by S. J. Gazan
“I left the bedroom and went into the living room, which was pitch black. I sensed the window must be covered with a heavy curtain, and I hoped desperately it was because he had been napping. I yanked the curtain open, but the room stayed dark. That was when it dawned on me that the room was alive: Asger had transformed his living room into a terrarium.
“‘I painted the window black recently,’ he casually told me when he returned with the tea. ‘The plumber came and he opened the curtains though I had expressly told him not to. My South Chilean tarantula was about to lay her eggs, and she can’t tolerate daylight when she does that. Not at all. In their natural habitat, the female buries herself in the ground so the eggs are exposed only to moisture, cold, and darkness. That plumber ruined it.’ He was angry. ‘I haven’t been able to make her lay eggs since.’ He put the teapot and the cakes on a coffee table that I could only just detect the outlines of.
“‘But I can switch on the light, if you want me to,’ he said, and before I had time to reply he flicked the switch. He explained it was a special light that filtered out all the red beams. You can’t read in it, but you can find your way around. He asked me if it was all right or whether I would rather sit in the kitchen.
“The living room now looked as if it was lit by twilight. The walls were covered with tanks from floor to ceiling.
“‘Spiders?’ I whispered.
“It turned out that he had seventy-two spiders, of which thirty-four were lethal, thirty-nine scorpions, all lethal, four venomous snakes, as well as cockroaches, mice, and crickets for food. He explained it all very cheerfully. Along the wall to the left were more bundles. Books, binders, science journals, and CDs would be my guess.
“I asked him why he kept his possessions like this, and he replied it was nature’s way of storing her possessions. Eggs and food, always packed in clusters, piles, and heaps. He was merely emulating nature.
“He told me it was just an experiment and it was just for fun, but he hesitated.” Professor Moritzen stopped and stared at Søren.
“I don’t really know why I’m telling you all this.”
Søren cleared his throat.
“Please go on. It’s important.” Søren gazed straight at Professor Moritzen who briefly looked as if she had lost the thread.
“I don’t know… I left…” she shuddered. “And I was sad… but also angry with myself. It’s not like I had found child porn or funding. I wondered what was troubling him, but I didn’t know him very well anymore. I concluded his usual invincibility had vanished or was weakened, and I spotted an opportunity to stick the knife in.” Professor Moritzen looked straight at Søren. “After the meeting I caught up with him. I told him I had decided it was time to tell Asger the truth. He replied he had no idea what I was talking about.
“Two days later I was officially informed that more than three quarters of the grant had been awarded to my department, specifically to two of my projects. I arrived at my office to find champagne corks popping. My younger colleague, who had attended the meeting with me, beamed and said that whatever I had said to Helland, it had worked. And he congratulated me. He hugged me. I was speechless, and for five naive minutes exactly I thought we had been given the money on merit. Then I understood. Helland had bought my silence.
“In the weeks that followed, I was torn. Morale in the department was sky-high, and we held one ambitious strategy meeting after another. We could afford a new electron microscope, we could invite three postgraduates on a planned trip to our overseas projects, and we could afford to participate in two upcoming symposia in Asia and America. The atmosphere was euphoric. I saw Helland several times, but still he never once looked through my window, even though I’m certain he knew I was in my office. I also saw Asger several times. He was radiant, having been offered a fellowship at the department. I had never seen him so happy. It was more food for thought. Should I let Helland get away with buying my silence?
“I made up my mind one afternoon when I saw Asger with Erik Tybjerg. They walked right past my window, laughing out loud at something, so Asger completely forgot to wave. The next day, I informed Helland that his blatant bribe had been accepted on one condition. He would put himself forward for the next election to the Faculty Council, and when he was voted in he was to make sure my department would never be short of funds again. I tried to gauge how badly he wanted Asger to remain a secret. It was clearly of the utmost importance, because he consented. Asger remained fatherless, I became a blackmailer, and Professor Helland kept his job. I lost no sleep over this. Our parasite research saved lives in the Third World, and my son was spared a father who didn’t want him. It went on for years.” Professor Moritzen blinked. “Lars was good at securing grants, exceptional, even. Once the grants were awarded, he got creative. The money was allocated across the system and when it reached individual budgets, it was disguised and moved along so that when it finally came to us, no one was keeping an eye on it anymore; no one asked questions.”
“So what happened?” Søren wanted to know.
“There was an election, and the new government had other plans,” Professor Moritzen said bitterly. “It slammed the money box shut and threw away the key. From now on, every unit within the institute had to submit a half-yearly report explaining how grants had been spent, along with research results. Every kroner had to be accounted for. The new government was highly mistrustful, and it soon became clear it cared nothing for our work unless it was profitable. There was a major management shuffle, and Professor Ravn was appointed as the new head of the institute. In consultation with the Faculty Council, he decided to close Coleoptera Taxonomy—”
“What’s that?”
“A small unit, specializing in beetle systematics. It had a staff of two: one was an older professor of taxonomy on the verge of retirement and the other was a young, upcoming invertebrate morphologist…” Professor Moritzen looked at Søren with tears in her eyes.
“Asger.”
She looked away.
“Asger had spent the summer in Borneo collecting samples and returned the day before the start of the new academic year. He was tanned, and I had never seen him looking so relaxed and contented. The institute claimed they had sent a letter and an e-mail, that they had tried hard to contact him, but whether it was Asger’s fault or they were lying, he showed up, unsuspecting, and found his department closed. There was a photocopier, still in its bubble wrap, waiting outside the door for Asger to clear out his things, so his office could be turned into a photocopying room. Not long after I said hello to him I saw him storm out. He had arrived with his buckets and specimen jars, wearing a too-warm jacket, smiling from ear to ear, his backpack tucked under his arm, and now I saw him head for the parking lot without his things and in a T-shirt. I worried and waited for him to come back. After half an hour, I knew something was wrong. I called Asger’s former colleague, but calls to that line were forwarded to his secretary. She gave me his home number. When I called him, my hands were shaking. Afterward I called Lars. It was a very unpleasant conversation. ‘There was nothing I could do,’ he said, over and over. ‘It was the smallest unit at the institute. There was nothing I could do.’ I wanted to kill him, even if he was telling me the truth. Lars assured me he had done everything he could, but he had been the only one to vote against it. ‘Did I know what a majority vote meant, had I heard about democracy?’ The department was closed immediately. The older professor retired, and Asger was… let go.” Professor Moritzen looked out of the window, at the building across the road. It had grown dark.
“Obviously I went straight to Asger’s. He didn’t open the door. I called out through the mail slot. I should have known it all along. His joy, his optimism, Borneo, his glowing skin, which almost made him look normal. It was an illusion. Underneath it Asger was what he always had been: a misfit. Someone who couldn’t cope with the world, and it was all my fault. I had worked too much, and he didn’t have a father. In the end, I called a locksmith and brok
e in. Asger lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling. I sat beside him, stroking his arm.” Professor Moritzen looked at Søren.
“I promised him it would be all right. I said I would make sure he didn’t become unemployed. Thanks to Helland, my department had enough money, and I hired Asger as an assistant in the Department of Parasitology. I twisted Lars’s arm further—I told him to get a grant for Asger for two annual trips to southeast Asia to collect samples, and offer him three lectures a year in Lecture Hall A. To a full house. Or I would start talking.
“Needless to say, Asger was far from content. He languished. His life had changed for the worse. He traveled regularly to southeast Asia, he classified animals, wrote papers, and helped out in my department. But it wasn’t what he really wanted to do. He didn’t want to be a gofer at the University of Copenhagen. He wanted tenure, his own office, to teach, to contribute to growth and debate in the world of research. He didn’t want to be an ultimately insignificant freelancer. I asked him if he still saw Erik Tybjerg, though I knew he didn’t.
“In the end I hated Lars Helland.” Professor Moritzen suddenly looked straight at Søren. “Hated him because…”
“He refused to be Asger’s father,” Søren said.
“He was Asger’s father,” Professor Moritzen said, defiantly. “And I hated him for not acknowledging it. But the person I truly despised was myself. Research grants are to us what steroids are to athletes. Whoever gets the most, gets the furthest. And I made sure I got plenty for myself.” She gave Søren a remorseful look.
“Last April I was made redundant and given three years to conclude my research. The Department of Parasitology at the University of Copenhagen will be shut, and the Serum Institute will take over our work. It happened during the Easter break. In contrast to Asger, I received a letter and a telephone call from the head of the institute. He apologized profusely. They had to make cuts. The government had the knife to the institute’s throat. When I returned after the break, I went looking for Lars. He seemed to have vanished, and his door was locked. I called, I e-mailed, but he didn’t reply. Finally, I called him at home and his daughter answered the telephone. Her voice was bright and happy. She was Asger’s sister, they shared genes, how could she sound so happy? My dad’s abroad, she said. At a dig. He wouldn’t be back for another ten days. That weekend I told Asger. After years of deliberation, when I had sworn to myself I would never tell him in anger, I told Asger that Lars was his father. Because I was hurting. Because I had been laid off. Because the money had run out. Because it would no longer trickle down to Asger. Because I was bitter that Lars’s daughter sounded so happy. For all the wrong reasons,” she said, wearily. She fell silent and stared at her hands.
“Why didn’t Anna know you had a son?”
Professor Moritzen looked up.
“She asked me the same question a few hours ago.” She smiled weakly and fidgeted with her clothes. “She was angry with me because I had kept it a secret. She shouted at me, in fact.” Another feeble smile. “But we didn’t see each other outside work. We met at a summer course where I taught terrestrial ecology. We started talking, and I was fascinated by her. She was so different from Asger, from my own child, and she reminded me of me, when I was a young biologist and a single parent. We had lunch together, maybe five times. It was lovely sitting in the cafeteria with her. It made sense. Anna’s life isn’t easy, is it? Living on a student grant with a young child. She never told me her story outright, but today she admitted she felt ashamed because her boyfriend had left them. And do you know something?” She looked up at Søren. “I, too, felt ashamed. I was ashamed of Asger.”
Søren tried to get his thoughts in order. “And then, last Thursday, Asger told you he had infected Professor Helland with parasites?”
“Yes.” She looked wretched. “But it’s my fault. I should never have told him Helland was his father. But I did. The night I told him, he reacted with surprising equanimity. He seemed puzzled more than anything. He kept saying: I thought you didn’t know who my dad was? As if it wouldn’t sink in that I had lied. Afterward, we shared takeout and watched a movie. When he went home, he seemed pensive rather than angry. Three days later, he called to say he didn’t want to see me for awhile. Then he hung up. Asger had never rebelled, not even as a teenager. He has always been my sweet little boy. I was shocked when he hung up on me. I called him back, but he didn’t answer. I went to bed. I wanted to sleep on it, not compound the damage by acting in haste. After three weeks, I called him. Yes, he was fine. What day was it? Really? He sounded surprised. He responded to everything I said as though he had had a lobotomy. I invited him to dinner; I asked if we should go away for Easter break but he said no, we wouldn’t be seeing each other. Good-bye. I told myself everything was all right. He was twenty-seven years old and he had the right to create some space between himself and his mother. Only I desperately wanted to talk to him, to explain to him once more why I had kept Lars a secret. I wrote him a long letter, begging for his forgiveness. I wrote I had been nineteen years old when I had slept with my tutor; I knew nothing, and today I would never have made the choices I had made then. I heard nothing, not even on my birthday in July, which Asger always used to make a big deal of. Not so much as a postcard.” The tears rolled down Professor Moritzen’s cheeks.
“He didn’t respond to anything. To my letters or my calls. He had quite simply dropped me. Last August I started therapy. It was mainly about my relationship with Asger, about my role in his life. My therapist told me to write another letter to Asger, that he definitely read them and they made a difference even if he didn’t respond. In the letter I was to assure him I would be there when he was ready, and I was to tell him I loved him and I looked forward to seeing him again. But not until he was ready. That was important, the therapist stressed. He had begun an emancipation process, she said, and I was to leave him alone. Respect him. The therapist insisted it was about time, too.” She looked embarrassed. “So that’s what I did. Wrote a letter, which the therapist read and approved before I sent it to Asger. Then I waited. I heard nothing, but the therapist comforted me. It was quite normal. The longer the period after puberty when emancipation ought to have taken place, the harder it was. She said it might take years. So I was so happy when he suddenly called last Thursday.” Professor Moritzen looked earnestly at Søren. “I swear it never occurred to me that Asger might be implicated in Lars’s death. I had speculated like crazy whether the parasite might have come from our stock, but in consultation with my colleagues, I concluded it couldn’t possibly be one of ours. We hadn’t been broken into, nothing had been touched, nothing had been taken. Last Thursday, Asger told me he had watched me through my office window. His plan was to make it look like I had infected Helland with tapeworm. We should both be punished, he said. He even found the prospect amusing. He knew tapeworms weren’t dangerous, but they frequently aren’t discovered until they’re several feet long and fill most of the intestines. He thought his plan was brilliantly disgusting. He imagined how the tapeworm would grow and take up more and more space, just like Helland and I had gradually taken over his life.
“He also told me he had threatened Helland. Sent him some e-mails in English from an untraceable address. Helland was completely indifferent; he didn’t even take them seriously. He had replied to a couple of them, Asger told me, though he obviously didn’t know to whom he was replying, and he seemed to find the threats amusing. Asger was crushed,” she said softly.
“Asger heard about Helland’s death on the radio and got very scared. Last Wednesday he visited the institute. It took less than fifteen minutes to catch up on all the gossip. Helland had been riddled with cysticerci. Asger panicked and went home where he spent the next twenty-four hours thinking it over. He couldn’t make sense of it. He called me Thursday night. His voice was small and timid. At first, I couldn’t understand why, after months of silence, he’d called me to talk about the life cycle of parasites. Surely he could look it up in his ow
n reference books? But he insisted. Slowly, the pieces began to fall into place and, in the end, I asked him outright: Are you involved in Helland’s death? He thought so, he whispered. Then he told me everything, though he still didn’t fully understand what had happened, all he had wanted to do was give his loser dad tapeworm. I connected the dots myself.”
Chapter 19
“Will it help him that he confessed? It will, won’t it?”
“He could have called the police himself,” Søren said gently.