And then it was November, early in the month, and level-headed Tine asked, but what do you do then Daddy, when you’re not with us.
Given that they spent only two and a half days with me every other week, this was a question of vast proportions and it was really impossible to come up with a meaningful answer. She knew that my job was to write, so that wasn’t what she meant. But of course I couldn’t tell her, tell Vigdis, Tone, about my nights in the city centre, so I said, I drive to Sweden, to a town called Arvika. Do you drive there every day, then. No, I said, not every day, it’s a long trip, but quite often. Then Vigdis took over and said, so what do you do in Arvika. I read, I said, and she said, but you can read at home, can’t you, you can sit on the sofa and read. No, I said. I can’t. You can’t, she said, and I said, no, I can’t. Now she didn’t know what to say. She thought I was different and not the same as I had been just a few weeks before, at Stråtjern in Hadeland, or was when we all lived together and I could read anywhere, any time, amid all the racket, I could see it in her eyes, how she was more cautious, and it made me sad. Just the same she said, so can we go there with you, tomorrow maybe. This was Friday, the night temperature had dropped below zero but no snow had fallen, we had just walked up the stairs to my flat, and now their bags stood heavy in the hall, as if packed and ready for a week on the Costa del Sol, or a Greek island, Rhodes maybe, but they were staying with me for only two hopefully fine days, and now all four of us were sitting at the kitchen table eating the traditional pancakes that Mrs Jondal had learned how to make in a different place than this, towards the west, in Telemark where she grew up and she had put them in a plastic bag from the Co-op and hung it on my door handle the evening before so I would have something to offer the girls when the girls came the next day and were hungry after school. She always had half an eye in my direction and my best interests at heart. I will never forget her for that.
I had other plans, really. If I went to Sweden, I always went alone. If I was with someone, I couldn’t read. But I had to read. Or else I was done for. I had put up a rickety construction, you could breathe on it and it would collapse. So what would I do in Arvika in someone’s company. Was I to show the girls the old table I used to sit at in City Konditori. And in that case how would the table look to me, feel to me, the next time I went there. Should I take them to Systembolaget and show them their assortment of Calvados, show them Swedish books they could not read, at The Book Tree, show them books by Strindberg, Hjalmar Bergman, show them Eyvind Johnson’s The Novel about Olof in a fat pocket edition and maybe tell them something about it, and then show them Christian books I would never have bought. It was pointless. There was nothing there that I could share with them. Of course you can, I said.
We were sitting in the car. How long till we get to Arvika, Tone said. She was already whining a little. She wanted everything to happen fast, after a short while she always got bored, no matter what we did. It was one hundred and forty kilometres to Arvika on rough forest roads. It was Saturday morning. We had driven for half an hour, we would soon be at Gjelleråsen, Stovner lay behind us, Vestli too, barely out of Oslo.
We had gone down to the car early, Vigdis had been tired and unwilling when I woke her and at first she didn’t know where she was and said things I could easily have found hurtful had I been her mother, which I informed her that I was not. Maybe it helped a little. But Tine and Tone jumped out of bed as soon as they opened their eyes. Now we were off.
We’re not going to Arvika, I said.
There was a silence. Aren’t we, Vigdis said. She was sitting right behind me. Her voice was very clear. No, I said. But you said so, she said. I know, I said. I know I said so, but it won’t work. I’m sorry. We’ll go somewhere else, I know of a nice place. It grew quiet again in the back seat. Then Vigdis said, I know why we are not going to Arvika. Tine and Tone said nothing. How can she know, I thought, she’s only twelve years old. We are not going to Arvika because you don’t want us to see it. You don’t want us to see where you read. You think it’s daft. You just want to be alone there. You don’t want to share it with anybody. I bet Mummy hasn’t been there either. Which was true. I never went there in Turid’s time. That’s correct, I said. Tine said nothing, and Tone said nothing. They didn’t understand. You are my daddy, Vigdis said. Yes, I said. I am your daddy. But you don’t want me to see the place where you read. She didn’t say us, she said me. That hurt. I waited a little. Then I said, yes, in a way that’s how it is, I’m really sorry, but it just won’t work.
When we had come all the way up to Gjelleråsen, I was getting restless. I turned left instead of going straight ahead, where the road dips down past Morten’s Café to Hellerudsletta, but we drove north, through Nittedal, Hakadal where you could see Glittre Sanatorium for lung diseases hanging on the hill on the far side of the valley, to the east, up towards the forest there, like a Chinese fortress, a Greek monastery or a power plant in the foothills of the rising Alps. And we drove on, towards Stryken where the river came crashing down and was flung foaming up into the air on the left side of the road, in English they call it rapids, I thought, it’s an apt word, in Norwegian it’s called stryk, an equally apt word, hence the name of this place, one would assume, and then the valley was squeezed into a pass, at the very top, if not the Khyber Pass, then at least a gate you had to go through before you came out on the other side, as into another country. But of course it wasn’t. It wasn’t Afghanistan, it was Harestua.
It was silent in the back seat and had been since Gjelleråsen. I tried to say something about what we saw through the windows as we streaked past, to make it worthwhile looking at, which I thought it was, the sanatorium, the frisky river, but there was no answer. Vigdis was wrapped in silence. I turned around and looked at her, to find her, perhaps to coax her out between her wide-eyed sisters, but she had closed her face, made her eyes dull. Was this when she started doing that. It felt new. But I became annoyed, honestly, I thought it was unfair. I rarely got angry with them, never raised my voice, for the most part I had no reason to, not even when the pressure of three wills pushed me into panic and helplessness did I get loud with them, something they obviously counted on, otherwise they would have held back. In most cases I would have given up, given in, turned east through the forests to Sweden and sent my brittle house of cards fluttering sky-high to make them happy, but this time I couldn’t, I didn’t want to, okay, I said, this is it, then, we’re going home, I’m fed up, in a tone of voice I had never used with the girls before. I don’t know what got into me. I pulled sharply into a bus stop, almost grazed the shelter and spun the wheel sharply to the left, straight out into a screeching U-turn into the southbound lane, and it seemed more dramatic than I had intended and sounded more dramatic, and I was shocked to see a car come around the bend behind us and another car come around the bend towards us, and actually it wasn’t really dangerous at all, the distance was too big, as long as I got my speed up and straightened my course, but I got scared and pulled too hard on the wheel, and the car with all four of us in it skidded across the gravel on the shoulder of the road for a moment before the laws of physics drew us down into the ditch, and the ditch wasn’t really that deep, but it wasn’t shallow either, and bang it went, with a nasty sound, and we tilted forward and stopped at an angle, each of us practically dangling from our own safety belt. Tine and Tone immediately began to cry, but Vigdis didn’t make a sound. Vigdis, I said, are you okay back there, but she didn’t answer. Damn, I thought, I need her on my side now, she must help me with the little ones, so I turned around, and there she hung forward in the middle with her eyes shut and only the safety belt around her hips holding her back. She must have hit the seat in front with her forehead and fainted. Vigdis, I said loudly, are you there, but she didn’t react, didn’t open her eyes, I heard a car stop and another car and a car door slamming, I said, Vigdis, can you hear me. Suddenly she looked straight at me, I have to go to school, Daddy, she said, I’ll be late. Vigdis, I said, it’s Saturday, no, she said, yes it is, I said, it’s Saturday. Her head began to sink again, look at me Vigdis, I said, but her head kept sinking, and I said, Vigdis, do as I say, and then she lifted her head and looked at me, it’s Saturday, I said. Okay Daddy, she said. She straightened up with her hand pressing against the front seat and looked to the sides, at her sisters who were crying low, did we crash Daddy, she said. Yes, I said, we crashed a little, it’s nothing to worry about. I’ll be right there. I loosened my safety belt and sagged a little towards the wheel and pushed the door open, and it was easy, because a man was on the outside pulling at the same time, and I got out knees first, and the man said, I saw the whole thing, it was reckless driving, do you understand, you can’t drive like that with children in the car, and I said, I know, I’m an idiot. Yes, the man said. Help me with the children, I said, and we practically crawled each on our side of the car and helped the girls out of their belts and on up the little slope, up on to the shoulder of the road, where another man was standing at the ready. Are you all right, he said in a slightly syrupy way. We’re fine, I said. Shut up, I said to myself. When we were all up on the road, I thought, it’s not so bad, but I’ll have to be towed out of the ditch, I think the car is okay except for a stupid dent, at least I hope so, and the girls are all right, Vigdis has to see a doctor, that was obvious, she had fainted after all, I have to call Falken, I said, I’m a member of Falken. There was a house on the other side of the road, I’m sure they have a phone there, I said and pointed to the house, it was yellow and far from pretty, and I started to walk over there, but then Tine said, don’t leave us Daddy. I stopped and turned around and said, I’m not leaving you, I just have to call for a car that can pull us out of the ditch. I started to walk again, but after just a few steps Vigdis said, Daddy, don’t go, with an emphasis on ‘go’, in a tone that was almost one of command, which made things a little difficult. I could understand them, they looked cold, frightened and alone. I can go, man number two said, I’ll go and make the call. I looked at him, there was something about him, I didn’t like him, he’s sneaky, I thought, so I didn’t answer, and then man number one said, no, no, I’ll call, and he walked off at once, quickly across the road to the house, and I said, thank you, thank you very much, to his back, I liked him a lot better. Man number two walked over to his car, he wanted to save somebody, he wanted his picture in the paper, if someone came to take pictures of what had happened, of the Mazda in the ditch and him in front of the girls: the saviour. But now he’d been made redundant, and was clearly offended and got into the car and pulled out into the road and drove off, south, towards Nittedal and Oslo.
Man number one came back across the road from the yellow house. They’re on their way, he said, the rescue vehicle was at Roa, it won’t take very long. I know, I said, Roa isn’t far. I knew that road, I had driven it many times, the last with Vigdis not so long ago, they had a Chinese restaurant at Roa, but not much else. Would you like me to stay here and wait with you, the man said. I can if you would like me to. It was a kind thing to say. He was ten years older than me, maybe fifteen, or more. He had a handsome overcoat on and a chocolate-brown suit underneath it, and his tie was an exemplary shade of beige. Striking and at the same time discreet. His fine suit trousers had got a stain on the left knee, he saw that I saw it, and brushed it as best he could, and it was almost gone. He thought I was an idiot, which was understandable, and it wasn’t for my sake he said what he said, but for the girls’, there was something he had seen, in Vigdis, in her face, I had seen it too, but she wasn’t aware of it herself, she was too young. I was about to say, thanks for the offer, but we’ll be fine until the Falken truck arrives, but then that’s not what I said, I said, thank you, that would actually be nice, and it was true, I felt so tired all of a sudden, so alone. One more grown-up would be a relief. Maybe only one of us was grown up, in that case it wasn’t me, but it was better for the girls, they would feel safer, no doubt, if he stayed a little longer, as long as I was there too, but only if it’s no trouble, I said, not at all, he said, I am going to Gjøvik for a meeting, but I have plenty of time. Trond Sander, he said and gave me his hand. I took it and said, Arvid Jansen. The writer, Trond Sander said. That’s right, I said, at least part of the time, and I thought, what does he know about that. He laughed, he could perfectly well hear what I was thinking, he said, I guess Dickens is my favourite, but I do try to keep up, and I said, it’s not easy to compete with Dickens. No, he said, but then that’s not necessary. I let it hang and swept my arm out towards the girls. These are my daughters, I said, Tone and Tine and Vigdis, showing them off in their full glory, as it were, and Trond Sander turned towards them and leaned forward somewhat stiffly, as a nobleman might do in a theatre or in a film, but not in real life, and it looked very solemn, for he took them by the hand one after the other and bowed politely and said, hello Tone, hello Tine, hello Vigdis, and said his own name each time, and each time he also said, it’s going to be fine, and so the girls had to bow too, which I had never seen them do before, Tine actually curtsied, she had seen it in a film, and I remembered which film, but the mood became brighter, and Vigdis even smiled a little, and I thought, why wasn’t I the one to make that happen.
And then the blue Falken truck arrived. The driver climbed out of the cab and greeted us, not with a handshake, all he said was hi. He placed two orange plastic cones in the middle of the road, one in the southbound lane and one in the northbound, closing off the traffic and creating a queue in both directions, and then he backed the tow truck into position by the edge of the ditch, got out and slid slid down in the gravel and fastened the cable with the hook around the tow bar of the Mazda, started the winch and pulled the car up without difficulty, it took only three minutes. Get in and check if it will start, the Falken man said, and I got in and turned the key in the ignition, and it started at once, like it always had.
I had to sign a form, he said you should have that front wing replaced as soon as possible, and I said I would. Or else it will fall off, he said, and he picked up the traffic cones and tossed them into the back of the truck, and then he lifted his hand to his cap and left. That was it. I had expected something a little more dramatic, to be honest.
Please, let me thank you again, I said, for your help, and I gave Trond Sander my hand, and he took it and said, it’s not always easy, I have girls myself, though of course they’re grown up now. Anyway, good luck. And drive carefully. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that. You don’t, I said.
I drove carefully and almost too slowly the long way back over Gjelleråsen to Oslo, towards the Sinsen junction. On some stretches cars were piling up behind us and drivers leaning on their horns, but I stood firm and kept the same speed of well below sixty kilometres per hour all the way to the roundabout and made a full circle and drove up again to Aker hospital and turned off. They didn’t really have a casualty clinic, but they helped me anyway. They concluded that Vigdis was fine and all in one piece, perhaps a slight concussion, I had to keep her awake for a few hours, I was told. You should be able to manage that, shouldn’t you, they said, and there was something about the way they said it I didn’t like, something condescending, but there was no way I could retaliate, so I pushed it aside and replied, of course, I can manage.
Then we drove out again on Trondheimsveien and turned left at the intersection. No one said anything. The only sound we heard was a faint scratching from the loose wing against a front tyre, but we pretended not to notice, and as long as it didn’t get worse, I didn’t want to stop and do anything about it. At Sandaker it fell off, we heard a sharp crack beneath the wheel when it struck, and Tone began to cry, and Tine began to cry, and Vigdis didn’t. Still, it was not enough to make me stop and check.