While the World Is Still Asleep (The Century Trilogy Book 1) (39 page)

“It shook me to my core when I saw your bicycle lying in the middle of the road,” said Adrian. “But putting it there was a good idea! I don’t know if we’d even have spotted you otherwise.”

The two men picked up Isabelle, and with Josephine’s help, they got her back up to the road. Gerd pushed aside the tools and spare parts covering the floor of the wagon, and they laid her down on a blanket.

“What about you? Everything all right?” Adrian lifted Jo’s chin to look her in the eye.

Jo smiled. “I’m fine. I’ve just had another hour’s sleep, whether I wanted it or not. But Isabelle . . . I’m worried about her. She might have some kind of internal injury.” Before she knew it, she started to cry.

Adrian gently wiped away her tears. “That’s the tension, sweetheart. But don’t worry too much. I think that Isabelle is just totally exhausted. It looks like this race was too much for her. And her wonderful boyfriend didn’t exactly help her take it at a reasonable pace. Where is he, by the way?”

“I’d like to know that myself,” Jo sighed, pressing one fist into her sore back. “When I got here, she was lying there, God knows for how long.” She chewed her lip.
Would it be unsporting of her to . . .
After a short pause, she cleared her throat.

“Would it be possible . . . You and Gerd are here now, and Copenhagen isn’t far, and Isabelle will be safe in a hospital there. I mean . . .” Josephine looked longingly at her bicycle, which was still lying on the road.

Without a word, Adrian went over to the wagon and dug out a water bottle and two sandwiches wrapped in paper. He held them out to her with an encouraging smile. “Provisions for the next sixty miles. As you know, the next food station’s in Kalundborg.” He kissed her. “Now get going! But carefully, please, one accident’s enough.”

Jo climbed back onto her bicycle and immediately felt her spirits rise. Isabelle was in good hands. What mattered now was the race.

Chapter Thirty-Four

The cramps began after Ballerup, a small town just west of Copenhagen. At first, it was only her right calf, which started pulling painfully tight every time she straightened her leg. Then her left calf started to cramp, too. Josephine took her feet off the pedals and stretched and twisted her legs every way she could think of, hoping the cramps would disappear on their own. But when she started to pedal again, the cramping in her right calf grew so sharp that she cried out in pain. Her bicycle wobbled dangerously for a second, and she had no choice but to roll to the side of the road and climb off. She massaged her calves, close to tears from the pain. But after the crabbed position she’d just endured while sitting with Isabelle, she wasn’t entirely surprised.

She climbed back onto her bicycle, her face contorted with pain. Even light pedaling was hard, but at least she was moving again. After just a few miles, she had to dismount again; the cramps were becoming unbearable. Massage the calves, drink some sugar-water, hope it would help, mount up, ride a short way, dismount again when the cramps returned—the next hour passed in a crippling rhythm. When Roskilde came into view, she was both aggravated and furious. It just wasn’t acceptable for cramping calves to ruin her race!

Unless she was mistaken, there was a farm with a large watering trough just beyond the next checkpoint in Roskilde. She’d noticed it the first time she rode past because it appeared to be much better tended than most of the other farmsteads in the region. Maybe it would help to soak her feet in water for a while?

After getting her stamp in Roskilde and a ten-minute ride at a snail’s pace, she reached the trough. There was no one in sight. The farmers were undoubtedly all out in their fields. All the better! This way she didn’t have to come up with tedious explanations.

Awkwardly, Jo lifted first one leg, then the other, into the trough, then sat on the edge of it. The water was ice cold. Josephine formed her hands into a bowl, held them under the faucet above the trough, and drank greedily. She splashed the refreshing water over her face, cooling her skin, which was hot and burned from the merciless sun. She sighed, feeling suddenly invigorated. She never wanted to leave here!

After a quarter of an hour, though, she swung her chilled legs over the edge of the trough and set them on the sandy ground. She felt fresher and stronger than she had for hours. But when she took a step toward her bicycle, a new cramp struck, this time in her right thigh . . .

What now? She couldn’t just sit in the trough for hours as if it was a bathtub! In desperation, Jo rummaged through her pockets for anything that might help her. Suddenly, she heard a loud male voice behind her: “Hey!”

Jo spun around. A big, powerfully built man with a similarly massive dog at his side stood before her. The dog’s head reached the man’s hip.

The farmer and his watchdog. Just what she needed.

“Hvad er der i vejen?”
the man snapped. His face was shot through with red veins, which could either be a sign of too much aquavit, or the result of working out in the raw sea air. Jo straightened up clumsily.

“Hvad med dig her?”

What she was doing there? All she wanted to do was be on her way again! She took a step back, but the man spread his feet and planted himself between her and her bicycle, blocking her path.

“Stop!” It sounded like the crack of a whip. The man’s dog growled.

Jo’s heart was hammering in her chest as she tried to move past, first on the left, then on the right, without success.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you. I just wanted . . . water.” She pointed to the trough. “
Vand
—do you understand?” she asked, the word that Charles Hansen had used so many times suddenly coming to her.
“En flaske med vand.”
A bottle of water. “Can I please go now?”

The farmer nodded, but he did not move aside. Then he pointed to her shaking legs.

“Du er syg?”

“Am I what?
Sick?
Ney . . .
” Jo bit on her lip. If she said the wrong thing now, he’d probably think she was easy prey and—

The farmer pointed to the bicycle and uttered something in Danish. Jo understood only two words.
Susanne Lindberg.

“Yes!” she shouted with relief. “I’m riding in the race! But my . . .” She gestured at her trembling legs.

The man’s dour expression transformed into a broad grin. This was followed by an excited but completely incomprehensible speech in which Susanne’s name came up several times.

Relieved but still plagued by cramps, Jo went to move past the man to her bicycle. But the farmer was faster. He picked it up and held it out to her. Then he said something that Jo took to mean that she should wait. Gesticulating wildly, he ran back to the farmhouse.

She waited. With the pain in her right thigh, she would only be able ride a few hundred yards, anyway. No longer afraid, she now hoped the man would bring her a glass of milk or something to eat.

But when the farmer returned, all he had in his hands was a small glass jar. He removed the lid and held the jar under Jo’s nose.

The smell was so sharp and penetrating that Jo instantly started to cough. She waved her hand frantically in front of her face to clear the stench.

The farmer laughed. Then he handed her the jar and made a motion with his hand as if he were rubbing his right leg.

Jo looked doubtfully at the farmer, then at the dark-brown stinking ointment. She’d heard many times that people in the country had miracle cures for all kinds of ailments. But should she try the stuff? The better question, she realized, was, what did she have to lose? Either the stuff would help with her cramps and she could continue riding, or her race was already over.

Jo dipped a finger into the jar and dug out a little blob of ointment.

The man turned away respectfully so that she could lift the hem of her bloomers and rub the stuff into her leg. She found the entire situation so ludicrous that she had to suppress a laugh.

The ointment, at first quite thick, instantly softened on her skin. Moving her hand in a circle, Jo massaged it into her thigh.

She felt its effects immediately. At first, it was just a light prickling on her skin. Then it began to burn, a sensation that moved from the surface down into the deeper layers of her skin. She felt her hardened muscles grow warm and soft again, and the pain vanished. Jo raised her eyebrows in surprise. What kind of wonder substance was this?

“God?”
shouted the farmer over his shoulder.

Jo laughed. “Good? I’ll say! This is . . . amazing!”

The farmer turned and clapped her on the shoulder so hard that Jo feared she might have a new injury to deal with. Then he signaled to her to keep the jar.

“Really?” Jo grinned broadly.

Jo swung her leg high and mounted her bicycle as if she’d never had a cramp in her life. “Thank you so much! You’ve saved me, I mean it!”

The farmer, who understood nothing of what she said but could clearly interpret her joy and relief, laughed.

“God rejse!”

The air smelled deliciously of seaweed, salt, and the smoke from the many fish-smoking operations in the area. The entire coast here made its living off fishing, which was not surprising considering the numerous small fjords, some of which penetrated a long way inland. Dozens of small fishing boats bobbed up and down in these sheltered tendrils leading in from the open sea. Along the shores, men with their hats pulled low hauled in large nets and carried crates of fish from the boats to land, their work accompanied by the constant screeching of seagulls fighting for scraps.

Josephine felt exhilarated as she rode past all of it. There was so much to see!

Still, her encounter with the farmer had left her thoughtful. Until today, she had never been in any serious danger on any of her rides, but how quickly that could change. She wanted to ride in the company of others going forward. But she hadn’t seen any of the other racers since the unfortunate incident with Isabelle. And when she rode into the next checkpoint, she was the only one there collecting a stamp for her booklet.
Was anyone else actually still riding?
she wondered, simultaneously worried and annoyed. What if she, too, had an accident? Adrian was a living example that her fears were not unfounded. When she thought about what had happened to
him
 . . .

Josephine had kept a tight lid on any thoughts of Adrian’s disability since starting the race thirty hours earlier. Now, though, she saw him constantly in her mind’s eye, and the way he had to hobble with his damaged leg. They had shot him like a mangy dog. A callous robbery on an open road for a watch and a few dollars had changed his entire life from one moment to the next.

How lightly he had dismissed his inflexible knee! As if he were dealing with a sniffle that would go away in a couple of days. But what if the doctors at the Charité hospital in Berlin could not help him, either? What if he could never ride a bicycle again? What then?

“I’ve got my great cycling adventure behind me. Now it’s your turn!” he’d said to her. She would ride to the ends of the earth for him. But would that be enough? Would he ever give voice to his envy? How would she feel then?

You think some useless thoughts,
she chided herself and was relieved when she saw the pretty half-timbered houses of Kalundborg appear against the light of the setting sun. Things were what they were. No one could force fate. All they could do was make the best of what they had, and that was exactly what she planned to do. Adrian was the man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with, and no smashed knee or other handicap would change that. Now she just wanted to get her next stamp. Gradually, her booklet was filling up.

The next food station had been set up in Vordingborg. As on the previous day in Køge, Charles Hansen had rented a barn where the riders could sleep for a few hours. As she rode up, Jo was besieged by reporters following the race. How did she feel? Which stretch had been the hardest so far? What did she think of Denmark? Did she think she’d be able to finish the race?

Although Charles Hansen had warned all the riders to be friendly with the reporters, Jo answered their questions as succinctly as she could.

She was just leaning her bicycle against the wall of the barn when she heard a voice behind her, “You’ve made it this far, too?”

“Lilo!” Josephine turned and embraced her friend. “It’s so good to finally see one of you again!”

Lilo grinned. “Did you think we’d given up? No way! I’ve already been here for two hours. I was just about to head off again, but what the heck. I’ll keep you company while you eat. Irene rolled in fifteen minutes ago. I’d love to hear how the race has been going for both of you.”

“Irene was just fifteen minutes ahead of me . . .” Jo murmured. That meant that they had been just a few miles apart the whole time. If Jo had known that, she might not have felt so lonely over the last few hours . . .

“So Adrian and Gerd Melchior haven’t come in yet?”

Lilo told her no, but Jo had not expected it to be otherwise. It would have taken them quite a while to get Isabelle to the hospital, then change horses and get going again. They may have taken a shortcut or followed the route in the other direction to make themselves available to other cyclists.

Charles Hansen had hired three coaches with helpers, tools, and spare parts as escort vehicles, and one of those was standing at the ready in Vordingborg. Jo asked the man to change her provisional front brake pads, then she went arm in arm with Lilo to the table with the food and drinks.

Josephine discovered that seven of the thirty starters had dropped out. She silently asked herself whether that number included Isabelle. But she didn’t want to bring that up before she got something to eat.

Susanne Lindberg and her fellow Danish riders had left Vordingborg long before. Susanne had to be superhuman, because it seemed she took hardly any breaks at all. No one knew exactly how far ahead she and her team were. According to an English rider, Leon Feininger and Veit Merz had joined the lead group now, too.
How nice for Leon,
thought Josephine grimly. All that mattered to him was riding with the leaders, even though his girlfriend was lying half dead in a hospital!

She was just spooning out a generous helping of mashed potatoes when Luise Karrer pedaled in. And with the words, “I can’t go on,” she threw first her bicycle, then herself, onto the grass.

Lilo, Irene, and Jo looked at her. All of them knew that feeling. They also knew that Luise would pull herself together in a few minutes. They joked about their disheveled appearance. Their hair was mussed and dusty; their faces were streaked with perspiration, road grime, and tears of pain; and their clothes stank of sweat and toil. But who cared? They were all still healthy and chipper.

Jo, sadly, had to dissent on that last point. Over a cup of tea and sweet pastries, she told the others about Isabelle’s accident. They were appalled.

“And Adrian’s the one who takes her to hospital . . .” Irene made a face. “Looks like she’s still keeping him on his toes!”

Luise told them that she had accidentally rolled over a dead rabbit and crashed north of Copenhagen. “Rotten little beast,” she said. “I’m lucky I didn’t end up like Isabelle.”

Then Irene reported that she had suffered such terrible cramps in her legs at one point that she had thought she would have to give up. Jo laughed and told them about her encounter with the farmer. Then she handed Irene the jar of brown ointment.

“It burns like fire!” Irene cried as she applied a little to one calf. “Are you sure you didn’t get this stuff from an Indian?”

Josephine looked at her in confusion.

Irene grinned. “Didn’t Adrian tell you? It took an Indian medicine man to heal his leg, and he used some kind of stinking ointment as well.”