The orchestra returns to the stage and the buzz of chatter increases in the hall. Joel peers at the wall where the girls had gathered in little groups. Still no sign of Gertrud. But the Caviar Man has re-appeared. He’s standing with a group of other young men in front of the stage. They are in a circle with their heads down. Joel can see that they are looking at something, but no matter how hard he tries, he can’t make out what it is.
Kringström starts stamping his foot again, the red and yellow lights are switched on, and he raises his saxophone to his mouth. But the group of young men in front of the stage have their backs turned on the orchestra. They are laughing at whatever it is they’re looking at. The saxophone is playing, but the young men are laughing. The Caviar Man is laughing louder than anybody else.
Then Joel realises what it is they’re laughing at.
The Caviar Man is holding a sheet of paper. A sheet of paper that Joel recognises.
It’s the letter from Gertrud. The letter Joel had written himself. On his dad’s writing paper.
Joel goes all stiff. The Caviar Man is showing his mates the letter from Gertrud, the letter that Joel wrote. He is showing the secret letter to his friends. And they are all laughing. They’re laughing so loudly that you can hardly hear the saxophone.
Only a couple of minutes ago, he had started to love somebody. Sara.
Now he was starting to hate the Caviar Man. And when Joel sees that they have stopped laughing, and the Caviar Man tears the letter into little pieces and drops them on the floor, where a thousand heels will grind them into the dust, Joel hates the man more than he has ever hated any other person before. It’s as if the Caviar Man had trampled on Gertrud...
Joel walks away. He goes down the stairs leading to the back door where they had carried in the instruments. He unlocks it and goes out. It’s autumn now. Cold, with a sky full of stars. You can hardly hear the saxophone any more. But the Caviar Man’s laughter is still echoing inside his head.
It’s noisy in front of the Community Centre. All the people Engman refused to allow in are gathered there. Somebody is holding onto a drainpipe and throwing up. A portable gramophone is blaring out from a passing car.
Then Joel sees Gertrud.
She’s standing in the shadows on the other side of the street. Staring up at the illuminated entrance.
Don’t go in, Joel thinks. Go home. The Caviar Man is not worth having. I was wrong...
Gertrud takes a pace forward. She’s now in the light from a lamppost. Joel can see that she’s wearing her best overcoat. The one she made herself from curtains and dresses, with fox fur trim. Where her nose ought to be she has her best handkerchief, the one made of Chinese silk.
She sets off over the road towards the entrance. Joel runs over to her. He stops in front of her, in the middle of the street.
‘Joel!’ she says in surprise. ‘What a funny hat you’re wearing!’
‘Don’t go in there,’ says Joel. ‘Don’t do it.’
‘I feel like dancing,’ she says.
‘Don’t go in there,’ Joel says again.
She stares at him in astonishment.
‘What’s the matter with you?’ she asks. ‘I have to meet somebody in there.’
‘I know,’ says Joel. ‘Don’t go.’
Gertrud can’t understand what’s going on. What does he mean? And why is he dressed up? Wearing a strange hat and glasses?
Now she turns serious. Her voice is sharp. As sharp as a knife, Joel thinks. She’s going to cut me open.
‘What do you know?’ she asks. She’s speaking so loudly that some of the young people loitering nearby start to show an interest, and listen to what’s going on.
‘What do you know?’ She’s almost bellowing now. ‘WHAT DO YOU KNOW?’
‘It was me who wrote those letters,’ Joel shouts. ‘I didn’t mean any harm!’
Gertrud looks at him. Her eyes are like ice.
‘I didn’t mean any harm,’ says Joel again. ‘I thought you and the Caviar Man could get married.’
‘The Caviar Man?’ she exclaims. ‘What are you talking about?’
She grabs hold of him. Gives him a good shaking. Curious onlookers gather round. Form a circle round them. A car that can’t get past sounds its horn angrily.
‘What are you talking about?’ she bellows again.
‘It was me who wrote those letters,’ yells Joel.
She eyes him up and down. The penny drops.
Then she boxes his ears. His hat and glasses fall off and dance around on the cobblestones. She hits Joel so hard that his head is buzzing. He almost falls over. As if through a fog, he sees Gertrud running away. Her coat is fluttering like a bird with a broken wing. All around him people are laughing and giggling.
‘What’s going on here?’ somebody asks.
‘Noseless Gertrud has been fighting,’ somebody answers.
Joel wishes there was a manhole cover in front of his feet. So that he could lift it up and disappear into the Underworld. Perhaps there is a passage down there that leads to the sea? Or a tunnel that runs to where Mummy Jenny is?
He picks up the hat and glasses, and runs away.
Behind him, he can hear people laughing.
Gertrud has vanished.
His cheeks are burning. Now I’m on fire, Joel thinks. That dream has come true. I’ve started to burn. Before long there’ll be flames coming from my cheeks.
He keeps on running all the way home. When he gets there he feels as if he were going to be sick.
Life has suddenly become so hard.
There are too many questions.
Maybe that’s what distinguishes children from grown-ups, he thinks.
Understanding that there are so many questions that don’t have answers?
He trudges slowly up the stairs.
All the time, in his mind’s eye, he can see Gertrud in front of him.
Her coat flapping like the broken wing of a bird.
You can get lost inside yourself, Joel thought.
You don’t have to go into the forest in order to get lost.
You have Day and Night inside yourself. And when twilight falls inside you, the shadows become so long...
11
Joel couldn’t hide his misery.
Needless to say, Samuel realised immediately that there was something wrong.
That was also the fault of Eklund and the Ljusdal bus. Before the accident, Samuel had been like all other grown-ups. Easily fooled. If Joel didn’t want to tell his dad that he wasn’t feeling very well, or that he hadn’t been to school, Samuel never noticed a thing. And as he didn’t notice anything, he didn’t ask any questions. But that was before the accident. Now Samuel seemed to look at Joel in a different way. Not a day went by without Samuel asking Joel how he was. It had become more difficult to fool Samuel.
Joel was awake when Samuel got back home. It was turned midnight.
‘Are you still awake?’ Samuel asked. ‘Why aren’t you asleep?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Joel. ‘But I’m going to put the light out now.’
‘I can tell you that dancing was great fun,’ said Samuel. ‘That was a terrific idea you came up with.’
Samuel switched off the light and left. Joel had a bit of a stomachache. His face no longer hurt from the slap Gertrud had given him. The pain had crept down into his stomach. But it wasn’t the usual stomachache. It felt as if there were fingers inside there, scratching him.
Joel had felt the same kind of pain once before. It was when he thought Samuel had abandoned him, and vanished in the same way as his Mummy Jenny. On that occasion, Joel had thrown a stone through Sara’s window.
If only he could have told Samuel what had happened! The whole complicated story that had begun when Joel had been careless and fallen under the Ljusdal bus. The good deed he’d tried to carry out; but everything had gone wrong.