We drove on and on through the summer night. There wasn’t much traffic, everyone was probably on their summer holiday. We passed Pori and turned off towards Luvia, then on to a small road heading out to Laitakari and Nina said I should look for a spot where we could drive the van into the sea.
That’s when it struck me for the first time that dolphins don’t live this far north – would they survive in the Baltic Sea? It had been unusually hot across the whole of Scandinavia for the last three weeks, but would the water temperature be warm enough for them, and would there be anything for them to eat? They normally live down in the Med. My head was starting to clear and suddenly I was sick with worry and the beginnings of a nasty hangover.
This is what they want, Nina said. Even if they don’t survive, at least they’ll die free.
How can you tell that, I asked and the Transit shuddered in my hands as my teeth chattered and sweat started pouring down my forehead.
They’ve told me, she said.
My head was throbbing something rotten. It was like being in a dream when we found a shallow cove with a sandy beach; I turned the van round and reversed it far enough into the water that the waves were beating against the rear doors.
We opened it up, pushed the boxes one at a time towards the edge and tipped them on their side. Splash. Joona. Splash. Delfi. Splash, Näsi, splash, Niki, splash, Veera. The water was still a bit too shallow for them, but they struggled forward until it was deep enough. Then they disappeared; five wet, dark backs.
The sun had risen and it was already getting bright.
It all felt completely surreal. A Transit van backed into the water, five cushioned chests. A girl shivering in a pink tracksuit. Heart-breaking birdsong. (Pause. Long, heavy breaths. Sniff.)
And that’s when it happened. I looked at Nina and thought about the stupid, mad things we’d just done together and how after an experience like that nothing in the world could separate us again; we’d been brought together, it was as if we’d been doing this sort of thing for years, and I knew she was the woman for me, for me and nobody else. And I was going to take her in my arms, carry her back to the front seat of the van and make love to her slowly, gently … then something about her face changed. It happened in an instant, like she’d taken off a mask and what was underneath was strange and empty. I saw that flame in her eyes dwindle until it was just a spark, then die away altogether, until all of a sudden in front of me there was a little brat whimpering and sobbing, and I could see she was scared, scared, scared!
A helpless fear came over me, I was sure she … she’d taken so much gear that she’d gone kind of schizo, so I tried to drag her on to the front seat so I could start up the van and take her somewhere, somewhere she could get some help or medicine, but she struggled loose and jumped out the back of the van into the sea and started thrashing about. I jumped in after her, I tried to talk to her, drag her back, but she couldn’t see or hear me, she didn’t recognise me, for Christ’s sake, she didn’t even recognise me; the water was up to our waists and she just kept on wading further and further out.
The next thing I remember was trying to start up the van and get help, but my hands were shaking too much and the motor wouldn’t start, so I left it there with the doors wide open and ran like a lunatic, like an animal, and I remember battering on the door at that house and shouting for them to bring a boat and call an ambulance, and then the old bill turned up and nothing’s made any difference since then, do you hear, nothing makes any difference. And what Nina did she did by herself, she died free just like those dolphins, and even though I still don’t know why she did it or what happened to her, I’m not a murderer! (Voice breaks. Thud. Silence.)
The Monster
Satu Waltari
Throughout her career as a writer Satu Waltari (born 1932) has played with reality and its various meanings. A theme particularly close to her is the boundless imagination of young people and their joy in trying new things. At times she may take inspiration from the art of Hieronymus Bosch, at others from a little girl’s love of horses or the deep schisms within families, but the result is always unexpected, absurd and uplifting. She is the daughter of Mika Waltari, also represented in this anthology. ‘The Monster’, the extract in this collection, is from the work Hämärän matkamiehet (‘Twilight Travellers’, 1964).
It was a wonderful night. Almost full, the moon was shining against the black sky like a toddler’s self-portrait. They were infuriating – little children’s self-portraits – they were everywhere. On the walls, on book covers, on every piece of paper imaginable; always entirely misshapen. The one in front of her now was rather more successful; it had been drawn with a good orange crayon and this time its eyes and mouth even fitted inside the outer edges of its face and didn’t bulge outside as in the majority of Romi Nut Bunny’s drawings. At least Stumpy’s drawings were slightly more skilful, even though she only ever drew crown princesses, which, from a distance, looked like nothing but big triangular tents. She gave a sigh and looked away from the sky. There really was no time to lose, sometimes the nights seemed to fly past in the blink of an eye.
The open bed yawned white in the darkened room. On the pillow there was a large black hole: it was brown spittle. It’s never really a good idea to fall asleep with a piece of chocolate in your mouth. Out in the hall there stood a tall white ghost.
Her own reflection in the hall mirror: a girl dressed in a white night gown stretching all the way down to the floor. Viivian. At first she had been furious upon noticing the name on the covers of her school books. Every single book contained that same name written out in her own handwriting. If she was not allowed to keep her own name then she might at least have been called Helena or Leif or Boy, anything else remotely tolerable. Never in her whole life had she heard of anyone called Viivian. Still, people eventually get used to all sorts of things. But on that first night it had made her very cross indeed.
Even so, Stumpy was a very silly name. Stumpy was fast asleep with her beloved spotted blanket pulled up over her lips, snoring softly and dreaming with her brow knotted, her bare feet hanging out of the bed like a chariot driver fallen on his back. Viivian giggled quietly to herself. Outside beneath the window a horse whinnied faintly in reply. Truly. But first she thought she had better do a little check before getting dressed; sometimes Father would sit up in bed reading almost until daybreak.
Everywhere was quiet and dark. A rasping sound came from the kitchen. The small door on the cuckoo clock creaked open and the cuckoo popped out. “Cuckoo, look at you, how time flew,” it said. How infuriating! You never knew whether it meant the strike of three o’clock or a quarter to without going up close and squinting. It was 33 o’clock. Romi Nut Bunny was asleep curled up beneath his red silken quilt with one dummy in his mouth and another clasped in his fist. Asleep he simply looked like a chubby baby. No one could have imagined how he hit, kicked, ripped, scratched and tore at everyone and everything and dashed about like a bundle of bones and muscles let loose, just like the real White Rabbit, who always feared he would be late and miss out on something exciting. Whilst he was asleep you could even stroke his cheek.
The faint smell of roast chicken hung around Mother, as always when she had started another one of her endless dieting regimes and was dreaming of good food. She was snoring too.
Father’s clothes were strewn all over the floor; he was sleeping with two foreign books under his head and another open across his face with a mountain of blankets covering him, and on top of the mountain sat the middle cat who narrowed its eyes, raised its head and winked. The coast was clear.
Viivian ran with silent, rapid steps back into the hall, tying her plait around her head as she went – hanging loose it would only get in the way beneath her helmet and would catch in the trees and bushes. She tore off her nightgown and quick as a flash slipped on a long-sleeved grey vest and tights, an iron chain mail suit, leather knee pads and spats, bent down to attach spurs to her shoes. She got rathe
r flustered with the awkward straps and buckles of her plated armour bearing an Airedale terrier crest, tied a sword belt around her waist, a dagger hanging from one hip, a sword from the other, pulled first a grey hood then a helmet complete with plumes and Airedale terrier motifs over her head, checked that the visor moved freely up and down, slipped on a pair of long-sleeved leather gloves with metal knuckle protectors, picked up her bow and arrows from the coat rack in the hall and threw them over her shoulder, and with only a few swift leaps she was at the window again and jumped out straight on to the back of the black horse waiting beneath. The horse gave a contented snort and set off at a furious pace.
The fresh night air brushed her face like soft, moist fern leaves; the air whistled through the helmet’s raised visor and its plumes, through the feathers of the arrows and the horse’s thick mane. Tired of waiting, the horse galloped joyously with all his strength; he did not care for the bridge beneath which silent bats swirled on their rapid hunting flights, oh no, but he raised his shod hooves in a great leap, stretched his entire body and together they flew across the babbling brook as easily as the night hawks. In a blur they scaled the hillside, then rushed down into the meadow. At the edge of the forest Viivian pressed her face against the horse’s fragrant mane so that the low-hanging branches would not whisk her from the saddle. She gently stroked her steed’s silken neck, a shudder ran through the horse’s body and he burst into an even more dizzying gallop. Startled red deer ran crashing from where they slept; squealing frantically, a family of wild boars dispersed across the dark pathway; Viivian laughed with joy. A large bird all but lost its footing on its branch, dived to just above the forest floor, then with a fluttering of its great wings disappeared into the shelter of the trees.
Deep inside the forest it was pitch dark. Every now and then the horse’s hoof would strike a stone amongst the moss and give off a bright spark. Viivian slowed the horse a jot. It would be dreadful if the horse should suddenly stumble on some of the tree roots creeping out across the path and she were to be thrown to the ground. Though in fact riding a horse was no more difficult than sitting on a hay sack lain across the cottage doorway.
‘Oh no! Don’t change,’ she shouted anxiously. ‘My dear, dear horse, don’t ever change,’ she said in fright taking hold of the horse’s hot, muscular neck. The horse gave a snort, bounded onwards, and in only a few leaps they had crossed a small swamp. The water splashed up to the her knees; it smelt of mud and of the night. Only for a split second had her steed resembled the old hay sack, that horrible limp old thing with two dried thistles sticking through as ears. At the other side of the swamp they paused for a moment in a moonlit copse. Viivian thanked the horse with a gentle stroke along its quivering neck from the silken skin beneath the ears right down to the saddle’s breast strap, and at this the horse turned its head and very carefully touched her foot with his lips.
‘You are real,’ she said softly consumed with a silent joy. She patted the horse’s shanks and gently hopped down from the saddle. Only once she was standing with both feet firmly on the ground again did she realise that she was shaking through and through, as though they had just been saved from a terrible danger. She rested her head against the horse’s neck, stroking its powerful breast and filling her nostrils with its wonderful, warm scent.
The horse belonged to her, it was entirely up to her whether she kept it or not and whether she could breed it into the fastest and bravest horse in the world. A single unhappy thought could destroy it all. Nonetheless, not even two happy thoughts were enough to grow the horse a pair of wings, because such things simply don’t exist. Viivian gave a wistful sigh. Then she shook herself from her daydreaming, checked the horse from the tip of its muzzle to the hairs on its tail, pulled its bridle straps, tightened its saddle belt, lifted each and every one of its legs to make sure no sharp stones had caught in its hooves, ran her fingers through the horse’s wavy mane and tail, and with a fragrant bundle of ferns she brushed away the sweat on the horse’s sides.
Once the horse had taken a few sips of water from a spring, their reflections dancing with the stars across the surface, she led her steed over to a suitable rock and hopped once again into the saddle.
‘What now?’ she said to herself. They could easily have stayed there forever, like the Red Knight who, at the ford in the river, sat night after night upon his horse thinking and waiting for imaginary enemies. In amongst a clump of mountain currant bushes sang a nightingale, the forest was filled with the scent of butterfly orchids and moss. The horse listened to something far in the distance with his ears pricked; the still and calm was like a restful dream.
Viivian let the reins dangle loose around the horse’s neck and spread out a small map, etched on a soft, paper-thin piece of lamb’s skin that she kept in her saddle bag.
In the dim light of the stars she did not even have to squint to examine the map, because it was very old indeed and therefore simple and as easy to read as a child’s drawing.
‘We’re in the King’s Wood, to the left of Badlucksberg, and here is the swamp,’ she said; the horse stretched one of his ears back to listen to her. ‘If we travel straight ahead for a while we’ll cross the Black Hills and arrive at an uncharted area marked with three stars.’
She rolled up the map, picked up the reins and with her spurs touched the horse’s side as gently as a feather. The steed rose up on his hind legs, excitedly snorting the slumber from his nostrils and galloped forward. A fanfare of horns could be heard in the distance.
‘They’re at the pond,’ Viivian said to herself. ‘The King is calling in the crayfishers, they are on their way home.’
At that moment they arrived at the Black Hills, but behind the row of hills a terrible surprise awaited them. Quicksand stretched through the darkness as far as the eye could see.
‘Well, boy,’ Viivian spoke to the horse, whose ears were twitching restlessly as they took in the sight before them. ‘No wonder this territory has been left uncharted.’
Very cautiously the horse placed his hoof on the sand, only to draw it sharply back to the verge that same moment, as where his hoof had been the sand moved all by itself, its fine grains began to flow into the depths of the earth, into the emptiness beneath, like through an enormous hourglass, until a small stone blocked up the hole. Upon that, as if by magic, the surface of the sand was smooth once again. An unwitting traveller may not have feared it in the slightest.
‘Huh!’ exclaimed Viivian impatiently. ‘Easy does it. Softly and quickly forwards,’ she said guiding the horse on to the sand. And the horse moved sideways across the shimmering, whispering sand, as nimbly as a ballet dancer, as lightly as though he were dancing across freshly laid dove’s eggs. They flew like the wind and after only a few minutes they had crossed the quicksand and were standing safely on the firm, heather-covered ground at the edge of a small wood. The stretch of sand surrounding this mysterious, unknown wood had not been as wide as it had looked from a distance. Laughing excitedly Viivian patted the horse’s neck. But now the horse no longer paid any attention to these otherwise very pleasant displays of affection; he was listening out and sniffing the dark woods.
‘What is it,’ asked Viivian, though she too was listening carefully. Close by, from behind the trees, her own voice echoed back as if it had struck a wall. Above the trees the darkness was impenetrable, the stars were no longer visible. Viivian coughed warily. Her voice boomed as if they had been standing inside a great cavern with trees growing all around. Without her having to urge him, the horse began slowly walking forwards; through the trees there ran a winding path which seemed to be leading them down and down into a gorge. All around there grew tall ferns reaching as high as the horse’s withers.
‘Dead Man’s Hands,’ said Viivian in nothing but a whisper. She could feel her own whisper resound like a warm breath against her face. As she stretched her hand out in front of her she fumbled the black rock of the cliff face, which did not feel at all as cold as stone
but was soft and warm, as if she had gently brushed a feather pillow. She brought the horse to a halt and pulled the dagger from its sheath.
‘Just as I suspected, soapstone,’ she said as she carved a thin piece out of the rock and let it drop to the soft moss on the forest floor. ‘We must be in some sort of pass or cave,’ she said to herself. The air was almost unpleasantly warm, humid and difficult to breath, her undershirt clung stickily to her back and she was too hot. All of a sudden the horse startled, took a great leap and they flew like a shot across a dizzyingly deep gorge. At once the air cleared. Viivian felt against her face a gust of fresh air, heavy with the fragrances of strange spices. The smell of cloves. It reminded her of the dentist. Onwards they travelled, down and down into the gorge. ‘But how we find our way back is another matter altogether,’ she said to herself giving the horse’s neck a calming pat. The horse shook the reins and seemed clearly distressed.
‘Let’s have a little rest, my old friend,’ she said dropping the reins and jumping down from the saddle. They had arrived at an opening in the trees, perfect for a rest, with a small, clear spring rippling out from the rock face.
‘A little bite to eat would certainly not go amiss,’ she said throwing herself down on a soft knoll. ‘The next time we set off on a long journey like this we shall have to pack something small to eat,’ she said as she rummaged in her saddle bag for a pen. This adventure would be of no use whatsoever unless she carefully marked the route they taken on the map. As always, she could not find a pen: she lived in house in which pens disappeared the minute they came through the door. She did however pull out of the bag a nice, white parcel. Very carefully she opened it up. Inside there was a smoked pig’s knuckle.
The Dedalus Book of Finnish Fantasy Page 17