To Cook a Bear

by Mikael Niemi

  “Come in, come in,” the pastor said, indicating the visitor’s chair awaiting her.

  I stood up hurriedly, drenched in sweat. When she sat down, so did I, and I fumbled for the paper and pencil with trembling hands. The pastor had given me strict orders not to speak unless I was addressed directly and to write down exactly what I heard.

  “Maria, you are engaged as a maid, are you not?” he began.

  “Yes,” she squeaked, so quietly that we could hardly hear her.

  She had changed into her finest Sunday clothes for the visit, as if going to a church service. Undoubtedly she had spent a long time scrubbing herself, and her neck had turned red. Small golden curls were peeping out from under her headscarf and I wanted to twirl them round my finger. Tuck them between my lips. I thought I would write something about it, her sweetness, but it was just a scrawl. I crossed it out and wrote “maid” in stiff, uneven handwriting.

  “Maria is a pretty name,” the pastor said.

  “It’s my mother’s name as well.”

  “And Maria loves dancing, so I’ve heard.”

  Giving me a furtive sidelong glance, she blushed intensely, her neck flaring up as if covered in gnat bites. I was furious. Now she would think I was the one who had been telling tales to the pastor.

  Maria sat in silence, her cheeks burning. The pastor stared hard at her, tormenting her, wanting her to feel the agony of sin.

  “There is nothing wrong with dancing,” he said after a pause. “Did Maria believe I thought there was? I know people say I’m severe, but I actually enjoyed dancing in my youth.”

  I gawked at the pastor, scarcely believing my ears. Would that rather stooped body manage a waltz? No, he was lying!

  “However, one must heed the dangers,” the pastor added hastily. “Dancing can arouse the desires of the flesh. Like a sauna, it can make someone hot. And that person might walk off to cool down?”

  She attempted a nod, but her neck was so tense her head barely moved. Once again the pastor waited, knitting his eyebrows. I wrote a jerky “sauna.”

  “And what about after the dance? When everyone walked homeward?”

  “Yes?”

  “Was Maria alone then?”

  “Yes.”

  It came too fast. The pastor placed his fingertips together and flexed his fingers. Perhaps he was emulating one of his old professors in Uppsala.

  “So no gallant escort accompanied Maria home along the path?”

  “No. . . . No, no one at all.”

  With shaking fingers, I wrote down “no one at all.”

  “None of the other girls?”

  “No.”

  “Is Maria absolutely sure?”

  She swallowed and gave a brisk nod. I wanted to shout at the pastor to be quiet, to stop tormenting her.

  “I walked . . . I walked home on my own.”

  “Did Maria notice anyone following her?”

  “Who might that have been?”

  “A man.”

  “No. . . .”

  “Did Maria see the lad Roope during the evening?”

  “Yes, he was there. But he wasn’t very nice.”

  “In what way, not very nice?”

  “He . . . he’d been drinking.”

  “I understand,” the pastor said. “So he didn’t follow Maria?”

  “I didn’t see him.”

  “And what about Jolina? Did you notice if any fellow followed her?”

  “No, I didn’t see her.”

  “Not at all?”

  “Yes, earlier in the evening. But then she disappeared.”

  “And Maria wasn’t afraid to walk home through the forest on her own? I mean, in the light of what happened to Hilda Fredriksdotter?”

  She looked defiantly at the pastor, and then at me, before shaking her head. Red blotches spread across her neck. The pastor smiled and rose to his feet.

  “I thank you, Maria, for this conversation. By the way, may I show Maria something before she leaves? I have been experimenting with sowing potatoes. Something quite blessed has grown. Come with me and I’ll show you.”

  She followed him out into the garden and I saw them wandering around Brita Kajsa’s vegetable patch. They bent down and he showed her some of the plants. With his hands he gently pushed the soil aside and uncovered the white rootlets. The pastor looked completely relaxed, and joked with her, while she showed every sign of being anxious to depart. As for me, I couldn’t take my eyes off my beloved. With a hasty curtsy she took her leave and hurried away. I couldn’t remove my gaze from the swing of her hips, the curls of hair on her bare neck, the hands, slender but strong, smoothing the cloth of her kirtle.

  When she had gone, I walked over to the pastor, who was wiping his fingers on a tuft of grass.

  “Well, Jussi?”

  I cleared my throat and attempted to arrange the words in the right order in my mouth before I replied.

  “She appeared to be slightly nervous.”

  “Do you think so, Jussi? Nervous?”

  The pastor gave me a sardonic look.

  “Perhaps she had cause.”

  “And why did the pastor want to show her the potatoes?”

  “The potatoes? Well, Jussi is finding it hard to think today. He only has eyes for the young lady’s pretty shape.”

  I blushed and was about to step onto the potato patch. The pastor cried out and pushed me away.

  “What the—”

  Bruised, I saw the pastor put his hand inside his coat and take a piece of paper from the inside pocket. He was pointing at the ground, just where I had been about to set my foot. In the soft soil you could clearly see: the perfect impression of her boot. When he unfolded the piece of paper, I could see it was the drawing I had made of the shoe print at Kenttä, the footstep we found in the clay.

  “Look at this, Jussi. This cut in the sole matches. And the pattern of wear and tear on the heel is identical. I would say that the imprint comes from the same shoe.”

  I could only nod in agreement, as I recalled the depression in the moss where the lovers had lain. The man’s siggar butt.

  “You thought Maria seemed nervous,” the pastor said grimly. “Is it so strange that she lied to our faces? She and Nils Gustaf lay together there on the hill in the forest. While a pursuer hid himself and spied on them.”

  “Does the pastor think it . . . it was the assailant?”

  He gave no answer and instead gently stroked the potato plant, fingering the thick, fluid-filled stem.

  “The potato . . .” he said. “I believe it can have a significant bearing on Tornedalen’s future. As long as it ripens.”

  I pointed at one of the white flowers that had closed and was beginning to turn into a berry.

  “This one’s already on the way.”

  “Nonsense,” the pastor said. “The berries are poisonous. Never trust outward beauty, Jussi. The edible part of the potato plant is something else entirely. I’ll show you when the time comes.”

  As we returned to the cabin, he spoke good-humoredly about his climate studies and how the same plant species could assume quite diverse guises according to its particular habitat. This could result in ambitious botanists discovering new species that they hoped would be named after themselves. The pastor contemptuously called them “species-makers.” Rather, it was vital always to examine one’s conclusions critically.

  I had things other than plants on my mind.

  “What are we going to do about the sheriff? Shouldn’t he know?”

  At a stroke the pastor’s good humor vanished. He stopped and kicked at the grass like a horse.

  “What do we have to show him?” he exclaimed. “Some notes and a couple of sketches.”

  “And our deductions,” I said. “What we have thought out.”
r />   “Thoughts,” the pastor muttered. “Complicated thoughts often seem to be the last thing justice is interested in.”

  31.

  The entire parsonage was swept and scrubbed, bedding was aired, and quilts shaken out in the fresh air. The pastor himself decorated the house with beautiful summer blossoms, and the sweet smell of newly baked bread rose from the oven.

  The guests arrived on foot in the afternoon. I had met them when we lived in Karesuando and recognized them from a distance. Juhani Raattamaa was blond with a neat line of beard down the side of his cheeks and along his jaw and a mouth that resembled a kerf. His face was warm and jovial, as the pastor walked up to welcome him with outstretched arms. Plodding behind Juhani came his older brother Pekka Raattamaa. His face was angular and beardless and his expression warier. It was not only in appearance that the two brothers differed; Pekka was older by several years and sometimes had the air of wanting to quell Juhani’s enthusiasm. Tjalmo the dog ran around the guests, barking happily, as they both embraced the pastor and exchanged their greetings of peace. The day was cool with chill winds from the north, but the men were perspiring after their walk. Juhani in particular was panting and wiping the end of his long nose, which wouldn’t stop dripping. Both men were strikingly well dressed, considerably better than the pastor was. Their coats were of fine cloth and their Finnish boots looked newly sewn. Pleased to have arrived, they removed their carrying straps and rubbed their sore shoulders.

  Later on that day Per Nutti arrived, another of the pastor’s renowned preachers. He was wearing his Sami tunic and seemed unaffected by the journey, despite having hiked all the way from the coastal region of Norway over the high mountains in the north. The pastor came out with Juhani and Pekka and they exchanged warm salutations. Brita Kajsa emerged into the yard too, with the brood of children, the youngest, Daniel, in her arms. The daughters curtsied and the sons bowed while the pastor and Per Nutti both began to puff on their pipes. Juhani handed a ladle to the thirsty Nutti, with the words:

  “He that believeth on me, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.”

  “John 7:38,” Nutti answered, and gulped it down with gusto.

  “The sauna is warming,” added Juhani, “so the kingdom of heaven is truly nigh.”

  “Enough preaching,” Brita Kajsa said, and shooed them all toward the cabin. “First of all we shall have full stomachs.”

  I followed them into the parsonage, eager to listen to these famous gentlemen. Ever since the revival had gained pace, they had been the pastor’s crying voices in the barren north. It hadn’t always been easy. God’s word had been met with derision, menace, and even fists. I had heard them preaching up in Karesuando in both Finnish and Lapp and seen them reach into people’s hearts. Juhani was one of the pastor’s first catechists; he organized a mission school for the village children whenever he passed through, and conveyed God’s word to the adults in the evenings. But he had seldom noticed me, cowering in the farthest corner of the parsonage. Now I could smell their damp clothes, the sweat and pine-tar oil, and I noticed how both they and the pastor were animated and excited, almost as though anticipating a lovers’ tryst. Once in the kitchen, Juhani turned round hastily to take something from his bags. It took me by surprise and I had no time to react. Our heads collided so hard there was a sudden crack, forehead against forehead, like the sound of an earthenware dish breaking. Without a word he looked at me, rubbing his poor skull. The others were seating themselves round the kitchen table, unaware of what had happened.

  “Anna antheeksi,” I whispered. “I’m sorry.”

  The whack seemed to have made Juhani giddy, and he shook himself. He was standing so close I could see the short stubble that had grown on his sunburned cheek since his morning shave. I sensed he was seeking inspiration for something to say, something funny, something clever or witty that would ease the tension between us.

  “Woodenhead! You have a wooden head, puupää.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said again.

  “But at least with one of those you’ll escape death by drowning,” he said.

  I rubbed the bump and realized he was inviting me to a duel. I frantically tried to think of a good rejoinder. Had I been a speaker, I might have succeeded; if only I had the gift of speech . . .

  “I don’t have the gift of speech,” I said, blushing slightly.

  With a quick movement he took hold of the scabbard hanging from my belt. He drew out the knife and brushed the blade’s edge with his thumb.

  “The tongue is no gift,” he said. “The tongue weighs nothing, you have it with you all the time. But only you can make sure it is kept sharp.”

  With an elegant flick, which he must have learned in Kuttainen, he flipped the knife in his hand so that I could take it by the handle and slide it back into the scabbard. Now it was two–nil to him. This was a duel I would never win.

  * * *

  —

  Pekka helped with the fire in the sauna. He grasped the pastor’s hand-forged ax, praising its fine balance. Clearly all the blacksmiths in Kengis knew their craft. With proficient swings he chopped the wood and carried it in. As the flames flickered and the sauna slowly reached its full temperature, I sat and listened to the guests’ conversation. My head was pounding after the knock, but in a good way. It was as if Juhani had forced an opening in me, a gap through which the world could enter. The men sat crouching over their Bibles filled with bookmarks, and they swiftly thumbed through to the verses they were looking for. The conversation was about the revival movement, the earthshaking wave that started up in Karesuando and was spreading over North Calotte to both the east and the west. But all was not well. There was still serious discord in Kautokeino. Per Nutti related how Ole Somby, Aslak Haetta, Rasmus Spein, and a number of the other awakened had been thrown into the jail in Tromsø and Alta. Around twenty Sami had been convicted for breach of the peace and blasphemy at the trial.

  “Blasphemy?” the pastor said.

  “Both Haetta and Somby shouted out in church that they were Christ and God.”

  “That can’t be true, surely?”

  “It is, according to numerous witnesses.”

  “Christ and God!” Juhani exclaimed, aghast. “We must travel to Kautokeino and talk some sense into them.”

  They went on to discuss their “work in the vineyard,” as they called their revivalist preaching. They had been through village after village on the Swedish, Norwegian, and Finnish sides. I heard several stories about the miracle of salvation and their opinions on various theological matters. I didn’t always understand, but I could see how earnest they were. How much salt of the law was needed before you could proclaim the sweet honey of the gospel? Did salvation happen in the same way in all people? What actually were the signs of grace?

  It was clear that the situation in Pajala was a matter for concern. Juhani asked the pastor if the seed had begun to bear fruit, but the pastor replied grimly that the ground in the Kengis region was harder than rock. The Pajala burghers’ denouncement of him to the chapter meant that now he was obliged to hold two services, one where peace and tranquility could reign, and one for the awakened souls that the Holy Spirit was allowed to attend. And in the columns of the newspapers the assault continued, compelling the pastor to spend a great deal of time writing submissions in his defense. The only advantage Pajala had over Karesuando appeared to be that the potato grew better here.

  “So the gentlefolks of Pajala want to stay asleep,” Pekka said.

  “It probably accounts for many of the workers as well,” the pastor said. “If they just get their jug of brandy, they’re happy.”

  “Perhaps the children of Pajala are our hope,” Juhani said. “Is there anything greater than seeing a little boy or girl who can read the Lord’s name for the first time?”

  Juhani told them about his teaching, how he would bring together the
children in one village at a time and organize a mission school for several weeks. Many of their parents were illiterate and some could do no more than scratch their mark. Nevertheless, they permitted their children to learn the alphabet, and every time a child learned to read, a miracle happened. On the last day of the school, he would gather all the children and parents for worship and let some of the children read out God’s words in their own voice. It would bring tears to the listeners’ eyes and several of the adults would ask if they could learn to read too.

  Brita Kajsa sat down at the table and joined in. It was education that would eventually give the people up here their freedom, she said. The poor would no longer be poor if they could read and write. Armed with knowledge, the Finns and Lapps too could train to become teachers, scientists, or doctors, and they would have control over their own future. And in this way the future would prosper in Lainio, Kangos, and Tärendö, indeed in the whole of the north. Free, God-fearing people who didn’t give their last farthing to the liquor dealers.

  “Instead they donate it to schools,” the pastor said. “Our enemies are trying to use it against us by saying we pocket the money ourselves. But Bishop Bergman has personally approved our accounts.”

  Pekka agreed that education was a good thing, but it had to involve a degree of rigor. He had noticed how some children wanted to hold the pencil in their left hand, not the right. Since the left side was the devil’s, these children must be reprimanded and taught to write with the correct hand. Juhani concurred, the right hand was preferable, and he thought that if children learned correctly from the start, they would continue to use their right hand for life. His way was to encourage these children to always hold their left hand clenched behind their back while they were writing.

  “There’s another thing,” Juhani said gravely. “I need to tell you about a prayer meeting we held in a courtyard in Kitkiöjärvi. Some women arrived in a state of high anxiety and agitation. They asked me if I could tell whether they had the true faith. I answered, as we always do, that only they could look into their hearts. One woman in particular was deeply disturbed. She was a recent widow, suffering the pain of sin, and she begged me again and again to help her, weeping inconsolably. I remember her appealing for deliverance.”