I struck lucky with that programme. A commentary in one newspaper said that I had cut through the whole debate as to where the new opera house should be situated. I had shown that the opera lay here, in the heart of the rugged Norwegian countryside. Norway was opera.
Once when she was telling a story from The Mahabharata, Kamala mentioned one of the weapons which Drona the master gave to the hero Arjuna; an astra which could hold all the warriors on a battlefield spellbound by the illusions it created. ‘That’s pretty much what you did with your television programmes,’ she said to me.
One writer pointed out that, seen from above, this landscape, with the arms of the fjord reaching deep into the country, looked not unlike a network of nerve fibres, and as such could lead one to think, or imagine, that one was inside the brain, in the area relating to hearing, the enjoyment of sounds — or indeed, why not: inside the nervous system of love itself. I have heard that this place, the grassy bank running down to the water at the head of Finnafjord, has become a sacred spot of sorts for lovers. Quite a number of bridal couples have reportedly gone there after their weddings.
There would come a day when it would dawn on me that with this scene I had not only unwittingly reflected one of the happiest moments in my life, but that I had also prefigured the unhappiest. For a moment, as I sat there on the floor of Villa Wergeland, with Margrete’s lifeless head in my lap, I had a feeling of stepping outside of myself, of being lifted up; of seeing myself and Margrete on the living-room floor from a great height. A picture of dead love.
For a long, long time I sat there with her head in my lap, looking round about me. Looking at all the blood. Outside the sky was red, lit up, so it seemed by a huge flare. For one bewildered second I had the idea that she had been shot by some incensed viewer. Or rather: I hoped. But I had known straight away. She had shot herself. Right before I got home. And something told me that her mind had been perfectly clear when she chose to curl her finger around the trigger. That she had not been consumed by the darkness. That she may merely have seen the darkness approaching. And that she had done it not because of me, but — however inconceivable it seemed — for my sake. Shot herself in the heart. In her innermost chambers. Those four strokes at the centre of the Chinese character for love. Distraught though I was, behind it all there was a feeling of anger. You simply did not do something like this. Something so brutal. Why not pills? She was a doctor, for Christ’s sake. She could have cut her wrists, the way other women do. But this was Margrete. And I knew nothing about her. It was almost as if she wanted to show me that I had not understood a single thing.
Why did she do it?
I cursed my stupidity; to think that, in a fit of paranoia and worry about our safety, I had shown her that bloody gun, which I kept in the cupboard in my workshop. I had even had it primed and loaded. I had received threats after a programme on immigrants — I may even have been a little bit proud of this, proud that — after all those tame light-entertainment shows — I had once again made a programme with the ability to shock, something with a touch of dangerous originality. I let her hold the gun, an old Luger, a relic of an enigmatic grandfather. I showed her, solemnly almost, ceremoniously, how to release the safety catch. She had muttered something about Hedda Gabler. Smiled. I eyed the gun lying there on the living-room floor, with its remaining bullets. Gently I removed her head from my lap. I picked up the pistol. It seemed suddenly heavier. I put it to my head. I beheld her, with the gun muzzle pressed against my temple. It was almost as though I saw her — her beauty — for the first time.
I had had this same thought that time when I ran into her again, while I was studying architecture. Suddenly, one day, there she was. She had left me on a winter day in the rain and now, on a spring day years later, there she was again, in that same soft rain, as if she had only gone behind a waterfall and now calmly stepped out again.
I stood for a long time staring in disbelief at the more mature, but just as unmistakeable face, there, right in front of me, in a web of water. I was overcome by a sense of touching wonderful depths. Meeting Margrete again, being faced with that rather diffident smile, was like seeing a whole lot of tangled threads gather themselves into one solid, conclusive knot, like receiving a sign that everything had a purpose. I remembered the stories of people who lost gold rings only to find them twelve years later, inside a potato, or a fish.
It’s hard to describe the sort of first impression Margrete could make. Once, for example, when she was eighteen, she was on a plane: as the daughter of a diplomat she travelled a lot and usually first class. Someone came over and placed a hand on her shoulder — a young man, the heir to the throne of a small but wealthy country in the East. He asked her to marry him. Right out of the blue, but most formally. She knew right away that he was not just flirting with her, he was offering her the life of a princess. Such was the effect the sight of Margrete had on some people.
Including me. I stood in the soft spring rain, trying to take it in. The unusual orange coat. Her ‘Persian’ beauty. Her eyes. Those black pupils in irises shot with gold. She stood there glowing, shining, at me. I remembered what my old neighbour, Karen Mohr, had once said: ‘Someone looks at you — and everything changes.’ When Margrete fixed her eyes on me, it felt as though I had not been seen in a very long time. As if I had been invisible for years. I stood there before her and I was discovered.
I had, of course, always cherished a hope of meeting her again, quite by accident like this, at a tram stop. I had dreamt of this scene a thousand times. And even though, deep down, I knew the chances of it happening were very slim, one thought was always there: I swore that I would not fall in love. And not only that — as if it were the twin of the hope of seeing her again, I toyed with the notion of revenge. Even when I ran into her again on that spring day and could hardly believe it, my luck, this merciful turn of events, for a fleeting moment I did also consider paying her back for the pain she had caused me in seventh grade.
The spring after the break-up outside the Golden Elephant restaurant was the most miserable of my life. It’s easy to joke about it today, but when you’re in seventh grade and you’re unhappy, there is no end to how miserable you can be. When summer came I went into hiding on Hvaler, I camped out at Smalsund, in the very south of the island, could not face being at the house with everybody else; they left me alone, understood that I was upset, merely made sure that I had everything I needed, some food and, most important of alclass="underline" batteries. I was a castaway. I lay out on the rocks, just me and a couple of mink which soon got used to me; I simply lay there, flat out, stupefied by sunshine and the sparkling sea, listening to the waves, the water lapping and splashing right at my feet, for all the world as if the elements shared my grief, were sobbing with me. I was a real ‘nowhere man, sitting in his nowhere land’. The holidays were almost over and I had worn Rubber Soul thin, playing it on a battery-driven Bambino record player. That LP had spun round and round all summer long, like a black sun next to my head, and was now as bent out of shape as I felt in my mind. I had long since memorised every song on it, but still listened intently for something in the background hiss, behind the music, like one of those indefatigable, ever-hopeful scientists who listens out for radio signals from outer space. I lay there and I knew: I had to do something.