“I think that no grave is too fine for really great men,” said Ólafur Kárason.
“Many good men have had the idea that he ought to become the president of the republic,” said the editor, and there was butter in his smile again.
“That seems to me only right and proper,” said Ólafur Kárason; but even if his life had depended on it, he could not have said how sincere was this solemn talk about Pétur Pálsson the manager.
Finally the editor said, “Have you considered whether it wouldn’t be advisable for you to compose a few verses about the old fellow sometime?”
The poet realized with a shock that he had fallen into a trap.
“Is there any hurry for it?” he asked.
“Oh, no, not really, at least not as far as Pétur’s concerned,” said the editor. “But for various other reasons it might perhaps be advisable if you did it fairly soon, before sentence is pronounced. I hope now you realize that I’m doing you a good turn?”
“Yes,” said the poet, with emotion in his voice. “I feel that I’ve found a good friend.”
“It also occurs to me that it wouldn’t do any harm either if you were to write a nice article in The Alfirðing about the nation’s most distinguished man and Iceland’s greatest leader of the modern era.”
“Yes, excuse me, who would that be, again?” asked Ólafur Kárason, scratching himself behind the ear.
“Who would that be?” asked the editor in amazement. “Who do you think it is? Our new National Bank manager, of course!”
“Of course, how silly of me!” said the poet. “It’s quite true, too. Of course I ought to write something about Júel Júel. It’s a disgrace that I’ve never written anything about him.”
“And it wouldn’t do any harm,” said the editor, “if you gave the Russians and the Danes a little dig in the ribs, and also those poets who in fact don’t belong in Iceland but in other countries. All voices that aim at strengthening the Security of the Nation in these critical times are gratefully accepted.”
“I’ll do what I can,” said the poet.
“When you bring the poem we can have another word about the most practical way to work for Our Movement in your part of the world,” said the editor.
“And we’ll just forget that thing about the sun?” asked the poet as he took his leave.
“Anyone who has the nerve to write about the sun in these critical times for the nation is against Pétur ríhross,” replied the editor. “He is against the Bank; he is against the National Movement; he is in danger of being judged.”
12
One day in midsummer when the heat-haze made even what was near look distant, so that the stones at the roadside had also become blue (that was the extent to which distance and unreality were mingled in everything), three people were on a journey, a man, a woman, and a child, leading a horse along the route over Kaldsheiði. They took turns at riding with the child.
There was a heavy fragrance of ling and brushwood and precious mountain plants. The chirping of the birds was quiet and soothing in the summer stillness; all Nature lay in an uninterrupted trance of bliss.
Sometimes it is as if man is the poorest of all the things in Nature; but today all cares were dulled; today their journey lay not through human life but through a dreamland. And this blue, shimmering dream, this almost airborne blissfulness where the next bend in the road held all the enchantment of a distant mirage, gave no sustenance to grief.
And the poet was wearing a new suit. His wife, Jarþrúður Jónsdóttir, had said that no one from this part of the country had ever been known to go south without a Sunday-best suit; she had suddenly become very proud on behalf of this part of the country, and she said that that rabble in the south, the same slaves who in their time had almost tormented the life out of our late blessed Hallgrímur Pétursson, would have to find something other to laugh at than a man from Bervík without his Sunday-best. She had got hold of a jacket off an old man who had died in the district last year; it had been his Sunday-best jacket for more than forty years and he had never worn it. True, the jacket was both too short and too wide for a tall, thin man like Ólafur Kárason, but who could say what the fashion might be down south? One thing was certain—well-fitting jackets are never in fashion with the well-dressed, they are always too long or too short. The origin of the trousers, on the other hand, was shrouded in some mystery, but even so the poet had a suspicion that they had come from afar. They were gray in color, of a material which was not above criticism, certainly, wide where they should have been narrow and narrow where they should have been wide. When one put them on, some of the most important seams burst, and when they were buttoned up for the first time, the buttons fell off. By accident, shortly after the trousers arrived, the poet happened to meet a traveler from Sviðinsvík who was wearing trousers of the same make, and then it dawned on him that these would be National and Cultural Drawers from Pétur Pálsson the manager, sepulcher-owner and prospective president of the republic. But wherever these trousers might have come from, the poet was grateful for the advantage of having a prudent and resourceful wife in these critical times for the nation.
And when they reached the trading station she did not stop at jacket and trousers, but went into a shop and bought him a pair of boots; and that was not all: when he had put on the boots she also bought a stiff collar, a dummy shirt-front, and a tie, which she got the shopkeeper to fasten round her husband’s neck. Never in all his life had Ólafur Kárason been so well dressed.
A boat had arrived to take the passengers on board the steamer. Down on the quay a few souls had gathered, all wearing their Sunday-best suits, stiff collars and sheepskin shoes, people of the same type as Ólafur Kárason the poet and his wife, people setting off on a journey.
Jarþrúður Jónsdóttir told her husband to give her the boy, and he was really rather relieved to get the child off his arm; but as he handed him over he noticed how unhappy and forlorn he looked, his face almost that of an old man. And when it occurred to him that these little blue eyes would perhaps live a long time without seeing mankind becoming free he grew sad, and all of a sudden he began to feel fond of this boy at the moment of parting and to wish that Jón Ólafsson, too, might have a share of the sun. He kissed the boy in order to ease his conscience, and had forgotten him the same moment. And just when he had kissed the child and forgotten all about him, something unheard of in this household occurred: this poet’s penniless wife brought some money out of her skirt pocket and gave it to him, real bank notes with the king’s portrait on them, no less than twenty-five krónur in ready cash. “Use this to enjoy yourself with,” she said.
He stared in amazement at this huge sum of money and held it tightly between his fingers so that it would not blow away. In the poet’s house, money had never been an everyday sight; for years on end the gleaming metal had been kneaded in places unknown to him; he hardly knew one coin from another. His knowledge of economics consisted of ensuring that what he bought on credit from the merchant did not exceed the pay he could expect as a primary schoolteacher during the winter and for casual labor with the Bervík bailiff in summer. He went on seeing his wife Jarþrúður Jónsdóttir in a new and ever newer light right up to the last moment; on top of everything else she had been hoarding money. He felt that neither he nor anyone else could ever have a more understanding wife or one better qualified to take charge of a difficult marriage in critical times. Men with good-looking wives never had a happy moment, never had a moment’s peace; Jarþrúður Jónsdóttir’s epileptic fits, on the other hand, became milder and less frequent with age; besides which she had undoubtedly been good-looking once, like other women.
“There, put the money in your pocket quickly so that no one sees it, or else it will be stolen,” said his wife. “They’re beginning to call the passengers down on the quay. Ask God to redeem our souls and forgive me, and may Almighty Jesus go with you, and now Good-bye.”
People sail out into the world in differen
t circumstances, but it is always a pleasure, not least the first time, however late one starts; the unknown is itself a promise. The strips of grassland on the mountainsides between the gullies and the gorges reached right up to the sun-gilded cliff-belts; between the mountains lay grassy valleys with lazy rivers, enchanted valleys from the world of myth or fairy tale; the mountain trails entranced the seafarer’s eye. The poet felt completely free now as he stood there on the deck in his collar and boots, sailing past new and ever newer districts; even if he did not own this land’s resources, he owned its beauty. In the distance towered the glacier, his greatest wealth, his thousand, his million. The beauty of things is greater than the things themselves, and more precious; most things are of little or no value in comparison with their beauty, above all the beauty of the glacier. The poet was the wealthiest man in Iceland because he owned the sight of this beauty, and therefore he had no apprehension about the world. He felt he was not afraid of anything. Some people own a lot of money and large estates, but no beauty. He owned the beauty of all Iceland and all human life. He felt kindly towards everyone; he was reconciled with everyone. The music that sustained his soul was the music, along with the nightingale’s, that will triumph when the world destroys itself. Here sailed a wealthy poet. Happy and victorious is the nation which has wealthy poets! He could not understand why the Creator of the world had given him so much. “God, God, God,” he said, and gazed towards the land, and the tears streamed down his cheeks without anyone seeing them. “Thank you for having given me so much!”
Then the storm clouds began to gather and a cold breeze blew up, the ship was out past the headland, out in the open sea; there was even a suggestion of slight rolling. At first the poet found the swell comfortable, but soon he began to feel cold as he stood there at the rail, then he began to feel strange in the head, then he began to feel sick and broke into a cold sweat; finally he leaned out over the rail and vomited. Afterwards he dragged himself, sick and exhausted, down into the hold where he had his bedding, and made his bed with difficulty among other souls in a similar condition, and lay down. Life’s joy had vanished.
13
By the end of the journey the traveler’s collar was much the worse for wear. The starch had gone out of it long ago; it was no longer a stiff collar. The tie had fallen off during the seasickness and had been trampled underfoot in the dirt on the floor of the hold. The dummy shirt-front turned out to be cardboard, and it sagged into his trousers when the buttonhole got torn; the poet had thrown it away long ago. He threw away the collar also. But the suit was fine, except that the forty-year-old jacket gathered a lot of fluff, and the National and Cultural trousers from Pétur Pálsson the manager were all too prone to wrinkle. Word came that the ship was entering harbor. It was early in the morning. The steerage passengers got themselves on deck, some of them rather fragile from seasickness or hangovers, others, including Ólafur Kárason of Ljósavík, looking solemn and full of expectation for the unknown whose doors were being opened. A little later he stepped ashore.
This was the capital of the country. At long last this poet had left the valleys and outer nesses of the farthest coasts and had been lucky enough to see the place which contained the grave of Sigurður Breiðfjörð.
“Country bumpkin, country bumpkin!” shouted a few children, and pointed at him as he stood there at a street corner with his sack.
But hardly had he realized that he was this country bumpkin before the children had disappeared. Here there was no time to think about the same thing for long. He remained at the street corner for a long time, deep in thought. Then two gentlemen came walking across the street in a slow slalom, stopped at the corner beside the poet, greeted him effusively, and called him their friend. They were a little puffy in the face and red-eyed, and had not shaved for the last few days or had their shoes polished. The First Gentleman squinted with one eye at a time at the people in the street and asked in amazement: “Young man, can you tell me why these people don’t go to bed?”
“I’m afraid I can’t say with any certainty,” said the poet. “On the other hand, I presume that they’ve just got up.”
“Yes, what terrible morals we have in this town nowadays,” said the First Gentleman. “This rabble sleeps all day and then goes whoring all night, even five-year-old children. Listen, friend, what’s the sun doing over Mosfell District at this time of day?”
“It’s shining,” said the poet.
“It can’t be a real sun,” said the First Gentleman. “It’s an artificial sun. I want these children sent home to bed. Will you be honest with me and tell me the plain, unvarnished truth: Are there any morals here in this town? Can the birds be right at this time of day? And what sort of a sun is that? Is it I who have lost my bearings or you, who comes from the country?”
“It is I who have come from the country,” said the poet.
“Friend,” said the Second Gentleman, and embraced the poet. “The Bank’s been closed. The English have closed the Bank.”
“Just so,” said the poet.
“And why have the English closed the Bank?” asked the Second Gentleman. “It’s because there’s no money left in the Bank any more. Júel has cleaned out the Bank. Júel has squandered all the money the English lent this ill-starred nation out of the goodness of their hearts. Júel has sunk all the English money in the depths of the ocean. That’s why the Bank’s been closed.”
“Really?” said the poet.
“D’you say ‘Really’?” said the Gentleman. “How dare you say ‘Really’ here in the south?”
“He needs to go to bed; he’s sleepy,” said the First Gentleman.
“He’d better be careful about saying Really,” said the Second Gentleman. “D’you know who I am? I’m a political editor. I’m a leader. I can prove that you’re a traitor to your country and an anti-patriot. I have the proofs to hand. Whoever says Really is against our kinsmen, the Finns, I can prove that. Listen, have you got a króna?”
The poet found a króna piece in his pocket and gave it to the men. Then they asked if he had two krónur. He dug into his pocket and found two krónur and handed them over, and thus bravely bore the banner of the lending activities which the English had stopped by closing the Bank.
“Now we’ll take him out on the tiles,” said the Second Gentleman.
But the poet thought that The Tiles was the name of some very high mountain, and said that unfortunately he did not have time to climb The Tiles.
“What d’you drink, then?” asked the Second Gentleman.
“Milk,” said the poet.
“Milk!” repeated the Second Gentleman. “God help me, I blush for shame! So you drink milk? In other words, there’s no limit to how far people will go in shamelessness nowadays. May I ask: Are you making fun of people here? Or have you really got V.D.?”
Then the First Gentleman said: “You, as a political editor and town councillor, don’t understand countrymen, whereas I, as a lawyer and a sheriff and spiritual aristocrat, understand countrymen—let me speak. Friend! Milk isn’t just the most boorish and unpoetical drink ever known, but also the most vulgar drink which has ever been invented on earth. No one with an uncorrupted aesthetic sense can announce that he drinks milk, at least not in public and without prior notice. Milk is taboo, my dear friend; milk is an obscenity; d’you understand me? On the other hand it’s a matter for negotiation, and I’m quite prepared to consider the matter at a suitable opportunity, how one should classify cattle. As a spiritual aristocrat I incline in the main to the doctrine that cattle are cattle, as far as that goes. And I willingly admit that when I see a cow chewing the cud, I wouldn’t dream of denying that in these disgusting creatures there may reside a certain philosophical, I’m tempted to say metaphysical, power which . . .”
“That’s a repulsive point of view,” said the Second Gentleman. And mercifully for the poet’s purse they forgot all about him and staggered away, bickering.
He shouldered his sack and set off
into the town. There was some sand blowing about, as on Sprengisandur, and everyone was thinking about himself. He was still feeling a little peculiar after the voyage, and knew of no way of finding something to eat in a capital city. He went up to various people and asked where the sheriff was, but people only asked in return if he were an idiot. Finally he met a policeman, which was lucky for him; for this gigantic, uniformed man neither made fun of him nor took money off him nor was suspicious of him on sight, but went out of his way like the good Samaritan to help a stranger, in the spirit of the Gospels.
A midsummer stillness reigned in the police station; no one was in any hurry to take the trouble of coming to the counter to ask this lanky countryman what he wanted. The visitor was allowed to kick his heels for a long time by the door. But when there was no longer any hope that he would go away without bothering people, an elderly gentleman got up from his chair in this mighty sheriff-house, walked with measured stride to the counter, stopped there, and tapped the lid of his snuffbox.
“Good-day,” said Ólafur Kárason.
“Good-day,” said the man.
Ólafur Kárason offered him his hand. “Are you the sheriff?” he asked.
“There’s no sheriff here,” said the gentleman, taking the visitor’s hand rather reluctantly. “This is the police. What do you want?”
“I’m the man from Bervík,” said Ólafur Kárason.
“Bervík,” said the gentleman. “So there’s a Bervík, is there?”
“Haven’t you heard of me?” said Ólafur Kárason. “I’m the one who committed the crime.”
“Really?” said the man, a little absentmindedly. “You committed a crime, did you? What crime was that?”
Ólafur Kárason took from his wallet a copy of the judgment and a document from the sheriff to prove his story, and gave them to the officer.
The man spelled his way through the document and called some of his colleagues over, and they all spelled their way through the document; some of them were wearing ordinary gentlemen’s clothes, others had gilt buttons. They nodded amiably towards Ólafur Kárason when they saw what was up; some of them asked the news from his district about the weather conditions, the grass-growth, and the fishing. The poet said that the grass-growth was well above average in Bervík, and the hay crop was doing well so far this summer; on the other hand there was not much fishing at our place. One man offered him some snuff. These were splendid people. They asked if he could not come back tomorrow.
World Light Page 61
