Castle Gripsholm Read online

  We stood up at once. ‘Oh yes – we know her all right.’ We ran outside.

  There was the little thing.

  She looked as if she’d been dragged through a hedge backwards, she had been crying, her hair was all over her face, perhaps she had been running. She wasn’t herself. When she saw Lydia, she ran quickly to her and buried her face in her dress.

  ‘What is it? What’s the matter?’ The Princess bent down, and was transformed from the sportswoman of this morning to a mother; no, she was both. The lady of the castle stood there, brimming with curiosity – soaking it all up. Well?

  The red-haired woman had beaten the child and smacked her and shouted at her so loudly, that the child had run away. She just hadn’t been able to bear it any longer. The child was trembling violently and looking towards the door. Was she coming–? Frau Adriani was coming to get her! Frau Adriani was coming to get her! It was only piece by piece that we could find out from her what had happened. At last we had the whole story.

  We stood around.

  ‘I won’t let her go back,’ I said.

  ‘No . . . of course not,’ said the Princess.

  ‘Will you not send the child back?’ asked the lady of the castle.

  The little thing started crying loudly: ‘I don’t want to go back! I want my Mummy!’

  ‘Another black coffee,’ I said to the Princess, ‘and then we’ll be off.’

  We took the child back inside with us and piled biscuits up in front of her. She wouldn’t take a single one. We drank our coffee quietly: when things are hectic, it helps to count up to a hundred or drink a cup of coffee.

  ‘There, Lydia – now will you calm the child down and clean her up a bit while I telephone the old treasure. Would you please connect me with the children’s home?’ The castle-lady asked a lot of questions, I gave her some cursory answers, she said something Swedish over the telephone; I sat and waited.

  Someone answered, in Swedish. I spoke German, on the off chance.

  ‘Can I speak to Frau Adriani?’ Long pause. Then a hard, yellow voice spoke,

  ‘This is Frau Direktor Adriani!’

  I introduced myself. And then she erupted.

  ‘The child is with you then? Yes?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’ll return her . . . You’ll send her back to me immediately! I’ll have her collected – no, you send her to me . . . You bring her back to me at once! I’ll take you to court! For abduction! You put her up to it! You! What? If that child’s not here in half an hour . . . in half an hour . . . Do you understand me?’

  Inside me, a regulator snapped into operation, restraining the spring-action. I had myself fully under control. ‘We’ll be with you in half an hour!’

  A click – she had hung up.

  ‘Lydia,’ I said, ‘what now? I’ll talk to the woman – it’s her turn now. But the child’s things . . . It’s no good: we’ll have to take her with us, or else we won’t get all her belongings!’

  ‘Hm!’

  ‘And if we leave her here in Gripsholm, that woman’s perfectly capable of coming here to snatch her, and the whole business will start all over again. Can you explain that to the little thing?’

  It took ten long minutes. I heard the little one crying next door; she kept bursting into tears. At last she calmed down, and when the castle-lady spoke to her as well, she finally became quiet.

  ‘Will you be sure to . . . will you be sure to take me back with you?’ she kept asking.

  We promised her, and set off.

  So that the child wouldn’t understand, we spoke in French.

  ‘I hope you’ll just throw the letter and the cheque in her face?’

  ‘Lydia,’ I said, ‘I want her to rage for a while. Just a bit . . . I want to have another look at it all. Just for a little while!’

  In disagreement, the Princess lapsed from French into her beloved Platt. ‘You mean I’m to be savaged by a sheep, when I’ve got a dog in my pocket?’ We turned back to the little one, who was becoming more uneasy with each step that took us nearer the children’s home.

  ‘Will I be able to get out again? But she won’t let me – she won’t let me!’

  ‘We just have to collect your things. There’s no need to be afraid . . .’ When we saw the house, we fell silent. I quietly put my arm round the little one’s shoulders.

  ‘Come on – it’ll be all right!’ I had to pull her a little, but she came along quietly. We didn’t have to knock – the door was open.

  Frau Adriani was downstairs in the hall, bending over a chest with her back to us. As soon as she heard our footsteps, she spun round.

  ‘Ah – there you are! Just as well for you! You didn’t meet my maid, then? No? Well, there was someone coming for her, if you hadn’t brought her yourself . . . Where did you run off to, you limb of Satan!’ she screamed at the child. ‘I’ll be talking to you later! I’ve got something to say to you! Now get upstairs!’ The child cowered behind the Princess.

  ‘One moment,’ I said, ‘not so fast. Why did the child run away from you?’

  ‘That’s none of your business,’ screamed Frau Adriani. ‘None of your business! Come here, child!’ She went up to the child, who shrank away in fear. She laid her hand on her head. ‘What are you being so silly for? Why did you run away from me? Are you frightened of me? You mustn’t be frightened of me! I only want the best for you! And you run away to strangers . . . can those strangers be closer to you than I am? I have explained to you, they’re not even properly married . . .’ She appealed to the child with false conviction, listening to herself; she spoke self-consciously, theatrically. ‘Running away like that . . .!’ The child shuddered.

  ‘Could I possibly have a word with you?’ I said gently.

  ‘What . . . There’s nothing to talk about!’

  ‘Perhaps there is.’ We all went into the dining-hall.

  ‘So the child ran away to you! Wonderful! Just as well you returned her when I told you to! She won’t be running away any more – I can promise you that. What a creature! She’ll . . .’

  ‘But the child must have had some reason for running away!’ I said.

  ‘No. Not at all. She had no reason.’

  ‘Hm! And what will you do with her now?’

  ‘I’ll punish her,’ said Frau Adriani, scenting blood and greedy for more. She stretched in her chair.

  ‘May I ask you one question: How will you punish her?’

  ‘I don’t have to give you an answer – I don’t have to. But I can assure you, because it’s in accordance with Frau Collin’s own wishes, with her own wishes, that the child receives a strict upbringing. So she’ll be confined to her room, she’ll be given some extra work to do in the household, she won’t be allowed to go out with the others on walks – that’s the way we operate here.’

  ‘And if we were to ask you to remit her punishment . . . would you do that?’

  ‘No. I couldn’t agree to that. You could ask till . . . Was that what you wanted to ask?’ she added sneeringly.

  ‘But . . . do you treat all the children like that? Of course, one has to be strict some of the time, but to drive a child to the point of desperation . . .’

  ‘Who’s driving children to desperation! Bring up your own children! If you and this lady here should have any! And I’ll bring up this one!’

  ‘Go tell that to the marines!’ muttered the Princess.

  ‘What was that?’ asked Frau Adriani.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘I have my principles. So long as a child is in my power . . .’

  I looked her firmly in the eye . . . I let her wriggle a moment longer in her insane and impatient rage. Her eyes kept shifting from us to the child and back, she was waiting for the child. I thought about how many people like her held power over others. What would it be like if we really had to leave the child here; what did the other children have to go through . . .

  ‘Right – now I’ll make the necessary arrangements . . .�
�� Frau Adriani stood up. Then I got to work.

  ‘The child will not be staying with you,’ I said.

  ‘What?’ she screamed, and put her hands on her hips.

  ‘We’re taking the child back to her mother. Here is a letter from Frau Collin, and here is a cheque. We’ll pay right away!’

  A wave of shock travelled across the woman’s face like milk boiling over in a saucepan; you could see what she was thinking; you could hear her thinking, she didn’t believe it.

  ‘That’s not true!’

  ‘Yes, it’s true. Now come along – sit down. I’ll give you all the papers in turn.’

  ‘You go upstairs!’ she yelled at the child.

  ‘The girl stays here,’ I said. ‘This is the letter. The signature is authenticated.’ Frau Adriani grabbed it from me.

  Then she threw it down at the Princess’ feet. ‘That’s what I get!’ she shouted. ‘That’s what I get for taking trouble over that neglected brat! That’s my reward for caring for her! But you – you talked Frau Collin into it! You’ve set her against me! You’ve slandered me! I’ll . . . Out! You . . .!’

  ‘We’re taking the child with us now. You will have her belongings packed immediately, and give me the bill. I will give you this cheque, drawn on a bank in Stockholm. And I shall need a receipt.’

  Money! There was money at stake! The woman immediately cut to the new scene and her tone changed. Her new voice was much quieter, colder – and very firm.

  ‘I’m unable to give you a bill at the moment. The child has broken a lot of things here, there are claims for damages. And of course, payment is due for a full quarter, that’s the arrangement. Naturally. First I have to have an inventory made up, of all the things the girl has broken in this house. That will take at least a week to do.’

  ‘You will write me out a receipt now for the amount of the cheque; it covers the costs up to the end of the quarter, with fifty-two Kroner over and above that . . . the exact sum you can settle with Frau Collin later. The child is coming with us.’ The child had stopped crying, and darted constant looks from one of us to the other. She didn’t let go of the Princess for a second, not a second.

  Frau Adriani looked at the cheque, which I was holding in my hand. ‘Money alone doesn’t settle this affair!’ she said. ‘After all . . . Wait.’ She went out. The Princess gave a nod of satisfaction. The woman came back.

  ‘She’s ruined a cupboard . . . she’s broken a window; the window was bolted from inside, she must have thrown something at it . . . that makes . . . and I also have a laundry bill . . .’

  ‘That will do,’ I said. ‘You will get nothing at all now, and we will take the child, even without her belongings – or else you give me a receipt for the cheque, and you let us have all the child’s belongings’ – Frau Adriani gesticulated – ‘all her belongings, and you’ll get your money. Well?’

  She was wriggling; you could sense that she was squirming and seething inside . . . but there was the cheque! Psychology can be very simple sometimes. No – not quite that simple. What a repertoire that woman had! Now she was down to her last record.

  She started to cry. The Princess stared at her, as though at some fabled exotic animal.

  Frau Adriani was crying. It sounded like someone blowing on a child’s trumpet, a kind of squeaking noise, produced very quietly, and with completely dry eyes – like little rubber pigs when the air is squeezed out of them, and they crumple up, all wrinkled. ‘I am a woman who has made a life for herself by hard work,’ sang the toy trumpet. ‘I have travelled a lot, and acquired culture. I have a sick husband; I have no one to help me. I have been in charge of this house for eight years – I am like a mother to the children, like a mother . . . the child is very dear to me . . . for this child . . . Little bleeders!’ she screeched suddenly.

  It felt like deliverance. The performance of the play, The Compassionate Mother’s Heart had been so ridiculous – it was from the repertoire of a provincial hysteric – that it was like being released from a nightmare when she started swearing and came back to reality, to her reality.

  ‘Now,’ I said, ‘now we can go and get packed!’

  She flared up with one final moment of bravado, ‘I’m not packing. You go up there yourselves, and collect her things. Probably all over the place anyway. I’m not going to look for them.’ She threw herself into a chair, and immediately leaped up again. ‘Of course I’m not letting you go up there by yourselves! Senta! Anna!’ Two maids appeared. She said something to them in Swedish, which we didn’t understand. We went upstairs.

  Little heads were peering out of all the doors, frightened, curious, excited faces. No one spoke; one girl curtsied awkwardly, then others. We were up in Ada’s dormitory; the four little girls who were in it huddled shyly in a corner. We opened the cupboard and the Princess asked about a suitcase. Yes, the child had brought one, but it was up in the loft.

  ‘Would you please . . .’ One of the maids went. The Princess cleared out the cupboard.

  ‘This? And this one?’ The door flew open, and Frau Adriani swept into the room.

  ‘I want to see just what she’s taking! I expect you’ll probably pinch a few things while you’re about it!’ She was a bad loser – but who can remain decent when they’ve lost the contest?

  ‘You can see everything for yourself, and besides – Hey!’ She had made for the child, who ducked away. I stepped between them hastily. For a moment we looked at each other, Frau Adriani and I; there was enough physical intimacy in that look to make me shudder. This struggle was the obverse of love – like any struggle. And in those eyes I saw a deep chasm: this woman had never been satisfied, never. The old cynical prescription flashed through my brain:

  Rp.

  Penis normalis

  dosim

  Repetatur!

  But that was not all. The atavistic drive of mankind was rampant in her: for power, power, power. Nothing hurts such a creature more than an unexpected rebellion. A world collapses. Spartacus . . . So many children were suffering here. I could have hit her. She shrank away.

  The maid arrived with the suitcase; we packed in silence. Once the woman grabbed a little blouse and then threw it down again. The child held onto the Princess’ hand. The little girls in the corner hardly dared to breathe. Frau Adriani looked over to them and jerked her head, they shuffled out of the door. The suitcase was shut. One of the maids wanted to help – Frau Adriani forbade it with a gesture. The suitcase wasn’t heavy. The child followed quickly; she wasn’t crying any more. Once I heard her take a deep breath.

  ‘The receipt?’ Frau Adriani went over to her desk, scribbled something on a piece of paper, and gave it to me, as though with a pair of firetongs. I very nearly felt sorry for her, but I knew how dangerous and how wasted such pity was. It wouldn’t even have done her any good, because she would have used that emotional honorarium to buy herself some new props, and the whole business would begin all over again. I gave her the cheque. I watched her face. The curtain was down – there was no more acting. The show was over.

  Slowly we left the house where the little girl had suffered so much.

  None of us looked back. The door closed behind us.

  2

  The last day . . .

  I’m already dressed in my travelling-clothes, there is a remoteness between Lake Maelar and myself; we address each other formally.

  The long hours where nothing happened; only the wind fanning my body, the sun shining. The long hours where I gazed at the water, the leaves hissed gently, and the lake splashed against the shore; empty hours in which energy, intellect, health and strength can be replenished from the reservoir of nothingness, from that mysterious store which will one day be empty. ‘I’m afraid,’ the storeman will say, ‘we have nothing left . . .’ And I suppose that’s when I shall have to lie down.

  There’s Gripsholm. Why don’t we stay here for good? We could take lodgings for a long period, sign a lease with the lady of the castle, it wouldn’t
even be that expensive, and then we would always have blue skies and grey skies, sun, sea-breath, fish and whisky – holidays forever.

  No, it’s not feasible. When you move, your worries follow you. If you’re only staying somewhere for four weeks, you can laugh at everything – even the little unpleasantnesses. They don’t concern you. If you stay there forever, though, you have to be involved. ‘It’s beautiful here,’ Charles V said once to a prior whose monastery he was visiting. ‘Transeuntibus!’ replied the prior. ‘Beautiful? Yes, if you’re passing through.’

  Our last day. In all those weeks, we’d never had such a refreshing swim as this. The warm wind had never been so kind. The sun had never shone so brightly. Not as on this last day; last day of the holidays – last day of summer! A last sip of red wine, a last day of love! Another day, another ship, another hour! Another half-hour . . .! When the taste is most delicious, it’s time to stop.

  ‘Today is today,’ said the Princess – because now everything was ready for our departure: suitcases, handbags, dachshund, the little thing and us.

  ‘You look a right mess!’ Lydia said to me as we were going to say goodbye to the lady of the castle. ‘You must have shaved with a cheese-grater! One really can’t leave the boy on his own for a moment!’

  I rubbed my chin ruefully, got out a mirror and hastily put it away again.

  There was a lot of palaver with the castle-lady. ‘Tack . . . thank you . . .’ and, ‘Thank you very much! . . . Tack so mycket . . .’ and, ‘All the best!’ – a friendly and animated to-ing and fro-ing. And then we took little Ada by the hand, each of us picked up a bag, there was the little car . . . Away.

  ‘Holiday jok,’ I said. Jok is Turkish and means ‘gone’.

  ‘You really don’t miss anything, do you,’ said the Princess combing the child’s hair.

  ‘Lydia, I’d never have guessed you’d make such a good nanny! What great qualities you keep hidden away!’

  ‘Just because I happen to be like an onion!’ said the Princess, thereby disclosing, perhaps unwittingly, the essential nature of all her sex.