Mysteries

by Knut Hamsun

  “That I don’t know,” she says, “not from here. But the first house you come to is the parsonage, and from there it’s a mile and a half to town.” With that she wants to go, without further ado.

  “Thank you very much,” I say, “but if the parsonage is at the other end of the woods, permit me to walk with you if that’s where you’re going, or even farther. There’s no sun anymore, so let me carry your parasol. I won’t bother you, I won’t even talk if you like, as long as I may walk beside you and listen to the birds chirping. No, don’t go, not this minute! Why are you running away?”

  But since she took to her heels anyway, refusing to listen to me, I ran after her so she could hear my excuse: “I’ll be damned if your lovely face hasn’t made a most powerful impression on me!”

  But now she was rushing off at such a frantic pace that I lost sight of her in a couple of minutes. As for that heavy blond braid of hers, she simply held it in her hand as she ran. I never saw anything like it.

  This is what happened. I wasn’t going to annoy her, I intended no harm; I bet she loves her lieutenant, it never occurred to me to force myself on her. But it’s okay, it’s quite okay; maybe her lieutenant will challenge me, heh-heh, he will join forces with the deputy, the deputy judge, and challenge me....

  By the way, I wonder if that deputy will give Miniman a new coat. We can wait a day, maybe even two days, but if he hasn’t done it within two days we’ll give him a reminder.4 Period. Nagel.5

  I know of a poor woman here, she has looked at me so sheepishly, as if she wanted to ask for something but hasn’t yet dared to. I’m quite obsessed by her eyes, although her hair is white; I’ve gone out of my way four times to avoid meeting her. She’s not old, it’s not from age that she’s white; her eyelashes are still startlingly black, fearfully so, giving her eyes a smoldering look. She almost always carries a basket under her apron, which is probably what makes her feel so sheepish. When I turn around once she has passed me, I notice that she walks to the market, takes a few eggs out of her basket and sells those two or three eggs to the first comer, whereupon she returns home the way she came, the basket under her apron. She lives in a tiny little house by the quayside; it’s a one-story house and unpainted. I once saw her through the window—there are no curtains, only a few white flowers to be seen on the windowsill; she was standing far back in the room staring at me as I walked by. God only knows what sort of woman she is; but her hands are quite small. I could always give you a handout, my white maiden, but I would rather give you some assistance.

  Incidentally, I know very well why I’m so obsessed by your eyes, I knew that right away. Strange how a youthful infatuation can linger for so long and crop up again every once in a while. But her lovely face is not yours, and you’re much older than she, alas. And yet she married a telegraph operator and moved to Kabelvag! Well, there is no accounting for tastes; I couldn’t expect to have her love, nor did I get it. There’s nothing to be done about that—. Listen, the clock is striking half-past ten—. There certainly isn’t, there’s nothing to be done about that. But if you only knew how dearly I have remembered you these ten or twelve years, not forgetting you for a moment—. Heh-heh, but that is really my own fault, she can’t help that. While other people remember someone for a year and that’s that, I go on remembering for ten.

  I’ll give that white-haired egg-wife an assistance, well, both a handout and an assistance, for the sake of her eyes. I’ve got worlds of money to take from, sixty-two thousand kroner for a landed property, cash in hand at that. Ho-ho, I need only glance at the table to find three telegraphic documents of the greatest value before my eyes—. Ah, some joke that was, what a trick! One is an agronomist and a capitalist, one doesn’t sell just like that, at the first offer, one sleeps on it and thinks it over. That’s what one does, one thinks it over. And meanwhile not a soul is surprised, although one purposely made the joke as crude and the trick as thick as at all possible.6 Man, your name is jackass! One can lead you by the nose wherever one likes.7

  Over there, for instance, sticking out of my vest pocket, is the neck of a small bottle. It’s medicine, Prussic acid, that I’m keeping as a curiosity, not having the courage to use it. Why, then, do I carry it around with me, and why did I provide myself with it? Humbug again, nothing but humbug, the modern humbug of decadence, quest for publicity, and snobbery. Pfui—. As pure and fine as porcelain, she is my proper medicine—.

  Or take an innocent thing such as my lifesaving medal. I earned it honestly, as they say; one dabbles in all sorts of things, one saves people’s lives. But whether I really deserve any credit for it, God only knows. Judge for yourselves, gentlemen and ladies: A young man stands at the ship’s rail, he’s crying, his shoulders are shaking; when I speak to him he gives me a distracted look and scurries down to the saloon. I pursue him—the man has already turned in. I examine the passenger list, find the man’s name and note that he’s going to Hamburg. That’s the first evening. From now on I keep a constant eye on him, taking him by surprise in unexpected places and looking him squarely in the face. Why am I doing it? Gentlemen and ladies, judge for yourselves! I see him cry, he’s horribly tormented by something and repeatedly gazes into the deep with a rapt, distraught expression in his face. What concern is it of mine? None, to be sure, and so judge for yourselves, go right ahead! A couple of days go by, there is a head wind and a high sea. At two o’clock in the night he comes aft, where I’m already hiding out and observing him; the moon gives his face a yellowish cast. What then? He turns here and there, flings up his arms and jumps overboard, feet first. But he is unable to hold back a scream. Did he regret his decision? Did he panic at the last moment? If not, why did he scream? Gentlemen and ladies, what would you have done in my place? I leave it entirely in your hands. Maybe you would have respected the honest, though faltering courage of the poor unfortunate and kept quiet in your hiding place; I, on the other hand, yell to the captain on the bridge and jump overboard in turn, and in my haste I even go head first. I splash about like crazy, floundering in every direction, all the while hearing shouts from thunderous voices on board. Suddenly I bump against his arm, outstretched and stiff, with splayed fingers. He kicks a bit with his legs, good! I grab him by the neck, but he gets heavier and heavier, turning lazy and no longer kicking; finally he even gives a tug, to get free. I wheel about with him—the heavy sea knocks our foreheads together and I black out. What should I do? I grind my teeth and curse like blazes, holding the fellow firmly and stubbornly by the scruff of his neck, until the boat finally gets to us. What would you have done? Behaving like a ruthless, brutal bully, I saved him, so what? Well, haven’t I already left it to you, gentlemen and ladies, to judge? You mustn’t spare anybody, it’s all one to me. But what if, say, it was very important to the man to avoid ending up in Hamburg? There’s the rub! Maybe he was supposed to meet someone he didn’t want to meet. Yet the medal was given for a meritorious deed and I carry it in my pocket—I don’t cast it before swine, no way! This, too, is for you to judge—go ahead and judge, what the hell do I care? I care so little about it that I don’t even remember the unfortunate man’s name, though he must still be alive. Why did he do it? Maybe because of a hopeless love, maybe there really was a woman involved, I don’t know; anyway, it’s nothing to me. Enough!

  Oh, women, those women! Take Kamma, for instance, my little Danish Kamma. Lord help me! Gentle as a dove, sick as can be with tenderness and full of devotion to boot, but still capable of wheedling the last penny out of you, squeezing you to the point of destitution, just by leaning her wily little head sideways and whispering, “Simonsen, my sweet little Simonsen!” Well, God be with you, Kamma, you were full of devotion, so go to blazes, we’re quits—.

  And now I’ll get up.

  No, one has to watch out for that sort of thing. “My son, beware of women’s favor,” says a great writer—or whatever it is that a great writer says. Karlsen was a weakling, an idealist who died because of his strong feelings
, that is to say, because of his weak nerves, which again is to say, because of the lack of a nourishing diet and outdoor work—heh-heh—and outdoor work. “May your steel be as sharp as your final no!” He ruined his entire earthly reputation by a quotation from a poet.8 If I had met Karlsen in time, on his last day as lief as any, but still half an hour before the disaster, and he’d told me that he would quote someone when he was dying, I would’ve said something like this: Look at me! As someone of sound mind, I’m concerned on behalf of humankind that you do not blacken your last moments by quoting some great poet or other. Do you know what a great poet is? Why, a great poet is a person without shame, someone who never blushes.9 Other fools have moments when they blush with shame by themselves, in private; not the great poet. Look at me again: if you want to quote someone, quote a geographer and don’t give yourself away. Victor Hugo—do you have a sense of humor? One day Baron Lesdain was talking to Victor Hugo. In the course of the conversation the artful baron asked, “Who, in your opinion, is the greatest French poet?” Victor Hugo made a face, bit his lip and finally said, “Alfred de Musset is the second greatest!” Heh-heh-heh. But perhaps you don’t have a sense of humor?10 Do you know what Victor Hugo did in 1870? He wrote a proclamation addressed to the inhabitants of the earth in which, in the strictest possible terms, he forbade the German troops to besiege and bombard Paris. “I have grandsons as well as other family here, and I don’t want them to be hit by shells,” said Victor Hugo.11

  Can you believe it, I still have no shoes. What has Sara done with my shoes? It’ll soon be eleven, and she hasn’t yet brought them.12

  So we’re going to quote a geographer—.

  Incidentally, that Sara has a delicious figure. When she walks, her hips quiver, they’re like the flanks of a really sleek mare. It’s perfectly splendid. I wonder if she has ever been married. In any case, she doesn’t squeal very loud if you poke her in the ribs, and she would probably be game for anything—. Oh, what a marriage I once witnessed, I might even say attended. Hm. Gentlemen and ladies, it took place on a Sunday evening at a railroad station in Sweden, the Kungsbacka station. I beg you not to forget that it was a Sunday evening. She had large white hands, he a brand-new cadet’s uniform and still no beard, that’s how young he was. They were traveling together from Göteborg—and she was very young, too, they were both mere children. I was observing them from behind my newspaper; they were quite helpless with me being there. They never took their eyes off each other; the girl was bright-eyed and couldn’t sit still. Suddenly the whistle blows for Kungsbacka and he grabs her hand—they understood one another: as soon as the train stopped they promptly jumped off. She runs toward “For women,” he strides after her, at her heels—by God, he makes a mistake, he too steps into “For women”! They quickly shut the door behind them. At that moment the church bells burst out ringing in the center of town, because it was a Sunday evening; their visit was accompanied by a full peal of bells. Three minutes, four minutes, five minutes go by, what has become of them? They’re still in there and the bells keep ringing—God knows whether they won’t be late! Finally he opens the door and peeps out. He is bareheaded, she stands right behind him putting on his cap, he turns to her and smiles. Then he jumps down the steps, followed by her, still fiddling with her dress, and when they reached the train and got back to their seats not a soul had noticed them, no, not a soul except me. The girl’s eyes were perfectly golden when she looked at me and smiled, and her little bosom was bouncing up and down, up and down. A few minutes later they were both asleep; they just faded away, so deliciously tired were they.

  What do you think? Gentlemen and ladies, my story has come to an end. I pass over that excellent lady over there, the one with the pince-nez and the stand-up men’s collar, that is, the blue-stocking. I address myself to the two or three among you who don’t spend your lives with clenched teeth, engaged in socially beneficial activity. Pardon me if I’ve hurt anyone’s feelings; a special apology to the honorable lady with the pince-nez and the blue stockings. Look, there she rises, she’s getting up! Good grief, she will either go her way or quote someone. If she’s going to quote someone, she will probably refute me. And if she wants to refute me, she will say something like this: “Hm,” she will say, “that gentleman has the most uncouth masculine idea of life I’ve ever heard. Is that life? I wonder whether the gentleman is totally ignorant of what one of the world’s greatest thinkers has said on the subject: ‘Life is a war with trolls in the vaults of the heart and head,’ he says....”13

  Life is a war with trolls, sure. In the vaults of the heart and head, that figures. Gentlemen and ladies, one day the Norwegian Per Coachman was driving a great poet. As they were riding along, the simple-minded Per Coachman says, “By your leave, what does it really mean to be a poet, in your opinion?” The great poet manages a pinched mouth, puffs his birdlike chest up to the utmost and brings forth the following words: “Being a poet means to stage your own doomsday.” Whereupon the Norwegian Per Coachman felt stricken in every joint of his body.

  Eleven o’clock. My shoes, what the hell has become of my shoes? ... Well. But as for14 raising one’s hackles about all and everything—

  A tall pale lady, dressed in black and with the rosiest smile—she meant to be kind—pulled my sleeve and tried to stop me. “Why don’t you get a movement started like that poet,” she said, “then you will at least be entitled to participate in the discussion.”

  “Heh-heh!” I replied. “I who don’t even know a poet and never spoke to one! I who am an agronomist and have lived among guano and bran mash since I was a child; I who couldn’t even write a poem about an umbrella, much less about life and death and universal peace!”

  “Well, some other great man, then,” she says. “You go around giving yourself airs and running down all great men. But the great men are still on their feet, and they will be so as long as you live, you’ll see.”

  “Madam!” I answered, bowing respectfully. “Great God, madam, how half-educated what you said just now sounds to me, how intellectually shabby. I’m sorry to speak so plainly, but if you were a man instead of a woman, I would say you were a liberal, as I hope to be saved. I don’t run down all great men, but I don’t judge a man’s greatness by the scope of the movement he has gotten started; I judge him for myself, by the discernment of my own little brain, my mental aptitude for evaluation. I judge him, so to speak, by the taste his activity leaves in my mouth. This is not arrogance on my part, it’s a manifestation of my blood’s subjective logic. The important thing is not to produce a movement, to have Kingo’s hymnal supplanted by Landstad’s in Høivåg township by Lillesand. It’s not at all a question of creating an uproar among a crowd of lawyers, journalists or Galilean fishermen, or of publishing a monograph on Napoleon le petit. The important thing is to affect and educate power, the superior, chosen few, the masters of life, the great ones, Caiaphas, Pilate, and the emperor. What good would it do to create a stir among the rabble if I were to be nailed to the cross, in spite of everything? You can make the rabble so numerous that they’ll manage to seize a scrap of power, fighting tooth and nail; you can put a butcher’s knife into their hands and order them to stab and slash, and you can whip them into gaining the upper hand in a vote. But to win a victory, a victory for fundamental spiritual growth, to win a hand’s-breadth of benefit for the world—that they cannot do, that the rabble cannot do. Great men are excellent topics of conversation, but the superior man, the superior men, the masters, the universal spirits on horseback, have to stop and search their memories merely to know who these so-called great men might be. And so the great man is left with the crowd, the worthless majority—lawyers, schoolmarms, journalists, and the emperor of Brazil—for his admirers.

  “Well then,” the lady says ironically—. The chairman bangs the table and asks for silence, but the lady insists and says: “Well then, since you do not attack all great men, mention some, or at least one, who finds favor in your eyes. It would be most i
nteresting to know.”

  I answer as follows: “I would be glad to. But the fact is, you will take me all too brutally at my word. If I were to mention one or two or ten, you would simply assume that, apart from those, I knew of no others. Besides, why should I? If I gave you the choice between, say, Leo Tolstoy, Jesus Christ and Immanuel Kant, even you would hesitate before making the correct selection from among them. You would say that all these were great men, each after his fashion, and the entire liberal and progressive press would agree with you—”

  “So who is the greatest of these, in your opinion?” she cuts in.

  “In my opinion, madam, it’s not the one who has been best at creating exchange value who is the greatest, though he is the one who always produces most commotion in the world. No, the voice of my blood says that he is the greatest who has contributed most fundamental value, most positive profit, to human existence. The greatest one is the great terrorist, a towering magnitude, an unheard-of universal jack that balances planets.”

  “But, of the three who were mentioned, it must be Christ who—?”15

  “It’s Christ, sure,” I hasten to say. “You’re quite right, madam, and I’m pleased that we agree on this point, at least—. No, on the whole I have a low opinion of the ability to do business, to preach, that purely formal gift of always having a word ready on your tongue. What is a preacher, a professional preacher? Someone who serves the negative purpose of the middleman, an agent for merchandise. The more money he makes by his merchandising, the more world-wide his fame becomes! Heh-heh, that’s the way it is: the more he can ballyhoo, the more he can expand his business. But what is the point of preaching Faust’s opinions of human existence to my good neighbor, Ola Upnorth? Will that change the thought of the next century?”

  “But what will become of Ola Upnorth if nobody—?”