When they moved out to Bromma from the apartment in the city, his wife had sometimes teased him. “God, how nice,” she used to say, “that we finally have a fireplace so I don’t have to watch you starting fires in the kitchen sink.” Berg had taken it with a sense of humor, for he knew better, but, with all respect to modern paper shredders-he of course had one of the latest and best models at home-when it came to destroying papers, fire was superior to anything else. First you started the fire and then you were careful to crush and powder the ashes.
There were three levels to what Forselius had said. On the first level was the basic question of whether there was any truth in his musings or whether he was just imagining things. Berg had discussed just that aspect with him extensively. Forselius was widely known for his capacity for critical thinking and not least when it came to questioning himself, his own ideas, his own intellectual capacity, his own motives. “In the world in which I live there is no room for either lies or wishful thinking,” he had said to Berg the first time they met.
Of course Berg had also tried to press him on this point. How did he himself view the suspicions that Krassner had sown in his mind?
“If it was a question of placing bets I’d put my money on the fact that he knows something and he knows it’s true and it’s even so bad he can prove it’s true.”
Here Forselius had started to laugh a little while he supplied himself with a fresh cognac.
“What he knows and how much he knows?” Forselius shrugged his shoulders in an eloquent gesture.
“You have no ideas on that point?” asked Berg.
“Well,” said Forselius. “If it hadn’t been the case that he’s related to my old acquaintance, then I probably would have decided that he was only trying to get attention. Or that he was out snooping around in the most general way, as is the custom with that kind of humanist hack.”
Forselius took a hefty gulp from his large snifter.
“As I’m sure you see this hangs together,” Forselius continued. “True or false? If it’s false, stop and do something else instead. If it’s true, completely or only partly, we go ahead. What is true and what is false? When we find that out we can swing ourselves up to the highest level. Is that which is true actually interesting and in that case to whom? Whatever the case, these are empirical questions and you of course can resort to that sly type with the watch and those fancy clothes for the real heavy work.”
Here the chuckling had turned into a minor coughing attack.
“Exactly like when you break a code,” said Berg.
“Well,” said Forselius. “As a general description perhaps, but completely uninteresting when you’re going to do it. You’re a good man, Berg, and you are of course no numbskull, but in my world…”
Forselius made a gesture with his hands.
“I know, I know,” said Berg. “Math was never my strong suit when I was in school.”
That’s how it’ll be, thought Berg, and how do I get Waltin to do his utmost without giving him all the pieces? As far as he was concerned he knew exactly what he should do. He didn’t intend to utter a syllable to anyone about Forselius’s suspicions. First he would see about getting onto more solid ground, and once he had done so he could take a position on how he should act regarding the top level in his world. Whom he should inform about what.
In the elevated and beautiful world where Forselius and his ilk were, where everything, even chaos, could be ordered and described and explained with the help of symbols and functions, there was naturally no place for disturbing human factors of the type that afflicted Berg in particular when he came to his workplace on Monday morning.
“Welcome,” said his secretary, smiling. “You’ve received an invitation to a very fine lunch.”
“When?” asked Berg.
“Today,” said his secretary. “The prime minister’s special adviser called awhile ago and wondered if you had time to have lunch with him today. He wants you to call him.”
“How did he sound?” said Berg, and even as he said it he regretted it.
“He sounded very nice,” said the secretary, surprised. “Why? Has something happened?”
Berg shook his head. If I have time? What choice do I have? None, he thought.
On the surface he had been his usual self, the same half-closed eyelids, the same sarcastic curl of the lips, and the same reclining position, in spite of the fact that he was actually eating. It was his manner that bothered Berg deeply. For in a purely objective sense, if you looked at what he really said and how he said it, he had been nice to Berg. An obliging and entertaining host at a lunch, quite simply. Furthermore, in a place to which few had access. One of the government’s most exclusive guest dining rooms at Rosenbad.
Both his behavior and his choice of milieu disturbed Berg more than if he had tried to grab hold of Berg and butt heads with him. That’s no doubt the point of this playacting, he thought. Calm, he thought. Just calm, calm, calm.
“It was nice to get to see you for lunch, Berg,” said the special adviser, raising his glass of mineral water.
“Nice to be here,” said Berg neutrally, and replied by raising his near beer.
“I thought that our most recent meeting was enormously positive. I got a definite feeling that we actually started to approach those matters that both you and I are assigned to manage.”
Are you being ironic, you bastard? thought Berg and contented himself with nodding.
“I’m not being ironic so don’t misunderstand me,” said the prime minister’s special adviser, making a slightly dismissive motion with his left hand. “What I mean is that both you and I, each in his own place, are prisoners of our various contexts.”
Now where are you going with this? thought Berg and was content to nod again.
“Quite a few years ago, when I was doing my military service, at the kind of place that one can’t talk about-but you already know that, of course-I wrote an essay about mirror war.”
“That sounds interesting. I’m listening,” said Berg.
“Of course my thesis was based on the special operation in which I was serving at the time. I had a superior, if you please, and mine in particular was in a league of his own. He was a very talented and exceptionally cussed old son of a bitch, and I myself was only eighteen years old.”
Forselius, thought Berg, so now I know and he knows that I know, and why does he want me to know that he knows too?
“Basically it dealt with what we say to one another, in speech, in writing, with gestures and glances and in all other manners and means. For example, by not saying or doing anything whatsoever. Or just by avoiding the reaction that our opponent is expecting.” Berg contented himself with nodding; he had set his fork and knife aside.
“The ideal communication in the best of all possible worlds, populated only by good people… How does that look? To begin with, it is true. The sender is not mistaken on that point. What he or she is saying is actually true. In addition it is important to both the sender and the recipient, and in the best of worlds all communications are of course good. They are of use both to the sender and to the recipient and for the world around them.”
“The best of worlds,” said Berg, as he experienced a remarkable sense of peace, which he hadn’t felt for a long time.
“Compare that with the world in which you and I live. I couldn’t help seeing what you were thinking when I mentioned that I knew Forselius, in spite of the fact that you have a face that a poker shark would give his dealing hand for.”