The Elephant Keepers' Children (24 page)

Anaflabia and Vera and Thorkild and his wife follow on the heels of the powdered wig. I sense they would rather remain behind and investigate their suspicions further, but the funny thing is that a great many grown-ups, even born generals and field marshals like Thorkild Thorlacius and Anaflabia Borderrud, lose some of their powers of judgment when addressed by a person in uniform, so within a moment they are gone and only Maria remains, together with Basker, the count, Tilte and me, and now we form a circle around Rickardt Three Lions and he is painfully aware that unless he delivers an explanation, he will be lucky to get away with severe corporal damage.

“It was my archlute,” he says. “Forces of darkness took it away from me. All of a sudden it was gone. But I need it with me, I've promised to play at the conference, and music is the path to religious experience. I was in a pickle, but then the little blue men came to my aid. They showed me where it was
locked up and where the key was. But how was I to bring it on board? I needed to think quickly. And that was when the little men told me about the coffin. I opened it, though it was a challenge. I'm not good with my hands, as you know. The lute fitted perfectly, and the coffin was even upholstered.”

“So you put Maria in the carriage?”

“I'm afraid I didn't know the lady at the time. But I followed the instructions of the little men. She's as cold as a cold turkey. I had to wear gloves. And she, of course, needed a hat and a pair of sunglasses.”

“Rickardt,” says Tilte, her tone ominous, “did the little men also tell you how to get her on board the ship?”

The count shakes his head.

“That's sometimes the problem. They only give you the initial inspiration, if you know what I mean.”

It would be a stretch to say that Maria from Maribo was loved by one and all when she was alive. A closer approximation of the facts would be to admit that most people took it for granted that on a full moon she transformed into a werewolf. So her posthumous reputation would be unlikely to cause Tilte and me to break down and weep at the thought of leaving her behind on the quay. On the other hand, Bermuda Seagull Jansson and all the great world religions do stress the importance of treating the dead with respect and consideration, and moreover both Tilte and I realize that once it was discovered Maria was missing, a search would be initiated, and if there's one thing you don't need when traveling under a false identity, it's a maritime inquiry and subsequent cabin search.

“Rickardt,” I say, “how did you get her from the hearse down to the carriage?”

The count opens the luggage box at the rear of the carriage and takes from within it a folding wheelchair. Tilte and I gaze at each other, in telepathic agreement as to the nature of our next move.

The ship is boarded
by means of a gangway, and at the gangway stands the ship's captain in white uniform and gold-braided cap together with Svend Sewerman in order that he may wish us all a safe and pleasant journey. Svend lights up in a big smile when he sees us, and then his gaze falls upon Maria in her wheelchair.

For a moment I fear that Tilte will present Maria from Maribo as yet another member of the Ahlefeldt-Laurvig family, but fortunately even she appears to think it would be pushing our luck.

“The Leader of the Vedantist Sangha,” she says.

Svend moves forward with the clear intention of kissing the hand of Maria from Maribo. It is an intention that must be thwarted.

“I'm sorry,” I whisper to Svend. “Chastity vows. I'm sure you understand. No man must ever touch the abbess.”

Svend steps respectfully aside, an aluminum ramp is produced, and muscular seamen roll Maria on board and show us to our cabin. I am struck by a slight sadness at the fact that Maria was unable to be a part of all this when she was alive. Being manhandled by several muscular young men all
at once would most certainly have given her far more pleasure than even her hollow scoops of ice cream. As we pass through the ship, we notice the restaurant and the galley, and at once Tilte and I exchange knowing looks, because where there's a restaurant there's a kitchen, and where there's a kitchen there's a cold store, and if there's one thing a person is looking out for when lumbered with a dead body, it's a cold store.

Anyone who thinks
that ships' cabins are always cramped broom cupboards with bunk beds and a porthole would do well to take a trip on the
White Lady of Finø
. Our cabin is as big as a ballroom and looks like something out of the
Arabian Nights
. The bed is in the shape of a heart and draped with red velvet. There's a three-piece suite and a marble bathroom complete with dressing gowns and Persian slippers, and in any other circumstances Tilte and I would have permitted ourselves to enjoy such luxury to the full. But as soon as the seamen have gone, we roll Maria from Maribo back out into the corridor, through the empty restaurant, and into the deserted galley, at the rear of which we find the cold store we have been hoping for.

It is a cold store that sets out to make an impression on the world, as big inside as a caravan and packed from floor to ceiling with all manner of quadrupeds hanging from hooks, skinned and slaughtered in accordance with the prescriptions of Islamic law. And there at the very back of the store, from
where she may enjoy the passage undisturbed until we manage to locate her coffin and put her back inside it, we park Maria and cover her up with some white trash bags. That done, we return to our cabin, sit down on the sofa, and place the parcel from Mother's and Father's safe-deposit box on the table in front of us.

Inside the wrapping
is the kind of black cardboard box in which Father stores his sermons. It contains several bundles of paper held together with elastic bands. We begin with a bundle of newspaper clippings.

They are about the Grand Synod, and there are hundreds of them. At first, we have no understanding of how Mother and Father could have laid hands on them, because they are from all sorts of different papers, and the only one to which we subscribe in the rectory is that well-known international journal the
Finø Gazette
. But the explanation is that they are all printouts from the Internet that have been cut to size. They go back three years, the first of them mentioning the conference as though it were still a flight of fancy, but they become increasingly definite and sensational, and the most recent are fully confident of the event being realized. These latter articles even contain pictures of important delegates who have already agreed to come, and the papers report that they will be arriving from all over the world to represent Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Judaism, as well as various forms of nature worship and schools of the occult.

There is a large photo of the Dalai Lama with what I would call a penetratingly kind look in his eyes that makes you think that, styled and with a white beard and red hood, he would make a marvelous Santa in the Christmas grotto at Finø Town's community hall. Next to him is the pope wearing a smile that in no way poses any danger to the Dalai Lama's candidacy in that respect, but it nevertheless might conceivably qualify him to look after the smallest children during the Christmas revue. There are pictures of the metropolitan of Constantinople, and of other metropolitans, too, and one can only give Tilte her due and say that Finn Flatfoot could double for any of them at a religious service if only he kept his mouth shut and left Titmouse at home. There are a number of grand muftis as well, and while I have said that I am rather uncertain as to what that title actually covers, I can confess to not having seen a more awesome outfit than theirs since the Finø Amateur Dramatic Society put on
Son of Ali Baba
last year. And there are pictures of monks from Mount Athos, besides, and Mongolian shamans and Spanish Carmelite nuns, and the papers write that the Grand Synod will be the largest ever gathering of representatives of the world religions, and that moreover it will be the first time in history that the subject of religious experience will be discussed on such a huge scale. And then the journalist writing that particular piece goes completely over the top, because not only is this true, but the whole event is to take place in Denmark, at historical Filthøj Castle in northern Sjælland, which is absolutely fantastic because it once more goes to show that even though we consider ourselves to be a
small nation, in the broader scheme of things we are actually the most tolerant and welcoming, and one gets the feeling from his writing that the greatest and most widespread religion of all is and always will be self-satisfaction.

And now that Tilte and I have read this far, we stumble upon the bombshell. Because the next clipping in the pile focuses not on the conference itself but on something else altogether. At the top of the article is a picture of a black pointed hat that looks like it might belong to some great wizard, and another showing some small dark statuettes that could be from the bargain bin of a rummage sale. Next to these are pictures of jewel-studded tiaras, the kind you buy from toy shops off the Internet and that Tilte used to wear until she reached the age of five. A final picture shows what could be creme eggs and stones from the beach all mixed up together, but then follows the caption:

Tilte and I exchange looks. The ship rolls beneath us.

It goes without saying that we do not shun the opportunity to reach inside and ask ourselves who at this moment is experiencing such total paralysis.

But after we have done so, we must make room for indignation.

It's not that one can't take pleasure in seeing others make progress in life, especially when it's your parents. But making progress isn't enough on its own, one also has to consider in what direction such progress is progressing. And right now, as we sit here in front of all these newspaper clippings, Tilte and I share the thought that our mother and father seem to be progressing in giant evolutionary leaps toward at least eight years in prison.

The next pile of papers contains invoices, and at first they make no sense. Everything they itemize has been purchased within the last three months, from perhaps twenty different firms, some of which are located abroad. We flick through
them at random and pick out bills for equipment bought from Grenå Electrical Supplies, fittings from Møll & Madame in Anholt Town, overalls of waterproof Beaver Nylon from Rugger & Rammen of Læsø. There are bills for two mobile phones and SIM cards, for something called
closed-cell foam leg protectors
, and two from the Grenå Pump Factory specifying
syringe pumps
. There are bills for stopwatches, for neon propylene rope, and an inexplicable invoice for something called an
18-foot wave-breaker
to the tune of fifty thousand kroner, to which has been added a 40 hp outboard motor for another fifty thousand. And this is all the more inexplicable because we know that Mother and Father have never voluntarily boarded any vessel less stable than the Finø ferry. Then come a number of invoices in languages we cannot read, and a slip of paper upon which we gaze rather more pensively, which is a receipt for five two-hundred-liter containers of soft soap from Samsø Sanitation Ltd.

We look at each other.

“It's all the gear they need to pull off the heist,” I say.

We open the last parcel and find that it contains a flash drive and nothing else.

“We must pay Leonora a visit,” says Tilte, “and appeal to Buddhist compassion.”

We permit ourselves to enter
without knocking. Leonora's on the phone. She blows us a kiss.

“Listen carefully, dear,” she says to the woman on the other end. “I'm on my way out to sea where there's no mobile
coverage, so in a minute our connection will be lost. What you must do is to tighten the noose, give him six of the best with his fishing rod, look him in the eye and tell him:
This is what love feels like, Fatty
.”

The desperate housewife on the other end protests.

“Of course you can do it,” says Leonora patiently. “But love without a filter is too much to begin with. That's why we need to start off with the thumbscrews and the dildo and the guillotine. They're like sunglasses to stop you being dazzled by the light. You have to get him used to it gradually. When autumn comes, spanking can be replaced by playful love bites. And by the end of the year, he can make do with the fetters and the sjambok.”

The connection is lost. Leonora mumbles a mantra to get her annoyance under control. Tilte places the flash drive in front of her.

We are gathered around the laptop
, because Leonora, of course, has her computer with her, and the
White Lady of Finø
is naturally equipped with high-speed Internet. The drive whirs, Leonora glances up at the screen, and this time a mantra is not enough. This time she swears.

“Protected by password. Nothing I can do about it.”