The Island

by Ben McPherson

  ‘What are they feeling, then?’

  I laughed. ‘Maybe it would be better if you did the piece. You have a headset, and everything.’

  For a moment Vee laughed too. Then she stopped, became serious.

  ‘Dad, who’s collecting Licia?’

  ‘Licia’s safe on her island,’ I said.

  The glass was sand beneath our shoes. We heard sirens, though we saw no police. The few people we did see floated past, empty-eyed, or stood on corners, watching the clouds of smoke and brick dust as they rolled and turned in the Midsummer air.

  I stood on the subway platform, Vee’s headset covering my ears, the cable attached to my phone. In front of us was the empty carriage, lights on, doors open. Even down here the air was filled with dust.

  ‘Dad,’ mouthed Vee.

  I lifted the earpad from my right ear. ‘What, love?’

  ‘Is it true you can breathe in bits of people and not know it?’

  From my left ear I could hear the station assistant’s voice. ‘This is Lori. Am I speaking with Cal Curtis again?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Vee. They’re patching me through to the studio, love.’ I replaced the earpad over my ear. The sound of the subway disappeared. All I could hear was my own breath.

  ‘So, Cal,’ said the voice on the other end. ‘Dan tells me you are a satirist.’

  ‘I am.’

  Lori laughed as though I had said something funny. ‘And Cal, we are good for level and we are all set, and the next voice you hear will be Carly’s. Patching you through … now.’

  ‘And from Oslo, Norway we have Cal Curtis, a Scottish satirist who has lived for many years in Washington DC, but is currently on a career break in Norway. Cal, you were an eyewitness to the fearful explosion that rocked the Norwegian capital less than an hour ago. What was your first thought when you heard the bomb that tore through the town hall?’

  ‘Well, my first thought was thunder. My daughter’s first thought was that this was a bomb.’

  ‘Your daughter was a witness to the explosion?’

  ‘My daughter is a very brave young woman.’ I smiled down at Vee. Vee tried to smile back. ‘She was in the centre of town. The window in the room she was in was sucked out by the blast. She and her friend lay face down, bracing the backs of their heads, waiting for help to arrive, just as she was taught in school.’

  ‘Dad,’ mouthed Vee urgently. I lifted one earpad. ‘We need to get on the train.’

  I replaced the earpad, put a hand on Vee’s shoulder. ‘One second,’ I mouthed.

  I saw her mouth move. ‘But Dad …’

  I turned away, folded my hand over the earpiece. ‘It’s important to stress we don’t yet know what has happened. The government has confirmed that there has been an explosion. They have asked us to be vigilant. No word of a bomb. No word on casualties. We are in the centre of the city and the streets here are virtually empty.’

  ‘Dad.’ Vee was in front of me, tugging at my elbow.

  I held up my hand. Wait.

  Carly’s voice. ‘Theories must be emerging, Cal.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘What are people saying?’ I didn’t know what people were saying. I thought for a moment. ‘Yes, at this stage I suppose it’s impossible to rule out a terrorist attack. This country has had military presences in many Middle Eastern flashpoints.’

  Lights flashing. The Doors Closing signal.

  Vee stepped away from me on to the train. ‘Dad, come on …’

  I stepped on board; the doors slid shut.

  ‘Thank you, Cal Curtis in Oslo, Norway. More on that story as it emerges.’

  A click, and the feed from the studio faded out.

  Vee sat facing me, stared me full in the face, arms folded angrily across her chest. I took off the headset.

  ‘What is it, Vee?’

  ‘Why did you say the Muslims blew up Oslo?’

  ‘Vee, you know I would never claim something like that.’

  ‘Actually you pretty much did. And you were speaking in this weird deep voice, like you think that’s how radio people speak.’

  ‘Please tell me I wasn’t,’ I said. ‘Was I?’

  She nodded at me sternly, then her face broke into a smile.

  ‘OK,’ I said. ‘Well, that isn’t good.’

  Vee stepped across the threshold, leaned in to her mother, let herself be held, then pulled away and headed towards her bedroom. Elsa watched her go, wondering perhaps if she could call after her.

  ‘How is she?’ she said.

  ‘It’s all coming out as anger. She was very close to the bomb.’

  ‘If it even was a bomb.’

  ‘From what she says, it was.’

  ‘Maybe.’ She said it on the in-breath. A strange little sighing sound.

  I followed Elsa through to the kitchen, stood, looking up at her unreadable pictures on the white wall above the table. The pictures were of crime scenes in Washington, photographed with the cooperation of the police. Elsa would work methodically, using whatever light was available, shooting on large-format film cameras, always without a lens.

  Carmine 12 was taken at the scene of a stabbing; Cinnabar 44 a shooting; Burnt Umber 11 a hammer attack.

  ‘Why murder?’ people would ask.

  Elsa never explained.

  The serious newspapers loved my wife’s work; critics made favourable comparisons with Munch. ‘A Postmodern Scream for the New Post-Enlightenment’ was my favourite headline; the article was as hard to decipher as Elsa’s pictures.

  ‘Elsa,’ I said, ‘there’s something I need your help to understand.’

  She looked levelly back. ‘What’s that?’

  That video file, I wanted to say. Timestamped three a.m. When you came home at four. On the morning of our anniversary.

  No hint of guilt in Elsa’s gaze. Instead there was something complex and loving and warm.

  ‘You guys about ready?’ Henrik’s voice from the hall.

  Elsa smiled. ‘Dad’s going to drive us to the marina.’

  ‘You sure, Henrik?’ I called out.

  Henrik stepped into the hall from the kitchen. ‘Important not to be dramatic. I shall drive you.’

  ‘I mean, Henrik, that’s great, but it doesn’t feel—’

  Henrik cut me off. ‘If it is terrorism, we do not want such people to win. And if it is not terrorism, what is the risk? Your marriage is a precious thing to you, no?’

  ‘Wait,’ I said. ‘Henrik, no disrespect, but Vee is in pieces, and we haven’t spoken to Licia.’

  ‘Viktoria is playing a computer game, which involves shooting people and then dancing. I do not think she is in pieces.’

  Elsa smiled. ‘I texted with Licia. She was fine.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Something about this doesn’t feel right.’

  ‘Cal, you must go,’ said Henrik. ‘Simple.’

  ‘Henrik,’ I said, ‘again, with respect, it isn’t simple.’

  ‘What Viktoria needs is calm and normality. A good walk, out in nature. Pine trees and forest animals. Maybe we will see an elusive moose.’

  ‘Or I could come with you, Dad.’ Vee’s voice. She had slipped into the room, unseen. ‘Please, Dad?’

  4

  Elsa swung the wheel, slipped the motor into gear. The engine note rose, and our little rented speedboat continued its arc out of the bay and into the fjord beyond. Vee lay on the sun seats by the motor, staring up at the sky. Beside her, her laptop bag and her gaming headset.

  I sat beside Elsa, the passenger seat angled towards her, my bare feet on the edge of her seat, watching her. A woman perfectly in command of a boat, in a strapless black dress and fitted life preserver. An everyday sight in Norway, perhaps; still exotic to me.

  ‘What?’ said Elsa.

  I grinned. ‘You, at the helm of a small speedboat.’

  ‘Eyes on the water in front, Mum,’ shouted Vee from behind us. ‘And Dad, shut up.’

  ‘OK, love.’
Elsa grinned again, and turned to face forwards.

  The boat was an indulgence. We couldn’t afford it, but everyone we knew in Oslo had one. And besides, Elsa was comfortable on the water. She stood behind the windshield, sunglasses pushed high on her head, turning from time to time to check for other boats coming in from the side, watching the marina disappear behind us, poised and in control. The engine pitch rose to a soft whine; the bow of the boat kicked up.

  Elsa looked at me and nodded. We took a step forward, used our weight to bring the nose of the boat down, stepped back into place, sat down. In seconds we were skimming fast across the fjord, cutting a perfect wake across the glassy water.

  Vee’s eyes were closed now.

  Elsa leaned in to me, whispered, ‘You smell of really good food.’

  ‘I smell of sweat and sexual frustration.’

  ‘Trust me, you don’t.’

  Behind and to the left the scattered bays, the painted houses by the water. The land was green, the rocks pink, the water a deep northern blue.

  On islets near the shore you could see wood stacked neatly in vast piles, ready for the evening’s bonfires. Further out, birds dive-bombed shoals of herring fry and ahead, though it was partly hidden by the headland, you could see the sweep of the Oslo waterline, the cruise ships and the grain towers and the monstrous industrial cranes.

  ‘We could buy a little boat back home,’ said Elsa. ‘Be good for the girls.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Maybe we could.’

  The smoke. We saw it as we rounded the headland. It rose in a vertical plume from the middle of the C-shaped bay. Elsa eased off the throttle; the boat dropped down on to the surface of the fjord. Vee sat up, instantly awake.

  The bay was divided in two between light and dark. In the centre of town the buildings lay shrouded in a grey pall. The twin towers of the town hall vanished into the smoke. News helicopters dipped in and out, rotors shifting the edges of the swirling grey column above, ruffling the water below.

  Elsa’s eyes scanned the shoreline.

  ‘We can turn around,’ I said.

  ‘It’s not as bad as it looks,’ said Elsa. ‘The ferries are running.’

  To our right were the islands. The smoke from the mainland had not reached them. They stood there, jewel-green in the sunlight.

  ‘Still,’ I said. ‘We really don’t have to go.’

  ‘No, Dad,’ said Vee firmly. ‘That way the bad guys win.’

  The engine ticked quietly. Elsa eased us past the boatyard and into the shallow channel in front of the restaurant. A single-storey building, its wooden cladding painted green, with a fleet of small boats moored to the pontoons outside. Ahead, on the outermost pontoon, our friend Jo stood waiting, a bottle of beer in each hand, looking blond and fresh. On his T-shirt an inverted swoosh, and the words MATE, JUST DON’T.

  As we drew level he passed a bottle to Elsa, took from her the rope she carried in her left hand, pulled the boat gently towards the pontoon, and tied it off at the front.

  ‘Hei, Cal!’

  ‘Hey, Jo.’

  He handed me the beer. I leaned across, put an arm around him, felt the scrape of his stubble on mine.

  Jo turned towards Elsa. ‘Hey, nice dress, darling,’ he said, in his practised London English. ‘Seriously frodig, darling.’

  Elsa took Jo’s hand, stepped easily on to the pontoon. She embraced him, cheek against cheek. Jo turned towards me. ‘Don’t you think?’

  ‘What’s frodig?’ I said.

  ‘Yeah, Jo, don’t be dirty!’ said Vee.

  ‘Sorry, Vee. Didn’t see you there.’

  Vee smiled. ‘You so did. Stop laughing, Mum. And Jo, don’t say that stuff.’

  Jo put his hands up. Guilty as charged. ‘You’ve got it, darling. Where’s your sister?’

  ‘Feminist summer camp.’

  ‘Ooh. Fun.’

  ‘Not if I know my sister. Where’s the new boyfriend?’

  At this Jo became serious. ‘Edvard sends his love. He’s trying to put a helicopter in the air.’

  Vee said, ‘There are lots of helicopters.’

  ‘Not a single one from the police,’ said Jo.

  We stared towards the the town. Jo stood between us, an arm over Elsa’s shoulder.

  ‘Edvard says no one died,’ he said. ‘Can you believe that? Literally not one person. Come on, you.’ He took Elsa’s hand in his and led her into the restaurant.

  I hung back with Vee. ‘Well, that’s a result,’ I said. ‘You OK?’

  ‘Can I tell Julie?’

  I looked at the ash cloud that hung above the town. It must be half a mile across.

  ‘Don’t want to cause trouble for Edvard and Jo.’

  Vee nodded. ‘All right. Got it.’

  On the wooden steps outside the restaurant was Hedda, smoking a cigarette, a beer in her left hand. Tiny compared to Elsa, barely taller than Vee, in stacked heels and black knee-length dress, her dark hair hanging in ringlets around her face, watching the town.

  ‘Love,’ I said, ‘why don’t you go in, get Mum to get you set up with a table? I want a word with Hedda.’

  ‘You don’t even like her.’

  I laughed. ‘I do like Hedda.’

  ‘I do like Hedda,’ she mimicked through clenched teeth. ‘You always say that in exactly the same way. And anyway, I asked Mum if you liked Hedda—’

  ‘See you inside, Vee.’

  ‘Don’t you want to know what Mum said?’

  ‘See you inside.’

  Vee began to walk towards the bar. I put my phone in my pocket, walked towards Hedda, whose eyes remained fixed on the horizon.

  ‘How was your night out?’ I said.

  She looked up at me, eyes twinkling. ‘Which night out?’

  ‘With Elsa? Last night?’

  ‘Oh, that night out.’ She got to her feet, stood swaying slightly, examined her cigarette as if trying to remember something, then smiled again. ‘Nice, thank you. Why aren’t you asking Elsa?’

  She hugged me demonstratively, as if making a point, then planted a kiss on my cheek.

  ‘Elsa came home at four,’ I said.

  ‘Sounds about right. All those married men at Lorry, quietly slipping their wedding bands into their pockets, sending over trays of drinks, sliding in at our table, bumping hard against our thighs …’

  I pulled away slightly, trying to read her expression.

  A smile twitched across her face. ‘Obviously I’m joking.’

  ‘Obviously.’ I put my arm around her, patted her twice, then tried to step out of the embrace, but she held on to me, pulled me towards the restaurant, then pushed me gently through the door and into our anniversary party.

  ‘Skål for Cal and for Elsa, everyone!’

  ‘Skål!’

  A toast. To us.

  A hand exchanged my beer for champagne. I raised my glass, met the eyes of each person around the table in turn, ending with Elsa.

  ‘Seventeen years,’ mouthed Elsa.

  ‘I know,’ I mouthed.

  Elsa stood up, raised her glass to me. We drank to each other, standing at the head of the table, as around us our friends got to their feet. Knives chinked on glasses. People at the other tables were watching us. I rested my hand in the small of her back. ‘Well, this isn’t in any way embarrassing.’

  A half-smile from Elsa, knowing and complex. She leaned in very close. She smelled of sunlight on clean skin. The white-blue iris of her left eye; the amused curl of her lip; and below her the faces of her friends, smiling up.

  ‘Speech, Cal,’ someone shouted.

  ‘Yes, speech!’

  ‘Elsa,’ I said. ‘Did you say I would speak?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘I don’t understand you,’ I said. Elsa looked at me, serious now. I stood at the head of the table, looking around. ‘Seventeen years married, and still that question: who is this woman I share my life with?’

  The faces around us were expectant.
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br />   ‘I don’t know where the rest of you are in modelling the psyche of your wife, your husband, your – forgive me for saying this, Jo – your life partner, but I’m stuck in the black-box model of marriage.’

  People were quiet. No one laughed.

  ‘Tough crowd. OK, let me give you an example. The sexist version of this joke is this: I know, through observation, that a dropped pair of underpants on the bathroom floor – that’s stimulus A – results in icy atmosphere at dinner – that’s response B. But the route from A to B cannot be mapped, because it’s taking place inside a black box.’

  Sporadic laughter.

  ‘For anyone who hasn’t figured it out, the black box in this joke – the sexist version of this joke – is the inside of my wife’s head. Because women are a mystery to men.’

  A couple of good-natured boos.

  ‘OK, good. We agree that no one comes well out of that version of the joke. Right?’

  People nodded.

  ‘Right. But you guys are way beyond the black-box model, right? You formed a hypothesis about why underpants on floor equal icy atmosphere at dinner.’

  I selected Hedda.

  ‘Hedda, you hypothesize that Elsa is mad because I left my underpants on the bathroom floor, and she feels – reasonably, I should stress – that as an adult …’

  Hedda smiled. ‘… you should pick up after yourself.’

  ‘Now my wife is no longer the butt of the joke, and I come across as an imbecile who is incapable of change. But …’

  Elsa’s eyes locked on to mine.

  ‘Twenty years ago I slipped a note on to the desk of a girl sitting on her own in the New York Public Library. Six months ago the third of our beautiful children was born. And I know there’s got to be a connection there somewhere …’

  I looked around the table. The laughter was indulgent. Eyes were shining.

  ‘Here’s the point in the routine where I say something that demonstrates that I’m not a complete imbecile. That’s my schtick, right? Idiot savant says something profound. And I’ve been searching blindly for what that thing is, and truthfully, I don’t know. I have a wife who is more intelligent than me, and who demands from me a level of honesty which no man can reasonably be expected to achieve; I struggle to see connections that are obvious to her, and most likely to all of you. Though Elsa, I genuinely do do what I can to meet the standard you set.’