Tove Jansson - Fair Play

Darkness had fallen imperceptibly. Mari could make out almost nothing but the foam on the breakers. To the east, the seas broke over the rocks in a waterfall and crashed on through the lagoon. To the west, the breakers boiled around the point. There, somewhere in the middle, lay Viktoria .

After a while, Mari went back to the cabin.

“Well?” said Jonna.

“It’s remarkable,” Mari said. “Here in the house the storm sounds completely different. It sort of flows together; I mean like a long, humming tone. You tried to get it on a cassette once and it just sounded like an endless crunching…”

“How was she doing?” Jonna asked sharply.

“Good, I think. You can’t see very much.”

“You can use that acoustical stuff,” Jonna said. “You seem to work a storm into almost everything you write. Did you check the stern lines?”

Mari said, “I think they’re under water. It’s risen.”

They sat opposite each other at the table without talking. How Papa loved storms, Mari thought. The wind coming up would wipe away his melancholy and make him happy. He’d set the spritsail and take us out to sea…

Jonna said, “I know what you’re thinking. That you always hoped for storms because they made him happy. And when a storm like this blew up, didn’t he used to say ‘I think I’ll go down and look at the boat’? But you know, he just went out to look at the waves!”

“We knew that,” Mari said. “But we didn’t say anything.”

Jonna went on. “It was certainly no trick for your father to pull up his boat; it was child’s play. Shouldn’t we eat something?”

“No,” Mari said.

“Do you think there’s any point in going down to have another look?”

“Hardly. There’s nothing we can do.”

“When was it we realized we couldn’t do it any more? Years ago?”

“Maybe. It happened gradually.”

“When you were dragging up stones from the anchorage.”

“About then,” Mari said. “But it was actually interesting, not being strong enough to lift and roll any more. It gave me ideas, you know — completely new ideas. About lifting, leverage, balance, angles of fall, about trying to use logic.”

“Yes,” said Jonna. “Trying to figure things out, I know. But don’t talk to me about leverage right now. Is there anything left in that bottle?”

“A splash, I think.” Mari went to get the rum and two glasses. The storm’s humming monotone filled the room — steady, soporific, like an imperceptible trembling. They might have been on board a large steamer.

“He travelled a great deal,” Jonna said.

“Well, yes, when he got grants.”

Jonna said, “I’m not talking about your father. I’m talking about mine. He used to tell us about his trips. You never knew what he was making up and what really happened.”

“Even better,” Mari said.

“No, wait… They were awful, terrifying things, including storms, although he’d never been to sea.”

“But that can make them even better,” Mari said.

“You’re interrupting. And when he was talked out and didn’t know how to end it, he’d just say, ‘And then it started to rain and everyone went home.’”

“Excellent,” Mari said. “Wonderful. Endings can be really hard.” She went to get the cheese and the crispbread and then went on. “He didn’t tell us stories. He never talked much at all, now that I think about it.”

Jonna cut the cheese in pieces and said, “We used to go to the library, the two of us. Just Papa and me. It was like being in his pocket.”

“I know. He knew where the wild mushrooms grew, and he’d take us there and light his pipe and say, ‘Family! Pick!’ But he preferred going alone. Then he’d hide his mushroom baskets under a spruce and take us back with him at night, with torches, you know. It was frightening and wonderful. And he’d pretend he’d forgotten which spruce it was… And then we’d sit on the porch and clean mushrooms with the night all around and the kerosene lantern burning…”

“You said all that in some newspaper,” Jonna said, and filled the glasses with the last of the rum. “Old Smuggler. Put that to soak; I want to save the label.”

“Was he really brave enough to do serious smuggling?” Mari asked.

“Oh he was brave enough to do anything.”

“But my father was social,” Mari said. “You remember prohibition when Estonian vodka would float ashore and everyone went out to salvage it? Do you know what they did? They sold the canisters for huge sums of money! But he never did that. He let me go with him to search the beaches, young as I was. I’ll never forget it. We hid the canisters in seaweed. He was adventurous.”

“Wrong,” said Jonna. “He was an adventurer. There’s a big difference.”

“You mean your father?”

“Of course, that’s who I’m talking about. You know what I mean. He dug for gold, cut down enormous redwoods, built railways… You saw the gold watch he got in Nome when he was guarding fish, the one with the inscription?”

“Yes,” Mari said. “A genuine Hamilton.”

“Precisely. A genuine Hamilton.”

It had now started to rain, and that wasn’t good. A heavy rain could weigh down Viktoria and hamper her movements in the heavy seas. Mari tried to be funny. “And then it started to rain and everyone went home.” But Jonna didn’t laugh. After a while Mari asked, “Didn’t he ever get homesick?”

“Yes. But when he came home he wanted to be off again.”

“Mine, too,” Mari said.

The rain got worse and worse — a real downpour.

Mari chattered on. “You know what he did when he got his government prize? He bought a paletot, you know — an overcoat. It was long and black and new, and he didn’t like it. He said it made him feel like one of his own statues, so he went to Hesperia Park and hung it on a tree.”

They listened to the rain.

“She’ll get too heavy,” Mari said. “And we can’t get out to her to bail.”

Jonna said, “Don’t tell me things I already know.”

They both knew well enough. The rain would go on, the boat would grow heavy, the waves would come in over the stern, she’d sink in her lines. But how deep would she sink, and would the rocks on the bottom knock her to pieces, or was it calm down there despite the storm, and how deep was it, how many metres…?

“Did you admire him?” Jonna asked.

“Naturally. But being a father wasn’t easy for him.”

“Not for mine, either,” Jonna said. “It’s funny. You actually know very little. We never asked, never tried to find out about the things that were really important. We didn’t have time. What was it we were so busy with?”

Mari said, “Work probably. And falling in love — that takes an awful lot of time. But we still could have asked.”

“Let’s go to bed,” Jonna said. “She’ll probably make it. And anyway, it’s too late to do anything about it.”

The wind died toward morning. Freshly bathed and shiny, Viktoria lay at anchor as if nothing whatever had happened.

JONNA HAD A MATTER-OF-FACT RELATIONSHIP with Mari’s brother Tom. They rarely saw each other in town, more often on the island, and then their discussions were practical. Tom would motor over to talk about lumber, special tools, maybe a generator that didn’t want to work. It was barely three miles between their islands. Generally they got their machines running again, which gave Mari a secure feeling that most things here in life can be made to work.

She would stand for a long time and stare down his arrow-straight wake every time he drove back home. In June, Tom’s island lay right in the sunset. Later the sun went down behind islands further south.