Ice

by Ulla-lena Lundberg

  And when everyone has been assigned a place to sleep in the guest room, study, dining room, parlour, or attic, and when it’s been decided who the pallbearers will be, and a number of other exhausting questions have been answered, Mrs Hellén says in friendly conversation that she doesn’t suppose the Co-op will have a black veil. And therefore she has brought an old veil with her, which she can help Mona fasten to her hat. In fact, she is wrong—Adele Bergman promptly delivered a veil—but the thought was excellent and allows Mona and Mrs Hellén to withdraw to the bedroom while the others cluster at the other end of the house with their sighs and tears and their gestures of complete helplessness whenever Mona’s situation is cautiously broached.

  Mama has her own funeral hat with her in a carton and Mona brings out the pretty black felt hat she had to buy for Petter’s ordination. The veil would fall better if the hat had a broader brim, but it will do. The veil her mother brought hangs nicer and smells better than the stiff, unused one from the Co-op, which has absorbed the stink of tobacco smoke and kerosene in the store. “Thanks,” Mona says. She starts sewing it to the hat right away, while Mrs Hellén stitches on her own. Mona knows what she looks like in it, but Mama sees her eldest daughter in mourning for the first time. As soon as she’s hidden behind it, her shoulders begin to tremble and there is a snuffling sound, as if she were sobbing. Quickly, she throws it back over her hat. “Oh, just because I’m wearing a veil, I think I have to start crying.”

  Mrs Hellén smiles evasively, the way she does, and says, “Yes, yes. It’s hard. It’s dreadful, having all of us here in the house. Tell me if you think there’s anything I can do. I’d really like to help, even though I’m the way I am.”

  Mona gives her a quick evaluating look. “If you could keep your old friend Martha from interfering constantly, that would be a real boon. If you talk to her, she can’t talk to me.”

  “True enough,” Mama says. “And I can spend time with the girls. Read to them, for example.”

  “They’re going to be hopelessly spoiled!” Mona says. “No routines and no rules. They’re impossible if they get too much attention.”

  While the two women sit in the bedroom, the verger comes in through the kitchen right into the group of funeral guests, like living proof of the saying that no matter what you’re doing, you’ll be interrupted. Surprised, he excuses himself for his work clothes—he has come to help the widow with the evening milking. Whereupon they all start talking at once. For heaven’s sake, Mona can’t possibly go out to the cow barn under the circumstances! Can’t someone else go? Is there no one who knows how to milk? No one to ask? This is terrible!

  No one in the group knows how to milk a cow or else they would. With pleasure. Finally the verger himself raises his voice to say that it’s Mona herself who insists on going. “She says she wants to go by herself, but I go with her anyway. And I must tell you”, he adds with all the weight of his office, “that I don’t know how we’d get through this without the cow barn, because in the cow barn she can weep.”

  That gives them something to think about. Mona too heard him come and emerges from the bedroom followed by Mrs Hellén. “You came this evening too!” she says. “You know I can manage by myself. But let’s go. If Berg and Skog arrive while I’m out, make them some tea. I’ll come and throw together some supper for everyone when I’m done. In the meantime, make yourselves at home.” A general invitation, but the order to make tea is directed to Mrs Hellén and banishes the elder Mrs Kummel to the outer circle. Nothing more to be said, she closes the kitchen door, puts on her milking coat in the hall, pulls on her boots, and then off she goes with the verger in her wake.

  Almost as if they’d been waiting around the corner of the house for a signal, Berg and Skog come in. When the Coast Guard unloaded the mourning relatives at the church dock, Berg and Skog continued to the west villages, where they prepared the next day’s funeral service with the organist. They ate and talked and are now going to spend the night in one of the attic rooms at the parsonage.

  Mrs Hellén thinks that Berg looks terribly down in the mouth, while Skog can hardly contain his desire to arrange and direct. As Petter’s predecessor in this parish, he had, on his own initiative, decided and announced that he, who knows his Örlanders, would deliver the sermon. Until he was informed that Berg had been asked to conduct the funeral, he had simply assumed that the call would come to him. Hard to explain why they’ve chosen the colourless Berg from the neighbouring parish, who has had very little contact with the Örlands, while Skog himself, with the ability to play on the Örlanders’ emotions like a keyboard, must content himself with a sermon. Well, he can say a lot in that sermon! In the course of the discussion at the organist’s table, he has expressed his views on a great many subjects and was irritated by Berg’s tenacious resistance. It seems that he and the widow have made all the decisions and that they have completely won over the organist to their point of view.

  Well, what’s done is done. But now they have to greet the relatives from the mainland all over again, having met them once already, on the boat, and make a much greater effort with those who came from Åland to the west—the grieving parents and the male representatives of Petter’s father’s home farm. Many think them empty phrases. Even Fredrik Berg thinks his words sound hollow, although he means it from the bottom of his heart when he says that he, who counted Petter as a friend and brother, knows better than most what they have lost. It is difficult to pull his thoughts together into something personal when the food seems to have a higher priority than the death. Mona’s mother, Mrs Hellén insists on serving tea to the new arrivals, although they try to insist on waiting until Mona returns. “These are Mona’s orders,” Mrs Hellén says as she pours. “It seems to be a rule of the house that everyone must get something warm in their gizzard as soon as they come through the door. Drink this now, and then you can have a second cup with the rest of us.”

  With Skog on hand, there is at least no problem with the conversation. He quickly takes over the grieving parents and, at last, says all the things that a proper priest is supposed to say to the devastated parents of a beloved son who has died before his time, in the bloom of youth. They hang on his every word, and, trembling and weeping, they speak of the absolute incomprehensibility of what has happened. Berg sits silent, but it doesn’t matter, for Skog leads the discussion with authority. Mrs Hellén tiptoes carefully to the kitchen. Ingrid, Frej’s little seasick wife, is unobtrusively washing the dishes, and Mrs Hellén peeks into the pantry. Everything prepared—sliced bread, butter on small plates, farmer cheese. She chats a bit with Ingrid and has her suspicions confirmed. The seasickness is a result of a newly confirmed pregnancy. “So strange, just at the same time as Petter’s death.” “Yes, yes,” says Mrs Hellén. “Such things happen. It’s so nice of you to do the washing-up, Ingrid. Maybe Charlotte could dry. I’ll start setting the table for evening tea in a few minutes.”

  Charlotte comes in, weeping, and Mrs Hellén looks around for the little girls, both of whom are anchored on Hellén’s lap. She has to admit that he has a fatherly touch with children. She goes around on sore feet and sets the table, conscious of the fact that Mona doesn’t want her to, but it’s a way of getting them all into bed a little earlier so her poor daughter can rest and gather her strength for an exhausting Sunday. “Where will we find the strength?” she wonders, as she’s wondered for thirty years, padding about, all but invisible under Skog’s ringing voice.

  Almost everything is ready when Mona comes rushing in. The verger has gone on to the church. If he builds a fire in the boiler this evening, then all he’ll have to do early in the morning is add wood. She looks around, displeased. “What in the world have you been up to? I was going to do all this when I came back! Go sit down, Mama! I’ll do the rest.” She greets Skog quickly and waves away his condolences, greets Berg, an ally, more heartily. And she keeps her emotions under control, under tight control as she puts the girls to bed and her mother reads
them a story. Mona leads them quickly through their bedtime prayers (“God who holds all children dear”) and then goes back out to the others, who are starting to gather their things and get ready for the night. The only sensible thing is to get to bed. The ones just arrived have a long, trying journey behind them, and the day to come will be heart-rending and difficult. Another reason not to sit up and talk half the night is that they’re afraid of Mona and don’t know how to behave. Darkness and silence may be preferable.

  Still, it’s wrong to say that the house lies at peace. It is not necessary to express the thoughts of the people lying in bed, shivering, afraid they will never get to sleep. It’s enough to take a look into the attic room under the northernmost gable. The energetic Skog has built a fire in the tile stove, but it’s still cold. He and Berg sit opposite one another at the wobbly table that has stood here since long before Skog’s time. Berg puts his briefcase on the table and opens it to take out his aspirin. Skog extends his hand. “May I see?”

  Berg, timid, as if he were trying to hide something shameful, “What?”

  “The eulogy. Surely that’s what you were going to show me.”

  “No, not really.”

  “You have written it, I suppose?”

  “Naturally.”

  “Well then, give it here. I’ll tell you what I think. I know exactly what will work with these Örlanders.”

  Berg, feeling coerced, “I don’t know that I want it improved. It’s hard to explain. Imperfect as it is, it’s what I want to say.”

  “What sort of nonsense is that? You want it to be good, don’t you?”

  “Of course. But I also want to speak to Petter’s memory in my own words.”

  “I could really help you. I know how the Örlanders think.”

  “It’s hard for me to compromise about this.”

  “I simply don’t understand your attitude. Can’t you take criticism?”

  “Yes, I guess that’s the problem. You didn’t know Petter the way I did. I’m grieving. I have a hard time seeing the whole thing coldly and critically.”

  “All the more reason to listen to an experienced colleague.”

  “Perhaps. My arguments are weak. But I can’t.”

  “Don’t be such a little girl. We’re colleagues. This is a professional consultation.”

  “Why is it so important to you to read my poor eulogy?”

  “You seem so uncertain. As if you needed help.”

  “I get the feeling that you want to direct and control me.”

  “You’ve buried yourself out here for too long. There are fresh ideas in the city. We no longer speak of individual effort. Now it’s all about teamwork, working together.”

  “I’ve read about that. But I’ve wrestled with this eulogy. I’m the one who’s going to deliver it. It’s not a matter of teamwork.”

  And so on. Skog, somewhat older, does not give up. Fredrik Berg can feel that his cheeks are red, his eyes moist. His forehead sweaty, his armpits damp, the cassock that must on no account smell bad tomorrow. He hasn’t even the strength to get up and go to bed, just sits there like a sullen child and refuses. His gaze wavers, can’t look this self-important man in the eye, this Skog, who thinks it’s only a question of time until unreasonable Berg has been beaten into submission and his eulogy criticized to death.

  Because that’s what it’s about. If Skog says a single dismissive word about the eulogy, Fredrik will never be able to deliver it. He’ll be forced to flee with his tail between his legs while Skog pulls out the unctuous speech he has probably already written. Why must a person have good arguments against a conceited and contemptuous authority? There is nothing he can do but refuse.

  “No. It’s a principle of mine. I let no one read my speeches and sermons in advance.”

  “The vicar calls on principle?”

  And so forth. Finally, Fredrik manages to get up, dizzy with exhaustion. “We’re getting nowhere. We need to go to bed. We have a great deal to do tomorrow.” The voice of reason. He starts getting ready. The oil lamp on the table leaves the rest of the room in merciful shadow, but he is as timid as a girl as he tries to avoid exposing himself as he undresses. He brushes his teeth at the washstand, anxious about spitting and making noise. In everything he does, he behaves like a toffee-nosed young lady, and, going grey with shame, he lies down finally in his bed, frozen to the marrow, afraid to move, afraid to make the slightest peep that would arouse Skog’s contempt. He would like to take his briefcase into bed with him; on the grounds that his aspirin are in it, he has instead placed it as close to the headboard as possible.

  Skog, on the other hand, takes his time going to bed. Without embarrassment he empties his bladder in the chamberpot, snorts and hawks, wipes his armpits, undresses and puts on his nightclothes, throws himself into bed, rolls over, lies still and prays a semi-audible evening prayer, which to tell the truth Fredrik Berg has not uttered, changes position several more times, then lies still and quickly falls asleep, deep breathing, with a little pup-pup-pup as he breathes out. Sacerdotal snoring. Dear God.

  The sleep of the righteous. A good conscience the best pillow. All that hogwash that people say, whereas Fredrik, sleepless, desperate, ill, lies awake as if paralysed. The perpetrator sleeps like a pig, the victim lies awake in guilt and shame.

  Downstairs, those who don’t fall asleep hear the priests’ discussion only as a distant murmur, as if they were exploring some profound theological question about the mystery of death prior to the great burial service on the following day. Mona is sleeping in the bedroom, making the best of a few poor hours of exhaustion before waking at four o’clock to an icy room. Petter’s bed has been carried out to the dining room, where Uncle Richard is camping. The coffin in the shed has been closed and the cover nailed down. Now there is nothing left but duty.

  In the doctor’s apartment in the attic of the medical clinic in the northern archipelago, Doctor Gyllen spends the night before the funeral pacing. Even without drugs, her feelings are blocked. “Incomprehensible,” she has said, like everyone else. “That dear, good man. And his wife and the little girls. How can such a thing happen?” But at the same time, an inexplicable feeling of guilt is eating at her heart despite her efforts to reject it.

  She heard about the death days earlier, on the radio, like everyone else, and when her father called a short time later, she thought that was what he’d called to tell her. Together they would repeat the words. “Incomprehensible. Dear Petter Kummel who’s become such a friend.” And they did so. But Papa had another reason for calling.

  “Irina. A letter came. Our Kolja is alive. We have an address.”

  Complete silence. Her self-control so practised that she can no longer show emotion even in an empty room. Not even a sigh. No tears.

  “Irina, are you there?” Papa says. “Did you faint?” To Mama: “I’m afraid she fainted.”

  “No,” Doctor Gyllen says. “Don’t tell me such things. I no longer dare to hope.”

  “But it’s true, Irina. Be happy! We’ve been waiting for this for nine years.” He starts telling her who the letter came from— the child’s aunt in Kazan—and how the letter made its way to Finland. They can’t make contact directly because of the regime, but they have a go-between, a good person, whose name can’t be mentioned over the phone, with contacts in the legation. “Irina, you can write. They can write.”

  “Thank you,” Doctor Gyllen says. “There’s nothing I can say. My heart too full. I’ll write to you later this evening. To him. Yes? Oh God. What can I say?”

  Now Mama comes on. “How wonderful that I’ve lived long enough to see this happen!” She talks on, while Doctor Gyllen stares out the window. A light wind, a little snow. The first patient already arriving, sweeping the snow off his boots on the steps. The medical assistant pottering about downstairs, wondering why she doesn’t come down. They usually do a little run-through before the day starts.

  “I have to go to work,” Doctor Gyllen says.
“We’ll talk later, we’ll write. It’s like Pastor Kummel’s death, but the opposite. It’s incomprehensible.”

  She rings off and is about to go downstairs, but instead she makes another call, to her dear friends the Hindrikses on the Örlands. Greta answers, and when she hears that it’s Doctor Gyllen, she says, “We do nothing but cry. We just can’t believe it’s true. If only the doctor had been here, we keep saying. If the doctor had been here, maybe he could have been saved. But they say he was in the water too long. They worked on him all night, but not a sign of life. How could it happen?”

  It could be that Doctor Gyllen called to tell them about her son, but she sees that on the Örlands there is no space for anything but the priest. That’s as it should be, and she’s glad she said nothing, for in the course of the day’s work and later, at home, having her evening tea, Doctor Gyllen works through a lot of thoughts—religious superstitions she never imagined she was capable of. It’s about a simple coincidence, one of many in the course of a long life, nothing to get worked up about. No cause for a lot of overwrought religious speculation.