The Rock Blaster

by Henning Mankell

  Oskar dozes off at regular intervals. There is no difference between night and day. Five times in every twenty-four hours he is given liquid sustenance; a warm hand supports the back of his neck and each sip sets fire to his torment. When he urinates, the bandages are changed. Then he sleeps, wakes up when he moves, lies and looks or shuts his eye and day is the same as night. The hours flow together and thoughts and images flit through his mind.

  To Oskar, none of this is real. Everything is only strange and he is unable to grasp what has happened even when his mind is least affected by the drugs. It is beyond his comprehension. He sees no images of a cliffside exploding. No images of himself in the June heat, watching from a distance as he stands by a rock wall, gripping a detonating cable with one hand and then being blown into nothingness. No images that show him lying on the ground, contorted. There is no sound of Norström bellowing or the young helper crying. An endless row of people dressed in white glides through Oskar’s mind. Dressed in white, but with bright faces, they sometimes take on Elly’s appearance. Faces that look down at him, smile at him, stroke his cheek, straighten out his blanket, change his bandages. Reality is reduced to what is immediately present. Everything else is gone. There are no memories staring at him from within his head. There is no inkling of anything from his past. His world is reduced to what is palpable, easily grasped. It is confined within these walls. Infinity is the blue or gray sky. He travels when his bed is pushed through the corridors to X-ray and the laboratories. The faces looking down at him in his bed represent both event and memory all at once.

  The only thing that remains from another time is Elly’s face. She has not yet been allowed to visit him. He is not well enough. But there is her face, leaning over him and smiling her pinched smile. During the day her face sometimes appears outside the window, in relief against the gray or blue background.

  And then there are the dreams. Vividly colored and chaotic. Since he wakes up so often, he nearly always recalls them. Every new waking spell begins with him looking back at the most recent dream.

  There is one where he is sitting in a dark cellar sewing flags. A narrow slit of a window, just where the wall meets the roof, lets a faint light into the room. The walls are gray, bare. The floor is of trodden clay. The air is cold and damp. He is sitting on a brown wooden table in the middle of the room, sewing hems onto flags that are two meters long. A roll of yellow-and-blue material is standing by one of the walls. The yellow cross is already woven into the coarse cloth. He sits and sews, pushing the needle up and down through the hem, with the thread winding into an even spiral. And then the flag in his lap begins to flutter. A wind starts blowing in the room and the fabric slaps against his knees. The only sounds are those of the flag beating against his legs.

  In another dream, Elly and he are running along a street at night, chasing an enormous rat, which is galloping ahead of them. It is the size of an Alsatian. There are moldy spots all over its brown coat. Its gray tail whips against the paving stones like a length of steel wire. Elly and he run after the rat. Suddenly he sees that Elly is also a rat, with tiny dark brown eyes.

  He wakes up and runs the images of his dreams through his mind once more. For him they are pictures, two-dimensional. Nothing more. He opens his eye, the empty socket twitches under the bandage, and he sees the portrait of the royal family on the wall opposite.

  Day is dawning. The steely light of early morning. Soft sounds from the corridor outside his door make their way into the room. Footsteps, voices growing louder and then moving on.

  Oskar has been in the hospital for two months and ten days. Outside, summer is coming to an end and the blasters have just started on the third and last railway tunnel.

  Today will be different for Oskar. He is going to have visitors, although he does not know it. Elly is coming. Norström is coming. And through their words Oskar will begin to understand what has actually happened. His mind will turn to wondering; the images and the dreams will be different.

  * * *

  —

  It is afternoon, and Norström is the first to arrive. He enters the room. He has changed out of his work clothes and is wearing a black suit that is too small for him. His collar feels tight and he is afraid and sweaty faced. He is twisting his mouth round and round and trying to wet his lips. He pulls up a chair and drops heavily onto it, sits and looks at Oskar.

  “Well then, Johansson. You made it. Not bad, bloody good effort. We thought you were done for. Hard to imagine anything else. The thing went off only half a meter from you. Damn near brought down the whole rock face.”

  He wipes his lips and tries to hide the mixture of disgust and unease he feels at the sight of Oskar lying there, wrapped in bandages and blankets.

  “Must hurt like hell, I suppose. It seemed pretty bad when we got to you.”

  Oskar looks with his one eye. He recognizes Norström, but he does not understand what he is hearing and cannot place it in any context.

  “I won’t stay for long. They said you had another visitor.”

  Norström tries to look cheerful. He feels uncomfortable and wants to get away even after just these few minutes. His mouth is dry and his lips move faster and faster. He tries to suck on his teeth to get the saliva going.

  “We’ll do our best to come along quite often now, one of the boys or I. We weren’t allowed to before.”

  Silence. Oskar tries to smile, but the bandages are tugging.

  “Well. I’d better be going, then.”

  Norström gets up, wonders if he should move the chair back, but he leaves it where it is.

  “Fine. Bye then. You get better now.”

  Norström walks toward the door, turns around, and looks once more at Oskar. Then he goes out and gently closes the door.

  * * *

  —

  Something is troubling Oskar. An obscure memory is starting to nag at his consciousness. But as yet he does not know what it is.

  * * *

  —

  Elly.

  She is sitting on the edge of the bed, staring at you.

  Was it really that awful?

  It must hurt so much.

  Isn’t there anything left of the eye?

  * * *

  —

  Oskar.

  She sits on the edge of the bed. I recognize that dress.

  I don’t remember.

  I’ve gotten used to it.

  Apparently there’s nothing left.

  * * *

  —

  Elly. Tell me what happened.

  * * *

  —

  “I saw in the paper on the Monday that you were dead. It had fallen onto the floor from the table in the hall. I was just going to put it back. I was on my way to the kitchen to have my morning coffee.”

  Now she is crying. Floods of tears as she leans down toward Oskar, who is lying in the bed with his blanket pulled up to his chin.

  “It was so awful. I thought I was going to faint. I had to sit down on the floor. I sat on top of the galoshes and was shaking all over. My heart kept beating faster. I thought I was going to die. Then I went straight in to the lady of the house and said that my husband had been killed in an accident and that I couldn’t work. That’s what I said. My husband is dead, and the lady sat there on the little sofa eating her breakfast and got annoyed because I hadn’t knocked.”

  “But you’re not married, Elly. Not as far as I know. Now go back to the nursery. I don’t want the children to be left alone. Go back now.”

  “But my husband is dead. It says so in the paper.”

  Elly is standing there holding the newspaper. She takes the remaining steps to the sofa where the lady is sitting with her tea and holds up the newspaper. With both hands.

  “It says so here.”

  And the lady of the house takes it, reads the
piece.

  “But surely your name isn’t Johansson? It’s Lundgren. If Johansson is a close friend of yours then I understand that it’s sad. But go back to the nursery now. Someone must be with the children. Take them out this afternoon. They need it. It’s nice and warm. Go now. Leave the newspaper here.”

  And she goes back to her breakfast and Elly leaves the room.

  “Close the door, Elly.”

  Elly closes the door. Elly goes into her room and lies down on her bed. She curls up into the fetal position and tightens every muscle in her body. She moves slowly. She rocks back and forth.

  But the accident, Elly?

  What do you mean?

  I don’t know anything about it.

  * * *

  —

  Elly sits on the edge of the bed. She is wearing her white dress.

  “I heard there was an explosion. They pulled you through town on a cart. Nobody thought you had survived. Nobody thought you would live. The paper said you were dead.”

  And suddenly there you are, Oskar, standing by the rock wall one afternoon in June and pulling at a length of detonating cable winding into a drill hole. Then what? Your eye wanders from Elly’s face to the royal family on the wall. And you see yourself. Standing up the slope, a short distance from the excavation site. You see yourself standing by the rock wall and suddenly the whole thing explodes and you’re thrown backward and end up as a mutilated body lying in the gravel.

  * * *

  —

  Elly puts her hand on the blanket. Her touch is light; you hardly feel it.

  “Was that how it was? Is that what happened?”

  “Yes.”

  “An accident?”

  “Yes.”

  * * *

  —

  That’s why I’m lying here. I was in a blasting accident. A charge that tricked me. Dynamite that shot out of the rock with furious force and tore me to pieces.

  * * *

  —

  Elly.

  “I’m so glad you’re alive, Oskar.”

  Elly’s visits.

  At first every day. Then every third. Then once a week.

  Then one last time.

  * * *

  —

  Elly in a white dress. She is standing by your bed. Looking down at her clasped hands.

  “What is it, Elly?”

  “I’ve met someone else. We’re leaving town.”

  And you notice that her stomach is a bit rounded. But what are you thinking? What are you feeling?

  “I don’t remember. It must have been hard. It was unexpected. Because when she came to visit me the week before she hadn’t mentioned anything. And she wasn’t behaving in a funny way either. I was probably trying to pretend it wasn’t happening. But it’s easy to understand. I must have looked dreadful. After all, in those days you needed strong hands and healthy men. And she did get a good one too. When she died a few years ago I saw in the death announcement that there were many children and grandchildren. One of them was named Oskar, I remember.”

  OSKAR JOHANNES JOHANSSON

  Oskar sits on the chair, his index finger drumming. It is evening and we are waiting for the rain to stop. The light in the sauna is fading. The paraffin lamp is lit. We are not going to put out any nets. It is too late for that. But on many evenings we just sit and wait for it to stop raining. If it goes on all night, then Oskar stays up. He never sleeps when it rains.

  “I find it hard to go to sleep.”

  * * *

  —

  August. The summer visitors are beginning to desert the archipelago. Fewer boats pass the island. The only ones left are the permanent residents. This morning, when we took up the nets, we saw a solitary sailboat disappearing out to sea.

  * * *

  —

  Elly goes. She is glad that Oskar is going to live. She promises to write. Her hand brushes the blanket. Then she is gone.

  And Oskar is there in his bed with his head saying no, no. He can’t help it that his eye begins to run. And the empty socket responds.

  * * *

  —

  The other visitors.

  The theologian.

  Norström.

  The other blasters.

  But his parents? His sister and brother?

  * * *

  —

  The third summer he talks about it.

  “My father and I had fallen out. He must have been fifty-plus and was tired and worn out. He used to empty waste from privies and it was heavy work. There were three of them dealing with a huge number of houses and they had to slave away night and day. Sometimes he said that he was worse off than everybody else. A shit collector, that’s what I am. All year round. He never had any time off and was never rid of the smell. I can’t ever remember him laughing. He sometimes smiled, but that only made him look sad. In any case, we had an argument. It was about the agitator. There was to be a meeting at another estate nearby and I was going. It wasn’t that man Palm. It was somebody less well-known. He was both an auctioneer and an agitator, from Blekinge, and he had this funny dialect. But he spoke well and we were all stirred up by the time the meeting ended. I bought a paper from him for fifty öre, and when I came home with it and put it on the kitchen table and Far saw it, he became angry. He grabbed it, stared at a picture of the king on the front page, and then saw that there was a drawing underneath so that it looked as if the king were standing on the head of someone who was supposed to be a dockworker or something like that. At that, he said that he did not want to see this in his house. It would only cause even more misery. Then he stared at me and asked if I was one of those. And I said yes, mostly just to be cheeky, I suppose.”

  “What did he look like, your pappa?”

  “Hard to say. More than anything else he was tired.”

  * * *

  —

  A spring day in 1910. A conversation.

  “Can’t this be banned? They’re so easily influenced.”

  “I don’t think so. They’ll rage for a while. Then things will calm down.”

  “Wouldn’t it be best if it was forbidden?”

  “Of course. But you can’t, except by threatening them. The owner of the property has given his permission.”

  “Who is he?”

  “I don’t remember the name. But it’s the brewer.”

  “Kvist?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “What do they hope to gain by this? Do the workers really understand what they’re being told?”

  “Some of them maybe. But it’s a language of one and one makes two and no frills.”

  “What’s the subject of the meeting?”

  “A hey and a ho for the revolution…”

  Laughter. Drawn out, indifferent.

  “The Party is growing.”

  “Obviously. But it doesn’t matter.”

  “No. True. We have all the power on our side.”

  “So to speak, yes.”

  “Will there be clashes, do you think?”

  “I’m sure there will be. At some point.”

  The conversation peters out. The weighty gentlemen get to their feet, shake hands, and go their separate ways. Slow steps, eyes to the floor.

  * * *

  —

  “We were about fifteen kids and maybe ten adults at the gathering. Not exactly a mass meeting. The man from Blekinge who was speaking was going to go around to various different properties. But then it ended up just being this one meeting. Turned out he had to leave. He stood on a barrel and we were a little way off and the little kids were running around, but he didn’t mind that. We were impressed that he could speak for so long without any notes. He had a good voice. He didn’t shout like some others. And I’d say we understood quite a lot. Eve
ryone clapped. I and a few others bought his newspaper. He said the money would be spent on publishing more material. Then he went around asking what our current or most recent job was, if we were in the Party, how much we earned. Many told him what a hellish life they had and he agreed. I imagine he was very intelligent and I suppose we felt just as we were meant to. Important and strong. I kept that paper for many years afterward.”

  * * *

  —

  “But there was a rift. I was told I could not stay at home if I became a socialist.”

  * * *

  —

  Where was his mother? Was she sitting in the kitchen too and listening? Did she say anything? And his siblings?

  * * *

  —

  Oskar is brown from the sun. It has been a warm summer. The eyelids that have grown shut over the left eye socket shine a pale brown.

  * * *

  —

  Oskar Johannes Johansson. Oskar after the king. Johannes after his grandfather. Oskar never met him. He died in 1886, at the age of ninety-three.

  * * *

  —

  “If I’d been born a little earlier, I would have known someone who was born in the eighteenth century. He came from a small place up by Lake Boren. He worked on the construction of the Göta Canal. Once that was done, he got a job working on one of the locks. He stayed and worked at that for the rest of his life. I believe they had six children, but only my father survived. I went there at some point in the thirties. The lock is still there and I expect it looks much the same as it always has. We cycled there one summer, my boy and I. We spent an entire day watching all the traffic passing through the lock. We saw four timber boats, a ship from Lidköping carrying bricks, and the passenger steamer coming by. If we’d had any money, we would probably have taken that boat back to Söderköping and then cycled home from there. But it was too expensive. I didn’t have any work at the time. It was interesting to look at it all, though.