The Living and the Dead in Winsford

by Håkan Nesser

  If he doesn’t give me any kind of answer, I must seriously wonder if something is not as it should be. Or am I thinking along the wrong lines?

  It’s Tuesday today, Mark and I have agreed not to be in touch until Saturday, when it’s my turn to treat him to dinner at The Royal Oak. I think we both take it for granted that we shall end up at his house, as does Castor, and perhaps even Jeremy.

  Incidentally Jeremy is a welcome excuse for me not having to provide dinner in Darne Lodge. Mark has done no more than pop in through the door, and I intend to leave it at that. I have quite a few items of men’s clothing and other things difficult to explain away hanging around the house, and of course I can’t get rid of them. It is essential for me to get home with all Martin’s belongings intact.

  The thought of me actually sitting down in the car and driving away from here together with Castor fills me with equal doses of exhilaration and dread. No, that’s not true: at this point the feelings of dread are greater, significantly greater; but I hope the balance will be roughly equal when the time actually comes.

  *

  E-mail from me to Christa, the seventeenth of January:

  Dear Christa, I hope all is well with you and Paolo. Down here in Morocco, I’m afraid things are not all that good. Perhaps it was daft to come here in the first place: I’m beginning to think that Martin and I should have done the sensible thing and gone our separate ways after all those goings-on. It’s not that we quarrel, but Martin is suffering from a terrible attack of depression: he doesn’t want to talk about it because he’s such a pig-headed individual, but I’m beginning to fear that he might do something silly. I don’t want to burden you with all this, but I’ve got nobody to talk to down here. I’ll just say that it’s very hard going, and ask you to keep your fingers crossed on our account. Luckily something has turned up: the woman who is renting our house in Nynäshamn is having to break the contract because her mother has fallen seriously ill in Argentina, so there’s nothing to stop us going back home. I’m trying to persuade Martin we should do that: there’s nowhere here in Morocco where he could get decent treatment, and I really do think he should go into an appropriate institution or at the very least get professional psychiatric help. He hasn’t been able to cope with the work he hoped to do down here, and that is of course a significant cause. But as I said, please keep your fingers crossed for me, Christa, and hope that I shall be able to persuade Martin to go back home with me. Love, Maria

  E-mail from Martin to Soblewski:

  Dear Sob. Let’s go ahead with Miss Słupka. No doubt a real talent. As for myself, though, I have huge misgivings regarding my talent. My work is going to pieces and so am I. Fuck Herold and Hyatt. I will give it a last push by trying to write a play about it, but not sure it will work. Sorry to have to tell you this but it is unfortunately the truth. I drink too much, have taken up smoking again and Maria is very worried about me. So am I. M

  E-mail from Martin to Eugen Bergman:

  Dear Eugen. Thank you for your kind thoughts. I’ve gone to the dogs, and have even started smoking again. I think we’ll have to go home, I can’t go on like this for much longer. M

  That will do for today. But if I haven’t got a response from Soblewski by Monday I shall have to take steps different from those I had planned. I sit there in the centre for some time thinking about that while reading news from the rest of the world without much in the way of enthusiasm. If in fact I am now going to crawl out of my hideaway, I had better make an effort to inform myself about what’s going on out there. But it’s a pretty depressing thought.

  I also try – for the twentieth time since he told me about it – to come to terms with what Mark said he had seen outside that butcher’s shop in Dulverton, but only come to the same conclusion as I have reached nineteen times before.

  I have never seen Martin wearing a hat.

  Mark said the man was in his sixties. Professor Soblewski must be at least seventy.

  I already knew that the person who had hired the car was a Pole, bearing in mind that newspaper on the car dashboard. The fact that there was also a copy of the Swedish Dagens Nyheter . . . well, I decide to leave it at that.

  I have no desire to dwell on the fact that these are precisely the conclusions I want to draw. The time for hesitation and doubt has passed.

  And in that depressing short story by Słupka there was just one line – one single line – that jarred. The suggestion that women don’t realize they are more cold-blooded than men until after they have passed the menopause.

  That was written by a young woman. How does she know? I leave the Winsford Community Computer Centre, skirt round the church and walk up Ash Lane towards Mr Tawking’s house in order to collect my two hundred pounds. It’s beginning to get dark, and is drizzling slightly. I note that this is my last Thursday evening but one in Winsford, and the village is displaying itself in its gloomiest possible guise.

  I knock on the door but nobody comes to open it. I can see that lights are on in two windows, so I think this is a bit odd. To make things worse, Castor is standing beside me and growling, something he never normally does. I knock several more times and think I can hear a noise inside the house. I pause for a moment, then turn the handle.

  It’s not locked, and we go in.

  ‘Mr Tawking?’

  He’s lying on the floor on his stomach with his arms underneath him. I can see his left eye as his head is turned to one side. He gives me a terrified look, so it’s obvious he’s alive. Castor growls and keeps his distance.

  ‘Mr Tawking?’

  His head moves slightly and he blinks.

  A stroke? I wonder. Cerebral haemorrhage? Heart attack?

  Or is that just three different names for the same thing?

  I realize that it’s not a question I need to think about, hurry back out and ring the neighbouring doorbell. A woman in her forties answers. I explain the situation.

  ‘Ah well,’ she says. ‘It’s just a matter of time. But I’m a nurse, I’ll take care of the situation. Bill, take that bloody chicken out of the oven, we’ll have to eat later!’

  She smiles at me and is already ringing for an ambulance. I can see that the chances of my ever getting back that two hundred pounds are very small.

  52

  ‘They said at the pub that Castor had gone missing. You never told me that.’

  I think for a moment. ‘No, maybe I didn’t mention it.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I don’t really know. It was during the Christmas holiday period when you and Jeremy were in Scarborough.’

  ‘It’s still odd that you said nothing about it.’

  ‘Do you think so? I thought I had done, in fact.’

  What is all this? I think, and for the first time I feel a pang of annoyance directed at Mark Britton. Or maybe it’s aimed at me. I ought to have told him about those awful days when Castor was missing: instead I’m keeping quiet and telling lies and holding information back when it’s quite unnecessary, and in the end I won’t be able to keep it up.

  ‘At least nobody can accuse you of being an open book,’ he says. ‘I’m not scared of mysteries, and sooner or later I’ll get to read all the pages, won’t I?’

  He laughs, and I choose to do the same. After all, this is one of the last occasions we shall meet. At least for the foreseeable future. I take a piece of cheese and a mouthful of wine, and he does the same. We are sitting in his kitchen, and I feel rather upset when I think the thought: the thought that I won’t be sitting here any more.

  ‘It’s not even possible to Google you,’ he adds. ‘It’s a stroke of genius, using a pseudonym.’

  I nod. ‘Genius is the right word.’

  ‘And you’re not going to tell me what name you’re using?’

  ‘Not just yet. Sorry.’

  Does he suspect something? Is Mark beginning to understand that there are hidden and worrying motives behind my veil of secrecy? Perhaps. I can’t make up my mind. He like
s casting out flies on the water like this, in the hope of getting a bite: and he didn’t do that a month ago. But I can’t say that I don’t understand why he does it.

  Especially if I mean as much to him as I suspect I do.

  But this isn’t going to be the very last time we meet. We have another weekend left, assuming I really do leave here on the twenty-ninth as planned. I’ve looked into my diary and put a cross by that day. I must remember to get rid of that diary, but there are quite a few other things that must be disposed of as well.

  ‘I’m in love with you, Maria – I take it you realize that?’

  That shouldn’t have been an unexpected declaration, but I nearly drop my glass even so. I don’t recall hearing such words since . . . I try to remember if Martin ever said anything like that. I’m damned if I know. But Rolf no doubt did.

  How many people are there in the world who never hear such words: an assurance that somebody loves them?

  ‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘Thank you for saying that. I like you an awful lot, Mark. My life out here on the moor has become so much more meaningful since I met you. But I can’t make any promises . . . if that’s what you are after.’

  He sits for quite a while, weighing over what I said – I would do the same if I were him. Then he nods and says: ‘You know, I feel pretty confident regarding our relationship. There must be some reason for you turning up in this very village.’

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘No doubt there was a meaning.’

  ‘We are grown-up people,’ he says.

  ‘We are indeed,’ I say.

  ‘We know what it means to be in denial.’

  ‘We’re experts at that.’

  He leans forward over the table and takes hold of my head with both hands. ‘In love with you, did I say that?’

  E-mail from Martin to Gunvald:

  Hi Gunvald. Thank you for your message – great to hear that you’re enjoying life down under. The situation in Morocco isn’t nearly so enjoyable, I have to admit. I have total writer’s block, and to tell you the truth I feel utterly dejected. We might go back home to Sweden sooner than intended: I know it’s a bloody awful time of year and all that, but what can one do? Anyway, take care of yourself – we’ll keep in touch. Dad

  From Eugen Bergman to Martin:

  My dear friend! Come home at once if you’ve run into a brick wall. There’s no point in wandering around in a foreign country and suffering. And a play might be just the right thing, don’t you think? You’ve never written anything for the theatre before. But we’ll see how it goes with that, the main thing is that you keep your head above water. My very best wishes – to Maria as well, of course. Eugen

  From Soblewski to Martin:

  My dear friend! You are far too young for depressions! But I can imagine how sitting in that very country with that very story could make anybody go crazy. I suggest you leave it and try to find other distractions – and if you really are on your way home, you are more than welcome to stay a few days in my house, which might enable us to talk things through properly. Your lovely wife and your dog are welcome too, of course. No new bodies have been reported and I have no idea whether they managed to identify the old one. I have heard nothing more about it. All the best, Sob

  I read Soblewski’s message very carefully, especially the last sentence. No new bodies have been reported and I have no idea whether they managed to identify the old one.

  I think it over. Surely, I think, surely this must be the most positive piece of information I could have wished for? I sit there for a minute or so, considering it from every conceivable point of view, but I can find no other possible assessment.

  What happens next is up to me, of course.

  E-mail from Martin to Eugen Bergman:

  We shall see, my dear Eugen. It’s hard, but maybe we’ll do as you suggest and head northwards. Don’t have too high expectations of the play, though. All the best, M

  From Martin to Soblewski:

  Thank you for your concern. We shall see what happens. M

  From Christa to me:

  Damn and blast! I knew there was something about those dreams! But of course you are the one on the spot down there and will have to take care of the breakdown. I can’t say I’m surprised, I’m afraid. As you know I’ve had my share of depressed menfolk. They’re worse than three-year-olds with earache if you ask me – sorry to have to say that. But for God’s sake make sure you come home so that we can meet and talk everything over. I’ll be staying in Stockholm until the middle of February, so there’s time. Then a month in Florida, thank the Lord. Keep in touch and come home! Christa

  From me to Christa:

  I’m afraid things are no better here. I think we’ll probably do a runner in a week or so’s time. So if you are still in Stockholm maybe we can meet at the beginning of February. I’d like to put Martin on a flight home and drive all the way myself, but of course that’s not possible. In any case, thanks for your concern. Love, Maria

  From me to Gunvald and Synn:

  Dear Gunvald and Synn, just a line to let you know that your dad’s not very well at all. We plan to start our long journey back home a few days from now. I don’t know if he’s written to either of you, but it’s pretty unlikely. He is very depressed, and hardly speaks to me at all. Keep your fingers crossed that we get home safely and can get some help. Love, Mum

  Well, I think to myself, that’s the foundation for what comes next done and dusted, and it’s with a feeling of relief and cautious optimism that I leave Winsford Community Computer Centre for the last time.

  53

  We spend the last few days repeating everything.

  We go for our favourite walks one more time: Doone Valley, Culbone, Selworthy Combe, Glenthorne Beach. We manage to find our way back to Barrett’s bolt-hole and to the pub in Rockford where Jane Barrett’s exhibition is still taking place, but she happens to be out when we go there. I’m a bit annoyed to find she’s absent: there are a few things I’d have liked to ask her, but I suppose I’ll get by even so. The main thing is to dare to get that feeling of confidence she talked about, and rely on Darne Lodge being protected. We call in at the second-hand bookshop in Dulverton one last time and say goodbye to the hundred-year-old dandelion. We also say goodbye to Rosie, Tom and Robert at The Royal Oak Inn. It feels odd to note that it’s only three months since I set foot in here for the first time. I remember that sofa the cat had been peeing on for so long. How was it doing now, and how was Mrs Simmons?

  And I carry on writing. It’s surprising to find how easily I make progress with ‘At Sunrise’ – that’s the working name I’ve given the play. I’m writing on Martin’s computer, of course, and perhaps that’s the reason why I don’t feel I need to accept responsibility for it all, and the dialogue flows so smoothly. In parallel I’m reading Bessie Hyatt’s two books, and with Martin’s reports on them at hand it’s not difficult to work out the references.

  The setting is the same all the time: the big table on the terrace. It’s explained that we are in Greece during the first two acts, and in Morocco for the last three. It’s important for the audience to understand that time has passed. Eleven roles, of which two are servants. I use Megal – and in a few places his hypnotic wife – as a narrator. They address the audience directly, and describe the off-stage circumstances – exactly as in classical dramas. Their roles are especially important in the closing scenes, when they are together with Bessie Hyatt in the house, watching what happens to Gusov from some distance away. How the murder takes place.

  But it’s all about Herold and Hyatt, of course. I’ve changed the names of all the other characters, and I stigmatize Herold as much as I dare without turning him into a caricature. Hyatt is the innocent party, albeit not absolutely so; all the rest are fellow travellers who act in such a way that Herold can assert himself continuously. Which makes it possible for him to crush both Gusov and Bessie Hyatt. For instance, I locate Bessie’s abortion in a room adjacent to the terrace: th
e audience will know what is happening, but the other characters pay no attention: they sit eating and hear her cries through the open window without bothering about them. Her suicide is announced in a sort of prologue before the curtain rises. I know that my play is brutal and harsh, without mercy or reconciliation; but I think a little rewriting can make it more mild and sophisticated. If such adjustments need to be made. I also toy with the idea that at some point in the distant future I can explain to Eugen Bergman that I have worked on the text together with Martin, so that perhaps I can take another good look at it and produce an amended version. At some point in the even more distant future I can envisage the play being performed at the Royal Dramatic Theatre in Stockholm, and picture myself saying a few brief words about Martin from the edge of the stage before it starts. There is no limit to my fantasies.

  Two days before we leave I complete the script. Five acts, a hundred and twenty pages of dialogue. Tom Herold and Bessie Hyatt placed under the microscope: I’m surprised by the euphoria pounding away inside me. This must be what it feels like to be a real writer, I think. When you come to the point at which a project has been successfully completed.

  My taking leave of Mark Britton turned out to be less emotional than I had feared, and it occurs to me that I have underestimated him. As usual Castor and I spend an evening, a night and a morning in Heathercombe Cottage: when we part on the Sunday, we have checked carefully one another’s telephone numbers and e-mail addresses, and I am sure that we shall meet again. Nothing, not even the most awful short story imaginable, can end like this.