The Beekeeper's Ball. Susan Wiggs
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What was it like, having another family living with you?”
“At first, life still seemed...normal. Routine. From my perspective as an only child, it was good fun having a playmate. Yes, it was routine, until Sweet and Eva disappeared into the night.”
“Were they warned that there was going to be a roundup of the Jews?” asked Mac.
“You’ve done some reading, then,” said Magnus. “But in fact, some years later, in the autumn of 1943. No, the reason Eva and her father had to leave was that the Germans found out my father’s greatest secret.”
Secrets seemed to run in this family, Mac thought, looking from one sister to the other, two beautiful but very different women who hadn’t known each other while growing up.
“What precipitated their leaving, then?” Mac asked Magnus.
“An agent affiliated with the Danish underground was caught and tortured. We had to assume the operation was compromised. Eva and her father had to leave in secret well in advance of the official action. They were sent up to a small coastal town called Helsingør—you would know it as Elsinore, from the Shakespeare play. Shortly after that, the soldiers came to search the house, but by that time, there was nothing to find. The Nazis were furious that the tip-off failed to yield any results, and they took my parents in for questioning.”
Now Magnus closed his eyes and held himself very still, so still that Mac thought he might’ve drifted off to sleep. He exchanged a glance with Isabel. She sat unmoving, her fingers braided together, tense.
Then Magnus opened his eyes. “I never saw them again. From that night onward, I was on my own. Which is my long-winded way of explaining what I meant when I said I didn’t make a decision of any sort about my own future. I simply reacted, determined to survive, as any wild animal might do. I lived by my wits—or lack thereof—from day to day. So in that sense, it wasn’t a decision that brought me to America. It was happenstance—and sheer blind luck, although I do not recall feeling at all lucky that day.”
He shook his head, paused to sample the honeyed cheese with some bread. “From today’s perspective, it is easy to look back and deride ourselves for not seeing the storm coming. But you understand, we were simply Danes, living our lives and going about our business. It was quite some time before I even grasped that there was a division between Jews and Gentiles. We were all Danes first. Denmark did not force Jews to register their property, or to identify themselves, and God knows, they were never made to give up their homes and businesses.”
“That came later, didn’t it?” said Tess, regarding him with soft-eyed sympathy. She reached up and took the feather thing out of her hair and set it aside.
“It all came about gradually as the Germans tightened their control. They broke their promises one by one, replacing each edict with another. The Germans even claimed the Jews of Scandinavia would not be included in their Final Solution. But by that time, everyone knew that was a lie.”
“For the bee, honey is the ultimate reality. It represents the fulfillment of her life mission, the triumph over her enemies, the continuity of the hive, the justification for working herself to death. Honey is to bees what money in the bank is to people—a measure of prosperity and well-being. But there is nothing abstract or symbolic about honey, as there is about money, which has no intrinsic value. There is more real wealth in a pound of honey, or a load of manure for that matter, than all the currency in the world. We often destroy the world’s real wealth to create an illusion of wealth, confusing symbol and substance.”
—William Longgood, The Queen Must Die
If possible, get the ingredients at your local farmer’s market. Food tastes better when you know where it comes from.
⅓ cup honey
⅓ cup lemon or lime juice
6 fresh mint leaves, finely snipped
2 cups melon cubes
2 cups green seedless grapes
1 cup fresh blueberries
1 cup fresh pineapple chunks
Use a whisk or hand mixer to whip the honey until it turns thick and opaque. Add the lemon or lime, then stir in the mint leaves. Combine the fruit in a large glass or pottery bowl. Pour the honey mixture over and stir gently to coat. Serve immediately with a clear flute of sparkling water or Prosecco.
[Source: Original]
Copenhagen, 1940
“Here, let me fix your hair again.” Magnus’s mother licked the palm of her hand and smoothed it over his head. “This cowlick will not be tamed.”
He gritted his teeth, enduring the grooming in order to get the picture taking over with quicker.
“Goodness,” Mama said, “you’re taller than me all of a sudden. When did that happen?”
“He’s going to be taller than all of us,” said Farfar, his grandfather, reaching out to straighten Magnus’s tie. Even though it wasn’t a Sunday, they were all wearing their Sunday best. The starched and creased collar cut into his neck.
Uncle Sweet had set up a big cube-shaped black camera on a tripod, its accordion-fold lens aimed at the apple tree in the backyard, where they were gathering for the family portrait. Sweet wasn’t really Magnus’s uncle, and Sweet’s daughter, Eva, wasn’t really Magnus’s cousin. Yet Magnus had long known him as Uncle Sweet. His real name was Sigur, but everyone called him Sweet. Papa said they’d come up through school together as boyhood friends, the way Magnus was with Kiki Rasmussen, his best mate.
Sweet was a photographer, making his living by taking pictures of people and buildings. He used to have a studio and picture laboratory in Strøget, but he closed up shop soon after the Germans invaded Denmark and overran the city. Papa said this was because Uncle Sweet was Jewish.
“All together, now,” he said, motioning Magnus and his parents and Farfar to their places under the tree. “You, too, Eva. How pretty you look, with those ribbons in your hair.”
Unlike Magnus, Eva seemed to like getting all dressed up. She preened as she stood next to him. Then Uncle Sweet got into the picture, and fired the shutter with a button on a cable attached to the camera. He repeated this several times until he was satisfied.
“Good work, everyone,” he declared, clapping his hands. He had a funny grin and dark hair that stuck out over his ears. Magnus had always thought he looked like a tall, skinny clown. “I’ll go to the basement and process the plates. Eva, hang up your good clothes and finish putting your things away in your new room.”
“Yes, Poppy.” Flipping back her fat, dark pigtails, she followed him into the house.
Papa had explained to Magnus that Uncle Sweet and Eva had been put out of their house, and were coming to live with them. For safety’s sake, they had to pretend they truly were family. The photograph was meant to promote the illusion. It would be displayed on Mama’s pianoforte, along with the other family pictures.
“How long will they stay with us?” Magnus asked his mother.
“For as long as they need to, I would imagine.” Her mouth turned down at the corners. “That poor little