Holst stepped out of the gondola a few houses away from the designated place and walked up the staircase to the alley behind in order to closely inspect the lie of the house. He was now quite sure in this regard and it was now just a matter of the assignation taking place without the lady suspecting anything.
III
Holst met the beautiful unknown woman in the procurators’ building opposite the Campanile. She was very beautiful, small and nimble, dressed in a tight-fitting travel suit, decent and modest to look at, with a pair of wonderful, beautiful, brown eyes and a mournful smile. When Holst approached her with a greeting and the few words he had provided as a kind of password, she looked up at him and a slight blush passed over her cheeks. It struck Holst that the last thing she resembled was a brazen adventuress, with her slightly tired face and her melancholy gaze; she awoke some compassion within him and he looked kindly at her. Her gaze rested on him as if trying to gauge him; it was apparent that she found the handsome young man attractive, almost as if her role fell more naturally to her, and it didn’t take long before they were conversing freely. Holst found he could express himself easily enough, although it was a little tricky for him with the French, and the couple walked together over the Piazza towards the Riva in cheerful conversation like old acquaintances.
Holst told her that he had seen her several times and felt drawn to her beauty and grace, that he had used all the tricks imaginable to find out her address, that he had acquired it through her gondolier and that he was happy for the trust she was showing him. He also said that he was a Danish officer spending his leave in Venice, studying the beautiful heritage, especially the art, and ended by paying a nice little compliment to his companion.
She called herself Jeannette Gorin; she was from Lyon, she said, and her parents were merchants whose business had fallen on hard times. She had left her home with an artist who was now living in Venice, but she felt very unhappy in this alien country. She had only dared to meet Holst because he had written so warmly and beautifully to her; she trusted his chivalry and hoped he wouldn’t misunderstand why she had come.
It was apparent that there wasn’t a word of truth in any of it. Her attitude would probably adjust itself according to Holst’s tactics; she belonged to those women who, having gone down an insecure path, follow the flow. Confronted by a cynic, she would have stripped off her melancholy and been a fluttering butterfly; in front of a ponderous idealist like Braun, she had been a kind of Gretchen, a noli me tangere; and towards Holst it appeared she would go in for the same style.
Holst was curious. For him, it was a matter of bringing this adventure to an end and it was possible that a swift move from his side could speed up events. But coarseness was against his nature. He gently felt his way forward and it really did appear that he had made a certain impression on the young lady. He decided to pursue this line and smiled quietly to himself at the warmth and infatuation he displayed. He was the cold northerner melting under the looks from this southern beauty like the snow on the mountains melts under the rays of the sun, and when they were sitting in a separate cabinet in one of the Riva’s restaurants after an hour’s stroll, the thread between them was tied tighter, little by little. Jeannette was moved to talk about her childhood home and about her good father and mother; Holst played on the same strings.
“Have you been in love before?” asked Jeannette, giving him a semi-veiled look.
Holst looked up in a free and easy way.
“Never.”
She believed him and pressed his hand warmly.
“Yes, you probably won’t believe me,” he continued, “but it’s true. I’ve never been in love before, even though I’ve met a lot of women. But we northerners are as harsh and tough as the climate in our country, where the ice covers the fjords, where the bear builds his winter lair in the great pine forests, and where the wolves howl on the steppes in the winter.”
She looked acutely at him.
“Didn’t you say you’re from Denmark?”
“Yes, from Denmark high up in the north, where the women are blonde and cold, like the snow covering the plains and high…”
He changed it to mountains because he thought it rung truer.
Jeannette smiled – then she gave him a kind of quizzical look.
“Why do you talk to me of bears and wolves and mountains? I know very well that Denmark is an extensively agricultural country where there are neither wolves nor bears, where the mountains aren’t much higher than the houses in this town, and where the women are neither blonder nor colder to any great degree than the women here. Yes, in fact I know more than that. I know that Copenhagen is a city that looks like all other mainland cities, where the women are just as sly, the men are just as stupid as everywhere else in the world, and where the watchword is: A toast to you, a toast to me and a toast to all the beautiful girls.”
Holst blushed.
Jeannette continued in excellent Swedish.
“For that matter, I would say that if the lieutenant’s feelings for me are as honest and genuine as the lieutenant’s nonsense about his country of birth, well, thank you very much, but why don’t we just be honest with each other. What do you want of me?”
Holst pulled himself together and took her hand.
“Miss Gorin,” he said in Danish, “you are mistaken – what I said was calculated for a daughter of the south, but my feelings are the same. Your beauty has really captured me – totally – and my intentions are just to be where you are, to see you, talk to you, so I’m twice as happy now that I know you understand the language that I speak honestly like my native language. But you have lied to me. You aren’t Jeannette Gorin and you aren’t from Lyon, You’re Swedish. I’ve told you my name – Eigil Holst, Lieutenant from Copenhagen. You have nothing to fear by telling me yours.”
Jeannette looked sharply at him for a moment, her gaze gradually becoming milder; it was as if she was struggling with herself.
“What’s the point? You can’t help me, can you?” she replied tiredly in a subdued voice.
Holst took her hand once more.
“Dearest Jeanette, you say I can’t help you. How do you know that? Are you alone in a foreign country, far away from friends and relatives? Are you unhappy, maybe in the grips of a scoundrel?”
Jeannette gave a start.
“What do you mean?” she asked sharply.
Holst collected himself.
“You said yourself that you were married to an artist, didn’t you? Are you unhappy? I adore you and I’ll help you if you will trust me.”
He had got to his feet and bent over her; he wrapped his arms around her neck and kissed her eyes.
She was startled and looked up at him.
“No, I don’t want to believe you. You’re just like all the others – you’re all the same – all of you.”
Holst felt that it was now or never. Maybe he could succeed with his onslaught, but if he didn’t, she would probably slide out of his hands. She would hardly go as far with him as with Braun. But if he let on that he knew about her relationship, there was a danger that she would withdraw completely. It was a rather unusual situation, but the foray had to be carried through. Holst took both her hands in his and looked her in the eye with a firm, warm look.
“Dear Jeannette,” he said, “I call you Jeannette, because that’s what you call yourself. I don’t know who you are, but I know how you live. I know the man who controls your destiny, who forces you to do the most degrading thing of all – to lie and deceive for his benefit, to mock that which is most beautiful and noble on Earth, to mock love itself, and to feign love for him and for others; all this to be repaid with evil words and scorn. I don’t know you, Jeannette, but I know him, and if you wish it, I will save you from the hideous circumstances in which you live and deliver you from him and help you escape his clutches.”
Holst was still bent over her and had locked her in his arms.
The young girl looked up at him, frightened
through her tears.
“Do you know Hugold?” she whispered, hardly audibly.
The name shot through Holst like a flame from head to toe. Like a steel spring snapping, he stood up straight, and with his blood pounding in his temples, he almost whispered the words between clenched teeth – Hugold and the girl’s name, Gorin! The name from Elsinore. Now or never – if he was mistaken, the whole mission would be doomed. What did it matter to him who this woman was? But if it was how he sensed it could be, how it had to be, his luck had followed him, and he was now on the point of reaching his goal.
It only lasted a second, then he spoke.
“Yes, I know Hugold Sjöström, and no man in the world knows him better than I.”
His eyes rested upon her so searchingly and sharply that they were almost boring into her. She went deadly pale, threw her arms around his neck and burst into a sobbing that made her limbs tremble.
Holst became ice cold; it was like a fever pushing all the blood away from his head – he had to grasp the edge of the table to remain standing.
It was over in a flash.
He lifted the sobbing woman, laid her head against his shoulder and gently stroked her hair away from her forehead. It was as though Annie had instantaneously become alive, as if this sobbing girl was the Annie whose fate had filled his life for months, and without wanting it, without knowing how he formed the words, a phrase came whispering gently from his lips.
“Little Annie mustn’t cry – little Annie mustn’t cry.”
The name reached the girl’s ears – she straightened up and looked at him with eyes that contained such astonishment that he immediately felt what was important and gathered himself to resist anything that could interfere with him and his duties.
The road had now opened up for him.
“Annie?” whispered the girl, “Why do you say Annie – did you know Annie – which Annie?”
Holst bent his head towards her and kissed her forehead, but at that moment she wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her lips against him in a kiss so hot that it scorched.
“Save me,” she whispered, “if you love me, as you say, save me if you can.”
Running through Holst’s head was the realisation that there was only one road – this girl can bring him into my hands, he has mistreated her, demeaned her. She has loved him, maybe still loves him. But there is only one road – only the one – I have to take action.
And Holst took action. He didn’t talk to her about Sjöström and Annie or ask what her name was or who she was. He took her in his arms and whispered the most tender, warmest words in her ear, found the way to open her mouth and immediately closed it with his kisses. It was like an intoxication, but he didn’t for a second lose sight of his goal while the soft Swedish language rang in his ears.
For the first time in his long service, Eigil Holst had broken out of the path he had faithfully followed. He was 26 years old, alone in a foreign country and stood on the road leading to his goal.
IV
Holst and Jeannette met for lunch in the same restaurant where they had spent the evening before and plans for the breakaway were begun in earnest. Jeannette’s ingenuity when it came to fooling men was almost unlimited.
It was certainly not going to be easy, but she was patient enough to move forward gradually, and Holst reinforced her in that, because for him it was precisely a matter of winning time. He first wanted to win Jeannette’s wholehearted confidence and it made it so much easier that the young woman was clearly very much in love with him; he could thus be reassured that his role wasn’t difficult at all, at least for the moment. He should just not estrange her, so that at a certain point, everything would work steadily and smoothly. Time would bring the rest.
Jeannette told him about herself. She was 20 years old, she said, which meant a little more, of course, although it wasn’t far off. Her father had been a sergeant in a Scanian dragoon regiment, but later served as a stable keeper for a major Scanian landowner, a count from an old line. When the latter had moved to live in Paris, Ljunggren, as her father was called, went there with him and had spent eight years in France with his wife and children. It was then that Jeannette had learnt French, and she spoke it well enough. By the age of sixteen, she had become the young count’s lover and when her father died and her mother returned to Sweden, her home was broken up and Jeannette came out into the world.
What else she said about her fate was hardly completely true and not of great interest either. She had met Sjöström in Paris; he was living there with Annie, whom he called his wife. But she was silent about these two. Holst would have liked to ask, but he had to tread carefully and at no point did he let on that he was interested in the couple.
During lunch, Jeannette reminded him that he had called her Annie the previous evening and asked him what he had meant.
Holst dodged the question.
Jeannette looked up at him and asked, “So, what do you actually want with me?”
“To help you,” said Holst, “if you are as unhappy as you said yesterday.”
Jeannette sighed.
“There isn’t much for me to do here. I’ve had such a turbulent time the last few years that I can’t imagine ever finding peace and quiet. But we don’t want to think about that. We should just love each other, because you will love me, won’t you?”
Holst would certainly do that – but practically speaking, it wasn’t at all easy to arrange. Jeannette was probably quite pampered and Holst didn’t have abundant funds. On the other hand, he was embarrassed to talk about that and he didn’t really know how to handle the matter. He didn’t want to tell her about Braun. It went against the grain for him to hurt her; she was so pretty and chirping like a little bird in the sunshine. Besides, Sjöström was responsible for the situation and Holst had to be very careful with regard to everything concerning him.
“Tell me,” he said, “do you want to go back to him, the one we talked about?”
“Are you bored with me already?” she asked with a quick look at him.
“Of course not, but we can’t stay here – and aren’t you living with him?”
Jeannette blushed.
“Yes, but if you want, I’ll gladly leave him. I hate him – hate him,” she said, clenching her fists.
“Have you always hated him?” Holst asked her and gave her a serious look.
“I’ve never loved him, never. It was Annie I loved, but he was nasty to Annie, and I… I didn’t have a thing in the world, so when Annie left, I had to go with him. That’s what he wanted.”
“When was that?” Holst asked.
“Now, this winter,” she replied, “I went with them to Copenhagen. Annie was good friends with a very rich young man who made a great fuss of her. Annie didn’t care for him, but she wanted to marry him.”
She stopped herself.
“But here I am, talking about Annie – you don’t know her at all.”
“Erm, yes,” said Holst, “a little – Annie Cederlund – right?”
“Yes – so you know her – wasn’t she lovely? And she was so good to me from the first day we met. God knows where she is now! I left them in Elsinore. Sjöström went off with her, but came back to Copenhagen alone. She’s probably got married to her friend, but she’s never written to me – and I don’t think that’s very nice of her, because she promised she would. She said she would think of me. I was waiting for a letter, and then Sjöström wanted us to travel to Nice. He lost a lot of money there gambling, money he’d got from Annie, and then he brought me to Venice, to this terrible life.”
“What terrible life?” asked Holst.
Jeannette got up and went over to him and put her arm around his neck.
“Won’t you take me with you – please? I’m so terribly unhappy.”
She burst into tears.
Holst patted her cheek.
“Tell me everything – you can trust me with everything,” he said kindly.
“Not n
ow – not now – but later,” she whispered. “You’ll get to know everything if you’re good to me. You will be, Eigil, won’t you? You’re so good and honest. And I’m so terribly unhappy.”
“Do you want to leave him?” Holst asked.
Jeannette nodded.
“Right away, if I only could, but he’ll do me harm.”
Holst smiled.
“You can trust me, Jeannette.”
Jeannette looked up in fright.
“No, you mustn’t, you don’t know how evil he can be – you mustn’t go to him.”
Holst smiled.
“Don’t be afraid. I have a message to him from his brother, who is a good, honourable man. The most sensible thing to do is for me to go to him quite calmly and deliver the message. Then when I’ve first talked to him, you’ll see there could be something or other that I could tell him that would make a certain impression on him.”
Jeannette looked puzzled.
“Do you know him then?”
“Not personally, but I know a little about him. It will probably be best to take it quite calmly. Now we must part. I have some business to take care of.”
Jeannette grabbed his hand.
“But you won’t leave me, will you? Eigil, you mustn’t leave me. You’re the only one who can rescue me. Listen to me – you must stay with me.”
She pressed herself against him and put her arm around his neck, while her eyes went misty with tears. Her plea cut Holst to the heart and he had to gently free himself. They were standing by the window on the first floor and life was beginning to get moving on the Riva – it was now late morning.
Suddenly Jeannette grabbed his arm with a faint cry and pointed down at the street.
“Look,” she said, “Look, Annie’s friend is walking down there – the three gentlemen there, he’s the young one on the left. So Annie must be here too.”
The Forest Lake Mystery Page 15
