Shadows in the Twilight (4 page)

'I suppose you must,' said Simon slowly. 'What
you've told me was awful!'

'I don't have any pain at all,' said Joel. 'I didn't even
bite my tongue.'

He suddenly noticed that Simon had tears in his eyes.

He had never seen that before.

Joel felt a lump in his throat.

'Awful,' Simon muttered. 'Awful, awful . . . '

'It was my own fault really,' said Joel. 'I wasn't
looking where I was going.'

A hen fluttered up onto the table and deposited a large
lump of bird poo in the middle of the page Simon had
just rewritten. Joel couldn't help but giggle.

Simon wiped the tears from his eyes, and smiled as
well.

'She's given it her seal of approval,' he said.

'A good deed,' said Joel, still giggling. 'How do you
think up a suitable good deed?'

'We must have a think,' said Simon. 'I think it's best
if we put our glasses on.'

Joel had forgotten all about that. Simon's Thinking
Glasses.

They looked like ordinary glasses. The only difference
was that the lenses were painted black. When you
had them on, you couldn't see anything.

Simon stood up and looked round the room.

'I wonder where I've put them,' he mumbled. He
turned to look at Joel. 'Where would I usually put my
glasses?' he asked.

'On a shelf,' suggested Joel, recalling where his dad
usually put his glasses.

Simon nodded.

'A shelf,' he said. 'Where is there a shelf?'

Joel looked round. There were no shelves in the room.

'In the pantry,' he suggested. 'There are shelves in
there.'

'You're right,' said Simon. 'There are shelves in the
pantry.'

He vanished into the pantry. Joel could hear the
clashing of dishes and the clattering of pans. The
clinking of empty bottles and the rustling of paper bags.
Then Joel heard a triumphant yell, and Simon
reappeared with two pairs of glasses in his hand.

'Now we can think,' he said. 'And if that doesn't help,
we can take the Seven-Windowed Wagon and drive out
to the Four Winds Lake.'

The Seven-Windowed Wagon was his ancient lorry.
Simon claimed he'd named it after the king's finest
coach.

They each put on the glasses. They were really old
motorbike goggles that fitted tightly on all sides.
Everything was black, even though they hadn't closed
their eyes.

'So, let's have a think,' said Simon.

There wasn't a sound. The elkhound was snoozing
under the table. A hen was pecking in a corner.

Joel tried to concentrate on thinking up a good deed.

In fact, he was finding it very hard not to start
giggling again.

That was something he'd noticed recently. Whenever
something serious was happening, he found it very hard
not to start giggling. It was as if an invisible hand had
started tickling the soles of his feet.

As soon as he thought about it, he started giggling.

I mustn't giggle, he told himself sternly.

That set him off giggling uncontrollably. The giggles
just seemed to come bubbling up out of his mouth. As if
they'd been flowing over a mass of giggles he had
buried inside himself.

Simon will be angry, he thought.

It didn't help. He giggled away even so.

But Simon wasn't angry. Joel had the feeling that
Simon was one of the very rare grown-ups who hadn't
forgotten what it was like to be nearly twelve years old.

There weren't many who hadn't forgotten.

His dad, Samuel, had forgotten. But not Gertrud.

Miss Nederström had forgotten. But not Simon
Windstorm.

'This is no good,' said Simon. 'We might as well take
our glasses off.'

Joel loosened the strap round the back of his neck
securing the goggles.

'We'll have to drive out to Four Winds Lake,' said
Simon.

In normal circumstances Joel would have been overjoyed
to go with Simon to the mysterious lake hidden
deep in the forest. He loved clambering into the
passenger seat beside Simon.

But not today.

Today there was something holding him back.

It was as if Joel had become scared of big motor
vehicles.

If he was a passenger in the big lorry, he could hardly
be run over.

But perhaps they might run over somebody else?

No, he didn't want to go in the lorry today.

'I haven't time,' he mumbled. 'I have an appointment
with my dad.'

Simon nodded.

'I'm sorry I can't help you,' he said. 'But perhaps the
bottom line is that you have to think of a good deed
yourself.'

Joel left.

It had stopped raining. Ragged clouds were scudding
over the sky.

He took a wrong turning in the middle of the
labyrinth, and ended up outside Simon's house again.

He felt angry, but set off once more. This time he
made no mistake. The fir trees became less dense, and
he emerged onto the main road.

Now he was tired of thinking about good deeds. He
wished he'd been able to chase them off like you scare
off a swarm of mosquitoes by flapping and waving your
arms about.

If only that idiot Eklund hadn't been driving so
carelessly, he thought. Then I wouldn't have had to
experience that miracle.

I have no time to mess about with good deeds, Joel
thought. I have to find myself a good friend. And I want
to be a better football player.

I haven't got the time.

He trudged homewards, kicking the gravel so hard
that he hurt his toes.

Joel felt sorry for himself.

He didn't have a mother. Nor did he have any close
friends. All he had was Simon Windstorm, who smelled
something awful, and Gertrud, who didn't have a nose.

There were so many things he didn't have.

I'm like Gertrud, he thought. She doesn't have a nose,
and I don't have a mum. . .

He suddenly stopped dead, in the middle of the road.

Perhaps he'd just had a brilliant idea for a good deed.

He couldn't help Gertrud to find a new nose.

But it was obvious that she needed a man!

She was thirty years old, and unmarried. She didn't
have any children.

Perhaps he could help her to find a husband!

That was it!

The good deed he would perform was to find a man
for Gertrud. So that she didn't need to spend her
evenings all alone. A man she could marry.

But where would he be able to find such a man?

It didn't take him long to find the answer to that.

The bar! Where Sara worked! Lots of men sat there
all day long, drinking beer. He'd heard Sara complaining
to Samuel that there were far too many unmarried
men spending all their time in the bar when they weren't
at work, drinking beer.

He was in a hurry now. He ran down the hill leading
to the town centre. There was the ironmonger's, and
there was the shoe shop. And over there, on the corner,
was the bar.

He'd been running so fast that he had to pause and get
his breath back.

It suddenly dawned on him that he was standing in the
very spot where he'd set off over the street without
looking. The very same place where the accident had
been transformed into a miracle.

That must mean that I'm doing the right thing, he
thought. Starting my good deed at the very same spot.

The bar door opened and Nyberg, the bouncer, came
out and blew his nose into his fingers. Joel dodged
quickly behind a parked car. He didn't want Nyberg to
see him and start asking questions.

Nyberg cleared his throat and spat onto the pavement.
Then he went back into the bar. Joel looked carefully in
both directions before crossing over the street. At the
back of the bar was a door that Sara had said he could
use if he wanted to pay her a visit.

He hesitated for a moment.

Then he opened the door and went into the bar to find
a man for Gertrud.

Joel sometimes broke a cup or a dish when he was
washing up after he and Samuel had eaten a meal.

But that was nothing compared with what Ludde
broke.

Ludde was the owner of the bar. But he didn't mix
with his customers: instead, he spent his time at the sink.
He was small and fat, and his hands were always red and
swollen because of the washing-up water.

There was a notice on the door leading into the
kitchen at the rear of the bar saying that unauthorised
persons were not permitted entry, but that didn't apply to
Joel because Sara worked there. Joel didn't often use
that door. It was always chaotic and noisy in the kitchen.
Besides, he didn't like Sara and the other waitresses
patting him on the head. Treating him almost as if he
were Sara's own boy.

He didn't like being a Nearly Boy. And even if Sara
was nice and Samuel was always in a good mood when
he was together with her, Joel refused to pretend that
Sara was his mother. His mum was called Jenny, and
would always be called Jenny. Even if he never met her
again for the rest of his life, he would never have
another mum.

But he did sometimes go in through the forbidden
door. And today he had an important errand. He had to
find a man for Gertrud.

When he entered the kitchen, it was even more chaotic
than usual. Ludde was bent over the sink, washing up like
a madman. There was a rattling and clinking and
clattering in the frothy water from glasses, cups, dishes
and cutlery.

It was mostly glasses, as this was a bar after all, and
everybody was drinking beer. But the beer drinkers
occasionally grew hungry and wanted food. Ludde did
the cooking and the washing up at the same time. Only
one dish was served in the bar, and it was always known
as
Ludde's Beef Stew
. Sara had told Joel that Ludde had
owned the bar for over twenty years, and he had served
the same stew all that time. Joel used to study the big pot
standing on the stove, and imagined it cooking for
twenty years. Ludde had occasionally added some new
bits of meat, and stirred the thick, brown gravy; but
essentially it was the same dish that had been standing
on the stove for twenty years. Once, when Joel was
hungry, Sara had served him up a plate of
Ludde's Beef
Stew
. Joel had eaten it, and thought how he had eaten
something that had been simmering on that stove since
before he was born.

Now, when Joel entered the kitchen, Ludde was bent
over the sink as usual.

'Joel!' he shouted. 'You can't imagine how pleased
we all were to hear that you hadn't been injured.'

'No doubt it was a miracle,' said Joel evasively.

Just then Sara came in through the swing doors
carrying a tray. It was full of empty bottles and glasses,
overflowing ash trays and sticky plates. Joel wondered
if he would have been able to lift the tray.

Sara was strong. Joel had once watched her heave a
sack of coal onto her shoulder. His dad Samuel was
strong, but Joel wondered if Sara was even stronger.

All the waitresses working in the bar were strong, and
they all looked similar. Big and fat and sweaty. And they
were all dressed the same: black skirts and white blouses.
Once Joel had been in the kitchen and they had come in
through the swing doors one after another, and it seemed
to him that they looked like animals. Black and white
waitress-elephants marching in from the beery jungle . . .

Sara put the tray down with a bang, and immediately,
Ludde started filling his sink with more plates and
glasses. A dish and a glass fell off the tray and smashed
as they hit the floor.

Joel hardly dare look in case he burst out laughing.
There were always piles of broken china and glass round
Ludde's feet. To avoid cutting his feet, he wore black
overshoes. He didn't have shoes inside the overshoes,
though, but slippers. As Joel wasn't really sure if Ludde
minded people laughing at him, he avoided looking at
the floor. Instead, he screwed up his eyes and peered
sideways at the scene. He wouldn't need to laugh if he
did that.

Sara had told Joel that all the money Ludde earned
by selling beer and beef stew was spent on buying new
crockery and glasses. Once Sara and the other
waitresses had been paid, and Nyberg the bouncer as
well, and all the beer and the stew bills had been
settled, Ludde only had enough money left over to buy
new crockery and glasses.

And it went on like that, year after year. And all the
time the pot of stew clucked and spluttered on the stove.

'Hello, Joel,' said Sara with a smile, wiping the sweat
from her brow.

Please don't hug me, Joel thought. I don't want to be
hugged.

'Have you come to visit me?' said Sara, pulling him
closer and giving him a hug. Joel tried to resist, but it
was impossible. Sara was as strong as a weightlifter.

She could have toured the fairgrounds in a sideshow
as Sara the Strong.

'Are you hungry?' she asked. 'Would you like something
to eat?'

'No thank you,' said Joel. 'I only called in to say hello.'

He didn't really know how to go about finding a man
for Gertrud, nor did he know if Sara would be able to
help him. That's why he answered as he did.

As he ran down the hill from Simon Windstorm's
house, he'd tried to gather his thoughts on what he knew
about how grown-ups came to meet one another. He
found it difficult to understand anything to do with love.
To be honest, he had a pretty good idea of what was
involved. At school, behind the bicycle sheds, Otto had
once condescended to explain to Joel and some other
boys how children were made. Joel had listened carefully,
so as not to miss a single word. At first he thought
that Otto must be out of his mind. Could that
really
be
what happened? Surely not? How was it
really
done?

Joel had been sensible enough not to ask any
questions, but for a long time he doubted if Otto had
been telling the truth. Later, when he'd heard the same
story from others, he had realised that it must presumably
be right, strange though it might seem. Strange
and complicated. He'd spent a lot of time wondering
how there could possibly be so many children around
when the whole business seemed to be so complicated.

So Joel knew quite a lot. And he knew how you went
about kissing, even if he hadn't yet tried it on a girl, only
on his own reflection in the mirror.

But the big question was: how do grown-ups get to
meet one another?

He knew some of the answer. You could go to the
dance at the Community Centre on Saturday night,
when Kringström's orchestra was playing. That's where
people met. And he'd read in books about other ways in
which people could meet. In fairy tales princes climbed
up long ropes to meet princesses who were locked in
high towers.

But in the little town he lived in the only towers were
the church steeple and the red tower at the fire station
where the firemen used to hang up their hose pipes to
dry. Joel found it hard to imagine Gertrud sitting at the
top of the fire brigade tower without a nose.

But there were other ways in which grown-ups could
meet. Inmost of the books he read there were always some
chapters describing how people met and eventually got
married. But there was never anything about what Otto had
described behind the bicycle sheds. Joel assumed that was
because it was so boring to write about it.

You could meet in the wreckage of a train that had
fallen into a ravine. You could rescue a girl who had
fallen into freezing water when the ice broke, and
later marry her. You could wear a black mask and
kidnap a girl.

There were lots of ways. But by the time Joel had
come to the bottom of the hill and paused to regain his
breath before entering the back door of the bar, he had
decided that the best place for Gertrud to meet the man
he hadn't yet found for her was probably the
Community Centre.

Joel sat down on a chair in the corner where he was
least in the way. Sara had vanished through the swing
doors again, carrying a tray full of beer bottles. He tried
to think up a good way of getting Sara to help him,
without her realising it. If he could get her to tell him
about the men sitting out there in the bar, which ones
were unmarried and which ones were nice, he'd be able
to choose the one he thought would be most suitable for
Gertrud.

But what characteristics would be most suitable for
Gertrud?

What kind of man would she most like to have?

It wasn't easy to think in the kitchen, with Ludde
creating havoc at the sink all the time. And Sara and the
other waitresses running in and out, emptying trays and
loading them up again with new bottles and glasses.

'I'll soon be coming for a sit down,' said Sara, before
disappearing with her tray.

The other two waitresses, Karin and Hilda, said the
same thing.

'We'll soon be coming for a sit down and a rest.'

Joel didn't say anything. He was regretting not having
waited a bit longer before coming to the bar. He ought to
have thought through what kind of man Gertrud would
want first. Then he should have worked out how Sara
could be tricked into helping him.

This was typical of Joel – he often forgot to think
before starting to do something.

And this was the result. Just then Ludde dropped
another glass that shattered on the checked tile floor.

'Now!' exclaimed Sara, throwing down her tray and
slumping onto a chair. 'Time for a rest!'

She poured herself a cup of coffee, put a lump of
sugar in her mouth, and started slurping. Then she
looked up at Joel, and smiled.

'I'm so pleased,' she said. 'So pleased that nothing
happened to you. You wouldn't believe how much the
blokes out there are talking about the accident. You've
given them something to talk about. Everybody knows
who Joel Gustafson is now.'

Joel couldn't make up his mind if that was a good
thing or a bad thing.

Perhaps in future people would turn round in the
street to look at him and think: there goes that Joel
Gustafson who was run over by the Ljusdal bus without
suffering a single scratch.

Maybe they would even give him a nickname. Like
Mr Under the horse dealer, who was only ever referred
to as Neighing Ned.

Or Hugo, who was an electrician and the best player
in the local ice-hockey team.

How many people knew that his name was Hugo
when everybody called him Snotty?

The world is full of nicknames, Joel thought. Snotty
and Fleabag-Frankie and Paintpot-Percy, who was a
painter and decorator. There was a chimney sweep
known to everybody as Jim even though his real name
was Anders. Not to mention the baker everybody called
Bluebottle, because he had a front tooth missing and
made a buzzing sound when he talked. Or the stonemason
known as Buggery, because that was more or less all he
ever said. Or the vicar whose name was Nikodemus but
was called Knickers by those who knew him. But most
people just said Vicar. Then there was a skier known as
Skater-Sammy, and a drayman nicknamed Pop. But
oddest of all was surely the carpenter called Johanson
who was known to everybody as The Welder.

What would Joel's nickname be?

Joel
Ljusdal
Gustafson?

Lucky Joel?

Miracle Gustafson?

Joel frowned, and pulled a face at the very thought.

That was the worst thing about nicknames – it was
always somebody else who invented them.

You ought to be able to choose your own nickname.

'What are you pulling a face at?' asked Sara, with a
laugh.

'Nothing,' said Joel.

'It was nice of you to come and visit me.'

'I wanted to ask you something,' said Joel, without
knowing what he wanted to ask her about.

Sara nodded, and looked at him.

Just then the swing doors were flung open and Karin
came storming into the kitchen. She was red in the face
with anger.

'I can't make head nor tail of that lot,' she said. 'Now
two of them have started thumping each other.'

Ludde broke off his washing up and turned to look
at her.

'What's Nyberg doing about it?' he asked. 'Why
doesn't he throw them out?'

'He tried,' said Karin. 'But now he's on the floor with
the other two on top of him.'

Before they knew where they were, everybody was
rushing towards the swing doors. Joel had stood up and
followed Sara, but when she got as far as the doors she
turned round and said sternly:

'You stay here.'

Joel was angry at not being allowed to go with them.
But at the same time, he had to admit that he was a bit
scared.

He peered cautiously through the crack in the doors.

Tables and chairs were overturned all over the floor.
Nyberg the bouncer was just crawling out from underneath
a mass of arms and legs. He was rubbing his nose
and looking furious. Sara had taken hold of one of the
drunks, and was shaking him as if he were a little boy.
Ludde was waving his red hands about and shouting
something Joel couldn't make out.

He wasn't at all sure who had been fighting.

On the other hand, he noticed two men sitting calmly
at a table, apparently completely unconcerned by what
had been going on. They were drinking Pilsner, both
leaning forward with heads close together, and talking
away. One of them was fair-haired. It struck Joel that
he looked very like the blond boy depicted on tubes of
one of Sweden's favourite delicacies, Kalle's Caviar. (It
wasn't the expensive, 'real' caviar, but what you might
call the poor man's caviar – fish roe, delicious with
your breakfast toast.) The man was the spitting image
of Kalle, despite the fact that he was probably three
times as old. His friend had dark hair, combed in Elvis
Presley style.