Kennedy's Brain

by Mankell Henning

  There was only one man standing out there fishing, she could see that now. His movements were jerky, as if he had suddenly become impatient.

  She felt a mixture of joy and horror. It was Aron, nobody else moved as awkwardly as he did. But finding him had been too easy, too quick.

  It occurred to her that she did not have the slightest idea about what kind of a life he led now. He could well have remarried, and maybe even had more children. The Aron she had known and loved did not exist any more. The man standing a hundred metres away from her in the bitterly cold wind, with a fishing rod in his hand, could turn out to be a man she no longer knew. Perhaps she ought to go back to the car, and then follow him when he had finished fishing?

  Then she felt angry at being so indecisive. As soon as she came into close proximity with Aron, she lost her usual resolve. He still had a hold on her.

  She made up her mind to confront him here, on the pier.

  He has no escape route, unless he jumps into the icy water. This pier is a cul-de-sac. He can't run away. This time he's forgotten to allow himself a secret exit.

  When she reached the end of the pier he was facing away from her. She could see the back of his head; his bald patch had grown bigger. He seemed to have shrunk, his figure gave an impression of weakness she had never associated with him before.

  Next to him was a square of plastic sheeting, held in place with a stone on each corner, weighing it down. He had caught three fish. She thought they looked like a sort of cross between a cod and a pike, if such a cross was conceivable.

  She was about to call his name when he turned round. It was a quick movement, as if he suspected he was about to be attacked. He looked hard at her, but she had the hood of her windcheater up and tightly fastened around her face, so that he did not recognise her at first. When it did dawn on him who it was, she could see that he looked afraid. That had never happened during the time they had lived together: Aron had never seemed insecure, never mind frightened.

  It only took him a couple of seconds to regain his composure. He jammed the rod between some stones.

  'I didn't expect this. You finding me here.'

  'You'd never expect me to come looking for you.'

  He looked serious, waited, was afraid of what might come next.

  During the long hours on board the plane and during the car journey she had told herself she must be gentle with him, wait for the least hurtful moment to tell him about Henrik. It was now clear to her that it would be impossible.

  It had started raining again, the wind was more blustery than ever. He turned his back on the wind, and came towards her. His face was pale. His eyes were red, as if he had been drinking, his lips were chapped. Lips that don't kiss split and crumble away, he used to say.

  'Henrik is dead. I've tried everything I could think of to make contact with you. In the end this was the only possibility left, so I came here and looked for you.'

  He looked at her, his face expressionless, as if he had failed to understand. But she knew that she had stuck a knife into him, and that he was feeling the pain.

  'I found Henrik dead in his flat. He was in bed, as if he were asleep. We buried him in the cemetery in Sveg.'

  Aron swayed and looked as if he were about to fall over. He leaned against the stone wall, and held out his hands. She took hold of them.

  'It can't be true.'

  'I don't think it can be true either. But it is.'

  'Why did he die?'

  'We don't know. The police and the pathologist say that he took his own life.'

  Aron stared at her, his eyes popping.

  'They say the lad committed suicide? I can't believe that for one moment.'

  'Nor can I. But his body contained a large dose of sleeping pills.'

  Aron gave a roar, threw the fish into the water, then hurled the bucket and the fishing rod over the pier wall. He took firm hold of Louise's arm and led her away. He told her to follow his rusty old Volkswagen campervan. They left Apollo Bay, taking the road she had used to get here. Then Aron turned off onto a road that twisted steeply up into the hills that tumbled down into the sea. He drove fast and unsteadily, as if he were drunk. Louise followed close behind him. In among the hills they turned off onto a road that was barely more than a path, climbing steeply upwards all the time, and eventually stopped at a wooden house perched on the very edge of a cliff. Louise got out of the car, thinking that this was exactly the sort of place she would have imagined Aron choosing as a hideaway. The view was boundless, the sea stretched as far as the horizon.

  Aron flung open the door, grabbed a bottle of whisky from a table next to the open fire and filled a glass. He looked enquiringly at her, but she shook her head. She needed to be sober. It was enough for Aron to go overboard and when he drank he could become violent. She had seen too many broken windows and smashed chairs and had no desire to experience anything like that again.

  There was a big wooden table outside the large picture window facing the sea. She could see colourful parrots landing on it and pecking at crumbs of bread. Aron had moved to the land of parrots. I would never have imagined he would do that.

  She sat on a chair opposite him. He was slumped on a grey sofa, holding his glass in both hands.

  'I refuse to believe this is true.'

  'It happened six weeks ago.'

  He flared up.

  'Why did nobody tell me?'

  She made no reply, but turned away to look at the red and light blue parrots.

  'I'm sorry, I didn't mean that. I realise that you have been looking for me. You would never have left me in ignorance if you could have avoided it.'

  'It's not so easy to find somebody who's hidden himself away.'

  She remained there, sitting opposite him, all night. Conversation was spasmodic, with long, silent intervals. Both she and Aron were skilled at allowing silence to roam. That was also a sort of conversation, she had discovered that during the early part of their life together. Artur was another person who never spoke unnecessarily. But Aron's silence sounded different.

  For a long time afterwards Louise would remember that night with Aron as being like returning to the time before Henrik was born. Of course, he was the one they were talking about. Their sorrow was one long scream. But even so, they remained sufficiently far apart to prevent her moving to the sofa beside Aron. It was as if she could not rely on his sorrow being as intense as it ought to have been in somebody who has lost their only child. And that made her bitter.

  Shortly before dawn she asked him if he had fathered any more children. He made no reply, merely stared at her in astonishment: that told her all she needed to know.

  The red parrots returned at dawn. Aron put birdseed out on the table. Louise went outside with him. She shivered. The sea way down below them was grey, the waves foaming.

  'I dream about seeing an iceberg out there one of these days,' he said without warning. 'An iceberg that's drifted all the way from the South Pole.'

  Louise remembered that letter he had written.

  'That must be an impressive sight.'

  'The most remarkable thing is that a gigantic iceberg melts away without our being able to see it happening. I've always thought of myself like that, melting away, vanishing bit by bit. My death will be the result of slow warming.'

  She observed him in profile.

  He's changed, but he's still the same, she thought.

  They had been talking all night.

  She took his hand. They stared out to sea together, looking for an iceberg that would never come.

  CHAPTER 8

  Three days after the meeting on the pier, amid all the wind and the rain and the hurt Louise sent a postcard to her father. She had already phoned him and explained how she had found Aron. The line to Sveg had been surprisingly clear, her father seemed to be very close, and he had asked her to send his best. She had described the colourful parrots that gathered on Aron's table, and promised to send him a card. She had discovered a s
hop next to the harbour that sold everything from eggs to hand-knitted jumpers and picture postcards. The picture she chose was a flock of red parrots. Aron was waiting for her in the café where he regularly started and finished his fishing expeditions. She wrote the card while still in the shop and posted it in a box next to the hotel she would have booked into if she had not found Aron on the pier so quickly.

  What did she write to her father? That Aron was living the life of a comfortable hermit in a wooden cabin in the forest, that he had lost weight, and above all that he was heartbroken. You were right. It would have been irresponsible not to track him down. You were right and I was wrong. The parrots are not only red, but also blue – or perhaps turquoise. I don't know how long I shall stay here.

  She posted the card, then went down to the beach. It was a cold day with a clear sky and virtually no wind. A few children were playing with an old football, an elderly couple were walking their black dogs. Louise walked along the beach, just above the waterline.

  She had been together with Aron for three days. At dawn, after that first long night, when she had taken hold of his hand, he had asked her if she had anywhere to stay. His house had two bedrooms, and she could use the spare one if she wished. What were her plans? Had the tragedy of Henrik's death hit her hard? She did not reply, merely accepted the offer of the bedroom, collected her bag and slept until late in the afternoon. When she woke up Aron had left. He had left a message on the sofa, in his usual impatient and scrawling handwriting. He had gone to work. 'I look after some trees in a little rainforest. There is food. The house is yours. My grief is unbearable.'

  She prepared a simple meal, put on her warmest clothes and took her plate to the table outside the window. Before long the tame parrots were perched all around her, waiting for their share of the food. She counted the birds. There were twelve of them. It's the Last Supper, she thought. The last meal before the crucifixion. She felt a moment of peace, for the first time since she had crossed the threshold to Henrik's flat. She had somebody else besides Artur with whom she could share her sorrow. She could tell Aron all about the worries and fears that were plaguing her. Henrik's death was not natural. Nobody could explain the sleeping tablets. But nevertheless there must be a reason. He had committed suicide without being responsible for it.

  There is something else, something to do with President Kennedy and his missing brain. If anybody can help me to find that truth, it's Aron.

  When Aron came back home it was already dark. He took off his boots, gave her a furtive glance and disappeared into the bathroom. When he came out, he sat next to her on the sofa.

  'Did you find my note? Have you eaten?'

  'With the parrots. How did you manage to make them so tame?'

  'They're not frightened of humans. They've never been hunted or trapped. I've got used to sharing my food with them.'

  'You wrote that you were looking after some trees. Is that what you do? How you earn your living?'

  'I thought I'd show you tomorrow. I look after trees, go fishing, and I keep out of the way. The latter is my biggest job. You have dealt me a major blow, simply by finding me. Naturally I am grateful that you were the one who came with the awful news. Perhaps I would have wondered why Henrik stopped writing to me. I would have found out sooner or later. Possibly by chance. I would never have survived a shock like that. But you were the messenger.'

  'What happened to all your computers? You were the one who was going to prevent the world from losing all the memories created in our age. You once said that the "ones and zeros" in the world's computers were demons that could trick the human race into losing all its history.'

  'I believed that for a long time. We felt that we were saving the world from a devastating epidemic caused by the virus of vacuity, the ultimate death that blank pieces of paper represent. All the empty archives stripped of all their contents by a cancer that was incurable would make our day and age an insoluble riddle for people who live in the future. We really did believe we were on the way to finding an alternative archive system that would preserve our time for generations to come. We were looking for an alternative to the "ones and zeros". Or, rather, we were trying to create an elixir which would guarantee that one day computers would refuse to allow data inside them to be removed. We created a formula, an unprotected source code, that we later sold to a consortium in the USA. We received huge amounts of money for it. We had also made a contract guaranteeing that within twenty-five years the patent would become available to all countries of the world to use without their needing to pay for a licence. One day I stood in a New York street with a cheque for five million dollars in my hand. I kept one of those millions and gave away the rest. Do you understand what I'm saying?'

  'Some . . . Not everything.'

  'I can explain in detail.'

  'Not now. Did you give anything to Henrik?'

  Aron gave a start and looked at her in astonishment.

  'Why should I have given him any money?'

  'It wouldn't have been entirely unreasonable to give one's own son a contribution towards his living expenses.'

  'I never received any money from my parents. I still thank them for that even today. Nothing can spoil children more than giving them something they ought to earn for themselves.'

  'Who did you give the money to?'

  'There were so many possibilities to choose from. I gave it all to a foundation here in Australia that works to preserve the dignity of the Aborigines. Their life and their culture, to put it another way. I could have given the money to cancer research, to the preservation of rainforests, to the fight against locust plagues in East Africa. I put thousands of bits of paper in a hat and pulled out one that said Australia. I gave away the money, then I came here. Nobody knows it was me who donated the money. That's the most satisfying part of all.'

  Aron stood up.

  'I need to get a few hours' sleep. My tiredness is getting to me.'

  She remained on the sofa, and soon heard him snoring. The snores rolled through her consciousness like waves. She remembered them from the old days.

  In the evening he took her to a restaurant that clung on to a mountain ledge like an eagle's nest. There were few other diners. Aron seemed to know the waiter well, and went out into the kitchen with him.

  The meal served as another reminder of the time when she and Aron had lived together. Poached fish and wine. That had always been their celebratory menu. She remembered an odd camping holiday when they had eaten pike caught by Aron in dark forest tarns. But they had also eaten cod and whiting in northern Norway, and sole in France.

  He spoke to her through the choice of menu. That was his way of becoming familiar with her, making a cautious attempt to find out if she had forgotten what had once existed, or if it was still a reality for her.

  A feeling of melancholy overcame her. Love could not be reawakened, just as it was impossible for them to get back their dead son.

  That night they both slept soundly. She woke up once with the feeling that he had come to her room. But there was nobody there.

  The next day she got up early to accompany him to the small patch of rainforest he was responsible for. It was still dark when they left the house. There was no sign of the red parrots.

  'I see you've learned how to get up early in the morning,' she said.

  'Nowadays I don't understand how I could live for so many years and hate early mornings.'

  They drove through Apollo Bay. The forest was in a valley that sloped down to the sea. Aron told her it was the remains of an ancient rainforest that once covered all the southern area of Australia. Now it was owned by a private foundation which was financed by one of the men who, like Aron, had been paid millions of dollars for the unprotected source code they had sold.