The Discoverer Read online

  The wind was coming from abaft; he could no longer have said how hard it was blowing. Sometimes, when they were sailing so fast that they overtook a wave – great billows towering over them like ravening monsters three and four metres high – Jonas was certain that they were done for, that the bow would drag the boat under when it surged into the wall of the wave. Yet each time, as if witnessing a miracle, he saw the bow rear up again. Other times, when they were moving more slowly and were hit from behind by foaming breakers – in what seemed like horrible, insidious ambushes – he was equally convinced that the stern would be engulfed, only then to see how elegantly it lifted again – he sent a silent thank you to the boat’s brilliant designer – so that the waters slid away underneath them and buoyed them up, sent them scudding forwards, surfing, hanging for seconds at a time on the crest of a wave, as if they were flying through the darkness; as if they were not on their way from Hvasser to Hvaler, but were somewhere out in space, between Venus and Mercury.

  She beckoned him over. He thought she was going to give him an order, but instead she kissed him, kissed him as if it were the most natural thing in the world, a succulent, provocative kiss, a kiss which, panic-stricken though he was, with the sea frothing menacingly along the lip of the well, left him wondering what it would be like to kiss her belly button, stick his tongue into that glorious little dot and roll it around in there. Might that not give him the feeling of disappearing, of being sucked under by a whirlpool; waking up in another galaxy? Wasn’t this – at long last – the woman he had been looking for?

  They scudded over the waves. He could see that she was concentrating, keeping an eye on the sails, noting the slightest flap, reading signs that he could not see, following every move of the boat as if it was a living creature; he noticed how firmly she gripped the tiller, yet how gently she moved it from side to side, as if she were not steering, but caressing the waves, leaving the boat to find its own way. He imagined her holding him, his penis, just that way, firmly but gently. ‘Haul in the foresheet a bit!’ she yelled, as if she had heard his thoughts and meant to give him something else to think about. She had brought them back into a broad reach. He was putting everything he had into it, but he kept ballsing up. ‘God, what a clumsy clod!’ she snapped, clearly annoyed by his ignorance of sailing terms. As far as Jonas was concerned this merely confirmed what he already knew: that girls had a language all their own. Nonetheless it seemed pretty obvious that something was going on between them, in the midst of the storm; that this sail was bound to culminate in, to carry on into, a race between two bodies, because this was only the foreplay, that much he understood, that much he could tell from the look in her eyes, the fury and the lust he saw glinting in them through the salty spray with which they were drenched every now and again.

  The sea grew rougher and rougher the farther east they sailed. Then, dead abeam, Jonas spotted a ship. A massive vessel strung with tiny lights. A starship in space. It looked as though Julie, out of sheer bloody-mindedness, meant to cut straight across its bow. They were done for, he was sure of it. ‘Ease up!’ he screamed. ‘For God’s sake, can’t you see we’re going to ram right into it!’

  Up in the organ gallery, surveying the church below, Jonas Wergeland thought to himself that this too was a sea voyage of sorts – or a cruise, perhaps, what with everyone being so primped and perfumed. Against his will his eyes lingered again on the nape of Margrete’s neck – that enigmatic vulnerability – until he managed to pull them away and ran them over the rows of pews. He recognised more and more faces and once again it struck him what a springboard for memories this was. Although many years were to pass before Jonas realised that it was during this funeral service that the seeds had been sown of what was possibly his most famous programme, the one on Henrik Ibsen. It had something to do with the sight of a church wherein everything was condensed, to form a mesh, a net, in which the whole of one’s life had been caught. If, that is, it had not been inspired by hearing the powerful words from the Bible, by being confronted with the deepest solemnity. For what was the biggest challenge where Henrik Ibsen was concerned? It was to discover what actually occurred at the greatest moment in Norwegian literature. And this too involved a church.

  In the spring of 1864, at the age of thirty-six, Henrik Ibsen began his twenty-seven years in exile by travelling to Italy. It was a far from successful writer who left his native land, left Norway – in political terms a Swedish province, in cultural terms a Danish one. He was plagued by money troubles and had not yet written any work of real consequence, or at least not anything that could be described as world-class. It is not much of an overstatement to say that his life was – figuratively speaking – on the rocks.

  For a long time Jonas considered centring the programme around Ibsen’s arrival in ‘the Beautiful South’, Ibsen himself having so often described what a revelation it had been to come down from the Alps: ‘from the mists, through a tunnel and out into the sunlight’; a dark curtain had been pulled back and suddenly he found himself bathed in the most wonderful bright light. In his mind Jonas saw images of the countryside, an evocative montage of contrasting scenes; was tempted, but eventually dropped the idea.

  Because the moment of truth does not occur until the following year, on a summer’s day in 1865. The Ibsens are staying in the Alban Hills, at Ariccia, twenty kilometres from the Italian capital. Ibsen is working on Brand, but getting nowhere with it. But then, on a brief visit to Rome, things fall into place for him. The incident is described in a letter to Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson: ‘Then one day I visited St Peter’s Basilica […] and all at once I found a strong and clear Form for what I had to say.’ What can we take from this vague statement? What was it that Henrik Ibsen discovered in St Peter’s. Whatever it was, back at Ariccia he completely rewrote Brand, working as if in a trance. What had been a monologue became a dialogue. He turned an epic poem into a drama – and reaped the plaudits at home in Scandinavia. This was followed by his masterpiece Peer Gynt, and thereafter, almost singlehandedly, Henrik Ibsen created modern drama. Not only that: he also did much to influence, possibly even change, the whole tenor of contemporary thought. On that day in St Peter’s, something happened which was to put Norwegian literature on the map.

  Jonas Wergeland’s theory concerning Ibsen’s experience in the Basilica bore little resemblance to anyone else’s. Because the way he saw it, and presented it in pictures and sound, not until he stepped into the gloom of St Peter’s was the outer light which Ibsen had encountered in Italy transformed into an inner light. And even though this provocative assertion found form in a key scene which was strongly criticised for its audacity and its speculative cast, many people regarded this programme on Ibsen as the lynchpin in a series which did for Norwegian television what Ibsen had done for the country’s literature. Thanks to Jonas Wergeland, NRK’s reputation not only reached formidable heights outside of Norway; his work led also – and far more importantly – to a renewed interest in Norwegian culture in general.

  Wergeland did not, therefore, succumb to the temptation to start the programme with a train rushing out of a black tunnel, out into the light of the Mediterranean countryside; instead it opened with an allegorical scene prompting associations with life-saving. You had the impression of rising, along with the camera, after a long dive into the deep; ascending from the darkness towards a bright, shimmering surface, and as you broke through you heard the sound of heavy breathing and saw a bewildered Henrik Ibsen stumbling, wading almost, from the recesses of St Peter’s into the sunlit summer’s day. It was, in short, a programme about a man who not only came close to foundering, but who was actually drowning, until – quite unexpectedly, perhaps even undeservedly – he saved himself.

  Another event which might have sparked the idea for the Ibsen programme, was the mysterious, as yet unexplained, incident which took place towards the close of Haakon Hansen’s funeral service, after the congregation had mumbled their way through The Lord’s Prayer, after Da
niel had sprinkled the symbolic handful of soil on the coffin and given the blessing and everyone had sat down again; just as Jonas struck up the choral prelude to the final hymn, ‘Love divine all love excelling’. Jonas did not see the whole thing himself, but he heard about it later, in a wide variety of conflicting versions. Suddenly a woman had come walking up the centre aisle, a woman clad in a bright orange coat, like a flame, a foretaste of the cremation to come. Some people got quite a fright, the singing petered out. She had an intent look on her face, this woman. She looked dangerous, some said. She strode slowly up to the coffin as the singing swelled again, as if with ‘Love divine all love excelling’ the congregation meant to shield Haakon Hansen from the figure now making her way towards him; a note of discord in this harmonious ceremony. A disgrace, some whispered afterwards. Interesting, said others. Who was she, everyone asked.

  No one needed to tell Jonas Wergeland that women were unpredictable, dangerous. Because once, late one night, he had been out in a sail boat in the middle of Oslo fjord, in a storm, along with a girl who seemed ready to risk being sunk rather than give way to a huge passenger ferry. But he need not have worried, they passed astern of it, with plenty of room to spare. She shot him a glance, smiled – or no, she didn’t smile: she smirked. He felt such an idiot. He was on the point of collapse. She, on the other hand, still had her captain’s cap firmly on her head and was in complete command of the situation; she loved this, Jonas could tell, enjoyed having control over tremendous forces, exploiting tremendous forces, the air, the water, because she was not sailing the boat, she was sailing the wind and the waves. Just as she was sailing his thoughts.

  If, that was, she wasn’t stark, raving mad. Because things were moving far too fast; he was scared, truly terrified. She was the sort of woman who was quite liable to live her life according to that old chestnut from Ibsen: ‘And what if I did run my ship aground; oh, still it was splendid to sail it!’ The sea was black, dark edged in white. It had been a big mistake coming out with her. She looked as if she was quite capable of hoisting the spinnaker. And more: Jonas had the impression that she was planning to make love to him as resolutely and passionately as she sailed her boat through the storm. The water seethed, the storm thundered all around him. From time to time he heard a crack from the sail, it made him jump, he thought disaster had struck. He was sure his heart leapt into his mouth each time the boat slammed down into the trough of a wave, its joints creaking and rigging groaning; he had never been quite so literally caught between wind and water.

  Despite being so afraid he could not rid himself of the thought that there was something epic, something mythic, about this voyage. He had the feeling that he was on a quest, that there was something he had to do, something he had to bring back: a golden fleece, a vital ice sample from one of the rings of Saturn. Or that this odyssey was a kind of training, a tempering process. And when he was most terrified, just when he had told himself: that’s it, we’re sunk, she would lean forward and kiss him, a hard, wet, salty kiss, more of a suck than a kiss, while at the same time, outwith the kiss, as it were, keeping an eye on the waves. And always with a sly grin hovering around her lips, as if this gruelling crossing was no more than a harebrained bit of teasing.

  It should be said, though, that even Julie’s face eventually began to show signs of worry. The wind must have grown even stronger. ‘We’ll have to shorten sail!’ she suddenly yelled, as if their lives depended on it. She bent down to Jonas, put her lips close to his ear and told him what to do, so clearly and precisely that he realised this was a very risky manoeuvre. ‘Slacken the main sail halyard when I turn into the eye of the wind,’ she shrieked, giving him a nudge which bordered on being a kick. He was scared out of his wits, more or less crawled across the deck to the mast, praying to God. The water churned around his feet. She turned into the wind. ‘Move it, dummy! Loosen the line round the starboard cleat! And watch out for the corner of the jib!’ she yelled as he fumbled about. The sails were flapping wildly, cracking like whips, frightening him so badly that he was almost shitting himself. At last, though, he managed to carry out her order. ‘Make fast the luff cringle. Christ, you’re slow!’ He could hardly hear what she was saying. He spotted the eyelets on the sail, grasped what she wanted him to do, slipped the eyelet over the hook. Even this simple action sent his mind off down another track entirely, so much so that, terrified though he was, he could not help wondering what might happen later, if they survived. She would make him flap and crack just like those sails. Or no: she would sail him until his timbers rent. ‘Come here!’ she bellowed as she tightened the reef line on the after end of the boom. He managed to scramble back down into the well, totally done in, ripe for a rest home. ‘What’s wrong with you?’ she said. ‘You look as though you’d seen Old Neptune himself.’

  The sail was well set, she bore onto the right course. ‘Good boy,’ she said with affected heartiness, slapping his thigh, blatantly, only a hair’s-breadth from his groin. ‘No reason to spoil the stars with a flare,’ she said. ‘But take a quick turn on the pump just to be on the safe side.’

  The reefing did not seem to have slowed them down at all. He was trembling as badly as ever. What worried him most of all was the sight of the mountainous waves which came from behind, you could see them a long way off: black walls of water barrelling relentlessly closer. He tried to keep his eyes front, but was constantly having to glance over his shoulder at the giant rollers steaming down on them, the surging foam, the sea trying to lap him up like a thousand-mouthed beast of prey. That swelling roar reminded him – of all things – of organ music. ‘Right Jonas, time to set full sail,’ his father always said when he played organo pleno. But this roar had a sorrowful note to it, like the music for a funeral. Still Julie never faltered. Her set face shone with concentration and what might have been pleasure. More and more, Jonas was wondering what was going to happen when – if – they reached harbour, he fell to day-dreaming about this, he did not know why, but he sat there, terrified out of his wits, like a condemned man with a hard-on, fantasising about how she would rip off his clothes, demand that he take her from behind, like a mountainous billow, wash over and under her, lift her up, again and again. ‘If you don’t sit still I’ll have to put a safety harness on you,’ she yelled, again with that knowing smirk on her face, as he dodged the spray from a huge rogue wave.

  It was getting late. She was taking her bearings from the lighthouses. For a long time he had kept his eye fixed on the Tresteinene light. It was so beautiful, quite unearthly. Mawkishly he thought to himself that his life had begun to flicker, like a light bulb just before it goes out, but the light did not go out, it went on flashing at its set intervals as they sailed passed it and Julie cut across the white sector towards Homlungen light, her eyes darting from side to side. She was keeping a sharp look out for spar buoys, barely visible in the gloom. Jonas held his breath until they had slipped past the lighthouse on its headland and he could see the lights of Skjærhalden.

  He knew what would happen next. She would ride him like she had ridden her boat across the waves, there would be no reefing where he was concerned, she would not allow him any slack. She would screw him rigid, on and on until she drained his bilges, making him gurgle from top to toe, pumping him utterly dry. And yet it was not her, the woman, he feared, but himself, the forces he felt stirring within him. As if she had set all his sails, generating a potency he had not known he possessed, a desire that rendered him willing to drown if only he could poke his tongue into that navel; an urge so strong that he would not have been surprised to discover that he was actually still on dry land, on Hvasser, staring at Julie’s belly; to find, in other words, that this whole, crazy boat trip had taken place inside her navel.

  As they glided in to the docks and he noted with relief that it really was Skjærhalden, and not Hvasser, he felt compelled to make a decision. Was his objective – was she, Julie – what he thought, what he hoped, she was? Or was he suffering from another
attack of Melankton’s syndrome?

  They were safe in harbour, securely tied up. Just when it looked as though she was about to drag him into the cabin – she had already tossed her cap through the hatch, in what seemed like the first move in a striptease act – he said: ‘Hang on, I need to feel solid ground under my feet first.’ And as she went aft to check the anchor line, he seized the chance to grab his rucksack and climb ashore. He strode off briskly to the bus stop, where the last bus for Fredrikstad was preparing to leave.

  Jonas Wergeland sat at the organ in Grorud Church, playing ‘Love divine all love excelling’. Over the years he had expended a lot of energy on eluding women. Riding out storms. Had his father experienced something similar? Who was this woman walking up the aisle, stepping out like a bride, someone said, as if hearing in her head, not ‘Love divine all love excelling’, but Purcell’s Wedding March. Someone from whom he could no longer escape? Jonas had long suspected that there was a lot he did not know about his father. As a youth, almost grown, he had stumbled upon a scrapbook on his father’s desk. To Jonas this was as unlikely a discovery in the familiar surroundings of the family flat as a mineral from another planet. All the cuttings related to one question: whether there was life elsewhere in the universe. No one had known anything about Haakon Hansen’s interest in this subject. Could it be that his father had regarded his organ music as radio transmissions of some sort? Could it be that, whenever he played, his father was wondering: is there life out there?