The Garden

by Magnus Florin

  Herr Norlind listens to the gardener playing. His enthusiasm is great and the gardener, pleased by this response, extends the moment into a little concert, an afternoon concert in the heat. Herr Missa joins the company, taking notes. Lövberg stands a little way off, with a rake in his hand.

  After the concert, for after all it must finish sometime, Norlind delivers a little speech in which he praises the gardener’s playing. Despite being widelytravelled he has never heard anything of the kind before and he would like to describe the gardener’s playing of the instrument as almost perfect.

  In fact, there are only two things that he would personally like to draw attention to with regard to this hummel – as the instrument is properly called, he says – and that is two notes which are very slightly wrong. But this could very easily be corrected. “How?” asks Linnæus. “Perhaps it would be easiest if I showed you, says Norlind, with the gardener’s permission?”

  Norlind now sits on the bench with the instrument in front of him and adjusts the cross-string on the sounding-board.

  “The basic scale is a major one,” he says. “But you have to avoid the fourth being too high and the seventh too low. It’s only a question of a millimetre. A trifling little millimetre, here … and here … and here.”

  Linnæus is proud of his gardener. After Hörner and Norlind have left them he grasps the gardener’s hands and cries out:

  “Gardener! Gardener!”

  It is a light night out in the field, in the mud. Linnæus alone, in a central point from which footprints radiate out in every direction. The prints are from walkers’ boots. The walkers have taken rapid strides. They are the prints of all the disciples. They followed him, he went in front, they followed in all directions and now he is alone in the centre.

  Dawn and sunrise over Lövsta. Moisture covering the ground. Linnæus is surrounded by his cows. Their breath is thick steam in the morning chill. They are Summer Rose, Beauty, Maidie, Aster, Proudie, Dainty, Lily, Rosie, Blossom, Thrift, Mumsie, Missie, Velvet, Goldie. They graze their way towards him. Nobody sees him among them.

  He is lecturing. On the table in front of him is a specimen of Linaria, Common Toadflax, and a specimen of Ziöberg’s remarkable plant.

  “They look identical. This one, which is known to us, has four paired stamens of unequal length and a single spur. But this other one, which is hitherto unknown, has five spurs and five stamens of equal length.

  He demonstrates, compares. Four additional spurs. An additional stamen. A significant addition. The circle of students around the table.

  “It comes from Linaria. And yet we must see it as being from another, as yet undescribed species, even belonging to a different class from Linaria. To me, it was common toadflax. Now it is not common toadflax. It has made the leap from Didynamia to Pentandria. I call it Peloria, from the Greek word “pelor”, which means malformation or monster. Nothing can be more fantastic than what has happened with this plant of ours, namely, that a misshapen offspring of a plant, which formerly produced irregular flowers, begins to generate regular ones. In so doing it deviates not only from its maternal family but totally from the whole class. It is no less amazing than if a cow gave birth to a calf with a wolf’s head.”

  Linnæus looks up from the table at the circle of students. They are motionless, silent. Linnæus imagines they are astounded. He continues:

  “We are confronted with the astonishing conclusion that new species occur within the world of plants. That genera which differ in their organs of reproduction can have the same origin and nature. That different organs of reproduction can be found in the same genus. As a result, the fundamentals of reproduction, which are also the fundamentals of all botanical science, would be overturned. The natural classes of plants would be exploded.”

  Strong wind. Linnæus with case in hand on the Uppsala plain, waiting to depart, lifts the case high into the air.

  “Take it!”

  But nobody takes it.

  Lövberg in his shed, drunk. The gardener is thrashing him.

  “You are a swine, Lövberg.”

  Lövberg screams from the pain of the blows, but his screams turn into the grunting and shrieking of a pigsty, then into fits of laughter, then into improbably solemn tones. A story begins, narrated by Lövberg.

  “Listen to this. When King Louis of France was ill, no-one in his court could get him to utter the slightest laugh, however much they joked and played the buffoon. One jester after another approached him to practise their arts, but while the gentlemen and ladies of the court laughed themselves silly, the king sat apathetic and stony-faced. No-one could think what to do. But then in came a particularly resourceful jester leading a troupe of trained pigs, bizarrely dressed-up and dancing and skipping to the music of a bagpipe. And the king laughed! Now, gardener, what do you say to my little story?”

  The gardener has listened patiently. In certain circumstances Lövberg has a talent for telling such stories.

  “It’s only a fairy-tale, Lövberg. You made it up. I can hear that, for you tell it like a fairy-tale.”

  “And you won’t forget it, gardener. It exists now, you’ll never get rid of it.”

  “You’re a swine, Lövberg, a swine. It doesn’t exist, it can’t exist, any more than there is a … a crazy countess just because I’m standing here thinking of a crazy countess!”

  “There you are, gardener. Now there’s a crazy countess as well! Swine and countesses everywhere!”

  Night. A figure is down among the paths. Linnæus looks down from his window. A man is leaning backwards and gazing up at him. Spitting. It’s Rolander. His nosebleed.

  Linnæus goes down, calls his name. Rolander clears his throat, spits, wipes his nostrils with his fists, rubs them against his coat, excuses himself, and pleads that he comes with greetings.

  Linnæus carefully takes his time, pronounces different names, enquires after their health. Rolander replies:

  “Sparschuch? Fell downstairs, dead. Wetterman? Burnt to death. Grufberg? Cut his throat with a razor, dead. Baeckner? Died of fever in Paris. Lutteman? Still living, insane. The Ferber brothers? Both died in poverty in America. Gisler? Mad, murdered three people. Edvall? Buried in Canton. Berzelius? Died on the way home from China. Lindh? Died on the ship Terra Nova. Lundberg? Died of fever in Stockholm. Carlbohm? Died of consumption in Paris. Björnståhl? Died of plague at Litochoro, Greece. Lundborg? Drowned. Salomon? Drowned. Luut? Drowned. Wennerberg? Drowned. Söderberg? Drowned.”

  It’s early June. The watchmaker is standing by the coach talking to the coachman and the servant. Linnæus sees him helping himself to a piece of cheese. Linnæus comes down and follows suit. The cheese is very good. They stand together chewing it. It’s pleasant in an unaccustomed way.

  “There are three kinds of cheese and butter,” the watchmaker cries.

  There are lots of kinds, thinks Linnæus.

  “There is then, there is now, there is afterwards,” says the watchmaker. “But everything happens at once. You took a piece of cheese then, you’re eating it now, and you’re wondering what will come afterwards. But that was then.”

  Linnæus begs pardon for the obtuseness of his thought processes, which means that he doesn’t have the right kind of receptiveness for such flights of fancy.

  The watchmaker balances his plank on his shoulder.

  “Come and see my house at a convenient time.”

  Linnæus is talking loud and clear.

  “The total number is there, gone over so many times, put in order. And then this single one comes along which changes everything. One plus one plus one plus one, I know what that comes to. But this latest addition?”

  The gardener to Linnæus, standing a short distance from him.

  “Can you see me properly where I’m standing?”

  “Yes. Of course I can see you.”

  The gardener comes closer:

  “It’s true. As you can see, I am visible. You are also visible. But I can make myself i
nvisible.”

  “How?”

  The gardener is right beside Linnæus.

  “It’s foolproof magic. I will exist, just like now, I will see everybody, but no-one will be able to see me, even if I was standing in the middle of the church.”

  “How?”

  The gardener walks around and begins to explain in a matter-of-fact tone:

  “All I need is a barrel. I bore lots of small holes in a barrel, creep down into it and shut the lid from inside. Through the bottom, which will be turned upside-down, that is, pointing to the sky, I will be able to see everybody through the small holes. But will be invisible to all!”

  In every one of his copies of Systema naturæ Linnæus scores out in black ink the words “no new species emerge”.

  Linnæus is acquainted with lots of gardeners. Jakob Gottschalk and Henrik Kralitz in Lyon. Johan Snippendal and Herman Cornelius in Amsterdam. Philip Miller in Chelsea.

  But none of them is like his own gardener. It would be wrong to say that he is acquainted with him. Wrong too to say unacquainted.

  Yet Linnæus knows him inside-out. He has always been there.

  It’s Sunday, and Linnæus is resting and repenting.

  On Monday he cancels man and woman.

  On Tuesday he takes back the cattle.

  On Wednesday he lets the birds and fish disappear.

  On Thursday he cancels everything to do with the reptiles and insects.

  On Friday he sees to it that the stars, sun and moon disappear.

  On Saturday only the stones on the ground are left. He cancels them too.

  Linnæus is sick. His hands and feet feel stiff. He feels his veins are swollen. He has a sensation of tension in his muscles.

  On this warm afternoon the usual things do not happen. The gardener leans back on his bench. He has his instrument in front of him, but he is not playing it. Simply picking with his fingers at a little ball of sticky soil. Clayey soil.

  Linnæus comes anyway, enticed as much by the silence as he had formerly been enticed by the playing, and asks:

  “Is it a dulcimer? Or a zither? Or a hummel?”

  Then ceases his questions when he sees the gardener’s eyes, which are not eyes but two small, cold balls of clay.

  I wonder if the fungi should constitute a new natural realm of their own, a regnum neutrum or chaoticum.

  “In Skåne,” says Linnæus to the gardener, “I saw the body of a dean who had been dead for eleven years. It had been treated with alum, not with pitch, and also with vitriol, and in addition it had been filled with the ears of hops so that the result was exceedingly true to life.”

  The gardener stands silently.

  Linnæus continues:

  “But the most wonderful thing would be if one could discover the art of melting amber and insert the dead body into the melted material, thus preventing the body from rotting.”

  The gardener silent.

  It happens after this that Linnæus traces with his finger over the gardener’s forehead, along the lines that are there, up to the hairline and down over the eyebrows. There can be no response to this deed.

  All that can happen is that Linnæus withdraws his gesture, takes a step to the side and lets the moment pass.

  Warm morning. Still June, long-drawn-out June. There is a knock at the door. It is Artedi. His friend on a visit. He talks about his life in Amsterdam.

  “I go to the tavern from three to nine, work from nine till three in the morning, sleep from three until noon. That’s the whole story!”

  Linnæus wants to ask about the canals, but doesn’t ask. He feels unsettled, insecure, although he is the host and his friend is the guest.

  Artedi has brought his manuscript with him and reads from it all night for Linnæus.

  Artedi stands with a fish in front of him, a strange fish. Linnæus has never before seen an example of this species. Artedi dissects it, cutting out the relevant parts quickly with a sharp little knife, releasing the organs while he demonstrates:

  “Anableps tetrophthalmus, popularly known as the “telescope fish” or “four-eyed fish”. It is distinguished – look here! – by the fact that the outer row of teeth is flexible and consists of soft teeth, while the pharyngeal teeth, here! are pointed like the teeth of a carding comb. But the most distinctive thing is the structure of the eyes. The hemispherical cornea is divided by a horizontal strip of conjunctiva into two halves, an upper and a lower, here! and the pupil too is double due to an interlacing of the iris. The upper halves are designed for seeing in air, the lower ones for service in the water. In such a way the fish can be on the waterline and with the help of these two pairs of eyes it can see just as clearly over the surface as under it.”

  Artedi places the two organs of sight in Linnæus’s hand.

  “This fish was caught on a muddy sandbank in Guyana.”

  Linnæus thinks he and his friend are singing: “Two friends were sitting / In artless repose, in artless repooose …”

  But they are not singing. Artedi goes on to the next fish, a megrim caught in the Trondheim fjord.

  It begins to rain heavily outside. Artedi doesn’t let it disturb him. He lifts up the megrim and holds it in front of Linnnæus’s face. Opens and shuts the mouth.

  Artedi has departed from the garden, is on his way back to Amsterdam. Lövberg comes looking for Linnæus:

  “He left this with me, to hand over to you after his departure.

  Linnæus studies the plant, which is growing in a pot. There are some smaller plants there too. An attached label reads: Hort. Cliff.89. From Clifford’s garden.

  Even the original source is given: Habitat in Libano.

  Linnæus can see that the plant belongs to the umbellates. But he has never seen this species before.

  Linnæus shouts:

  “Gardener!”

  There is something he wants to relate, to assert, to exult over. But the gardener looks worried and it all dies down. The gardener shows Linnæus the palm of his hand. In it are a mass of black blotches of different shapes, yellow round the edges.

  “I don’t feel anything,” he says.

  Linnæus sees how the blotches are creeping inside the cuff of the gardener’s shirt.

  “Nothing,” says Linnæus.

  It is meant as a question, a question in response, but he can hear that it does not sound like a question.

  “I don’t feel like raking any more just now,” says the gardener. “Not raking. Not just now.”

  Still June. Linnæus is out in the fields. It is night. He is calling:

  “Beauty! Proudie! Lily! Blossom! Goldie! Summer Rose!”

  But nothing happens.

  Lövberg arranges a beating for Herr Missa, who then disappears from Hammarby. Linnæus summons Lövberg to his room and thanks him.

  “A rascal may play his part as well as he likes,” says Linnæus, “but in the end he has to pay.”

  Lövberg answers that he will also gladly convey a thank-you to his assistant.

  “Your assistant?”

  “Broberg. A smart fellow. He lives in the shed among the rakes. You will certainly get a chance to see him one day.”

  Linnæus, sick, screams loudly with pain, throws himself on the floor, runs here and there, as if burnt by fire, bounces off the walls. His mouth is twisted, his tongue is lacerated by his teeth, he suffers from intermittent loss of vision.

  It is a dark night. The Swede wanders home from the apothecary’s table at Haarmlemmerdijk near Brouwerstraat to the room on Warmoesstraat by Nieuwebrugsteeg. He is between being drunk and feeling sick. There is nothing in sight. By the sides of the bridge over Herengracht a slight chill can be felt. It is the clammy haze that comes off the water and touches the skin of passers-by. He feels an impulse to throw up. A rusty iron pillar serves as a support. He continues on his way, in a good mood, relieved.

  A purity in the air. Sunrise within an hour.

  Broberg is whistling a tune. He is painting the shed green. B
ut he is not painting green. He is painting moss, verdigris, blades of grass, mildew.

  He paints the door of the shed white. But he doesn’t paint white. He paints graupel, arsenic, sail-cloth.

  He changes his mind and paints the door yellow. But he doesn’t paint yellow. He paints butter, urine, straw.

  Linnæus is standing at the window looking out at Broberg and listening to the tune he is whistling. Then tries to whistle it himself.

  Artedi dead.

  Found at dawn, cold and drowned.

  Linnæus out in the garden with the students. Magnifying-glass, lead-pencil. On the ground is the pot with the plant from Artedi, the umbellate from Lebanon. Lövberg with spade, digs a square. Linnæus to the students:

  “The umbel on top. The flowers in the middle without sprouts. The fruit consists of small rough scales.”

  Linnæus writes on the label which is fastened round the stalk. Lövberg finishes digging and steps to one side. Linnæus goes down on one knee and places the tall plant and the smaller plants in the soil.

  “We shall give it the name Artedia squamata, the scaly one. From Arabia petræa.”

  Lövberg waters it with the green watering-can.

  It is the smooth linen and the creases that become visible in it, the four legs of the bed, the three pillows by the head, it is by the foot of the bed that he is standing for this one action, the tossing, to toss, and see how it comes down, the two possible outcomes, heads or tails, and he tosses, and it comes down, and he tosses again, and the coin falls on the smooth linen and the creases appear, and then it is as if a decision has been taken, but there is the clock as before and the lamp, the magnifying-glass, the wallpaper, and on the floor the feet which are his and which hold up the body that tosses the coin, up, up, falls.

  Then an animal comes pacing, strides straight out of a trap, climbs out of the iron ring of the snare. It is a bear - cunning bears, to keep their dens secret, walk backwards for long stretches, and can then hop three or four metres to the side to avoid their pursuer.

  There is a knock at the door. Rolander comes in, pale, exhausted. He sits down, pleading faintness. Linnæus gives him a drink. Rolander reels off: