Until I Find You

"What kid?"

"That poor little boy," Lars said.

"Stop," Jack said. "What little boy?"

Ladies' Man Lars looked very distressed. "Ole said this would happen!" he blurted out.

"What would happen?"

"This--you finding me!" Madsen said. "Okay, okay. Let's begin with that, Jack. How hard was it to find me?"

"Not very," Jack told him.

"It's not hard to find anybody, Jack--let's begin with that. Your mom was never looking for your dad. She'd already found him before she came here. Do you get that?"

"Yes, I get that," Jack said. "It was never about finding him, right?"

"That's right--you've got that right," the Ladies' Man said. "Okay, okay," he repeated. Jack realized that the Fish Man had been dreading this moment for almost thirty years! "Okay, okay. Here we go, Jack."

Because William thought that the news might finally persuade Alice to leave him alone--not to mention that he hoped Alice would allow him at least occasional visits with his son--Jack's father wrote to Alice in Toronto and told her that he was engaged to be married. The lucky girl was the daughter of the commandant at Kastellet, the Frederikshavn Citadel, where William Burns was apprenticed to the organist, Anker Rasmussen, in the Kastelskirken.

Jack thought he remembered the Ladies' Man telling him and his mom that William was involved with a military man's young wife, but William Burns had actually been engaged to a military man's daughter. There was no young wife; if Jack had heard of one, it was his mother who'd told him about her, not Lars. Alice had brought Jack to Copenhagen to prevent the marriage from ever taking place.

Hans Henrik Ringhof was the commandant's name. He was a lieutenant colonel. He loved William like a son, Lars Madsen told Jack. Lieutenant Colonel Ringhof had a young son, Niels, who was twelve going on thirteen. Niels's older sister, Karin--William's fiancee--doted on Niels. William was teaching Niels to play the organ; Niels was quite a gifted pianist. Karin was an accomplished organist; her late mother had been a musician. Lieutenant Colonel Ringhof had lost his wife in a car crash. The family had been returning to Copenhagen from a summer holiday in Bornholm when the accident happened.

They were a wonderful family, William wrote to Alice--he felt he was marrying all of them. Once Jack had started school, his father hoped that Jack's mother would allow the boy to spend part of his Christmas vacation in Copenhagen; William thought that Jack would find the atmosphere of the Frederikshavn Citadel stimulating at that time of year. There were Christmas concerts, and what boy wouldn't be excited to spend time in a fortification with all the soldiers?

"But your mother had her own agenda," Ladies' Man Madsen told Jack.

Soon Lieutenant Colonel Ringhof and his daughter were exposed to various sightings of Alice--and the same long-distance sightings of Jack that his mom had permitted his dad in Toronto. Nothing had changed in Alice. "She had a keep-me-or-lose-Jack mentality," as the Ladies' Man put it.

In Copenhagen, Alice added a new rule to the conditions she imposed on William: if he wanted to get a look at his son, William had to bring his fiancee with him. She had to see Jack, too. Naturally, it was Alice who wanted to get a look at Karin Ringhof, but Karin complied; she loved William and shared his hope that Alice would one day permit the boy to spend time with his father.

Additionally, Lars told Jack, Alice tried to seduce the only men in William's life who mattered to him. Anker Rasmussen, the organist, was justifiably appalled by her behavior--Rasmussen refused to see her. Lieutenant Colonel Ringhof, the widower who loved William almost as much as he loved his own little boy, was also appalled. Lieutenant Colonel Ringhof tried to reason with Alice, to no avail; he most certainly didn't sleep with her.

"The situation was at a standoff," Ladies' Man Madsen informed Jack. "Then you fell in the Kastelsgraven--the damn moat!"

"But what did that have to do with it?" Jack asked.

"Because the commandant sent little Niels to rescue you!" Lars told Jack. It was Niels Ringhof, not the littlest soldier, who'd saved him! "Until then," the Ladies' Man continued, "everyone had done a good job keeping your mom away from Niels. She barely knew he existed. I know that Niels knew nothing about her. But that was how she met him, Jack. Your mom must have said something to the boy; she must have thanked him for saving you, I suppose."

That had been Jack's idea--that his mom should offer his rescuer a free tattoo, not that a tattoo was what she offered Niels.

"She seduced the kid?" Jack asked Ladies' Man Madsen.

"She sure did, Jack. She got to him, somehow."

Niels Ringhof's clothes had almost fit Jack, but not the soldier's uniform; Niels had obviously borrowed or stolen it. Maybe that was how Alice had got him in and out of the citadel--she'd dressed him like a soldier. And that night she'd sent him back from the D'Angleterre, he must have walked home alone!

"He was how old? Did you say twelve?" Jack asked Lars.

"Maybe twelve going on thirteen, Jack. I'd say thirteen, tops."

Their last night in Copenhagen, Tattoo Ole and Lars had taken Jack and his mom to a fancy restaurant on Nyhavn. But William had picked up the tab. That would have been William's last sighting of his son in Copenhagen--his and Karin's last sighting, because Jack's mom insisted that his father bring Karin to the restaurant, too. ("To see us off," Alice had told William.)

"They were there, in the restaurant?" Jack asked Lars.

"At a table on the same side of the fireplace," the Ladies' Man answered. "You may remember the restaurant, Jack. You had the rabbit."