by Håkan Nesser
‘Then you’ve seen the old dump, huh? We don’t need to waste time on sightseeing?’
I said that I’d seen what I needed to, and we decided to make our way to the cabin without further delay.
Lake Lemmeln is an oblong brown-water lake, whose southernmost end turns into the black, nameless river that runs through K– and continues out over the plain. I don’t know how common it is that obvious geographic phenomena lack a name in this way, but where this waterway is concerned the circumstance is recorded all the way back to the fifteenth century. It is mentioned in a variety of writings over the years, but is never called anything other than the river, or possibly the River. The explanations are legion, but none I’ve come across seems more probable than any other.
In the other direction, northward, Lemmeln is surrounded by forest-clad shores, here and there broken up by scattered settlements; isolated farms, an occasional fishing cabin, but no actual villages or communities.
Urban Kleerwot’s nest was a simple, extended fishing cabin right on the edge of the lake, a hundred or so metres down from the main road. It consisted of a larger room with an open fireplace and four rattan chairs around a table, two smaller bedrooms and a kitchen with running water but no electricity. Stove and refrigerator were run with butane; a simple sauna was around the corner and an outhouse a little way up in the forest. Towards the lake side it was clear-cut; an overgrown grass field that sloped down towards the water. Under tarps and a scanty tar paper roof was a flat-bottom plastic boat and some irregular woodpiles.
‘Et voilà,’ said Urban, hitting me on the back. ‘Welcome to Urbanhall. I was here at Easter, but it may be a little stuffy.’
It was. We opened windows and doors wide and cleaned out mouse crap for a while. Carried in baggage and necessities. So far the day had been cloudy, but now towards afternoon the sun started to break through. When we finished with the practicalities – got the fridge going, put the beer in the water barrel, lifted the boat into the lake and found the oars – we took a dip from the rickety dock. Urban preferred floating on his back near the dock with a skinny cigar in his mouth and a beer in his hand, I myself swam a good way out in the dark water. The cool water and the strong silence, broken only by the calls of scattered birds and someone chopping wood far away, felt undeniably invigorating. Rather soon I had a sensation that time – these years and decades that had elapsed – had a different meaning in this stillness. A kind of new dimension; seeing Urban Kleerwot again after so many years had actually not been a particularly strong experience, apart from this. It could easily have been the case that we had been away from each other just a couple of weeks, it seemed to me, and I suddenly felt quite tangibly what this business with the relativity and varying density of time can actually mean.
Seconds, days, years? I thought again as I slowly circled around in the water and observed the surrounding forest. In the rear-view mirror of life the one is no larger than the other. Perhaps not in the telescope of the future either.
Then I started to swim back, because I was hungry.
During the entire day Urban had not said a word about his book – the reason that we were meeting in this way – but after dinner (a splendid veal ragout that he prepared with pickled onions and cucumbers and all on his own, despite my serious attempts to get involved and help out) it came out. With a solemn expression he took a thick bundle of papers from a black, worn briefcase, and explained that now it was high time that I made myself a little useful.
I smiled and took the manuscript. The sheets were not numbered, but the whole thing seemed to amount to 250–300 pages, as far as I could see. I looked at the title and browsed a little; to my surprise I realized that it was a mystery. I don’t know what I’d actually expected, hadn’t thought all that much about it, but in any event, that Urban Kleerwot would have written a crime novel came as a surprise.
It was called The Fly and Eternity, and it did not take long before I had Vera Kall coming back. In some semi-conscious way I had managed to keep her at a distance the whole afternoon, but now she was back with unreduced force. I consulted with myself for a few seconds.
‘Vera Kall,’ I then said in as casual a tone as I was able while I gestured towards the manuscript. ‘Speaking of mysteries, that is . . . there was never any clarity in what happened to her, was there?’
Urban Kleerwot did not answer immediately. Just sat and twirled the cognac glass in his hand and observed me over the edge of his steel-rimmed glasses. Suddenly I felt the sweat breaking out on my palms.
‘You know,’ he said. ‘I’ve always had a feeling that you knew more about that story than the rest of us . . . No, there was never any damned clarity, no.’
I swallowed. Gulped down the cognac and tried to quickly consider how much I could rely on Urban. And if I really had the desire to open the lid on something that had been closed up so long.
If it hadn’t already been opened, that is? The envelope with that brief message was in the pocket of my jacket, which was hanging on a hook inside the door. Did it matter if I let my host read it? I wondered. What would he think about that?
Urban cleared his throat. ‘If it’s that way . . . that you know something about it, that is, you can go ahead and tell me. It was prescribed five years ago. If you were the one who killed her, you’ll go free in any case.’
He laughed out loud and the wicker chair complained. That decided things.
5
The suit was a prison.
No doubt it was stitched according to all the rules of the art; my mother came for a visit one week in March and dragged me to Suurna the tailor, who measured and gauged and poked me in the crotch. I retrieved the result the day before the student dinner at Limburg’s. Positioned myself in front of the mirror and gasped out loud at all the finery: white shirt with tie, black crepe nylon socks, shoes with edges like Polish tin cans. And the hellish suit. A waistcoat!
A prison, as stated. From outside it was possibly acceptable, from inside it felt as alive as a casket. False. Tame monkey in borrowed plumes. Miserable.
The next evening, when Niels and Pieter and Urban were waiting for me a couple of blocks from Limburg’s, they didn’t look much happier, but that was meagre consolation. ‘Christ,’ said Niels. ‘My whole body is itching, do you all have starched undies too?’
‘Sure,’ Pieter said in an English accent with a gloomy sigh. ‘Every inch.’
Pieter was already an Anglophile at that time.
The Limburg foyer was a new trial. I ended up for almost twenty minutes with the wife of rector magnificus Laugermann, chemistry lecturer Hörndli and the twin Siewertz sisters, who were both known for being tongue-tied, but were good at laughing in a way that was heard. I spilled a little bubbly on one of them, but Hörndli expertly explained that it would presumably evaporate and in any event there were two of them, so people could at least stare at the one who was spotless.
‘Ha ha ha ha,’ Ada Siewertz whinnied.
‘Hee hee hee hee,’ Beda filled in.
‘What do you think about the theatre’s operetta programme this year?’ the rector’s wife asked.
At the table it turned out that I had drawn yet another blank. To my left I had old Miss Glock, lecturer in mathematics. I never had her as a teacher; the only thing I knew about her was that she was single and had tried to commit suicide during Christmas break. To my right side was a Doric column that was just about as talkative and across from me sat a shy and nervous boy from one of the biology classes. His name was Paul and he had eczema. Both on his neck and as a special interest.
By force of age and maturity it was Miss Glock who took the first, and only, initiative in conversation. It happened after about ten minutes. ‘So, what are you going to do this summer?’ she asked, glaring at Paul, whom she had either had in some class and recognized or perceived as a kindred spirit.
‘Huh?’ said Paul.
‘What are you going to do this summer?’
‘I don’t know,�
�� said Paul, looking down at the table.
Then nothing more was said. As long as the food lasted I could keep my gaze on it. Neither Paul nor Miss Glock drank wine, so I had to be content with toasting with the column. Beside Paul sat Marieke van der Begel – the one that I kissed and got a slap from – but because of a substantial flower arrangement I could not even make eye contact with her. Maybe that was just as well.
When dinner finally ended after two and a half hours, I had long since decided to go home. True, the remainder of the evening could hardly be worse, but I was done, to put it simply. Mentally and physically; enclosed in a horrendous Dacron casket (plus 20 per cent pure wool) in a depressing corner among suicides and eczema researchers . . . You student bold, Spring of life . . . kiss my arse, I thought.
The evening was warm and redolent as I walked into the yard. So as not to be too hasty, I decided on a cigarette and a walk around the block first, and it was when I had made it halfway around this block that I ran into her.
First her bike, then Vera Kall herself.
The black-painted lady’s bicycle was parked a bit carelessly on the pavement, leaning against a grey pad-mounted transformer. The small suitcase on the carrier. Vera first became visible as a white speck inside the overgrown garden on the Gillberg lot. The Gillberg house had burnt down sometime right after the war, and ever since then it had been overgrown. An excellent refuge in general: when you wanted to sneak a smoke. Or have a gulp of lukewarm vodka-lime out of the way. Or just pee.
It was presumably the latter Vera had been engaged in, but I didn’t ask.
‘Hi,’ I simply said.
‘Henry? Hi, Henry,’ she said, smoothing out her dress. ‘How are ya doing?’
‘How are you?’ I countered, and at the same moment I understood what was going on with her.
She was drunk.
Vera Kall, the Snake Flower from Samaria, the consolation of our German classes and the Valkyrie of our wet dreams, had had a little too much of a good thing and now she was standing there staggering on her heels. Not stiletto, to be sure, but still. Good Lord, I thought. This can’t be true.
‘I feel so funny.’ She giggled and supported herself against the bicycle. Pushed back the thick, dark hair and looked at me with her green eyes.
‘Where . . . where are you going?’ I asked, feeling the suit tighten up again.
She turned serious. ‘Home,’ she said. ‘I have to go home. It’s eleven . . . although . . .’
‘Although what?’ I said.
‘I don’t feel so well . . . or I’m fine, but I feel so strange.’
‘Did you have a nice time in there?’ I signed towards Limburg’s.
She lit up again. ‘Very nice. We talked and laughed and sang . . . I’m not accustomed . . . didn’t you have a nice time?’
‘Not too bad,’ I admitted. ‘Ended up a little awkward.’
She nodded vaguely and took a couple of exaggerated deep breaths.
‘I have to go now.’
She was making no effort, however, to get on the bicycle. Just kept looking at me. I suddenly felt the blood rush up in my face.
‘Uh . . . you don’t want to go back?’
‘No.’ She shook her head energetically. ‘No, I can’t . . . it feels so strange.’
Suddenly voices were approaching. I quickly consulted with myself. Then I made the decision. ‘Come,’ I said. Took hold of the handlebars of the bike with one hand, put the other on Vera’s shoulder. When I felt her bare skin the world turned black before my eyes for a brief moment, but I regained control. ‘Come, I’ll walk with you a bit.’
She did as I asked without protest and let my hand stay there. Before the merry gang managed to catch sight of us, I had guided us into Günders steeg, a narrow, dark alley smelling of jasmine. I have to say something, I thought. Have to think of something. Talk, talk, talk.
‘Why do you have to go home?’ I finally managed to squeeze out. I knew the answer, of course, but it was the only thing I could come up with to ask after my hours at the mute corner of the dining table.
‘Daddy,’ she said simply, and sounded so mournful that I thought that now the angels are crying.
‘So that’s how it is,’ I said.
Then the Snake Flower hiccoughed.
Then she started crying. I pressed her a little closer to me and it went black before my eyes again.
‘What’s going on with me?’ she said, sniffling a little. ‘I don’t understand what’s going on with me.’
Two hundred thousand thoughts went through my head. None of them stayed.
‘I know what’s going on with you,’ I said. ‘You’ve had a little too much wine. I think it’s best if you wait a while before going home.’
She stopped and looked at me.
Her glistening green eyes were brimming with tears and I understood that this was the most beautiful thing the earth had ever managed to produce. Those eyes in this moment. Thanks, I thought. Thanks that I get to experience this moment.
‘Do you mean . . .’ she said. ‘Do you mean I’m drunk?’
‘A little,’ I said. ‘Just a little, but I don’t think it would be a good idea to go home right now.’
‘Do I smell?’
She got on tiptoe, opened her mouth and breathed carefully over my face.
I don’t know if there really was wine on her breath. I just know that I kissed her.
When we went up to my room it was quarter to twelve. We hadn’t said much the past ten minutes. After the kiss we just went there. Close to each other in the summer night, and several times I caught myself wondering if it really was just us walking there. If it was me and her. Henry Maartens and Vera Kall.
And if those were the sort of thoughts all lovers were struck by. If that was how it felt and if it truly was for real.
Would the earth continue its orbit tomorrow? Would the sun come up? It was all the same to me. It was all the same to us. I loved her. She loved me.
I took off my jacket and tossed it onto my red rented-room armchair.
‘I think we should lie down and rest, Vera,’ I said. ‘For a while anyway.’
I don’t know if I had expected it, but she didn’t protest.
‘Yes,’ she simply said. ‘Let’s do that. A while.’
Then she slipped out of her dress. Turned her back to me while she undid her bra strap, took off her panties and crawled into bed.
I tore off my clothes hurriedly. Got a strong and irrepressible erection that I did my best to conceal, but Vera just smiled at me. I didn’t see it, but I felt it. Her smile in the thin summer darkness.
‘Come here,’ she said.
And I suddenly knew that making love was no more difficult than eating an apple.
A warm, fully ripe Gravenstein apple.
When I woke up she was gone. It was twenty minutes past four. She had left a note on the desk.
I’m leaving now. Don’t know how it’s going to turn out, but know that I love you.
Vera
I read the words a hundred times. The blackbirds were singing out in the garden. I read a hundred times more. Then I fell back asleep.
6
Urban Kleerwot sat motionless for a long time after I stopped talking.
‘That’s the damnedest thing,’ he said. ‘I hardly believe my ears. Sure, I’ve had a feeling all these years that there was something, but that . . . but that . . .’
He couldn’t finish the sentence. Stuffed a new skinny cigar in his mouth instead and poured more beer in our glasses. I didn’t say anything. Felt exhausted like after a case of gastritis; as if I wouldn’t be able to squeeze out one more word after getting this out of me . . . this burden that had finally been let loose after thirty years. Yes, it was like giving birth, I think. You get a little tired. Urban took a gulp and lit the cigar.
‘The message?’ he said. ‘The note from the hotel. Where is it?’
I stood up and retrieved the envelope from my jacket pocket. Handed i
t over to him. He read the brief text a few times with a frown. Leant back in the chair and looked at me.
‘That’s the damnedest thing,’ he repeated. ‘But why . . . why the hell didn’t you say anything? Why didn’t you come forward?’
I sighed. ‘Let’s deal with that tomorrow,’ I said. ‘Can’t take any more right now.’
He looked a little disappointed, then he put on an understanding expression and nodded paternally. ‘All right. But what does the message mean? It says Vera Kall. My God, you don’t think that she . . .? No, I don’t understand a thing!’
I took a deep gulp of beer so that the bitterness brought tears to my eyes. Blinked them away and looked out over the dark, absolutely mirror-like water of the lake.
‘Me neither,’ I said. ‘You were talking about putting out nets?’
I rowed, Urban sat on the thwart and let out the net with expert, careful hands. I shouldn’t get my hopes up, he explained, but there was usually a perch or two and one or two bream.
We didn’t say much as we slowly glided across the black water. It was a little past midnight and the stillness was complete; it felt as if we were sitting in a painting and I started wondering again about that business of the actual nature of time. How poorly our experience of it really fits with our way of measuring it.
How poorly our feelings fit with our thoughts.
Urban respected my wish to save the discussion of the Snake Flower until the next day, but I could see that it wasn’t easy for him. He smoked intensely and muttered now and then when the mesh got caught; a couple of times I caught him sitting and observing me with a deep frown and narrowed eyes. As if he suddenly no longer knew what to make of me.
As if this thing with me and Vera Kall was something basically incomprehensible, something he couldn’t imagine.
Or else he just sat there and thought about whether it would be possible to write a crime novel about it. When we were done casting nets and came on shore, we did a hasty evening toilet, wished each other good night and went to bed. I took The Fly and Eternity with me as reading matter, but only made it a few pages before sleep was hanging in my eyelids.