The Prophets of Eternal Fjord (43 page)

Then at once he stiffens. Voices. He hears footsteps, the creak of a door. Someone speaks beneath him. Madame Kragstedt. Instinctively he rises to his haunches, ready to snuff out the light and conceal himself behind a barrel if anyone should venture to the loft. The Trader's voice replies. He relaxes. There seems to be no alarm. A door creaks again and shuts. The Madame has gone to the privy. He feels the good aquavit warm his blood, pictures with arousal the Madame's figure bent forward on the lavatory below, her stockings around her ankles, shift drawn up, the spray of her urine.

He collects himself. He is cold. It is time to fill his flask and return home.

He wonders what the Trader wants with so many kegs of aquavit. It is – not to put too fine a point on it – a sin, the vice of greed, to hoard so much provision without sharing it with others. He ought to take the Trader to task, reprove him, lash him with some biblical quotes. His anger returns. He feels it now to be a personal affront that he should be compelled to sneak up here in order to secure his winter sustenance. This time he will take with him enough to ensure that his trips back and forth become less frequent.

The keg is heavy and unwieldy. He tries to hoist it on to his shoulder, only for it to jar against the ceiling, and he realizes he must carry it in his arms. At the same time he needs to hold the lamp and the ham he has lifted from its hook. He staggers somewhat, momentarily unsteadied. The aquavit sloshes inside its wood, the ham slaps at his hip. He veers to the side, but recovers course. A plank creaks underfoot and yet he has no fear of being heard. Stooping forward, he proceeds cautiously towards the hatch. The lamp swings unmanageably in its cradle, striking against the ham. He wriggles his hand, attempting to shift the lamp so that it may hang from the crook of his arm. But the manoeuvre fails, the lamp falls to the floor. He hears a shatter of glass, looks down and sees that the flame has escaped its chamber and now ignites the gunpowder he has scuffed across the floor and which remains on his boot. He dances a jig to stamp it out, but succeeds only in causing it to spread. He pauses, the keg of aquavit cradled in his arms, and tries to focus his thoughts. But the fire spreads like spilled water across the planks, a blue breaking sea. The gunpowder flares, flames rise and crackle, and then he hears voices, downstairs at first, then outside. He recognizes the Trader's hoarse modu­lation as he roars out the alarm; the cry of the smith, who has the fire-watch; and he heads for the hatch, the cumbersome keg still clutched to his chest.

Jørgen? he hears below him. Jørgen! It is the Madame: she sounds so forlorn, solitary, as helpless as a captured bird.

Kragstedt shouts back. Return to bed! Hardly the soundest advice, Falck thinks, jiggling his legs to be free of the flame.

The gun! he hears Kragstedt holler. Bring the gun and I'll give the bloody thieves the fright of their lives! He hears footsteps running, more voices.

Now it's the whipping post and chains, he surmises, tap dancing towards the hatch. Behind him the fire spreads, flames lick the first barrels, the timber stanchions, then strive towards the hams at the ceiling, and he is cold no more. Orange tongues of fire, flashes of blue, red leaping flame. I know you, he realizes, the eunuch warned me about you.

Below, the Madame calls out again. Jørgen, I smell smoke!

Smoke, indeed, he says to himself, the whole loft is full of it and I am suffocating. But now he is at the hatch, he opens it and is too late, he sees, for the Trader and his men are already ascending the ladder with loaded flintlocks and eyes flashing with rage.

Who's there? the Trader demands. Halt in the name of the king!

Which is easier said than done when one's boots are on fire and one's arse is as hot as a frying pan. He senses the rush of air that is sucked into the loft, as though the room were taking a deep breath, and he sees how it causes the fire to blaze up behind him. He sees the carpenter, the abstainer, the soberest man in the colony excepting the natives. Their eyes meet, a millisecond of recognition, perhaps another of bemusement, before the carpenter throws up his arms in front of his face at this sudden encounter with flames and smoke, and Falck is about to speak; to say he is sorry would be the most appropriate utterance, but as he bends down to climb through the hatch the pressure leaps inside the loft, which is now a powder room, and he feels an abrupt force against his back: the hatch is the gun barrel, he the grapeshot, and as the roof is blown from the colony house he is projected high above the snow-clad fells towards the shimmering Northern Lights, out into the universe and inwards into the depths of his own being; he dissolves into the aurora, is torn from his own flailing body, a human cannonball, and his keg of aquavit blown out into the winter's night, expelled into a place where even the silence has no name.

When he wakes up he is safe and sound in a cot, naked though wrapped in skins. The ceiling is low; he would bump his head if he tried to sit up, which he has absolutely no intention of doing. A lamp burns; the room is warm. It is a tidy chamber, though small, a cosy den. The only thing wrong is that it leans rather drastically to one side.

And now he understands. He is back in his cabin on board
Der Frühling
. His voyage is incomplete, he has yet to reach his destination, he has dreamed a nightmare of four years. Or is he on his way home? And why does the cabin lean thus? Is the ship about to sink?

The widow leans over him.

Awake?

He moves his lips. He does not know if any sound comes out.

She holds his head and gives him some water. It is the strongest water he has ever tasted. He splutters. The widow laughs.

Spit it out. There is plenty here. A whole keg.

Go away, he breathes. You are not real.

Go away yourself, Priest, if you can. This is my chamber.

He sleeps. When he wakes up she is gone. I knew you were not real, he says to himself. Such relief.

It dawns on him where he is. The
Taasinge Slot
, the wreck. This must be the captain's cabin. He must have dragged himself here, half-conscious. He remembers the loft, the burning gunpowder, the boots of the men on the ladder. The darkness. The aurora. And then a deeper darkness that ought to have been death, followed by one of the lower levels of Purgatory, but apparently it was not.

Behind his eyelids the light is removed. He opens his eyes, but still it is dark. He fumbles for the tallow candle, but succeeds only in knocking some objects to the floor. He falls back on to the cot. In reality he is lying halfway up the wall on account of the leaning vessel.

And then the widow is with him again. She sits up against the bulk­head, cutting hunks from a ham and putting them in her mouth. He groans. When will this nightmare end?

Slept well? There is both kindness and sarcasm in her voice. It is a surprisingly delicate dream.

Good ham, says the widow. But the priest won't be able to chew it with such miserable stumps instead of teeth. Here. She takes a lump from her mouth and puts it inside his. He presses it against his palate and sucks on it. It is salty and tastes of the Trader's loft.

The widow removes her outer garments, then climbs into the cot with him, shuddering with cold.

Warm me up.

It is you, he says.

I live here, she says. I have lived here for some time.

How have you managed?

My brother looks after me.

I didn't know you had a brother.

Neither did I. We only just found out.

I see.

Soon we will leave, you and I, she says.

Together? Where will we go?

To Habakuk and Maria Magdalene. They are waiting for you.

I must remain in my calling, he says. My work is incomplete.

You have done enough, she says. The colony house is burned to the ground. The carpenter is dead. The Madame has lost her mind. What more do you need to do?

He says nothing for some time. He allows the information to settle.

Do they know who caused the blaze?

I know, she says.

When his thoughts become clearer she tells him what happened. Every man, woman and child in the colony took part in extinguishing the fire. She saw the charred body of the carpenter, burning hot, the snow melting around it. Constable Bjerg was badly burned, but survived. She saw him come running from the crew's quarters, pursued by a flaming tail of fire. The smith was unharmed and seemed even to be in his element. He poked at the carpenter's corpse and said it was as good as fried!

And Madame Kragstedt, says Falck, what about her?

The Trader ran backwards and forwards in front of the burning house, the widow says. He called out for his wife, but everyone was sure she had perished. The house was consumed. No one could get anywhere near because of the heat. Joists collapsed, windows burst in loud explo­sions. Each time a keg of aquavit went up there was a rushing sound followed by a bang that caused everyone to duck. The Trader stood with his hands at his sides, staring up at the house. The smith said something about intruders in the loft. He was of the opinion some of the natives had been out plundering.

Falck says nothing.

Then someone screamed. At first the widow thought it was the fire, so inhuman was the sound. Then it came again and everyone turned and looked in the same direction. It was the strangest sight, says the widow. From the steep incline behind the colony house a figure came floating across the snow. It appeared in the light from the flames, twirling like some great flake of soot, but then she saw that the figure was flailing; it screamed again, as hoarsely as a raven. It sought out the house, as though it wanted to go in, and then everyone could see who it was; they shouted to her and the smith ran up and took hold of her, dragged her away and fell on top of her. I kneeled beside her, says the widow, but I could not bring myself to touch her, for she stank so foully and was covered from head to toe in some slimy substance, and then of course I realized what had happened.

The Madame was in the privy when the house exploded, says Falck, and recalls her footsteps below him as he stood in the loft. She was covered in excrement.

She had been on the lavatory reading, says the widow. She would do so often when I worked at the house, sometimes for hours on end. The Madame is fortunate to be such an avid reader, though she did not seem happy.

What book was she reading? Falck asks.

He must have suffered serious concussion; he feels dizzy; his head aches and he is pained by a sense of everything taking place at staggered inter­vals. His mind is addled by the kind of distraction whereby one finds one's own utterances to be clear, while others seem to speak in a delirium. Apart from that, he is fine. He discovers the keg of aquavit she has recov­ered and brought to the wreck. He drinks a little. He offers the widow a cup. She drinks.

I knew you would be glad for the aquavit, she says. It was heavy to carry. I almost gave up.

It was kind of you, he says.

The blubber lamp hangs by a cord from the ceiling, the peat wick burns unevenly; she attends to it the whole time, straightening it with the trimmer. In the evening she gives him boiled stockfish, which he devours ravenously. She chatters away, though he does not understand a word.

This is the new home the Lord hath prepared for me, he thinks to himself. Thank you, Lord.

He is unclear as to whether the matter of Madame Kragstedt and the fire was something he dreamed, so he asks the widow and she tells him the story again, about how the Madame came floating down from the incline like an angel covered in filth from the privy tub.

How awful, he says.

But he does not think it awful at all. He finds it banal and tedious.

Everyone is asking about you, says the widow. You must go back to the colony; otherwise they will find out what happened. Madame Kragstedt is out of her mind; she goes about in the warehouse where she and the Trader are living until the new colony house is built, searching for her things. My brother would like to see you back, too. His son is ill. Perhaps you can help.

Your brother, says Falck. Have I met your brother?

You can meet him later today, she says. He is coming here to collect you.

The captain's cabin of the
Taasinge Slot
is warm. The horizon leans like seasickness in the portholes, half the planks are broken away and the gaps filled with whatever materials were at hand. I am content here, he protests. I wish to remain here for the rest of my days.

The widow smiles and shakes her head.

This is my home, she says. Yours is in the colony.

I thought you said you were going to take me to Eternal Fjord.

I will. But the time is not right.

The door opens. A man steps into the diagonal cabin. He stands with one foot on the floor, the other against the bulkhead.

Magister Falck.

Falck lifts his head in the cot and stares at him.

Bertel? Is that you?

Yes, it is me. And here you are, Priest. What a cosy little arrange­ment.

The widow steps up and kisses him.

Magister Falck, Bertel says again. Everyone is looking for you. I don't know why you are hiding here, nor do I wish to know. But I think it best that you come home.

He sits up, supporting himself on stiffened arms, and glances from one to the other. Do you two know each other?

I told you, I found out I had a brother, says the widow.

The Eighth Commandment

Questions and Answers (1791)

The Eighth Commandment, as it is most plainly to be taught by a father to his family:

‘Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.'

What does this imply?

Answer: That we should fear and love God, so that we may not deceitfully belie, betray and backbite our neighbour, nor raise an evil report; but we should excuse and speak well of him and direct all things for the best.

Bertel decides to try his luck fishing while there is still ice on the ford. He gathers his tackle, lines, hooks, ice pick. Outside, on the roof of the house, he has left a pair of sealskin mittens, now frozen stiff. He cuts them into strips and puts them on the hooks for bait.

The boy wants to go with him.

You are not well enough yet, says Bertel. Promise me you will stay in bed. We'll go out in the spring and then I will teach you to fire the gun.

Why not today? I promise to wrap up warm. There is an accusing tone about his voice, as if it is his father's fault that he must stay in bed all winter.

Bertel is in dejected mood as he makes his way across the ice, but the cold air freshens his thoughts and quickly brightens his aspect. On his feet are the skis he has covered with sealskin, the hairs of which are faced to prevent him from sliding backwards. He makes good speed, rounding the promontory where the wreck of the
Taasinge Slot
lies, then entering the bay where sometimes the wolf fish gather in the shallow waters. The sun makes the sheer fell light up like a torch. He chooses a spot where he knows there is a good current and where the ice is therefore thinner, and begins to hack his way down to the water. With his bowl he scoops up the mush of ice that collects as he works, dousing the edges of the hole with water until a hard, smooth rim is formed. When the hole is nearly an ell in width, he drops in his line and hooks. A bundle of nails from the Trade is his plummet. He feels it touch the bottom, then stands and jerks the line, his back against the cold and his skin hat pulled down to cover his neck.

A raven circles at the fell, drawing figures of eight in the air; it turns with such ease, now and then raggedly cawing out, watching him. He smiles and realizes he is praying to it, the spirit of the raven, praying for a catch, a heathen practice in which he ought not to indulge, even in secret. He says the Lord's Prayer out loud to make up for it, only then to add: Great Raven, give me a big fish and I shall leave its guts for you.

Presently he feels a tug on the line. He can feel what kind of a fish it is; each species has its own way of taking the bait; some do not struggle, others, the small ones especially, fight as though possessed. This one resists, then resigns and becomes but dead weight. He heaves it on to the ice without difficulty and is contented. A wolf fish!

It is a good fish, almost an arm's length, perhaps ten pounds in weight; the head is large and knobbled, the eyes stare emptily into death. Ever since he was a boy and his uncle told him that if they manage to bite they will not release until they sense the bone is crushed, he has been afraid of the strong jaws and sharp, fang-like teeth of the wolf fish. Swiftly he stabs the knife into its head and watches the sullen mouth stiffen. He makes a long incision in the belly and allows the liver, stomach and intes­tines to spill out on to the snow as he has promised. Then he fastens the line to the lower jaw and drags his catch off across the ice with a cry over his shoulder of
takanna!
– dinner! He looks back and sees the raven descend in decreasing circles, then land.

A man does wisely, he thinks to himself, to stay friends with the raven. He hastens to say the Lord's Prayer once more.

At home he hangs the fish by the door. Later he will boil it. His mouth waters at the thought of the thick layer of fat beneath the skin, how it will open between his teeth and the juices seep into his mouth.

The boy is lying with his book open, exactly as before.

You have not been up, have you?

No.

Stubborn. Defensive.

Have you been out, boy?

Silence.

He is afraid of being found out, yet he also wants me to know that he can defy me, Bertel thinks to himself.

He goes up to the bed and pulls the covers aside. The boy is fully dressed, the bedding wet with melted snow. The boy grins cheekily, eyes fixed firmly on his book.

You have been out to see them put the roof on the new colony house, he says, taking the boy's chin in his hand, turning his face to make him look at his father. Then he strokes the boy's hair. Was it exciting?

They fired the cannon, says the boy. Three times.

Yes, I heard the salute. Did they hit anything?

The boy laughs. They laugh together. Then Bertel shows him the wolf fish and they help each other prepare it. For the first time in a long while, the boy eats up.

All will be well again, Bertel thinks.

Question: How may the world be categorized?

Answer: Into the spiritual world and the physical world.

Spring, light, renewed hope. But also: thaw, wet floors, soaked stockings, dripping ceilings, cold feet and coughs. The boy has a fever; he lies staring up with eyes that are moist. On the now-returned Falck's instruc­tion, Bertel lays a cold compress on his forehead, a warm compress on his chest. He is not entirely convinced of the wisdom of such opposing reme­dies, but he is reluctant to do otherwise. He knows the priest has studied medicine; he speaks often of the lectures he attended and of how he only pursued theology to appease his ageing father. Bertel has no choice but to trust in his judgement.

How are you feeling? he asks the boy.

Well.

Oddly enough, the answer makes him feel even more anxious.

He asks Falck to come and attend to the boy again. The priest does not appear to be in the best of health himself. Besides his bad eye, which resembles fish meat, white and matt and presenting a lattice of tiny red veins, Morten Falck is rather sickly of appearance and has acquired the peculiar habit of frequently tipping his head to one side, as though he were listening out for something. He speaks much of his cow, the only decent being in the entire colony, he says, which presumably is why she is allowed to maintain such good health. The cook is laid up again, this time definitively so. Falck considers the man has but weeks to live at most. The Kragstedts have moved into the new colony house, though the Madame continues to wander about in search of her former belongings and seems unable to grasp the fact that they were destroyed in the fire. She speaks in torrents of nonsense; the Trader sits brooding in his chair facing the wall. Hammer has moved out into his workshop on a perma­nent basis; he labours at his anvil day and night, but no one knows what he is working on, perhaps not even himself. Constable Bjerg seems to have recovered from his burns, though appears consumed by religious longing and speaks of travelling into the ford and joining the prophets, no matter that it would hardly be good for him.

Even I, says Falck with a cough, who have always considered myself to be an enlightened and rational individual, have had certain, er, expe­riences of late.

What kind of experiences? Bertel asks.

Have you not heard or seen anything? Falck replies. Trumpet calls? Hymns? People who, er, ought not to be there?

I have enough with mortal matters, says Bertel curtly. But Magister Krogh did speak of such things before he did away with himself.

I saw my poor deceased mother last week, says Falck with melan­choly. I wonder what it means? And the gold I washed from a river in the north has disappeared.

Gold? says Bertel.

Stolen, says Falck. While I was staying on the wreck. I don't suppose you would know anything about it, Bertel?

I didn't steal the priest's gold! Bertel snaps. I didn't know he had any. Was it not rather careless of him to leave it lying about in the Mission house?

Indeed, says Falck sadly. It is my own fault, I know. There was a whole new life there, Bertel, it was enough to get me settled back home, a fortune. And now it is gone.

He sits down next to the boy and senses their spirits lift. He asks him about his reading and the boy shows him the book he is on. Falck flicks through the pages; the boy stops him to point out an illustration and read a passage aloud. Falck calls him Professor Bertelsen and they agree it is a fine title. He opens his medical bag.

The boy sits up, pulls his shirt above his chest and follows Falck's instructions. They exchange banter and chuckle. Falck lets him borrow his stethoscope and pulls up his own shirt. The boy listens intently.

I can hear the pastor's heart.

Oh, thank goodness, I must still be alive then, says Falck.

Wait, I can hear something else, too, says the boy.

Falck sits with his back hunched towards him as he moves the chest-piece about. He looks at him over his shoulder. What do you hear, Professor Bertelsen?

Music, says the boy and laughs. A whole brass band. It think it must be the royal musicians.

Bertel stands watching as they jest and speak of things he does not understand and is excluded from. He feels a stab of jealousy.

Falck takes back the stethoscope. He taps his fingers against the boy's back, then his chest. He listens to his lungs, retracts the eyelids and studies the mucous membrane, feels his throat and under his arms. Bertel tries to infer something from the priest's facial expressions.

Well? He looks enquiringly at Falck as he returns the stethoscope to his bag.

A minor case of consumption, says Falck. When the summer comes with warmer weather, it will subside.

He has been sick every winter for years, says Bertel.

Childhood is a perilous voyage, says Falck with a mournful smile. Once the beard begins to show on the chin, it will usually be overcome.

That will be a while yet, says Bertel.

Give him salt, Falck instructs.

Salt?

A tablespoon every day, to facilitate the flow of the bodily fluids. Moreover, plenty of fresh water. And fatty food, he adds. Do you make sure to eat what your father prepares for you?

The boy nods.

Liar, says Bertel.

The boy looks away.

He will hardly eat a thing, says Bertel. Not so much as a spoonful.

A little later Falck returns with a jug of fresh milk. He makes the boy drink a glass of it.

I don't like it, says the boy.

Hold your nose when you swallow, Falck says, then you won't taste it.

The boy pulls a face, but does as he is told.

Falck pats him on the shoulder. Professor Bertelsen, you must promise me to drink a jug of milk every day, otherwise you will not be as clever and wise as your father. Will you promise me that?

The boy nods.

He takes the salt as Falck has prescribed, swallowing it dutifully, though gagging with revulsion. But when Bertel pours him a glass of milk in the evening he will not have it.

The priest has told you to, says Bertel.

My stomach hurts, the boy complains.

That's because it's empty, Bertel tells him. If you drink a little or eat something it will get better, just like Pastor Falck said.

But the boy has turned his face to the wall and refuses to either eat or drink. Bertel sees the hint of a victorious smile on his face and knows this is a battle he cannot win.

Question: What may be noted in general about the true movement of the planets?

Answer: Any planet exhibits a double movement; that is: (1) Its orbit around the sun, and (2) Its rotation around its own axis.

He gets Lydia, his sister, to come and mind him while he is away with Mr Falck. She brings her daughter with her, the boy's cousin, he reasons, and at the same time his father's sister and her own mother's sister, Oxbøl's child and grandchild. An incestuous mess. How strange to have these new people in one's family, he thinks. And yet he is in many ways glad to have met his sister. He sees that they resemble each other, in appearance and temperament, and that both resemble their secret father, old Oxbøl. She is the only person who knows who his father is, apart from Sofie, who has guessed. They are together in a shameful matter, something that has hitherto been silence and great solitude. Now they speak of it occasionally, he and his sister, and for this reason life has become somewhat easier.

The visit livens the boy up, and a couple of days later he rises from bed. The children sit at the table. The boy reads aloud for his cousin, explains to her the trajectories of the planets and that of the Moon around the Earth. The girl stares at him with a smile that is at once febrile, gorm­less and inbred. Her head nods with fatigue.

Are you listening to what I say? the boy asks.

Yes, says the girl. Her elbows lean against the edge of the table. They keep falling down. She puts them up again and rests her chin in her hand.

If you don't listen, you won't learn anything and then you will be no better than the savages.

I'm listening.

What was the last thing I said?

Something about water?

The properties of water, says the boy. What are the properties of water?

I don't know what a property is.

What does it do?

Make you less thirsty.

The boy sighs. Go and lie down, you're tired.

The girl shuffles over to the cot and pulls a blanket over her head. She coughs in her sleep. The boy remains seated at the table, turning the pages of the book in the lamplight. Bertel lies secretly watching him, with curbed affection. He has become long-limbed during the past year, but skinny too. If only all that reading could put some weight on him, he thinks.

His sister appears not to care much for her daughter. She gave her over to the natives while she was in the Trader's household and could fill her belly every day. Now that she is no longer in their employ, the girl's presence seems to annoy her. Bertel cannot understand her. He has considered adopting the child and thinks it would be good for the boy to have company. But he finds it unpleasant to think of who the father is and that his own inherited characteristics, so to speak, are doubled within her.