Mysteries (40 page)

Sara burst into a loud, hearty laugh. What was she to do with a fur coat?

Well, he saw her point, but that was her business; all she had to do was to accept it, give him the pleasure of accepting it.... Her cheerful laughter made him laugh as well, and he began bantering with her: Heavens, what beautiful shoulders she had! But would she believe it, one day he’d seen a little more of her than she realized. Well, it happened in the dining room, she was standing on a table washing the ceiling when he saw her through the crack in the door; her skirt was tucked up, he saw a foot, part of a leg—in fact, he had seen a good dozen inches of lovely leg. Heh-heh-heh. But however that might be, before nightfall, in a few hours, he would present her with a bracelet; she could take his word for it. Besides, she mustn’t forget that the fur coat was hers....

The crazy man, had he gone completely out of his mind? Sara laughed, but she was getting half frightened by his many strange ideas. The day before yesterday he had given a woman much more money than she had coming to her when she brought him his laundry; today he wanted to give away his fur coat. They were also saying all sorts of things about him in town.

SURE, HE WAS CRAZY, completely crazy. He had to be, for Sara offered him coffee, milk, tea, offered him beer, offered him everything she could think of, and yet he got up from the breakfast table soon after he had sat down, leaving the food untouched. He had suddenly remembered that Martha used to bring her eggs to the market just at this time; maybe she had returned by now. What a wonderful stroke of luck it would be if he could see her again, today of all days! He goes back to his room and positions himself by the window.

All of Market Square is before him, but he sees no Martha. He waits half an hour, an hour, keeping a sharp lookout for every corner, but to no avail. At length he concentrates his attention on a scene by the steps of the post office which has attracted many interested spectators: surrounded by a circle of people, in the middle of the sanded street, he sees Miniman jumping up and down, dancing. He has no coat on and has also taken off his shoes; he dances away and keeps wiping the sweat off his face, and when he stops he collects his pennies from the spectators. Sure enough, Miniman had resumed his old activity, he had started dancing again.

Nagel waits until he stops and people have dispersed before sending for him. And Miniman appears, respectful as ever, with bowed head and downcast eyes.

“I have a letter for you,” Nagel says. He gives him the letter, pushing it deep into his coat pocket, and starts talking to him. “You’ve put me in a very awkward position, my friend; you’ve fooled me, led me by the nose with a cunning I can’t help admiring, even though it has caused me great chagrin. Do you have a few moments? You’ll recall that I once promised you an explanation of something. All right, I’ll give you that explanation, I find that the moment has come. By the way, may I first ask you: have you heard that people in town are talking about me, saying I’m mad? Let me reassure you: I’m not mad, as you can see for yourself. Right? I admit I’ve been a bit confused lately, quite a few things have happened to me and not all of them pleasant; fate would have it that way. But now I’m quite well again, there’s nothing wrong with me. I ask you to bear this in mind.... I suppose it’s no use offering you anything to drink?”

No, Miniman didn’t want anything.

“Well, I knew that.... To come to the point, I’m full of mistrust toward you, Grøgaard. Maybe you understand what I’m referring to. You’ve cheated me so atrociously that I’ll no longer try to put the best face on it. You’ve simply hoodwinked me in a very important matter, out of pure altruism on your part, out of the kindness of your heart, if you will, but still you’ve done it. You once had this little bottle in your hands, right?”

Miniman squints up at the bottle but doesn’t answer.

“There was poison in it; it’s been emptied and filled half full with water. Last night there was only water in it.”

Miniman still says nothing.

“Well, actually, no evil deed has been committed. In fact, the perpetrator did it with a pure heart, to forestall evil. But it was you who did it.”

Pause.

“You did it, right?”

“Yes,” Miniman answers at last.

“Yes. And seen with your eyes it was the right thing to do, but seen with mine it appears quite different. Why did you do it?”

“I thought you might perhaps want to—”

Pause.

“Ah, there you see! But you were mistaken, Grøgaard, your kind heart led you astray. Didn’t I say expressly that night when you walked off with the poison that I would never have the courage to take it myself?”

“But I still feared you might do it. And now you have done it.”

“I have? What are you saying? Heh-heh, you’ve fooled yourself, my good man. It’s quite true I emptied the bottle last night, but take note: I didn’t taste a drop of its contents.”

Miniman looks at him in surprise.

“There you see, you’re laughing on the wrong side of your mouth! One takes a walk in the course of the night, one gets down to the quayside, runs across a cat writhing in the most terrible agony as it drags itself along the whole length of the pier. One stops and takes a good look at it; there’s something stuck in its throat, it’s a fish hook, and it coughs and squirms and can get it neither up nor down; but blood is streaming from its mouth. All right, one grabs the cat and tries to do something about that fish hook, but because of the pain the cat can’t keep still, rolls over on its back, makes a furious upward jab with its claws and gashes one’s cheek in a trice, much as, say, you can see my cheek has been gashed. But now the cat is on the verge of choking, and its throat is still bleeding. What should one do about it? While one ponders this, the church bell strikes two, so it’s too late to get any outside help; it’s two o’clock in the morning. Then one suddenly remembers the wonderful vial of poison in one’s vest pocket; wanting to put the animal out of its misery, one empties the vial into its throat. The animal suspects it’s swallowing something terribly dangerous, clinches up and, staring around with perplexed eyes, jumps sky-high—it breaks away and jumps sky-high, then continues to wriggle its way along the pier. How could that be? Well, you see, there was only water in the vial, it couldn’t kill, it could only add to its misery. The cat still has the hook in its throat and is bleeding and gasping for breath. Sooner or later it will bleed to death, or it will choke in some corner, mutely and horribly, alone.”

“It was done with the best intentions,” Miniman says.

“Of course! Everything you do is sincere and well-intentioned. One simply cannot catch you deviating from that, and in a way your noble, honorable trickery with my poison is nothing new for you. Take, for instance, your dancing in Market Square a moment ago. I was standing here by the window watching you. I’m not going to reproach you for it, I just want to ask you something: why had you taken off your shoes? You are wearing shoes now, after all, so why had you taken them off when you danced?”

“So I wouldn’t wear them out.”

“Just what I expected! I knew that would be your answer, that’s why I asked you. You are a walking image of immaculate purity, the most irreproachable soul in town. Everything about you is kind and unselfish, you’re without blemish or flaws. I tried to test you once, offering to pay you to assume the paternity of a strange child. Although you were poor and might need the money very badly, you promptly turned down the offer. Your soul revolted at the mere thought of such a shady deal, and I could get nowhere with you, though I offered you two hundred kroner. Had I known what I know now, I wouldn’t have insulted you so grossly. I didn’t yet have a clear impression of you, whereas now I know that vis-à-vis you one must at once spur one’s steed and rein him in. Well, that’s all right! But let’s go on with what we were talking about.... The fact that you take your shoes off and dance barefoot, without calling attention to yourself, without heeding the pain or complaining, just shows one of your character traits. You don’t whine, you don’t say, for instance: Look, I’m taking my shoes off so I won’t wear them out, I just have to, I’m so poor! No, you work, if I may say so, in silence. It’s a consistent principle of yours never to beg anything from anybody; you get all you want anyway, without opening your mouth. You are absolutely irreproachable, vis-à-vis other people as well as yourself, in your own consciousness. I place on record this character trait of yours and move on; you mustn’t be impatient, I’ll get to the explanation eventually.... You once said something about Miss Gude which I’ve often pondered; you said that she might not be quite so unapproachable at that, if one went about it in a nice way; at any rate, you had gotten quite far with her—”

“Oh but—”

“You see, I remember. It was the evening when the two of us were sitting here drinking together; that is, I was doing the drinking and you were looking on. You said that Martha—yes, you called her simply Martha, and you also said that she always called you Johannes, I’m telling the truth. She does call you Johannes, isn’t that so? I definitely remember your telling me that! All right. But you also said that Martha had gone so far as to allow you all kinds of liberties with her, and what’s more, you made a most disgusting gesture with your finger as you said it—”

Miniman jumps up, red in the face, and interrupts in a loud voice, “That I never said! I never said that!”

“You didn’t? What? You really didn’t say it? What if I called Sara and asked her to testify that she was in the next room during our conversation and heard every word through these thin walls? Well, I never! But anyway, your denial has knocked the bottom out of it. I would’ve liked to pump you a little more about this, it interests me, and I’ve often thought about it; but since you deny having said it, well. By the way, please sit down again, don’t leave head over heels as you did last time. Besides, the door is locked, I’ve locked it.”

Nagel lights a cigar, and as he lights it he suddenly checks himself.

“Oh, but dear me!” he says, “good heavens, what a mistake I’m making! Mr. Grøgaard, please forgive me; you’re right, you didn’t say that! Forget it, my friend, it was someone else who said it, not you, I remember it now; I heard it a couple of weeks ago. How could I think for a moment that you would compromise a lady—and above all compromise yourself—in such a way! I don’t understand how it could have occurred to me, I must be pretty mad, after all.... But look: I acknowledge it when I’ve made a mistake and apologize at once, so I can’t be mad, can I? And if, for all that, my talk is a bit disorganized, a bit wild, you mustn’t think it’s done on purpose; I’m not trying to turn your head with talk, you mustn’t think that. In any case, since you scarcely utter a word, that would be pretty impossible. No, the fact of the matter is I talk in this odd, unpremeditated way because that’s how I feel at the moment, no other reason. Pardon this digression. You’re getting impatient, anxious to hear that explanation, aren’t you?”

Miniman remains silent. Nagel rises and begins to walk nervously back and forth between the window and the door. Suddenly he stops and says, sick and tired of it all, “I really can’t be bothered to play games with you any longer, I’ll tell you my honest opinion! Sure enough, I have been talking confusingly to you, and until this moment I’ve been doing so on purpose, to get something out of you. I’ve been feeling my way, using every possible tack, but it’s all no use and I’m getting tired of it. All right, I’ll give you that explanation, Grøgaard! I believe in my heart that you are a secret scoundrel. A secret scoundrel.”

When Miniman begins to shake, his eyes casting anxious and perplexed looks in every direction, Nagel continues, “You don’t say a word, you don’t give yourself away. I can’t make you budge, you are a mute power of a rather rare sort, I admire you and take a great interest in you. Do you remember the time I talked to you for a whole evening and, among other things, stared hard at you and thought you gave a start? I did it to feel my way. I’ve kept an eye on you and tried all sorts of ways, almost always without success, I admit, because you are irreproachable. But I haven’t doubted for a moment that you were a quiet, sanctimonious secret sinner of some kind. I have no evidence against you, I’m afraid that is lacking, so you can feel quite safe, it will all be between the two of us. But since I have no evidence, how can I be so confident that I’m right, can you understand that? No, that you cannot grasp. And yet you have a way of ducking your head when we talk about certain things; you show a pair of eyes with this or that expression, eyes that blink at the very moment you utter such and such words or when we approach such and such questions. Besides, you have a voice with a sort of whistling sound, oh, what a voice! Ultimately, your person affects me with repugnance; I feel it in the air when you approach, my soul immediately winces with aversion. You can’t understand that, can you? Nor can I, but that’s the way it is. Even at this moment I feel convinced that I am on the right track, God knows I do, but I cannot catch you for lack of evidence. The last time you were here I asked you where you were on June 6—would you like to know why I asked you about that? All right, June 6 was the day Karlsen died, and until then I believed that you had murdered Karlsen.”

Thunderstruck, Miniman repeats, “That I had murdered Karlsen!” and falls silent.

“Yes, I had believed that all along until then. I suspected you’d done it—that’s how far my feeling that you were some kind of crook had driven me. I no longer believe that, I admit I was mistaken; I went too far, and I ask your forgiveness. Whether you believe me or not, I feel very sorry to have done you this great wrong, I’ve begged your pardon for it many an evening when I was alone. But though I was mistaken on this point, I’m still confident that you are an unclean, unctuous soul; I’ll be damned, but you are! I can feel it in my heart of hearts as I stand here looking at you, and strike me dead, you are! Why do I feel so certain? Note that, from the beginning, I had no reason to entertain anything but the best opinion of you, and all you’ve done and said subsequently has also been right and proper, even noble. Besides, I had an unusually beautiful dream about you—that you were in the middle of an open marsh, suffering terribly from my importunities, but that you kept thanking me all the same, throwing yourself on the ground and thanking me for my not tormenting you even more, for not doing you even more harm. That’s what I dreamed about you, and it was very beautiful. And there isn’t a soul in this town who thinks you capable of wrongdoing; you receive the best character reference from everybody, you have everybody’s sympathy—that shows how secretive you’ve been in your life. And yet, in my heart, I see you as a cowardly, groveling angel of the Lord, with a kind word about everybody and a good deed every day. But haven’t you slandered me, done me harm, given away my secrets? No, no, you haven’t; that’s just part of your insinuating ways—you do right by everyone, you never do wrong, you are pious and irreproachable and ever free from sin in people’s eyes. And to the world that’s enough, but to me it’s not; I still suspect you. The first time I saw you a curious thing happened to me. It was a few days after my arrival in town, at two o’clock in the morning. I saw you outside Martha Gude’s house down by the quayside. All of a sudden you were standing in the middle of the street, I hadn’t seen where you came from; you waited to let me pass, and as I went by you stole a sidelong glance at me. I hadn’t yet spoken to you, but a voice inside me drew attention to you, and the voice said your name was Johannes. If it’s the last word I’ll ever utter, my heart sang out that your name was Johannes and that I should take note of you. Only much later did I learn that it really was your name. I’ve been aware of you from that night on, but you have always evaded me, I haven’t been able to drive you into a corner. Finally you even go and adulterate a mouthful of poison for me, simply because of a kind and noble fear that I might possibly want to drink it. How can I explain to you how I feel about all this? Your purity brutalizes me, all your beautiful words and deeds only bring me further away from my goal: to knock you down. I shall rip off your mask and make you betray your true nature; my blood bridles with repugnance every time I see your mendacious blue eyes, and I shrink from you because I feel you have the soul of a counterfeiter.
¹
Even at this moment it appears to me you’re sitting there laughing inwardly, that despite your despairing, crushed expression you are still laughing a secret, filthy laugh over my inability to do you any harm for lack of evidence.”