When the Snow Fell (6 page)

The railway bridge loomed ahead of Joel.

It was lurking there like a petrified dinosaur. The moonlight glistened in the enormous iron arches.

Not so long ago Joel had tried to climb up one of the arches and gotten stuck. In the end, Samuel had come to the rescue.

Joel shuddered at the thought. If he’d fallen, he would no longer be alive. He’d be like Lars Olson. A skeleton six feet down in the cold earth, with a stone over his head.
Joel Gustafson. Died at the age of eleven
.

He was on his way over the bridge to Gertrud’s house. He both wanted and didn’t want to think about death. If you thought about it, it was like beckoning it to come. You shouldn’t fondle death like you stroked a cat. You should be as wary of it as of a lion in the jungle. But at
the same time, the thoughts insisted on forcing their way into his mind. It was difficult to keep them out.

Joel had decided that death was more difficult to understand than life—which was complicated enough. It wasn’t possible to imagine yourself as nothing. To think that you could no longer think.

And moreover, you’d be dead for such a long time. That was the hardest thing of all. Lars Olson had already been dead for twenty years. That was longer than Joel had been alive. But there were lots of people who’d been dead for hundreds of years.

If only you didn’t need to be dead for so long, Joel thought as he contemplated the railway bridge.

Then it might have been tolerable.

He looked up at the moon. It was seven o’clock. He’d had dinner with Samuel. Now he was on his way to Gertrud’s. It was several weeks since he’d seen her last.

He braced himself and started running over the bridge. It was easier to get up speed if he imagined that he was being chased. There were lots of possible pursuers he could think of.

He imagined a cavalry of fat old women riding behind him on horseback, wielding their carrier bags like swords and clubs.

He came to the abutment on the other side of the river. The fat old women disappeared from his mind. He turned onto a little road that followed the river to the left, and came to Gertrud’s house in its overgrown
garden. It contained a rowan tree and some currant bushes. Her windows were lit up. She was at home.

Joel got his breath back before pulling the leather strap hanging outside the door. A music box started playing inside the hall. That was the signal they had agreed on. Then he heard Gertrud shouting for him to come in.

Joel didn’t know how many times he’d visited Gertrud’s house, but it was a lot. The first time was that unfortunate night when he and Ture had dug up a frozen anthill and thrown it through her kitchen window. But that was a long time ago. Ture didn’t live here anymore. Gertrud and Joel had become friends. Not all the time. They had fallen out the previous year, when Joel had tried to find a husband for Gertrud. But that was all over now. All done and dusted.

Gertrud was a remarkable person. It wasn’t simply that she didn’t have a nose. Only a hole in her face that she hid behind a handkerchief. Or a red clown’s nose when she was in the mood. She had lost her nose as a result of an operation that had gone wrong. Now she lived by herself in this house on the other side of the river from Joel. She had turned thirty, and sometimes told Joel she was beginning to feel old.

Gertrud was like no other person Joel knew. He knew that people used to talk about her behind her back. About her wearing strange clothes that she made herself. About her having a stuffed hare in a birdcage and a toy train in an aquarium. But most of all about her saying
whatever came into her head, and what she thought about things. Despite the fact that it was usually exactly the opposite of what other people thought.

But it seemed to Joel that Gertrud was a difficult person. He sometimes thought that whatever she did, she went too far. Joel was always scared of not being like everybody else. What he did and thought when he was on his own was one thing. But when you were with other people you shouldn’t draw attention to yourself.

Gertrud was the best friend he had.

He wasn’t really happy about that. He would have preferred to have a different best friend. One who had a nose, at least.

But that was the way it was. And Gertrud always listened to what he had to say. She didn’t laugh at him—not in a malicious way in any case—when he said something silly. Which he thought he did far too often.

This evening Joel had decided to tell Gertrud about his New Year’s resolutions.

But maybe not all three. He was still a bit doubtful as to whether he should tell her about Ehnström’s new shop assistant. The one who had already started dancing inside Joel’s head, wearing nothing but transparent veils. Joel wasn’t really sure how she would react. That was the only thing he and Gertrud had never talked about. Other women.

Gertrud was sitting curled up on her orange-colored sofa, reading the Bible. Joel had never really understood what it
meant, being religious. All that stuff about God was something he only thought about now and again. Strangely enough, it was usually when he didn’t have any money. As if that were God’s fault. Not having a krona for a cinema ticket.

But just now his New Year’s resolutions were more important.

Gertrud put down her Bible. Today she had a checked handkerchief over the hole where her nose had once been. She had rolled it up into a ball and pressed it into the hole.

“I thought you’d forgotten all about me,” she said. “I haven’t seen you for ages.”

“There’s so much to do for school,” Joel said.

Which was nearly true. But not quite. A few weeks had gone by without his giving Gertrud a single thought.

“But anyway, here you are,” she went on. “And that means, of course, that you have something on your mind. Is that right?”

Joel nodded. Then he told her about his New Year’s resolutions. She listened, with her head on one side and her chin resting on her hand, as usual.

For the moment Joel didn’t say anything about Ehnström’s new shop assistant.

“Is there an age limit?” he asked. “For being a rock idol? Or a trailer salesman?”

“It might be possible to be too old,” she said, “but hardly too young.”

“How old was Elvis when he started singing?” Joel
asked. He knew that Gertrud liked Elvis Presley. They had sometimes listened to his records together, and tried to work out what the words meant. It was often difficult. It seemed as if the songs weren’t really about anything at all.

“I expect Elvis started singing when he was rocking around inside his mother’s stomach.”

Joel wasn’t at all pleased by that answer. It was far too vague.

“But what about later? After he’d been born?”

“I expect he’s been singing for the whole of his life.”

Joel realized that Gertrud didn’t have a better answer to give him. So he moved on to trailers. He explained how that was really Samuel’s idea.

“It could well be true,” she said. “But I don’t think it sounds like a lot of fun, wandering around a big parking lot crammed full of trailers on display. And trying to sell them. Where are you going to get the money to buy them?”

“I’m not going to buy them. I’m going to sell them.”

“But you’ve got to have something to sell, surely? And before you can sell it, you have to buy it.”

Joel hadn’t thought of that. Presumably nobody was going to give him any trailers on the strength of his paying for them later?

That settled it. He didn’t need to hesitate anymore.

He would become a rock idol. He told Gertrud how he’d already been to see Kringström. First he would
learn to play the guitar, and then he’d start practicing singing.

“I didn’t know you were a good singer,” she said tentatively.

“Elvis isn’t a good singer,” Joel declared. “But he sings very loud.”

She nodded hesitantly.

“But surely, he does sing quite well, doesn’t he?”

“But most of all, very loud.”

Joel didn’t want to go into that any further. Not just now, at least. When he’d learnt to play the guitar and practiced a few songs, she could listen.

She asked if he would like some juice. He would. They went together into her big kitchen. A strange thing about this house was that it had two kitchens, even though it wasn’t very big. But that was the way Gertrud wanted it. Just like the way she slept in different beds.

One kitchen was for when she was only a bit hungry. The big one was for when she threw a party and had visitors.

Joel watched her pouring out the juice. He thought that Gertrud could be very pretty. If only she had a nose. And wore proper clothes. Like everybody else. Instead of all those peculiar skirts she made herself.

Joel suddenly found himself seeing only her nose that didn’t exist. And all her strange clothes.

He didn’t know where the feeling came from, but now he thought she was revolting.

She handed him the glass of juice. He took it.

“What’s the matter?” she asked.

“Nothing.”

“I can see that something’s bothering you.”

“Don’t talk such garbage!”

Now it hit him even more strongly. The feeling that Gertrud was revolting. And was a person who could see right through him. Read his thoughts. What did they call somebody like that? A witch, that was what she was. But without the long nose. Gertrud was even worse. She didn’t have a nose at all.

Then everything went very quickly. He flung the glass of juice at the wall. It shattered and the juice splashed all over Gertrud’s clothes. Some of it even landed on the handkerchief she had stuffed into the hole where her nose should have been. But Joel didn’t see that. He’d already turned on his heel, left the kitchen, grabbed his jacket and boots and carried them out into the garden. He had palpitations and didn’t know what had come over him. He struggled and cursed as he tried to fasten his boots. All the time he kept looking round. But Gertrud didn’t come after him. When he’d finished tying his laces the sweat was pouring off him. He ran off as fast as he could. Not until he’d reached the middle of the railway bridge did he pause to catch his breath. Steam was coming out of his mouth. His sweat was starting to freeze and made him feel cold. He was trembling. But the main problem was inside him. What had he done? Why had he hurled that glass of
juice at the wall? He’d gone to visit Gertrud, who was his friend. He’d wanted her to answer some of the questions that were bothering him. But when she’d asked him a question he’d thrown a glass at her wall.

He regretted it now. He was still out of breath. And very cold. The sweat was pricking at his skin like needles underneath his sweater. He stared down into the black water. There was no ice yet, but the water had started to thicken.

I’ll jump, he thought. I can’t handle this. I can’t see Gertrud ever again. Why did I do that?

But he didn’t jump. He remembered that Gertrud had once tried to commit suicide. In this same river. And she really did have a reason, not having a nose.

It seemed to him that he ought to go back to her place right away. She couldn’t have understood what had happened either. But maybe she could explain it for him. Explain what he had done.

But he didn’t go back. He was far too cowardly for that. He shouted up into the sky.

“Because I’m too much of a coward. Joel Gustafson’s a lily-livered coward.”

Then he walked home. He was so cold, he was shivering. His teeth were chattering.

When he got to the flat he found Samuel sitting by the wireless. A squeaky voice was holding forth. Samuel had fallen asleep. His head was resting on his chest. Mouth
wide open. Joel tiptoed past. He would have preferred Samuel not to wake up just now. In fact, he would have liked the whole world to be asleep. He closed the door to his room, got undressed and snuggled down into bed. He slowly began to thaw out. He closed his eyes and tried to convince himself that it was all a figment of his imagination. He hadn’t in fact hurled a glass at Gertrud’s kitchen wall. She wasn’t upset.

But it wasn’t possible to conjure it all away. He was able to think of something else for a few brief moments, but then it all came back again. The kitchen. Gertrud’s question. His curse. The glass thrown at the wall.

He had a stomachache now.

There were moments in Joel Gustafson’s life when he simply didn’t know what to do next.

This was one of those moments.

He could hear that Samuel had woken up. He’d switched off the wireless. Joel pulled the cover over his head and pretended to be fast asleep. Samuel opened the door just a few inches. Listened. Then closed it again.

But Joel was awake.

If only he’d been able, he’d have left his body there and gone away. But human beings couldn’t shed their skin. Only snakes could do that.

He didn’t know what had happened. If he thought that Gertrud was repulsive, it wasn’t her fault. She wasn’t the one who had cut off her own nose.

Samuel fell asleep. His snores came booming through the wall. Just now it was hard to think about the new shop assistant at Ehnströms Livs. Or about how he would soon be beginning a new career as Sweden’s youngest rock idol. Perhaps even the youngest in the world.

He tried to fall asleep and forget all about what had happened. But he couldn’t. So he got out of bed and went over to the window. The sky was clear and full of stars. Then he looked down at the street, where the lone streetlamp lit up the snow. That was where he had seen the mysterious dog run past several years ago.

But then he felt a stab in his chest. There was somebody standing there in the shadows, at the very edge of the light cast by the streetlamp. At first he thought he was imagining it, but then he was certain. There was somebody standing there, staring up at his window.

Then it dawned on him who it was.

It was Gertrud.

It had never happened before.

Gertrud had never stood by that streetlamp before. Neither by day nor, like now, at night. When Joel first saw her, he thought she was a mirage. Something that could be seen, but didn’t really exist. But she was still there, moving slightly, until she came within range of the streetlamp. Now she was very clear. Joel stood with his face pressed up against the cold windowpane. It was Gertud, all right. And she was gazing up at his window. But he knew that she couldn’t possibly know that he was there. The room was in darkness. He could see her. But she couldn’t see him.