The Birds (16 page)

Hege didn’t ask when, there was only one boat trip in the whole world.

More or less by chance Hege made an important decision for Mattis as they stood there. She suggested that he ought perhaps to go on rowing people about on the lake. It would be just the thing for him.

Mattis seized on the suggestion the moment it was thrown out,
rather like catching a ball in the air: “Yes, of course! That’s something I really can do!”

“Row girls across,” said Hege.

He sent her a quick glance.

“Do you think so?”

But Hege had to disillusion him: “No, I’m afraid not. No one lives over there, it’s just moorland, so there’s no traffic across. But if there had been people living there, you could have been a ferryman.”

The idea struck him with full force. He wasn’t listening to the things she was saying about no one living there.

“Yes, of course,” he said, talking to himself.

He would never have thought of anything like this himself. If Hege had said it to please him she’d picked on just the right thing. He fell silent, was lost in thought, didn’t look where he was going and stumbled in the brushwood. Hege tried to chat a bit, but all she could get out of Mattis was
hm
—

“Let’s go home now,” said Hege. “The break’s over as far as I am concerned.”

They walked along the shore in silence. Mattis led them to the place where he kept his boat.

“Are you going to stay down here?”

“Yes, you go on,” he answered, busy. “I’ve got a lot to do to the boat now.”

Hege left him. When she was a little way up the slope, Mattis
shouted to her, seemed to have got his breath back at last: “Imagine, not mentioning this before!”

Hege’s only reply was a wave of the hand. Soon she was gone. But imagine not mentioning this before. Was she clever, or wasn’t she? But what a wonderful end to all his worries today: he began to look forward to a job he could manage.

We won’t give that lightning another thought, he said to himself. It isn’t either of us that was meant for! And maybe by tomorrow I’ll have someone to row.

Now he was going to make the boat as decent as he possibly could, without spending any money on it.

Mattis worked until darkness fell. It was late July and the evenings were long. Mattis was no better at carpentry than anything else, but he worked lovingly on the boat that afternoon – with the poor tools he had at his disposal. When Hege asked, she learned that he was to begin the very next day. Begin what? What you said, of course! Rowing people across the lake.

“It’s the best idea you’ve ever had!” he finished.

Hege had to tell him the truth.

“I didn’t mean it seriously, you know. There isn’t anyone to row across.”

“You’re not going to be like that, are you?” he said angrily, but by no means crushed. “Are you trying to fool me?”

“I said there wasn’t anyone.”

Then she reflected, and added quickly: “Actually, now that I come to think of it, maybe you ought to have a go. No harm in trying for a while. It’ll keep you busy, too.”

Her words seemed like a distant murmur to Mattis, something that didn’t concern him. She didn’t realize what she’d started. For his own part he felt a turning point had been reached. A way was opening up before him.

He only stopped working after the blows of the hammer had turned his thumb black and blue. It was so dark by then that he no longer saw the difference between his thumb and the nails.

As he walked up the slope he reflected that it had been a good summer, even though the woodcock was lying under the stone.

FERRYMAN FROM TODAY. The thought sent a warm glow through Mattis.

The surface of the lake was like a mirror and it lay there waiting for him.

Hege had obviously been pressing the ferryman idea, which had come tumbling so suddenly from her lips. And Mattis half understood why: she was glad she wouldn’t have to see him wandering about here all day with nothing to do. Glad to get rid of him for a bit in fact. But Mattis was so grateful to her for her idea that the motives behind it didn’t really upset him very much.

She made some sandwiches and wrapped them up.

“Is it all for me?”

“Well, it’s got to last all day, hasn’t it? Or are you thinking of coming back right away?”

“No, no, of course not,” he said. It sounded as though he were making her a promise.

Hege told him about all the things a ferryman has to do when he’s on duty, too.

“And even if nobody comes right away and shouts for the ferryman, the ferryman just has to wait and wait.”

Mattis looked at her, and all of a sudden she started blushing. She had been caught in something she didn’t want to acknowledge.

“I suppose I row across where it’s narrowest?” he asked when he was ready to go.

“Yes, I think that’s what they do.”

“But suppose it isn’t narrow anywhere? What can I do then?”

“Well, then you’ll just have to shift in and out,” said Hege, and this was a decision that pleased him. His parting words were as they should be: “See you this evening.”

Hege nodded.

Things were going smoothly.

Mattis sat down in the boat, placed the oars in their correct position – and then it was only a question of waiting.

On this side of the lake there was no sign of anyone who wanted to go across. But he had to keep an eye on both sides, so after a while he rowed out from the shore. He had no timetable to keep to, and it was exciting to try out the boat after all the repair work he’d done. And it was such a relief to have found a permanent job at long last. No more waiting till someone took pity on him on the farms, no more of those dreadful days trying to work with the strong and clever ones. And a job like this, he thought, reaching forward and giving long pulls at the oars. As soon as I’ve earned enough money to buy a new boat I’ll stop using this old hulk. The better the boat, the more people will want to use it. And then perhaps the people I want to row most of all will come.

He rowed in a dead straight line. His thoughts didn’t stray. I must have been born to row on a lake, he said to himself. Imagine wasting so much of my life on all sorts of other things.

I might just as well row right across and wait there for a while.

But as he drew close to the blue slopes of the western shore, he saw there was nobody waiting there either. Well, that was quite natural, seeing it was his first day. People would have to get to know about the new ferryman before they started queuing up for his services.

He rowed along slowly, close to the shore, to see if there was any track leading down out of the forest. No. He would have to wait without a track – somewhere or other where the boat could be maneuvered right onto the shore. The ferryman must always wait, those were Hege’s words.

Mattis was feeling fine, lying contentedly in the bottom of the boat, and letting the sun shine straight into his face. The boat smelled strongly of tar, a pleasant smell that came from the new rags that had been pushed and nailed into place the evening before. The sunbaked shore had a faint, pleasant smell of its own.

Mattis stretched, happy and relaxed.

And I’m fully employed as well! Lying here and loafing about.

He couldn’t help laughing.

Lie there as long as he would, no one came. He pushed the boat out again and set course for his own shore. There might well be someone sitting there waiting by now. The news was bound to
spread as time went on and people noticed he was rowing straight across, on a sort of regular service.

That’s what it’s like being a
ferryman
, you’ve got to be everywhere at once—but how can you?

He liked murmuring the word ferryman – that was what he was now, and it didn’t sound at all bad. I bet there isn’t a ferryman who rows straighter. You can’t row straighter than straight. Pity the wake disappears so quickly, it ought to stay on the water for days, covering it with streaks.

There wasn’t anyone on his own shore either, when he finally got there. He would have liked to have taken five minutes off now, and nipped up to see Hege, but he resisted the temptation. He sat loyally on the shore eating his sandwiches. Hege shouldn’t have any cause to be angry with him this time, he wouldn’t be a burden to her any longer; here he was, eating his sandwiches.

Hush.

He listened.

In fact he had been listening all the time. And wasn’t someone calling, over from the hills in the west? He stopped chewing so he could hear better. Listened for a long time with his mouth full of bread. No, no one could shout across a lake as wide as that. And yet someone was shouting!

Mattis began rowing at once. Surely there was something familiar about the shout, too. It could have been Hege, but that was impossible for the simple reason that Hege was on this side of the lake.

Hege’s calling, far away on the other side, he mumbled, and suddenly he stopped dead.

Is someone calling?

A call like that on my very first day. Anyone who can shout across a lake this size, why, I’m almost frightened of them. But it
is
Hege—

Nonsense.

A good thing it isn’t night. But I suppose they have to go out in the middle of the night, too, ferrymen. People call across the water in darkness as well as in light.

At least the calls had stopped now. Mattis heaved the oars, arrived covered in sweat after so much hard work in the hot sun. That didn’t matter. He was managing to cope with ferrying, that was the main thing. His thoughts held the oars in their proper place.

But there was no one there. No one to been seen or heard. The hills on this side were long, gentle, tree-covered slopes, which reached a great height. It was all forestland, not a house anywhere. No one lived beyond the highest ridge, either, there was nothing but deserted moorland up there.

Who had been calling?

No one, of course, you can’t shout right across the lake, he said in a stern voice. But there was something wrong here. Mattis took his job as a ferryman so seriously that someone was bound to come down from the hillside soon. Ferrymen had to meet people like this. The hillside lay deserted. Who was it that shouted so loud that the sound carried farther than an ordinary voice?

Perhaps the ferryman had to give a signal himself? He got up from his seat and shouted
hey
! in a loud and frightened voice. It wasn’t an easy thing to do.

The echo answered, no one else.

“Here I am!” Mattis shouted at the mysterious hillside that held a thousand secrets.

No, no one came down. No one needed a ferry on this side of the lake.

This wasn’t as it should be.

Yes, but Hege did say it was a question of waiting and waiting, he tried to comfort himself.

But somebody was calling me!

He listened so intently that everything else, too, seemed somehow to die away to an attentive whisper.

Then came a call from the other side of the lake. From his own shore. The voice to whom distance meant nothing. And once again it was Hege’s lonely voice, calling for the ferry, or whatever it was.

“Alright!” he answered in trembling tones, swinging his wretched little boat around. But it’s a long way!

Must be because it’s my first day, he thought in bewilderment.

Once again he was on his way. But progress was slow, after all, he couldn’t row at top speed the whole time. But everyone’ll get across all the same, he promised.

He was still keeping a dead straight line. Nothing wrong with his rowing. He pulled and tugged at the oars, arrived back at his own shore, saw with horror that there was no one waiting there. Nothing but the familiar, deserted stretch of the beach at the bottom of the slope below the cottage. He gulped. This filled him with fear. The familiar shore filled him with fear and panic. There was only one thing to do now: get back home to Hege. He refused to believe that it was really she who’d been calling him.

Mattis secured the boat and hurried up the hill. Didn’t feel like looking behind him.

Hege was busy knitting, as calm as could be. She didn’t show any sign of irritation at seeing her brother back so soon. She just said: “Home already?”

“It’s not like you think!” he said. “There’s something odd happening on the lake today!”

“Odd?”

“You’ve been calling down there!” he said, hysterically. “What do you say to that?”

“Don’t talk nonsense, Mattis.”

“As soon as I’m on one side, there’s a call from the other! And it’s your voice. Right across the lake. Is that odd or isn’t it?”

“There are no calls like that,” she said quickly. She was disturbed, that was obvious.

“But you know how good I am at hearing things,” said Mattis.

“No, you’re just too keen on this ferrying job of yours and you imagine you’re hearing all kinds of things. You don’t want to listen for things that aren’t there, you know. Just go back and carry on as before. There’s nothing odd out on the lake.”

Her words had a soothing effect on him.

“I wasn’t thinking of giving up.”

“I know. Off with you now.”

Comforted, he went back down to the lake. But no sooner had he reached the boat than he began listening. And very soon he heard all sorts of strange sounds. Above them all came the sound he wanted to hear: the call for the ferry, commanding, inquiring, and in Hege’s voice, just as before.

It must be because I’ve got a permanent job for the first time in my life, he thought. That’s why I can’t help hearing all sorts of things. That’s what Hege said, too.

And a call for the ferry was what he wanted to hear, after all. He couldn’t really understand why those who were calling didn’t show themselves, but that was bound to alter soon.

It was a real strain. They want to put me to the test my first day, he thought. And I won’t fail!

He swung the boat around and set course for the distant hills in the west, another tiring trip across.

There were no calls to be heard.

At long last he arrived at the other side, his arms aching. He was prepared to find the shore deserted and every kind of terror waiting for him. The day had begun with fun and laughter – now it was tense and tiring. But a test was a test – the boat grated against the bottom, and Mattis stood erect and mastered the unfamiliar situation.