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about kindly, setting breakfast before me. She gives me weak ale, to which I’m not accustomed. We drank tea at home. The bread is dark and bitter, like nothing I’ve ever tasted. I don’t like it at all. I hope they have proper bread here as well as this sort.
    Once I’ve eaten what I can, I thank the landlady and she teaches me the word in Danish. Tak .
    ‘ Tak! ’ I imitate. She smiles, and pats me on the cheek.
    It’s my first word of Danish and it will be useful. I’m still weak and shaken from the sea crossing, but the ground is firm beneath my feet now, and I’m able to walk up the hill to the town.

SEVEN
     

Frederikshavn, September 1885
     
    I shiver as I climb down from the train into the smoke and steam on the platform: the temperature has dropped at the end of the day and I’m stiff and cold. A porter hurries forward to take my trunk. I’ll have to pay him. More money gone.
    Large signs announce that this is Frederikshavn, the last station on the line north. I am only some thirty miles south of Skagen now. Nearly there!
    I have travelled up from Esbjerg in just one long day. The train was comfortable and swift, and I enjoyed the journey. But it was an expensive luxury. I only have five Danish kroner and a few øre left. The coins are wrapped in a handkerchief, carefully tucked into my pocket. I’ve counted them over and over again.
    As we walk up the platform, I look for a railway official. When I see one in his dark suit and cap, he is surrounded by passengers. I must wait my turn to speak to him while the porter taps his wooden clogs impatiently. I feel flustered. Queuing is not much respected here, it seems, and I am left standing stupidly as other passengers push past me to speak to him.
    ‘Excuse me!’ I say at last, when there is a moment’s pause. ‘I need to go to Skagen.’ I’ve written the name on a piece of paper. He says something and gestures, but of course I don’t understand. I’m so tired I can’t think of a way to explain. In the end he shrugs and turns away as someone else claims his attention. My heart sinks.
    ‘Problems always look smaller in the morning,’ my mother used to say. I settle for miming to the porter that I need to find somewhere to sleep, somewhere cheap.
    As I follow him out of the station I can smell the sea and the fish from the harbour. We are right by it here; I can see cranes and warehouses on the quay, and here too, they are extending the harbour.
    We pick our way through a maze of narrow, filthy alleys. Either side of us are hovels and drinking houses, from which men emerge from time to time, reeling with the effects of drink. Outside one, two men are attempting to fight, but are almost too drunk to stand upright. They slip and stagger among the refuse that’s lying in the street. We give them a wide berth. I’ve never been out this late, though I’ve heard the sounds of drunken men often enough.
    The place the porter takes me to is neither clean nor friendly, but it is cheap. The name on the front of the building is Cimbria . It’s a huge, many-storeyed building on the harbour front, and stinks of fried fish, stale spirits, and pipe smoke.
    I thank the porter, and impulsively press a fifty øre coin into his hand. That’s half a krone. I can’t afford so much, but he’s carried my trunk a long way. He touches his cap and smiles as he leaves. I’m glad I gave him the money.
    A hard-featured woman with a dirty apron slaps some fried fish, bread, and ale on a dirty table for me in a busy public room, and then ignores me. There are shouts and bursts of raucous laughter from the men and women at the other tables around me. They too are drinking. My mother would not consider this place respectable. I feel conspicuous sitting alone.
    I eat quickly and flee to my room. It’s right up on the attic floor under the eaves. The room is tiny, just space for a bed. By the sound of it there are whole families squeezed into the other rooms around me. I can