54
I’ve taken a photo of Henk from the wall in Father’s bedroom and put it on the mantelpiece - on the other side of the mirror. The photo is in an old frame, the kind you can either hang or stand up. Dressed in brand-new overalls, my brother is sitting on a milking stool next to some bony hindquarters and beaming as if nothing in the whole world is more beautiful than milking a cow. Now we’re all together in the living room.
This morning I left Father alone to go to the tobacconist’s in Monnickendam. It didn’t really feel right, leaving him in the living room like that. That’s why I locked the hall door and the front door before I left. There were two people in front of me at the tobacconist’s and I was nervous. When it was my turn the shop assistant asked me what I wanted and I hadn’t had time to study the shelves behind her. “I’d like a packet of rolling tobacco,” I said. Fortunately no one had come into the shop after me. All right, which brand? I didn’t know. Which brand did I usually smoke? Van Nelle, I read, to the right of her hip. “Van Nelle,” I said. Strong or medium strong? “Medium strong,” I said, no longer guessing, because suddenly I saw the almost empty pouch of rolling tobacco on the coffee table in the laborer’s cottage. Papers? Mascotte, of course, they’d lain next to the pouch that first time and I had seen them later in his hands, when his practiced thumb brushed the shag off the packet after he opened the pouch. “So, have you worked it out yet?” the shop assistant asked. “Mascotte,” I said. It came to four euros and eight cents. That was a shock, I had no idea tobacco was so expensive.
Afterwards I searched the bureau for Father’s papers and found the letter from the Forestry Commission. I’ve put it on top of a pile and soon, but not now, I will go through it again thoroughly. Then answer it. The second part of Lodewick’s history of literature was still lying on the desk. I didn’t need it any more. I went up to Henk’s bedroom and put it back in the box - which was still sitting on Mother’s dressing table. I re-taped the box carefully and put it back in the wardrobe.
I locked all the doors yesterday as well - before driving to the ferry. By the time I arrived it was getting dark. It had occurred to me that Henk wouldn’t have taken the bike with him on the ferry, because what use would it have been to him on the other side? You only have to cross the road and you’re in the train station. I wanted Father’s bike back. Henk wouldn’t have bothered to lock it (I wasn’t even sure it still had a lock), because you only do that if you’re coming back to use it. I drove a circuit, but from the car all the bikes looked the same. Although there were less of them than I had expected. Then I walked past all the bike racks twice. Father’s bike wasn’t there. Could Henk have taken it onto the ferry with him after all? No, it must have been stolen. After a ferry had left, I stood for a while on the bank of the IJ. The other side was white with ships, the kind of ships that take elderly people on river cruises. I wondered why Riet hadn’t called. Or had she called, but I wasn’t at home? I wasn’t home now either. I pictured the hall and heard the telephone ringing. A telephone ringing in a house where there’s no one to answer it. When a ferry came sailing towards me, I felt it was time to leave.
The last lamb was born last night. Thirty-one lambs from twenty ewes.
I’ve finally managed to roll a cigarette that looks reasonable. I should have bought two packets of papers. I turn the roll-up around in my fingers. The cooling unit clicks on, Father shudders. They didn’t mention that: that the deceased shudders when the cooling unit clicks on or off. I’m sitting on a kitchen chair next to the coffin, I don’t know where else to sit. The box of matches is lying on the edge of the coffin. I light the roll-up. “You’re a weird one,” he said. When was that? The day before yesterday? Three days ago? Everything is different when you have a coffin in your living room. I wonder, for instance, whether it’s proper to have the blinds open? I definitely remember the curtains being half drawn when Henk was laid out in here. I’ve forgotten how the curtains were with Mother. On the other hand, I’m hardly going to sit here with the blinds closed, am I? It’s Sunday tomorrow and Monday will be like another Sunday. Two Sundays in a row. Easter. I inhale the smoke. It’s not too bad. I breathe out through my nose and, for the first time in my life, smoke comes out of my nostrils.
Someone’s in the scullery. “Quiet, now,” she says as the door between the scullery and the hall opens. She comes into the room, the boys stop at the door.
“What are you doing?” she asks in astonishment.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re smoking!”
I look at the roll-up in my hand, then stub it out in the ashtray on the arm of the sofa. I get up.
Ada doesn’t say anything else. She comes up to me and wraps her arms around me. Her hair smells nice and fresh, she presses her fingers into my shoulder blades. Teun and Ronald look at me with big eyes. I wink at them over Ada’s shoulder. Ronald thinks it’s funny and starts grinning. Teun’s expression stays serious. Ada lets go and plants a wet kiss on my lips at the same time. Then she looks at Father.
“I’ll put some coffee on,” she says. Although Ada is still Ada, nothing has been quite the same since the day she brought me the rug and Teun gave Henk the poster of the singer whose name I’ve forgotten. She walks to the kitchen saying, “If you’d like to, it’s all right. You can have a look.”
Teun and Ronald approach very slowly. Teun stops at the foot of the coffin and pretends to look. Ronald comes closer. He’s not as tall and has to stand on tiptoes to see over the side.
“Is it scary?” he asks.
“No,” I say. “Do you think it’s scary?”
“A bit.”
“When’s the funeral?” Ada calls from the kitchen.
“Tuesday,” I call back. “You don’t look scared,” I say to Ronald.
“Did you have to cry?”
“No.”
“Is there anything I can do?” Ada calls from the kitchen.
“Why not?” asks Ronald.
“Well . . .” I say. “You either have to cry or you don’t, there’s not much you can do about it.”
“Why is he dead?”
“He ate an egg, Ronald.”
It makes him laugh. “I eat eggs, they don’t kill me.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” I say. “Come on, let’s go into the kitchen. Would you like an almond cake?”
“Yes!” shouts Ronald.
“Please,” Teun says politely.
We go into the kitchen. The coffee machine is on, its gurgling drowns out the buzzing of the electric clock. Ada has put out two mugs. I get a packet of almond cakes out of a kitchen cupboard and tear it open.
“I’m just happy you’ve come over,” I tell Ada, in answer to her question.
“Of course I’ve come,” she says, almost indignantly. “And I’ll come tomorrow as well. It’s horrible, especially now it’s Easter, without a soul around. You have to come and eat with us, and shall I phone farm relief, to send someone for the milking? Wim wanted to come as well, but the bulk tank’s not working properly and he has to be there when the supplier . . .”
“You have to cry now,” says Ronald. “Your eyes are wet.”
I don’t answer. The boys are sitting together on one chair, because the fourth kitchen chair is in the living room.
“Has Henk gone?” Ronald asks.
“Yes, he’s not here any more.”
“Why’s he gone?”
“He’d been here long enough,” I say.
“Has he gone back to Brabbend, where his mother lives?”
“Ronald,” Teun says through a mouthful of cake, “just shut up for once.”
I really am happy they’ve come.
Ada, Teun and Ronald have gone, it’s quiet again in the house, but a different kind of quiet. Better. I don’t want to sit down on the kitchen chair next to the coffin any more. I walk through the scullery and the shed to the yard. It’s almost time to put the cows out again. I check the sheep and then walk over to the chicken coop. The wheelbarrow is in front of the donkey shed. I should actually muck it out. Not now. I go back inside and get the binoculars from the bureau. I stand with my legs apart in front of the side window and raise the binoculars to my eyes. Ada is standing there five hundred yards away. When she sees me she immediately raises one hand and waves. She gestures with her other hand. Teun and Ronald come into view. They raise their hands as well. I wave back and lower the binoculars. For a moment I stay there, in front of the side window, binoculars at chest height. Letting them have a good look at me. How long has she been standing there? How long has she been waiting for me? She knew I would appear at the window. Just as I knew she would be standing there. Relieved, I put the binoculars down on the table. Now she can come back with a light heart and take charge of things around here again.
After smoking another roll-up next to the coffin, I go out through the front door. I walk over to the bridge and sit on the rail. The hooded crow has taken a few steps to one side and has turned to face me. It looks at me. I look back. Until I see a car pulling up at the remains of the laborer’s cottage out of the corner of my eye. A man gets out of the car. It is bleak and gray and there are no sunny-day cyclists. A large group of coots is bobbing in the canal. The man has walked from the car to the magnolia. He grabs a branch and shakes it. Then he walks to the half-wall. When the man has been standing there motionless for a while staring up the imaginary staircase, I slide off the rail and walk up onto the road. The donkeys come over to the new fence and follow me to the former laborer’s cottage. He turns around when he hears me approaching. It is an old man with a weather-beaten face. An outdoor face.
“Helmer,” he says.
“I thought you were from the Forestry Commission,” I say.
“And I didn’t know whether I could expect to find you here.”
“Henk’s dead,” I say.
“Really?” he says. “Since when?”
“April 1967.”
“That’s a long time. And now you’re the farmer.”
“Yep. Mother’s dead too and Father is laid out in the living room.”
He screws up his eyes. It is a lot of deaths in one go. Then he turns around. “And the cottage burned down.”
“Yes,” I say to his back. “Amsterdammers. Holiday home.” I shiver, I’ve come out without a coat.
He stands there staring for a while, then turns back. He lays a hand on my shoulder. “Come on,” he says. “I’ll go and pay my respects to your father.” He walks over to his car. His back is straight, the stubbornness hasn’t disappeared. I follow and get in next to him. He puts the car in reverse and backs onto the road. We drive slowly to the southwest.
“It smells of dog in here,” I say. I can smell that, even though we never had a dog.
He looks at me and smiles. “He always sat where you’re sitting.” Because he’s looking at me, he sees the donkeys. “Are they your donkeys?”
I nod.
Again he smiles. “Yes,” he says. “You’re a donkey man all right.”