The Black Cauldron

by William Heinesen

  It was stuffy down in the subterranean bakery. A perfectly ordinary, dirty packing case standing upright on a dais in front of the oven served as a pulpit. Along the wall and across the floor other packing cases had been placed to support the rough boards acting as benches for the congregation. It was a big, old bakery, but it was in a sad state of repair. Simon had bought it a couple of years before, but he had never taken much interest in the baker’s shop, preferring to live by fishing and a little agriculture and any odd job that came along. Now the bakery was used as a meeting place for the sect. God alone knew what Simon lived on otherwise.

  The two sisters sat down on one of the benches along the wall. Simon came across and shook hands with them. His handshake was firm and brief. His tall, thin figure radiated paternal harmony and benevolence; he looked almost distinguished, quite different from what Magdalena had expected.

  Benedikt was standing over by the oven, his arms folded; the light from above fell obliquely on to his bald pate, and his eyes were almost invisible in their deep sockets. There was a third person on the dais: Selimsson, the photographer, who was tuning his violin and occasionally using the back of his hand to wipe away a drip from his red nose. His hair was curly, and he was dressed in a greasy worsted suit with shiny knees and elbows. Before his conversion he had been a great drunkard and reprobate; so had Morten the shoemaker, an infamous domestic tyrant who on more than one occasion had been arrested for maltreating his wife. Now the two of them were sitting peacefully side by side on the front bench. On his left, alone as usual, sat Tørnkrona, the tailor; Magdalena felt a little sorry for the tall, well-dressed Swede with the blond moustache: he was always alone, and everyone knew that both his wife and his two daughters were having it off with Englishmen and leaving him to his own devices. Tørnkrona stammered and was a little hard of hearing; he hardly ever opened his mouth, which made him yet more lonesome.

  Immediately behind the tailor there was a round-shouldered little man wearing glasses, and with an untidy drooping moustache; it was Mrs. Schibbye’s head clerk, Lydersen. After the sinking of the Fulda he had suddenly joined the bun sect. Further along the same bench sat the mad boat-builder Markus, with the long silvery beard. He was an enigmatic person, who only occasionally seemed to be deranged; otherwise he saw to his work and was said to be good at it.

  Next to Markus sat Kristian the Beachman and his wife and son. Kristian was smiling, as usual; he quietly shook his head, and his great bushy eyebrows moved up and down, as though he was having difficulty in containing some overwhelming joy. The middle benches were occupied by a group of young and not-so-young girls well wrapped up in dark clothes. Black-Betsy, with her severe and wrinkled face, was one of them. The wildest tales had always been told of Betsy; she was said at one time to have been the mistress of a rich man in Copenhagen; she was believed to be suffering from the most dreadful whore’s diseases and had been in prison for a time for murdering a child, but then one day she had done an about turn and gone all religious. At first she had been a member of the Capernaum congregation, but had then followed Simon when he broke away from those more classy sectarians and started on his own.

  The back bench was occupied by a group of girls; they were flushed with the heat and dared not look at each other for fear of laughing. It was quite obvious that they had come merely out of curiosity.

  Jonas was distributing hymn books, and he looked intently at Magdalena. Quite unwittingly on her part, their eyes met in a manner which could almost be described as flirtatious; she blushed and quickly looked away again. Jonas was employed in Masa Hansen’s shop; he had recently joined the baker’s sect and undergone a conversion. He was a good-looking man, and his thick full beard went well with his fresh complexion and his kindly, fervent gaze. Magdalena could not help thinking that he bore a striking resemblance to Jesus. His loose-fitting faded raincoat, looking for all the world like some Eastern robe, made the resemblance all the more striking.

  Suddenly the entire congregation bent forward as though a gust of wind had passed over them; some knelt between the rows of benches, while others leaned forward and hid their faces in their hands. Liva remained upright, merely bowing her head a little; Magdalena did likewise, bowing her head and folding her hands. She heard the baker pray in a deep, agonising, imploring voice; she could not concentrate on the words; she felt sickened and was much inclined to leave. She thought of Liva’s words the previous evening about how terrible it would be to wander about in an eternal night without a lamp, and her thoughts then went to Frederik, who was at that moment sailing without lanterns in the darkness of night … that thought was almost as terrible. And Oluf who had sailed into everlasting night in just the same way … ! His poor dead body lay somewhere at the bottom of the sea or on some desolate shore. Good God, how dreadful to think that he had had no lamp. And then she could not help thinking of Ivar. She regretted not wanting to see his body, but she had not dared; she was so afraid of dead bodies.

  Now the baker fell silent; the prayer was ended, and the congregation began to sing:

  Take hold your lamp, oh timid heart,

  It lights the way so clear,

  Bids evil from this world depart,

  For now the night is near.

  For now the night is near – those words continued to ring and resound in Magdalena’s ears. Beads of cold sweat suddenly appeared on her forehead; she felt she was suffocating, cramped as though shut in a cupboard, and suddenly everything went black; an inky darkness issued from the floor and filled the entire room …

  “I think I’m going to have to go,” she said and pressed Liva’s hand. They both got up.

  “Let me help you.” She heard Jonas’s voice close to her ear. She felt herself taken by both arms and allowed herself to be led out into a little side room. It was cool in here and there was a penetrating smell of sourdough. Jonas held a glass of water up to her lips, and she drank greedily.

  “Look, lie down here for a while, and you’ll feel better,” said Jonas. “Wait a second; you can lie on my coat, so you’ll not get yourself dirty.”

  Magdalena soon recovered from her attack, but she was reluctant to go back into the bakery. She lay quiet.

  “You just go back to the others, Liva,” she said. “I’ll be all right.”

  She could still hear the hymn from inside the bakery.

  It lights the way so clear;

  It lights the way so clear;

  Take hold your lamp, oh timid heart,

  For now the night is near.

  Before long Jonas returned. She closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep. He gently placed his hand on her bosom and ran his fingers sensitively over both her breasts. She opened her eyes and met his gaze.

  “Have faith in Jesus,” he said gently.

  Embarrassed, she looked away. Jonas filled her glass. As soon as he had disappeared again Magdalena got up and made her way out through a back door. She breathed a sigh of relief when she was once more standing outside in the cold under the clear starry sky.

  Thomea was sitting up alone, waiting, when Magdalena arrived home. She was very agitated, and it was obvious she had been weeping. The little kitchen was warm and tidy, and the kettle was singing on the stove.

  “I say, Magdalena …” said Thomea, getting up.

  “Well, what is it?” replied Magdalena rather reluctantly. Humming to herself, she sat down and took off her shoes, and then she yawned: “Oh, I’m dog tired.”

  “Where’s Liva?” asked Thomea. “Haven’t you come home together?”

  Magdalena shook her head and yawned again.

  “I’m so afraid,” said Thomea in a hollow voice.

  “Then you ought to go and lie down.”

  “That Mrs. Lundegaard from the hotel has been here,” said Thomea.

  “Mrs. Lundegaard? What did she want?” Magdalena was suddenly interested.

  Thomea sat with her head bowed and stared down at her hands. “She wanted to have a talk to me. She told me t
hat she’s going to have a baby with him.”

  “With Engilbert?” exclaimed Magdalena. “Good heavens.”

  She got up and went across and laid her hand gently and almost protectively on her sister’s back. “So that’s the sort he is,” she said in a low voice. “Well, I’ve always thought he was, Thomea. A shifty piece. A real unsavoury type. But it’s lucky that you …”

  Magdalena shook her head. “I mean … in a way it’s a good job you’ve found out what he’s like, isn’t it?”

  “She said a lot more,” continued Thomea; her voice was still hollow and choking. “She said that he had been … destroyed. Yes, that’s what she said. Destroyed. She said that I’d destroyed him. She believed I’d cast a spell on him. Yes, that’s what she said.”

  The two sisters stared wide-eyed at each other.

  “Yes, but what does she mean cast a spell?” said Magdalena.

  Involuntarily adopting a lighter tone, she added: “Do you mean to say you can perform magic, Thomea?”

  “Do you think I can?” replied Thomea uneasily. She sighed.

  “Well, you should know that best yourself, my dear,” laughed Magdalena.

  Thomea suddenly grasped her hand and squeezed it; then, in a hoarse voice she asked: “What is it to cast a spell, Magdalena? Is it to wish? I wished I could have him. I wished it. And then it happened. Is that casting a spell?”

  “Rubbish,” said Magdalena uncertainly. “As long as you’ve not been … playing around with magic. No, I don’t know. I don’t know anything about that kind of thing.”

  She tried to pull her hand away, but Thomea refused to let go. She said in a dull voice: “If I’ve got such a strange power as Mrs. Lundegaard says … and as Engilbert says … for he’s said it so often… But if I’ve got a power like that …”

  “Well, what then?” asked Magdalena tensely.

  “Then it’s something I’m not aware of. It’s something about me. Do you think there is that about me, Magdalena?”

  Their eyes met again, and they sat staring at each other. Suddenly Thomea’s face twisted. She let go her sister’s hand and bent forward in a dull, dry sob.

  “Thomea,” said Magdalena and shook her arm. “Of course you can’t do magic. It’s a lot of rubbish. There’s no such thing, is there? It’s that swine that’s made up the story to defend himself now he’s got himself into a mess and come unstuck. Yes, anyone can see that, Thomea.”

  “Yes,” sniffed Thomea.

  “Yes, of course. And now you’d better drop the subject and think no more about it. Do you hear? Put that great oaf out of your mind, lass. Forget the dreadful man, he’s nothing but a snake in the grass.”

  Thomea sighed again and started sobbing once more. “I don’t know whether I can …”

  “If you can what, Thomea?”

  “Forget.”

  Magdalena leant forward and took her sister’s hand. “No, poor you; I understand. He was your first one. And now he’s running off like the wretch he is… And then he’s mean enough to expose you to her scorn and put the entire blame on you. He really ought to have a good hiding, Thomea. Oh, my fingers are itching to … to rub his nose in his own dirt. Shall I go down and have a talk to Mrs. Lundegaard?”

  Thomea shook her head. She curled up, still sobbing.

  “He was here yesterday evening,” she whispered in a thick voice. “Yesterday evening, while you were down at the ship with Frederik. He wanted me out in the barn. But I wouldn’t. I was mourning Ivar, you know. I was terribly tired. But then he said … then he said so many things. He said he was down in the depths … down in the depths of the earth, he said. And then he said he wanted to die and be born again like a blind worm, and live like a worm in the darkness. And then, at last, he said: ’Good-bye, Thomea … we shall meet again in the darkness … for you have sunk as well, and you, too, will die … and perhaps we shall meet as two worms in the earth.’ Yes, that’s what he said.”

  “He’s as mad as a hatter,” said Magdalena in an effort to comfort her. “All Icelanders are like that, Thomea. Don’t you worry. Forget him; that’s all he’s worth.”

  “I don’t know,” said Thomea. She crumpled up; her eyes became small and blurred, and her lips were half open.

  “I wish him dead, now,” she said.

  “Nonsense,” Magdalena tried to make light of it. “I say, Thomea,” she added, without looking at her sister. “Don’t say anything to Liva about this, understand? We’ve got enough trouble already, we don’t want any more. Here she is. You’d better get to bed, my dear.”

  Magdalena started humming gently to herself. She went across and took the singing kettle off the hob.

  “Oh, so you left, Magdalena?” said Liva.

  “Yes, I couldn’t stand them. It was horrible.”

  “That’s what I thought too at first,” said Liva dully.

  “Ugh … that Jonas,” said Magdalena. “Don’t you think he’s a proper old fraud?”

  “Why do you say that? No, I don’t think so. You should just hear him speak. No, Magdalena, I think it’s just you having nasty thoughts. But I was like that to begin with. I didn’t like it at all the first time Simon kissed me.”

  “Kissed you?” Magdalena turned round with a smile towards her sister. “No, does he really kiss you, Liva? Really, on the mouth?”

  “No, on my hair,” said Liva unconcernedly. “Like a brother kisses a sister. Yes, at first I thought, too, that he was a … dirty old fraud, as you put it. But that was only because I had the wrong thoughts. Now I know him and I know there’s no guile in him whatever, Magdalena. Simon is a man battling for a cause. He suffers a lot, suffers terribly for the sake of Jesus Christ. I love him as a brother no, even more than that .. as … as Mary of Bethany loved the Saviour and sat at His feet. For he is a true instrument of Jesus, he is a disciple, I know, Magdalena. He has helped me through the wickedest and most difficult time in my life. I can never repay him for what he’s done for me.”

  Liva sat down. There was a deep flush on her cheeks. “And in any case, why do you think that about Jonas?” she asked.

  “Because he groped me,” replied Magdalena flashing a sharp look at her sister. “Is it usual down there … for them to paw the women’s breasts like that? Is that part of the sacred ritual?”

  “It must have been an accident,” said Liva in amazement.

  “Good heavens above,” said Magdalena. “I’m not narrow-minded. Had it been at a dance, for instance, I’d think nothing of it. But down there! But admittedly, the filthy brute thought I’d fainted or was asleep and wouldn’t notice his filthy paws …”

  Liva had got up and was wringing her hands. “I’m terribly sorry to hear you say that, Magdalena,” she said uneasily. “But I think you’re mistaken. We must try to drive out the evil thoughts from our hearts. We must be cleansed. Even if it hurts.”

  Liva’s voice sounded firm again. Her eyes turned hard and curiously alien. She added: “Yes, for it hurts to tear yourself away from sin. But if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out. It is better … it is better to meet your Saviour without eyes than to go seeing into eternal darkness.”

  “Liva,” said Magdalena. “Don’t look at me like that … I don’t like you when you’re like that. I’m afraid of you. You look really wicked and horrible.”

  She sat down and turned sobbing towards the wall.

  “It’s no good,” said Liva, adding in an invocatory tone: “Pray and pray, Magdalena, until you feel that your prayer has been heard. There is no other way. It’s as Simon said this evening: If we live after the flesh we shall die; but if we through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, we shall live …” Liva could not get Magdalena’s accusation against Jonas out of her mind. She was much inclined to talk to Simon about it in confidence. But in a way it felt like informing on a fellow human being and brother. Jonas had presumably given in to carnal temptation, and he might well have repented of it and prayed to Jesus for forgiveness and strength. She coul
d not help thinking of Simon’s words the day after Ivar’s funeral: Tear down the webs of Satan and destroy his snares … let not this new infernal potion poison our souls. Never as long as she lived would she forget these powerful words and the almost desperate voice in which Simon uttered them. It hurt like a burning fire in her breast to think that he, too, could allow himself to be tempted by the Devil. But he had the strength of faith with which to combat it; he was full of the light of the Word; he had immediately found the healing power and the antidote: See, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions.

  Perhaps God in His mercy would also arm poor Jonas with His Word with which to defend his soul.

  The following morning Liva aired these thoughts to Magdalena, but her sister simply shook her head and in general appeared to be trying to avoid her.

  “You could come with me down to Simon’s this evening,” suggested Liva. “And then we could have a talk to him and hear what he thinks.”

  “I don’t think there’s anything to discuss,” Magdalena tried to put the matter aside. “And incidentally, Thomea’s not well today.”

  Thomea lay buried beneath her eiderdown, and the black, tousled top of her head was all that could be seen of her. She had shut herself entirely off from the world and would neither eat nor say anything. Old Elias, too, stayed in bed that day; he looked still weaker and more sallow than usual and had difficulty in speaking. Liva sat down on the edge of his alcove and read a piece of the Letter to the Galatians. She read in a loud voice so that the words could also reach Thomea and Magdalena out in the kitchen.

  Liva became noticeably agitated, and her voice trembled when she reached the words: This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.