The Solitaire Mystery

by Jostein Gaarder

  ‘Maybe we’ll meet her in Athens,’ Dad said. ‘But it won’t be easy to get her home.’

  Something was written at the bottom of the page, but it was in Greek, and even Dad had certain language difficulties there. It wasn’t only the meaning of the words which was a problem; Greece still hadn’t bothered to change to the Roman alphabet.

  Breakfast was put on the table, but Dad did not even lift his coffee cup. Taking the magazine with him, he started to ask people sitting at nearby tables if they understood English or German. He eventually struck lucky with some teenagers. Dad then unfolded the picture of Mama and asked them to translate what was written in the small print. The teenagers glanced over at me. The whole business was totally embarrassing. I just hoped Dad wouldn’t start arguing about the theft of Norwegian women or anything like that.

  When Dad returned, he had written down the name of an advertising agency in Athens.

  ‘We’re getting warm,’ he said.

  Of course, there were pictures of lots of other women in the magazine as well, but Dad was interested only in the picture of Mama. He carefully tore it out and threw the rest of the magazine in a waste paper basket – in much the same way as he would chuck a brand-new pack of cards after nabbing the joker.

  The fastest route to Athens went south of the Bay of Corinth and across the famous Corinth Canal. However, Dad had never been one to take the fastest route if there was an interesting detour to be made.

  The truth was, he wanted to ask the Delphic Oracle something. That meant we had to cross the Bay of Corinth by ferry and then drive through Delphi on the north side of the bay.

  The ferry trip took no longer than half an hour. When we had driven twenty miles or so, we came to a little town called Naupaktos. We stopped there and drank coffee and a fizzy drink in a square with a view over a Venetian fortress.

  Of course, I thought about what would happen when we met Mama in Athens, but I was just as interested in everything I had read in the sticky-bun book. I tried to work out how I could talk to Dad about some of the things on my mind without giving myself away.

  Dad waved to the waiter and asked for the bill, and then I said, ‘Dad, do you believe in God?’

  He jumped. ‘Don’t you think it’s a bit early in the day?’ he asked.

  I could agree with him there, but Dad had no idea where I had been in the early hours of the morning while he was in dreamland. If only he knew. He sat turning some clever thoughts over in his mind; now and again he might do a card trick, too, but I had seen how a pack of cards could flit around in broad daylight like living people made of flesh and blood.

  ‘If God really exists,’ I went on, ‘then He’s clever at playing hide-and-seek with His creations.’

  Dad laughed out loud, but I knew he completely agreed with me.

  ‘Maybe He was frightened when He saw what He’d created,’ he said. ‘So He ran away from everything. You know, it’s not easy to tell who got the biggest fright; Adam or the Lord. I think such an act of creation terrifies both parties. Mind you, I agree He could at least have signed His masterpiece before He took off.’

  ‘Signed it?’

  ‘He could easily have carved His name into a canyon or something.’

  ‘So you believe in God, then?’

  ‘I haven’t said that. Actually what I did say was, God is sitting in heaven laughing at us because we don’t believe in Him.’

  That’s right, I thought to myself. That was what he’d been going on about in Hamburg.

  ‘Even though He didn’t leave his calling card behind, He did leave the world. I think that’s fair enough,’ Dad said.

  He sat for a while deep in thought before he went on: ‘A Russian cosmonaut and a Russian brain surgeon were once discussing Christianity. The brain surgeon was Christian, but the cosmonaut wasn’t. “I have been in outer space many times,” bragged the cosmonaut, “but I have never seen any angels.” The brain surgeon stared in amazement, but then he said, “And I have operated on many intelligent brains, but I have never seen a single thought.”’

  Now it was my turn to be amazed.

  ‘Is that something you’ve just made up?’ I asked.

  He shook his head. ‘It’s one of the corny jokes from my philosophy teacher in Arendal.’

  The only thing Dad had done to get a piece of paper showing he was a philosopher was take the Introduction to Philosophy course at the Open University. He had already read all the books, but last autumn he went to lectures on the history of philosophy at the School of Nursing in Arendal.

  Of course, Dad didn’t think it was enough just to sit and listen to what ‘the professor’ said. He brought him home to Hisøy as well. ‘I couldn’t just let the guy sit alone at the Central Hotel,’ Dad said. So I, too, got to know him. The guy talked nineteen to the dozen all the time. He was as hooked on the boundless truths as Dad. The difference was that ‘the professor’ was a halfway educated bluffer, whereas Dad was just a bluffer.

  Dad sat staring down at the Venetian fortress.

  ‘No, God is dead, Hans Thomas. And we’re the ones who have murdered Him.’

  I thought this comment was so incomprehensible and so upsetting I let it go unanswered.

  When we had put the Bay of Corinth behind us and started the climb up to Delphi, we passed endless groves of olive trees. We could have driven to Athens that day, but Dad insisted that we couldn’t just speed past Delphi without paying the old sanctuary a proper visit.

  When we reached Delphi around midday, we checked into a hotel above the town with a beautiful view over the Bay of Corinth. There were lots of other hotels, but Dad picked the one with the best view over the sea.

  We walked from the hotel through the old town to the famous temple site a couple of kilometres further east. As we got closer to the excavation, Dad started to spout like a waterfall.

  ‘People came to consult the oracle of Apollo here throughout ancient times. They asked about everything – whom they should marry, where they should travel, when they would go to war against other states, and which calendar system they should use.’

  ‘But what’s the oracle?’ I had to ask.

  Dad told me that the god Zeus had sent two eagles to fly from different ends of the earth across its surface. When they met in Delphi, the Greeks declared it the middle of the world. Then Apollo came. Before he could settle in Delphi, he had to kill the dangerous dragon Python – that’s why his priestess was called Pythia. When the dragon was killed, it transformed itself into a snake, which Apollo carried around with him at all times.

  I had to admit I didn’t understand everything Dad said, and he still hadn’t told me what an oracle was, but we’d just about reached the entrance to the temple site. It was situated in a ravine at the foot of Mount Parnassus. The Muses, who gave people creative powers, had lived on that mountain.

  Before we went in, Dad insisted we drink from one of the holy springs just below the entrance. He claimed that everyone had to wash before going into the holy site. He also said that you got wisdom and poetic powers when you drank from this spring.

  When we went into the site of the temple, Dad bought a map showing how it had looked two thousand years ago. We definitely needed the map, because all that was left was a load of chaotic ruins.

  At first we walked around the remains of the old city’s treasury. In order to ask the oracle’s advice, you had to bring exquisite presents to Apollo, and they were kept in a special house which the different states had to build.

  When we reached the great Temple of Apollo, Dad gave a better explanation of what the oracle was.

  ‘What you see here are the remains of the great Temple of Apollo,’ he began. ‘Inside the temple was an engraved stone called the “nave”, because the Greeks believed this temple was the navel of the world. They also believed that Apollo lived inside the temple – at least at certain times of the year – and he was the one they asked for advice. He spoke through his priestess Pythia, who sat on a thr
ee-legged stool across a crevice in the ground. Hypnotic vapours rose from this crevice which put Pythia in a trance. This enabled her to be Apollo’s mouthpiece. When you came to Delphi, you presented your question to the priests, who passed it on to Pythia. Her answer would be so obscure and ambiguous that the priests had to interpret it. In this way, the Greeks made use of Apollo’s wisdom, because Apollo knew everything – about the past and the future.’

  ‘What are we going to ask?’

  ‘We’ll ask if we’re going to meet Anita in Athens,’ Dad said. ‘You can be the priest who asks, and I’ll be Pythia, who brings the god’s reply.’

  With that he sat down in front of the ruins of the famous Temple of Apollo and started to shake his head and wave his arms around like a madman. Some French and German tourists stepped back in horror.

  I asked solemnly, ‘Will we meet Anita in Athens?’

  It was clear that Dad was waiting for the powers of Apollo to work within him. Then he said, ‘Young man from land far away … meets beautiful woman … near the old temple.’

  He soon returned to his old self and nodded with satisfaction.

  ‘That’ll do,’ he said. ‘Pythia’s answers were never any clearer than that.’

  I wasn’t satisfied, however. Who was the young man, who was the beautiful woman, and where was the great temple?

  ‘Let’s flip a coin to see if we’ll meet her,’ I said. ‘If Apollo can control your tongue, then he’s bound to be able to control a coin, too.’

  Dad went along with the suggestion. He took out a 20 drachma piece, and we agreed that if it was tails we would meet Mama in Athens. I flipped the coin into the air and stared excitedly at the ground.

  It was tails! Tails it was. The coin lay on the ground as though it had been there for thousands of years, waiting for us to come along and discover it.

  KING OF CLUBS

  … he thought it was

  downright annoying that he didn’t know

  more about life and the world …

  After the oracle had assured us we would meet Mama in Athens, we walked further up through the temple site and found an old theatre, which had room for five thousand spectators. From the top of the theatre we looked out over the temple site and right down to the bottom of the valley.

  On the way down Dad said, ‘There is still something I haven’t told you about the Delphic Oracle, Hans Thomas. You know, this place is of great interest to philosophers like us.’

  We sat down on some temple remains. It was strange to think they were a couple of thousand years old.

  ‘Do you remember Socrates?’ he began.

  ‘Not really,’ I had to admit. ‘But he was a Greek philosopher.’

  ‘That’s right. And first of all I’m going to tell you what the word “philosopher” means …’

  I knew this was the beginning of a mini-lecture, and honestly I thought it was a bit much, because the sweat was pouring off my face under the burning sun.

  ‘“Philosopher” means one who seeks wisdom. This does not mean a philosopher is particularly wise, however. Do you understand the difference?’

  I nodded.

  ‘The first person to live up to this was Socrates. He walked around the market square in Athens talking to people, but he never instructed them. On the contrary – he spoke to people he met in order to learn something himself. Because “the trees in the country cannot teach me anything,” he said. But he was rather disappointed to discover that the people who liked to say they knew a lot really knew nothing at all. They might be able to tell him the day’s price of wine and olive oil, but they didn’t know anything considerable about life. Socrates readily said himself that he knew only one thing – and that was that he knew nothing.’

  ‘He wasn’t very wise, then,’ I objected.

  ‘Don’t be so hasty,’ Dad said sternly. ‘If two people haven’t a clue about something but one of them gives the impression of knowing a lot, who do you think is the wisest?’

  I had to say that the wisest one was the one who didn’t give the impression of knowing more than he did.

  ‘So you’ve got the point. This is exactly what made Socrates a philosopher. He thought it was downright annoying that he didn’t know more about life and the world. He felt completely out of it.’

  I nodded again.

  ‘And then an Athenian went to the Delphic Oracle and asked Apollo who the wisest man in Athens was. The oracle’s answer was Socrates. When Socrates heard this, he was, to put it mildly, rather surprised, because he really thought he didn’t know much at all. But after he visited those who were supposed to be wiser than he and asked them a few intelligent questions, he found that the oracle was right. The difference between Socrates and all the others was that the others were satisfied with the little they knew, although they didn’t know any more than Socrates. And people who are satisfied with what they know can never be philosophers.’

  I thought the story had a point, but Dad didn’t stop there. He gestured towards all the tourists swarming out of the tour buses far below and crawling like a fat trail of ants up through the temple site.

  ‘If there is one person among all those who regularly experiences the world as something full of adventure and mystery …’

  He now took a deep breath before he continued.

  ‘You can see thousands of people down there, Hans Thomas. I mean, if just one of them experiences life as a crazy adventure – and I mean that he, or she, experiences this every single day …’

  ‘What about it?’ I asked now, because again he had stopped in the middle of a sentence.

  ‘Then he or she is a joker in a pack of cards.’

  ‘Do you think there’s a joker like that here?’

  A look of despair now crossed his face. ‘Nope!’ he said. ‘Of course I can’t be sure, because there are only a few jokers, but the chance is infinitesimal.’

  ‘What about yourself? Do you experience life as a fairy tale every single day?’

  ‘Yes, I do!’

  He was so forthright with his answer I didn’t dare argue with him.

  ‘Every single morning I wake with a bang,’ he said. ‘It’s as though the fact that I am alive is injected into me; I am a character in a fairy tale, bursting with life. For who are we, Hans Thomas? Can you tell me that? We are thrown together with a sprinkling of stardust. But what’s that? Where the hell does this world come from?’

  ‘Haven’t a clue,’ I replied, and at that moment I felt just as much out of it as Socrates had.

  ‘Then it sometimes pops up in the evening,’ he continued. ‘I am a person living right now, I think to myself. And I’ll never return.’

  ‘You live a tough life, then,’ I said.

  ‘Tough, yes, but incredibly exciting. I don’t need to visit cold castles to go on a ghost hunt. I am a ghost myself.’

  ‘And you worry when your son sees a little ghost outside the cabin window.’

  I don’t know why I mentioned that, but I thought I had to remind him of what he’d said on the boat the night before.

  He just laughed. ‘You can handle it,’ he replied.

  The last thing Dad said about the oracle was that the old Greeks had engraved an inscription into the temple here. It said: ‘Know thyself.’

  ‘But that’s easier said than done,’ he added, mostly to himself.

  We sauntered back down to the entrance. Dad wanted to visit a museum just beside it, to study the famous ‘navel of the world’ which had been inside the Temple of Apollo. I humbly asked if I could be excused from joining him inside, and in the end I was allowed to sit in the shade of a tree and wait for him. The museum could not have contained anything essential to a child’s upbringing.

  ‘You can sit under that strawberry tree,’ he said.

  He dragged me along and showed me a tree I had never seen the like of before. I could have sworn it was impossible, but the tree was bulging with red strawberries.

  Of course, I had an ulterior mo
tive for not going inside the museum: the magnifying glass and the sticky-bun book had been burning in my pocket all morning. From then on, I didn’t allow any opportunity to pass without reading more from the sticky-bun book. I would have preferred not to look up from the little book until I had completely finished it, but I had to show a little consideration to Dad, too.

  I had started to wonder whether the little book was like an oracle which would eventually give me the answers to all the questions I asked. I got a chill down my spine when I read about the Joker on the magic island, especially when there had just been so much talk about jokers.

  JOKER

  … He stole into the

  village like a poisonous snake …

  The old man got up and walked across the room. He opened the front door and peered out into the black night. I followed him.

  ‘I have a starry sky above me and a starry sky below me,’ he said softly.

  I understood what he meant. Above us sparkled the clearest starfilled sky I had ever seen. But that was only one of the starry skies. Down in the valley a faint light shone from the cabins in the village. It was as though some stardust had come loose from the sky and had fallen down to earth.

  ‘These starry skies are equally unfathomable,’ he added.

  He pointed down to the village. ‘Who are they? Where do they come from?’

  ‘No doubt they ask themselves the same question.’

  ‘The old man turned to me suddenly. ‘No, no,’ he exclaimed. That’s something they must never ask.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘They wouldn’t be able to live side by side with the person who created them. Don’t you understand that?’

  We went back inside the cabin, closed the door behind us, and sat down on either side of the table.

  ‘These fifty-two figures were all different,’ the old man resumed, ‘yet there was one thing they all had in common: none asked any questions about who they were or where they came from. In this way, they were one with nature. They just existed in the lush garden – as bold and carefree as the animals … but then the Joker arrived. He stole into the village like a poisonous snake.’