A Bridge to the Stars

6

What actually happened that night when Joel discovered that his father was not in his bed?
He wasn't at all sure. All his memories were blurred, as if he'd been looking at unfocused photos, when he tried to remember later. What he would really like to do was to forget that night altogether; but his memory was stronger than the urge to forget, and his fear was so great that he couldn't shake it off.
What happened?
What did he do?
He sat quite still on the edge of his father's bed and cried his eyes out. That deadened his fear. Then he ran round and round the empty flat, as if he were suffering severe pains that he was trying to shake off.
All the time he kept thinking he could hear Samuel's footsteps on the stairs, but when he flung open the door there was nobody there. He looked out of the window but the street was deserted, and the night glared disdainfully back at him.
And he thought lots of awful thoughts.
First he'd been abandoned by his mother. Now his father had done the same thing to him.
The good humour, humming the sea shanties, promising to buy him a bike – it had all been false.
His fear was so great, he could hear it bellowing deep down in his subconscious. As if there were a dog chained up inside him, howling non-stop.
It was a long time before he calmed down sufficiently to think straight again.
There were no trains running at night. They didn't have a car. And Samuel could hardly have set out for the far side of the vast forest on foot.
There was only one explanation and Joel felt he needed to have immediate confirmation of what he knew was true.
As he runs down the stairs again, the door to old Mrs Westman's flat opens and she stands there framed by the light coming from her hall, wearing a brown dressing gown and a white nightcap.
'It's shocking, all this running up and down stairs,' she says. 'Has something happened?'
'No,' says Joel. 'Nothing at all.'
It occurs to him that it might be a good idea to hide in Mrs Westman's flat. Hide behind all her embroidered pictures of Christ in the flat smelling of apples, and pretend that he doesn't exist. But he runs out into the street and keeps on running.
He doesn't stop until he gets to the entrance door of the block of flats where Sara lives. He's been running so fast that he has a stitch, and the cold air is biting into his throat.
He opens the door carefully and sneaks into the dark rear courtyard. There is a faint light behind the curtains in one of Sara's windows.
He looks round the courtyard but can't see a ladder. He knows there is one behind the ironmonger's on the other side of the street, so he runs back through the entrance door, over the street, and sees the ladder half-buried under the snow. It's heavy. He can hardly lift it. He has to use all his strength to lug it over the street.
Jesus with the cross, he thinks. Jesus with the cross and Joel with the ladder . . .
By the time he's carried the ladder into Sara's rear courtyard, he's soaked in sweat. His bladder is bursting, and he pees all over the bicycle he thinks belongs to Sara. There is still a faint light behind one of the curtains. He's shivering with cold, and tries to work out how best to raise the ladder and lean it against the wall without making a noise.
But he can't think of any way. The ladder is too heavy. He'll just have to try to slide it up the wall and hope nobody hears anything.
Not that it matters. Nothing matters any more.
So he braces himself, heaves with all his strength and manages to raise the ladder against the wall.
No sign of movement behind the curtain.
He's out of breath and sweaty, and his throat feels raw.
But the worst is yet to come.
He climbs tentatively up the ladder until his head is almost up to the windowsill.
He closes his eyes; once again his eyelids are padlocked. He's prepared to give up everything – The Flying Horse, Celestine, his rock – as long as Samuel isn't behind the curtain.
Then he looks.
Sara is lying under a sheet in a brown bed.
Her mouth is moving, but Joel can't hear what she's saying.
Sitting on the edge of the bed is Samuel.
He's naked, and is listening to what Sara has to say.
Through the curtain Joel can see the long, red scar on his father's thigh. The scar he got when a hatch burst open in a severe storm off the Hebrides, and he almost lost a leg.
He's giving that scar to Sara . . .
Joel is overcome by a deep sense of pain and sorrow as he perches there on the ladder. It's as if he no longer exists, as if he were condemned to perch on that ladder, frozen stiff, for a thousand years.
Why has he been abandoned? He's never abandoned anybody. After all, he's his own mum.
He doesn't know how long he stands there on the ladder. But he doesn't climb down until his sorrow has slowly given way to contempt and fury.
He doesn't climb down until he feels strong enough to avenge himself.
He digs out a stone from under the snow next to the wall. It's not very big, only half the size of his fist, but it's big enough.
Now he has to make sure he doesn't miss.
He'll only have one throw, no more. If he misses and then tries again, he'll be discovered.
It doesn't matter if he is discovered, of course, but he hopes to avoid that even so. He has to hit his target with the first stone. He's not bothered about the ladder. Explaining to the ironmonger how the ladder turned up underneath her window will be even more revenge on Sara.
He takes aim. He's taken his glove off, and holds the cold stone in his frozen hand.
Then he hurls the stone, and feels a pang of regret as he lets go. The stone hits the window right in the middle, and the glass is shattered with a crack that echoes all round the courtyard.
He runs off as fast as he can. He doesn't stop until he's back at home, and the cold air feels like sandpaper in his throat.
When he's got his breath back, he tiptoes cautiously past old Mrs Westman's door.
He wonders if she'll tell his father that he's been out in the middle of the night.
Samuel will understand what has happened if she does.
But the thought only worries Joel a little bit.
He turns on all the lights in the flat before untying his boots with his freezing cold fingers. One of the laces has got a knot that he can't unravel. He fetches the bread knife and cuts it off. He undresses and snuggles down into bed in order to warm up.
He's not going to think about his father as such any more. From now on he will call him Samuel.
It strikes him it was silly to leave the lights on. He switches them all off then creeps back into bed. Then he waits, waits for Samuel to come back home. But he's so tired, he can't keep his eyes open and he nods off to sleep.
His dreams are restless, nasty, long-drawn-out. Dreams he won't remember anything about . . .
When he wakes up next morning Samuel has already left for the forest. Joel stands in the kitchen doorway and sees that he has been there and made coffee. The stove is still hot.
The bootlace Joel had cut off is lying on the floor like a strip of a shed snakeskin.
Joel is tired. He must hurry up if he's going to get to school on time.
But when he emerges into the cold dawn he decides that he's not going to go to school. He can't face it, he has to do some thinking. Mind you, it's not sure that he'll have the strength to think either. It would be good if he had a tap inside his head that he could open, and let all his thoughts run out . . .
For no obvious reason he finds himself heading north out of the little town. First the long hill up to the railway station. Beyond that is the hospital, and then the endless forest.
In a little hollow by the road, almost completely hemmed in by dense fir trees, is The Old Bricklayer's house. It's a dilapidated smithy that has been converted into a private home. The garden is full of junk and overgrown currant bushes.
Joel pauses and peers in through the dense fir trees. He can see wheel tracks in the snow. Then somebody shouts to him.
'Come here,' somebody says. 'Come and give me a hand.'
He looks round. He can see nothing but trees. Fir trees with a thick covering of snow on their branches.
'I need a hand,' he hears the voice say once more.
And then he sees The Old Bricklayer, in among the fir trees.
He waves to him.
'Come over here and hold this,' shouts The Old Bricklayer.
Joel approaches hesitantly.
The Old Bricklayer emerges from the trees with the end of a thick, long rope in one hand.
Joel thinks that his real name is so appropriate. A man with a name like Simon Windstorm has to look exactly like The Old Bricklayer. He has big gaps in his mouth – no doubt his teeth have blown away. Bushy eyebrows are sprouting round his eyes like rambling rose bushes. His eyes are bright and piercing, and he seems to be looking right through Joel.
The Old Bricklayer is wearing a voluminous fur coat riddled with large moth-holes. He has a Wellington boot on one foot, and a spiked boot on the other.
The Old Bricklayer notices that Joel is intrigued.
'You're looking at my feet, are you?' he says. 'People have no idea of what's best. I can slide forward using my Wellington, and use the spiked boot to dig into the ice and keep me steady. Who says you have to have identical boots on both feet? Does it say anything about that in the Bible? Do the police have the right to arrest people who wear odd boots? Of course not. Not even any two feet are the same. Hang on to this rope now!'
He stuffs the end of the rope into Joel's hands and vanishes again into the trees. The rope becomes taut, and The Old Bricklayer comes hurrying back through the snow.
It strikes Joel that he looks like an animal. A sort of cross between an elk and a human being. A Windstorm Ox.
He takes the rope from Joel and lays it down in the snow so that it stays taut. All the time he's mumbling and snorting to himself.
'What are you doing?' Joel asks.
The Old Bricklayer looks at him in surprise.
'Doing?' he says. 'I'm laying out the rope in the snow. I think it looks good. I only do things that look good.'
Then he looks worried.
'Do you think it looks good?'
'Of course,' says Joel. 'It looks really good . . . '
The Old Bricklayer lies down in the snow and relaxes, as if he were lying in the warm heather on a summer's day.
'I feel less isolated when I do something that looks good,' he says. 'That's my medicine. I was ill for a long time. It was only when I started doing things that look good that I started to be healthy again.'
The man's mad, Joel thinks. No normal person lays out ropes in the snow and thinks it looks good.
'The earth is round,' says The Old Bricklayer. 'It spins round and round. Sometimes I get dizzy and I have to lie down in the snow, and cool my head down. Then I can think about the past and the future. And while all that stuff's going on, I'm alive. When I'm dead I won't be alive any longer. That's the top and bottom of it. But I'm a bit worried when I think that nobody will realise how important it is to lay ropes out in the snow when I've gone. I wish I had some apprentices . . . '
'Why do you drive around in your lorry at night?' asks Joel, hoping that The Old Bricklayer will recognise Joel as the boy he helped out of the snow when The Flying Horse had crashed.
But Simon Windstorm doesn't recognise him. He lies in the snow, gazing up at the sky.
'I've given up sleeping,' he says. 'There's nothing so lonely for a lonely man as sleeping alone in a lonely house. So I get into my lorry and drive round. I think about all those years I was in hospital, and I sing to banish all the nasty memories. You can sing away your sorrows. And you can whistle away your nasty memories so that they don't dare come back . . . '
He suddenly sits up in the snow and looks at Joel.
'Thank you for your help,' he says. 'You can go now. I want to be left in peace. But come back some other time and I'll give you some soup that will enable you to see into the future.'
'That's not possible,' says Joel.
'Oh yes it is,' says The Old Bricklayer. 'Come back to see me, and I'll show you.'
Then he gets up, brushes off the snow and plods off into the trees.
Joel continues on his way.
He tries out what The Old Bricklayer said, to find out if it's true. That you can sing away the things you'd rather not think about.
He knows 'Shenandoah' off by heart.
He thinks about Sara with her red hat, and starts singing, loudly and out of tune.
After the first verse she is still patting him on the cheek. After the second verse, that he can't really remember properly, she is starting to fade away. After the third verse she's disappeared altogether. But as soon as he finishes, she comes back again. I can't remember the words, he thinks. It doesn't help . . .
He goes back home to his house by the river. It starts snowing, and it's hard going.
I have to speak to him today, he thinks. Samuel. If he tells me where Jenny is, he can sit on Sara's bed and show her his scar as much as he likes.
Although he prefers not to think about it, he does realise that when Samuel sits naked on the edge of her bed, that means he could end up with unwanted brothers and sisters.
Sisters, he thinks. It would be bound to be sisters. Little Saras with red hats . . .
He stamps hard as he tramps up the stairs. The sound echoes from wall to wall and he knows that Mrs Westman won't like the noise, but at least being able to hear his footsteps proves that he still exists.
He lights the stove and watches the flames licking the wood. He sticks a finger inside and tests how long he can keep it there without getting burnt.
Then he decides to search Samuel's room. The photographs must be there somewhere. Now he will find them.
Samuel's room has a bed and a chair. A table with the radio on it and a bookcase full of books. His clothes are hanging in a wardrobe. Nothing else in there. Joel looks round and asks himself where he would hide some photographs. But he knows that strangely enough, adults don't think like children. They often find worse hiding places.
He starts by looking in bad hiding places. Under the pillow, between the bookcase and the wall, under the carpet. Nothing there. He shakes all the books, but no photographs drop out. Then he searches through the table drawer where Samuel keeps his penknife with the mother-of-pearl handle among lots of papers, and his sailor's record book. No photographs there either.
So Samuel hasn't chosen a bad hiding place. He has to think again.
Good hiding places are places you don't think of as hiding places. Places you don't see, don't even notice that they exist. A good hiding place could be underneath a newspaper.
He lifts up the newspaper but there's only dust underneath.
Another good hiding place could be underneath the embroidered table mat Samuel was given by Mrs Westman.
He lifts up the cloth. There are the photographs. But not only the photographs: also a letter. He takes the photos and the letter to the window seat in the hall where he can keep an eye on the street and see Samuel coming in good time.
He examines the photos carefully, but he doesn't think he looks all that much like his mother. He fetches Samuel's shaving mirror from the bathroom and holds it so that he can see Jenny's face and his own at the same time.
Perhaps there is a bit of a likeness after all? He tries to pose in the same way as his mother. Moves his lips backwards and forwards, raises an eyebrow, blows out his cheeks a little. In the end he thinks he has adjusted his face to ape his mother's. Now he can see that there is a likeness. Not a lot, but it is there.
Then he remembers that he hasn't been keeping an eye on the street. Two small children run past, a bus signals that it's turning left. But there's no sign of Samuel trudging home from the forest. He puts the photographs on the window ledge and looks at the letter.
He sees that it is postmarked in Gothenburg. November 19. But he can't make out the year.
He takes the letter out of its envelope. It's folded in two and written in ink on both sides.
To his surprise he sees that it is written by Samuel. 'Your ever-loving Samuel', it says at the bottom of page two. He examines the envelope.
'To Samuel Gustafson, The Seafarer Guest House, Gothenburg.'
Does he write letters to himself? Joel wonders.
He looks out over the street. It's snowing heavily now, big chunky flakes. The errand boy from the sawmill is going past, carrying a parcel. Joel notices that he keeps changing hands. It must be heavy.
He reads what Samuel has written.
It's a letter to Joel's mother.
He writes that this very day he has signed on with the SS Vassijaure that has been in the shipyard to have its propeller shaft changed. Tomorrow they will sail for Narvik and pick up a cargo of iron ore for taking to Newport News. He doesn't know the next port of call but he hopes it will be somewhere in Sweden so that he can take a few days' leave and visit her in Motala. Then he tells her that he has backache but expects it will soon pass, and that somebody he knows called Lundstr?m has signed on for the same ship. He asks if Jenny remembers Lundstr?m. He had a long beard and used to play the concertina. He tells her how much he misses her, and that she must stay faithful to him. . .
Joel reads the letter one more time, after checking to make sure Samuel isn't approaching the house.
There is a lot in the letter that gives him food for thought.
The most important thing is Motala. He fetches his diary, which contains a map of Sweden, and locates the town. It's almost in the very middle of the country.
Perhaps that's where his mother returned to when she left?
But why is the letter in the wrong envelope?
Why does Samuel have a letter that she ought to have had?
Perhaps Simon Windstorm has some kind of potion that enables you to see into the past, Joel thinks. He could do with something of the sort.
He notices that the fire in the stove has gone out. He hurries to replace the letter and photographs, and puts the shaving mirror back in the bathroom.
As he is relighting the fire he realises that he can almost remember the contents of the letter by heart.
SS Vassijaure, The Seafarer Guest House, Motala . . .
He lays the table while the potatoes are boiling. He sees through the window that the snow is falling thicker than ever. It's starting to get dark. He goes to the window seat again and waits. Black figures pass by through the snow.
And there comes Samuel.
Joel can tell from the way he's walking that he's in a good mood.
He jumps down from the window seat and goes to his room. He doesn't want Samuel to see that he's been looking out for him. He rummages under his bed and produces his tin soldiers, covered in dust.
Then Samuel appears in the doorway. He laughs and brandishes a piece of meat in his hand.
'We'll be eating well tonight,' he says. Then he lowers his voice.
'Elk steak. But don't tell anybody. It's not allowed at this time of year. But it's good!' Joel sits on the kitchen bench and watches Samuel turning the meat in the frying pan.
It's not easy to understand grown-ups. Sometimes they stand over you and want to know everything, but just as often they don't want to know anything at all.
Joel likes elk meat. It has a very special taste. Besides, you can eat as much lingonberry jam with it as you want. When there is elk meat on the table Samuel never bothers to frown if Joel takes too much jam.
They eat in silence. Samuel rarely speaks at the dinner table. He just eats. Joel knows that the best time to ask something is when they've just finished eating, before Samuel has fetched the newspaper he has in his overcoat pocket and lies down on the kitchen bench or sits down on his chair and starts reading.
The trick is to have your question ready when Samuel pushes his plate to one side and wipes his mouth.
'I dreamt about my mother last night,' he says when Samuel puts down his knife and fork.
'Really?' he says. 'What did you dream?'
'I can't remember,' says Joel. 'But I know it was her I dreamt about.'
'It would be just like her to start haunting you in your dreams,' says Samuel, and now he sounds annoyed.
'Why?' asks Samuel.
'You shouldn't think so much about your mother,' says Samuel. 'I understand that it's not so easy for you not to have a mum, but she was no good. She wasn't the person I thought she was.'
'What was she like, then?' asks Joel.
Samuel looks long and hard at him.
'We can talk about that when you're a bit bigger,' he says, getting up from the table.
'How much bigger?' wonders Joel.
Samuel doesn't answer but goes to fetch his newspaper.
When he comes back he pauses and looks at Joel.
'No doubt you think your mother was a wonderful person,' he says. 'I don't want to disappoint you. We can talk about her when you're a bit bigger.'
Then he goes to his room leaving Joel on his own at the table.
'Disappoint you', he thinks.
What does Samuel – the man he no longer calls father – know about Joel's disappointments?
Nothing . . .
If he goes to Sara again tonight, I shall run away, he thinks.
He stays in his room all evening. He moves his tin soldiers back and forth without paying any attention to what he's doing.
He wonders if Ture will be able to help him scare Sara off.
It's hardly going to be possible to scare Samuel. How can you scare somebody who doesn't understand anything?
If he knew what Joel was thinking, he wouldn't bother about Sara of course . . . It occurs to him that there might be another possibility.
What if he were to go and see Sara himself? Go to the bar and tell her to leave Samuel alone. Tell her that he was the one who threw that stone, and that he doesn't want any sisters with red hats.
Maybe she would understand that it was important. After all, she had a boy herself who was killed in a fire.
He goes to bed and thinks that might be the best solution. He'll go to the bar and talk to Sara.
Suddenly Samuel appears in the doorway.
He comes to sit on Joel's bed. He smiles, but it seems to Joel that the smile isn't anything to do with him, but because Samuel is thinking about Sara.
'Would you like to hear a sea story?' asks Samuel.
Joel would really, but he forces himself to say no.
'I'm nearly asleep already,' he says.
'Sleep well, then,' says Samuel. 'Maybe tomorrow. . . '
Joel wraps the alarm clock in a sock and places it under his pillow. He wishes he didn't have to get up tonight. If he doesn't turn up at school tomorrow Miss Nederstr?m will start wondering what's going on.
Best of all would be to sleep right through until summer. Wake up and know that it was the summer holidays and that Sara had moved to somewhere a long way away. If only it were possible just once to wish for something it was impossible to wish for . . .
Even so he is happy when the alarm goes off and he wakes up. The first thing he hears is Samuel snoring next door. So he hasn't gone to see Sara tonight.
Perhaps that stone through the window was enough, he thinks. Perhaps Samuel will never go there again?
Now he no longer feels tired.
Perhaps everything can be just like it used to be?
He gets dressed, goes downstairs and out into the night.
It's not as cold as it has been, so it doesn't hurt when he breathes.
Spring is on its way, he thinks. First comes spring, and then the summer holidays . . .
Ture is waiting for him by the goods wagons. He has a spade with him, and a paper sack.
The ant hill, thinks Joel. He'd forgotten about that.
But why does Ture want Joel to show him an ant hill?
Next to the sawmill there's a clump of trees with lots of ant hills. Maybe the snow isn't so deep there.
Joel takes the paper sack and they hurry off. As usual everything is quiet and deserted.
As they pass the church they see the rear lights of The Old Bricklayer's lorry as it turns into Hedev?gen.
Next to the roots of a fallen tree they find an ant hill with not much snow covering it.
Ture has brought a torch so that they can pick their way through the trees. Joel thinks that he wouldn't have dared come here by himself, even if he'd had a torch. The trees are too tall, the loneliness is too oppressive away from the streetlights.
'Hold the torch,' whispers Ture.
Then he starts digging at the bottom of the ant hill. It takes him a long time to hack his way through the frozen soil, the pine needles and the hibernating ants.
Joel holds the sack open so that Ture can fill it with the pulverised soil. Then they change places and Joel has a go at digging.
What's he going to do with all this? Joel wonders as he hacks away at the frozen soil and tree roots. Why does he want sleeping ants and frozen soil?
When the torch batteries start to wear out, they pack up and leave.
On the other side of the bridge Joel turns off and takes a road that meanders past silent houses.
Eventually he stops and points.
This is where Gertrud lives.
It's a little yellow wooden house all on its own at the end of the road. In the garden are currant bushes and a potato patch.
Ture stands the spade in a snowdrift.
The house is in darkness.
'Does she have a dog?' whispers Ture.
Joel shakes his head. 'Not that I know of.'
'Wait here,' says Ture and slinks in through the gate, which isn't properly closed. He vanishes into the darkness.
Joel suddenly starts feeling uneasy.
What is Ture going to do?
After a few minutes Ture reappears. He looks pleased with himself. He gestures to Joel to bring the sack and follow him.
At the back of the house there is a window standing ajar. Ture has put a crate underneath it that they can stand on. Ture carefully opens the window wide.
'Pass me the sack,' he whispers.
There is a table just inside the window.
Ture tips the frozen soil and the sleeping ants onto the table. When the sack is empty he carefully closes the window again.
'There we go,' he says.
He puts the crate back where it was, then they hurry back over the railway bridge.
Ture laughs.
'By the time she wakes up tomorrow the ants will have thawed out,' he says. 'The whole house will be crawling with ants.'
Joel laughs as well.
In fact he's not at all sure that he likes this. It's one thing throwing a stone through Sara's window. He knows why he did that. But tipping ants through No-Nose's window? Why?
To create fear, Ture has said.
But why create fear in No-Nose?
'Tomorrow we'll smear varnish all over her currant bushes,' says Ture. 'This is just the start.'
Smear varnish over her currant bushes?
That's not something Joel would ever have thought of doing.
This isn't what his Secret Society was set up to do.
The dog heading for a star no longer seems to be a part of it.
'I want to look for the dog,' he says. 'I don't want to smear varnish over any currant bushes.'
'You daren't,' says Ture.
'Of course I dare,' says Joel. 'But I don't want to.'
Then they start quarrelling.
Neither of them says anything, but they quarrel even so, in their thoughts.
They walk all the way home without saying a word.
They go their different ways when they get to the courthouse gate.
'See you tomorrow,' says Ture and jumps over the gate.
Joel doesn't answer, but hands over the paper sack. Ture has been carrying the spade.
'I have to go home now,' says Joel. 'I can't spend all tomorrow in bed.'
He has no intention of smearing varnish over any currant bushes, he intends to look for the dog. But he doesn't say that.
On the way home he thinks about Ture running away soon. Then Joel will be alone again with his Secret Society. At least he won't have to do things he doesn't want to do any more.
Such as smearing varnish on currant bushes.
It's not that he's a coward, he dares to do it all right. It's just that he doesn't want to.
When he enters the kitchen he can sense straight away that Samuel isn't asleep in his bed. He doesn't need to check if Samuel's clothes and boots are still there. He knows even so.
He edges open the door to Samuel's room. The bed is empty. Joel starts crying. He sits on the kitchen bench with tears running down his cheeks. He sits there for ages.
Then he takes out the logbook from underneath Celestine. He finds a pen and writes on an empty page: 'All the crew have been lost now. The last one to be swept overboard was Able Seaman Samuel Gustafson. His son fought to the last to save him, but it was all in vain.
The only one left on board now is Joel Gustafson.
No other soul, only Joel Gustafson . . . '