Novel 11, Book 18

by Dag Solstad

  Christmas was coming to Kongsberg too. Peter had a kind of mock exam just before the holidays, and when it was over he packed and went home to Narvik to celebrate there. He had only one suitcase with him when he left, and his father accompanied him to the station. The train arrived, and Bjørn held out his hand to him. ‘I’ll be back,’ Peter said. ‘After Christmas. It’s so nice staying with you.’ His father smiled and wished him a pleasant journey. You’ll be back after Christmas, he thought. But you won’t stay for very long. That I know.

  Christmas came. Bjørn Hansen celebrated Christmas quietly, all alone, only interrupted by dinner at Berit and Herman Busk’s the second day of Christmas, as usual. Peter returned at the beginning of January, and in the middle of that same month Bjørn Hansen left for Vilnius.

  Where is Vilnius? Vilnius is situated somewhere or other in Europe. It is impossible to state it more precisely. You take the train from Kongsberg to Oslo, fly from Fornebu to Kastrup in Copenhagen, and after an hour’s wait in the transit hall you board a plane bound for Vilnius. After a flight of an hour and twenty minutes, you land in the airport of Lithuania’s capital. Then you are one hundred and twenty miles from Minsk, if you travel in an easterly direction. Riga is one hundred and eighty miles to the north-west, Warsaw two hundred and forty miles south. It is four hundred miles to St Petersburg, five hundred and fifty to Moscow, and five hundred and twenty miles to Berlin. Midway between Berlin and Moscow, somewhere in Europe. To the Baltic coast, with Lithuania’s most important seaport, Klaipeda, and to the bathing resorts, it is one hundred and fifty miles.

  So Bjørn Hansen found himself in Vilnius. He was staring out of the window of his room on the eighteenth floor of the typical Soviet-Russian Hotel Lithuania, down at the city on the other side of the river Neris. An old, venerable city. In Europe. A castle rose proudly on the top of a hill, together with Gedimina’s tower, and below it lay the city with its churches, buildings, towers and walls. Bjørn Hansen was moved by the view from the window and decided to go out at once. Shortly afterwards he was crossing a stone bridge over to the other side of the river, where this old city was located. A city with a skeleton from the thirteen hundreds. A centuries-old home for Lithuanians, Poles, White Russians and Jews. Now a Lithuanian population with a large Russian minority. A place with narrow cobbled streets and a smell of coke. With smoke rising and settling on the city. A smell of coke and rancid cooking oil. Bjørn Hansen hurrying through the streets in his western clothes, quite drab by Norwegian standards. Everyone looked at him. They stood watching him from cramped courtyards. In their worn, old-fashioned clothes. With bundles under their arms. Bent over and hunchbacked. But they observed him with eyes shining with curiosity. He was an envoy from America. Cabbage and potatoes. Rolls of fabric in the shops lining the streets. A man pulling a cart full of empty milk bottles. It rattles. Bjørn Hansen hurried along, actually feeling rather uncomfortable. The old city gate, from the 1500s. St Kasimir Church. A theatre from the 1700s. The palace of the archbishops. The new City Hall, from the 1700s. The university, from the 1500s, with St John Church. The Gedimina Square with the cathedral and the freestanding bell tower. Ding-dong.

  It was cold and he shivered. It was the middle of winter. People were hurrying through the narrow streets. Suddenly it began to snow. It was such a dark day in Vilnius, and suddenly it began to snow. Yes, here, in this city, Bjørn Hansen got to see it snow in Central European fashion. The snow fell wet and heavy upon Vilnius, which long ago was called Lithuania’s Jerusalem and between the wars was a Polish provincial town. Large white snowflakes in the air, which came floating down, got sucked up by the ground and evaporated. The snow fell in heavy white flakes between the baroque buildings, over the tortuous narrow streets, down on the people’s padded shoulders and into their hair, wetting it. All at once the streets were full of schoolchildren, who tried to catch the snowflakes in the air. They suddenly entered the street from small, narrow openings in the row of houses, dressed in school uniforms and carrying their books in slings, which they hastened to get rid of by putting them on cornices, into niches in the walls, or onto stairs, before they ran into the middle of the street to catch the snow with their eager hands. They clapped as they caught the snow in the air, at a quick pace, in the vain hope of catching enough snowflakes to make a snowball. Bjørn Hansen hurried on through the city while observing this strange sudden scene which unfolded so spontaneously before his eyes. He again came to the old stone bridge across the river Neris and to his secluded hotel, Lithuania, which throned it on the other side.

  He shook the melted snow from his hair as he stepped into the reception of Hotel Lithuania. The reception was deep and dark, in a pompous style of the 1960s. Thick carpets on the floor, dim lighting, with, at the very end, a long reception desk with twinkling small lights. In front of it stood a party of people, who were jovially greeting another party with hugs and exaggerated gestures. Bjørn Hansen hurried up, because he knew the people who made up one of the parties. It was the party to which he, too, belonged and they were now greeting their Lithuanian hosts. For Bjørn Hansen was in Vilnius as a member of a delegation. He had been handpicked for a Norwegian delegation of municipal civil servants bound for Lithuania for the purpose of teaching the Lithuanians democracy. And now, here they were, greeting those who were to be taught. They would have discussions and conversations with Lithuanians who were selected to fill important positions in the local administration of this ex-Soviet republic, which had now declared its independence. The object was for the Norwegians to give the Lithuanians some good advice on how local democracy can function in a sensible way, so that the local population can both be governed and take part in the governing. It was not unreasonable that such a delegation would take along a Norwegian town treasurer, nor that this Norwegian treasurer was Bjørn Hansen, because, after all, he had served as such for almost twenty years, and had also during that time held several positions of trust within the Association of Norwegian City and Borough Treasurers.

  The conference, which began immediately after these introductions in the vestibule, took place in the very hotel where the Norwegians were staying. There followed three more days of meetings, interrupted by sightseeing in Vilnius and a day trip around and about in Lithuania. The last evening featured a festive dinner, whereupon the Norwegian delegation returned to Oslo. Bjørn Hansen had little to say about the conference itself. He must have felt rather indisposed, both because of abundant partying in the evenings and his own thoughts. But he noticed, from the very start, that this meeting between Norwegian and Lithuanian municipal administrators had a peculiar air about it. The Norwegians were idolised. More so than he actually cared to be, because what they were idolised for was not their own worth as individuals but their desirable nationality.

  The Lithuanians were dreaming they were in Bjørn Hansen’s shoes. They looked upon his shoes as extremely elegant and even pointed at them. And as a result Bjørn Hansen felt it was strange to find himself in his own shoes. His watch, too, had a promising aura about it. They looked upon the person wearing it as someone who manifested a natural superiority. Every now and then he was asked what time it was, even though the Lithuanians had their own watches. Then Bjørn Hansen extended his arm, looked at his wristwatch and gave the time the dial showed, in German. But the Lithuanians were not listening, they just looked, spellbound, at what was revealed on Bjørn Hansen’s wrist as he jerked his shirtsleeve back so that his watch came into sight, a natural movement he had made thousands of times previously without it causing any commotion whatsoever. And these were not ignorant people from the Lithuanian countryside, the direct descendants of dumb serfs. They were well-educated people who had been selected to be local leaders in the new Lithuania. They represented the backbone of the new Lithuania. And Bjørn Hansen was not the only one who became the object of their endless admiration simply because he walked about in his own clothes. The entire Norwegian delegation experienced the same thing. And since they were rather so
ber, some might say rather grey, Norwegian municipal bosses, few of whom, if any, could be said to be smartly dressed, it was not surprising that the mood of the Norwegian delegation became quite elated, and inevitably many of them felt extremely flattered. For Bjørn Hansen, however, it led him to understand that the plan he had come to Lithuania to carry out could not fail.

  Therefore he left the hotel before breakfast on the second day and hailed a taxi. He was anxious but calm. He asked the taxi to take him to the largest hospital in Vilnius. The problem was to find the right man; if he did, everything would go like clockwork. Dr Schiøtz had given him some good advice as to how he should proceed, what kind of specialist he should look for, and how high up the hospital hierarchy he should go, and when the taxi stopped outside a gigantic hospital complex, he managed, with the help of a German–Lithuanian dictionary, to find his way to Dr Lustinvas.

  He told Dr Lustinvas that although his request might appear rather strange to him, he still asked permission to fully explain why he had sought him out. Dr Lustinvas nodded, inviting him to speak. He was a man of about thirty, dressed the way doctors dress everywhere in the world, in a white coat. Bjørn Hansen presented his request. Not once while he related what services he wanted the doctor to carry out did Dr Lustinvas show any sign of emotion. He neither gaped nor raised his eyebrows. Even though it must have seemed completely insane to him, he appeared quite unmoved; rather indifferent, in fact. It didn’t matter to him. He listened, and when Bjørn Hansen had finished Dr Lustinvas gave a shrug and said that, if it really were true that Mr Hansen wanted this, he could not see that there existed any serious obstacle to having it done. But, he added, naturally such an operation could not be undertaken for free, something Mr Hansen must surely understand. The only thing he wondered about was whether Mr Hansen realised that he would have to pay the fee in cash, so he sincerely hoped that Mr Hansen had borne that in mind when he left his native country to come here, and had taken the necessary measures in advance. When Bjørn Hansen confirmed this, Dr Lustinvas nodded, showing thereby that he was satisfied with his new patient. But when Bjørn Hansen mentioned the sum he had expected to pay, Dr Lustinvas gave a start. Had he heard correctly? Was it possible? Was this man from the West offering him $10,000? For barely anything at all? Dr Lustinvas repeated the sum: $10, 000? In cash? Bjørn Hansen confirmed it. Dr Lustinvas rose and gave Bjørn Hansen his hand. He was visibly moved, and although he tried to hide it, he didn’t quite manage to. Dr Lustinvas’s hand trembled.

  At the end of this conversation, after Bjørn Hansen had paid an advance of $1,000 and they had arranged what happened next at their leisure, Bjørn Hansen could return to the Hotel Lithuania and the conference. He came back just in time for lunch. No one found it strange that he had been away in the morning, because the night before had been pretty boozy and the Lithuanian participants in particular gave him a jolly welcome when he finally turned up. Thereafter he participated fully in the remainder of the conference, both in the meetings, the sightseeing tours, the dinners and the rest of the partying, while he kept hidden the fact that his thoughts were elsewhere. He drank moderately, but made the most of what little he drank in an exceedingly drunken manner. After a festive dinner in the hotel’s assembly hall on the last evening, the festivities continued in the bar and the adjacent room. The time had come to swear eternal friendship, and Bjørn Hansen gladly drank a toast to his new friends. He was invited up to the room of one of the Lithuanians in order to continue the fraternal celebrations with a number of others, something he would not have turned down under normal circumstances. But now he said he would drop by a little later. He had to get a breath of fresh air first. He said this with a crooked smile and in a slightly snuffling voice, which made the others understand that, indeed, he needed some fresh air straightaway. Then he put on his overcoat, handed in his key at reception, as is the custom, and stepped out into the late January evening. When he knew he could no longer be seen from the hotel, he straightened his back and strolled through the streets with firm, relaxed steps. It was snowing. The same snow as before. Heavy white snowflakes upon the sparsely illuminated European city of Vilnius. He reached the hospital, where Dr Lustinvas stood on the stairs to receive him.

  He was led into the hospital and taken, via some back stairs, to a room with a bed. This was his room, a private room. Dr Lustinvas left him alone while he got ready. He undressed and hung his clothes in a tall wardrobe in the austerely furnished room. Then he lay down on the bed. After a while Dr Lustinvas entered, accompanied by two nurses. Under Dr Lustinvas’s supervision, Bjørn Hansen was bandaged and put in plaster according to the medical rules that applied to a case of this kind.

  It gave rise to concern when Bjørn Hansen did not show up the next morning. Neither at breakfast, nor when the Norwegian delegation gathered at reception to leave for the airport. Nor was his suitcase among the Norwegian delegation’s luggage, which had been brought together at reception and was watched over by a cloakroom attendant. An enquiry at the reception desk yielded the information that the key which Bjørn Hansen had handed in the previous evening had not been picked up again. When they let themselves into his room, they found it empty, but with his things still there. They called the airport and had him paged, in case, for some obscure reason or other, he had gone straight there without bothering to take his luggage. They were now beginning to be seriously concerned. The bus to the airport was already waiting, but no Bjørn Hansen could be tracked down. Then a very upset member of the Lithuanian delegation pulled the leader of the Norwegian delegation aside. He had received a message from the hospital to the effect that Bjørn Hansen had been admitted after a traffic accident, and had been operated on for his injuries. His condition was serious but not life-threatening.

  What now? The plane would soon leave and it was time to get to the airport. But could they just take off and leave Bjørn Hansen behind in a Lithuanian hospital seriously injured? Maybe one or two of them should stay and give him support? The Lithuanian delegation leader assured them that this was not necessary. First, it wouldn’t do him much good for a long time and, second, he was in the best of hands. In case anything came up, the embassy in Warsaw had already been notified. An embassy secretary would visit him as soon as the time was ripe. This soothed the Norwegian delegation sufficiently to persuade them to leave for home together at the appointed time.

  Bjørn Hansen remained in Vilnius Hospital for several weeks. He was Dr Lustinvas’s patient and nobody else was allowed near him without Dr Lustinvas’s permission. Sometimes Dr Lustinvas visited him with some other doctors, who would stand in the middle of the room: he could hear Dr Lustinvas speaking to them in an undertone. Or else Dr Lustinvas would pay a call accompanied by a flock of nurses, one after another, like a little procession, in which case the visit with the envoy from the West was only part of an all-inclusive.round of visits. Once a day a nurse came to change his bandages and to rub him thoroughly with ointments. Two nurses took turns at it, the same ones who had bandaged him and put him in plaster that first evening. They were young and sweet and nursed him with all possible care. Sometimes they would talk to him in Lithuanian, smiling when they realised he didn’t understand a word. Once in a while they both came, in the company of Dr Lustinvas, and then Bjørn heard them talking about him among themselves, the nurses’ voices sounding mournful. Dr Lustinvas would come over to his bed and stand there with a worried look in his eyes. Or he would sit down beside him, take his hand to feel his pulse or listen to his heart with the stethoscope. Every day he updated the curves on a chart that hung on the wall above his bed.

  One day Dr Lustinvas gave him an injection that made him pleasantly drowsy. Shortly afterwards, Dr Lustinvas returned, accompanied by a gentleman who spoke Norwegian, Bjørn Hansen could tell, but unfortunately he was so drowsy that he did not quite catch what the man said or wanted. Afterwards, Dr Lustinvas explained that it had been the secretary at the Norwegian embassy in Warsaw, and he pointed at the primitive
bedside table which had flowers and assorted chocolates on it. At his next visit Bjørn Hansen would supposedly feel better, and the embassy secretary would bring him a bundle of Norwegian newspapers and other reading matter.