The Bridges

by Tarjei Vesaas

  ‘Well, it looks as if you found her,’ she said to Torvil without pausing.

  ‘That’s right. We went for a walk in the wood for a while.’

  ‘For quite a while.’

  ‘I ought to have helped you with the syrup,’ said Aud, ‘but we dawdled a bit longer than we meant to.’

  ‘Oh no, I don’t want any help. It’s never right unless you do it yourself, you know. Besides,’ she added, ‘you mustn’t forget that entrance exam of yours.’

  ‘I haven’t forgotten it, Mother.’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘You don’t have to fuss, Mother.’

  That was unfair. She didn’t fuss, they knew that. She was simply quick-footed and full of zest for work. She let the accusation roll easily off her.

  Aud’s father opened his door and stuck his head out through the crack.

  ‘Is Torvil here?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Was it nice in the wood?’

  Torvil did not catch the teasing tone in his voice, and started slightly.

  ‘Yes, of course. Why?’

  The door was already closed.

  ‘Are you coming over to my house for a bit, Aud? I’ve got something I want to show you before I go to bed.’

  ‘Yes, come on,’ said Aud, already on her way, as quickfooted as her mother when necessary.

  How will she bear it tonight? thought Torvil as he followed her out.

  It was only a few paces from the one house to the other. Indoors the houses were built alike, but the furnishings made them look different. At Torvil’s house people behaved as if they thought a good deal, looking straight in front of them, thinking and saying nothing. It was quiet. His mother was by nature placid and had left her mark on her home. Torvil had soon learned to go next door, because Aud was there and because it was all so different. But one thing was the same throughout the twin houses: a great calm. Everything as it should be. The slight bustle in Aud’s house was unimportant.

  Aud and Torvil drifted next door. They were just as welcome there. But this evening the silence felt suddenly oppressive.

  ‘Going to show Aud something.’

  He was answered by a couple of nods from people who sat at peace in their chairs in the evenings, and who had an eighteen-year-old son who never got into trouble.

  His mother said calmly, ‘I suppose you’ve come from the wood.’

  That little start again. ‘We’ve just come from Aud’s house. We’ve been sitting ...’

  ‘Yes, but you came from the wood and into the yard.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘It’s only that I saw you.’

  ‘Yes. We went for a walk.’

  His father cleared his throat.

  ‘Which you have every right to do.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  What a lot of chat! Torvil looked at his mother. This was not like her. Had she noticed something?

  ‘Of course,’ she said again. ‘But it looks as if there’s something the matter this evening.’

  ‘I don’t see why,’ said Torvil.

  ‘I thought there was, but never mind. I noticed it as soon as you came in through the door.’

  That was all. She never interfered with personal questions. Torvil knew that. She had established a fact: what she had seen. All the same Torvil was nervous of her quiet eyes.

  He said indifferently, ‘What about that essay you wanted to see, Aud?’

  ‘Mm.’

  They went into his room.

  There were exercise-books in Torvil’s room too, for he was working for the same examination as Aud. But that evening they did not look at their work.

  ‘I’d better go home again, Torvil.’

  He remembered what he had been thinking about once, long ago. This afternoon, but so long ago.

  ‘We must decide what we’re going to do before you go.’

  ‘Your mother could see there was something the matter.’

  ‘No, she didn’t. It’s just her way. She never pries.’

  ‘I know that. Oh, I’m so frightened. What shall we do with it tomorrow?’

  ‘We’ll take our books out somewhere tomorrow as usual,’ said Torvil, ‘and then we’ll go there.’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘Then we’ll have to see. We must take a spade with us.’

  ‘Ugh.’

  ‘You’d better go, Aud, you can’t stand much more.’

  ‘But we ought to find out something.’

  ‘You know we can’t do that.’

  Aud winced. Then she said, ‘When everyone’s asleep I’ll go there and look, Torvil!’

  ‘Look? At what?’

  ‘To see whether anyone comes. To see whether anyone has been there and done anything.’

  ‘You’re crazy. You certainly won’t do that. You’re just saying it to—I don’t quite know.’

  She quietened down again. ‘I’d like to, but I daren’t. It’s the sort of thing you want to do badly, but then you let it go. But now I’m certain someone will come.’

  ‘I don’t think it’s all that certain,’ said Torvil.

  ‘Shall we sit here and wait, Torvil?’

  ‘Sit here and wait? What do you mean? Aud, you must go to bed, you sound as if you’ve had about as much as you can stand. I know you have.’

  ‘And what about you?’

  ‘Do go.’

  ‘I shan’t sleep, Torvil. I keep seeing it under the twigs.’

  She got to her feet and picked up one of Torvil’s books.

  ‘Are you going to work all the same?’

  ‘I was supposed to be fetching one of your books, remember?’

  ‘Of course. I’d forgotten. Oh yes—and I’d forgotten that I was almost run over by a lorry a little way along the road this afternoon. Just before I went off to look for you.’

  ‘Oh?’ said Aud. ‘How horrid.’

  It didn’t seem important.

  7

  Nightmare about the Dog and the Clearing

  Is it already autumn, chill and white with rime? There’s a trace of frost in the air. You draw back from it, shamefaced, as if from a defeat. What does it mean?

  I won’t do it.

  What is it you won’t do?

  Things are slowly taking form.

  A black wall? No, it’s the black pier of a bridge. It’s only the big pier of the bridge at home, that’s all, with the silent river flowing under the arch. The parapet jutting out boldly in the cold morning half-light. Just jutting out.

  What is it you won’t do?

  A raw breath of daybreak and water. A damp puff of air against the sleeping grey-black bridge. But there’s another bridge today! I didn’t know that. This is happening at the bridges—that’s how it is. I’ll have to accept it. The river and the bridges are so strong and so solitary.

  Is no one to cross, then?

  Don’t know.

  It’s silent because of that dog.

  There’s a dog going across the bridge. It seemed to climb right out of the parapet and is crossing over slowly, big, long-legged and colourless. The colour is lost in the wisps of mist billowing round it, and in the yellow-grey gravel on which it walks. But it is clearly a dog.

  No one is watching, it seems. If anyone is watching he is doing so secretly, from behind the comer of a drawn blind, from a look-out which has been waiting for precisely this. A dog this size has a voice that could raise the echoes, if it wanted, but it does not open its jaws.

  It walks up on to the bridge and moves slowly across to the side that is out of sight. The other side is hidden today.

  There is complete silence.

  There probably was someone on the bridge. But it is as silent as the grave there.

  The dog goes across. There is yet another bridge—so he can appear again from the same direction.

  The old bridge seems to have died many times. It continues to stand, its stones darkening. The other bridge is not for us. We did not know it was there until th
is moment of nightmare.

  There seems to be no one there: and yet there is a dog that is much too big, the sand-coloured dog. Halfway across it meets the wind that blows eternally on the bridges.

  It stands in the wind on the bridges and slowly disintegrates before our eyes. We watch with relief. There is no dog.

  It was only our wretched eyes. It is standing there. It mingled with the mist and the invisible wind for only a second. It goes across without trembling or uncertainty, and on towards its rime-white clearing. When it comes back across the other bridge we shall not be with it.

  No, no. Turn away from me.

  No good saying anything, it’s here. Fear glitters in the eyes of hidden sentinels.

  The sentinels’ teeth chatter and they say with dropping jaws: Turn away. You don’t exist.

  But immediately afterwards, made impotent by what they have witnessed, they say: Open your jaws! Do it. Make the earth tremble. Loosen the moss from the rock.

  Or they say: No, I won’t do it. It’s not mine. If there’s a dog loose, then what of it? It’s not mine.

  But it’s our bridge.

  Help me, all you who are near by—what is this?

  What is it, Aud? I can’t look at you because you’re right here. Are you here? In the rimed clearing and in ice-cold moonlight—what are you doing?

  Of course I’m here. You know that.

  You were beautiful this evening, Aud.

  Shhh.

  I must hurry, I have to go into the centre of that rimed clearing. I’m going there—and it’s the only thing I know I am going to do.

  The circular clearing is framed by dark trees. Tall trees, so that the land around it is shut out. Not a single bush in the clearing, but the autumn grass lies rimed and flattened, rimed and glittering under the enormous moon.

  If there is another place nearby it cannot be seen, though it seems important that there should be such a place. I walk very tensely, listening to my heart hammering against its walls.

  I mustn’t look at Aud. If I do she’ll disappear. I must go into the centre of the circular clearing. The rime rattles against my boots like crushed glass.

  Heart in mouth.

  What am I going towards?

  The harsh grip of the unknown makes me tremble as I walk. I must walk fast, yet cautiously. Nothing is explained.

  That’s how it is for us tonight.

  If we had looked at each other now, we probably would not have recognized each other.

  Walking stiffly forward to the designated spot. Was it I who wanted this?

  Was it you who wanted it?

  Then one of us says: I can’t feel my feet any more.

  What did you say?

  That’s the sign. Not to feel your feet.

  Are we here ...?

  We’re here.

  We stop abruptly whether we want to or not, we are in the middle of it, utterly defenceless in the moonlight.

  Not a living soul.

  Who should be here, anyway?

  We know nothing about it yet: but here, on this spot, we shall probably soon find out.

  Even though we want to look at each other, it is forbidden, impossible. Instead, we are forced to look quickly the other way.

  We say: This isn’t true.

  Everything is silent.

  Now ...

  No, everything is silent.

  The seconds stutter, no, they leap over one another: the moment has come.

  Someone has appeared from somewhere behind us. This knowledge turns my body to lead. I am unable to turn to see what it can be. I sense that someone is standing there.

  There is a tinkling like crushed glass in the rime.

  Of course not, it’s nothing like tinkling. Whatever may be meeting us here will not rustle in the grass. But there is something on its way forward.

  The only thought: this is impossible. I try to fool myself by saying it, but I know it is possible all the same, for there is no other way.

  We are so close that warmth passes from one to the other, but here this blessedness seems wasted, it may not count, may not be important, here we can only be one and one.

  Then without warning I am able to turn round! I can manage it, for some unknown reason. As if by a concerted effort we turn round simultaneously, glimpsing the whites of each other’s eyes. Glimpsing defiance.

  What do we see?

  A sand-coloured long-legged dog.

  That is all.

  It is more than enough.

  All at once I am not certain that I can see it, for the whites of my eyes are showing, altering and transforming everything. But when the eye rights itself, the dog is standing there after all. Not close by, but a fair distance out in the clearing, facing us, its head held high. At the moment it is standing still, its raised head stiffened as if searching for something.

  Why should the sight of it make me shudder? A sand-coloured dog, that’s all.

  Now the clearing begins to expand in all directions. I watch it with my own distended eyes. The clearing becomes more than twice its original size. At the same time the huge beast starts walking again—like a wandering sand-coloured patch in the rime, and in the deep moonlight. This huge creature is on the move.

  We stand rooted in our places.

  The dog moves forward, straight as an arrow. But it approaches slowly, because the clearing widens beneath its feet and moves backwards—it has to go over the same ground incessantly. We see that its tongue is lolling as if it has been running, even though it walks very calmly. The moon shines on it strongly, and its colour throws back the light. It is a splendid, enormous dog.

  Shaken to the core we watch it.

  I try to harden myself, to brace myself, to resist this. I haven’t the strength.

  I stand listening in case a song might be found at this moment. A defiant song, at least.

  No song to be found here. No song is made here. No song penetrates here. Instead the shock makes my lips dance. My lips stopped forming words a long time ago. Yet they are saying something the whole time. I am saying something the whole time, to Aud.

  The dog grows larger. Now it begins to come close. Well, we managed to turn towards it at any rate. Supposing it had come from behind, and we had had to feel that?

  It would probably have stopped behind our backs and touched us with its tongue. Then everything would have gone black. I would not have had the strength to bear it.

  I can’t bear it now either, can I? Standing searching for lonely songs deep down inside myself, open mouthed to serve as resistance.

  The dog approaches as if along a ruled line, slowly, gradually. It is so close now that I see it as it really is. And then I start in disbelief: I see that the tall dog has no eyes.

  It’s not true!

  But when I look again, it is true.

  I tremble, rooted to the spot. Aud is not permitted to hear what I was going to say to her. What she is saying never reaches me either.

  Trembling, rooted to the spot. Now is the moment. Now it will stretch out its tongue.

  The defiant song?

  Useless. It’s hidden itself.

  Its face comes closer. It is unbelievable, impossible to look at for anyone who has come to this place. We who have come to this place. We do not look at each other either, but all the same we try to see what is happening out of the corners of our eyes.

  Will it, with that tongue?

  Does it have to be this way?

  Yes, it’s doing it. From the corner of my eye I see Aud touched by its tongue. It touched Aud with its tongue. A single light lick.

  No!

  Who says no?

  No one. There was no sound as it happened to Aud. Silence and speechlessness.

  I can’t look at her.

  She is standing. She hasn’t collapsed.

  She flinched inwardly but you can’t see that. Has Aud turned to ice now? Or does she feel flames of fire?

  I can’t ask her.

  Not a sound. Not a mo
vement.

  But she has not fainted.

  Ice?

  On the contrary, what is this rising warmth that is spreading inside me? I was not touched! It only concerned the one of us. I ought not to feel it!

  The dog has already turned, and started back towards the woods encircling the freezing, rimed clearing.

  Aud is standing upright.

  A wild wish: Say something! Make a sound, if only once.

  Can’t you hear any more?

  No. Mute.

  The splendid dog returns as if along a ruled line. The moonlight leaps after its sand-coloured back with every movement. It must be growing smaller, but it seems just as large all the same. It does not quicken its pace, but the clearing shrinks once again, so that the dog appears to move more quickly than it actually does. The thick woods open up for it, it is not here.

  Aud—

  How shall I speak her name now? It is not the same any more!

  Aud—

  She is not here.

  Aud!

  She has gone.

  8

  Night Riddles

  Where am I?

  Torvil put a hand to his forehead and found that he was sweating. No question of dry frost—he was sweating and tossing about in bed. The room was pitch-dark. He groped about on the table for his watch strap, and found his watch with relief. Everything fell into place.

  At any rate he was here, in his own bed; and could think.

  He thought: is none of it true? Weren’t we in the woods either? Didn’t we find anything under the twigs?

  It was tempting to imagine so.

  Only it was no use. That could not be made to vanish by waking up; it was only too true.

  Everything came back to him harshly and plainly. Doubly clear since the night was dark and still.

  But what about this nightmare he had been struggling with?

  What is Aud doing?

  Is Aud asleep?

  Oh no. It’s worse for her than for me. I knew that when I heard her weeping behind the stone.

  But the dog still seemed very much alive. He must go over to Aud at once because of the dog!