Authors: Tove Jansson
Anna was only half listening. “I used to row,” she said. “I’d borrow a dory and row off by myself, but the islands were too far out, and then there was always the problem of getting back in time for dinner… But if I buy this boat you designed, you mustn’t think I’d want to ride around in it all the time. I’ll probably use it very rarely. Actually, I only need to know it’s there… Just the idea of it, you know. You must never forget that it’s yours.”
“I don’t understand,” Mats said.
“What is it you don’t understand?”
Mats just shook his head and looked at her, almost sternly.
“You think I’m just talking,” said Anna impatiently. “You don’t know that, if there’s something I really want, then I get it, all the way, and nothing stops me. It’s a shame I so seldom really want anything these days… But I want to give you this boat. No, we’re not going to talk about it any more, not now. And it’s to be a secret, just between us. Now I’m going to bed. And I’m going to sleep very well and very long.”
“H
AVE YOU GOT A MINUTE
?” Mats asked. Liljeberg looked up from his work and saw it was private. They walked to one side of the shed.
“What is it?”
“You haven’t promised the boat to anyone, have you?”
“We’ll see what happens.”
“Because it’s mine,” Mats whispered. “You understand, it’s my boat. I’m going to be its owner.”
“You don’t say. And how did you plan to pay for it? Is that all set?”
“It’s all set.”
“So, it worked out after all,” said Liljeberg amiably. “Don’t worry, we haven’t promised the boat to the wrong person, not at all. The important thing is that I know what to tell the others. An anonymous donor – that sounds good. Just so long as it’s all set.”
Later that day, Liljeberg was standing outside the boat shed smoking when Katri came by on the road. “Hi, little witch,” he said. “So things are starting to fall into place.”
Katri and the dog stopped. She liked Liljeberg.
“Everything seems to be working out,” he said. “And there’s no hurry about that down payment. Anyway, it’s nice not having to go around pretending any more. Now everyone knows it’s Mats’s boat.”
Katri froze. “Who said so?”
“Mats himself, of course. He told me it was all set. Is something wrong?”
“No.”
“You look tired,” Liljeberg said. “You shouldn’t take life so seriously. Things have a way of working out if you just wait.”
“They do not. Nothing works out just by waiting. And sometimes you wait too long.” Katri walked on, the dog lagging behind. Liljeberg stood watching them, thinking that something wasn’t right.
Katri walked out towards the point. Quietly, in a very deep voice, she gave repeated commands to the dog. The dog ran to one side, the hair on his shoulders standing straight up, his ears pointing forwards as if in attack. Suddenly Katri lost her calm and screamed at him. She just stood in the road and screamed at the dog, screamed at the whole world, at all the things she hadn’t the strength for, unrestrained words that sprang from
disappointment
and exhaustion. And the dog started barking. No one in the village had ever heard Katri’s dog bark. They were used to the yapping of mongrels, but this was the barking of a large wolfhound, and they heard it everywhere and wondered what had happened. The dog continued to bark. Slowly he followed Katri to the house. She tied him up in the yard, and he went right on barking.
“What’s wrong with your dog?” Anna said. “Why is he barking?”
“He’s not my dog any more,” Katri said. “You’ve taken him from me. And what have you done with Mats? You sat there night after night, whispering across your books, planning and making your deals…”
“What are you talking about? I don’t know what you’re talking about…”
“The boat! His boat! You’ve given it to him.” Katri came closer. She was crying silently, her face rigid. “You gave him the boat,” she said. “It was supposed to come from me. You must have known that.”
“No,” Anna burst out. “No, I didn’t know!”
“The Mats Game! For me it was serious.”
“I didn’t know,” Anna repeated. “Don’t be this way. You frighten me…”
“I know,” Katri said. “We have to take care of you. You’re so sensitive. You despise money. It means nothing to you, you give it away, you sit on it, you play with it, and, no matter what you do, we have to take care of you. Anna. It’s so much fun to give a present, isn’t it? To someone nice who’s surprised and grateful? I’ve lived with him my whole life, and waited all that time to make him happy. Everything’s written down. It’s all noted down in clear, honest numbers that you’ve approved yourself. Isn’t that true? I had an idea…”
Anna was very frightened, and from the depths of her incomprehension she cried, “You know nothing about ideas! Mats knows. I know. We try to shape them, but all you do is arithmetic… Go away.”
Katri didn’t answer.
“I had one idea,” Anna said. “I did. But not any more. Can’t you make your dog be quiet?”
* * *
Oh, Anna, let the dog bark, let him howl out my lament for caprice and self-deception, for gentle, unconscious cruelty and easy, narrow-minded evasion and stupidity – most of all stupidity, talented, incurable stupidity. Howl it out to the heavens! Because you will never know and never understand what I’ve tried to do!
* * *
Katri walked down to the shore, where Mats was walking towards her. “Why is the dog barking?” he asked.
She didn’t answer.
“Something must be wrong with him. What are you going to do?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing? What do you mean? You know you’re the only one he’s got.”
“Mats, please,” Katri said. “Don’t be angry. Not right now.”
“But it’s like you didn’t care.”
She shook her head. Neither of them spoke, and then she said, “Look at the rocks out there. They look like flowers, don’t they?” They looked at the big rocks along the shore that now in the spring stuck up pitch-black against the receding ice. Around each of them the ice had ruptured up like huge flower petals. Katri was right: the rocks really did look like flowers, dark blossoms extending far out from the shoreline and casting long shadows across the ice. The sun, about to set, rolled out an avenue of shimmering gold right to their feet.
“Katri,” Mats said. “Come. I want to show you something. But you have to hurry, we’ve only got a few minutes.”
The evening sun was just as strong inside the boat shed, shining at them from every polished surface, every tiny tool, so that the whole room sparkled like dark gold, brimming with sunset and calm. Katri looked at the boat. It was under construction, still only a skeleton, a
latticework
, and it shone most clearly of all. And then the sun sank below the horizon and the colours died.
“Thank you,” Katri said. “Would it be all right if I stayed for a while? I know, I need to let myself out on the water side.”
“Yes, that’s best,” Mats said. “And don’t forget to close the latch.”
T
HE DOG BARKED ALL NIGHT
. Sometimes he howled. Towards morning, Katri went out, turned him loose, and he ran into the woods. Later, the barking resumed far away.
The next day the dog killed a rabbit – actually an insignificant event, just one of the Liljebergs’ rabbits killed by a dog instead of having its neck wrung a day or two later as planned. They had sat down to dinner. The dog scratched at the hall door, Mats let him in, and he ran in to Anna and laid the dead rabbit at her feet. Anna dropped her spoon in her soup and went pale.
“Take it out,” Katri said. “Mats. Quickly.”
Anna sat still, staring at the floor. There wasn’t much blood, just a few drops. Katri got up, dropped her napkin on the unhappy bloodstains, walked over to Anna and said, “It’s nothing. This is nothing to get upset about.”
“Maybe not,” Anna observed and went on slowly eating her soup. “Go and sit down.” After a few moments, she added, “Katri, you are kind to me.”
The dead rabbit was thrown out onto the ice.
T
HE DOG CONTINUED TO BARK AT NIGHT
, sometimes far away, sometimes close to the house. Towards morning, he would howl. It could be quiet for hours, but there were those who lay in bed waiting for the next howl, and they would say, “Did you hear that? It’s like having a wolf in the woods. An unhappy woman has an unhappy dog. It ought to be shot.”
Katri did not talk about the dog, but she put out food and water in the yard. Sometimes at night Mats would wait by the kitchen window with the light off and the door open. He saw the dog only once, just as it was growing light, and he went very slowly out on the steps and tried to coax it in. But it ran off into the woods, so he gave up.
One Sunday, Madame Nygård came to visit. She had baked, and the bread she brought was still warm, wrapped in a towel. “Miss Aemelin,” she said, “I would like to speak to you alone, if Katri doesn’t mind. As I
understand
it, you are in the habit of sitting at table together.” She came quickly to the point. “I am older than you, Miss Aemelin, and therefore I venture to speak of things that might otherwise be left unsaid. People in the village are talking. And I thought it would be just as well to come up and enquire as to just what is going on here in the rabbit house.”
“What do they say?” Anna said quickly. “What are they saying about me? Is it the storekeeper?”
“Now my dear, please, let’s not get excited…”
“Oh, I know it is,” Anna interrupted. “He’s the one. It’s him. He’s an evil man, not to be trusted.” Clearly defined red spots had suddenly appeared on Anna’s cheeks, and her eyes were sharp as she leaned towards her guest. “It’s true – admit it, it’s him. Or else Liljeberg. They cheat. They cheat Mats. Mats has been underpaid the whole time, everyone knows it. And it’s all about the boat, isn’t it?”
Madame Nygård was silent for a long time. Finally she said, gravely, “I had a feeling that all was not well up here, and now I know I was right. Listen to me now, my dear little friend. We just want to know if you’re all right. Why is that dog howling?”
Anna pushed her coffee cup away. “Excuse me,” she said. “I’ve never really liked coffee. I used to like it. I mean, I used to think I liked it… I don’t know. I don’t know why it howls. I don’t want to talk about this.”
“Miss Anna, is the boat a gift from you?”
“No, it’s Katri’s gift.”
“Oh yes, Katri. Yes, she’s been squirrelling it away for quite some time.”
“And what if she has?” Anna exclaimed defiantly. “Katri’s been saving her money for a long time, and she has everything written down in a notebook!”
Madame Nygård nodded slowly. “Yes, indeed,” she said. “It’s not everyone has such a good head on their shoulders.”
“Katri is honest!” Anna went on vehemently. “She’s the only one I can depend on!”
“But why are you getting so excited? We all know that Katri Kling is a capable and conscientious young woman. My dear little Anna…”
Anna interrupted again. “Don’t say ‘my dear little…’ Wait. Wait a moment, it’s nothing…” After a little while, she explained that it was just age, her eyes teared so easily… “And the spring sun. A little more coffee?”
“No, thank you. No more for me.”
Madame Nygård sat quietly waiting with her hands clasped on her stomach. Finally Anna took up the conversation to speak about something that had been bothering her for quite some time – the fact that she had begun speaking ill of people. “I never used to do that,” she said. “Believe me, I never did. Someone came to Mama once and said, ‘Your daughter is unusual; she never speaks ill of anyone.’ I remember it, I remember it quite clearly. But why? Did I trust everyone? Or was it only that I forgave them?”
“Well, well,” said Madame Nygård. “That snow fell a long time ago, did it not?”
“But you trust people, don’t you?”
“Yes, I suppose I do. Why shouldn’t I? One sees and hears a great deal about the way people behave, but that’s their problem. One doesn’t want to make things worse by not believing that they mean what they say.”
“It’s beginning to get dark,” Anna said. “I don’t want to keep you too long.”
“I’m in no hurry,” said Madame Nygård. “Those days are over. But I think I should be going in any case. Sometimes it’s not wise to say too much all at once.”
That night the dog stopped howling.
S
PRING CAME CLOSER
. During the day, the soil under the trees steamed in the warm sun; the nights were ice cold and deep blue. It was a brilliantly beautiful time. The boat was almost ready to be launched, but no one talked about it at the rabbit house. The eiders had arrived. One night, the wind began blowing in from the sea. Katri lay listening, remembering the spring nights when she used to go down to the water to wait for the ice to break up. She’d been very young. And when it came time for the first seagulls, she used to go out to wait for them. They almost always came the same night every year.
Yes, they always came at night. I’d stand and freeze and listen, and I was completely alone with the landscape and the night, and even then I had the patience I have now. And my thoughts were as grand back then as they are now – plans and conquests out in the wide world – but they were thoughts without a foothold or a clear goal. They were just powerful. Now I know what I want.
Katri couldn’t sleep. At dawn she got up, dressed, and went outdoors. It wasn’t cold, and the wind was strong and steady. The sun was ready to come up, and the same gentle, transparent, colourless light lay across the shore and the ice and the sky. Katri stood at the end of the fish pier and watched the dark ice bulge and bend over the swells moving in towards the shore, a long, slow, rising and sinking surge.
It’ll break, but not yet. Ice is tough. There must be open water further out. They’ll be putting boats in the water soon. Why doesn’t he say anything about the boat?