Tómas Jónsson, Bestseller

by Guðberger Bergsson

  These flew over to me.

  The light flashes over the roofs and the girl cries out:

  I’ll be right over.

  A few moments later there is a light knock on the door. Ásmundur pulls open the door; a young girl appears in the doorway and says she is called Fía. He gets embarrassed but invites her in though he has few conversational topics to bring up, so he talks about how she made a good choice with the flashlight, which she willingly hands him; he sees it is a rectangular flashlight with two conflicting polarities and a mirror lantern on the side. They look at the flashlight a considerable time, testing it together and she says there is almost no way to get new batteries, so she makes these ones last by putting them out overnight on the radiator.

  The compounds inside them ferment, you see, she says.

  They do, yes, of course, he says.

  I was stupid enough to buy it from a trawler fisherman who sailed from England.

  I’ll buy some batteries for you, says Ásmundur.

  They speak of “things you cannot get in this country,” for most of their time, almost all, which saved them from having nothing to talk about. Many trawler fishermen owe their marriages to “things you cannot get in this country.” The girl discusses how different life in England had been: there you could get all things of all kinds, whereas here there was nothing to be had. The topic peters out and then she asks for her clothes, the panties that were drying during the conversation. Because the frost has worsened, she asks Ásmundur to turn around while she slips into them; she has nothing to change into and often goes without panties except in August.

  That time of year it is dry enough, it’s feasible to dry something in one day, she says.

  Ásmundur turns and looks out of the roof window while she changes.

  I feel like my clothes sought you out, she says. I hope that you let yourself imagine something.

  Ásmundur imagined many things during the rustling that took place behind him, and from the shallows of those imaginings a marriage proposal rose, the way a house gets built on sand. It became clear Fía was thrifty; in no time at all she had him bequeath her half his property.

  If you find yourself scared of me, she says, remember a woman will not run from half a house.

  And thus began a marriage story marked by hope for neither happiness nor unhappiness. Ásmundur’s wish of inviting a woman into his house had been fulfilled; he believes a woman is a property’s protective coat of arms. He had a professional paint a rose pattern up the staircase, rented out the second floor and part of the basement, but lived with the woman in the roof apartment. This was a manifestation of optimism. Ásmundur had a younger brother named Markús who was a scoundrel with a pageboy haircut and a slender mustache like a fop. While Ásmundur endlessly hauled cod from the sea, his brother pulled haddocks on the divan in the apartment and made his home in . . . (This part of the manuscript is missing.)

  . . . hook caught under the ring . . . he was hanging, dangling in the air, swinging to and fro in his boots and anorak; they cried:

  Take off your ring.

  . . . did not want to not let go of the ring. The wire snapped the finger and the ring off him, and after his return his brother reported it to Fía as that he’d wanted to get rid of the trappings of marriage so he could have a girlfriend in every port . . . Fía besieged Ásmundur with questions about the causes of the accident. Then she ordered him in the future to report his movements to her, not that there were multiple ports to discuss; the trawler only ever docked in one place in England.

  He thinks you aren’t worthy of him, said Markús, the wicked brother, who was descended from the priestliest country but was in revolt against his family.

  We are a match.

  His words fell on good soil. They spoke heatedly, and Márkus said he had never felt a warmth with any woman but her—never before such spiritual understanding.

  You are different from any other woman I have met, he said. I cannot define what it is, but warmth does not quite capture it . . .

  They talked sub rosa; he told Fía about his commercial enterprises and about women and how some women shaved their genitals before intercourse.

  I am probably too sensitive. He cannot stand to see her in daylight, because of a fear inside that started after the dog bit me in the groin when I was a child. From then on he has been afraid of any opening, and if he is shocked he imagines it as a pair of gums. So women and I have never properly fit together.

  This stirred Fía, in truth it aroused in her great pride as the savior of this unfortunate bachelor. After having shut the window and turned off the lights she undressed under the covers to see if they fit together. He buried himself in her sweater and wept in the dark after he kissed her for giving him so much and her altruistic breast was delighted for the short time she received him, stock-still, without being pushy.

  I have to sacrifice myself and save this man my god he has had such a hard time he needs to be cared for, she maintained.

  Oh she is so good to him.

  Fía’s confidence grew, she “had never in her life received anything but ingratitude and shame” so her body had been completely unsatisfied. She got orgasms with Ásmundur, but the soul’s weight from Markús—and so she did not feel guilty, but generous.

  god is good to allow a man this

  She thought a lot, in the kitchen and in the bathroom and even in the hallway and in bed, as Markús dressed her warmly in ever more sweaters and dresses until he finally had her tied up. His crying fits increased, he complained and cursed life, and not even she could care for him during the fits. The weak disposition of Þórhöllu from Efrabæ in Flóa was now surfacing in him.

  Everything will be all right in time, Fía reassured him.

  Then stop letting my brother dishonor you, yours, and mine.

  Ásmundur is on a trip with the trawler. Imagine the sea glittering in the expanse, variously in moon or sunshine, variously gray or blue, maybe green. He thinks often about the gap between his fingers, how he is skilled in woodwork and widely read in literature, and it occurs to him to whittle a finger to replace the one he had lost (he considers cutting off more fingers so the wooden fingers would be identical in all respects). In order to replicate the original finger, he singed the tree finger with hot nails where there had been a bruise under his nail, and in private he admired the construction and expected that Fía would, too (he had gotten that notion from books). One time when the net had been emptied onto the trawler deck and the artificial finger sat motionless within his glove, melancholy seized him; he reached into his pocket for the dead finger, seized with minimal fuss a wriggling cod, put his finger in its throat, and released it back into the sea.

  I guess not all of me will end up in your jaws.

  This is the way he thought.

  His first task in Hull was to buy black gloves, and on his homecoming he tried his finger in the thumb before he pulled the glove over his hand; he placed the wedding ring on the outside of the glove. Thus adorned, he came out of the bathroom, and once in the kitchen Fía mocked him for his ingenuity, leaping away from him with cries and clambering up on a windowsill.

  You devil! I’m afraid of you, are you trying to become a man with metal hands?

  After that, Fía was quick, together with Markús, to head down the stairs to tell Sigurður and Ólaf about “the way things have developed.” That night, before Ásmundur went to bed, she put some black twine and embroidery scissors in a white envelope and placed it under his pillow.

  Egh, I’ve got goose bumps. I’m mad. Eczema has broken out over me just thinking about him, she said and stamped on the stairs as though she was beside herself with disgust and itchiness.

  They stood without moving by the coat hooks on the stairway leading to the attic: she, Sigurður, Ólaf, and Markús.

  Hello, Tóm, how are you, Fía called out to me. That’s enough chitchat for today, Tómmas.

  Can I chitchat with myself?

  Perhaps I curs
ed the stairs, but Fía could be agreeable, the way tarts are when wrapped in thick smoke, coughing and throat-rattling, styled in uncombed perms, always a cigarette between their lips. She was pretty enough and neat, if she wanted to be, with a small mouth like a pinhole under her nose, her eyes bright and tense, nimble as a snow bunting. They critiqued the situation among themselves, the dinner matron and Fía, who slept on a pallet on the floor for the week after Ásmundur had searched under the pillow with his fingers, found the letter with the twine, cut open the thread with the scissors, and knew in that symbolic way their marriage had ended without any struggle on her part—though he lay in bed, his soul in utter turmoil. Ásmundur stopped going to sea.

  But because I felt pity for him, I arranged for a food service for my husband, on the condition that the costs would be taken from his share of the apartment. Markús and I do not need much space; we are both slender.

  The matron knew the stipulations well for when the attic apartment was all gone. Ásmundur had eaten it up past use but she had continued to feed him and now he lies in the trash-storage with his mental and physical capacities slightly inflamed. The Board carefully discussed his situation before he managed to eat himself all the way down the stairs. At that point, no one had seen this mysterious man’s eyes; he just floated or existed in thin air and then one day, very unexpectedly, he was sitting at the end of the table, silent like a rock pillar, and Sigurður had to give up the seat he had held a long time. We estimated that Ásmundur’s trip down the stairs with a knife, spoon, and fork took about seven years. No one knows for sure, no one knows how square-meter amounts convert to meal costs. His stay among us in the refectory will undoubtedly take much longer. The second floor is much more valuable than the penthouse. Here one must, however, take into account the overall deterioration of properties, depreciation, and the recent significant devaluation and increase in the cost of food. It is much more expensive to eat than it was a year ago. The worst of all this is that the apartment’s valuation was confirmed in writing before the war. Devaluation had not been taken into account. Ólafur loosely estimates that if Ásmundur does not have any food other than Knorr soup he would eat up about 1 cm2 per day. How many milimeters2 with each soup spoon or soup dish. Depending on how many spoonfuls are in the dish and whether they are heaping or half. On average I estimate there are five, well-heaped. Ásmundur eats soup twice a day and porridge in the morning, but can anyone survive indefinitely on a gurgle of empty soup.

  I just calculated this on the spot, said one of the students out of nowhere. Supposing there are on average five spoonfuls per plate, then the equivalent for each spoonful—

  But no one was listening to him. However, I was full of curiosity. Only old Tómas pricked up his ears. He seemed like his whole life he would be the sort to shoot up a hand and say:

  I’ve got the answer, teacher. If the Russian chess grandmaster Mikhail Tal moves his queen to G 5 he will win the game in four moves, without a doubt.

  Tómas has hit upon my child-like pretensions.

  A lifelong, young adult middle-aged old man, he pretends to know better than anyone else—always in all cases these young intellectuals know that if Tal places the queen on G 5 the game is won in four moves

  Tómas blinked. He opened his crunching jaws and put the spoon between his tongue and teeth.

  Example No. 1: Ásmundur has a three-story house, one hundred square meters in size on a three hundred square meter freehold lot.

  a) How long does it take him to eat each story, if the upper story is valued at ISK 200,000, the second floor at ISK 300,000, and the basement apartment at ISK 150,000? His board is estimated at ISK 23.30 per day.

  b) How many cm2 does he eat per day? Assume two main meals and three snacks. The ratio between the main meals and snacks is 2:1.

  c) How many of these cm2 does he eat with a soupspoon, if the ratio of soupspoons and snacks is 15:1?

  d) Calculate each apartment separately using the same numbers.

  Such an example might occur in a math textbook for school children; it is no wonder that children become such angry devils if they get this sort of question, says Ólafur.

  Dísa enjoys the humor and laughs:

  I see that you bankfolk are not all that strong at problem solving.

  The Board rolls around laughing.

  And if you had answers, they would not be worth copying in an exam.

  Ásmundur continues to chew on his own little morsels. Ólaf wittily says to Sigurður:

  This man’s work is just like the communist’s subversive activity: he eats away his own property rights.

  When Ásmundur stumbles to the table everyone falls silent. For some reason, everyone is frightened of the jewelry that adorns his dead finger, a ring set with a shiny stone. Some are of the opinion the entire hand is cast in gold, which I deem impossible. Ásmundur lost it long after one could go to the bank and demand the equivalent of one’s account in gold. I was once tempted to tell the Board a story about how everything gets destroyed from the inside and covered in dust, about an Englishman who was granted vacation from his dedicated service to the Crown, and stayed in England. He began his work as a poor man (yes, I know this story is somewhat cliché) and was relieved of his duties after the summer vacation, having then reached an advanced age, and he returned to India where he was going to pass his days in his house, but when he stepped over the threshold, it crashed to the ground because termites had eaten the core lumber from the inside and nothing was left standing except a coffee table with ivory edging; all the rest was dust at his feet. And you know why the table stood alone in the ash heap. Because the termites could not get into the wood. The Board started giggling to hear of this tragedy. I fell silent, and after that I decided to not speak up. In my silence I had the idea Ásmundur could protect his property by taking tranquilizers. You cannot spend while sleeping, you need no nourishment, you do not eat your house, and you never feel better than when sleeping in your bed. It is not enough to lie down. Just being awake and keeping your eyes open consumes energy.

  What did he eat at this meal, asked Sigurður. The roses from the rose tapestry; linoleum on the landing; brass braces on the edges of the steps (Edeltraud polishes those Sunday mornings).

  He does not need to worry even if he eats himself all the way down to the basement. A widow lives there. But who will feed him when he gets to the garden. Ásmundur eats with his left hand, which is evidently cumbersome, and you can see the struggle in the fierce convulsions of pain at the corners of the mouth. Maybe he needs to know the food has reached his stomach, since he seems to hesitate with each spoonful. The house shrinks beneath his feet.

  what am i eating nowi think it is the damn toilet bowl

  Today he eats a door-frame, tomorrow it will be part of the internal wiring or a key from a lock. One spoon: groms-puff-groms; and the vicious circle narrows. He puts the spoon away in disgust; so long as she lies there dead, the property stands intact. He has tried to go hungry, has lain all gassy in his bedroom cubby without any food for two days, the dining matron plunks herself down, through the door abusive language can be heard in the dead-silent dining hall, the pensioners gulp their soup down quietly and hold their breath. The matron plunks back through the room, sweaty and hot, her face flushed. People stare at her, but she sails heavily on, her buttocks rising and falling. And we know what food will be served the next day: salted meat and beans. All the doors will be allowed to remain open, doors that otherwise are closed (the kitchen is kept closed so our appetites do not increase too much), and the salt meat and bean smell will flow through all the parts of the apartment.

  Alone in the room off of the dining hall, tormented by hunger and anguish, Ásmundur will bury his nose and face in the pillow and wage a hopeless struggle with the great banality that is the smell of bean soup. Thinking of the smells, of the steam, something invisible will win him to this great struggle. The body’s needs are stronger than a man’s temperament: the sound of chewing;
water rolling along the tongue. The swollen stomach yells out its motto: food, yuuum, food . . . he sways and sweats and stumbles with a terrible expression from his lair toward the destruction inside: a spoon and a fork and red salt-meat sprinkled with yellow beans. He barges jabbering on (no other sound emanating from his body except stomach growling).

  Well, what’s this, man. I’m just cooking.

  And several square millimeters disappear inside him with the spoonful. And this is why he sits last at the table fighting with his appetite. The same method is being used against me in my apartment.

  Tómas, don’t you find it awfully tiring, always eating at the refectory?

  She is crafty, her conversation sly. This great pile shakes from belching.

  Are you going to have anything nutritious today Tómas at least get some milk soup inside you.

  Ásmundur’s mental anguish gives me stomach cramps, even though his anguish is probably only in his head. For days I remain listless. I force myself to pick at the food Anna brings me and leaves on the chair.

  you can choose whether you touch it, but refectory food will never be as nourishing as homemade food that castrates the soul, sterilizes it.

  Anna is simple. An invalid.

  yes but good Tómas you settled the rent with us

  In front of her swelling stomach she dandles a child in light-blue satin clothes, blue boy with long blond locks that fall over his ears. I do not answer. Dog.