The Best Intentions (28 page)

At any rate, this scene now starts, and I maintain it starts at this very moment: Anna is standing by the covered reredos, her head down, her arms hanging by her sides. Then she slowly starts putting on her gloves, which she had pulled off when she had made an attempt to play the organ. Henrik goes up to the altar rail and its stained and worn kneeler. He is standing with his back to Anna and looking at the stained-glass windows in the cruciform. Lighting? It's dramatic and full of contrasts! The sun has stopped going down at a snow-laden cloud, which has appeared above the edge of the forest. The cloud forms a blue-black wall and the light is white and merciless, but only over half his face. The compensatory light on the other half has turned to gray.

Henrik:
Anna?

Anna:
Yes, my dear.

Henrik:
I want us to . . .
(Falls silent.)

Anna:
What
do you want?

Henrik:
When we get married . . . can't we get old Samuel Gransjö to officiate?

Anna:
Yes, of course. If you like.

Henrik:
Here.

Anna:
Here?

Henrik:
Yes, here in the chancel of our unfinished church. Just you and me. And two witnesses, of course.

Anna
(
mildly
): I don't know what you mean. Are you saying our wedding should take place here?

Henrik:
Just you and me and old Gransjö, then two witnesses. Mrs. Säll, for instance, and the churchwarden. Then we'd be dedicating the church and dedicating ourselves to this church. Can't we do that, Anna?

Anna:
No, we can't.

Henrik:
Can't? What do you mean?

Anna:
You and I are to be married in Upsala Cathedral. and the dean is to marry us. He's promised. And we're going to have a proper marriage with bridesmaids and pages and ushers and guests and the Academic Choir and lots of family and dinner at the Gillet. We've agreed on all that, Henrik dear. We can't change it.

Henrik:
Can't change it! We're getting married in March, and it's only September!

Anna:
What do you think Mama will say?

Henrik:
I thought you no longer cared what your mother thought.

Anna:
I've invited my whole nursing-school class to the wedding. Nearly all of them have accepted. Henrik, dear, we've already talked about this before.

Henrik:
You've told me what it'll be like. I have had to keep my views to myself.

Anna:
It was you who wanted the choir. You and Ernst have already decided on the program. You can't have forgotten that?

Henrik:
What if I ask you now to abandon all that? Is that so impossible?

Anna:
Yes, it's impossible.

Henrik:
Why should it be . . . ?

Anna
(
incensed
):
Because I want to have a proper wedding!
A really splendid, impressive festivity. I want to celebrate. I want to be joyful. I want a terrific wedding.

Henrik:
And the wedding I'm suggesting?

Anna:
Let's stop this stupid argument here and now. Otherwise we'll start quarreling. And that really would be unfortunate.

Henrik:
I'm
not quarreling.

Anna:
No, not you, but I am.

Henrik:
Think it over. (
Pleads
.) Anna!

Anna:
I
have
thought it over, and of all the idiocies I have endured for a very long time, this latest whim of yours is the worst. If you don't see that, you're more idiotic than I thought you were, and that's not saying much.

Henrik:
And if I don't want to?

Anna:
Don't want to what?

Henrik:
If I don't want to be part of this spectacle in the cathedral? What'll you do then?

Anna
(
angry
): Well, I'll tell you, Henrik Bergman. Then I'll give you your ring back.

Henrik:
But this is mad.

Anna:
What is it that's mad?

Henrik:
Are you sacrificing our life together,
our life
, for a shabby ritual?

Anna:
It's
you
who's sacrificing our life together for a foolish, theatrical, melodramatic, sentimental . . . I don't know what. My
celebration
is anyhow a
celebration.
Everyone will be happy, and everyone will be aware that you and I are at last properly married.

Henrik:
But we're going to live
here! This
is where we're going to live,
don't you see? It's important that we start our new life here, just here, in this church.

Anna:
Important to you but not to me.

Henrik:
Don't you understand at all what I mean?

Anna:
I don't
want
to understand.

Henrik:
If you loved me, you'd understand.

Anna
(
angry
): Don't give me that! I might just as well say that if you loved me, you'd let me have my wedding.

Henrik:
There's no limit to how spoiled you are. Don't you understand that this is
serious?

Anna:
I shall tell you what I understand . . . you don't like my family. You want to humiliate my mother as much as you can. You want to demonstrate your new power. Anna, come with me. Anna, don't bother about what your family thinks any longer. You want to get even in a very hurtful and sophisticated way. That's what it is, Henrik! Admit it!

Henrik:
It's amazing how you can misinterpret things. Horrible and amazing. But of course, it's good now that I really know . . .

Anna
(
even more angry
): . . . don't stand there looking like that. What's that stupid grin all about?

Henrik:
All I can see is that you're on your family'S side,
against me
.

Anna:
Are you
really and truly
crazy? I nearly killed my mother in order to come to you. And Papa, what do you think he thought when . . . ?

Henrik:
. . . I'm only asking a silly little sacrifice of you.

Anna:
You're still crazy. You know
what
, Henrik? Sometimes you seem to me to be painfully lower-class. You've a way of making yourself worse than . . .

Henrik:
What did you say?

Anna:
You make yourself out to be stupider than you are. You put on an act that doesn't suit you at all. Do you know what? You flirt with your poverty and your wretched miserable childhood and your poor wretched mother. It's disgusting.

Henrik:
I remember when you asked me what Frida did, and I told you
she was a waitress. I remember your tone of voice. I remember your expression.

Anna:
It's not necessary to wear dirty shirts and have holes in your socks. It's not necessary to go around with dandruff on your collar and dirty nails.

Henrik:
I
never
have dirty nails.

Anna:
You aren't always clean, and sometimes you smell of sweat.

Henrik:
Now you've gone too far.

Anna:
Of course. The pastor can't stand the truth.

Henrik:
I can't stand your being cruel.

Anna:
Don't trample on me, Henrik.

Henrik:
I'm glad this conversation occurred
before
the wedding.

Anna:
So am I! Now we both know where we stand. We almost made a huge mistake.

Henrik:
So you're prepared to throw away . . .

Anna:
Am
I
throwing it away?

Henrik:
No, the awful thing is we're both . . .

Anna:
Well, it was remarkably easy.

Henrik:
Terribly.

Anna:
I want to cry, but I can't. I'm far too miserable.

Henrik:
I want to cry, too, I'm so horribly miserable. I don't want to lose you.

Anna:
It didn't sound like that just now.

Henrik:
No, I know.

Distance, geographical as well as spiritual. The sunlight has gone into the blue-black wall of snow slowly looming up over the forest. The daylight is gray but sharp. Anna sits down on the altar rail's dirty kneeler. Henrik sits down on it, too, but at a distance — several steps away Their grief is palpable, but so are the anger and the poisonous words just spoken, and what has not been said. This story of good intentions could end here, as the main characters now
consider themselves abandoned, alien, and alone. Anna is thinking with revulsion about that man's body and his smells. Henrik is thinking with distaste about this cruel, spoiled child. Both are thinking (perhaps) how terrible to have to live together for just one day, one hour. Humiliating. Unworthy. Frightening.

Anna:
Henrik?
      (
Henrik says nothing
.)

Anna:
Henrik
.

Henrik:
No.

Anna
(
holds out a hand
): Henrik!

Henrik:
Don't be affected.

Anna:
I'm miserable.

Henrik:
Are you? Too bad.

Anna:
I said terrible things.

Henrik:
Yes.

Anna:
Can you ever forgive me?

Henrik:
I don't know.

Anna:
So this is the end?

Henrik:
I think so.

Anna
(
sigh
): It feels like it.

Henrik:
Words flown out can't be caught on the wing.

Anna:
What do you mean?

Henrik:
That's Luther. He means that one can say anything. But not
just
anything. Certain words are irretrievable.

Anna:
And you mean that now I've . . .

Henrik:
Yes.

Anna:
But that's terrible.

Henrik:
Yes, it's terrible.

Anna:
But you're a priest.

Henrik:
My profession has nothing to do with . . .

Anna:
You
must
forgive me.

Henrik:
I can't. I'm furious. I hate you. In fact, I think I could hit you.

Anna:
Well, at least that's clear.

Henrik:
You're welcome.

Anna:
Here I am, sitting here humiliating myself and . . .

Henrik:
No one asked you to.

Anna:
. . . and going on about you — that
you
should forgive
me!

Henrik:
If I were capable of it, I'd get up, go out that door, slam it shut, and never come back.

Anna:
Are you crying?

Henrik:
Yes, I'm crying, but I'm crying because I'm in such a rage. No, don't come any closer. Don't
touch
me.

Anna touches him. He knocks her arm away, the blow striking harder than he had intended. She is frightened and falls back against the altar rail. Astonishment and horror.

Anna:
You hit me!

Henrik
(
pure rage
): I may hit you again! Go away! I never want to see you again. You're vile. You torment me. You torment me because you
want
to torment me. Go away. For
Christ's sake
.

Anna:
What a coward! Now I'm beginning to understand why Mama was frightened of you. I'm beginning to understand . . .

Henrik
(
interrupts
): . . . oh, yes, that's really good. Your mother and you will fall into each other's arms and thank God you've escaped with nothing but fright and loss of virginity.

Anna:
God, how
crude
you are. It wasn't just Mama and Papa, I'll have you know. Ernst warned me too. Constantly. He said you were a dual personality no one could . . .

Henrik
(
white
):
What
did he say? What did Ernst say?

Anna:
That you were untrustworthy. That you were a liar. The worst kind of liar, because you never knew when you were lying. He said you were incapable of telling between the truth and a lie. That was the real reason you became a priest.

Henrik:
Did Ernst say that?

Anna:
No.

Henrik:
What did Ernst say about me?

Anna:
Nothing. He likes you. You know that.

Henrik:
Now
I know nothing.

Anna:
I think you should go back to Frida. Carl thought she'd be a good wife for a priest. For Anna Å kerblom, this will have been an instructive interlude.

Henrik:
Stop acting. You do it so badly. And leave Frida out of this squalid . . .

Anna:
Miss Frida made no demands. She loved her dear Henrik. Her motherliness no doubt knew no bounds.

Henrik:
Shut up.

Anna:
Your crudeness is really . . .

Henrik:
. . . on a level with yours.

Anna:
Yes, maybe so.

Speechlessness and anger, they are almost audible, echoing in the darkening church, freeing themselves from the protagonists and striking against roof and walls, maybe even breaking windows and rushing like searing flames along the stone flags.

Henrik:
I'm beginning to recognize my life now. It's at last coming back, and it looks as it has always looked. I was dreaming. Now I am awake.

Anna:
Sometimes you sound like a novel. A cheap romance.

Henrik:
I don't know any better.

Anna:
And we were supposed to have children! Three children! Two boys and a girl. How filthy everything is. And stupid. This is all crazy. Here I am, sitting in a decaying palm house in the wilderness and it's getting dark, and I think it's starting to snow.
Me.
This is really crazy. A strange man shouting at me, hitting me! It's all quite mad.