Barbara (21 page)

“Now then,” shouted Gabriel, throwing himself down in a chair. He crossed his legs and was completely at home in the bailiff’s sitting room.

When Barbara emerged into Gongin, she met Johan Hendrik, the judge.

He greeted her with his usual sarcastic smile: “Well?”

Barbara laughed contentedly.

“Ah, when you look like that, we all know which way the wind is blowing,” said the judge. “Tell me. Is he very much in love?”

Barbara laughed back at him. She liked Johan Hendrik; she often actually felt an urge to confide in him.

The judge stroked his chin. “This man Gabriel,” he murmured. “Hmm, I don’t know. It’s a bad business.”

“Why on earth have
you
never thought of marrying her?” said Barbara with a laugh. But she immediately blushed slightly.

“I? Who do you think could be bothered with an old man like me?”

“Oh, stop it, Johan Henrik.” Barbara laughed aloud and was by now quite red in her face.

“What do you really think I would be like as a husband?” asked Johan Hendrik.

Barbara looked down. Then, kicking gently at a stone: “I don’t know. I once dreamt you were married.”

“To Suzanne?”

“No. To me.”

“Now, now,” said Johan Henrik, “are you sure I can stand hearing that sort of thing?”

Barbara’s face was quite pale. She tried to look straight at the judge, but finally had to close her eyes. There was something both comical and touching about this.

“No, what was I going to say,” she finally managed to mumble: “I think that Suzanne would be a thousand times happier with you than with Gabriel.”

The judge stroked his chin.

“The law speaker said the same to me this morning. Have you two been getting together?”

“No, not at all.
Not at all
.” Barbara laughed: “It was just something that struck me the moment I saw you. And so I thought I might just as well say it to you straight away. Fancy the law speaker having the same idea!”

She was flushed and happy and had quite recovered her composure.

“Aye, it’s a curious thing,” said Johan Henrik. “This is the only time in my life that I have had the impression that the law speaker really wanted something. He certainly didn’t
say
much, as you can well imagine, but…”

“Well, won’t you, then?” shouted Barbara. She stood there shuffling about, and her voice radiated both eagerness and expectation.

“Well, of course. As far as I am concerned… I have always thought very highly of Suzanne, and even if they should write a song about me… though I don’t think they will do. But, you understand, I don’t think there is much to be done about that now.”

“Oh, but you must try, Johan Hendrik. Won’t you?”

“We’ll see,” said the judge, adopting a meditative expression.

But then he brightened up and glanced at Barbara:

“But then it will never be us two.”

Barbara dropped her eyes like lightning. Her throat tightened.

“Goodbye, Johan Hendrik,” she exclaimed and hurried off in the direction of Reyn. Joy radiated like a sun in her voice.

The first thing to meet his eyes when Pastor Poul left Regnegaard after the clergymen’s dinner was Barbara in her radiant green silk dress. He felt a dull sense of satisfaction as so often when he had hoped but not expected to see her. She came towards him with a smile, took his arm and was full of gaiety and tremulous spirit. The falsetto in her voice tickled his ear like a rainbow of sounds. He went with her; she was vivacious and relaxed, while he himself was burdened with agonizing joy.

“Where shall we go?” he asked.

They wandered through Gongin right down to the river outside the town. Pastor Poul told her about the meeting, about Pastor Christian and Elsebeth, and Barbara laughed and said that it was a cruel way to treat Pastor Christian.

“Didn’t they say anything about me?” she asked suddenly. Her voice sounded rather humble and she looked down.

“No. That’s to say, Pastor Severin said something ridiculous, but you know what he’s like.”

“What did he say?”

“Oh, he simply laughed loud and said something to the effect that it was all madness and so on.”

Pastor Poul felt a little pressure on his arm. Barbara shot a quick look at him. There was something both worrying and grateful in her look. There was a pause. Then she quite casually asked:

“Did the dean say anything?”

“No,” replied Pastor Poul firmly. “But Pastor Severin,” he added quickly, “Pastor Severin thought that it would have been far better if
I
had married Elsebeth Marcusdatter from Sandoy. He said she was a sweet lamb.”

Barbara looked like a child that has been ill treated. But it was merely a shadow that passed over her face. She laughed straight away and said, “You know, I think Elsebeth’s a very sweet girl and she suits Pastor Christian
perfectly
.”

Barbara continued lost in thought. Then she added, “But Pastor Severin is and will always be a fool. He usually addresses speeches to me and calls me Chrysillis and Amaryllis.”

They had stood for a time down by the river, had turned back and again reached Reyn. They didn’t know where to go. Barbara suddenly had an idea: they should go into the headmaster’s garden and sit down. It was so quiet and secluded there.

The sun was shining straight down into the headmaster’s garden. It was behind the school on a steep slope on the best side of Reyn. There were no trees, but several decorative bushes and everywhere the angelicas stood as high as a man with clusters of white flowers. Nowhere in the Faroe Islands had Pastor Poul seen such a luxuriant plant growth; he was almost anaesthetised by the heat and the spicy scent from the plants.

Barbara sat down. She was at home here as she was everywhere else in Havn.

“Have you got a knife?” she asked.

He handed her a knife. Barbara cut one of the tall angelicas off, trimmed the leaves and flowers off it and handed him a piece of the thick stem. “There,” she said, “just taste that.”

Pastor Poul bit the stem. It was extremely green and juicy.

“Doesn’t it taste good?” laughed Barbara. She had started eating.

The angelica tasted strong, burning and fresh and darkly spiced all at the same time. Pastor Poul did not immediately know whether he liked it; he was quite surprised, and it burned his mouth.

“It tastes of summer,” said Barbara. She sat with the greenish white flowery sunshade in her hand, turning it with her fingers.

“It tastes as it looks,” said the parson, thinking of the plant’s fierce, luxuriant green. Everything around them was green. They were sitting as though at the bottom of a bottle.

“Can you imagine,” said Barbara, “I’ve proposed to someone today, proposed to a man.”

“Proposed? What do you mean?” asked Pastor Poul. “Who have you proposed to?”

“To Johan Hendrik, the judge.”

Pastor Poul’s heart had started to beat. What was this? He was always full of apprehension, never felt completely safe.

“Oh Poul. Don’t look like that,” exclaimed Barbara. She took his head in her hands and looked him straight in the eye: “Do you hear? You mustn’t look like that.”

“No, but…” he murmured and was quite confused.

“Did you really believe what I said?” Barbara went on, refusing to let go of his head. Her voice was both happy and indignant.

“Of course not,” said Pastor Poul, gently disengaging himself. “You just… gave me a fright.”

“You are so silly, you know,” said Barbara. “You mustn’t be like that. It’s not nice of you. It’s really horrible. I didn’t propose on my own behalf, of course. I proposed on behalf of Suzanne. Can’t you understand that?”

And then Barbara told all about Suzanne and Gabriel, how horrible he was and what a pity it all was, meanwhile twisting the big, greenish flower parasol she was holding.

But Pastor Poul thought of that Sunday evening when the French ships were in port.

“And what did the judge say?” he asked idly.

“Well, of course, he said… that he would rather have married me.”

“Oh,” said Pastor Poul.

Barbara’s eyes wandered a little and then she tried to catch his, but he was looking down at the ground. So she took a blade of grass and tickled his neck with it.

“Silly, silly, silly,” she whispered in his ear.

It was a moment or two before Pastor Poul raised his head, but the moment she could see into his eyes, Barbara flung her arms passionately around his neck, kissed him long and fervently and finally sighed affectionately. At last she, looked him in the eye and asked: “Did you really think that?”

But at that moment she held him tight again, moaned and was almost as though she would never let him go. Pastor Poul sat there in the burning air, quite confused; he could still feel the sweetness from the angelica in his mouth, and his heart was burdened with agonizing joy.

Gabriel was in the bailiff’s sitting room as Pastor Poul and Barbara went past. The sight of them struck him like a blow between the eyes; he was perfectly well aware that they must be together at that moment. Nevertheless, the sight of them was more than he could stand; it hurt him, not only in his heart, but in his stomach as well, indeed right down into his legs. This was the very devil. He wandered restlessly up and down the floor. Then he went out. He didn’t want to go too quickly, for he was frightened of catching up with them and seeing them again. Why did he go out at all? He couldn’t prevent the lower part of his body from bearing him away through Gongin.

He stopped in the middle of Reyn. He couldn’t see them anywhere. The sun was burning down on his head, and he had forgotten his bonnet. He was completely confused and at a loss and had a dull sensation in his thighs. He wandered around among the houses, but kept returning to the highest point of Reyn, the part known as the school ground. His nostrils were palpating. Suddenly, he heard Barbara’s laugh. It struck him like a tiny sharp, shiny arrow somewhere in his body. No, this was more than he could stand. He went straight into the headmaster’s garden and made his way through the red currant bushes. He stopped and listened for a moment. The flies were buzzing and the sun burning. He could now hear Barbara’s voice quite close at hand. And there she sat in her green silk dress and great fichu.

Barbara and Pastor Poul.

The very moment he saw Gabriel approaching, Poul adopted that dark, tense expression suggesting that he would now have to hold on tight again. But Barbara was surprised; she laughed and said, “Gabriel! Are you here?”

Gabriel gave the two an embarrassed smile and took up a position in front of them. Pastor Poul felt as though a cloud had passed before the sun. He stared bitterly at Gabriel’s powerful legs and said not a word. He had a sense of disgust at the sight of him, just as he would have had at the sight of a bluebottle on a fresh berry.

It was Barbara who spoke first. “Would you like some angelica, Gabriel?” she asked quite unconcernedly.

The clergyman gave her an angry look. But Gabriel, too, was incapable of showing any kind of polish. Perhaps he was put off by something in the exaggeratedly natural tone of her voice; perhaps he was provoked by a glint in her friendly eyes. Hell! He knew perfectly well he was standing there looking foolish.

“Angelica,” he snarled angrily. “I don’t eat churchyard plants.

Barbara looked as though someone had hit her. She was completely unaccustomed to people speaking to her in that harsh tone.

“But, Gabriel,” she said, “this isn’t…”

“They are corpse plants,” said Gabriel. “Don’t you know there’s been a plague cemetery here?”

“Rubbish,” shouted Barbara. “The plague cemetery wasn’t here; it was right down there in the corner.”

“Even so, it’s still horrible,” said Gabriel.

His anger was actually directed at the clergyman though he refused to see him or to acknowledge his presence here in the garden.

So it was Barbara he was scolding, and he felt a kind of sweet satisfaction as he observed the effect of his words. He laughed quietly without smiling and went on, “Surely you know, Barbara, that angelica’s a filthy plant. You can get leprosy from it. Ha, ha, ha. Aye, otherwise where the hell should all that leprosy come from that is all over the place here in Tórshavn? It’s horrible –
horrible!
”

Barbara was really upset. Never had anyone told her that what she was doing was horrible. She spun the big bunch of angelica round quickly and suddenly threw it away.

“You do talk rubbish, Gabriel,” she said with a brief laugh that was anything but happy.

Gabriel was so pleased with his victory that he sat down beside Barbara.

“Oh well,” he said in order to say something, and he groaned a little. He ignored Pastor Poul. Nor did Pastor Poul look at him; he was so angry that everything went black before his eyes.

Gabriel gave a gentle laugh again and was sufficiently appeased to add, “No, of course it’s never been proved that it’s the angelica that causes leprosy. But, everyone knows that Hans, Niels the Point’s son, who was put in the leprosy hospital in Argir last year had gorged himself on angelica just before he was taken ill.”

Barbara made no reply to this, but suddenly she said, “Are you pleased you’re going to get married, Gabriel?”

She wanted to talk about something other than angelica.

“Pleased?” said Gabriel. “What the hell have I got to be pleased about?”

“Well, pleased about Suzanne for instance.”

“Hmm. Am I supposed to be pleased about the baby, do you think? Hardly.”

He sat with his elbows resting on his knees and staring down into the grass. Suddenly, he looked at Barbara and laughed: “No, it must be admitted that there was someone who managed things a lot better that evening.”

Barbara gasped.

“You’ve got it absolutely wrong,” she exclaimed vehemently. Laughter and indignation struggled for supremacy in her voice, and she gradually showed signs of blushing. But she did not manage to become angry.

Gabriel sat there laughing silently and watching her. He had the same gently offensive look as he had had that morning. He gave the minister the occasional searching glance. It was the first time he had turned his eyes on him. Pastor Poul had the same withdrawn expression that said he was keeping a grip on himself.