The Hand that Trembles

by Kjell Eriksson

  THE HAND THAT

  TREMBLES

  KJELL ERIKSSON

  Translated from the Swedish by Ebba Segerberg

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  December 1956

  November 1993

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  THIRTY-FIVE

  THIRTY-SIX

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  THIRTY-NINE

  FORTY

  FORTY-ONE

  FORTY-TWO

  FORTY-THREE

  FORTY-FOUR

  FORTY-FIVE

  FORTY-SIX

  FORTY-SEVEN

  FORTY-EIGHT

  FORTY-NINE

  FIFTY

  FIFTY-ONE

  FIFTY-TWO

  FIFTY-THREE

  FIFTY-FOUR

  FIFTY-FIVE

  About the Author

  By Kjell Eriksson

  Copyright

  Advertisement

  The Hand that Trembles

  December 1956

  He had been sent to get more firewood. His mission was of the utmost importance. It was bitingly cold; the snow in the garden sparkled and smoke rose like a grey-white genie above the cottage tucked in the hollow.

  Suddenly a shadow darkened the bark-and sawdust-covered earthen floor. Sven-Arne had just added a split log to the others he carried in his arms. The piece wobbled, then slid out of his grasp along with most of the rest of the load.

  ‘Shall we do it together?’

  Sven-Arne dropped the few remaining pieces.

  ‘Did I frighten you?’

  He shook his head, too annoyed to say anything. Ante stepped into the shed and looked around at the stacked wood.

  ‘Well, someone’s been busy,’ he said, and smiled unexpectedly.

  He bent down and grasped a couple of logs.

  ‘Hold out your arms,’ he said, and Sven-Arne obeyed.

  Sven-Arne wiggled his knees back and forth. If he came in with this big of a load he would be praised. He wanted to hurry out of the woodshed and back to the cottage, but his uncle stood in the way.

  ‘I remember the winters during the war. We burnt a lot of wood back in those days.’

  ‘Your war?’

  Ante shook his head.

  ‘That one was hotter than hell.’

  Sven-Arne was getting cold. He misjudged shifting his weight, and stumbled slightly.

  ‘I’ll tell you about it sometime,’ Ante said.

  He was missing two fingers on his left hand. Emil had once mumbled something about how it was Ante’s carelessness that had been the cause, but no one really wanted to talk about Ante’s war adventures, not even Ante himself. That was why his comment about how he would tell him about it one day was a little out of the ordinary.

  ‘You seem to have your head screwed on right. Olars doesn’t understand anything.’

  Ola Persson was Sven-Arne’s cousin, older by ten years. He was having a cup of coffee inside the cottage. He was a dynamite expert and smelt funny, even when he changed into his nice clothes. Ante insisted on calling him Olars.

  Sven-Arne’s arms were aching, but his irritation vanished at the moment that his uncle criticised his cousin.

  He couldn’t help staring at Ante’s left hand as it searched for suitable pieces of wood. He stretched right and left, and after a while his arms were full.

  ‘Head back together when we’re done?’

  Sven-Arne nodded. He tried to shift the weight of the wood, get it closer to his chest.

  ‘We’ll take only birch,’ Ante decided, and tightened his right arm around his load.

  When they were done, they could hear the tinkling of bells and shortly thereafter the muted thuds of hooves against the deeply rutted gravel road.

  ‘That’s Rosberg,’ said Ante, who had a curious way of tilting his head as he listened.

  They left the woodshed. The sun blinded his eyes. Sven-Arne caught a glimpse of his grandmother’s neighbour behind the lilac bushes. Rosberg was sitting on the load of timber with his hat jauntily askew and holding the reins as if he were driving a four-horse hitch.

  His horse, an unusually light-coloured Ardennes by the name of Lightning, shook its head as it passed the cottage. Maybe it disliked the smell of smoke, or else it was just anxious, very conscious of its proximity to the barn.

  Sven-Arne was still cold, but enjoying it. The cottage stood out more clearly than usual in the afternoon sun. The snow was piled all the way under the windows, the chimney almost as crooked as the house, but the sun made it gleam red-brown. Sven-Arne repressed a laugh.

  The tinkling from Rosberg’s sled died away. A flock of bullfinches fluttered about the Swedish Whitebeam tree in the middle of the garden. A swing still hung from the lowest branch. Now it was topped with a white cap like a chef’s hat. He had to admit that he still loved to swing back and forth with the great Whitebeam tree above him like a protecting giant. No rain could penetrate it. In the wind, it simply turned up its leaves and showed the silver-fuzzy underside. In the spring, it was covered in white flowers, and in the autumn there were clusters of berries, some years so heavy that the colour could be seen from far away. Sometimes his grandmother brought in clusters and laid them in a bowl of water. She maintained that her grandfather had planted the tree, even though most people did not believe it was that old.

  ‘That Lightning, he was also in the war,’ Ante said, and Sven-Arne was suddenly unsure which war he was referring to.

  ‘The only ones they get are horses and idiots.’

  They walked back to the house, Ante in the lead. It was only three degrees Fahrenheit. Ante spat in the snow, smiled at Sven-Arne, and pushed open the door.

  ‘Damned excruciating,’ he said, and stepped into the hall.

  Sven-Arne assumed he meant the cold. Or else he meant being in Grandmother’s kitchen.

  Even though she had built a fire in the parlour, it was too cold in there and so everyone had crowded into the kitchen. Sven-Arne’s parents, Erik and Lisbeth, were there, as was Uncle Emil and his sons Ola and Tommy. Their mother was in the hospital, but no one talked about that. She had weak nerves.

  Grandmother’s brother Edvin and his two unmarried daughters were sitting by the window. Majvor – large as a house, who breathed laboriously and liked to complain about everything and everyone – and Inga-Lisa, always on her way up to assist Grandmother Agnes but who was trapped between Edvin and Majvor so she remained seated. Both sisters were active members of the society ‘Friends of Jerusalem’ and considered a bit quirky, but tolerated.

  A neighbour woman, who kept track of all social engagements in the area and made sure to stop by if there was going to be coffee and cake, was sitting on a stool next to them.

  ‘I’ll be damned. We should make sure to send Sven-Arne out to get the firewood from now on,’ Emil said.

  The cousins gave Sven-Arne a look of in
difference.

  Ante and Sven-Arne dropped the logs straight into the wood bin.

  ‘Your boys will have to top it up before we leave,’ he said.

  ‘Of course they will,’ Emil said good-naturedly.

  Agnes patted Sven-Arne on the head.

  ‘Make sure you warm up now.’

  He sat down at the end of the table with his back to the stove. His grandmother opened the door and pushed in a log. Ante remained standing, a cup of coffee in his hand.

  The warmth in the room made the birthday guests drowsy but the conversation gradually picked up again. Clearly the trio of men, Erik, Emil, and Edvin, had been involved in a discussion that had been interrupted by the return of the wood-bearers. Maybe Ante had gone out to the woodshed to escape it, not primarily to help Sven-Arne. When Emil said something, Ante sighed heavily and mumbled something that to Sven-Arne sounded like ‘Damned whining.’

  Ante was different, not just because he had been in a war and was missing two fingers. He maintained a skeptical attitude to most things. Emil called his brother a ‘Snuffy Smith’ and they quarrelled often. It was as if they were drawn into a lifelong duel, only interrupted from time to time simply because they could not stand to listen to the other’s words.

  Later, Sven-Arne would understand Ante’s irritation and hopelessness that no words or phrases could persuade or change. When he himself was accused of being one-sided and not flexible enough, then it was Ante’s inheritance making itself felt, for it could not be Eric’s genes that had moulded his mindset. Sven-Arne’s father was ‘flexible’ in the personal sphere as well as in his work as a printer at A&W. Only in his meetings with his brother did he display a tendency toward obstinance.

  In general, Eric did not say very much, did not anger, and those times he spoke up it was in a soft-spoken way and with such a disarming smile that any antagonists let down their guard, perhaps in the belief that they had changed his mind.

  Since a couple of years back he had been secretary of the local chapter of the Typographical Society, in the eyes of many the ideal of trustworthiness – taciturn, dutiful, and as precise and predictable as the calendars he produced. Eric most often came with not amazing ideas, but well-reasoned propositions, which he called his suggestions, always timely, delivered in a dry, somewhat formalistic, factual tone that vouched for rationality and continuity. The protocols were miracles of meticulous attention and the arrangement of the paragraphs beyond reproach.

  Sven-Arne was drinking coffee with milk. He had no idea where the coffee came from, but the milk came from his neighbour’s cows. Rosberg had seven milk-producing cows in a dilapidated barn that threatened imminent collapse. They were discussing whether or not Sven-Arne and his cousins should go over and help clear the snow from the roof. It had been snowing nonstop for two, three days and now warmer weather was coming. This would make the snow heavy as lead and endanger the barn in its frail condition. Ola and Tommy had refused, and Ola added that it was just as well for the barn to collapse. He said this with such assurance and such a grown-up air that no one chastised him. Sven-Arne had realised that adults were allowed to say things without being corrected. If he had said anything to this same effect, he would have been told he was impertinent.

  Not even Agnes said anything, even though everyone knew that she and Rosberg were as close as two good neighbours who had lived next to each other their entire lives could be.

  That Rosberg himself was missing from the party, and out driving timber, was nothing remarkable. Everyone knew he would come over once the family had gone. After the evening milking he would wash up and take the well-worn path to the cottage. They would have a couple of sandwiches and share a beer. Maybe they would listen to the radio. Not much would be said. At half past nine he would take his leave.

  Come spring, Rosberg was planning to get rid of the critters, so this was perhaps the last time that Sven-Arne would drink the neighbour’s milk. He had always liked Rosberg. The warmth of the cowshed, the low grinding sound of the animals masticating, and the smell of the farmer’s entryway were intimately connected with his childhood.

  They would have been able to shovel the snow from the roof with ease, it would be done in half an hour, but they preferred to sit in the warmth and pretend to be city-modern and adult.

  ‘I can do it,’ he said.

  ‘What?’ his uncle said.

  ‘Go over to Rosberg’s.’

  Emil did not reply, but flashed a grin. Agnes put a hand on Sven-Arne’s shoulder.

  ‘Me and the boy,’ Ante said.

  ‘You want the boy to fall to his death?’ Erik objected.

  ‘The cows can’t get up there,’ Ante said. ‘Rosberg can’t either. The snow has to come down. Someone has to do it, that’s all there is to it.’

  The view from the barn roof made Sven-Arne pause in his shovelling for long periods at a time. The road to the church curved at the horizon and was swallowed by the forest. From up here the narrow road looked completely different, much more interesting than from the country bus. Ax – the bus driver – would joke with Sven-Arne and call him his ‘little pal.’ Once he had stopped the bus, climbed out, and urinated on one of the front tyres. He did as he pleased, but was generally well-liked. He made an effort, made sure packages got to the remote cottages, and ran errands for the isolated elderly in the village.

  Two other small farms also took on a different perspective from above. The distance ennobled the small outhouses. What looked insignificant from the ground attained grandeur from another perspective. Sven-Arne saw someone moving on a plot of yard several hundreds of metres away.

  Rosberg was on the hill leading up to the farm. He had not showed any surprise when Ante and Sven-Arne turned up and offered their services, and had immediately gone out to unhook the ladder from the wall.

  ‘You’ll be careful, won’t you,’ he yelled.

  Arne waved reassuringly, turned to Sven-Arne, and smiled. ‘You cold?’

  Sven-Arne shook his head.

  ‘I’ll tie the rope around you so you can slide down to the edge.’

  It was around six metres to the ground, but since the barn backed onto a hillside that sloped sharply down, the impression of height appeared great. Sven-Arne slid across the roof tiles, a shovel in his hand, pushing the snow in front of him. He felt the rope around his middle. The thudding sound of the snow masses leaving the roof and hitting the ground made him smile and turn.

  ‘Good job,’ Ante said. ‘You can do almost anything.’

  Bam went the next landing. Ante pulled him up to the ridge and then they kept going. Ante like a conquering general, broad-legged, with bowed legs but a straight back. Sven-Arne like a front-line soldier on the attack, pulled back by the commander only to attack the enemy once more.

  ‘Doesn’t matter,’ Ante said, when a roof tile clattered with an almost metallic sound. ‘The barn’s coming down in the spring anyhow.’

  Maybe it was the windowpane in the front door, flashing with a reflection from the sun, that caused Sven-Arne to turn his head. He spotted his father and cousins on his grandmother’s garden.

  ‘Do you see the bugs?’ Ante asked.

  Should he wave to them? No, they could stand there and stare. Soon they would get cold and have to go in. Sven-Arne unconsciously slowed his pace, resting a moment with his hand on the handle, and spitting over the edge of the roof. He shot Ante a look.

  ‘What is it with Hungary?’ he asked. ‘You’re always arguing about it.’

  ‘Just shovel,’ Ante shot back.

  ‘But what is it about?’

  Sven-Arne saw the indecision in his uncle’s face. If he hadn’t known him so well he would have interpreted it as pain.

  ‘Doesn’t matter,’ he said with nonchalance and picked his shovel back up.

  Rosberg had also gone over to the other side and was watching intently. Suddenly Ante sat down on the roof ridge, pulled his gloves off, and laid them beside him.

  ‘Sit down,
’ he said, and made a gesture of invitation. ‘Sit on the gloves!’

  Sven-Arne did as he said. His uncle looked off toward the forest.

  ‘Sunset,’ he said after a while.

  Then he started talking about the war he had been in. Sven-Arne did not understand everything, but did not want to irritate him with questions. His uncle’s stubble glowed black. The high cheekbones he had inherited from his mother and the large nose created a sharp profile. He talked slowly, as if he had to look for the words a long way back in the past.

  He repeated some of the words, particularly place names. I want to go there too, Sven-Arne thought, each time his uncle mentioned the name of a village or city.

  Sven-Arne relived the feeling of grandeur he had felt earlier in his grandmother’s garden. It felt as if every individual word his uncle was uttering was important, as if Ante was sending them out into space as a message. He was sending a message from Rosberg’s roof. He was addressing the forest, and Sven-Arne. Rosberg heard him but understood nothing. The bugs heard but understood nothing. Only he got the message. Only he was allowed to take part in the knowledge of what really happened.

  Suddenly Ante finished, smiled sadly, and looked at Sven-Arne.

  ‘You know, sometimes I don’t want to live,’ he said. ‘It’s as if nothing means anything anymore. I look around me and nothing seems appealing. There is no medicine for the pain I feel. It’s in here.’ He thumped his chest. ‘I knew it would go like this. Do you know what I had in my backpack when I walked ashore in France?’

  Sven-Arne shook his head. He wanted to reach out to Ante, hug him.

  ‘Children’s drawings. Hundreds of them. Dreams, terror, and all the longing the children felt, all that I carried with me.’

  Ante turned his head and stared off toward the church and the community house.

  The stillness over Rosberg’s farm and the village was monumental. The winter afternoon was resting in silence. Say something else, Sven-Arne pleaded in his head. Tell me about the children. Who were they? Why did you bring children’s drawings back with you?

  But he felt as if he were walking on the frozen millpond. A single word could shatter it, not only the silence but also the connectedness, just as a careless movement could crack the thinnest ice.