Walking Into the Night

by Olaf Olafsson

  On a table in an alcove stood two bronze lions, along with various other bits and pieces—a cigarette case, a vase, and an antique spoon with a broken handle. One of the lions held up a card with the name of the month, the other the date: May 20. He paused beside them, suddenly realizing what had been nagging at his memory for the last couple of days. May 20th. Maria would be twenty-five tomorrow.

  He shook his head inadvertently, as if to fend off an unexpected attack. His ears rang but he carried on regardless, pushing open the door to the Chief’s bedroom and entering the gloomy half-darkness with slow steps.

  4

  High up in the oak by the walkway outside my window bluebirds have made their nest. I watch their comings and goings through a pair of binoculars whenever I have time; there are four chicks in the nest. Yesterday the male made eighteen journeys in just half an hour for food. He never seemed to come home empty-handed, if you can say that of a bird. I’ve been trying to draw them but have lost some of my old skill through lack of practice. I always thought the drawing I did of the black-tailed godwit— the one we hung in the study—was best. I remember how hard it was to capture the shadings of its chestnut breast; it’s as though I was working on it only yesterday. It was around noon on a Saturday. The sound of hammering drifted in through the window, the smell of pancakes carried from the kitchen, and I looked up to see Maria closing the gate to the street and strolling up the path to the house. She looked dreamy, and paused on the way; I seem to remember she was holding a buttercup in her hand . . .

  But now I’m out of practice and can’t capture the blue sheen on the birds’ backs and wings, even though I can picture it and know it from the sea and the sky. In fact, I came across a dead bird down on the hillside the other day and brought it home so I wouldn’t have to rely on my faulty memory. But it didn’t work—there was no way I could find the right shade, even with my new watercolors.

  The steamer I wrote you about will leave tomorrow morning. The warehouses are now packed with iron and cement for the Chief’s endless building projects here on the hill. I dreamed last night that I sailed away with the ship; I was wearing the blue hat I bought in Copenhagen, waving from the deck. I’ve dreamed this dream before but this time I woke up disoriented because it’s years since I’ve seen that hat or even thought about it. Could I have left it behind?

  He folded the letter carefully; five densely written sheets, a polished, almost feminine hand, in blue ink. He didn’t date it and wrote nothing on the envelope but her name. He didn’t seal it but opened the bottom drawer of the desk and laid it on top of the other two letters, next to a small boat whittled from a piece of wood that bore the name Einar RE 1 and a pebble from home. He laid it carefully on top of the other two letters and decided not to wonder if he would ever send them.

  5

  Beneath the peaks of the Santa Lucia range, a few miles inland from the coast, rises the castle built by William Randolph Hearst. Seventeen years ago, before Hearst arrived with his plans, there was nothing on these hills but sunbaked gravel, the odd oak that had managed to put down roots, laurel and sage, and, on the lower slopes, winding, rutted cattle tracks and dry creek beds which ran out in the middle of the plain, having abandoned the attempt to reach the sea. During winter and spring the low-lying land is green, but the grass bleaches during the summer and turns yellow by fall. The shore is lined with sandy beaches, rocks, dunes, and bluffs. The village of San Simeon, with its fish-drying frames, boats, and fishermen’s shacks, so empty and silent it seems even the Almighty has overlooked it, lies a stone’s throw to the north.

  The summer heat can become unbearable down on the plain, but up in the hills the air is cooler. In the spring the wind sweeps like a white wing over the sand and flats, but in the winter it howls and rages. Sometimes when he can’t sleep he remembers the nights when Einar crawled into his bed, afraid that a ghost was blowing on a blade of grass outside his window.

  The Chief had printed a leaflet containing information he wanted the staff to tell guests about the place. He calls it the Ranch, and the hill the Enchanted Hill. The staff are never allowed to use the word castle to refer to the place. The information sheet notes that first to be built were the three guesthouses, the Casas del Mar, del Sol, and del Monte. In parentheses: “a total of eighteen bedrooms and twenty bathrooms.” The print is small, so that everything will fit on one page. Kristjan has advised two waiters with poor eyesight to learn the information by heart so they don’t have to squint at it in front of visitors. There are one hundred and fifteen rooms in the main building: fourteen sitting rooms, twenty-six bedrooms, two libraries, thirty fireplaces, a beauty parlor, a barbershop, and a movie theater. The refectory, which is what Hearst calls the dining room, is said to be over three thousand square feet, which Kristjan believes is probably accurate because it takes him about forty seconds to walk the length of the room when he’s not in a hurry. The leaflet makes no mention of the service wing, where the staff live, nor the secure vaults in the cellar, though it’s mentioned that there is a switchboard and telegraph facility in the construction foreman’s office. Kristjan finds the descriptions of the two swimming pools—the indoor bath, which is known as the Roman Pool, and the other, which is named after the sea god Neptune—unnecessarily detailed, but that doesn’t seem to bother the guests, whose appetite for information is insatiable. Kristjan welcomes them on the south stairs and escorts them to the rooms they’ve been assigned while the houseboys bring in their bags. Generally guests arrive ill-equipped for their stay on the hill, especially actors and other movie types from Hollywood. The staff provides them with toiletries, tooth powder and brushes, cologne, combs and razors, perfumes, and all manner of unguents, riding clothes, bathrobes, and bathing suits. It takes about five minutes to fill them in about the place, longer if they’re curious. Some ask if they can keep the information sheet but that’s against the rules. However, they’re always left with the day’s menu and a schedule of mealtimes, along with a short description of the movie to be screened that evening.

  The Chief’s a stickler for rules and order. Many people find him intimidating.

  The leaflet once contained a fairly detailed description of the main building but when Mr. Hearst saw it he had it removed. It’s called Casa Grande. All vistas lead to where it stands at the top of the hill, with the guesthouses clustered in a semicircle a little lower down, like ladies-in-waiting at the feet of their queen. Some say it resembles a gothic cathedral, its chalk walls corpse white, the campaniles towering grandly aloft, as if their peals were intended more for heaven than for us here below on earth.

  Guests have to come to the main building for food and drink as there are no kitchens or refrigerators in the guesthouses. Not even a kettle. The occasional person gets up the nerve to complain about this after a drink or two, though never directly to the Chief. Some would prefer breakfast in bed but the Chief regards this as a waste of time. It’s good for people to have a breath of fresh air in the morning, he feels. To walk here in the dew with the sun sparkling on the sea below and a refreshing breeze blowing off the mountains. It’s good for them. This is no place for lazy-bones, he’s fond of saying.

  Down by the harbor there are warehouses full of antiques and works of art that the Chief has amassed. There are even more warehouses in New York, where people are employed in inventorying and cataloguing the vast quantity of statues, swords, torchères, fireplaces, paintings, tea sets, altarpieces, columns, and vases which Mr. Hearst keeps buying, even though no more can be accommodated here in the houses on the hill. Sometimes he buys whole castles in Spain and Italy and has them demolished stone by stone and strut by strut so they can be loaded on board ship.

  So here I am in this labyrinth, Elisabet dear, he wrote, deciding to put the description of the castle into the envelope with the letter, a bird of passage that has lost its way. I’ll always be a stranger here, so there is little to remind me of what I miss, and this makes it easier for me to discipline my thoughts. Th
ough I can still be caught unawares. It doesn’t take much, no more than the outline of a pale cheek glimpsed through the trees. I try to perform my duties diligently and occupy my mind with as many small details as I can, because it makes the time pass faster and prevents things from stealing into my mind.

  It’s very peaceful here late in the evening and you never know what visitations may take place in the silence. But I have nothing to complain of, least of all to you.

  The Chief is calling. Sometimes I think everyone is afraid of him except me. I’m afraid of nothing but myself.

  6

  I see now that I may have given a misleading picture of this establishment and my life here on the hill. I see I called it a “labyrinth,” but on reflection I don’t think this word gives the right impression. The truth is that I’ve mostly been happy here, but perhaps I chose not to write that to you, perhaps I felt subconsciously that you would be more likely to forgive me if I told you I’d been miserable all along. Why do I do this? I ask myself. Will I always feel like a naughty child in relation to you? Even now I find it difficult to tell you what I’m thinking for fear that you will disapprove.

  I know I wouldn’t have stayed this long anywhere else. When I first came here in 1921, I felt as if a whole new world was opening up before me. And at the same time the old one disappeared. It was as if this labyrinth had been built expressly for me to lose myself in, and I managed to do so successfully for years.

  Life here used to be one long round of parties. On weekends there were never fewer than twenty people, mostly guests from Hollywood, friends of Miss Davies. You’ll have read about these people in the papers and seen them in films: Clark Gable, Rudolph Valentino, Gary Cooper, Chaplin, etc., etc. Sometimes I felt as if I was in a movie with them. These people liked me and turned to me for advice about all sorts of things, especially in relation to the Chief. No one wanted to offend him.

  I enjoyed the way the guests deferred to me and I did nothing to play down my relationship with the Chief, though I never bragged about it. I said as little as possible and let people draw their own conclusions. “Do you think it would be all right to go horseback riding this evening?” “Could I borrow a bathing costume?” “Would you be so kind as to get this script to the Chief? I’m sure he’ll want to finance the picture if he reads it.”

  No one knew what I’d done before coming here, no one wondered at my being a servant; on the contrary they looked up to me as people often do here with Europeans. “Iceland?” they would ask. “Where’s that again?” They thought it was quite something when the Chief answered for me and said I was a true Viking.

  I was always busy. I never gave myself time to let my thoughts wander. I knew that if I did, the memories would flood over me. During the week the building work went on from morning to night; it’s still in progress, the Chief’s forever extending or altering. On Fridays Miss Davies would generally set off from Los Angeles with her companions; they’d travel through the night, arriving early on Saturday morning. We’d have their breakfast ready; afterwards they’d go to bed and rise again at noon; lunch would be served at half past two. After that the guests would sun-bathe or go for a swim, some played tennis, others went for a ride over the hills. Supper would be served at half past eight and afterwards they’d watch a movie; most slept late on Sundays and ate lunch before they left.

  One of the guests once offered me a job. He had had too much to drink that night and I suppose it was his way of expressing his gratitude for my services. The following day when he woke up he came directly to find me and asked me to please forget all about it and never mention to the Chief that he had tried to poach me. I assured him I hadn’t taken him seriously and wouldn’t mention his indiscretion to anyone, least of all the Chief. He was very grateful.

  Three weddings in the summer of 1928, I see I’ve written in my diary, two costume balls, four birthdays, two concerts . . . I see also that this was the summer when the Chief ordered us to move the oak which used to stand right in front of the main building. He bumped his head on the lowest branch when coming out of the house one day and his hat was knocked off. Although he didn’t hurt himself, he told me to get in touch with the head gardener and have the tree moved ten feet. Each foot cost a thousand dollars. He didn’t care.

  This is my world, Elisabet, and I admit that I was dazzled by it. At first I suppose I felt the way I did when I arrived in Copenhagen and discovered that I could leave the past behind. When I’m trying to assuage my conscience I tell myself that this wanderlust is the sign of a born traveler, this eternal longing to be free. I remind myself that I’m descended from a long line of seafarers; that I couldn’t wait to leave home when I was a boy.

  When I’m depressed I see how pathetic an excuse this is.

  7

  I know you won’t be surprised to learn that I try to perform my duties conscientiously. As you’ll understand, I’m not writing this to boast—who would have thought that I’d ever become a servant again? But I devote myself to my job and often manage to lose myself in the day’s business, because there is plenty to do here and the Chief depends on me.

  The nights are hardest, when silence surrounds me and there’s nothing to deflect the memories. I dread the quiet evenings and try to draw out my chores, sitting up late preparing for the next day, writing myself endless notes or adding to the shopping list, which I always carry, making yet another trip to the pantry to be sure we haven’t run out of something that I forgot to put on my list.

  The Chief usually stays up late, and I’m happiest when he needs me. He often calls me after midnight, and that’s a relief because then I know I’ll have something to occupy me for a while. I think he realizes I don’t see it as an imposition.

  Yes, I perform my duties conscientiously, and if you were like most people you would probably smirk if I described to you the menial jobs that I believe I can perform better than anyone else. But you were never the vengeful type, never tried to get even with those who had hurt you. That forbearance, where does it come from? Why wouldn’t you berate me, take pleasure in seeing me trapped in a web of my own making? Because that would make me feel better. One word from your lips, one word that stung me to the core, and I’d finally have some peace.

  But I know you’d be incapable of such behavior. You would consider it vulgar.

  Last spring there was a plague of insects here on the hill. At twilight the building was filled with them, starting with the entrance hall, as if they were respectable visitors paying us a house call. They settled on the dinner service and serving dishes, on bars of soap and flower arrangements; every morning they lay dead on all the windowsills, delaying the morning chores. They didn’t even let up at night, buzzing in the darkness and keeping everyone awake, the Chief most of all. They would settle on his face and a couple even tried to climb up his nose.

  I tried to remember how I had got rid of the flies in our house in Reykjavik but couldn’t immediately recall. We had just moved in when the plague hit us; I clearly remember when it reached its peak. It was one evening in June; you were playing Mozart in the living room, you and your friends in the quartet, a woman whose name I forget—skinny, with a long nose—and two young men, one of them in love with you, though you didn’t realize. You all invited friends and relatives; people who shared the habit of talking down to me about the “Maestro,” as you all called the great composer. Chairs had been set out in the middle of the room; I sat at the back, a guest in my own home. Everyone but you wore a pious expression; you were smiling, your thoughts far away. I shifted in my seat, crossed and recrossed my legs, looked out the window. Then the flies came to my rescue. It was as if the room filled in an instant; the guests began to flap at them, first discreetly, then violently, as if warding off an attack. Your quartet persisted in playing longer than I expected, you longest of all. Finally the gathering broke up. It wasn’t until the last person had fled that I set about trying to get rid of the flies.

  But now I couldn’t remember
any longer what tricks I had used. I looked for advice in some old books that I’d found in the Chief’s library. Some of what I dug up was interesting in its way, but nothing really worked until I began to experiment myself, from memory. My tactics may not have been particularly scientific, but eventually I stumbled upon a solution that worked. I put half a teaspoon of ground pepper in a shallow bowl along with one teaspoon of soft brown sugar and a tablespoon of cream. I mixed them thoroughly, then put the bowl under the living room window. I changed the mixture daily. After two days the flies were gone.

  It was the Chief himself who suggested I write down this tip, along with others which might be useful for the staff here on the hill. This has been a welcome diversion, a way of making time pass more quickly in the evenings and pinning down my thoughts so they don’t stray as far off as usual. I’ve almost finished one exercise book, having written sixty-four tips in it, some quite clever, though I say so myself. But I’ve plenty more to write, in reality I’ve only begun. I started indoors, describing things like how best to look after furniture made from mahogany and other types of hardwood, how to get grease stains out of tablecloths, how to polish silver properly, how to clean teapots and coffee mills. I’ve tried to categorize my thoughts as best I can, so they’ll be useful to as many people as possible and are easy to follow, though I reckon I could do better in this respect.

  So that’s how I kill time in the evenings and early in the mornings when the Chief and Miss Davies are away. As I told you, I’ve also started picking up a pencil every now and then to sketch the birds here on the hill and down by the sea; sometimes I go down to the shore and sit on a rock with a little sketch pad. Though I’m still rusty, there’s no doubt I’m making progress with every week that passes. Next I’m going to try a hawk. And one day I might even have a go at a condor.