As soon as she had set the casserole on the stove again, the telephone rang.
Suppose it was Dad! She wished desperately that he would come home so she
could tell him everything that had happened in these last weeks. But it was probably
only Joanna or Mom. Sophie snatched up the phone.
“Sophie Amundsen,” she said.
“It’s me,” said a voice.
Sophie was sure of three things: it was not her father. But it was a man’s voice,
and a voice she knew she had heard before.
“Who is this?”
“It’s Alberto.”
“Ohhh!”
Sophie was at a loss for words. It was the voice from the Acropolis video that
she had recognized.
“Are you all right?”
“Sure.”
“From now on there will be no more letters.”
“But I didn’t send you a frog!”
“We must meet in person. It’s beginning to be urgent, you see.”
“Why?”
“Hilde’s father is closing in on us.”
“Closing in how?”
“On all sides, Sophie. We have to work together now.”
“How...?”
“But you can’t help much before I have told you about the Middle Ages. We
ought to cover the Renaissance and the seventeenth century as well. Berkeley is a key
figure...”
“Wasn’t he the man in the picture at the major’s cabin?”
“That very same. Maybe the actual struggle will be waged over his philosophy.”
“You make it sound like a war.”
“I would rather call it a battle of wills. We have to attract Hilde’s attention and
get her over on our side before her father comes home to Lillesand.”
“I don’t get it at all.”
“Perhaps the philosophers can open your eyes. Meet me at St. Mary’s Church at
eight o’clock tomorrow morning. But come alone, my child.”
“So early in the morning?”
The telephone clicked.
“Hello?”
He had hung up! Sophie rushed back to the stove just before the fish soup
boiled over.
St. Mary’s Church? That was an old stone church from the Middle Ages. It was
only used for concerts and very special ceremonies. And in the summer it was
sometimes open to tourists. But surely it wasn’t open in the middle of the night?
When her mother got home, Sophie had put the card from Lebanon with
everything else from Alberto and Hilde. After dinner she went over to Joanna’s place.
“We have to make a very special arrangement,” she said as soon as her friend
opened the door.
She said no more until Joanna had closed her bedroom door.
“It’s rather problematic,” Sophie went on.
“Spit it out!”
“I’m going to have to tell Mom that I’m staying the night here.”