Jan Kjaerstad - The Seducer

So Jonas Wergeland knew it was little coincidence that he should now find himself here on the field, only a week after the occurrence in the changing-room, simply bursting with energy. It was his turn to jump. No one could have guessed that they were about to witness something quite exceptional; in Norway sensational moments in athletics tend to be very few and far between. Not that I mean to make fun of Norwegian pole-vaulting, but I need only remind you of Audun Boysen and a Norwegian record in the 800 metres which was to remain unbeaten for half a generation, and that a Norwegian is likely to win an Olympic gold in athletics only once every 40 to 50 years.

So it was not as if anyone were expecting anything, nor was Jonas himself really prepared for what was about to happen, mainly because he still favoured the scissors technique, a bit more old-fashioned than the dive-straddle but far less dangerous when you are having to land on all manner of rock-hard mats, so Jonas concentrated on his ritual — in the high jump the ritual is half the point, or half the fun, even on the sports field down by the stream at Solhaug they had performed the craziest rituals prior to jumping, and it was most important that one followed the same procedure every time, as in church, so Jonas slowly removed his track-suit, jogged back and forth, stretched a bit, checked that the bar was sitting properly, flexed, checked his start mark, did a trial run-up, gave his limbs a shake, loosening up, flexed again, did a couple of high-kicks, knowing that he was annoying the life out of the other competitors, particularly the guy who was going to win if Jonas knocked down the bar, since he had already jumped successfully at a lower height, the jammy bugger, so Jonas had to clear it, he might not even believe he could do it, but there was something about his body, an unaccountable litheness, the itch to jump. He stood still, glanced over at Grorud Church, the tall spire, retreated into himself, shutting out his surroundings, shutting out the sounds, shutting out even Nina H., who was over there by the curve in the track, leaning on the fence and watching; he knew that this was it, this was the decisive jump — no, not a jump, but a leap . Jonas took the measure of the run with his eye, several times, swore at that bar to stay put, measured the run again and again brushed back his hair, brushed back his hair once more, heard some guy sighing with exasperation and yet did not hear him, broke into a trot, took a few short strides then picked up speed, more speed, full speed, heading towards the bar from the right side, taking long strides now, knew he was looking good, knew he was looking fantastic; standing outside of himself, looking on, even while he was running, relishing the image of himself; he was on the move and standing outside of himself at one and the same time, running in an arc towards the bar, sensing that this would give him greater momentum, jumped like a tangent striking out from a semicircle and there, right there, in that tenth of a second when he came down with everything he had on his left foot — he always planted with his left foot, for the simple reason that most people planted with the right, and he was Jonas Wergeland who would take a different approach to most other people whenever he could — just as he brought that foot down, abruptly compressing himself, as a writer will do in a fine poem, he heard a cry break through his film of concentration, ‘Come on, Jonas!!’, and instinctively he turned to see who was shouting, almost losing his balance, almost going over on to his back, so that his body actually twisted and he flew over the bar left shoulder first and, as if that were not enough, he flew over the bar back first, or at least that was how it seemed to the spectators who were all set to burst out laughing, except that their laughter was nipped in the bud as they saw Jonas Wergeland jumping over, way over, 1.60 to become area champion, a feat which prompted Nina H. to call out again, exultantly, as if she were lying beside him on the pile of foam-rubber mats: ‘Fantastic, Jonas!’

Jonas was a star for a day or two, and people talked about it for weeks; shook their heads as they described how this crazy guy had jumped ‘backwards’; shook their heads, that is, until they saw the American Dick Fosbury on television during the Olympic Games in Mexico City that same summer, taking the gold in the high jump with the selfsame technique which Jonas, albeit by accident, had demonstrated on the Grorud sports ground. That Jonas Wergeland would later be described as a pioneer will come as no surprise to anyone who saw him do the Fosbury flop long before anyone else in Norway.

Jonas did not know it yet, but he was now on the track of his unique penis.

And now you are making another leap, an impossible leap in which everything gets twisted and you land involuntarily, with a stab of pain, as if you had landed wrongly, here, here in this room, thirty square metres of it and it might as well be a galaxy, in which someone is playing Johann Sebastian Bach’s celestial music on the organ, and I understand why you do not make that call, why the thought of picking up the phone simply does not enter your head, why you stand stock-still in that room with a dead wife and let the seconds pass, you even cast the occasional glance at your wristwatch, an exclusive make, a present, you think, it must have been a present, you think, and you remember, wondering as you do so from what corner of your mind the memory has surfaced, the stopwatch you were in the habit of using on the skating rink, that blissful sense of being in control, the significance of every second magnified, tenths of a second and, most important of all: the ability to stop the hand, stop time, break the circle, and you look down at your wrist-watch to find, to your surprise almost, that time continues to pass, regardless of the sight before you; you see the second hand moving forward in tiny jerks as if every second were a minuscule impossible leap, and you think that surely one of these small leaps ought also to be capable of flicking things back to the way they were, much like yanking a dislocated joint back into place, you think, or sending things off in another direction, the way the bow of the Skipper Clement abruptly altered course, you think, knowing all the time that this thing here, this body on the floor, springs from something else entirely, that time has nothing to do with cause and effect.

So there you stand, Jonas Wergeland, connoisseur of art, the bomber’s last victim, son of a mother who had seven lovers, and you notice the fireplace, notice that someone has had a fire going, Margrete often lit a fire, you think, she liked having a blaze as big as a bonfire in the grate when she was reading a book, because bonfires and stories went hand-in-hand she said, and you see that she must have been reading not that long ago, because there is a book on the coffee table in front of the sofa, and you sniff the air in the room as if the smells might actually reveal something, give you a clue, and you catch a whiff from the fireplace, a suggestion of smoke and dead embers and you detect the vaguely stuffy odour of synthetic materials, of dust on electronic equipment in use, warm plastic, and you feel so hopeless, as if this mélange of scents is telling you that you are looking here at something, a constellation of old and new, which you will never understand.

But just as you are about to resign yourself to the inevitable, it comes to you, as pain turns to perception, that it has something to do with burglars, a break-in, you think, and Margrete has surprised them, you think, how stupid can you get, you think, why couldn’t you just let them take whatever they wanted, you suddenly find yourself shouting at the dead woman, and for a few seconds you even expect an answer, an explanation, because you know how gullible Margrete is, how ingenuous, you never could fathom that naïve, trusting side of her, bordering on stupidity, you think and you picture the scene: Margrete, standing in the doorway and asking, politely no doubt, what they were up to, as if she could make the burglars see reason, you think, and you picture what happens next, aching inside, and now there she is, stone dead, on the floor in a pool of congealing blood.