light and Jannick caught his breath, as if his whole future depended on this young friend’s answer.
“I like them,” she stated imperiously. “I think they are real. Maybe we could ask them to come down and talk to my mother about you.”
She put her hand on her small chin, in the pose of someone deep in thought. Her hair shone crimson in the slanting sunlight and Jannick caught his breath, as if his whole future depended on this young friend’s answer.
“I like them,” she stated imperiously. “I think they are real. Maybe we could ask them to come down and talk to my mother about you.”
“What about me?” Jannick asked in a panic, sure that the island lords had seen his every error and sin.
“That you are my friend,” she stated simply, and he cast his blue eyes quickly to the sea. Then he caught her hand in his and skipped around her, singing a sea shanty his father had taught him. She blushed and slapped his arm lightly. “Silly boy.”
So, on the evening his mother told him she would die, Jannick ran to Hanna’s window and knocked their secret knock. Hanna did not answer immediately and the small boy panicked. He ran to the front of the house and banged on the white wooden door. It popped open and Mrs. Knudssen stood there, glowering.
“Stop that! You are…”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Knudssen, but my mother needs help right now!”
The ship captain’s wife hesitated, then strode past Jannick and across the grass to the open door of the Rasmussen house.
“Martja?” she called.