“That’s right, Herr Vuldum. I’m well aware of it. But she was with Herr Director Stamp, and I meant to tell him sometime that women like that—you understand that the Herr Director is an old friend of mine, a fine person, and he drops in here every afternoon for a drink—and I would have said it to him tomorrow—”
“Well, then say it to him,” said Vuldum, unimpressed.
“I will if—if the Herr Director ever sets foot in here again,” said Lundbom, lost in gloom. “He didn’t even say good-bye when he left. But a person has to behave himself here, Herr Vuldum.”
“I wouldn’t say so at all. Not when the Herr Director has the poor taste to drag Black Else in here with him. What do we want her here for? After all, we have Charles the Twelfth there. What more do we need?”
He pointed to the wall at the right. Jastrau turned and saw a life-size picture of a naked woman or, more properly speaking, a woman without clothes, with her feet illogically resting on a Botticellian seashell. Her hands were ingeniously clasped behind her neck, since her arms were too short to assume satisfactorily the traditional attitude—one arm shielding the breasts and the other down where the hand could hide the pubic region. In order to make the insipidness of the picture complete, the artist had painted hair only on the woman’s head.
“Ah, yes,” guffawed the stout gentleman. “Our beauty—the one and only.”
“We’ve named her Charles the Twelfth in honor of Lundbom and his native country,” Vuldum said to Jastrau, disregarding the stout man’s outburst of passion.
Lundbom bowed with an embarrassed smile.
“You do me too much honor—too much honor, Herr Vuldum.”
“And now perhaps we can have another whiskey, my dear Ole, because I don’t suppose you spent all your money on the roses.” Vuldum looked at Jastrau inquiringly.
“No, but take it easy. I’ve never seen you get so stirred up.”
Vuldum gave him a black look.
“Did you get a good look at her?”
“No—not really.”
“Well, if you had you would have understood. A fat, white neck. Didn’t you notice? And to wear a black dress with a neck like that! No—I tell you.”
“You didn’t have to look at her.”
Vuldum’s expression grew more intense, and he compressed his lips into a thin line.
“And did you see that mark on her arm? Can you think of anything worse than a sore covered over with powder? No, I tell you, she’s a bad one—a really brazen slut. But hadn’t we better talk about something else? How are your two Bolsheviks? Why are they sitting there in your apartment—waiting for daddy?”
Jastrau did not hear him. An ulcer covered over with powder. He could see it in his mind’s eye, like a colorplate in a medical book. And he felt a physical repugnance. He could not rid himself of the flesh-colored, suppurative image. He made no reply.
“Oh well,” Vuldum said, raising his glass to his lips.
Farther out in the room a group of the customers had gotten together in a noisy circle. A fat, old man and a tall, thin student were dancing to the phonograph music, and every now and then the fat man would give the student a shove that sent him spinning against the wall. As he did so he would shout, “Who do you think you are anyway, you snotty kid? Are you making fun of an old man?” But these angry reproaches came with the regularity of a musical beat. The two would then continue dancing until the fat man could again chime in, in time with the music, “Who do you think you are, you snotty kid?” And then another shove that sent the student whirling against the wall.
“No, things aren’t really very pleasant here tonight,” Vuldum said, shuddering as if he felt cold. “It’s all so stupid. And just look at Kjær and Little P. over there.”
He nodded sourly toward the stout gentleman and the shop clerk. Both were drunk and had been giving vent to some loud expressions of opinion.
“We could get a few free whiskeys over there if we wanted to,” Vuldum added.
“Who are they—this Kjær and Little P.?” asked Jastrau. He was not at all interested. But he had to do something to dispel the lurid picture of that syphilitic sore. He had seen its likeness once in a medical textbook. Ah—there on the bar lay the three roses.
“Nobody of any importance, but each one of them can put his hands on a sack of gold. The young fellow, that’s Peter Krag, son of old Krag of Kattrupgaard, so it goes without saying that he’s worth his weight in gold. Ah me!”
Jastrau glanced over toward the round table. There sat Little P., the count who looked like a shop clerk, staring out into the room with a vacant expression like that of a mannequin in a shop window. The corpulent Kjær was slumped over the table, looking at his empty whiskey glass with puckered eyebrows as if about to bellow out another order.
“And Kjær—does he have money too?”
Vuldum nodded.
“Ah yes—we two immortals,” he sighed. “Should we on behalf of the spiritual side of things go over and cadge a few drinks from them—in spite of everything?”
Jastrau shook his head wearily.
“Oh well, I got to bed late last night too,” said Vuldum. “Besides, I have a civil service job, and I have to go over to the library tomorrow and write American round hand. So I think I’d better be getting home.”
“I’ll walk along with you,” said Jastrau. “I have to go out Vesterbro a little way, too.”
He paid the bill and picked up the roses. Vuldum was already on his way toward the vestibule.
When they finally got outside, the street lay dark and empty. Over at Dagbladet’s building, the second and top floors were lighted, but the street in front of the building was deserted. Only a bicycle lay tipped over onto the sidewalk from the curb.
“Shouldn’t we go up to the composing room and have a beer?” suggested Jastrau. At home, Sanders and Steffensen were probably sitting and waiting for him, so why go home?
“No—although it’s mighty cozy up there,” Vuldum replied quietly. They stood peering up at the building on the opposite corner.
“Will you be there tomorrow night?”
“At the election-night doings? No, thank you. The idea makes me shiver.”
“Me too.”
They turned and walked slowly across the square, which at night always seemed prodigiously big, with barren stretches where the streetcar rode in the daytime, and murky darkness around the sunken “clamshell” amphitheater in front of the Town Hall. Between Strøget and Vesterbrogade a line of people made their way over the sidewalk in single file, as if crossing a frozen sea.
“There are lots of people out tonight,” remarked Vuldum, shivering a little in the cold.
“They’re fortifying themselves for election day.”
They had no sooner reached the broad sidewalk outside the Scala and the National when Vuldum stopped and stared at one of the large shopwindows, where a woman in a light-colored coat stood leaning against a brass guardrail. Her flesh-colored stockings shone white through the darkness.
Vuldum leaned forward.
“Well—so it’s you,” he said softly.
“Oh, good evening, Herr Vuldum,” said a youthful but rasping voice.
Vuldum and Jastrau drew nearer to her.
She was not very tall and quite plump. Big shoulders. Her face was heavily powdered. But even at their distance from the arc lamps, which imparted an icy glare to the street car tracks, they could make out the dark shadows under her eyes. Her rouged lips had the effect of a heavy black streak.
“What are you doing here?”
“I’m freezing,” she said, cuddling one cheek against her shoulder.
“Is that all?”
“I’m waiting to catch a fish.”
Vuldum laughed and addressed a few more chivalrous questions to her, then took her arm and complimented her on its plumpness while she laughed and wriggled coquettishly. Jastrau stood and watched, and now and then encountered her shining eyes as she looked at him appraisingly
.
“Well, I’m sorry, but I have to go home, you little mouse,” Vuldum finally said. “But I didn’t want to go by without giving you a little present.”
And with that he calmly took the three roses out of Jastrau’s hand and gave them to her with an elegant bow.
“Just a slight token of esteem from my friend and me. And now, good night, my dear girl.”
For some reason or other this trifling scene made Jastrau feel good—this little rococo episode from the city’s night life. And it was with a certain cordiality in his voice that he said good night to Vuldum near the Freedom Statue and turned down toward Istedgade.
That was where they now lay sleeping—those two.
4
OLE JASTRAU was awakened by a clatter in the kitchen.
At first he did not perceive it very clearly, but then he awoke with a start. He always did so after an evening of whiskey drinking.
The clatter continued. Cups and plates rattled. Someone was washing dishes.
“Johanne,” he called out in his usual grumpy morning voice.
Then he heard heavy footsteps in the corridor leading to the kitchen, and the door opened. He had already been alarmed by the ponderous footfalls, and as it turned out it was not Johanne. It was Sanders, his face smudged and grinning from ear to ear. His sleeves were rolled up, and he had a dishtowel draped over his arm.
“What’s going on here?” exclaimed Jastrau, sitting up in bed. “Am I seeing things?” He rubbed his eyes.
Sanders’s expression suddenly changed—so suddenly that Jastrau could see that the change was calculated.
“What do you mean?”
“Are you washing dishes?” Jastrau asked indignantly.
“Yes, of course,”—Sanders’s lips tightened in a contemptuous smile—“Is that all that was bothering you? Yes, I’m washing dishes.”
Jastrau lay back in the bed again. He did not feel like coming to grips with Sanders and his shifting facial expressions so early in the morning.
But Sanders went right on in a highly moralistic tone, “When we’ve made a mess of things here, it’s no more than reasonable that we should clean up. As a matter of fact, I’ve washed the floor and dusted too, and now I’m through with the dishes. And now your lordship is soon going to have coffee in bed.”
“Your lordship!” Jastrau growled from beneath the covers. “Is Steffensen still asleep?”
“Yes, the beast won’t get up.”
“Thank God for that,” Jastrau sighed in relief. “I was afraid he might be as much of a theoretician as you are.”
By this time Sanders had resumed his trickster’s grin.
“No, you don’t have to worry about that. He’s not motivated by principles.”
“Listen, is he really the son of H. C. Stefani?” he went on.
“Yes,” said Sanders with a mocking smile. “And it was really quite intriguing yesterday when you were talking about Stefani over the phone. You should have seen Steffensen’s face.”
“How the devil should I know that Stefani’s son goes by the name of Steffensen? But Arne Vuldum knew it.”
“Oh, so that’s why you stayed away,” Sanders said pointedly. “Now I understand better.”
“What do you understand better?”
“This Arne Vuldum—he’s a man of such fine feelings, such a sensitive man. And I suppose it must be much more interesting to be in such cultivated company than to sit and listen to our crude Communist chatter. Well, we got along all right. Steffensen drank a bottle of port, we found what we needed in the pantry, and we smoked most of your cigars. Then we read and talked a little, and Steffensen wrote some poetry. It was really a very pleasant evening. He found one of your writing pads, and the mere sight of so much paper inspired him. Afterwards we sang a few songs and played the phonograph. So we got along admirably. And today is election day, so you’ll soon be rid of us.”
“You could stay for lunch,” said Jastrau, lifting the covers and putting his feet on the floor. He wanted to get up.
“Yes—we’ve thought of the same thing. But now wouldn’t you rather have coffee in bed? I was just going out to put it on the stove.”
Without a word, Jastrau reached for his pants. Sanders, with a supercilious smile, had already disappeared into the kitchen. What sort of a flophouse for tramps was it that his home had become? For a moment he remained sitting morosely on the edge of the bed, thinking. But no—he didn’t want to think about it.
As quickly as possible he got hold of his shirt, necktie, vest, and jacket, and hurried into the dining room where it would be warm. But then it occurred to him that Johanne had not yet come home, and there would be no fire. He gave the door an impatient shove. No, this was really too much—the preposterous Sanders had thought of that too. He had laid and lighted a fire. Not only that, but he had swept up around the stove. Oluf’s playthings had been put together in an orderly pile. It was all too feminine—too ridiculous. But how well it fitted in with Sanders’s erotomaniac theatricalism.
Jastrau walked back and forth brooding as he slowly got dressed. Wasn’t Sanders carrying things too far—being downright impudent? He stopped before the mirror in the buffet and adjusted his necktie. Wasn’t he? he asked himself. Then, catching sight of himself in the mirror, he suddenly noticed how ill-natured he looked. It startled him. He saw a face with evil, Mongolian features. But then he felt flattered, and smiled grimly to himself. Could he really look so wicked? What thoughts had been running through his mind to give him such an expression? Was it a psychologically abnormal feeling of malice toward Sanders? Were there not half-grown boys who simply loved to wear women’s clothes, who loved to imagine themselves as women—so much so that the very thought of it made them tingle all over?
He went to the kitchen door, opened it with a jerk, and said sharply, “So you laid a fire in the stove, too, didn’t you?”
“Yes, of course,” Sanders replied blithely.
Jastrau slammed the door shut. But the noise it made was more than he had bargained for. It made even him jump. That was a bit overdone, he thought. He was giving himself away completely. So he opened the door again, and said, “There’s a bad draft through here. It bangs the doors shut.”
“I can’t understand that,” came an unruffled answer from the kitchen. “There are no windows open at the other end of the apartment.”
Jastrau doggedly shut the door again and slowly went into the living room. He could not take it any longer.
Sanders had put things in order in the living room too. But Steffensen lay on the sofa still asleep, a sight which made Jastrau feel some sense of relief. And, as might be expected, he lay with his big nose straight up in the air so that Jastrau could see way into his nostrils. His mouth hung open. It was as if there were three holes in his ugly head through which all consciousness had taken flight. Besides, his beard had grown so much during the night that it made him look like a porcupine. A lovely sight!
The table was littered with a writing pad and several torn-off sheets of paper. Beside it was a fresh box of cigars that they had opened. Without thinking—his mind was on his good cigars—he picked up one of the sheets and looked at it. What was this? “Like a ruffian with bloody hands,” he read. Then, farther down the page, “Like a ruffian with bloody fists.” It was all that was on that sheet.
He picked up another. Again the identical lines—the same variation of “hands” and “fists.” Furthermore, the paper was covered with profile drawings of old men, all in clerical collars, long pencil strokes, female legs, sketches of women’s curving backs, breasts, and loins, and, inexplicably, a marabou stork.
Apparently Steffensen had been trying to write a poem. Jastrau smiled. How well he knew the situation. The idle hand, doodling on the paper while the thoughts hovered over the sheet like a flock of pigeons that refused to light.
But on the third sheet there was finally a verse.
First a stanza written in a large, clear hand, but then crossed out:
Like a ruffian whose hands are bloodied
After a brawl and a binge,
I forsake my soft bed of indifference
For a couch at terror’s raw edge.
Then, farther down the page, almost in a corner of the sheet, and bearing no relationship other than the rhyme scheme to the stanza above, three more verses had been jotted down hurriedly in small script. They had seemingly been written in one unlabored flourish of inspiration, with but a single correction. And when Jastrau, his curiosity aroused, reached for a fourth sheet, there were the same three stanzas, neatly written this time, with the date and a signature added. So it seemed that the poem had been completed:
Fear is strong as a Mongol horde.
It is ripened by immature years.
And each day my heart grows heavy,
Foreseeing the continents flooded with tears.
But my fear must be vented in longing,
In visions of horror and stress.
I have longed for shipwrecks
For havoc and violent death.
I have longed to see cities burning
And the races of mankind in flight,
A world rushing headlong in panic,
From God’s retribution and might.
Suddenly he turned to look at his sleeping guest. He had a feeling that he was being watched. And sure enough—Steffensen’s eyelids were quivering, and a narrow segment of his eyes could be seen glistening from beneath their lashes. Furthermore, his mouth was now closed.
Then his eyes opened.
“I’m confiscating this poem for my book page,” Jastrau said abruptly, folding the sheet and sticking it in his pocket.
Steffensen suddenly sat up in bed.
“So! Is it good enough for the prostitute press?” he exclaimed, glowering at Jastrau.
“It isn’t always the worst-looking girls who turn out to be whores,” replied Jastrau.
“Well—no,” Steffensen said slowly. “But let me have another look at it.”
“You can look at the rough draft. The other I’m keeping—right here.” He tapped his breast pocket.
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