Pasi Jääskeläinen - Secret Passages in a Hillside Town

Olli had a habit of checking the time by this clock on his way to work. The clock had become familiar and beloved to him over the years; it sort of belonged to him.

It was five minutes to ten.

As he approached the observation tower, Olli looked up. He saw a person standing at the railing on the restaurant level. Possibly a woman. Perhaps the woman he was going to meet.

He passed the raised gun barrel in front of the tower entrance. It was a memorial to the bombings and the anti-aircraft guns that had protected Jyväskylä during the Winter War, and a regular stop on the Suominen family’s Sunday walks.

Olli crossed the lobby to the elevator and rode up to the observation deck with a young couple.

Inside the restaurant a wedding party was gathered. The bride, radiant in white, was surrounded by champagne glasses. Olli walked out onto the terrace. Every outdoor table but one was empty. Next to the striped ice cream awning sat a slim woman. Her left hand was resting on the table; her right held a cigarette. She was looking down at the city. Her golden hair was pinned up. Her pale-green pear-print dress set Olli’s heart pounding in his chest.

The manner in which she smoked her cigarette could only be described as reverent. Her slow motions were pure dance.

A Guide to the Cinematic Life had a whole chapter devoted to the art of smoking.

Thinking ordinarily, smoking is a vice that is hazardous to your health, and is thus limited, regulated and censured by society. In spite of that, or precisely because of that, it is also an indispensable part of the cinematic way of life.

What would the films of Wong Kar-wai, Godard, Truffaut or Kaurismäki be without scenes of smoking? How successful would Irving Rapper’s melodrama Now, Voyager have been if someone had cut the scenes where Paul Henreid lights two cigarettes and hands one to Bette Davis! It’s easier to imagine Charlie Chaplin without a moustache than it is to imagine Humphrey Bogart, Tony Leung or Matti Pellonpää without cigarettes. A lit cigarette is an aesthetic element comparable to music, with a power of expression when used in dialogue that should not be underestimated. Like any tool, however, it takes practice to learn to use it correctly so that the effect created is the one intended.

The following pages discuss various smoking techniques and situations, and examine how smoking can be used as an indicator of your persona and message.

(Smoking photo spread: Tony Leung in In the Mood for Love. Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall in The Big Sleep . Bebe Daniels in My Past. Lauren Bacall in Confidential Agent . Ida Lupino in Road House . Bette Davis and Paul Henreid in Now, Voyager .)

As he approached the table, Olli examined the woman’s profile. He noticed now that from a certain angle she resembled the silhouette of the smoking umbrella vendor. If he could commission a painting of Greta Kara and hire any artist, living or dead, Gustav Klimt would have been the best choice.

Greta Kara didn’t otherwise look familiar to him. Her hair was gold blonde, as he had thought—the same colour as Maura’s at Jyväskylä Umbrella. Her dress also corresponded with his expectations. But in a crowd, he wouldn’t have recognized her face. He dreamt about it every night, but now that he was actually seeing it, it was the face of a stranger. He was both saddened and relieved.

Now he was close enough to smell her perfume and trailing cigarette smoke. He was close enough to see her clearly. But he still hesitated, afraid he might be confusing her with someone else. Which was ridiculous. Who else could it be?

The woman was still looking at the view. That was how he knew that she was Greta. She wanted to punish him one last time. If it were someone he didn’t know, she would have already glanced up to see who was approaching. Olli said hello.

The woman’s head turned slowly.

Their eyes met.

“Olli.”

A cloud of smoke escaped from between her lips.

She put out her cigarette in the ashtray and smiled. Olli sat down, leant his briefcase against a leg of the table and smiled back. It was hard to look her in the eye.

“A pleasant evening,” Olli said.

“Yes,” Greta answered. “A good evening to sit together and talk about books and cities. And a good place for it.” She paused, then added dramatically, “The city is at our feet.”

She smiled ironically. Olli sensed that she hadn’t yet forgiven him for his earlier bungle. She was probably waiting to see how this meeting would go. Olli gathered his thoughts, ready to behave as he was expected to behave.

First of all he had to be an adult, dignified and self-confident, like the head of a publishing house, which was what he was.

Second, he should be a polite, friendly, respectful person; an editor who was meeting with a writer important to the firm, aware of his responsibility to make sure that she stayed with them, and aware that her sales could assure the daily bread of a large number of people.

Third, of course, was to be warm and attentive—they were, after all, old friends.

Olli remembered that they hadn’t hugged, or even shaken hands. It left an uncomfortable distance between them. It was too late to correct it. The next natural moment for it would be when they parted.

They started to chat about this and that, without really saying much. Natural talk. Light.

Good.

That was how this thing should progress. They both had their own lives, and new roles. This meeting was not between childhood friends and former lovers but between two middleaged, sensible professionals.

At the same time, it was a tragic irony that he could never tell this woman about the dreams he’d been having for months, dreams that had thrown his whole life into disorder.

You know, last night you were sucking me off and I came in your mouth and you said you would love me forever. We clung to each other and vowed that if anything ever separated us we would find each other again. And if in the meantime one of us forgot what we once meant to each other, the other person would make him or her understand by any means necessary .

The door of the restaurant opened and three people came out onto the terrace to smoke and look at the view.

The tall man suggested they climb the tower. The short man was excited at the idea. The woman laughed and said, “Don’t go up there. We can see well enough from here. Besides, I’ve been up there before. Going up again would show bad taste.”

“Let’s go anyway,” the tall man said, putting a hand on the woman’s shoulder. “Let’s go without this guy. I promise I’ll be a gentleman.”

The woman took a flask out of her bag, uncorked it and sniffed the contents, smiling knowingly.

“What’s in there?” the man asked.

“ Sulphuric acid ,” the woman said, her voice husky and dramatic. “ For the eyes of men who tell lies .”

The short man laughed and poked the tall one in the ribs. “Did you catch that? She’s turning into Catherine again. And you, I assume, are the unlucky Jim.”

The man who would be Jim shook his head. “Whatever. I don’t watch those old black-and-white French movies. Life is too short.”

The woman smiled slyly, pulled the tall man by the arm to the railing and shouted, “ Jules, watch us! ”

The short man laughed. “Our Jules might not follow you so meekly if he had seen more old black-and-white French movies. At least he wouldn’t get in your car until you had thrown that insane guide to life of yours in the trash.”

Olli asked if Greta would like some coffee or wine or perhaps something to eat. Greta lit a cigarette, took a drag and said, “To tell you the truth, I feel like I’ve got mud in my stomach. I couldn’t possibly get anything down until I’ve heard what you think of the manuscript.”