But according to my information, Jonas followed Margrete into the bedroom where, despite the fact she was tired, she embraced him passionately, hungrily, then made love to him with a tenderness and an ardour, not to say impatience, that surprised him, almost wore him out; so he lay and dozed for a long time with Margrete snuggled up against him fast asleep, pondering her erotic mystery, what it could be, because it wasn’t really as if sex with her was any different from sex with women he had known before her, and yet with her it felt unique, because the pleasure she gave him was of a totally different order – even when performing the same actions. Jonas lay in his future in-laws’ bed, staring at the golden statuette from Thailand which stood against the end wall and thinking to himself that her secret must lie in a kind of orchestration, the ability to coax something fresh and new out of a tired old tune. And he could not stop his mind from running on, starting to mull over the newly accomplished act, because there had been something about it, an almost diversionary intensity which worried him, which caused, yes, a suspicion to well up inside him; and no matter how much he told himself that what he feared couldn’t be true, he knew that it was true, or if not true, then perfectly possible. And however much he tried to fight it, these little stabs at his heart made his temper rise and forced him in the end, against his will, to tug at her, not gently, but roughly; and when she woke up, appearing more bewildered than surprised, he looked, or gazed, searchingly into her eyes, remembering as he did so, for a split-second, the sense of awe he had felt the first time he looked through a telescope, and then he said: ‘You didn’t?’ He heard himself all but begging. ‘Did you?’
And yet there is still a chance that he wasn’t there at all, that instead of following her into the bedroom he wrote her a loving note to say that he would be away for a day, then walked out the door, because there was one person, Professor, one of our most famous architects no less, who doggedly maintained – I have this from a reliable source – that on that very day – the same, that is, on which Khomeini returned in triumph to Iran – he had bumped into Jonas Wergeland in Trondheim, in the afternoon that is, outside Nidaros Cathedral, where Jonas was doing some sketches for a project which, with all the hesitancy of the novice, he immediately began to describe: ideas for a new kind of church, ‘a space formed by light’, part of an assignment at the College of Architecture, while at the same time sounding out this well-established architect on the possibility of a job in his office when he had completed his studies, because as he said, or is supposed to have said, he was going all out for this and only wanted to work with the best.
But all the signs are that Jonas Wergeland spent the rest of that day indoors, in Ambassador Boeck’s museum-like flat in Ullevål Garden City, more specifically in the white bedroom where, after having asked or begged or threatened Margrete and received no reply and after having contemplated her face at length, with some of the same mind-reeling wonder, or dread, as when he had stood looking at a cathedral, he pulled back and dealt her a searing slap in the face, causing her to roll her head on the pillow in pain. ‘Tell me it’s not true,’ he said.
‘Shall I tell you the truth or the truth you want to hear?’ she said.
Jonas could tell that this was bound to end badly, that something was already starting to collapse, as relentlessly as a fragile structure of ice hit by a little puck, and at that moment, as he was lifting his hand to strike her again, even though he didn’t want to, he wished he could turn the clock back almost two years, to an early summer before he met Margrete again, but long after he had entered the College of Architecture and, at last, begun on what he believed to be the right course of study. His only problem was money; his money had run out. He feared that there would be no more travelling for him. He could have borrowed money, of course, but he hated being in debt. Then one day in late May he meets his cousin, Veronika Røed, in the street, quite by chance – to the extent that anything happens by chance – and she, being in a good mood, invites him to the nearest café where, because it’s a very long time since they last saw one another, they sit for some hours. And the odd thing is – if one can regard it as odd – that on this day of all days Veronika is bursting with excitement about a plan she has, a plan based on information she has picked up in the circles in which she is currently moving, working as she is – as the final part of her course at the Norwegian College of Journalism – on a dissertation on certain captains of the business world, a topic of her own choosing. ‘Information is the most valuable of all commodities today, Jonas!’
He could not help admiring her: dark and sultry, face framed by black hair that flowed down over a striking and doubtless very expensive silk scarf. Her suit too was exceptionally smart, her work as a financial journalist seemed to have had an unconscious effect on her choice of dress. She came to the point. Since they were related, she was going to give him a really hot tip; she placed a hand over his, as if insisting: ‘This is your big chance to make some money,’ she said. ‘A lot of money, and fast,’ she said. ‘How?’ he asked, when she paused. ‘Buy shares in Tandberg,’ she said or almost whispered, rummaging around in her briefcase and producing a chart which showed movements in the price of Tandberg shares over the past four years. ‘Look at this,’ she said, or whispered, ‘look how low the share price is now, the lowest it’s ever been, down to thirty kroner.’ The factory was in trouble, but Veronika had it from a reliable source that it would be receiving an injection of fresh capital in the very near future, which meant that the share price was soon going to rise sharply. ‘But don’t tell anyone,’ she said, in a voice which reminded Jonas of summers when they were children playing in the attic of his grandfather’s house. ‘It’ll be our secret.’
Jonas took the sheet of paper from her. It was a risky proposition, that he could see; temptation was being put in his way, but it was a serious temptation, that much he understood: the prospect of making some easy money, a lot of it – without moving a muscle. And his cousin couldn’t possibly know that he was short of cash. ‘Why bother playing about with those buildings, Jonas, all those drawings that hardly ever come to anything?’ Again the slender hand, the long fingers, the beautifully manicured nails, on his hand. ‘Why not make some money, get rich quick?’
He heard her. Heard her all too well. For a second he saw himself from the outside, or felt it with every bit of his being: how the pupils and irises of his eyes were replaced by dollar signs, like Uncle Scrooge’s in the American comic books. And although he did not know it, in this he was embodying the spirit of the times. Because the people of Norway were standing on the threshold of an era marked by market liberalism and a swing to the right, by free play in so many areas. In parenthesis I must be permitted to say that at this point they were also in the process of letting an historic opportunity go to waste, since the existence of a welfare state presupposed two things: national solidarity and economic know-how. In the fifties they had had the first, but not the second. Now, on the other hand, they had at long last acquired the latter, only suddenly to throw the former overboard. As Denmark had its Legoland, so Norway was transformed into an Egoland.
‘What about you?’ Jonas said.
‘I’m buying 100,000 kroners’ worth,’ she said. ‘I’ve never been so sure of making a real killing.’ As she spoke she had unwittingly tied a knot in her scarf, one of the fine knots that their grandfather had taught them.
I ought perhaps to point out that in those days buying shares in Tandberg could be a somewhat hazardous business. Things were not going well for Tandberg Radios Ltd. Veronika certainly did her bit to persuade him, but there was something else which did just as much to sway him: the name of Tandberg was rich in nostalgia. For Jonas, to buy shares in Tandberg was to invest in a beautiful dream, something he believed in, a grand vision. To put money into Tandberg was to put money into the motherland. Jonas knew that for far too long Norwegian exports had consisted solely of raw materials and semi-fabricated products, as was the norm for an industrially underd
eveloped country. If, however, one wished to build a modern industrial society – and this was one of Vebjørn Tandberg’s big dreams – one had to be properly geared up for the production of finished goods; the electronics industry in Norway, not least, was in need of a boost. The more Jonas thought about it, the more confident he felt. Absolutely nothing bad could happen to a cornerstone company like Tandberg. Everybody, a whole nation, would come to its aid.
There was only one snag: ‘I don’t have any money,’ he said, feeling perhaps slightly relieved.
‘That’s the trouble with you,’ she said. ‘You don’t dare take chances. You don’t dare to risk more than you’ve got.’ And then, quick as a flash: ‘You could borrow the money.’ Then: ‘You could borrow it from someone who won’t charge any interest.’ And then, as if it were the final phase of a three-stage rocket launch: ‘I’m sure my Dad would lend you the money.’
The mere thought of borrowing money from Sir William tied Jonas’s stomach in knots. And yet. This could be his big chance, maybe his only chance, to make a staggering amount of money very quickly, salt away funds for many a worry-free year.
The next day he plucked up the courage to call his uncle, Sir William, who was now working for Statoil and had long since forsaken Gråkammen in Oslo for Stokka in Stavanger, where he had 4,000 gilt-edged square feet all to himself. When the family moved to Africa in the sixties as part of a development aid programme, Sir William’s wife had taken leave from her job with Norges Bank. In Kenya, however, she met an American working with the World Bank and allowed him to break into her vault on numerous occasions while she was lying around, bored stiff in Nairobi; it ended, you might say, with a merger between Norges Bank and the World Bank – in other words, she left Sir William. Jonas had always had the feeling that his uncle’s fantastic commitment to Statoil sprang from bitter thoughts of revenge: fewer Norwegians should be dependent on American oil companies.
It was easier to speak to Sir William on the phone than to meet him face to face, although Jonas shuddered at the thought of his uncle’s appearance: he looked not unlike Count Dracula with his hair brushed back and canines that spoke of a man who, after his spell in Africa at any rate, had acquired the taste for sucking up commodities. Jonas outlined the situation, more or less in Veronika’s inviting terms, and his uncle sounded very positive, in fact he almost seemed pleasantly surprised that his ne’er-do-well nephew was finally beginning to take things seriously. Jonas was promptly granted a short-term loan. ‘Of course I’ll help you, you’re family, after all!’ There was only one condition: his uncle wanted it in writing. Jonas agreed; he’d be able to pay the money back as soon as the share price rose and he had sold his shares at a massive profit. He had made up his mind that this would be a short-lived adventure, a one-off.
The contract came by post. Jonas signed it, and the agreed sum was duly credited to an account in Jonas’s name with a well-known brokerage firm in Oslo. Jonas called the stockbrokers and asked them to put all of the money forthwith into Tandberg shares. Later, when he received the share certificate and regarded this visual proof that he owned 3,000 shares in Tandberg Radios he felt much the same pleasure as when they had played Monopoly as kids and he had picked up the title deed to see what astronomical sum the person who had landed on his street now owed him. The thought of possibly losing money may well have crossed Jonas’s mind, but the prospect of making a fabulous profit eclipsed all else. Only a few years earlier Tandberg shares had been worth over two hundred kroner. Jonas was doing sums in his sleep and dreaming of becoming a rich man. Behind his eyelids, irises and pupils had once more been supplanted by dollar signs.
His dream of a big killing was short-lived. The shares did not rise in value. At the end of August trading on them was suspended, and in December Tandberg was removed from the Oslo stock exchange. Still Jonas did not give up hope. But then, in March of the following year, the shares were written down to nil. Everything was lost. Vebjørn Tandberg, the company’s idealistic founder, committed suicide. Later that same year Tandberg Radios was declared bankrupt.
With hindsight it is, as always, easy to see what went wrong. Tandberg was a victim of over-expansion, lack of capital and poor long-term planning. Above all else they underestimated how vulnerable the company was to competition from commercial electronics products from Asia. It was right what I wrote in that mock Norwegian essay, Jonas thought. ‘Autonomy’ is a bloody illusion.
Nevertheless, Jonas – typical Norwegian that he was – had fallen prey to nostalgia and unrealistic notions about the world: which is to say, the state of the market. But for Jonas there was also another side to this tragedy: an entire childhood had gone bankrupt, all those radio plays, all those happy radio days, an infatuation with wood nymphs. He felt that he had lost, and lost big-time, because – like a naïve child – he had had too much faith in Norway.
As for Veronika, in case anyone was wondering, she did not buy one single share in Tandberg.
The bitterest pill of all was that he was now in debt to a detested uncle. Jonas managed, nonetheless, to push the problem to the back of his mind, almost blocked it out completely, until the cold January day when he was sitting in his own flat in Hegdehaugveien, and Sir William called from Stokka in Stavanger, from the desolate reaches of his 4,000 square-foot stronghold, and said that he wanted his money back, now: made this demand with a curt brutality that wounded Jonas deeply, as if his uncle were some monstrous Shylock, calling for a pound of his actual flesh. For Jonas, this was a matter of pride. He muttered something about taking out a bank loan to free himself from Sir William’s contemptuous clutches.
It was at this point, after Jonas had spent several evenings at the flat in Ullevål Garden City, surrounded by brass Indian gods and jade Chinese dragons, sitting gazing into the fire, with something obviously weighing on his mind, that Margrete put down a book on Istanbul and persuaded him to tell her what was bothering him. And when he told her how he had gambled away his kingdom, just like that, with one throw of the dice, she suggested, with typical assertiveness that she should go down to Stavanger and speak to Sir William: she, who did not know his uncle, who was not one of the family. ‘Maybe I can fix it somehow.’ She had looked at him for a long time. He had looked at her for a long time. He heard what she was saying. He knew what she was saying. Or at least he thought he knew what she was saying.
A couple of days after this she went off, and twenty-four hours later she returned. ‘It went fine,’ she said the minute she walked into the kitchen where he was sitting over a late breakfast. And then, on her way to the bedroom: ‘The debt’s cancelled.’
‘How did you manage it?’ he asked.
‘I talked to him,’ she said.
He asked no more questions.
It could be, as I say, that not long after this brief confrontation, which left him in a state of quivering uncertainty, Jonas Wergeland walked out of the house, because on that afternoon, the very day, that is, on which the Ayatollah Khomeini landed in Iran, a former friend of Jonas Wergeland appears to have met him in the basement of Grøndahl’s in Øvre Slottsgate, where he had been busily intent on trying out a number of pianos – the friend remembered how a couple of radically beautiful fragments of ‘Someone To Watch Over Me’ had sounded pensively on everything from a Bechstein to a Schimmel. Jonas had said he was going to take up music again, that from now one he was going to devote himself solely to this, to ‘harmonies like shining constellations’, and thereafter, still according to this other person, he asked, or supposedly asked, a sales assistant whether it would be possible to pay in instalments and to have a piano delivered to his bedsit in Hegdehaugsveien.
But as far as I can tell, this has to be a pack of lies, Professor, at any rate if it is true that instead, on that afternoon, Jonas followed Margrete into the bedroom where they made love, briefly, but with extraordinary passion, and where afterwards Jonas lay on the bed thinking about how she had been aflame with desire when he came to her, as if she
wished to hide something or ease some hurt. And the more he thought – not least about her capacity for acting impulsively and improperly, like the time when she was dared into stripping for some mutual friends, almost taking his breath away with her shameless behaviour, and afterwards simply shrugged it off, said it was no big deal – the more he thought about that and about other things, the more he found himself picturing what must have happened in Stavanger, somewhere in Sir William’s lonely labyrinth of a mansion. He was also painfully aware of what a temptation it must have been for his uncle, a man without a wife, a man of temperamental longings and no scruples, and then there she is – Margrete, that dazzling creature, right in front of him, in his own barren home, a woman who politely asks a favour of him, with a look in her eye that says she is willing to do anything in return. Jonas lay there, tossing and turning, thinking, conscious that he did not know Margrete, only knew that there was so much he did not know, she was full of secrets; he could not lie still, shook her, woke her up, began to probe, to ask what had really happened down there in Stavanger, ‘Are you telling me that he actually waived the debt, just like that?’
‘Why are you so worried?’
‘Because…’ He chopped the air helplessly with one hand, listening as he did so to her voice, as if it were complex chord, on the very edge of dissonance.
‘No more questions,’ Margrete said, getting up.
Jonas was suddenly seized by a pain in his stomach, his back, his shoulders. He stood up, grabbed hold of her arms and swung her round, slapped her face hard with the flat of his hand. The crack resounded around the room. ‘Say it, I want to hear it,’ he said through clenched teeth. ‘Did you?’ He looked, he glared at her. ‘You really did it?’
‘What if I did?’ Margrete said defiantly, running her fingers over her cheek. ‘You certainly wanted me to. I could see it in your face.’
The Conqueror Page 31