Хеннинг Манкелль - Italian Shoes

‘Yes, and much more besides.’

‘Are you writing protest letters?’

‘The latest ones were to Tony Blair and President Chirac.’

‘Have they replied?’

‘Of course not. But I’m working on other courses of action.’

‘What?’

She shook her head. She didn’t want to go into that.

We continued our walk and came to a stop at the boathouse. The sun was shining on the lee wall.

‘You fulfilled one of the promises you made to Harriet,’ said Louise. ‘She has another request now.’

‘I’m not going back to that forest pool.’

‘No, she wants something to take place here. A midsummer party.’

‘Meaning what?’

Louise was annoyed.

‘What can you mean by a midsummer party apart from what the words say? A party that takes place at midsummer?’

‘I’m not accustomed to throwing parties here on my island. No matter whether it’s summer or winter.’

‘Then it’s about time you did. Harriet wants to sit out on a sunny summer evening with some other guests, to eat some good food, drink some good wine, and then go back to bed and die soon after.’

‘That’s something we can arrange, of course. You, me and her. We can set up a long table on the grass in front of the currant bushes.’

‘Harriet wants guests. She wants to meet people.’

‘Who, for instance?’

‘You’re the one who lives here. Invite some of your friends. There don’t need to be all that many.’

Louise set off for the house, without waiting for a reply. I could invite Jansson, Hans Lundman and his wife Romana, who works as an assistant at the meat counter in the big indoor food market in our nearest town.

Harriet would be able to partake of her last supper out here on my island. That was the least I could do for her.

It rained more or less non-stop until midsummer. We established simple routines based on Harriet’s deteriorating condition. To start with, Louise slept in her caravan; but when Harriet screamed out two nights in succession, she moved into my kitchen. I offered to help by giving Harriet her medication but Louise wanted to keep that responsibility. She used a mattress on the kitchen floor, and stored it in the vestibule every morning. She told me the cat would sleep at her feet.

Harriet slept most of the time, lost in a trance induced by the drugs. She had no appetite, but with boundless patience, Louise forced down her a sufficient amount of nutrition. I was touched by the extra ordinary tenderness she displayed towards her mother. It was a side of her I’d not seen before. I kept my distance, and would never have dreamt of intervening.

In the evenings, we would sit in Louise’s caravan or in my kitchen, talking. She had taken over the cooking. I would phone in her shopping lists and Jansson would deliver the goods. The week before midsummer, it was clear that Harriet didn’t have long to go. Every time she woke up, she asked about the weather, I realised that she was thinking about her party. The next time Jansson came, when it had been raining constantly with winds blowing in from the Arctic, I invited him to a party the following Friday.

‘Is it your birthday?’

‘Every Christmas, you complain that I haven’t put up any lights. Every midsummer you moan because I decline to drink a toast with you on the jetty. Now I’m inviting you to a party. Is it that hard to understand? Seven o’clock, weather permitting.’

‘I can feel in my bones that warm weather is on its way.’

Jansson claims that he can divine water using a dowsing rod and that he can feel the weather in his bones.

I didn’t comment on his bones. Later that same day I phoned Hans Lundman and invited him and his wife.

‘I’m working then, but I should be able to swap shifts with Edvin. Is it your birthday?’

‘It’s always my birthday,’ I said. ‘Seven o’clock, weather permitting.’

Louise and I made preparations. I dug out some of my grand parents’ summer furniture that had been stored away for years. I painted it and repaired a rotten table leg.

The day before Midsummer Eve, it was pouring with rain. A gale was blowing from the north-west, and the temperature sank to twelve degrees. Louise and I struggled up the hill and saw boats riding out the storm in a sheltered bay on the other side of Korsholmen, the island nearest to mine.

‘Will the weather be like this tomorrow as well?’ Louise asked.

‘According to Jansson’s bones, it will be fine and sunny,’ I said.

The next day, the wind dropped. The rain ceased, the clouds dispersed and the temperature rose. Harriet had had two bad nights when the painkillers didn’t seem to work. Then things appeared to improve. We prepared for the party. Louise knew exactly what Harriet wanted.

‘Simple extravagance,’ she said. ‘It’s a hopeless task, of course, trying to mix simplicity and extravagance, but sometimes you have to attempt the impossible.’

It was a strange midsummer party that I don’t think any of those present will ever forget, even if our memories of it differ somewhat. Hans Lundman rang in the morning and asked if they could bring with them their granddaughter, who was paying them a visit and couldn’t be left on her own. Her name was Andrea, and she was sixteen years old. I knew that she had a mental handicap, and that she found it difficult to understand some things, or to learn. But she also had boundless confidence in people she’d never met before. She would shake anybody at all by the hand, and as a child was more than happy to sit on the knee of total strangers.

Of course she was welcome. We set the table for seven people rather than six. Harriet, who by now was practically bedbound, was sitting in her chair in the garden by five in the afternoon. She was wearing a light-coloured summery dress chosen by Louise, who had also combed her grey hair into a pretty bun. Louise had made her up as well. Harriet’s haggard face had regained some of the poise it had possessed earlier in her life. I sat down beside her with a glass of wine in my hand. She took it from me and half emptied it.

‘Serve me some more,’ she said. ‘To make sure I don’t fall asleep, I’ve reduced my intake of all the stuff that keeps my pains at bay. But I do still have pain, and it’s going to get worse. However, what I want now is white wine instead of white tablets. Wine!’

I went to the kitchen, where a row of bottles were uncorked and ready to serve. Louise was busy with something about to go into the oven.

‘Harriet wants some wine,’ I said.

‘Give her some, then! This party is for her. It’s the last time she’ll be able to drink herself tipsy. If she gets drunk, we can all be happy.’

I took the bottle out into the garden. The table was laid very attractively. Louise had decorated it with flowers and leafy twigs. She’d covered the cold dishes already on the table with some of Grandma’s worn-out towels.

We toasted each other. Harriet took hold of my hand.

‘Are you angry because I want to die in your house?’

‘Why ever should I be?’

‘You didn’t want to live with me. Perhaps you don’t want me to die in your house either.’

‘It wouldn’t surprise me if you were to outlive the lot of us.’

‘I’ll be dead before long. I can feel death tugging at me. The earth is pulling me down. Sometimes, when I wake up during the night, just before the agony gets so bad that I need to scream, I have time to ask myself if I’m scared of what lies in store. I am. But I’m scared without being scared. It’s more of a vague worry, being on the way to open a door without being at all sure what’s behind it. Then the pains strike home, and that’s what I’m scared of. Nothing else.’