Eva's Eye

28

The money had to be moved out of the house. As the big Peugeot slowly disappeared, she pushed the door shut with a bang and rushed down to the cellar. Her foot was feeling numb again. She prized the lid off the tin with a knife and emptied the packets onto the concrete floor; then she sat and began tearing the foil off them. They were bound with rubber bands. She realized quite quickly that there was a system to the bundles. All the thousand-kroner notes were together, and the hundreds, it was easy to count them. The floor was very cold and she lost sensation in her bottom. On and on she counted, keeping a mental tally of each, laying it aside, and counting the next. Her heart thumped ever louder. Where could she hide such a huge sum? A safe-deposit box was too risky, she had the feeling that they’d be watching her now, watching her every move, Sejer and his people. And Maja’s husband.

Maja was married. Why hadn’t she said so? Had she felt that a husband, a companion for life, was an impediment? Or was he more a kind of business partner to share the running of the hotel? Or just a bloke she didn’t want to acknowledge? The last seemed the most likely.

The paint tin was a wonderful hiding place really, but she had to keep it somewhere else, somewhere no one would think of looking and where she could easily help herself to more when she needed it. At her father’s, of course, in his cellar, along with all the old junk he’d accumulated over the years. Eva’s childhood bed. The apples which lay rotting in the old potato bin. The defective washing machine. She lost count and had to begin again. Her hands were sweating and this made it easy to separate the crisp notes from one another, soon she had half a million in one big heap and there was masses more. Maja’s husband. Maybe he was a really shady character — if Maja had been a prostitute, what might he be? A drug dealer or something similar. Perhaps neither of them had any moral sense. Have I got any? she thought suddenly, she was getting close to a million now and she was making inroads into the money. This, she thought, probably represents a good deal of the housekeeping money of hundreds of housewives in this town, money that should have been used for nappies and tins of food. It was an odd thought.

She was on the hundred-kroner notes now, and it took longer. She thought the five hundreds were the nicest-looking, the color and the pattern, beautiful blue bills. One point six, her fingers were icy, she was counting fifties. If he’d got her registration number, it would only take minutes for him to find her address, if he phoned the Vehicle Registration Office, if he’d even noticed the car; if he’d had some imagination he’d probably have looked at it and considered the possibility, been surprised that it was standing there unlocked. Up in the mountains, not far from the cabin. But he hadn’t had the imagination to search in the earth closet. One point seven million. And a few fifties. Maja had been close to her goal. One point seven million kroner. Pieces of foil lay glinting in the light from the bare bulb in the ceiling. She put the money in the tin again and went up the stairs, the swelling in her foot seemed to have eased, perhaps because of the cellar’s coldness. Her dark hair hung like frozen twigs down her neck. She put the tin in the utility room and went back to the bathroom, took a quick hot shower, and got dressed.

The millionaire in the mirror was tenser now. She had to get hold of a tarpaulin for the car in case he was sniffing around. Or she could buy a new car. An Audi perhaps? Not one of the biggest ones, perhaps even secondhand. Suddenly she realized it was impossible. She could only buy bread and milk as before. Even Omar would begin to speculate if her shopping basket grew larger. She limped out and fetched the tin. This would have to do. And anyway, they could move. She got some aluminum foil from a kitchen drawer, wrapped the bundles up neatly, and laid them in the tin, all except one. On this she stuck a piece of masking tape, pondered a second and wrote “Bacon” on it. Then she put it in the freezer. No point in running out right away. The sixty thousand in the little tin had been considerably depleted. She put on her coat and went out. But first she examined her mailbox, which had entirely escaped her mind. A green envelope lay in it, from the Arts Council. She gave a smile of surprise. Her grant had come.

“You’ve started going out at night,” smiled her father, “that’s a good sign.”

“How so?”

“I kept ringing you yesterday, right through till eleven o’clock.”

“Oh yes, I was out.”

“Have you found someone to keep you warm at last?” he asked expectantly.

I was just about freezing to death, she thought, I was sitting waist-high in excrement half the night.

“Well, yes, sort of. I’m not saying any more.”

She played secretive, hugged him and went inside. The paint tin was in the car trunk, she’d fetch it later and smuggle it down to the cellar.

“Was there something in particular?”

“My fire alarm was wailing and I couldn’t switch it off.”

“Ah,” she said quickly, “so what did you do?”

“I rang the fire station and they came at once. Nice people. Sit down now, how long can you stay, can you stay a while? By the way, how long’s Emma going to be at Jostein’s, you’re not thinking of giving her up?”

“Don’t be so silly, I’d never even entertain the idea. I can certainly stay for a bit, I could make us dinner.”

“I don’t think I’ve got anything in.”

“Then I’ll go out and buy something.”

“No, you haven’t got the money to feed me, I’ll have a bowl of porridge.”

“What about fillet steak?” she asked with a smile.

“I don’t like you saying silly things,” he said crossly.

“My grant came today, and I’ve got nobody else to celebrate with.”

At that he gave way. Eva began to potter about the house, and his mind gradually became tranquil. It was the sounds he missed most of all, the sounds of another human being who breathed and padded about, radio and television weren’t the same.

“Have you seen the papers?” he growled a little later, “Some poor girl’s been suffocated in her own bed. People who do that sort of thing should be knocked on the head with a club. Poor young thing. Treating a girl like that, when she’s offering a service and a bed and everything, never heard the like. I thought her name sounded rather familiar, but I can’t place it, did you read about it, Eva? Is it anyone we know?”

“No,” she called from the kitchen.

He frowned. “Well, that’s a mercy anyway. If it had been someone I knew, I’d have tracked the bloke down and knocked him on the head with a club. Only punishment he’ll get is a cell with TV and three meals a day. I mean, does anybody even ask if they’re sorry?”

“Someone certainly will.” Eva knotted the neck of the rubbish sack and went to the door. She had to be careful now. “They take that into consideration during sentencing, whether they show signs of remorse or not.”

“Ha! So they simply say sorry for all they’re worth and get off lightly.”

“It won’t be that easy. They have experts who can tell if you’re lying for that sort of thing.” She shuddered at the sound of her own words.

Then she vanished outside, and he heard her banging the lid of the refuse bin. He waited a bit, but she didn’t return. There’s something up with the girl, he thought, as if she’s doing something I’m not supposed to know about, I know her too well to be fooled when she’s hiding things, just like that time when Mrs. Skollenborg died, she went quite hysterical about it, it wasn’t normal, the old woman was almost ninety and none of the children liked her, but then she was a horrible old bag. There was something fishy about it. And now she’s doing something in the cellar, what in the name of all that’s holy is she doing down there?

He thought as he struggled with a disposable lighter which wouldn’t light; he rubbed it hard between his rough hands until the gas pressure had built up sufficiently, and finally he got a light. He’d managed to get a flame out of a supposedly empty lighter up to ten times. You really do learn to economize when you’re a pensioner, he reflected.

“What d’you want with your steak?” asked Eva, who’d finally emerged from the cellar holding an ovenproof dish in her hands.

“What are you going to do with that?”

“I found it in the cellar,” she replied rapidly, “I’ll roast vegetables in it.”

“Don’t you boil vegetables?”

“Yes, sometimes. Do you like broccoli? Just tender with salt and butter?”

“See if I’ve got enough wine.”

“You’ve got plenty. I didn’t know you’d got an extra supply in the cellar?”

“That’s in case I lose my home help. You never know. The council’s trying to save money, this year alone they want to save twenty million.” He took a long drag at his cigarette to indicate that he didn’t want any comments.

“When did you start getting interested in food?” he said all at once. “You normally only eat bread.”

“Well, maybe I’m starting to grow up. No, I don’t know, I just felt like it. Porridge and red wine just don’t go together.”

“That’s pure nonsense. A good, well-salted rye porridge made with pork fat washed down with red wine is a really fine meal.”

“I’m going to Lorentzen’s, to their fresh-produce counter. Is there anything else you want?”

“Eternal youth,” he grunted.

Eva frowned. She hated him talking like that.

Without batting an eyelid she asked for half a kilo of fillet steak. The woman behind the counter was sturdy and wore disposable gloves, she reached resolutely for a large piece of meat that was almost the color of liver. Was that really what fillet steak looked like?

“Whole or in slices?” She raised her knife to cut.

“Well, what would be best?”

“Thin slices. Wait till the butter turns brown and then skim them quickly across the pan. Just as if you were running barefoot across newly laid asphalt. Whatever you do, don’t fry them.”

“I don’t think my father would take to raw meat.”

“Don’t ask what he wants, just do as I say.”

She smiled suddenly, and Eva was captivated by this chubby woman in her white nylon coat and becoming little net cap. A symbol of hygiene perhaps, but it looked more like a little crown, she thought, and all the dead meat on the counter was the realm over which she reigned.

She weighed the meat and put the price sticker on, gently, as if bandaging a wound. A hundred and thirty kroner, it was an unbelievable price. Eva wandered for a while among the shelves, picking out the odd small item, which she dropped in her basket, it was best to put them straight into the fridge without saying a word to her father, otherwise he wouldn’t accept them. Cheese, liver pâté, two bags of the best coffee, butter, cream. Biscuits with fillings. And on an impulse she grabbed three pairs of pants from the clothes rack. It was just a case of smuggling them into his chest of drawers and hoping he’d use them. By the checkout she added a box of marzipan and nougat chocolates, two magazines, and a carton of cigarettes. The final bill was overwhelming. But it struck her that all old people ought to be able to buy such a basket of groceries, at least once a week, so that they could enjoy themselves a little at the end of their lives. Young people can eat porridge, she thought. She paid, carried the bags out to the car, and drove back.

“Why did he do it, d’you think?” said her father, as he chewed the tender meat.

“Do what?”

“Kill her. In her bed and everything.”

“Why are you curious about it?”

“Aren’t you?”

Eva waited a moment and chewed slowly, mostly for show, she could have swallowed the meat whole. “Yes, a bit. But why do you ask?”

“I’m interested in the dark side of human nature. You’re an artist, aren’t you interested? In the drama of humanity?”

“It was a bit unusual, the world she lived in. I don’t know anything about it.”

“She was about your age.”

“Yes, and rather silly. Laying yourself open to that kind of trade isn’t particularly clever. She was probably only thinking of one thing: the most money in the shortest possible time. Tax free. They must have started arguing or something.” She filled her father’s glass and ladled a spoonful of gravy over his meat.

“It’s a sort of threshold they cross,” he said pensively. “I wonder what it is, what it means. Why some people overstep it, and others could never dream of doing so.”

“Everyone can,” Eva said. “It’s circumstances which dictate. And they don’t step over either — they stray over. They don’t see it until they’re on the other side, and then it’s too late.” It is too late, she thought in astonishment. I’ve stolen a fortune. I really have.

“I socked someone at work once,” her father said all at once, “because he was malicious. A really rotten character. Afterwards he showed me real respect, as if he acknowledged the fact. I’ve never forgotten it. It’s the only time in my life I’ve ever hit someone, but just then it was totally necessary. Nothing else in the world could have soothed my fury, I felt that I’d have gone mad if I hadn’t given him one, it was as if my brain was seething.” He took a few sips of wine and smacked his lips thoughtfully.

“Aggression is fear,” Eva blurted out suddenly. “Aggression is always really just self-defense, in one way or another. A method of defending oneself, one’s own body, one’s own intelligence, one’s own honor.”

“There are people who kill merely for gain.”

“Yes, of course, but that’s something different again. The woman in the paper certainly wasn’t killed for money.”

“In any case, they’ll get him soon. One of the residents in the block saw the car. I think it’s so funny, the way their cars always give them away. They haven’t even got the sense to use their damn feet when they go off to commit their awful crimes.”

“What did you say?”

“Didn’t you see that bit? He hadn’t realized it was important. He’d been away until this morning. But he’d seen a car go around the corner at high speed, early in the evening. A white car, not entirely new. Probably a Renault.”

“A what?” Eva dropped her knife on her plate so the gravy splashed.

“A Renault. A special model that’s not very common, so they thought it would be easy to find him. These car-registration places are good, it’s just a matter of searching for everyone with that type of car and visiting them one by one. And then they have to produce an alibi, and God help the ones who can’t. Clever stuff.”

“A Renault?” Eva ceased chewing.

“Yes. Elderly taxi driver, knew about cars. Lucky it wasn’t some old woman, they can’t tell the difference between a Porsche and a Volkswagen.”

Eva prodded her broccoli and felt her hands shaking. What a nuisance, she thought, talk about a blind alley! “He could have made a mistake. Think of all the time they’ll waste!”

“But they haven’t got anything else to go on, have they?” her father said in a surprised voice. “Why should he make a mistake? He knows about cars, that’s what they said on the radio.”

She gulped at her wine and tried to conceal her despair. Could a Renault really resemble an Opel? French cars looked so completely different. Perhaps he was some fool who wanted to seem important. She thought of Elmer and how happy such a ridiculous observation must be making him, he must have heard it, he was probably glued to the radio during the news bulletins and was even now rubbing his hands with relief, it was enough to make you weep.

“D’you want mousse for pudding?” she said abruptly.

“Yes, if I can have coffee as well.”

“You always do!”

“Yes, yes,” he said disconcerted, “it was only a joke!”

She got up and cleared the table, there was a clatter and clash of plates and cutlery, she’d have to do something about this. It was her fault that he was still free, they could have got him already if she’d told the truth. Now perhaps they’d arrest someone else. She placed a cigar next to her father’s glass and rinsed the plates. Afterwards they ate their mousse in silence, it stuck to her father’s upper lip like white foam and he licked it off with great relish. He glanced at her now and again, he’d adopted a slightly lower profile. Perhaps, he thought, it was a bad time of the month. When she’d settled him on the sofa, she went to wash up. First she stuffed four hundred-kroner notes into his jam jar and hoped that he didn’t know exactly what his financial resources were. Afterward, they sat next to each other on the sofa, sleepy from the food and wine. Eva had calmed down.

“They’ll get him all right,” she said slowly. “There’s always someone who’s seen something, who’s just a little slow off the mark, but they come forward eventually. Nobody gets away with that sort of thing. The world isn’t that unjust. It’s difficult to keep quiet as well, perhaps he’ll confide in someone when he’s drunk or something like that. A man who’s capable of killing like that, in anger for example, who’s that unstable, he won’t be able to control himself for the remainder of his life without giving himself away. And then he’ll have to confide in somebody. Who’ll go to the police. Or perhaps they’ll offer a reward, and then someone or other will rush out and report him, some greedy type.” Her own words stuck in her throat. “What I mean is, somewhere there’s a person who feels responsible for seeing that right prevails. People are just a little slow, that’s all. Or they’re scared.”

“No, they’re cowardly,” mumbled her father sleepily. “That’s the point. People are cowardly, they only think about their own hide, don’t want to get mixed up in anything. It’s nice you’ve got such faith in justice, my dear, but it’s not much help. To her, I mean. No one can help her anymore.”

Eva made no reply, her voice would have broken. She drew on her cigarette.

“Why did you thump that man?” she asked suddenly.

“Who?”

“The man at work, the one you were talking about.”

“I said. Because he was malicious.”

“That’s no answer.”

“Why did you go into such hysterics when Mrs. Skollenborg died?” he asked.

“I’ll tell you about it some other time.”

“On my deathbed?”

“You can ask on your deathbed, and then we’ll see.”

Night was coming on. Eva thought about Elmer and wondered what he was doing. Perhaps he was sitting staring at the wall, at the pattern of the wallpaper, at his own hands, as he marveled at the way they could live their own life like that and act beyond his control. While Maja lay in a refrigerated drawer, without consciousness, without a single thought in her cold head. Eva had no thoughts left either, she poured more wine and felt them fade away into a mist she could no longer penetrate.