The Exception

by Christian Jungersen

  Yet, as far as anyone knows, today’s meeting at the Ministry is not particularly important. Apparently Paul is out just to make a good impression.

  Anne-Lise spends the rest of the morning unpacking parcels of printed matter from abroad and recording their contents.

  By lunchtime Paul still isn’t back. The women have their usual lunch in the small meeting room, except the bread is stale because no one could face breaking the police cordon to buy fresh rolls.

  Camilla hardly eats a thing. She looks defeated, her arms hanging limply by her sides. ‘But what if it isn’t Zigic? It could be one of so many people, couldn’t it?’

  Iben replies energetically, quickly swallowing the last bite: ‘You’re right. The other day I tried to arrive at a figure for how many men known to have participated actively in genocides are still alive. Fifteen million, at least! More than five times the number of men alive in Denmark today. If you count people who’ve backed a killer at some point, the number is much, much larger – maybe several hundred million. That’s like the entire population of Europe. Or the US, for that matter. So, Zigic or no Zigic, there’s no telling who else might have been provoked by what’s on our website.’

  Malene gives her a puzzled look.

  Iben answers her question before she’s even asked it. ‘I calculated a ballpark figure like this: one million in Rwanda, and about the same number in Sudan and Cambodia. At least five million in China, and three million in Russia. Then pool all the rest.’

  Iben turns to Camilla. ‘Something happens, changes, inside most men in wartime. Did you read the three reports on genocide in Bosnia by Stjernfelt that appeared in The Week, a few years ago?’

  ‘No. I didn’t.’

  ‘Basically, it was the same story over and over again. A woman meets a nice man, her family likes him, and she feels safe with him. She has no inkling about the dark side to his character; neither has he. Probably. Anyway, no one would have guessed what he was capable of. Then the war begins.’

  Anne-Lise had often thought that Iben, rather than Malene, should be the one who did lecture tours. Iben always became so absorbed in what she was saying.

  ‘Then, one morning, his wife gets out of bed only to find him gone. Maybe there’s a note telling her that he has gone to join some obscure military unit or other. If she’s lucky, he will return to her and the children. It could take a few years, or just a few months. By then she will have heard that he has been shooting at civilians or herding people in front of execution squads or torturing prisoners. He might well have raped women and then killed them, or robbed houses and burnt them down. But there he is, back home, ready to pick up his normal life where he left off.’

  ‘Then what happens?’

  ‘I’ve written about it many times. For instance, in the Zigic article. Some men simply shrug the whole experience off. “That was during the war,” they’ll say and settle into peacetime life as if rape and murder couldn’t be farther from their minds. Others never let go of the past. They’ve changed.’

  ‘Are you saying that all men have a kind of war button? Like, you press it and they start murdering?’

  ‘Put that way – yes, I do. Not all, but most men. It’s a fact. If you don’t believe me, just check out our library. Isn’t that so, Malene?’

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  Camilla is silent, but looks distressed at the turn their conversation is taking.

  Iben is still fired up. She takes a slice of chorizo from one of the boxes and squeezes the plastic lid back on.

  ‘I’ll tell you a story. When I was little, we had this dog, an Alsatian called Max. All the children in the street liked playing with Max and at times it can’t have been much fun for him. We’d pull his tail or poke him in the eye by mistake, or stick our fingers into his mouth, but he put up with it. Max had been with us for years when we took him for a long walk one day. We let him off the lead because we knew he always came when we called.’ She hesitates.

  ‘Anyway, that day we set out to walk in a nearby stretch of woodland. Suddenly Max was off. Calling him had no effect. When my father finally found him it was in the much larger adjacent wood. Max had killed a young deer and was wild with excitement. There was blood all over his head. He had never seen a deer before in his life, but he knew what to do. He had run the animal down and leapt straight for its throat.’

  Camilla listens, her mouth hanging open.

  ‘We spoke to the vet about what had happened and he said that Max was dangerous now that he had experienced bloodlust. Hunting and killing had changed him. In a way, he had become another dog. We realised that we were more to blame than he was, but there was nothing else we could do. My mum and dad had to ask the vet to put Max down. All the kids in the street cried.’

  Iben and Malene exchange a quick glance. Anne-Lise realises that Malene has heard all this before. After the break she and Iben will go into the kitchen or the copier room to talk privately.

  Camilla has pushed her plate away. She looks at Iben. ‘So what you’re saying is that men are like the dog in your story?’

  Malene leans forward over the table. ‘Iben thinks that we’re all a little like animals, don’t you, Iben?’

  ‘In some ways, yes, I think we are. We should have known better and not let Max run free in the woods. It was instinct – he couldn’t help himself.’

  There is something about all this that appears to make Camilla more excited than Anne-Lise has ever seen her before. She has dropped the charming voice she uses on the telephone. ‘So you think Mirko Zigic is one of these men. We’re to feel sorry for him, because he’s got this instinct for … say, hanging people upside down from branches?’

  ‘He’s a frightening man, regardless of his motivation. Just like Max became a frightening dog, particularly around children.’

  Anne-Lise enters the exchange for the first time. ‘If there’s something in men that makes them all potential murderers, then is it present in women too?’

  Iben replies: ‘It might be … but you never read about all-female militias rampaging through the countryside, killing and looting and burning everything to the ground.’

  Camilla grasps a fork in her hands as if she’s trying to bend it. ‘In a way it sounds to me as if you are defending the man who has threatened to kill you. Or all of us.’

  ‘All I’m saying is that these men are victims of war as well. War reveals something inside them that normally would have gone undiscovered. When the war ends, they’re probably just as shaken as the survivors. In shock, if you like, wondering “What happened? What did I do?”’

  Camilla quickly looks round the group. ‘Well, it doesn’t make sense to me to compare the suffering of the executioner with the suffering of the people he has killed.’

  Malene sighs demonstratively. ‘Here we go. Back to the familiar old debate: “How much of human behaviour is due to instinct and how much to free will?”’

  Iben snaps at Malene: ‘Old debate it might be, but I can’t recall us ever talking about it.’

  Malene seems confused.

  ‘From a purely ethical point of view it’s important to hang on to what the victims have a right to demand … Oh, forget it; I don’t know where this is going.’

  All three have a new edginess to their voices. Is it fear of Mirko Zigic that has caused this tension? Whatever it is, they are different. Wilder.

  Anne-Lise feels like retreating to the library. She senses that in a moment one of them could lose control and every chance of reconciliation between them would be lost.

  Camilla puts the fork down. ‘What I’m hearing, Iben, is that you feel that everyone is a victim – rapists, the lot.’

  ‘I suppose I do.’

  ‘And a man who rapes in peacetime – what about him? His basic instincts are getting the better of him too, right?’

  ‘All I’m saying is that I’ve been surprised by how many men seem to have this built-in tendency – something that’s normally suppressed.’

&nb
sp; ‘And that means that we should pity them, does it? – be supportive and offer them therapy sessions because they’ve nobody to talk to about the women they’ve raped?’ Camilla’s usually gentle voice is tinged with anger. ‘We’re talking about men who might kill us!’

  ‘Let’s not talk about them then.’

  Malene speaks quietly. ‘Iben wants to understand every point of view, regardless of whose it is.’

  Silence.

  ‘Iben thinks that Zigic has gone underground some place, maybe here in Copenhagen, and is agonising away. You know, like … “I’ve raped my friends’ wives and daughters. I’ve painted the Serbian eagle on the walls of their houses using body-parts dipped in their blood as my brush – but hey! Does that make me a bad human being?”’

  Malene starts to laugh at her own irony, but nobody is smiling. ‘He would be utterly … disoriented.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  Malene glances at Iben sympathetically, then she looks at Camilla. ‘If we think he is in any way “normal”, then imagine what it must be like to live with all that and have no one to talk to about it.’

  Anne-Lise suddenly senses that something is being aimed at her. She wants to get up and leave, but being included by them is what she has always wanted.

  Camilla interrupts Malene. ‘No way would I let him talk to me, that’s for sure! I’m prepared to try to understand lots of people and make allowances, but that kind of thing – no, that’s where I draw the line.’

  Iben is more direct. ‘I wonder, is his loneliness getting a hold of him? Maybe he’s simply writing these emails because he’s so isolated? Maybe we could make use of that?’

  Anne-Lise pushes back her chair. As she stands up, Malene’s words reach her. Softly.

  ‘Perhaps it’s only people like us who have this need to talk. Someone like him might not feel the same way.’

  Malene’s eyes rest calmly, almost amiably, on Anne-Lise.

  Anne-Lise turns to go but remembers that she should do her part in clearing the table. She reaches for one of the dishes and watches Malene smile blandly.

  ‘But then, we’re clearly different from some people. Speaking for myself I could never bear to work the way you do, Anne-Lise. You know, alone all day long, year in and year out.’

  9

  Malene, Iben and Camilla sit together in silence. They’re waiting, their hands lying on the table. How will Anne-Lise reply?

  Holding the small dish with cheese and liver paté, Anne-Lise stops, her eyes glued to the table top. She mumbles an answer, so low that it is hard to grasp what she is saying: ‘I feel the same way as you do. I’d like to have someone to talk to.’

  The responses come in a rush. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You have us to talk to, any time you like.’

  ‘We’re here for you.’

  She can’t see how she can answer them, how she can be friendly and honest at the same time. She cannot allow the smallest crack in the wall of lies she has built to protect herself, or the truth will come flooding in – the real truth full of anger and tears and howls of hatred. She can no longer imagine a constructive way of being truthful.

  Anne-Lise remains silent.

  Malene apparently takes no notice. She addresses the other two. ‘We know that Anne-Lise doesn’t work closely with anyone else. Not the way we do.’

  Iben and Camilla join in, their voices confident and confiding.

  ‘She can’t chat the way we do when we’re sitting at our desks.’

  ‘But that’s not our fault, surely.’

  ‘Come on, nobody has said that it’s anybody’s fault.’

  ‘Anne-Lise, you know you can always come and join us. It isn’t as if our office is shut off, is it?’

  ‘But somehow it sounded as if we’d done something wrong.’

  ‘Oh no. No.’

  ‘Anne-Lise, what do you really mean?’

  ‘Do you think we don’t want to talk to you? It sounded a bit like that.’

  ‘You don’t think that, do you? You know you can always come to see us, don’t you?’

  All three of them are looking at her. Anne-Lise summons all her courage to speak. She almost spits out the words, enunciating each one crisply: ‘You three are such good friends. Clearly that is why you speak to each other in a different way from the way you speak to me.’ She stares at the plate in her hand, then at the lunch table. The smell of the food is getting to her.

  Malene smiles. ‘That’s true. Iben and I are old friends and that’s – you know – different from being friendly with people you work with.’

  Again, their words pour out almost in unison.

  ‘Naturally.’

  ‘People who work together should treat each other well – that goes without saying. But that’s quite different from being close friends.’

  ‘I’ve come to the library loads of times to ask if you wanted something, like when I was going to the baker’s or the supermarket.’

  ‘And when we take a break we always tell you.’

  Iben leans forward and her face has an earnest expression. ‘We don’t always remember to go to the library and tell Anne-Lise if we’re having an interesting discussion. We probably could do better, couldn’t we?’

  Anne-Lise’s throat tightens. The conversation isn’t over yet.

  Malene looks at her and raises her voice just enough to be heard above the other two. ‘Now, you must admit it’s understandable if anyone talks more with a close friend than with a colleague?’

  Camilla won’t let go either. ‘There’s no way we can work out how much it means to you if you don’t tell us. Many people really do prefer to keep to themselves.’

  Malene nods pleasantly at Camilla. ‘I’d like to hear what Anne-Lise has to say.’

  Anne-Lise realises that she needs a pee. Her voice is faint. ‘Yes …’

  Malene is staring straight at her with genuine interest. Anne-Lise finally tries to say something, more to herself: ‘Yes, of course I understand.’

  She knows when she tells Henrik about this he will be irritated with her for backing down.

  The others continue to protest their innocence to each other.

  After a while Anne-Lise tries to add something else. ‘Maybe I’d rather not be so …’ She thinks of Henrik and tries to finish her sentence with conviction. ‘… Well, it matters to me that I’m supposed to keep my door shut.’

  Camilla suddenly stands. With both hands on the table, she leans towards Anne-Lise. ‘What’s this? We’ve been through it before, Anne-Lise.’ Camilla takes a deep breath and looks at Malene and Iben for support. ‘We agreed! And I don’t want to go over it again!’

  Iben makes a small gesture for Camilla to sit down, but Camilla hasn’t finished. ‘I won’t put my health on the line just so the door can be left open. I simply won’t!’

  Iben gently replies. ‘But Anne-Lise didn’t say that the door has to be open. She’s only saying it makes a difference to her that it’s shut.’

  Anger is bringing out red spots on Camilla’s neck. ‘I’ve read all about it. It’s the draughts you don’t notice that are the most dangerous. Draughts can make you an invalid! – force you into early retirement!’

  They all pause, waiting for Anne-Lise to speak. It’s too much. Outside the sun breaks through the clouds, suddenly brightening the room.

  She opens her mouth, but the words don’t come. Suddenly, she’s aware of pressure behind her eyes. She manages to keep the tears back, but her hands and arms begin to tremble. This will not do. She can’t just sit here, speechless and shaking.

  The others are exchanging looks.

  Oh, they’ll be able to use this against her all right. From now on they’ll say she is mentally unstable. She has never trembled like this before, as if she were an alcoholic or a drug addict.

  Her words come too quickly: ‘And then there’s the whole thing about the library users, the fact that I’m not allowed to talk to them. If I could, it would make a diff
erence. In other libraries, researchers contact the librarian. I thought I’d be the Centre’s librarian and people would come to me. I didn’t think I’d just be doing archival work. That’s what they told me when I was interviewed …’

  Malene interrupts. Her voice sounds truly caring, warm and reassuring. ‘Anne-Lise, if you feel like an outsider here, it’s good that you’ve told us. We can do something about it now. I must say that I don’t believe it’s the only reason why you feel so unhappy, but even if this place isn’t as bad as you think, we still need to work something out. You mustn’t feel so bad. You can be absolutely certain that we all want to help you.’

  Anne-Lise raises her head and sees Malene look quickly at the other two, who are nodding nervously.

  ‘I think you’ve made such a good start by telling us about how you’ve been feeling. Maybe the next thing to do is to arrange a meeting with Paul and decide on some changes together. How do you think that sounds?’

  ‘It sounds like a good idea.’

  ‘Great! We’ll do everything we can to turn this office into a good place to work.’

  ‘OK.’ Anne-Lise can’t hold on any longer. She is crying quietly now. The sudden kindness has overwhelmed her.

  Malene has more to say. ‘But the changes mustn’t be at the expense of the people who use the Centre.’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘It’s what you said about having contact with the users that’s so problematic. There must be plenty of other things that we could do to make you happier. The users like having one person who handles all their needs, you know, from appointments to events and research projects. And that includes book requests.’

  Anne-Lise hears her own voice. High-pitched, almost a shriek. ‘But they don’t always like it! They often want me to help them.’

  ‘No, Anne-Lise. That’s not right. If someone said they preferred to speak to you, they would be passed on to you at once. No question about it.’

  ‘But you told Camilla off because she transferred Stephan Colwitz’s call from Geneva to my phone.’