Hornet Flight by Ken Follett

began to feel the music. He played louder and more emphatically, calling out in English at the high points: “Everybody, boogie-woogie!” just like Pine Top. The tune came to its climax and he said: “That’s what I’m talkin’ about!”
    When he finished, there was silence in the room. Mr. Duchwitz wore the pained expression of a man who has accidentally swallowed something rotten. Even Tik looked embarrassed. Mrs. Duchwitz said, “Well, I must say, I don’t think anything quite like that has ever been heard in this room.”
    Harald realized he had made a mistake. The highbrow Duchwitz family disapproved of jazz as much as his own parents. They were cultured, but that did not make them open-minded. “Oh, dear,” he said. “I see that was not the right sort of thing.”
    â€œIndeed not,” said Mr. Duchwitz.
    From behind the sofa, Karen caught Harald’s eye. He expected to see a supercilious smile on her face but, to his surprise and delight, she gave him a broad wink.
    That made it worthwhile.

    On Sunday morning, he woke up thinking about Karen.
    He hoped she might come into the boys’ room to chat, as she had yesterday, but they did not see her. She did not appear at breakfast. Trying hard to sound casual, Harald asked Tik where she was. Uninterested, Tik said she was probably doing her exercises.
    After breakfast, Harald and Tik did two hours of exam revision. They both expected to pass easily, but they were not taking any chances, as the results would decide whether they could go to university. At eleven o’clock they went for a walk around the estate.
    Near the end of the long drive, partly hidden from view by a stand of trees, was a ruined monastery. “It was taken over by the King after the Reformation, and used as a home for a hundred years,” Tik said. “Then Kirstenslot was built, and the old place fell into disuse.”
    They explored the cloisters where the monks had walked. The cells were now storerooms for garden equipment. “Some of this stuff hasn’t been looked at for decades,” Tik said, poking a rusty iron wheel with the toe of his shoe. He opened a door into a large, well-lit room. There was no glass in the narrow windows, but the place was clean and dry. “This used to be the dormitory,” Tik said. “It’s still used in summer, by seasonal workers on the farm.”
    They entered the disused church, now a junk room. There was a musty smell. A thin black-and-white cat stared at them as if to ask what right they had to walk in like that, then it escaped through a glassless window.
    Harald lifted a canvas sheet to reveal a gleaming Rolls-Royce sedan mounted on blocks. “Your father’s?” Harald said.
    â€œYes—put away until petrol goes on sale again.”
    There was a scarred wooden workbench with a vise, and a collection of tools that had presumably been used to maintain the car when it was running. In the corner was a washbasin with a single tap. Up against the wall were stacks of wooden boxes that had once held soap and oranges. Harald looked inside one and found a jumble of toy cars made of painted tin. He picked one up. A driver was depicted on the windows, in profile on the side window, full face on the windshield. He remembered when such toys had been infinitely desirable to him. He put the car back carefully.
    In the far corner was a single-engined airplane with no wings.
    Harald looked at it with interest. “What’s this?”
    â€œA Hornet Moth, made by de Havilland, the English company. Father bought it five years ago, but he never learned to fly it.”
    â€œHave you been up in it?”
    â€œOh, yes, we had great rides when it was new.”
    Harald touched the great propeller, at least six feet long. The mathematically precise curves made it a work of art in his eyes. The aircraft leaned slightly to one side, and he saw that the undercarriage was