he said in a quiet voice, ‘I think it’s much nicer with just the two of us. They’d only disturb us.’

“‘Jump out, little queen!’ the rose girl shouted, and the lighthouse keeper shouted, ‘Come back!’

“‘She’s my passenger now!’ the man shouted back. ‘You don’t have any say in the matter!’

“The little queen saw the rose girl take a deep breath before the girl shouted, even louder than she had shouted before, ‘Do you remember what the white mare told you?’

“‘The white mare?’ The little queen thought about that. ‘She said that I must run … as fast as I can … to the highest cliff … and if I meet a man wearing my name …’ The man still had his sleeves rolled up and, suddenly, the little queen saw the tattoo on his right bicep. When he saw where she was looking, he quickly pulled the sleeve down, but she had already read the letters there. And her heart turned ice-cold from fear. ‘Who are you?’ she asked the man.

“‘You can call me father,’ the man said.

“‘I’ve got to go now,’ the little queen said, and then she jumped overboard and started swimming toward the shore. But the water was as ice-cold as her heart. Even colder. The waves, she thought, are beautiful, but they are dangerous … They will devour me … Then she felt somebody lift her out of the water and carry her to
the beach. It was the rose girl. The roses that she wore seemed to fend off the cold and protect her slender body. She put the little queen down on the beach, and the lighthouse keeper shook his head and pointed at the rowboat. The man in it was removing his fleece-lined vest and his old sweater; underneath he wore a red gown. A diamond was embroidered onto the sleeve of the blood-red material in exactly the same place the man had his tattoo—a tattoo of the little queen’s name.

“He turned his boat and slid away, without a sound, toward a dark shadow in the water beyond, back to where he’d come from. Toward the black ship with its black sails.

“‘Oh, let’s stay here!’ the little queen cried. ‘This is the only place where I am safe from him and the other hunters on the ship!’

“‘If you really want to stay,’ the rose girl said, ‘take this necklace.’ And she put a garland of fresh, blooming roses over the little queen’s head. When the little queen turned her head, the thorns of the stems cut into her skin, and a trickle of blood ran down her neck and dyed the artificial fur collar of her jacket red. And the little queen was afraid.

“‘I worried this would happen,’ the rose girl sighed as she took the necklace away. ‘Go back to your own ship, little queen. Only the rose people can live on Rose Island.’

“She accompanied the little queen and the lighthouse keeper back to the pier, and the lighthouse keeper, from sheer nervousness, was already smoking his third pipe.

“‘Rose girl … how did you know what the white mare said to me?’ the little queen asked.

“‘When your island sank, the wind carried her words over the sea,’ the rose girl answered. ‘The others didn’t hear them, but I did.
I heard the breaking of the trees, the bursting of the rocks, and the last words of your white mare. And I knew you were in danger, and I was worried about you even then, though I didn’t know you. But now I know you. And now, I’m even more worried.’

“The rose girl laid her pale hands on the little queen’s shoulders, and the two looked at each other for a long time. On the rose girl’s nose there were five tiny freckles, which distinguished her from the other rose people.

“‘I am fed up with seeing nothing but roses, day after day,’ she whispered. ‘Can’t I sail with you and take care of you, little queen?’

“‘You can,’ the little queen said, ‘but I don’t know what will happen to us. Maybe we will die out there on the blue sea.’

“‘Maybe,’ the rose girl said, smiling.

“The lighthouse keeper helped the rose girl aboard. The little queen helped Mrs. Margaret, who was a little vain and had donned a rose petal for a hat. But all of a sudden, the silver-gray dog was standing on the pier barking. He jumped over the green railing of the ship, bared his teeth, and ripped the branches from the rose girl’s arm, and the roses covering that arm withered instantly.

“‘What are you doing?’ the little queen shouted angrily. ‘She has just saved me! The hunter with the red gown wanted to take me away in his rowboat, but she took me back to the shore! You just didn’t see it because you were here, on this side of the island …’

“The silver-gray dog dove back into the water with an angry snarl and disappeared. The green ship sailed on, though, and the little queen worried that maybe she would never see the sea lion or the dog again. And she felt a prick of pain in her diamond heart.

“But in the morning, there was a bouquet of white sea roses next to the bed in the cabin, where the rose girl had slept. They were the
kind of sea roses that grow only far out in the sea and only in winter. Somebody must have plucked them from the froth on the waves. Possibly a sea lion. The rose girl smiled. But there, behind the green ship, were black sails, very close, much too close, and the little queen was cold in spite of her down jacket.”

Abel looked down into his cup. He drank the last bit of hot chocolate, which was long cold. He gazed out at the sea in the February dusk. Silently. Maybe he had used up all his words. Micha tore a little corner from the paper napkin and put it on Mrs. Margaret’s head, like a white rose petal.

“I think I … I’ll be back,” Anna said and got up. “Too much tea. Rose-hip tea …”

Anna was alone in the tiny room that led to the ladies’ room. She stood in front of the mirror, combed her dark hair behind her ears with her fingers, and leaned forward, over the marble counter with the two built-in sinks, so far that the tip of her nose nearly touched the tip of her reflection’s nose.

It was true. She had five tiny freckles there. You couldn’t see them unless you were really close. She took a deep breath and splashed her face with cold water. “Thank you,” she finally whispered. “Thank you for the sea roses. It doesn’t matter that you destroyed the roses on my arm with your teeth. They were unnecessary anyway.” And then she smiled at her mirror image. It seemed beautiful all of a sudden.

Abel and Micha weren’t talking about the story when Anna returned to the table. They were talking about school, Micha’s school, and about a picture she had painted there. And about Micha’s teacher with the blond curls: Mrs. Milowicz, whose name
Micha never managed to spell correctly and who’d been wanting to talk to Micha’s mother for a long time now.

“She can talk to you instead, can’t she?” Micha said, shrugging. “I told her that. Like she did on the first day of school, back then.”

“Yes,” Abel answered, but he looked away, out at the sea.

“Didn’t your mother come on that first day?” Anna asked, and then was immediately sorry that she’d asked.

“Mama doesn’t like school,” Micha said to Anna. “She always has other things to do. And sometimes she has to sleep in really late in the morning, if she’s been out the night before. Abel, what I wanted to tell you before was we had to draw a fish, and I made one with a whole lot of colorful scales, and you know what I can write now? X. Even though you never need it. It’s strange what you learn in school, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, strange.” Abel laughed. “Why don’t you tell Anna about the time you had to learn about the inner parts of the eye, and nobody understood a thing …”

He didn’t want to talk about Michelle. Anna was getting the impression, more and more, that Michelle just happened to live in the same flat as Abel and Micha, who also just happened to be her children. It sounded like Abel had been taking care of Micha for a long time, even before Michelle had disappeared. Maybe since Micha was born.

How old had he been then? Eleven? When Rainer was living in that small apartment, too … and then they had thrown Rainer out.

Anna tried to pay the bill, but Abel’s eyes turned cold once more,
and she let it be. “We don’t need charity, but thanks,” he said quietly. She nodded.

Outside, in front of the café, it was difficult to say good-bye. Anna couldn’t find the right words. She wanted to say “see you tomorrow,” but she didn’t know whether Abel would talk to her tomorrow or whether he would go back to behaving as if he didn’t know her. Abel stood beside her smoking. Micha jumped up and down in the snow, her pink down jacket with the artificial fur collar bouncing, her boots making as many weird footprints as they could.

“The problem is, we don’t get full social services,” Abel said all of a sudden. “Not without Michelle. She has to go in and sign for it herself. We get the children’s allowance. That’s something, at least.”

“How many bank accounts do you have?” Anna asked.

“Just one.”

“And you said you’re getting the children’s allowance, so I take it you’re drawing from that account, right? Michelle’s not the only one who can, right?”

“Of course. I’m the one taking care of the fucking household.” He laughed. “I’ve been doing that for a long time now. Michelle, she … well, she had problems. Drinking, for example. Not only that, though.”

Anna nodded. “If that’s the only account, you can check to see if anybody else is withdrawing money. And from which ATM. Maybe that’s the way to find out where she is. I mean, she has to live on something. She’ll need money.”

Abel didn’t say anything for a moment. “She hasn’t taken out any money,” he murmured finally.

“You’re sure? Did you check?”

He nodded. “Nothing’s been taken out.” But Anna wasn’t sure
he was telling the truth. She wanted to say, You know where she is! Why don’t you tell someone? Don’t you want her to come back … even a little bit? Or are you protecting her? From what? From whom?

“If I can do anything,” she began, and then she realized how stupid she sounded. “I mean, I could lend you something … it wouldn’t be charity then …” He shook his head, smoking in silence. Micha made baby footprints in the snow, using the sides of her fists, and Anna remembered doing the same thing when she was a child. Linda had showed her how.

“Where I live everything is so different,” she said. And suddenly she heard herself telling him things. About the blue light; about Magnus; about Linda, who was nearly invisible; about the single rose in the garden; the robins; England; Gitta’s glass wall, through which you couldn’t see anything worth seeing; and the easy-to-clean furniture—and when she mentioned Gitta’s mother disinfecting the white sofa, Abel started laughing.

He ground out his cigarette in the snow with his foot and looked at her. “Thanks,” he said. “It’s … it’s good to not always be doing the talking.” He unlocked his bike, helped Micha onto the carrier, and pulled the black woolen cap down over his ears. “About charity,” he said, before he rode away. “You know … you could donate the eighteen euros. The ones I owe you.”

“Excuse me?”

Abel turned around to look at Micha, who was busy stuffing Mrs. Margaret deeper into her pocket and whispering to her that she’d be cold otherwise. Micha wasn’t listening.

“You gave me twenty,” Abel said quietly. “Two is what that blister pack was worth.”

“I … I don’t understand …”

“I was afraid you’d really take some of that stuff. You looked so determined.” And he smiled, his smile gliding past her, out to sea. “Lucky nothing was written on the back of the package. Tylenol. I sold you Tylenol. Children’s Tylenol.”

Then he rode away, and Anna stood there alone, in the snow. She felt an absurd, sparkling laugh creep up her throat and shake her whole body.

“Young lady,” said an elderly gentleman, who had just come down the staircase of the café with his wife on his arm, “young lady, can I offer you my handkerchief? You’re crying.”

“Oh,” Anna said. “Really? I thought I was laughing. Stupid mistake.”

It didn’t matter that she had canceled their date.

He told himself that it didn’t matter. Why should it? He stood on the beach alone and looked out over the ice. It was nearly thick enough to walk on. No. He wasn’t alone. There was the dog—the dog that probably wondered why, over the past few days, Bertil had taken it out so often.