The fish, in sharp focus, fills the centre of the frame along with the branch and the hand holding it. Beyond the hand Qvigstad’s arm arcs back towards his head, which will probably be blurred, but still recognizable. I use a wide aperture. Mount Vuorje in the background and the dark clouds against the blue sky will be dimly visible.
‘With that hat and beard you look like a highwayman — except there aren’t any highways here.’
Clutching my camera like a priest his prayer book, I move closer.
‘This is lake trout,’ he says, pointing to the fish, ‘red belly. Much bigger than the other sort.’
I would like to prolong our conversation, but can’t think of anything more to say. Qvigstad is one of those people you feel like asking: What do you really think of me? (but who’d ever ask such a question?), to which he’d say: Nothing at all (but who’d ever give such an answer?).
We are joined by Mikkelsen, after which the three of us walk back to the tents. Mikkelsen takes the stick with the fish from Qvigstad, saying:
‘It is not surprising that the founders of great religions were mostly fishermen.’
‘Is that so?’ I ask, to humour him.
‘Of all the things going on in the world, life under water is the least visible to man. Nothing is further removed from us than the world under water. That’s why the water world is the most powerful symbol of the afterlife. Heaven is reflected in water. Fishermen know more about the water world than anybody else. They take out creatures never seen before, they sink to the bottom in a shipwreck. That’s why all the great prophets are fishermen.’
‘And they drown, too,’ Qvigstad says. ‘A most intelligent interpretation — had it been you writing history.’
Back at the tents he squats down and starts gutting the fish with a knife as big as the ones Lapps wear on their belts.
Arne is busy folding the net into zigzag pleats. Mikkelsen goes off to cook porridge on the primus. I have nothing to do. It is probably wiser not to help my companions at all than to hinder them. They have been on dozens of these expeditions before. They know exactly how things should be done, or in any case how they want them to be done. If I offered to help they’d be too polite to say no, but what they’d be thinking is: it takes ages to explain exactly what he’s supposed to do, and as he’s so inexperienced we can do everything in half the time.
Still, I am thankful no-one has mentioned my mishap in the river yesterday. Not that they have any reason to complain. I didn’t cause a delay. I managed to keep the contents of the rucksack dry, and not a peep from me about the pain in my knees. So as not to stand around idle I go over to Arne’s tent and get out my notebook. I reread what I wrote yesterday, adding a comment here and there. My entries up to now don’t promise much in the way of new perspectives. Nor have I observed anything to support Sibbelee’s bold hypothesis. This queasiness in my stomach — could it just be that I’m hungry, or is it the smell of paraffin, burnt porridge and fried fish? In the meantime I ponder the definition of scientific practice. Does hunting for something no-one has found yet and then not finding it count as practising science, or as bad luck? Or is it a sign of insufficient talent? Who’s to say? A terrible fear wells up in me: having to go home empty-handed. Nothing to show for myself but a pack of nice colour snapshots, just the thing for handing round during family gatherings. Nothing that might impress either Sibbelee or Nummedal.
‘Breakfast ready!’ Mikkelsen shouts.
I go over to them and sit down.
It is beginning to dawn on me that Qvigstad seizes every opportunity of putting one over on Mikkelsen.
I have never seen Mikkelsen laugh, anyway his face is totally unsuited to expressions of amusement. And his skin, pale and dingy with yellowish down, is at pains to hold his lumpy frame together. His arms are thick and flabby like the arms of a female harpist. Were it not for his sturdy boots, shabby head gear (no head-net) and stained work shirt, you wouldn’t think he was up to much. But he is — he can carry the heaviest of loads and take the most perilous of leaps without difficulty.
If you saw him in a pavement café, smartly dressed (navy blue blazer, grey flannels), you would probably take him for some milksop who spent his allowance on flowers for darling Mummy. The type who gets to be called ‘Buddy’ by everyone after two days in military service … unless he’s taking a swipe at his fellow conscripts, that is. That’ll be another thing Mikkelsen’s good at, I don’t doubt — not a sound, not a flicker of emotion crossing his pasty face.
Naturally Qvigstad never says anything that might provoke Mikkelsen into demonstrating what he is capable of. All he does is take issue with practically everything Mikkelsen says, not that he says much.
‘But still,’ Mikkelsen says, ‘no-one can deny there must have been a god who made everything.’
‘The number of suppositions no-one can deny is infinite,’ Qvigstad says. ‘Just as infinite as the ways in which you cannot split an atom. That doesn’t get us anywhere.’
I eat fish with a grubby fork from a grubby plate. The fish tastes so delicious I would gladly launch into a panegyric! For the first time in my life it dawns on me what all those back-to-nature philosophers are on about. I am happy. I am eating a fish of such noble taste and freshness as is not elsewhere to be had for love nor money. Take away the fishing net, frying pan, margarine, matches to light the fire, and you’re left with food that owes nothing to civilisation. Now I know why Negroes and Indians didn’t bother to invent blenders or refrigerators, and never again will I laugh at the cranks who dismiss civilisation as a form of collective insanity. Oh for a Lapp to appear at my side! I would press him to my heart, now that I know what riches he personifies.
‘But anyway,’ Mikkelsen flounders on in his broken English, ‘anyway God must have created the universe, it is what people believe all over the world.’
‘So what does that prove?’
‘That people need an explanation.’
‘Oh, come on. All it proves is that people content themselves with an explanation that doesn’t explain anything.’
Arne tugs at my sleeve, saying:
‘Hark the great Qvigstad! In his element, he is.’
‘Listen here, my boy,’ Qvigstad says. ‘The one problem all those so-called gods never tackle is the origin of matter. Take the Edda, or whatever you like. Snorre Sturlason maintains that it started out with the creation of Niflheim and Muspelheim. Out of what, may I ask? The Edda doesn’t tell us, nor does Snorre. Between Niflheim and Muspelheim lay the yawning void called Ginnungagap, in which the streams coming from Niflheim froze solid. Sparks from Muspelheim fell on the ice, and the resulting pairing of heat and cold gave rise to a hermaphrodite giant by the name of Ymir. Fascinating I grant you, but that is not the point. The point is that you never get to hear where it all came from. Ymir fell asleep and sweated profusely. Then a man and a woman grew under his left arm.’
‘That’s it, then,’ I say. ‘Once you’ve got a man and a woman the rest is history.’
‘Don’t be so sure. One of Ymir’s feet had intercourse with the other, and Bor was the result. Bor, remember, the one who fathered three sons with Bestla the female giant: Odin, Vili and Ve.’
‘Anyway,’ Mikkelsen says, ‘all those myths may be ridiculous, but that doesn’t mean to say that there wasn’t a god who created the universe. God is a great mathematician, Einstein said so himself.’
‘Einstein said: a mathematician, Snorre Sturlason said: sweaty feet. This just goes to prove that people can only talk about things they have personal knowledge of. Explaining the origin of matter is something not even a dervish would have the nerve to attempt. What doesn’t take any nerve is making up stories about what some god or other did with the stuff once it existed.’