Birch Manor - New Beginnings

The alarm clock rang and Susan turned it off. Knud turned to her: "Good morning, darling!" he said as every morning and gave her a kiss.
"Good morning, my dear," Susan replied, as every morning. "You better brew some really strong coffee today. I did not sleep very well last night."
"No, I heard it. You tossed and turned all the time, and you even went downstairs in the middle of the night. Is something wrong?"
"No nothing's wrong with me, but I have been thinking. Now you skedaddle, and brew us some coffee, then I will come when I have finished the morning gymnastics. I think best with some coffee inside."
"Yeah," Knud replied smiling as he pulled on his clothes and tugged downstairs to brew coffee.
"Downstairs ..." Susan thought. "At Birch Manor the kichen and bedroom are both downstairs, it won't be 'down' just 'over'. I wonder how it will be?" Then she reluctantly got up and did her morning gymnastics in front of the open window. She took her old, brown suitcase with her downstairs.
Over the day's second cup of coffee, Susan began to feel her brain functioning again: "Knud," she said, "I've been thinking ... most of the night ..." Knud nodded and looked interested. "Where have they gone?" she asked. "I mean, all the people from the Unicorn Farm? The only one we know positively where has gone is Gilvi, and he's dead. She read aloud from the yellowed newspaper clipping: '... further investigations have not clarified the cause of the fire, but the body of an old vagabond was found in the barn. The technical investigation also shows that the fire occurred in several places at the same time ... ' I am 100 percent sure that the vagabond was Gilvi. But what about all the others. What about Heidi and her family They were not at that pandemonium of a closing party, can they still do magic? What about Jon, and Birgitta, and worse, Torben and David and that scoundrel Tristan from Holland. I would like to track them down."
"Belgium," Knud corrected automatically, "he was French-speaking. What about the Swedes, Helge and Bo and the others,"
"Oh, God yes, Helge" Susan said. "He always got off on the wrong foot, wondering how he got on without magic?"
"Facebook and Google are your friends," Knud replied. "I think we should maybe take a day off from packing down the house and instead go hunting on the internet."
"I agree," Susan replied, getting up. Together they cleared the table and Susan brought an extra cup of coffee and her brown suitcase in front of the computer.
"In order not to waste time on the same people, you take Heidi and family and the green team this morning? Then I take the blue one, I hung out with the Swedes a lot back then."
"It's a deal," Susan replied.

***

When it was coffee time, Susan had also baked scones, She needed to think of something else, "It's a little creepy," she said to Knud when he came in with the coffee. "Most of those I have been able to trace have been via obituaries. Thora's death is of course no surprise, she died full of days sometime in the late 90s. But the apprentices ... Veronika: Died 1982 in a solo accident on her first drive alone. Terje, died of an overdose in Oslo in 1981. Josta and Marja, the Birchsisters, died with their parents, and an aunt and her children when the family's cottage went up in flames in 1979. Kirstin: Drowned in 1979 on a swim after a high school party. I have had no luck tracking down Kalle and Anna yet." She sighed deeply. "And then the good news: Hilde is a head nurse at a hospital in northern Norway. It suits her perfectly. And Rósa, fortunately she is also alive. She is at some strange museum for Old Icelandic magic, it sounds like a lot of piffle, really. But she's alive. I've been putting off looking for Heidi and her family, I was afraid of what I would find.
Knud shook his head: "Pretty much the same as you. Tähti and Taavi are obviously dead, they were almost 100 years old. But as you said ... the apprentices." Knud stopped and sighed as deeply as Susan. "Let me start with the good news. Helge is still alive. And so is My."
"Oh how good," Susan interrupted, "All the wand singers are alive so far. Me, My, Rósa and well, I have not found Anna yet. Sorry, just keep going."

"All the Eklund children, Bo, Britta, Harald and Lukas died, also in a summer house. They had turned on the stove, but they fumbled with the air supply. Carbon monoxide poisoning got them. Selma and Grani got married and died on their honeymoon. David is dead too He joined the squatters and suffered a cannabis psychosis. He jumped out the window one day the police stormed the building. I have not been able to find Sarah. And I'm going to look for Monica after coffee. Should I continue with the yellow team?"
"Yes, Heidi and the twins were on the purple team, so I'm already all set there. But, I'll come up with more people, where I'm unsure of both last name and age and so on, but I suppose that's how you feel about the yellow ones, right? "
"Yes, certainly," replied Knud. "So if you think of something, write it down, then we can compare notes after lunch."
"OK," Susan replied.

***

For the rest of the morning, Susan continued the depressing work of plowing through Swedish, Norwegian, Icelandic, Finnish and Danish obituaries and telephone directories online. Looking for Heidi and her family was a total fiasco. Although Kaithan and Cassandra were not exactly common names, there was no trace of them, and no Bachs. No Tage, Lis or Heidi at least. They must have either emigrated or changed their name.
Birgitta had had a tumultuous career; she had become a high school teacher, but had been fired after a case of abuse, since free school educator, then homeless and had died just before the turn of the millennium in a closed ward. Jon had become an actor and had emigrated to the United States, and there the trail disappeared.
Susan then tried to find Aamu, the last of the wand singers. She was somehow convinced that all the wand singers were still alive. But there were many Aamu's and several of them were named Raita for a last name. And it had to mean something as well, she found lots of adverticements for knitting patterns, yarn and so on; all in Finninch of course. However, she also did not find any obituaries for any of that name, so Aamu was probably still alive. It was hard for her to be sure, she was not good at Finnish, to say the least, and even with Google translate you only got that far. Jouka and Finnbogi did not give anything either. Mostly because Susan was unable to remember their last names or pretty much anything else about them. Maybe Knud could help her.
Jan and Olav, the two Norwegians, were the only two from the purple group Susan had any success finding. They had a wine import and party rental service in Oslo, and looked happy, convivial and life-enjoying in the pictures on their website.
Finally, just before she was about to give up, Susan tried facebook as a last resorit, she typed Berggren in the search box and found the missing Anna. She still lived in Helsingborg. Kalle, her brother, had died a long time ago. There was a notice for the 40th anniversary of his death on Anna's timeline from the year before. She sighed loudly again and got up from the computer.

***

"... and Ingrid died in a car accident in 1990. The only positive thing is that all the wand singers are probably alive," Susan concluded her story. "What have you found out this time, and could you please take over Jouka and Finnbogi? You probably know more about them than I do."
"Yes," Knud replied, "and could you please try and find Marit. I do not remember her at all."
"Marit? Well she was one of the good flyers. She is Astrid's sister and Olav's cousin. She flew for the yellow team and was actually a great help in our conspirator group at the time. I will probably find her if she wants to be found. I found both Olav and Astrid."
Knud continued his sad enumeration: "Torben went to Belgium, where he worked in a water park - that has to be Tristan's place. Those two and several employees died during a flood. Martine is still alive, as the only teacher, but she is old and living in a nursing home on Funen, how ever she ended up there ... she was Norwegian after all. Maybe we should go and pay her a visit? The apprentices ... it's a bit like a repetition. The living: Fiona, is a painter and healer in Hundested - We can visit her come summer.
Bjørn died of an overdose in the Stockholm underground. Nata from Finland travelled to India with Astrid - is that Marit's sister?" Susan nodded. "They were both found dead in Goa," Knud continued. "Sif and Elvin, the two amazing flyers, flew hang gliders and died when their twin plane was caught by a strong wind and crashed into a steep cliff at a show. Josh was shot in a gang war."
"Who are left over now?" Susan asked.
"Marit, Jouka and Finnbogi of course. And then Heidi, Tage, Lis and their parents, if they are still alive, Sarah from Rødovre."
"Her last name was Poulsen," Susan said. "Not that it helps much."
"Thank you, noted," said Knud, and continued, "and Monika, wasn't her last name also Bach like Heidi and was she a Norwegian?"
"No Bakke, I think, but I'm not sure of the spelling. She was from southern Norway, probably Oslo or the surrounding area. And then there's Aamu ... We will probably have to let her rest for a time. I will take over Marit, Sarah and Monika and then I'm giving Heidi and family an extra try, so you can concentrate on Jouka and Finnbogi."
"It's a deal," Knud said.

***

Susan found Sarah Poulsen pretty quickly. She was on Facebook, she was an early retiree and was part of various anti-vaccination and conspiracy networks. Not exactly what Susan had expected. "Nitwit," Susan thought to herself, "She was not very clever at Unicorn Farm either. Maybe we won't reactivate her magcical potentials as one of the first ones ..."
Monika Backe, Bakke or something in Oslo was a total blank. Susan put her aside and continued. Marit was next. Susan remembered Marit vividly. Astrid's always optimistic and balanced little sister. And she could fly a broomstick! Upon reading more about Astrid's death and burial, she found out that Marit had married a gentleman named Espedal. It reminded Susan of something. Jan o course! His last name was Espedal. The website had been simply Olav and Jan's Wine and Party Service. A quick look at the Norwegian yellow pages found Jan and Marit Espedal in a villa in the greater Oslo area. It had to be them!
At a sudden whim, she also looked up Olav in the yellow pages. And there, right nearby, lived Olav and Monica Ravndal, Monica with a C and not a K. It sounded almost too good to be true. She was looking forward to telling Knud about her findings.
But the magician's family. She would like to find Heidi again ... If they had changed their name, what would Heidi be called now? Suddenly Susan knew it! Tanja. Heidi had once told her that she had always dreamed of being called Tanja. With bated breath Susan tipped in "Tanja" in the search box on Facebook. There were several of that name, but only one that resembled Sandra, Heidi's mother, a bit. She went to her news feed. And there were two older siblings, a man and a lady, who back in September had congratulated 'Tanja' on her round day. There were several pictures and a plus for more. Susan clicked it. 'Tanja' and her siblings were on most of them. And their children as well. Susan was no longer in doubt. The children looked almost as had Heidi, Tage and Lis as they were at the Unicorn Farm together.
"I found them, all of them," Susan ran in to Knud. "Heidi and her siblings, Olav, Monica, Jan, Marit and Sarah. They're all alive and Tanja, as Heidi is called now, and Lis and Tage have a lot of kids who look like them! Huzzah! I forgot to check their names, I'll be back. " And with a quick kiss on top of Knud's unruly hair, she was off again. Tage was now called Svend and Lis was Ida. And they all lived close to each other - and only 10 kilometres from Birch Manor. Susan was ecstatic.
Knud came in: "Wonderful good news, I have to see." Susan showed him the pictures. "Oh yes, look at that boy," Knud was delighted. "It's just like seeing Tage again and that girl looks a lot like Lis. But it is not their children. It's their grandchildren."
"It's hard to get used to the fact that we're getting old," Susan sighed. "But of course you're right. Those adult creatures," Susan pointed to a nicely posed picture with Heidi, the twins and their spouses in the back, a row of adults in the middle and a group of children in the foreground, "ithose are the children and in-laws of Heidi, Lis and Tage. The children are their grandchildren."
"And I have found Finnbogi," said Knud. "It's weird that you did not find him when you were looking for Rósa, he also works at that museum of Icelandic original magic or whatever it's called ... it sounds pretty bogus to me. But so what. At least I found him." He stroked Susan's hair and disappeared back to his own computer again, only to return shortly after, while Susan was still sitting and studying Heidi's Facebook profile trying to sort out children, grandchildren and in-laws.
"And I'm done," Knud said sadly. "Jouka has been found. Dead. Another overdose in the drug circles of Oslo in the 80es." Susan sighed deeply and put a mark next to his name on her list.
"Actually an incredible number of apprentices have died. I let my former colleague do the maths. Out of 39, far more should be alive today. 33 would be the expected number. I have not counted in the teachers, as they were older."
"But it seems like people have died of ... uh, we have to call it natural causes," Susan said. "I mean, no murder or assault, except for Josh. And Torben and David are both among the early casualties, otherwise we could have suspected a conspiracy. A kind of revenge."
"It makes no sense, thankfully," Knud said. "Many of the dead ones had gone over to Torben's side before the infamous party. And Marja and Josta were some of Torben and David's staunchest supporters. I just think deep down inside the - no let's admit it - us former wizards and witches lived a yearning, a hollow feeling, an existential hunger that several of us have tried to fill up with daredevilry, drugs or whatever was at hand. Just think of yourself, my dear. "
"I am so happy to have you," Susan sighed contentedly, grabbing Knud's hand.
"Same to you, my beloved," Knud said embarrassed. "But it won't be long before we start visiting all those other wizards, will it? "
"No, of course not, We can take a trip to Hundested and look at Fiona's exhibition next time the weather is good," Susan said with a teasing smile.

***