Jan Kjaerstad - The Seducer

He lay in the byre, all of his senses on the alert, picking up the sight of dust dancing in a band of light, the smells and sounds of ruminant creatures and, above all else, her ecstatic face, as if the sacred and the profane had been brought together in one room; and just before he came, as he felt the seed seeming to surge up from a deeper source than usual, in the midst of his thoughts regarding his own epic, or lack of his own epic, she jumped off, as if her subconscious were taking its own precautions, or perhaps feminine intuition had told her that this was her most fertile time of the month, with the result that his semen spurted over the small of her back, leaving an exclamation mark there, before she smeared it in with her hand and lifted her fingers greedily to her nose, holding them under her quivering nostrils.

Jonas Wergeland’s first clear memory was of the moment when he unlocked the door of his car outside the Fossheim Hotel. But as he bowled down the road towards Otta, even when he could clearly see her farm, or what he thought was her farm, a collection of wood, stone and turf that almost merged with the landscape, he was not sure what had occurred earlier or whether anything at all had happened, whether the whole thing belonged to another life, to another time entirely.

On the other hand, there were certain days in his life that Jonas Wergeland wished he could recall with less clarity, fearing as he did that they took up too much room in his memory, that they overshadowed, or blocked out, other precious memories: days so crammed with detail that as time went on they seemed to quash and eat away at other days, while at the same time swelling and growing, to abnormal proportions, like a young cuckoo. So it was with the memory of the Midsummer’s Eve celebrations at Solhaug when he was ten years old, and more particularly from the moment when the amateur jazz band laid into their instruments once more, lustier than ever, after a couple of exceptionally strong highballs at Five-Times Nilsen’s.

This last-named gentleman’s name was, in fact, simply Nilsen — if, in line with what has gone before, I may be allowed to dwell on one small detail. Nilsen worked in one of the town’s biggest gentlemen’s outfitters, but he was such a nondescript and unassuming man that people hardly took any notice of him — he could have been mistaken for a tailor’s dummy had it not been for the tape measure around his neck — but once, when the housewives of Solhaug had been lying sunbathing on the flag green, surrounded by magazines, flasks of coffee and grizzling toddlers, and it had been hinted, more out of a spirit of sympathetic solidarity really, that it must be a bit dull being married to such a quiet man, Fru Nilsen had drawn herself up, adjusted her very demure sun-top and said that she for one certainly had nothing to complain about as long as he could take her to seventh heaven five times in one night. So there. From then on he was known only as Five-Times Nilsen. Rumour had it that he also owned highball glasses decorated with ladies who were fully clad when viewed from the outside, but naked on the inside, so it was no wonder that the band, now reinforced by an accordion, was simply raring to go, launching into one sing-along after the other: ‘Kostervalsen’, ‘Ut på Nøtterø fins’, ‘Sol ute, sol inne’, ‘Bedre og bedre dag for dag ’ and all the other songs about sunshine and sea and happy days, so in keeping with the spirit of this party of theirs, songs which in those days everyone knew by heart, like Christmas carols and I mean every absolutely — every verse.

Jonas wished with all his heart that he could linger, stay there on that green so vibrant with neighbours and plates of smørbrød and sing-songs, but he had to go, he knew he had to go, because Nefertiti was missing and he had to find her.

And so he walked off, trailing his heels, looking back to see Herr Moen, the chairman of the residents’ association, wearing a velveteen jacket bought on sale at Five-Times Nilsen’s shop, doing the honours of lighting the bonfire, far too early as usual, because the children just couldn’t wait, and Jonas simply had to stop and watch, hypnotized by the flames licking up over the pyramid of old furniture, once such splendid indispensable items, now nothing but a pile of old junk, and in no time the whole lot was ablaze, the fire consuming the vestiges of thrift and harder times, while folk stood there gazing as if in a trance at a Midsummer bonfire that would never be bigger or consist of more remarkable or more historic objects, a veritable museum in flames; with the climax, greeted by loud cheers, coming when the flames reached chairman Moen’s old sofa perched on the top, a sofa so hideous that chairman Moen could not think how he had managed to put up with it for so many years, but now he had a brand spanking new sofa, a corner unit angled to face the television set: all things considered he had never had it so good, he thought to himself as he stood there, feeling quite moved, with the matchbox in his hand, two highballs inside him and his face golden in the light from the bonfire. It was Midsummer’s Eve, and all Norway was united by blazing beacons, forming a bulwark around the blessings of social democracy.

Not until the draw was about to start did Jonas collect himself. Some sort of a raffle was always held on such occasions, to raise funds for one thing or another, that year it was new street lamps, not that the old ones weren’t perfectly okay, but there’s nothing that can’t be improved upon, and tickets had been sold in advance, so all that remained was for Fru Moen to call for attention everyone, please: Fru Moen, who had once given Jonas a swingeing clout round the ear for taking part in a contest with the other lads to see who could pee farthest up a wall which just happened to be right under her balcony, but who today was sporting a Farah Diba hairdo so awesome that Jonas could have forgiven her anything as she picked a colour from one hat and a number from another, with all the children’s prizes being drawn first, since it would soon be the little ones’ bedtime.

Reluctant though he was, Jonas had to tear himself away from the smells of bonfire and perfume and coffee and home baking. He sped to his entry and leapt onto his bike the way he had seen the cowboys leaping onto their horses at the Westerns they showed at Grorud cinema. Jonas took Hagelundveien, cutting through Nybygga, thinking about the knife being raffled right at that very moment, wondering whether he might win it, a dream of a knife, with a handle shaped like the head of a fish and a sheath like the body of a rainbow trout, and meanwhile Nefertiti was sitting outside the forest ranger’s little cottage, a stone’s throw or two away from Bergensveien, along with Colonel Eriksen the elk hound, and nobody could know what she was thinking, not even me, and meanwhile, up on Hukenveien, an unknown, unsuspecting driver was climbing into the cab of a Scania-Vabis LS 71 Regent, and meanwhile Jonas was pedalling up the steep hill past the corner shop, thinking about the toy revolver that was being raffled right at that very moment on the green next to the Midsummer bonfire, a new sort, an ‘Apache’ it was called, that had just come on to the market, a long, slender Colt which, although he could not have said why, easily knocked all his other toys into a cocked hat, so that suddenly they were no fun to play with, they seemed so babyish, the heads of Indian chiefs stamped into plastic handles, imitation mother-of-pearl, while this was black and gleaming and relentlessly authentic, with just one silver star right in the centre, and meanwhile Nefertiti was sitting outside the forest ranger’s little cottage on the edge of the forest, under the sheer face of Ravnkollen, scratching Colonel Eriksen’s thick coat, and no one could know what she was thinking, not even me, and meanwhile an unknown driver was starting the six-cylinder diesel engine of his Scania-Vabis Regent, with its terrible 150 horse power, and meanwhile Jonas had cycled as far as Trondheimsveien, thinking about the Matchbox car that was being raffled right at that very moment, a miraculous copy in miniature of a Cadillac, with tail fins and a caravan with a door that could open, a toy that could transform any place on Earth into a little bit of California, and meanwhile Nefertiti was getting to her feet and saying goodbye to Colonel Eriksen, and the dog stood there with his tongue lolling, feeling uneasy as if it had caught wind of an elk, and no one could know what she was thinking, not even me, and meanwhile an unknown driver was setting out along Hukenveien in his seventeen-ton Scania-Vabis, and meanwhile Jonas was wheeling round the junction with Trondheimsveien, thinking about the Lego set that was being raffled right at that very moment, a fire station with two fantastic towers and loads of see-through bricks and garage doors that flipped up, as well as a leaflet giving step-by-step instructions for how to build it, the sort of intricate challenge that was just crying out for him to get his hands on it, and meanwhile Nefertiti was climbing on to her Diamant three-speed and pedalling slowly up Bergensveien, one hand holding her chromatic mouth organ to her lips, and no one could know what she was thinking, not even me, and meanwhile the unknown driver was easing up on the pneumatic brakes of his Scania-Vabis Regent and letting his seventeen-ton truck coast down the top end of Bergensveien, because there was no one on the road.