Fair Play (5 page)

“They're not shooting,” Mari repeated. “It's just thunder. Go to bed.”

“Ball lightning!” Helga cried. “They come in and roll into you, they find you, they roll into you!”

Mari took Helga by the shoulders and shook her. “Quiet!” she said. “Be quiet! Go to bed. Look, I'm closing the damper. Now they can't come in. Look here, put on these rubber boots. Then you'll be safe. Absolutely.”

Helga pulled on the rubber boots.

“And now, now I want to explain to you that thunder is a very simple phenomenon ... It's all a question of ...”

And suddenly Mari couldn't remember exactly how her mother used to explain the thunder away and make it seem natural. She said, a little vaguely, “Something about updrafts ...”

Lightning in all four windows, another divine wallop of thunder, and Helga threw herself into Mari's arms and held on as hard as she could. “Yes, yes,” she said, “updrafts, right? And downdrafts ... And what else? Explain it to me!”

“Electricity,” Mari whispered. “It's just simple electricity, that's all ...”

The thunderstorm moved north, as always. When thunderstorms come to the islands, they always come from the south and move north; that's common knowledge. Farther and farther away until they can barely be heard, and then it's only the rain.

Mari's arms were going numb from holding Helga. The lamp had starting smoking. “It's over now,” she said. “Now you can go to bed, we're out of danger. Listen to me, my friend, we're out of danger now ...” It was quite a while before Mari realized that Helga had fallen asleep.

The next morning, after raining all night, the sea was like glass and the island was washed and green. The cat came and cried for food.

They drove to the mainland with Helga and set two nets on the way.

Just before the bus left, Helga turned to Mari and said, “One thing you have to admit. You don't know much about thunderstorms.”

“No,” Mari answered. “But I'll try to find out.”

They pulled up their nets on the way home. One miserable roach and a little bullhead that they set free. The cat stood waiting on the shore.

“It's gone so quiet,” Jonna said. “What did you think? Wasn't that a good storm?”

“Very good,” Mari said. “The best we've had.”

T
HEY WERE
right in the middle of the sea-lane when the fog rolled in, ice cold and yellow. It came quickly. Jonna drove on for a bit, but pretty soon she turned off the motor.

“It's not worth it. We'll miss the island and wind up in Estonia somewhere.”

There is no silence like sitting in a fog at sea and listening. Large boats can loom up suddenly, and you don't hear their bow water in time to start your motor and get out of the way. They ought to use their foghorns ...

I should have brought my compass, Jonna thought. Dead calm, no help from wind direction. No watch, of course. I didn't even listen to the weather report ... And now there she sits, freezing.

“Row a little,” she said. “It'll warm you up.”

Mari put the oars in the locks. She looked miserable with her narrow, anxious neck and damp hair in tufts over her eyes.

“You're pulling too hard on the right; we're going in circles. But maybe it's just as well.”

“Jonna,” Mari said, “have you got crispbread in the stern box?”

“No, I don't.”

“My mother ...” Mari began.

“I know, I know. Your mother always had crispbread with her when she went out to sea. But the fact is, I don't have any crispbread in the stern box.”

“Why are you angry?” Mari asked.

“I'm not angry. Why would I be angry?”

A vertical tunnel opened directly above them, leading up to an annoyingly blue summer sky—like flying, except then the tunnel goes straight down.

Finally a ship's foghorn, a long way off.

“Crispbread,” Jonna said. “Crispbread, for heaven's sake. Your mother was really fussy about crispbread. She broke it in tiny little pieces and put them in a row and spread butter on each little piece. It took forever. And I had to wait and wait for the butter knife, and she did the same thing every single morning and every day and every year she lived with us!”

Mari said, “You could have had two butter knives.”

A gigantic shadow rose up from the fog and glided past like a wall of darkness. Jonna yanked the motor to life and raced away and turned it off.

Gradually the wake died, and it became completely still.

“Were you scared?” Jonna said.

“No. I didn't have time. Incidentally,” Mari went on, “your mother was pretty fussy about baking bread. She was always sending us loaves of her bread and every time she sent them off, she'd call at seven in the morning and talk for an hour. Graham bread. When it got moldy we used to call it Graham Green.”

“Ha ha, so amusing,” Jonna said. “And speaking of mothers, your mother used to cheat at poker.”

“That's possible. But she was eighty-five years old!”

“No, she was eighty-eight when she cheated. Don't deny it.”

“Okay, fine, she was eighty-eight. But at that age you've got the right to do certain things.”

“Never,” said Jonna solemnly. “At that age a person should have learned to respect her opponent. Your mother cheated shamelessly, and you might as well admit it. She didn't take me seriously, and you have to in a serious game. Row a little harder on the left.”

It had grown really cold. The fog drifted over them, through them, as impenetrable as ever. Jonna took the dibbling hooks out of the stern box. They might just as well dibble for cod if the day was ruined anyway. But somehow they didn't feel like dibbling.

They just waited.

“Funny,” Mari said. “Sitting here this way, you start thinking about all sorts of things. What time is it?”

“We don't have a watch. Or a compass.”

“That stuff about our mothers,” Mari went on. “There's something I've never dared ask. Jonna, what did you two fight about, really? Mother might say the wind was blowing from the northwest, and right away you'd say it was straight from the north. Or north-northwest, or south-northeast, you'd go on like that. And I knew that deep down you were fighting about completely different things. Important, dangerous things!”

“Of course we were,” Jonna said.

Mari stopped rowing. Very slowly she said, “Really? Don't you think it's finally time to let me in on what it was you were fighting about? Be honest. We need to talk about it.”

“Fine,” Jonna said. “Terrific. Then what you need to know is that your mother, the whole time, year after year, was secretly swiping my tools. She ruined one knife after another—she didn't know how to sharpen them. And let's not even talk about chisels! Don't even talk to me about all the precision tools that you carry with you half your life, tools you get to know and love—and then someone comes along who doesn't get it, doesn't respect them, someone who handles your delicate instruments like they were can openers! Yes, yes, I know what you're going to say. Her little ships were wonderful, and beautifully made, but why couldn't she have bought her own tools? She could have wrecked those to her heart's content!”

Mari said, “Yes. That was bad. Very bad.” She started rowing again, and after a while she raised the oars out of the water to say, “It was your fault she stopped making ships.”

“What do you mean?”

“She saw that yours were better.”

“And now you're angry?”

“Don't be an ass,” Mari said and started to row again. “Sometimes you make me crazy.”

They hadn't noticed the fog moving off. The heavy summer fog had rolled on north to annoy people on the inner islands, and suddenly the sea was open and blue and they found themselves a long way out toward Estonia. Jonna started the motor. They came back to the island from a totally new direction, and it didn't look the same.

W
HEN MARI
came into the front hall, she heard the printing press working.

“Are you here again?” Jonna said from inside her studio.

“I just came for those pens ...”

Jonna lifted her print and studied it severely. “No,” she said. “I know you've brought your George. You've changed him.”

“Yes. The whole ending. The whole idea! I've got rid of a lot of repetitions, and Stefan isn't called Sveffe anymore. His name is Kalle.”

“Good heavens,” Jonna said.

“Maybe I should come back a little later?”

“No, no, sit down somewhere. I'll finish this tomorrow.”

They sat across from each other at the window table. Jonna lit a cigarette and said, “You don't need to take it from the beginning. I know that part. ‘Miss, another round,' and so on. Anton went out to use the phone. Take it from the turtle.”

“But you know I have to take it from the beginning or it won't be whole! Could I read it fast up to where it's new? That part when they go to the restaurant is out, and no pointless explanations about Anton, he's just there. By the way, do you really believe in this idea?”

“Absolutely. But maybe it's not enough, not really. It may be difficult to finish.”

“But I've come to the end!”

Jonna said, “Anyway, take it from the turtle.” And Mari put on her glasses.

“Speaking of sad things,” Kalle said, “ did you read that piece about the lonely turtle in the paper the other day? Its name is George.”

“No, what about it?”

“The interesting thing about this turtle is that it's the last of its kind, Galapagos or something. He's the absolute last one of his particular turtle species, and after him there are no more.”

“I'll be damned,” said Bosse.

“Yes. And he walks in a circle, around and around, searching.”

“How do they know he walks in a circle?”

“They have him in a cage,” Kalle explained. “He's under constant observation. George. He's searching for a female, you see.”

“And how do they know that?”

“They're pretty sure about it. Scientists, you know.”

“Okay,” said Bosse. “And your point of course is that Anton's doing the same thing, phoning and phoning and no one ever answers. Should we go look for him?”

“Wait a minute,” Jonna said. “This Anton. He's forever going out to use the phone. The woman never answers. Why does he have to keep calling her? I mean, if she doesn't answer, she's just not home. And I think your parallel with the turtle is far-fetched, although you know I have nothing against turtles ...”

“Exactly,” Mari burst out. “Good. You like the turtle, but you don't like the rest of it! But I told you, I've changed the whole ending, totally!”

“Read on,” Jonna said.

“You know, Bosse, sometimes I get so damned depressed.”

“You do?”

“Yes, it's all so pointless.”

“But what can you do about it? That George ... How can they know there's not another one, how can they be sure?”

“They just know,” Kalle said. “They've looked everywhere.”

“But I don't think they've searched enough. They can't have had time to search the whole earth, every damned little place, and then try to tell us that
...
Look, I'm tired of your George.”

“Fine, forget it. I'm sorry I brought him up. Miss, another round.”

“Stop,” Jonna said. “Are you sure you haven't made these men a little too simple?”

“They are simple,” Mari answered. “Now Anton comes in:

“Look,” said Kalle, “we saved your drinks. Now you've got two.”

“Nice of you,” said Anton.

Bosse said, “No answer?”

“No. But I mean to keep trying.”

“How many times does he call, this Anton?” Jonna asked. “And what does he look like? What does he do, who is he? Never mind. Jump to ‘I don't know if it's dreadful or a comfort.' I like that.”

Mari read.

When Anton had gone, Kalle looked Bosse in the eye and said, “But anyway, those scientists are really fantastic, aren't they? I mean, they don't give up trying to find George a wife. Even though she doesn't exist. For that matter, wouldn't it be worse if she did exist but they never found her?” He emptied his glass gravely and added, “I don't know if it's dreadful or a comfort.”

“Here I cut half a page.”

“Bosse, do you know what makes me so tired, so very unhappy? It's that nothing fits. Listen to me. It's as if nothing mattered. Like, secretly. You never know why and how things have happened. Nothing fits together. Do you know what I mean?”

Bosse said, “And why should it fit together? In what way? What did you expect?”

“Some sort of meaning to it all.”

“Stop,” Jonna said. “You said that earlier. You're going on and on about it. What is it you're after? As far as I remember ...”

Mari ripped off her glasses and shouted, “But I've changed the whole ending! I told you! Do you want to know what I've done? The woman he's calling doesn't exist. She doesn't exist! Anton's calling his own number! Calling himself, you see? Isn't that better?”

“Yes,” Jonna said.

“Okay. You agree that makes it better. Now he comes back to the table, and Bosse and Kalle can see that something has happened. I'll read ...”

“Wait a second,” Jonna said. “Tell me what you're thinking.”

“I'm killing her,” Mari explained. “That is to say, Anton's killing her. So he doesn't have to go on phoning. Bosse and Kalle are upset, of course, and they order more drinks to comfort him ...”