Heaven and Hell (8 page)

II

How many years fit into one day, one day and one night? It
is a middle-aged man, not a nineteen-year-old boy, who opens the outer door to Geirþrúður’s café more than forty-eight hours after he walked through the same door for the first time with his friend Bárður, the boy misses him so much that he needs to rest his forehead for a long time on the wall inside the entrance, or whatever we ought to call this little space where Jens the overland postman usually keeps his boxes and bags until Dr. Sigurður fetches them, or sends someone after them, while Jens forgets the difficulties of life by drinking beer. The boy stares into the wall for a long time with wide-open eyes, then looks down at several pairs of shoes made of seawolf skin. Guests are expected to take off their boots here, if they’re covered in filth and mud, and slip on these fish-skin shoes instead. Many people find this an unnecessary ostentation, no doubt extreme, and some people stubbornly resist but have to give in if they wish to be served, and who doesn’t remove his footwear if there’s hope of a beer? I’m not taking off anything, the boy says quietly to himself, but, on the other hand, he needs to open another door to go all the way inside, the inner door opens into the Café itself, thus ensuring that the cold from outside does not follow guests in unhindered, life is a struggle to hold the cold at bay. Thirty years, mutters the boy, thirty years since I was here with Bárður. He looks at the door, so that’s how it looks, and that’s how the door handle is, remarkable, he thinks, but then everything becomes hazy, tears appear in the corners of his eyes and they muddle his sight. The boy doesn’t cry for long, several tears, several small boats that run down his cheeks heavily laden with sorrow.

The boy takes a deep breath, opens the door and is startled by the jingling of the bell above it.

He immediately sees three men in the corner farthest from him, of course he sees them, there are no others here, just these men and eight to ten empty tables. The men look up, they all look at him, then the thing occurs that he finds so unbearable and that he despises himself for: his shyness sweeps sorrow and grief from him, deprives him of thought, he becomes nothing but nervousness, uncertainty, and he has no idea what he ought to do. The only thing that comes into his mind is to sit down, which he does, sits down at the table as far from the men as possible, turns sideways to them and sits straight-backed, white with snow. It’s dim inside, two paraffin lamps glow on the walls and a candle on the table of the three men, a heavy chandelier hangs above the center of the room. He had been transfixed by it on his previous visit, but now he simply stares at nothing and then the snow starts to melt off him. He looks out the window as if he has walked for thirty-six hours in storm and darkness for the one purpose of sitting down and looking out the window. In that case he would have enough to keep him occupied for the next several hours, there are six windows in the Café and all of them dimly reflect the light within, dim mirrors. The boy sees little of the evening that fills the world outside, more of the idiot sitting there by himself at his table, the snow melting off him. I’m such a small character that I’ll more than likely melt with the snow, change into a puddle that dries up, change into a dark spot that then disappears. He looks at himself in the window with disgust, punishes himself by looking, but finally looks down at the tabletop, so the tabletop’s like that, one can easily spend one’s time looking at a tabletop, but if he makes an effort he can catch a glimpse of the three men, recognizes Kolbeinn and his blind eyes, grumpy as a seawolf, Bárður had said with a grin, yet liked him very much. The boy finds it highly unlikely that he will ever be like Kolbeinn. In the first place he’s malicious as hell, in the second place a dirty dog, and in the third place I’ll be dead tomorrow. But he has a lot of books, real books at that, not rhymes and ballads, Bibles and hymns and sermons and things like that, but poetry, instructional books, why does a bad man have so many books, books should make men good, thinks the boy.

He’s so naïve.

The men have started talking together, probably to make fun of him, but the boy unfortunately doesn’t understand a word of what they’re saying, it’s actually just completely unintelligible noises coming from them. At first he listens in surprise but finally realizes that this must be Cod language, very strange that he’s never heard it before. He raises his head slightly and glances over, no longer needs to roll his eyes as if he were being strangled. Has never seen the other two, both big men and undoubtedly fishermen, from a ship, he thinks, otherwise they would be at a fishing station, I hope the Devil takes them tonight and shoves red-hot pokers deep up their asses. Refreshing to think like that, refreshing to be bad, one isn’t being shy when one is being bad, he’s no longer a wretch melting with the snow. Now he sits and simply stares at nothing and couldn’t care less about anything or anyone. Wonder if their dialect is called Coddish? Then he notices that the snow is melting quickly and a large puddle has formed on the floor. Dammit. Should’ve brushed myself off at the door. Bloody hell. This Helga can’t stand folk bringing dirt and water in with them. I wouldn’t want to mess with her! Bárður had said, damn me if I’m not sometimes half afraid of her.

If Bárður was afraid of this woman, then I’ll probably be terrified, thinks the boy in his wet seat.

The men laugh Coddishly, and of course at him. It must be useful for fishermen to understand Coddish, it would be enough for them to stick their heads into the sea, shout something and their boats would be filled. What is
death
in Coddish? Probably
omaúnu
, and that with a capital O:
Omaúnu
. It hurts his eyes to look sideways so intensely. The other two are perhaps old shipmates of Kolbeinn and have started to grow old like him, one broad-shouldered, bald and with terrifically large eyebrows, the other with short gray hair and a strikingly large potato-nose, it would fill the palm of a medium-sized man, both are fully bearded, unkempt beards that reach down to their chests, making them appear even bigger. Maybe I should grow a beard, thinks the boy, it would take me just under a month to cover my cheeks, but then he remembers that he had thought of dying tomorrow and completely gives up on the idea of growing a beard. Suddenly he is standing up. It happens almost without his realizing it. Stands between the tables, perplexed. They stop talking and look at him, except for Kolbeinn, the blind one, who sticks out his chin and cocks his left ear toward him as if it were a malformed eye. Bottles of Carlsberg beer in front of them on the table, one of them nearly full. The boy takes three steps, reaches for a bottle, pours the beer down his throat, and then sees Helga, who is standing next to the counter, staring at him. Incredible what a big man he suddenly was. The boy turns on his heel, opens his bag, pulls out the book, unwraps it and holds it up, holds onto it as if it were a declaration, or a symbol, and says to Kolbeinn, Bárður asked me to convey his gratitude for the loan.

The old seawolf doesn’t react. No more than the other three. They just watch and appear to be waiting for him to say something else.

But there’s some kind of damned veil over the boy’s head that causes him not to be completely sure of when he is thinking and when he is speaking. Maybe he didn’t say anything just now, simply held the book above his head and said nothing. Because of this he clears his throat forcefully, takes a deep breath and applies all his might to deliver this message:

He concludes his speech abruptly, lays the book carefully on the table next to the three men, bends to retrieve his mittens, shoves his hands into them, what was I thanking them for, he thinks, I’m always the same damned fool, throws his bag over his shoulder and goes to the door but no further, he feels a heavy weight on his left shoulder, a hand or the sky, he collapses, his feet give way, it’s simply like that, they are no longer standing beneath him and he collapses to the floor and lies there in a heap. Unconsciousness comes and collects him.

III

Around eight hundred people live here in the Village.

There is much that fits into eight hundred souls.

Many worlds, many dreams. A swarm of events, heroism and cowardice, betrayal and devotion, good times and bad.

Some live in such a way that it is noticed and their existence sets something in the air in motion, others hang on to life for many years, even eighty, but never touch anything, time goes through them and then they are dead, buried, forgotten. Live for eighty years but still do not live, one might even mention a betrayal of life, because there are others who are born and die before they manage to say their first word, get a stomachache, a bad cold, and Jón the joiner needs to make a little coffin, a little box to go around a life that never was, except for a few sleepless nights, irresistible eyes, such small toes that they resembled a miracle. Paid a short visit like the dew. Gone when we awoke and the only thing we can do is hope deep inside, where the heart beats and dreams dwell, that no life is wasted, is without purpose.

Numbers have no imagination and therefore you can’t make much of them. According to maps the mountains here rise nine hundred meters into the sky, which is absolutely correct, some days they do that, but one morning when we wake and look out the mountains have grown considerably taller and are at least three thousand meters, they scratch the sky and our hearts shrink. On those days it is difficult to stoop over salt fish on the drying lot. The mountains are not a part of the landscape, they are the landscape.

The sand Spit on which the Village stands stretches out like a bent arm into the slender fjord and reaches nearly across it. The sea within the arm of the Spit is sheltered and freezes readily, changes into smooth ice, we whistle at the moon and emerge from our houses with ice skates. It is often placid here because these mountains stop the winds, yet you shouldn’t think there is eternal calm in our village and that feathers lost by flying angels float down to us, of course this happens but make no mistake, a gale can certainly blow in! The mountains deepen the calm and they also magnify the winds, which can rush wildly into the fjord, arctic winds full of murderous intent, and everything that is not securely fastened blows away and disappears. Beams, shovels, carts, roof tiles, entire roofs, right-footed boots, ideals, lukewarm expressions of love. The wind howls between the mountains, tears up the sea, the saltiness settles on the houses and cellars flood. When it becomes calm and we can go outside without dying, the streets are covered with seaweed, as if the sea has sneezed over us. But the calm always returns, angel feathers float down, we stand on the beach and listen to slow, small waves break with a low purl, the restlessness subsides, the blood flows more slowly, the sea changes into a tempting bed in which we yearn to lie, certain that the sea will rock us to sleep, the eider duck rises and falls, eternally gabbling, and then it’s not nearly as painful to think of those whom the sea has gathered unto itself.

IV

The boy sleeps heavily, unconsciously.

Dreams of life and dreams of death.

Some of the dead are alive in a dream and that is why it can be painful to wake up. He stirs in the darkness and takes a long time to come to his senses, to distinguish between reality and dream, life and death, he lies in the bed and winces like a wounded animal, sleeps again, sinks like a stone into the sea of dreams.

It is sometimes most blissful to sleep, you are safe, the world cannot reach you. You dream of lumps of rock candy and sunshine.

V

Geirþrúður is not from here. No one seems to know for sure
where she came from, where she grew up. She appears here one day with old Guðjón, wealthy Guðjón. Thirty years younger than him, even thirty-five, with her pitch-black hair, tall, eyes dark, like pieces of coal, a few dull freckles across her nose gave her an appearance of innocence and it was no doubt because of this, some would suggest, that the old man fell for her, as tired of life as he had become, you should never trust freckles. On the other hand we know Guðjón well, or knew him, born and raised here, descended from wealthy landowners, started a fishing company, bought shares in the Norwegian whaling station on the next fjord and made so much money that even the big merchants, Leó and Tryggvi, had no control over him, yet they control everything they care to control, what houses are built, what roads laid, who receives maintenance from the parish, who goes to Hell and who to Heaven. Guðjón’s wealth was of course not as magnificent as theirs, they were Germany and Britain, he perhaps Sweden, the rest of us scarcely a parish in Iceland. Guðjón married rather young. That’s common here. We marry young so we can lie close together when darkness and cold rule the world. His wife was descended from fine burgesses, willowy, with mousy hair, prone to laughter, and him this huge body, more than medium height, sturdy, and early on became quite stout and rather excitable, he’ll crush the girl, we said, yet she wasn’t crushed, Guðjón must have been careful, they had three children, lived together for almost thirty years and then she died. There was a piano in their home, heavy furniture, a carpet, a portrait of Jón Sigurðsson, and Dr. Sigurður lived a short distance away, but she died all the same. Guðjón never got over her death, the foundations of his life cracked, he started to drink copiously and he and the priest did various untoward things when the nights were longest, but his boys went to study at the Learned School and one of them all the way to Copenhagen, settled down there in some sort of business, the other is an official in Reykjavík and is under the Governor’s wing, they never come here. The daughter of course learned to play the piano, to sew, how to curtsey and make conversation at banquets, learned three languages, was encouraged to read long novels, she played Chopin and a Norwegian whaling captain heard her playing through the open window, she moved to Norway the year after and we haven’t seen her since. Old Guðjón remained behind alone. Restless, unhappy, bloated from sleeplessness and drinking, bought himself a pistol from an English sea captain, placed it against his temple thrice in as many years but didn’t have the strength to pull the trigger and break into the realm of death.

Then he met Geirþrúður.

He’d been in the habit for many years of making long journeys, most often abroad, since there is nothing to see in Iceland except mountains, waterfalls, tussocks, and this light that can pass through you and turn you into a poet. Guðjón saw the world, cities, paintings, castles, he fled himself, fled the loneliness, fled the pistol in the desk drawer, once fled all the way to Egypt and there knocked out three thieves with his fists and violent temper. His friend Jóhann managed the accounts and tried to keep the company running at the same time. Oh, dear, said Jóhann quite worriedly, an outstanding man, died many, many years later and must have taken the straightest path to Heaven. But when Guðjón returned from one of his trips, the longest, five months, traveled through England, Germany, Italy, saw the pope, listened to Mr. Charles Dickens read in London, Geirþrúður was with him.

She has a high forehead and there is something in her expression that we can’t grasp. Toughness or coldness, arrogance or distance, derision or mistrust, maybe a touch of all of these, and her freckles confuse us a bit as well. She worked at the Hotel Reykjavík, Guðjón said to his friends. I was lonely and asked whether she wanted to see the world, is there something to see, she asked, the pope in Rome, I replied, he’s just a decrepit old man, she said, full of greed and blather. That’s blasphemy, Reverend Þorvaldur said angrily. Guðjón shrugged. But she still went with you, the magistrate Lárus said. This was in the evening, a dense cloud of cigar smoke in the room, they could barely see each other, or at least until one of them came up with the idea of opening the window onto the autumn and the sky coughed when the smoke was sucked out. Guðjón looked at the glowing embers of the cigarette, I asked, he said, what she wanted to do in this life, there must have been something she wanted to experience. To eat breakfast in an old German village in the mountains, she replied. And that’s what we did. That’s why we traveled around Germany, ate breakfast in a village in the mountains, married in the afternoon in a three-hundred-year-old mountain chapel. She just wants everything you own, old friend, said Lárus sadly and angrily, you’re humiliating yourself, added Þorvaldur and clenched his fists instinctively, but then Guðjón smirked: you’re just jealous of my getting to sleep with a young woman, so young, beautiful and so white-skinned, besides which she’s smarter than I am and says things that get me to look at the world differently. You could surely have managed to sleep with her without marrying her and then dragging her out here, what do you know, maybe people are laughing at you, what do you know, maybe she’s waiting to get rid of you, take it all and leave? Guðjón looked directly into Lárus’ face with the blue eyes that could become oddly sad, as in an old dog, but could also be piercing and terrifying. Lárus looked away, was going to apologize, but then Guðjón cleared his throat, spit into the spittoon, and said, life was pointless for us both, so it was logical to marry, our age difference matters little.

They lived their first year in his old house, which stands on Main Street. A beautiful house in an excellent location, but Guðjón said he didn’t like it there anymore, and several weeks after the friends had their conversation, a great sailing ship came from Norway with precut timber for the house that now contains the Café, the house in which the boy sleeps, a very heavy sleep. Two spacious stories and a tall attic: a wedding gift from Guðjón to Geirþrúður. They had the house built next to the rectory on the highest street in the Village, where only those who have something live, the magistrate, the doctor, wealthy sea captains.

Reverend Þorvaldur was extremely pleased to gain Guðjón as a neighbor. They had been friends for many years and there was a great deal of interaction between their two homes while Guðjón’s first wife was still alive; she and the priest’s wife, Guðrún, got on well. The priest and his wife were the first to live on this street, moved from the old church farm, a turf farmhouse that was starting to show signs of wear, had gone crooked in some places, and was beginning to collapse slowly. It was just below our church, which is located highest of all the buildings in the village, a bit as if we are addressing the mountain with the house of God. There is a snow-white cross on the tower but at dawn two ravens sometimes sit on the roof ridge and make a hoarse and dusky sounds, as if to remind us of the eternal night. Þorvaldur goes up to church every morning to ask God for forgiveness, and to have time to himself before the day breaks over him with all its bustle, all its temptations and filth. Time was when Þorvaldur drank like an entire ship’s crew, had three children out of wedlock, but is now teetotaler. Rises early, goes up to the church, glowers at the ravens who look derisively back, kneels at the altar, and asks God to keep the liquor away from him because with liquor comes sin and unbridledness. He asks God to forgive all his transgressions and then goes home to breakfast, home to his wife and the children of theirs who have not left home, are not dead, not married, not in school. Guðrún once said to him, if God can forgive you, then I will try to do so as well, and she is still trying. They had seven children, one died in childhood, the two youngest still live at home but they will leave soon and then just he and his wife will be left, and the cleaner, Þorvaldur fears it and misses the days when he woke to the voices of children. Yet it wasn’t always easy to recall the past without feeling it in his heart, feeling the regret and grief for not having enjoyed it well enough, not listened enough, too pressed for time, needed to write a sermon, needed to collect dues from his parishioners, there was his work for the community, he sat for a long time on the town council, was involved in the drama company, and he drank, this took all his time and there were few moments left over for the children, the childish questions that can bring us closer to the beginning, Daddy, why doesn’t the sun fall down, why can’t we see the wind, why can’t the flowers talk, where does the darkness go in the summer, the light in the winter, why do people die, why do we have to eat animals, don’t they get sad, when will the world die?

Geirþrúður’s house, the wedding present, is one of the most stately buildings in the Village, and considerably larger than the rectory. There is a carpet on the floor, a heavy chandelier in the parlor, the piano that Guðjón sometimes hammered on in his despair and called it playing. Þorvaldur was happy having his friend next door, it is so unbelievably good to have a friend in this world, then you aren’t quite as defenseless, you can talk to someone and listen without needing to guard your heart at the same time. The winter evenings are also long here, they string darkness from one mountaintop to another, the children fall asleep and then the racket falls silent, we get time to read, think. But when the children fall asleep innocence retreats and we perhaps remember death, the solitude, then it’s a blessing to have a friend next door and endlessly good to hold a cigar in the office or Guðjón’s study, see the embers glow, watch as they burn slowly upward. Þorvaldur and Guðjón could sit like that for hours at a time. Talk about the government, about the Danes, about fishing, whether using shellfish for bait should or should not be banned, whether the Village should invest in a steamship, they spoke about municipal concerns. It was a great relief for Guðjón to talk about the problems of the world out there, where the issues are clear and the words don’t disturb the heart, don’t touch the wound deep inside us. Good evening for both of them, a good diversion and happy steps from the rectory to Guðjón’s Norwegian house, a happy twenty-eight steps, but Þorvaldur was always just as uncertain regarding Geirþrúður. She was courteous, no doubt about that, came with refreshments, smiled at him, asked questions that were easy to answer, but he always had the feeling that something was lurking beneath the surface, perhaps scorn, or just disrespect, and he disapproved of how little gratitude she, this former chambermaid in a Reykjavík hotel, displayed at having been raised so unexpectedly into the ranks of better society. She was, for example, soon invited, as the wife of wealthy Guðjón, to join the Eve women’s club, twenty or thirty women who meet regularly and chat about life and the world, about shortages and adultery. They sponsor the children’s Christmas pageant, collect donations when young women lose their husbands to the sea and are left behind alone with large numbers of children, at times get learned men to lecture to them. Geirþrúður attended twice. Unfortunately I don’t feel like sitting entire evenings over sweets and listening to women talk about obvious things, she explained to Guðrún when the priest’s wife came to visit and asked why Geirþrúður had stopped coming. You’re perhaps superior to us, Guðrún said, coldly courteous.

Why should I be?

Guðrún looked silently for a long time at Geirþrúður, who looked back at her quizzically, even innocently. We invited you out of goodwill, it was out of goodwill that I came here, and goodwill is not small change you find in the street.

I’m not one for company, the younger woman interjected.

Are you asking me to leave?

No, I’m just not one for company.

You’re not particularly friendly, I must say.

It’s not my intention to be unfriendly, I’m just trying to be honest.

They sat in the elegant parlor, which later was turned into the Café, the thick carpet dampened all sound, a large, old grandfather clock ticked away in a corner, otherwise there was silence. Guðrún looked down into the blue-white porcelain cup half full of tea, Geirþrúður drank coffee from a large cup, Helga came in with more coffee, Geirþrúður drank it like water. Guðrún waited until Helga had gone out again, this silent housekeeper whom Geirþrúður had sent for from Reykjavík, just as grumpy and unsociable as the housewife herself, aren’t you even grateful, Guðrún asked, after the door had closed behind Helga and they were left alone with the time in the spacious parlor. For what, the other woman asked, seemingly surprised.

Do I need to spell it out?

Yes, you most likely do, unfortunately.

Very good, Guðrún said, and she straightened herself in her seat, sat up and looked hard at the young woman, we know this look, it penetrates walls, Þorvaldur fears it more than almost anything else. Do you think, she said, speaking slowly, that it’s completely natural for a man like Guðjón, who is far from being an ordinary man and in addition is extremely well off financially, to take up with you, make an average girl, a chambermaid, his equal by marrying her? And do you think it’s normal and natural for the rest of us to welcome you unconditionally into our group, even treat you with motherly affection and tolerance?

Unfortunately, I’m not average, and unfortunately, I’m not a girl.

Yes, of course you’re a girl, Guðrún said sharply, she cannot bear it when people doubt what seems clear to her, you are a girl, average or not, we won’t go into that now, who becomes suddenly the wife of a wealthy man but who of course clearly shows signs of being lower class. I don’t say this to criticize you, we are what we are, but with the will and the correct disposition it is possible to learn much, and you should be able to devote yourself to customs and habits that do not perhaps lie completely in your nature, but then you also need to spend time with the right people. A woman of your class does not for example gulp coffee from a crock like a fisherman’s wife, like a fisherman, I feel I have to say. A woman of your class sits up straight, not like an unruly child.