by Gerard Reve
Frits took the plate and beaker to the kitchen, sprinkled scouring powder on them, held them under the dripping tap and scrubbed both with a wet rag. After he had rinsed both objects, he saw that they had become dull of tint and were covered in scratches. “Bloody hell,” he said, drying them off and taking them back into the room.
“You see!” said his mother. “Now you’ve gone and ruined them. That’s because you’re such a pain, you never listen to anyone.” “Come, come,” Frits said, “they still have an attractive sheen to them.”
He packed the presents, placing the beaker on the plate, a bar of chocolate on both sides and an apple stuffed into the beaker’s mouth. “I wanted to give you something for him too,” his mother said. “Wait, I’m going to put a few lumps of sugar in a sachet.” She gave him a handful of white cubes in a little orange bonbon sack, which he stuck into his coat pocket.
The dry street glittered. “It’s as though the paving stones are filled with tiny pieces of glass,” he thought. Following the route he had taken on Sunday evening, he passed the storehouses at the start of the canal. At number seventy-one, the door opened the first time he rang. At the top of the stairs he discerned a female form. “Joosje, congratulations!” he shouted up to her. “Thank you, Frits,” she called back once he was halfway up the stairs. In front of the coat stand, he shook her hand. A faint light was burning at the other end of the hall. When he looked up at the ceiling, she said: “The one above the stairs here is broken, but this way there’s enough light.”
He followed her in. They walked down a bare, uncarpeted hallway and entered a broad room with four chairs arranged around a cylindrical heating stove, all illuminated by a tall floor lamp. An old lady was sitting there, knitting. “Isn’t Jaap in?” he asked, after greeting the woman. “He has a meeting, and after that they were going out to dinner, I believe,” Joosje replied.
He sat down, placed the present on the table and handed her a pair of scissors, which he had seen lying on the mantelpiece.
“Oh,” she said, after opening the package, “that is awfully nice, terribly kind of you. And the chocolate too.” “And an apple,” Frits said. “That is lovely for the little fellow, isn’t it?” the old lady said. “Aren’t you cold?” she asked Frits. “Come, sit a little closer to the fire.” “I’m fine, thank you, only my feet are cold,” he said.
“Let me show you what else he got today,” Joosje said. Standing, she fetched a few objects from a table in the corner. Her light-blond hair was trimmed high at the back, to a point above her plump, rosy face. The hem of the dress she wore hung a good deal higher on the front, because of her round, protruding belly. She showed him the presents: a wooden locomotive, a lorry, undergarments, an embroidered bib and a picture book. “The book he got from Auntie Stien,” she said. “It won’t mean much to him yet,” the old lady said. Frits leafed through it, looking at the illustrations: a cow, a horse, a pig, peacocks, a dog and a turkey. He put the book back down.
“A turkey like that won’t mean much to him, I’m sure,” he said, “a ridiculous bird with a mass of red flesh on its head. Has the birthday boy gone to bed?” “He’s asleep already,” Joosje said. “And do you think Jaap will be long?” he asked. “I have no idea,” she replied.
“Probably drinking himself into a hole again,” Frits said, smiling. “Jaap doesn’t drink; he doesn’t, does he?” asked the old woman. “As long as it costs him nothing, he’s willing enough,” said Joosje. “Oh no, Jaap doesn’t drink,” the lady said.
“It has been a very long time since I last had a drink,” Frits said. “How long?” Joosje asked, opening the damper at the bottom of the stove. “At least a month,” he said.
“It is a bad thing, a great deal of misery comes from it,” the old woman said. She held a newspaper open in her lap. “It’s very unhealthy; it destroys the body.”
“In fact,” Frits said, “that is not true. One must not drink regularly, but getting good and drunk once every few months is actually good for you, doctors say these days. Modern science has it that the body needs to be thrown out of equilibrium from time to time, it needs a good poisoning.” “Oh yes, modern science,” the lady said. “When I have been drinking,” he said, “I feel tipsy, of course. The next day I have a hangover, there’s nothing to be done about that. But the day after that, on the third day, then I feel good! Then it is as though I have been reborn.”
He fell silent and glanced at his watch. It was a quarter to eight. He rubbed his hands together and shuffled his feet. “Still, I believe you’re feeling a bit cold,” the lady said. “Is it cold in here?” asked Joosje. “No, I don’t think so,” he said, “it is only my feet. My shoes have rubber soles.” “Are rubber soles that cold then?” the old woman asked. “They are when you have sweaty feet,” Frits said, “then you have to place your shoes behind the stove each night and hang your socks over the pipe. In fact, you need to wash your feet every night too, but that is so much work. In the summer, it’s even worse. Then you absolutely have to wash them, otherwise the smell is unbearable. For months, I sprinkled steatite powder on my feet in the morning; it helps a bit, yes, it does help.” “Hush,” Joosje said, “I hear little Hans. No, it’s nothing, I think.”
“That is a problem,” said the old lady, “I’m pleased I don’t have that.” “In the summer, the most comfortable thing is to wear sandals with no socks,” Frits continued, “then all your problems are over.” “Are your feet very cold at the moment?” she asked. “Oh, nothing serious,” he replied. “It is never that bad, not so that you cannot warm them again, I’ve never had that. It’s a matter of nutrition as well, of course.”
“Do you really think so?” the old lady asked. Joosje poured them coffee. “Oh yes,” said Frits, “if one takes cod liver oil every day—I’ve started doing that of late—one never need fear having cold feet.” “Auntie Stien, you take a lot of milk in your coffee, don’t you?” Joosje asked. “Yes, please, my dear,” she replied. “It is most definitely true,” she said, “that we consume various kinds of poisons each day. Things like coffee and tea, for example, which are very normal beverages. You shouldn’t take them at all, in fact, but still you do.”
“Yes,” Frits said, “we would be better off if we lived according to a natural diet. But it is also quite a chore to gather that kind of food and prepare it. It makes more sense to eat the way everyone else does. But that a vegetarian diet is healthier, I am firmly convinced of that.” He looked at his watch, which showed a quarter past eight. “Jesus, how am I going to get out of here?” he thought, breathing deeply without making a sound. “It is a fact that eating too much, eating late at night and eating a great deal of meat is harmful,” he said. “Oh, is that really so?” Joosje asked.
“Just look at America,” said Auntie Stien, “nowhere is there as much cancer as there is there.” “That,” Frits said, “is because they eat food that is poorly prepared, drink a great deal of alcohol, consume extensive dinners and hot sausages in their cafeterias and make excessive use of seasonings.”
“Cancer is really quite common, isn’t it?” Joosje asked. “It is a typical disease of the elderly,” he replied. “It used to be that not so many people died of it, but now that we live so much longer on the average, more people get it. Cancer is the cause of most deaths.” “I didn’t know that,” said Joosje.
“It is a quite marvellous disease,” he continued, “I have read fascinating things about it. It is a parasitic cell, it appears out of nowhere and never stops growing. Right through everything. From one organ to the next. Straight through the intestines. Gruesome, incurable, grand.”
“How can you talk like that?” said Auntie Stien, shaking her head. “And the pains of cancer are something fierce,” Frits said, “simply indescribable. It is one of the most stupendous of diseases.”
“That’s what that Mr Overland had,” said Joosje. “In his stomach. But it progressed rather quickly. He had it, and his family knew what it was. Within four months h
e was dead. It must have been terrible for him. Those were people who camped close to us, in Castricum. His wife drowned in the sea.” “The hand of fate,” Frits said.
“I’m not so sure,” Joosje said, picking up her knitting. “She went swimming alone, at night. Later they found her clothes on the beach. She had four little children; the eldest is seven. They told them that their mother was not coming home any more and that she had stayed in the sea. People who were visiting, I believe it was the Velzeners, heard what the eldest said to his little brother. He says: The sea said, you just come with me, you’re a worthless old thing anyway. So if the sea ever dries up, maybe she’ll come back then, but otherwise she never will.”
“Quiet,” she said suddenly, “I hear the baby.” She disappeared through the sliding doors and came back with a crying child on her arm. His face was pale and sleepy. She sat down and tried to calm him. At last she succeeded.
“Oh, poor little fellow,” the old woman said. The little boy looked at her inquisitively. “Couldn’t you get to sleep?” she asked. The child burst into tears again. Joosje felt the child’s nappy, took it off and, after hanging the wet one over the kettle on the fire, replaced it with a fresh one.
The doorbell rang. “Perhaps you’d better answer that yourself,” Frits said. “You’ll know who it is, whether they should be given the brush-off or not.” Joosje handed the little one to Auntie Stien and went to the door. A few moments later she came back with a woman who looked very much like her. The woman shook Frits’s hand hurriedly, and clamped Hans’s little hand in her plump fist. “It’s your birthday! Yes, it is! Did you know that!” she said. Then, after taking a seat, she began searching through her bag. It was, Frits noted, ten minutes to nine. He looked at the ceiling, which was covered in old, shabby ornamental leafwork.
Finding what she had sought, the visitor unwrapped a little silver beaker and handed it to Joosje. “It’s real silver,” she said, “it is real silver.” “How lovely,” Joosje said, continuing to peruse the gift. “It’s real silver, I polished it till I weighed an ounce,” the visitor said. “Show it to Frits,” she went on, “he’ll be able to tell.”
“Yes indeed,” Frits said, “it is real silver.” He looked at the hallmark stamps on the side. “Very nice, very heavy. A lovely, extremely lovely gift. It should actually have an inscription on it.” “That’s what I said, isn’t it?” the visitor asked, “or didn’t I? I thought of it only too late, but I’ll have it done.” Joosje placed the beaker on the table. Auntie Stien picked it up and looked at it.
“Well, it’s happened a fourth time now, Mother, that someone mistakes you for me,” Joosje said. “Jaap told me he had spoken to someone who had been invited to Uncle Leo’s party. And they said: I met your wife there as well. But I wasn’t even there. That’s what Jaap told them, and it turned out that he thought you were me.”
The visitor blushed, opened her mouth a little and said: “Yes, remarkable isn’t it?” “Mrs Mosveld,” said Frits, “the first time I saw you, a few years ago, I thought you were your husband’s daughter.” “What an evening,” he thought, “what an evening. When is it going to end?”
“How long ago was that?” she asked. “When was that?” Her brow was furrowed and she was leaning forward. “I don’t know exactly,” he said, “perhaps five years ago, or six.” “No, that was four years ago, in Hilversum,” she said quickly, waving her hand. “It was at the summer cottage. Don’t you remember, that that was four years ago? No longer than that.”
Auntie Stien followed the conversation by turning her head from one speaker to the other. The little boy suddenly began bawling. Joosje shifted him on her lap, picked him up and ran her hand over his head, but the crying did not stop. “Give him to Uncle Frits for a moment,” Frits said in a facetious tone. Joosje handed him the child, but it screamed only louder and began kicking its feet. Its moist little hands fought to push him away. Frits handed him back. “Look,” Auntie Stien said, “look at your pretty present, look at the pretty beaker.” She raised the silver beaker up close to the baby’s face. The child struggled to reach the shiny object, seized it then in both hands and went through the motions of drinking.
“Aw, look at that,” Auntie Stien cried out, “he’s thirsty. Are you thirsty, lambkins? Yes, he’s thirsty, the little fellow.” Joosje stood up, dropped her knitting onto her chair and poured some milk into the beaker from a saucepan that was resting on the stovepipe. The little boy drank greedily. “You see, that was it,” Joosje’s mother said. Frits saw that Joosje had thrown down her knitting so hastily that three stitches had dropped from one of the needles. He slipped them back on carefully, pushed the needles a good way through and stuck them into the ball of wool.
After it was finished drinking, the child began crying again. “It is, in truth, a terrible little monster,” Frits said. “The nerves have developed all wrong. It probably doesn’t have long to live.” “Don’t say such ridiculous things,” said Joosje. “The head is bound to become distended as well,” Frits went on. “It is growing all crooked, like a plant to light, mark my words.” “Oh, he’s just talking to hear himself speak,” said Joosje’s mother.
Suddenly the child grew quiet, and they saw that it had fallen asleep against its mother’s breast. Joosje carried him gingerly back to bed.
When she returned, she poured them more coffee. “How is Father doing?” Joosje asked. “A nasty flu,” her mother replied, “I have it too, in fact, but Father’s in bed with it. Did you hear what happened? Father is terribly upset about it. Two illustrations were printed incorrectly in the world encyclopedia. No, not with the wrong captions, but in an illogical order. Eight thousand of them were printed that way. The question now is whether they will print the next twenty-two thousand that way, or go back and correct the first ones. If they don’t, there will be different versions of the same edition. You do know, I take it, that Anna is getting married on the Friday after New Year? But I’d best be getting home, I am not feeling very well either.”
She left, and a silence descended for a time. “It is now twenty minutes to ten,” Frits thought, “if one subtracts the minutes by which my watch is running fast.”
At that same moment they heard the downstairs door open and someone climbing the stairs. “That will be Jaap,” Joosje said. “I’m glad you’re back,” said Auntie Stien, as a skinny young man in a blue hat entered the room. “Well, what have we here,” he replied. “Then I suppose I’ll be going,” the old woman said, “at least nothing has happened to you.” While Joosje was leading her to the stairs, Frits shook the young man’s hand and said: “My warmest congratulations on your son. I hope the present proves in some way useful.” He pointed to the table full of gifts.
After laying his hat and overcoat aside, the new arrival settled down in Joosje’s chair. He had a thin, pale mouth, bony fingers and a narrow skull with indentations at the temples. The wispy, light-blond hair on his head had become so thin at the front and top that one could see the bluish skin right through it. “Well, my good Frits,” he asked with a smile, “how are things? A cigarette? A cigar? Always up for that, right?” He proffered a box of thin cigars. They both lit one.
Joosje came back in. “Jaap, haven’t you seen the present Frits brought for Hans?” she asked. “Mercy me, no, how could I have forgotten, quite reprehensible of me,” said Jaap, barely containing his laughter. “Mr van Egters, I extend to you my sincerest apologies.” Joosje handed him the saucer. “Well, would you look at that, and a beaker, and chocolate bars, my goodness.” “And an apple,” said Frits. “And an apple,” Jaap added.
“I’ll be damned, but it’s Tuesday today, isn’t it?” he asked, after the present was back on the table. “The most miserable day in the week, after Monday, but it is in fact a Saturday, for tomorrow is Christmas.”
“I find Friday the most pleasant day,” Frits said, “for then one has the prospect of Saturday.” “And I enjoy Thursday most,” Jaap replied, “for then one has the prospect o
f Friday.”
“We could go on like this, I fear,” Frits said. He shivered, rubbed his hands together and tapped his feet. “I think I’m coming down with something,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “I’ve been working on the same premise for the last few days,” said Jaap. “Have you been staying inside, then?” Frits asked. “Oh yes,” Jaap answered, “our tap is still broken. Every morning I lug water from downstairs all the way up those steps. That’s enough for me. Then I feel no need to go outside any more.”
“But doesn’t the office send a doctor to examine you?” asked Frits.
“They do,” Jaap said, “but it’s a normal doctor with a practice of his own. All you have to do is count the hours: first he has his charity patients in the morning. Then he makes his neighbourhood rounds. When he’s done with that he eats lunch at home and then goes in to see his private patients. Which means he can get here no earlier than three thirty. At three o’clock I climb into bed and read something pleasant. At three thirty, when I hear a car door slam, I know what that means. By the time he comes in I’m asleep, and Joosje wakes me.” “And what has he said so far?” “He’s only been here once,” Jaap said, “so what could he say? You can be as healthy as anything, but if you say ‘I feel terrible’ and you’re lying in bed, what can a doctor like that say but: see how you feel in three days’ time. Am I right?” He leaned back and ran both hands simultaneously over his hair.
“You’ve become even balder,” Frits said, “you’re getting extremely bald. Are you still massaging it? You told me recently, as I recall, that you massaged your scalp.”
“I put paraffin oil on it,” Jaap said, “that’s an excellent remedy. I massage it with paraffin oil.” “What a filthy mess,” Frits said, “but then you have to wash it afterwards.” “No, of course not, I wouldn’t do that,” Jaap replied.