Harbor by John Lindqvist (no david read aloud TXT) 📗

the aspen trees, Simon snorted and said quietly to himself, ‘A particular kind of peculiar…’

Then he shuffled into his house and closed the door behind him.

The uninvited guest

The next morning Simon made a few calls, trying unsuccessfully to track down Marita. Then he sat down in the lilac arbour with a pen and paper to work out an alternative program for the performances at the community theatre.

He couldn’t settle to the task. His thoughts kept sliding away towards the most extreme issues. Why was he carrying on with this at all, what was the point of everything, how is a person supposed tolive a life with no future, and should you even bother.

This was his mood when Anna-Greta called out a brief, ‘Thanks for yesterday, it was very good’, on her way down to the jetty. He asked her to come and sit down for a while. She perched on the edge of the chair opposite him, and seemed uneasy. Simon wondered if this unease was a particular kind of peculiar, but of course he had no way of asking.

They talked about this and that, safe topics, and Anna-Greta had just settled more comfortably on her chair when Simon realised they were being observed. Standing by the gate, watching them, was Marita. Simon felt as if he had been caught out somehow and was just about to leap out of his chair, but the anger got there before the guilt. He stayed put and stared at Marita without moving a muscle.

Marita was blinking slowly, her eyelids moving in slow motion, as if it took a conscious effort for her to open and close them. Her hair was unwashed and she had dark circles under her eyes. She was scratching her arm mechanically. ‘Well, would you look at that,’ she said. ‘Isn’t that sweet.’

Simon continued to stare at her. From the corner of his eye he could see that Anna-Greta was about to get up, and he gestured to her to stay where she was. In a low voice, Simon asked the question that had become something of a mantra in recent years, ‘Where have you been?’

Marita waved her head around in a gesture that could mean just about anything, and therefore meant: Here and there, but mostly out in space.

Marita came and stood directly in front of Simon, looked down at him and said, ‘I need money.’

‘For what?’

She opened and closed her mouth; it sounded dry and sticky at the same time as she loosened her tongue from her palate.

‘I’m going to Germany.’

‘You can’t. We’ve got work here.’

Marita’s gaze slid between Anna-Greta and Simon. She seemedto be having some difficulty in focusing. ‘I’m going to Germany. You have to give me some money.’

‘I haven’t got any money, and you’re not going to Germany. Go inside and go to bed.’

Marita shook her head slowly, and seemed to be stuck fast in the same movement, as if her head were a pendulum and she had to keep it moving so that time would not come to a standstill. Anna-Greta stood up.

‘I’m going.’

The sound of her voice attracted Marita’s attention. She pointed at Anna-Greta. ‘Have you got any money?’

‘No, I haven’t got any money for you.’

Marita’s lips curled upwards in an imitation of a smile. ‘You’re carrying on with my husband. That means you have to pay, you must realise that.’

Simon shot up out of his chair, grabbed hold of Marita’s wrist and pulled her towards the house. ‘Shut your mouth!’

The violent movement made Marita stumble, and Simon dragged her along behind him towards the steps. Marita allowed herself to be hauled across the lawn for a few metres, then she yelled, ‘Help! Help!’

Simon looked up in order to convey some kind of message to Anna-Greta with his eyes, I’m sorry or don’t condemn me, but before he had time to formulate his expression he saw a man step out from behind the lilac bushes. Someone who had been standing there waiting.

Marita twisted herself free of Simon’s grip, and as she crawled towards the new arrival on all fours she said in a pathetic little voice, ‘Rolf, he’s hitting me.’

Rolf was so big that he looked as if he could easily pick Simon up and carry him in his arms. A pale, grubby linen suit concealed his muscles, but he seemed to have limited control over his body. He walked towards Simon: irregular, staggering steps, his arms dangling uselessly at his sides. The skin on his face was dark red, and his nose was flaking. The corners of his mouth pulled downwards in anunnatural way, as if he might have had a stroke.

Since Simon was part of the way down the hill, Rolf towered over him by twenty centimetres or more as he wagged his finger.

‘You mustn’t hit your wife. You must give her money.’

Marita curled up at Rolf’s feet like something on the cover of a cheap novel. Simon’s heart was racing as he folded his arms across his chest, looked up at the giant’s eyes—which were bloodshot—and said, ‘And what exactly has this got to do with you…Rolf?’

Rolf moved his cheeks upwards so that his eyes narrowed. This looked utterly bizarre with his drooping mouth, but Simon refrained from laughing. Rolf’s pupils darted about for a few seconds, then he said, ‘You don’t like my name, is that right? You think it sounds silly.’

Simon shook his head. ‘No, I think it’s a wonderful name, I just don’t understand what you’re doing here.’

Rolf blinked a couple of times and looked down at the ground. His lips were moving as if he were analysing Simon’s words carefully and considering his response. Marita was gazing up at Rolf as if he were an oracle. Simon looked around and noticed that Anna-Greta was no longer there.

Simon made a quick mental inventory of items in the vicinity that might be used as weapons. The closest was the spade leaning against the steps ten metres away. Rolf had finished thinking, and said slowly, ‘So you’re not