Bragi Ólafsson: The Ambassador

“Well, there’s the answer to your question,” says Jón, watching Sturla put on his overcoat.

They say their goodbyes. Jón wishes his son safe travels, but Sturla reminds him that they will be seeing each other tomorrow when he returns the movie, so he says he’ll hold off on a proper farewell.

The weather has cooled since Sturla came in to the warmth of his father’s house an hour earlier. As he goes past the Hotel Leifur Eiríksson on Skólavörðustígur then down Frakkastígur in the direction of Laugavegur it begins to snow. Snowflakes float lightly to earth in the twilight, an image Sturla tells himself he hasn’t seen for many years; he feels like it hasn’t snowed like this in Reykjavík since he was a kid. But just as he is wondering whether the weather in the Baltic will be like this, his foot slips on the wet sidewalk and he almost swings the plastic bag into a couple of kids who are walking towards him from Njálsgata. The hundred-kronur coins from the casino jingle in time with the quick motion of the bag, and after Sturla apologizes to the pair he reminds himself to go to the bank on the corner of Laugavegur and Barónsstígur before heading home.

He decides there and then to use the money he has received, these coins, to buy himself something special in Lithuania, something that will always remind him of the trip, the way he suspects the new overcoat will. In a book he read about the Baltic countries, Sturla had learned that in Vilnius sophisticated people bought jewelry made of amber — that was the local specialty, designs and creations made from fossilized resin — but he doesn’t have any use for such things, other than to give it to someone, and in the future a knick-knack he gave to someone would hardly remind him of a trip he’d taken on his own.

The soft winter sun lights up the classroom. Jónas Hallmundsson looks out of the window over Lækjargata and appears not to be listening as the teacher, Armann Valur, begins joking with his pupils that they are now one month into the new system of dating time, a system that began with the eruption on Vestmannaeyjar, the Westman Islands, on January 23rd of that year. He starts talking about the time he stayed in the town of Westman Islands ten years ago, when he visited a schoolmate of his from “this very school, this distinguished school,” and stayed at his parents’ house for a few weeks. At that time, in 1961, he’d been sure a huge volcanic eruption would take place there, and even though Surtsey Island had erupted a couple of years later “in that vicinity,” he’d never lost the faith that the Devil would bring the blesséd Westman Islands to world attention by spewing his powerful essence over the place.

“And because of that,” he continues, “I’m now giving myself permission to invite you up to the board, one at a time, and ask you a few questions about these famous islands of the Westmen, the Vestmannaeyjar.” He turns back to them, flexes his shoulders and stretches his arms out on both sides. Then he lets them fall quickly down to his sides and calls the name of a girl in the class, asking her to be so good as to “trot up to the blackboard.” The girl’s name, Ljótunn, always had an effect on her classmates, the girls no less than the boys: everyone would look up or show some other indication that they had heard her name mentioned, not just because it was an unusual, embarrassing name but because it was so ironic: her facial beauty — not to mention her physical beauty — was undeniable (if you can describe beauty in such terms). Just as people tend to look at the light rather than the dark, they tended to look at Ljótunn rather than the person next to her, if they could.

“How many islands comprise the Vestmannaeyjar?” asks Armann Valur when the girl has come up to the board and stands facing the class. “Do you know?”

“Aren’t there fifteen?” replies Ljótunn.

“That’s what I’m asking,” says Armann Valur, smiling. “You have to answer.”

“I guess it’s fourteen.”

“The number gets lower,” says Armann Valur.

“There are twelve.” Ljótunn corrects herself; her final answer.

“Not bad,” says Armann Valur after thinking for a moment, and addresses the girl by name again; he enjoyed saying her name. “Not bad, Ljótunn; there are exactly twelve. When you fly over them. Seen from land, there are perhaps no more than one or two, but when someone flies over them, I mean on a big iron bird, he needs the fingers of both hands, plus two of the fingers of the person sitting next to him, in order to count them. There are exactly twelve.” He asks the girl another question which she can’t answer, then he asks her to sit back down. She is now out of the game, this is a knockout round.

As Ljótunn goes to her desk and sits down, Armann Valur follows her to her seat with his eyes, even though he knows the other pupils will notice if he indulges his temptation to watch her. Then he scans the room and settles on Jónas Hallmundsson, who is still busy thinking about what is happening down on the street outside the school building.

“Jónas Hallmundsson,” says Armann in a commanding tone. “Would you like to be next in our Vestmannaeyjar quiz?”

Jónas nods his head and glances at the person sitting next to him, his friend Brynjólfur Madsen, who shakes his head, as if to say that he wouldn’t take part in this nonsense himself. Brynjólfur looks away from him to Armann Valur as he begins asking Jónas his first question:

“What is the temperature of a simmering lava field?”

Jónas looks out the window.

“You won’t find the answer out in Lækjargata,” says Armann Valur, his arms folded and an amused expression on his face.

“A hundred degrees,” replies Jónas.

The picture which Armann Valur made of himself, with his arms across his chest and a boastful expression on his face, momentarily calls to mind Benito Mussolini on the balcony of the Palazzo Venezia in Rome, talking to his people. “Very good, very good,” he says, nodding his head quickly. He removes his arms from his chest, and when a pupil in the next row starts to make a comment about Jónas’s reply, Armann stops him with a wave of his hand. “But tell me this, Jónas: How many inhabitants lost their lives when that awful eruption took place on the islands?”

“Everyone,” replies Jónas, without hesitation.

“Everyone, you say?”

“Everyone but one.”

“The number keeps getting lower,” says Armann Valur, smiling.

“Then I’ll subtract the one,” Jónas says, repeating his original answer.

“You’re exactly right, as ever,” says Armann Valur cheerfully, indicating to one of the rows of students that they should quiet down. “For the Islanders, the most wonderful thing about this astonishing eruption is that none of them was killed. They can thank their God, Betel, for that, the ones who survived.”

Stifled laughter can be heard from the back of the room. Armann Valur casts a meaningful glance at two longhaired boys who are sitting side by side, his eyes questioning whether he has said something funny, whether they have found a reason to start giggling like little girls. Then he turns back to Jónas Hallmundsson who is once again looking out the window.

“And now we come to your third question, Jónas. If you answer it correctly, then you’re in the final. That, I reckon, would be a great victory. The prize — so you know now there’s definitely something to strive for — is a plane trip for one to the Vestmannaeyjar; a plane-trip, obviously, which the victor has to take in his imagination, because as you well know the principal has lately disapproved of schoolteachers sending pupils out of the country, even in the service of knowledge. But the question is—” Armann looks at Brynjólfur leaning towards Jónas so he can whisper something to him, and he jabs his index finger in the air to add emphasis to his next words: “Now, Brynjólfur, you aren’t allowed to slip him the answer before I pose the question.”