The gravel makes a rustling sound as she walks down the driveway in her new shoes, they are tan leather with low heels. Ah, early summer, the lilac. The rumbling sound of the tram up the hill. She wants to walk arm in arm with Hartvig even though he does not like it. We’ll fall out of rhythm, he says, annoyed, making her angry and ice cold: Can’t we at least pretend to be married? Cutting. So he gives in and lets her link arms with him all the same. This is how a married couple should look. Her hand rests on the sleeve of his coat. It was nippy enough for her to bring the new gloves in light calfskin. Soft, unblemished, chic. Could have belonged to an actress for that matter.
They step aboard the tram, and she looks around. Sunshine fills the carriage as they go over Gråkammen. I’m pretty, I know that I’m pretty. A clear thought for once. Most of the passengers are in their best attire, going out to enjoy themselves. Hartvig sees several people he has to greet, tips his hat and nods. Good evening, good evening, people in different seats respond. Hartvig gives his trousers a punctilious pinch at the knee before sitting down, paying attention to the crease. The scent of perfume comes from the seat in front of them, lily of the valley, and Cessi finds her gaze level with a pink hat atop a bun of light blonde hair. Mrs Esther Heyerdahl. A swan neck, Hartvig once said, Mrs Heyerdahl is as beautiful as a swan. Some of the things he says are truly ridiculous.
Shush, she says, I do not want to talk to the Heyerdahls. But Hartvig does.
Oh, my word, what a lovely surprise. Esther and her husband turn halfway round in their seat, Esther as effusive as only Esther can be. As though she did not see them when the tram came to a stop at the platform and they got on. Rubbish, the lot of it. She knows Esther does not care for her. Oh well, the feeling is mutual. Fancy that, Hedda, is that not what they say, in Ibsen? Thank goodness the Heyerdahls are not going to the theatre but are playing bridge and eating supper at the Emmanuelsens’ in Majorstua. They are Jews, of course. Esther likes to adorn herself with what is different. But only slightly different. The Emmanuelsens are not their next-door neighbours, that would no doubt be quite another matter altogether, having them live so close. Jew riff-raff. Of course, apart from everything else, Esther gets a discount from Mr Emmanuelsen, at the jewellery shop.
Heavens, are we there already. That is the way Esther Heyerdahl speaks. The swan arises from its seat, enveloped in soft fragrances and a pleasant smile, fluffs its feathers discreetly, places an eagle’s talon on the seat back as the tram shudders to a halt at the station and says to Cessi: Now we’ll have to see each other soon. Whenever things are a little less busy. I’ve opened a practice, don’t you know. Yes, at home, naturally, and certainly not every day, but all the same, the children demand so much of my attention. But, of course, you know all about that, an only child needs no less looking after than three, that’s what they say, that the difference between having no children and having one is the same as between one and ten. But your boy isn’t at home for the time being, or did I hear wrong?
Cessi strokes her cheek with the finger of her glove. A cool, tender and restrained caress.
Damn her. Damn her to bloody hell.
She likes the red, carpeted floors inside the theatre. The gilded frames on the mirrors, the wall lamps. And the chandeliers, they are simply divine, she says to Hartvig, who refrains from replying. She no longer thinks his silence is due to any unwillingness on his part, but that he does not know what to say. He is only capable when he himself comes up with a comment, something he thinks appropriate to the situation. In which case he would say ‘delightful chandeliers’, and ‘spick and span here, quite immaculate’. Something like that. He nods and smiles to acquaintances, catches sight of supreme-court lawyer Rachløw and his wife, whispers to Cessi: You remember we ate dinner at Blom with them? Come, we must pay our regards. So they stop and shake hands, smile and chat, but Cessi can see by Mrs Rachløw’s expression that she wants to get on, she is not interested in them. Moreover, Hartvig is so long-winded, has so little of interest to say. Mrs Rachløw, incidentally, is much too plump, and really not well turned out, she has poor taste and no reason to behave in such a high-and-mighty way. No, Cessi really has no desire to stand talking to her either, nonetheless she is embarrassed by Hartvig. He drags her down, makes her appear boring and uninteresting as well. Something that by nature she most certainly is not, on the contrary, she has always been praised for how lively she is and for her sense of humour. She used to socialise, was popular, was invited here and there, a person naturally at the centre of attention. If she could not attend a party her friends would badger her. A bevy of them outside knocking on the door: Oh, Cessi, can’t you come, it won’t be the same without you. And Cessi threw on her coat and went with them for a while, I’ll be back within an hour, Mama, she called out, and her mother stood in the hallway in her black dress endeavouring to look helpless. Which she managed very well. But she should be perfectly capable of going to the parish meeting unaccompanied. Had she perhaps not given birth to two children? Had she not been half beaten to death by Papa and survived? How could it be so difficult to walk the few blocks to the parish hall alone? The pavements were not icy, neither was it particularly late, and the streets of Majorstua were safe enough. Oh, no, Mama’s ‘heart was so anxious’, Cessi had to be so kind. But Cessi clattered down the stairs with the others, through the covered entryway and out onto the street. Just an hour, Mama, I’ll be back in time to make it. But she was gone longer than an hour, they ended up arriving late for the meeting after all, and Cessi’s clothes smelled of cigarette smoke. Mama remarked upon it, that women smoking is an abomination: there are no two ways about it, Cessi. What kind of morals do you actually have?
But morals were a flexible notion. Not that she said as such to Mama and on the whole they just had innocent fun. Music, cigarettes, a little beer and sherry, a flirt. Only now and again something flew through her, yes, everything fluttered and loosened, and she rubbed up against some of the really handsome boys. She felt indelicate and common under their scrutiny, but could not manage to cease the laughter that encouraged them to be lewd, she became lewd herself, and the boys looked at her, laughed, stroked her rear. Hussy.
But the music, Mama, from America, you remember that? The Negro voices. I’m the only one of my friends who’s been in America, I’m able to describe the wide streets to them, you can be sure they’re thrilled. Of course, I can’t depict how it truly was, but I try. The streets were dusty on hot summer days and I protested because I had to wear the straw hat with the string that chafed beneath my chin. Everyone could hear Papa’s gramophone music through the open windows. He swung me around and said she’s musical, the little one, do you remember?
But Mama will not answer. She wants Cessi to eat her supper. Tea, scrambled egg and white bread, as well as an extra treat for little Cessi, smoked salmon.
Now it is different, she is in the vice, stuck in that big house with Hartvig, who does not like to socialise with anybody other than those boring colleagues and bridge friends of his. No doubt because he can only shine in their company. Since he registered them as Friends of the National Theatre they have been constantly attending productions, where she seldom gets more than cold conversation with the likes of the Rachløws. If one really is to take the gloomy view, that is. Because there is a better sort of person here too. Doctors, professors, of old stock, good lineage, so much so that they still speak Danish. The kind of family Cessi’s mother-in-law would have liked her to come from. Mean old woman. Money was the only thing on their minds in Hartvig’s family. And to think at times he could bring himself to call Cessi a snob. But she could have married into a better position than her mother-in-law dreamt of for her Hartvig. If she had wanted. If only she had not had a hussy within. If she had been able to overcome that blank feeling. Like drowning in fog. She went under and came back up, but then people seemed so far away, she could not speak to them. She had such abdabs. Faces seemed to pile together and stare at her, either beautiful and unattainable or fat and uncomprehending. Spiteful. She froze. What was she supposed to say to people such as them, those on the right side of everything, who were completely stuck-up? Not that this applied to Mrs Rachløw, mind you, she was of the kind Cessi could easily run rings around.
Mrs Rachløw’s dress is off-the-peg, expensive no doubt, but the cut is unbecoming on her. If one has such an ample form it is better to employ a seamstress, one who knows which materials to use and what cut conceals and accentuates at the right places.
What a lovely dress, she says to Mrs Rachløw, such pretty material.
Mrs Rachløw thanks her with an expression that says that discussing dress material with Cessi is the least interesting thing she can imagine.
But I can see it could do with some slight adjustment. It would sit a little nicer if you got it taken in along the upper sides, and let out somewhat at the waist. It’s fitting a little tightly around the waist as it is, while puffing a tad beneath the bust. I can do it for you if you like.
Really, Mrs Rachløw said, looking her right in the eyes, you still sew for people outside the family? Well, I dare say it’s a good thing to augment the family income a little.
She tries her hand. But Cessi has her now.
No, the very idea, no, she says. I just sew for the family and for friends of mine who have never quite mastered it themselves.
Now, now, Hartvig says, don’t take on more than you can manage, Cessi darling.
She looks Mrs Rachløw’s body up and down, as though studying the dress with an expert eye, but Mrs Rachløw is doubtless aware that Cessi is scrutinising her in order to express her contempt, which is after all the point. She notices that Mrs Rachløw has the same brooch as her. White pearls in the form of a bunch of grapes. It is boring, but no more boring than what most other women wear. What is worse is that Mrs Rachløw has the exact same. The brooch on Dr Vold’s desk, on the other hand, that was distinctive. The green colour, the curve of the leaves, its size. A brooch one could not help but notice.
Hartvig buys a programme and they stand with heads close and peruse it. It probably looks romantic, as though husband and wife share a particularly trusting relationship. If only he was not shorter than her then they would make the perfect picture. But she is three centimetres taller and is also wearing high heels, fearing they look ridiculous, she pulls away, taking the programme to flick through it on her own. One of their bridge acquaintances passes and Hartvig tries to crack one of his stupid jokes: Well, here we are standing waiting to see While We Wait. They both chuckle, but Cessi does not for one minute believe that high-court lawyer Berg found it amusing, she could see it by his expression.
The play is about waiting, it says in the programme, and about how nervous that can make one, because that brings all one’s worries and anxieties to the fore, the things that are set aside when one is in a hurry. Yes, that could be true all right, busy days can make her forget, calm her down. But then, at night, she can still burst into tears, because she is simply worn out, and she cannot bear it, no, she cannot.
The play is both a tragedy and a comedy, it says, tragedy and comedy are closer than siblings, they are the same person turning a face from morning to night. That jumps out at her. Is that perhaps how it is for her as well? She is not the same in the morning as at night-time, everything can change in the course of the day, becoming utterly wrong, she can be beset and torn to pieces by an uncontrollable rage.
The people around them saunter slowly across the soft carpets, or stand in groups chatting. She cannot say a word to any of them, not even those she knows a little through Hartvig. It is as though they do not actually exist, that no one of flesh and blood is going to come either, no one is suddenly going to appear and walk towards her. She is married now after all.
She would have felt different with that brooch in her lapel.
She could have been an actress, she really could have. Hartvig hands her a glass of sherry. She has never really liked him. The sexual side of things is so disgusting. But how could she get out of it, she had no idea at the time how that kind of thing was supposed to feel. Intimate relations. Is it perhaps merely Hartvig that makes her feel there is something repulsive about the whole thing? No matter, she is not going to do it any more. Neither will she share a bed. Hartvig snores and farts so at night, and she sleeps badly enough as it is. There is something foul about him, it goes together with his erotic fantasies in a way. All the things he can bring himself to say. Is that good? Do you like that? Will I do it like this? Or he asks her to do things that never would have entered her head. She does not like it. She can picture doing unmentionable things with other men. With Dr Vold, for instance. But with Hartvig, no. She feels like crying. But is she happy or sad? She really does not know, or whether it is good or disgusting. Knows only that she needs to control herself. That she must not cry. Because it is worse to cry with relief than with anger. She loses energy then. And Hartvig pulls her down to the bottom afterwards. Even though he may console her at the time. Because the next moment he has forgotten. And she goes around and around in that house while he is at work. There is no end of chores and he does not understand how much is resting upon her shoulders, no, he thinks things are as they should be. And he does not consider asking for a pay rise. They save a lot thanks to her being so nimble-fingered.
No, but Hartvig is kind too. Considerate, patient. He comforts her when she has her ‘spells’. She hates it when he says that. Are you having one of your ‘spells’, he asks. As though she did not have a valid reason to be the way she is, as if what she is screaming at him makes no sense, has no meaning. If she only knew what the reason was. Is it Hartvig’s nature that upsets her so much? He is a skinflint. And the responsibility for that big house, that unruly boy, the housekeeping. She wants to divorce him. No, Hartvig wants to divorce her. He was the one who said it first. She does not know if it is a threat or if he really means it. Besides, she could never have said so herself, not said it and meant it seriously. She may have said something similar while in a rage, she likely has, several times, but Hartvig knows well she does not mean what she says. One should not pay attention to words spoken in anger. It is different with Hartvig. When he says something like that, it is serious.
Oh, yes, she may want to be rid of him at times, or wish he was somebody else. But not really. The two of them are meant to be married. One should marry, settle down and start a family, it is best that way. Hartvig is dependable, comes from a good, upper-middle-class family, that offers great security. Besides which, she owns nothing herself apart from some furniture, inherited jewellery and silverware. No, divorce is not an option given her financial position. Nor should anyone find fault with her life. The lawn, the garden, the housework, the boy. She feels black inside.
No one can console her like Hartvig. Only Mama. Anyway, where would she go? Hartvig is not able to take any more of her outbursts, he says. What can she say then? She is speechless. Because one would have a hard time finding anyone as boring as Hartvig. The pedant. He is not how a man ought to be. And then he thinks he is the one who will leave her. Perhaps even feels sorry for her. As though he were the attractive one. Talk about back to front, and she cannot even say it. Still, maybe she will speak with Dr Vold about it.
The desk is brown, the chair, the walls, everything is brown except the Persian rug, and the cushions on the chair which are dark green. The traffic rushes by on wet cobblestones outside. There is so much she could have said, but as soon as she is sitting in Dr Vold’s office, it all collapses into something soft, jelly-like. Tiredness overwhelms her. The images move too quickly for her to see them clearly. Rooms, houses, directions. The words conceal something. Or is it the faces?
Hartvig is just a name.
Imagine, she said. Hartvig is just a word.
The doctor thinks she seems agitated. Not so strange perhaps, divorce is a serious matter, he says. Or is it a question? She just nods, cries a little. But it is the doctor’s office that gives rise to her anxiety, not Hartvig’s talk of divorce. There is something here and she does not know what it is. Something she visualises as a scorching hot liquid. Gas. A laboratory. Is it a hospital, is she being admitted now? She cannot get hold of it. Is it something impending or something that has occurred? Is this perhaps the closest she will get to anything resembling the feeling of God? Dr Vold? He is neither good nor evil. But the sight of him is the sight of something to come. Future. Help me, oh, help me. She does not say it, but on the inside, oh, on the inside she is a solitary scream. Not enough allowance is made for how mentally weak she is, they should know better, all of them. She has no one.
The manly, trousered legs under the desk scare her. But then she is not a child either? Everything is very confusing. Hartvig is not enough of a man, that is what it is. He does not frighten her the way Dr Vold does.
The smell of medicine. Seething. Like it said in the newspapers. The world is seething, Europe is at war. That may bloody well be but what good is that? Her thoughts spin on the same wheel. Rat in a cage. This room cannot disappear. She feels she is connected to Dr Vold’s brain, but what is inside it? When he writes in the journal, she no longer knows what might happen. Perhaps Dr Vold is only the beginning. The office is a waiting room. A big city awaits her. Not that huge, unfinished house in that dismal garden between the pine trees. She reads the newspapers, she knows that certain women can also accomplish great things. But to be alone? No. Dr Vold is not considering admitting her to hospital? No, he reassures her, only should she wish it herself, he does not perceive the situation as being that acute. She just needs to ensure she gets sufficient rest.
They used to joke about it. That the house would take as long to build as City Hall. Neither it nor their own house are finished yet. The claw-foot table and six matching chairs were delivered on the back of a lorry. All the furniture standing in the snow in the garden when they returned from town. It was a wedding gift from Papa. She did not know if his intentions were good or bad. If it was to make her feel guilty for not having invited him. Or if it was to make up for something. In which case it would have to be both at the same time. Papa would never do anything for her without at the same time wanting to torment her, confuse her, laugh at her. He enjoyed it. Anyway, she did not care about the table. It could go in the dining room as far as she was concerned, she would never feel at home here. And Hartvig was absolutely delighted to save the expense on furnishings. Naturally.