Wild Duck revisited
by John Fajo
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2002, 2012
Proofreading and short description: Christine Kecskemeti (2011)
Cover design and editing: Csaba Mengyan (2011)
For correspondence write to johnfajo@zoho.com
License Notes
Thank you for downloading this free ebook. Although this is a free book, it remains the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be reproduced, copied and distributed for commercial or non-commercial purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage everyone to download their own copy.
Chapter 1: First Act
He took a last good look at himself in the glass facade of the new headquarters building before going in; his tie and suit seemed fine. He had to be neat, after all, company chief, Werle, didn’t hold dinner parties too often, especially one in which he was invited. The building, he now entered, was prestigious in appearance representing power and might. Its construction was just recently finished, and it consisted of the most novel materials. With 20 stories shooting to the sky, outside elevators, and an overall post-post-post-modernist architecture, it looked down on the city from a hilltop. “Development and improvement,” was the slogan of chief Werle, and it showed on the company.
He entered the building and went to the reception desk. “I have come for the dinner party,” he told the receptionist, a young woman he had never seen before.
“May I have your invitation card?” she asked. He was baffled, because he had no invitation card, and blushed.
“I work for the company,” he said. The woman looked at him demandingly, and a grimace appeared on her face as if saying “I have never seen you here before”. “I mean, I usually prepare the presentation material, you know... the leaflets and brochures, and the computer imaging of course,” he said. “Gregers Werle has invited me. I didn’t know an invitation card was needed; he told me nothing.”
“Just a moment,” the receptionist said, and after a short conversation on the phone, instructed him: “take the elevator to the 14th floor, and on your right, you’ll find the conference hall.”
He thanked the woman reluctantly, and went to the elevator. Somehow he found his suit awkward to wear, it wasn’t tight or loose; he simply wasn’t used to wearing suits. He looked back over his shoulder to the receptionist, who sat there morosely. Despite her demeanor, he thought her pretty with a nice face and body. Women in the north were the most beautiful, he pondered as he stepped into the elevator. He used the short ascent to take a look at the city outside, sparkling in the night. Everything looked different from here; as if it was a different world. He tried to find his workshop, but he couldn’t locate it, it was in the eastern side of the city, on the outskirts.
When he got out of the elevator he almost stumbled on his schoolmate and old friend Gregers whom he hadn’t seen for ages. At first they looked at each other, then a joyful expression emerged on their faces, and they embraced each other with the fierceness of youth as if trying to continue where they had left off.
“It must be 15 years,” Gregers exclaimed excitedly.
“Actually almost 16,” he said with joy filling his heart. “Damn, I sure missed you,” they mutually agreed on that.
“Come, Hjalmar,” Gregers told him “we have time to talk before the dinner party commences, my father is tied up with some overseas investors, so he will be late as usual. There is a personal bar around the corner.”
They went to a small meeting room which ended in a bar.
“What would you like to drink?” Gregers asked him, but for a moment he couldn’t respond, because he was amazed at the richness of choice and because he usually didn’t drink. “You will like this 50-year-old, excellent Tokay. We weren’t even in the making when the grapes were harvested for this one.” He nodded. He knew Gregers had good and sophisticated taste. “Old chap, you sure live well,” Gregers said pointing to his paunch.
He smiled and waved his hands. “I can’t complain. I picked up some weight,” he blushed vaguely, “I’m a family man now, you know.”
“No kidding,” Gregers showed sincere surprise. “I didn’t know. Why didn’t we keep in touch?”
Gregers asked himself, but he thought he had to answer. “Even your father couldn’t keep track of the places you went to. How many times did you go around the world?”
“Can’t remember.” They laughed.
“You must have met a lot of people.”
“I sure have. Went to a lot of parties, saw good and evil... But you know what? Seeing you now again makes me feel at home. All these years I have been running, and although I met a lot of people I have always felt lonely. Sure wish you could have come.”
“16 years on the run is not something for me. You know that I don’t even like to travel that much. It’s tiring, isn’t it?” Gregers hummed. “What were you running from?”
“From everything. But mostly from myself.” They laughed, but this wasn’t a hearty laugh, rather a contemptuous, self-loathing one. “My mother died, your dad got into that trouble. I just had to get away.”
“Those were hard times for me as well.” He drank his wine in one gulp. “Father went to jail; I suffered a nervous breakdown... I would really have needed a friend.” He looked at Gregers, his eyes showed deep sorrow. He usually tried to hide his emotions, but he felt untethered from his inhibitions now. His best friend, the party maker was back.
“I am terribly sorry,” Gregers said and patted him on the shoulder. “I couldn’t stay.” Gregers poured him another glass of wine. “Somehow I felt responsible for your woes, because of my father, that is. After all, they were partners, before...”
“Before my father was sentenced and yours acquitted,” he said with a slight sharpness in his voice. “I couldn’t understand since what happened. Dad never talks about it. I just simply cannot imagine that he could cheat those pensioners out of their savings. It makes no sense.”
Gregers hummed distressed. He glimpsed at him, looking up from his glass. He realised that he had to change the topic. ”What about the babes?”
“The babes? What babes?” Gregers pretended to have no knowledge of any babes whatsoever, but he remembered him being called the Oksen, the ugly furry northern grazing mammal, known to have very small brains. “Oh, I get it. I changed a lot. I was alone, and this gave me time to think. I’m not the insane animal I used to be. I think when I acted irrationally back then, it was always because I was running from something.”
“Are you running now?”
“No, not any more. That’s why I came back. To face my destiny. A man has got to do what a man has got to do.” He wasn’t certain what Gregers could have meant about facing his destiny. Perhaps taking over the company soon?
“So, I hear you will be vice president,” he said enviously, though he attempted not to sound so. Gregers noticed the tone and tried to downplay the importance of the vice presidency.
“It’s not a big deal. My father’s gonna run the business in the future as well. But you know, he’s getting into politics.” Gregers went silent for a second. “So, you are married?”
“Yes, I am,” he said proudly, “got a 15-year-old daughter as well.” He rummaged in his pocket, then to hand over a picture of his daughter to Gregers. “She’s pretty, isn’t she?”
Gregers looked at the picture, and nodded. “What about your wife?”
“You know her. It’s Gina.”
“Gina who?”
“She was your father’s secretary for a short time.”
Gregers twisted his lips in an attempt to remember, and then said: “Yes, I know.”
Somehow he didn’t like the way Gregers said this. He felt some untold secret lay behind these words. Things he had suspected for some time, but never dared to think thoroughly through. He would have pondered on this, but Gregers didn’t let him.
“What are you doing nowadays?”
“I’m working for the company. Making presentation materials.”
“Really? Dad didn’t say anything about that.”
He wouldn’t have thought otherwise, he was a mere speck in the company’s immense machinery. With several overseas affiliates, thousands worked for chief Werle. He couldn’t have known all of them.
“Yes, I am really into this computer science. You can create anything with a computer, the virtual becomes real. This is the future,” he said and felt carried away by his own words, his body shook with excitement when he thought of the imagined future.
“I used a computer when I was younger,” Gregers said, “but then I found it was unbelievably dull. Numbers and numbers.”
“No, not at all,” he shouted and shook his head. “A lot has changed since then.”
Gregers didn’t seem convinced. “So you really like what you are doing?”
“Yes, absolutely,” he said as in school when the teacher asked if he had done his homework.
“Of course,” Gregers smiled, ”soon I’ll be boss, and I will need someone I can trust.” He nodded shyly. This was the time when he would have to “go and get it”, as Gina had put it, when he was invited by Gregers. She had thought this would be a great opportunity for him to climb up in the hierarchy of the company, using the son of the chief. But he thought this would be cheating, using an old friendship for monetary purposes. This hadn’t been the way his father had raised him. He liked Gregers for no reason at all.
“Are you going to settle down for good?” he asked.
“It seems so.”
From the corridor people could be heard conversing boisterously. Gregers glanced at him, slanted his head as if telling him that they should go. They put down their glasses, and joined the people outside. They were swarming around Gregers the very instant they emerged from the room. He didn’t know any of them really; he had seen some of them when they had computer problems, and he was then summoned. Otherwise, they never met before. He felt as an outsider, the shadow of Gregers. They shook hands with him, the top executives of the company, but there was no eye contact. They gathered around power, he thought, the heir of the land had come. He was bitter, he felt like a clumsy fool as he supported the corridor wall watching the cheerful crowd. Important people, he thought with the disgust of those who have never been important for anyone in their lives. He knew he wasn’t important to anyone, not even to his father who had drunk himself to benevolent stupidity in the past years. Suddenly his heart eased though, he thought of Hedvig, his daughter. At least there was someone who looked up to him, who had shown him that he was worth something. But how long could that last? Even she was starting to change as she got older, becoming timid to hug or stroke him.
“Dinner is being served.” He could not confuse chief Werle’s voice with anyone’s. It had all the authority the world could muster, the owner responsible for the employment and livelihood of thousands. And the chief knew it. And the chief had everything under control.
They all went into the conference hall the catering service had previously prepared for the occasion. Gregers seated himself by his father’s side, at the other end of the table, almost opposite to him. For a moment he perceived the piercing look of chief Werle, so he looked up from the plates and saw Gregers affectionately discussing something with his father. Then, for an infinitesimally small period, he and Gregers looked at each other; and yet this time was enough for him to comprehend that they were arguing about him. He knew chief Werle thought he had no right to be there, and Gregers tried to convince him of the opposite. He squeezed himself even more, as much as his belly would allow. He didn’t dare look at chief Werle when he proposed a toast to his son, and spoke of the future prospects of the company. He ate his dinner in almost complete silence, and his thoughts wandered to his ancestors. They were something to look up to. The Viking masters of yesterday, the conquerors. When he was down-stricken he liked to think of them and imagine himself in their places. Sailing the high seas, fearing nought. He had the countenance of a Viking, he was tall and strong. He snatched a glimpse at chief Werle, not even enough for his brain to gather the visual information to form a picture of him; it was rather his imagination at work. Chief Werle hadn’t the making of a Viking. Gregers’ father was balding, wearing thick light-sensitive spectacles, and a paunch he could never attain no matter how hard he tried. His figure represented the leader of today though, the man who had all the numbers in his head, and an air of authority. From the abyss of the past he could cite faint memories buried somewhere deep in his soul, images of a Viking master wiping the floor with a slave. The slave would have been half-naked, and would desperately glimpse at the open sky somewhere on the world seas as the Viking master ordered him to row. The slave would be Werle, simply Werle of no authority. He would be the Viking master.
“How is the computer business? Heard a new drive will emerge on the market soon,” an executive abruptly cut his thoughts. He was quick to respond, after all one had to be important for others. One had to be up-to-date.
“Yes, the new millennia have come. It will...,” he started listing all the specifications of the new drive, the patches, the software and the compatibilities. He knew everything about them. He explained with ease and excitement until he realised that the executives had lost interest.
“The best things about computers,” one fat executive said laughing, “are the babes. I mean I click here, I click there and all these boobies appear out of nowhere. You, Hjalmar, just admit it, that’s what you do all the time.”
“Do what?” He swallowed the last bit of his dessert.
“Watch the pussies.” The executives laughed. Even chief Werle laughed. Gregers didn’t laugh though. He was offended, though he didn’t know exactly why. Somehow he felt that with this rude joke the executives laughed at his chosen profession; laughed at him. They were almost saying: “that’s where your kind of little devils can see attractive women, not like us, we have lovers and mistresses all over the place.” He forced a vague smile on himself, trying very hard not to burst into tears or a violent outburst. They were making jokes of him all right. Although he knew it wasn’t true, he thought they had been laughing at him throughout the whole dinner. Laughing at the pussy Viking. He was just a pussy Viking to them.
“Be nice to Mr. Hjalmar,” Gregers told the guests, “he may soon be an important figure at the company.” Gregers tried to imitate being only ostensibly angry. Chief Werle frowned knowing that his son was furious within and for the possibility of a Hjalmar getting to play an important role in the company. At least Gregers could keep it to himself for now.
“Now, now, Mr. Gregers,” the general counselor said. “We weren’t really making jokes of Hjalmar. We were making jokes of ourselves.”
“So you watch babes as well, or rather dudes?” Gregers was referring to the obvious fact that the general counselor was a she. The executives had a good time.
“It’s private,” she said. The cheerfulness was complete now. Even he let loose a smile. He looked at Gregers and he wondered. Was his old schoolmate trying to protect him or was he treading on his father in some way? He admitted that he needed this protection; he was the youngest and, status-wise, weakest in the room. At the same time, he wanted no kind hand to help him through life. This was presently an insoluble paradox to him. If he couldn’t make a stand, he would never be anything in the eyes of the executives.
Suddenly, his thoughts were distracted. “Excuse me,” said an older man in a weary suit emerging from an inner meeting room that had its only entrance through the conference hall. Chief Werle glanced at the old man with demanding eyes. “We were working inside. Just coming through. Have a nice party,” the old man added.
Another older gentleman followed close behind. He was a tall figure, must have been quite a man in his youth. He sighed silently as his father, the tall man stole out of the conference hall quickly. Chief Werle looked at him with despise. He was sorry for his father. But he couldn’t help him, and this hurt. His father lived off the benevolence of chief Werle, just as he did; got his monthly salary from the company.
“I propose a toast to the Ekdal family,” Gregers stood up. Chief Werle shook his head in exasperation. The executives looked at him, the Ekdal at the table, and nodded with dignified pity.
The dinner ended not so much later; everyone started leaving. He went to Gregers, shook his hand and thanked him for inviting him. Gregers told him it was the least he could do. He was about to leave as well, but something kept him back. For some reason, he didn’t know why, he went into the inner meeting room. Perhaps it’s just the way it had to be.
“Everyone left?’ He heard chief Werle saying.
“It seems so, dad.”
“What was all this nonsense with Hjalmar? He is a nice guy, but he will never be more than a computer geek. He is weak; he would never make a good leader.”
“Really? But at least you’re strong, dad,” Gregers sounded ironic. “Everyone is so fucking afraid of you.”
He was not the eavesdropping type, but it would have been very awkward to leave now. And as a matter of fact, he was interested.
“Grow up, son. There are those who rule, and those who want to be ruled. This has always been so. I thought that now you finally came home you would be wiser. Didn’t all this travelling open your eyes?”
“Yes, it has.” There was a moment’s silence. “You forgot to mention that Hjalmar married Gina,” Gregers continued.
“I forgot to mention a lot of things to you. I didn’t mention that I bought a leather shoe 5 years 2 months and 7 days ago,” chief Werle was sarcastic. “So what?”
“So what? Like she was your secretary. Your personal secretary. Very personal indeed.”
“Listen. This is the way it is: you are head of a prosperous company; you have a lot of money, fast sports cars. Then there are these young bitches from the country, who think you are an easy prey. But you are not.”
“That’s very nicely put. Of course you fucked all your secretaries.”
“I didn’t rape them. I didn’t ask for it. Why do you care so much? You want to save the world? You can’t. You can’t even save yourself.”
He couldn’t think. What he had suspected for years now turned out to be true. It hurt all the more, because Gina had always denied it. And with Werle! What an ugly piece of shit she had chosen. He felt dizzy, his sight was blurred. How could she? He stumbled to a chair and sat there, the conversation outside was not entering his head any more. There was no protective dream world around him now, the Viking legend seemed no more than a fairy tale. He tried to think of it, but was unable. There were no high seas, no land to conquer. Only a murky modern meeting room with modern furniture, and a modern smell. There was no scent of the sea.
He didn’t know how much time could have passed; he just noticed the Werles weren’t there any more. He got up and started his way home. The northern wind blew, and it was raining outside as usual.
Chapter 2: Second Act
His flat was above his workshop in a small century-old house. He couldn’t remember anything about his way home. Raindrops fell from his fair hair, and he was drenched to the skin. He must have walked all the way.
“What happened with you?” Gina asked as he entered. “Didn’t you take a taxi?”
“No, no,” he murmured. He didn’t look up. “I needed a walk. I drank too much.”
“I told you to be careful,” Gina said scoldingly. “You’re soaking wet.”
“Where’s the kid?” he enquired as he took off his coat.
“She’s watching television.”
“And dad?”
“He’s in his room... sleeping... presumably.” He knew this meant his father was drinking.
He hummed. Just a couple of months ago Hedvig would have been running to the door to meet him, and hug him. He would have kissed her on the cheek, and they would talk about the day. But now television got hold of her.
He changed clothes, and then went to the living room. Hedvig was there all right, now accompanied by her mother as well. They hardly noticed him. “Hi, dad,” she said her eyes glued to the TV. “Oh, no,” she then suddenly shouted, “they are going to do it.”
“Do what?” he asked, but as they didn’t answer he went to take a look himself. There was a blondie and a fatso, who was the he and who was the she, he couldn’t tell. Anyway, they were in a very obvious position. He was baffled. He glimpsed at 15-year-old Hedvig, and then at his wife. What was going on? “Aren’t you a bit too young for this?” he turned to Hedvig, and then, not waiting for an answer, to Gina “why do you allow her to watch this? She should be in bed. It’s past ten o’clock.”
“Hjalmar, you’re so old-fashioned. She’s virtually a grown-up. Haven’t you noticed? She has to learn what life is about.”
“That’s true, daddy. Most girls in school have already been with a guy.”
His mouth stuck wide open as he had wanted to say something, but froze at hearing such sincere facts of life. He knew Hedvig would leave the family nest sooner or later, and he was happy for that. He would help her in everything as much as he could.
“Big Brother,” Hedvig shouted the name of the program together with the TV as the show was paused and commercial was given. She went to the phone and dialled a 12 digit number.
“Who is she calling?” he asked Gina.
“The Big Brother voting centre. The viewers can decide which player has to leave the show. The most democratic show, indeed.”
“And how much will it cost?” he pointed to the phone. Hedvig grimaced at him.
“You are always so concerned with money,” Gina was about to hold one of her monologues. “That is, if I want to buy some clothes or perfume for myself. Because how I look does matter, you know. A stewardess has to look pretty. Besides I earn more money than you do. I sure hope that Gregers friend of yours gives you a normal job. And just for your information; I paid the phone bill last month, and the month before, and before. You talk on the phone as well, don’t you? With your fishing mates,” she pursed up her lip showing how much she disliked them. “If you would care to make your own business, but no. Fishing mates… Off you go with them, instead of organizing your business.”
Gina had wanted him to start his own business for a long time. She had told him many times that he was a coward who couldn’t free himself from the company.
She was driving at this very same topic now. ”If you could just be a man...” He let her words wash over him, it was late for him, he felt all energy had petered out of him. The advertisement was long; way too long. The monologue ended only when the commercial was over.
There they sat, the two women watching television, him not watching or seeing anything except emptiness. He soon retired to bed and went to sleep.
He dreamed. It was the usual dream, he was the Viking master. The only exceptional thing was how much it resembled reality this time. He could taste the salty air in his mouth when he woke to the sound of the door bell in the morning. He opened the door in pyjamas as Hedvig, his father and Gina had already left, Hedvig to school, Gina to the airport and his father to the headquarters. He could hardly keep his eyes open.
“Do you believe in universal good?” There were two of them, members of some church.
“I just woke up,” he stuttered. “Couldn’t we...”
They could see he wasn’t in a condition to argue. “Because there is a universal good. And there is a God. Do you agree that God is good?”
“Possibly,” he wanted to get back to his dream.
“Once good reigned on the Earth. But then evil came. Once all animals lived in peace and harmony.”
“Really?”
“Yes. There was no violence, no one killed anyone.”
“No one?”
“No one.”
“But what about, say the lion?”
“What about it?” They were the patient kind.
“Lions must have killed back then as well.”
“No, not at all. They didn’t eat meat.”
“What did they eat then?”
“They ate what all other animals ate: grass.”
He started laughing as a child who denies the obvious insanity of grown-ups. “Lions ate grass,” he repeated.
“Yes. All of them ate grass.”
“This doesn’t make sense. Tell me then, why does a lion have canine teeth, and a paw as heavy as a hammer?”
“He has large teeth to be able to eat the dried grass, and heavy paws to be able to dig for it.”
Sleep left him all of a sudden, his eyes were wide open. He knew from earlier experiences that it was no use to argue with religious people. He would only annoy himself.
“So you are saying that God created these killing machines to eat grass.”
“No, God has created them to be peaceful. It was the devil that forced them to taste blood. Our holy quest is to chase away the devil.”
“And to make lions eat grass again.” He was getting annoyed all right.
“Yes,” one of them said as if a lion eating grass would be the most obvious thing in the world. “And there would be love, no more wars, no pain.” He realised it was time to quit this aimless conversation, he believed in evolution and these folks here in lions eating grass. Luckily the phone rang, and he bid them good-bye.
Gregers was on the other end of the line. “Hello, old chap, thought to pop by.”
“Okay,” he said. “I will be down in the workshop. Have to make a presentation for the international fair next month.” He hated to make presentations, because his hands were entirely tied, the marketing decided everything, and of course, chief Werle.
They ended the conversation quickly, and he went down to the workshop. There was silence, only the noises of the sparse traffic emanated from the surroundings. He was frightened. He knew the thoughts would come, no matter how hard he tried to hold them back. And soon the thoughts pervaded him indeed. The funny lion episode was shoved to the side, and he saw Werle and Gina as the two love mates in last night’s Big Brother. Werle looked somewhat like Gregers, the furry Oksen, so ugly that he ceased to be ugly. Gina was very, very passionate.
He turned on the computer; the low buzzing only accentuated the silence. He punched the buttons fiercely, and watched Gregers, no it was Werle, or.... he didn’t know which one and Gina on the monitor.
Then he leaned back, and told himself to think rationally. Like a computer would, if it could. Gina and Werle were together... kind of. Of course she couldn’t tell him, she had known how much he hated Werle. She wanted to protect him. He couldn’t believe himself. He was actually accepting this disgusting relationship. What was wrong with him? Soon Gina would be the victim. Well, she wasn’t. He was the victim, he and his father. They got only what chief Werle had no use for any more. That piece of shit. He often thought about the reasons an ugly-looking, cunning, but not too smart individual, could become a leader. What is it chief Werle had that he hadn’t? Was it some form of a hidden quality, an aura, a charisma? How could it be that his father, offspring of Vikings had failed in life so miserably, while Werle with ancestors not worth mentioning had succeeded? He knew his father hadn’t cheated anyone, it had to be Werle. Was his success a result of perfect unscrupulousness, indecency? But if it was, what does that say about their society?
“Knock, knock,” Gregers arrived earlier than he thought he would. “You have a nice place here.”
“Yes,” he said plainly and offered a seat to Gregers.
“I had a discussion last night with dad, and finally he was supportive that you should become my right hand. Work at the headquarters.” He couldn’t remember Werle being supportive of anything that had to do with him. “So what do you say?” Gregers stretched out his hand. He shook hands with him, somewhat distanced in his mind. He couldn’t imagine a reason why Gregers would need him. As if sensing this Gregers said: “I sure need someone like you. Someone who knows everything about computers. What can one do without them in today’s world?”
He looked at the computer in front of him; it looked somehow less appealing than just a couple of days ago. “Computers are the future,” he could remember saying this the other day to someone. “The virtual becomes real.” He had to modify his opinion. True, the computer was essential in a modern society. It could improve the quality of work if used correctly. It was a fundamental discovery, like the wheel. But what the misty and mystifying sales tactics concealed was that it was just a tool. It had its limitations. Just like the wheel that one couldn’t fly with. If used incorrectly it would simply increase despair, hold one’s mind in a tunnel.
“Hello,” someone said from behind him. He turned around and it was Hedvig as he suspected. For a moment he got worried. “You are not sick, are you?”
“Hello,” she noticed Gregers, who took her hand and kissed it like in the old days.
“Gregers,” Gregers said.
“Hedvig,” Hedvig said. Then facing him, she said: “No, I’m fine.” She turned immediately back to Gregers. “Who are you?”
Gregers explained.
“There is no school today?” he asked.
“I took maths free.”
“What do you mean you took maths free?”
“I discussed it with mom,” she squealed. “There is a test I could never pass.”
“Great. What else is there I don’t know about?” he sounded genuinely angry.
“Don’t take it so hard on her, Hjalmar. She’s just a kid.”
The kid blushed, frowned and was definitely irritated. Gregers noticed, and apologised. “I often skipped my subjects too.” He thought he could strangle his old schoolmate.
“So is the car outside yours?” Hedvig asked as her cheeks were retaining their normal colour.
“You mean the red sports car?” Gregers asked and nodded, smiling.
“Wow,” Hedvig uttered. “Will you take me for a ride?” Hedvig was undecided whether to act like a coquettish young woman or a demanding child. She ended up somewhere in-between the two, sounding like a girl ready to be taken. Gregers blushed slightly.
He said with the wisdom of a very old man, who knew it was no use to rebuke his daughter for it would only enforce her determination: “Go, I have to finish with this until early afternoon”. He acted as if their presence hindered him in his work.
“Right now?” Gregers asked.
“You can take me back to school,” she said, and her face lit up. He thought that she thought that arriving with a red sports car would surely impress her schoolmates.
Gregers was hesitant for a moment, then agreed. “I will be back, old chap.”
He heard the unmuffled sound of the rocket engine from outside, then just as a rocket, it shot through the street. He leaned back in his chair. He felt old. In the morning when he had looked in the mirror he saw a good-looking, young face staring back at him. Right now, though, he was more like his great-great grandfather if he were still alive. His limbs were heavy; his fingers moved slowly, the clicking was an arduous task. The most novel animated 3D images flashed in front of his eyes, but he didn’t really observe them. He was making the presentation from experience; only one small, unconscious part of his mind was involved.
The world was changing around him. Of course the world had always been changing. He just hadn’t noticed earlier. He was not against change, but somehow instead of the excited anticipation; he felt deep worry. As if all of society’s worries had aggregated in him. He tried to shake loose, but couldn’t. He was trapped, and at the same time he knew that eventually he would have to resolve the matter himself. In one way or the other. Sooner or later. But rather sooner if he didn’t want to go insane.
He was soon finished with his work; he sent the whole presentation electronically to headquarters, where he wouldn’t have been the most welcomed guest. He stood up and stretched his arms. He could hear the sounds of a rocket outside.
“We’re back,” Hedvig shouted and ran to him, and kissed him. He was stunned, but a warm breeze made his body tremble.
“School’s closed for today,” Gregers explained immediately. “Someone phoned in a bomb threat. Probably weren’t too eager about this math test either.”
He looked at Hedvig.
“It wasn’t me,” she said. “I don’t know anything about it.” There was a strange and dubious smile on hear face, and her eyes and Gregers’ met. “I have to show you something,” she said. She took Gregers by the arm and they went to one corner of the workshop; he followed them shortly.
“This is Hedvig’s corner,” he said. “I bet you haven’t seen anything like this before. It’s a prototype.” Gregers glanced at him, his long, curled black hair making him reminiscent of Latin lovers. Hedvig took out a box from beneath her computer desk, and put it on the desk. She waited for some time before opening the box. She wanted Gregers to ask for it.
“So what’s in it?” Gregers knew he had to ask. Hedvig made gestures stressing the importance of the contents of the box, then finally opened it. She rummaged, then “Quack, quack,” could be heard.
She placed the electronic duck on the floor. It flapped its wings, and looked at Gregers. “This is not like the dummies you can buy in stores,” she said, “it has in-built intelligence equivalent to a three year old child’s.”
“Brilliant,” Gregers exclaimed, the duck seemed so unrealistically real. “Where do you have it from?”
“From your father,” he said. Gregers twisted his nose as if smelling a foul rat.
“But daddy made most of the programming and research.”
“So it’s your brainchild then.”
“I did some of the work,” he tried to sound modest.
“Is this the only one?”
“Yes.”
“This could be sold in millions,” Gregers said. “Are we producing the ducks?”
“No,” his face lost the previous excitement all of a sudden.
“Why?”
“Your father thought it was an almost certain failure. Nothing has been done after we completed this project with the company engineers last year.” He was filled with new hope the way Gregers looked at him.
“I promise you, we’ll sell millions and millions, and be rich,” his friend waved his hands.
The duck was frightened of Gregers, it quacked and trotted behind a drawer. It was afraid of furry creatures. It was a duck after all. At least it should have believed.
“Yes, and then we can have a red sports car too,” Hedvig joined in the excitement. He thought she rather meant that she could have a red sports car. He was happy though. Not for the possible money. He would have accepted it if he earned no money with it at all. What was important for him was that his brainchild would make an appearance on the world stage after all.
They got so excited, everyone for his own reason, that they didn’t notice that Relling, the dentist from next door came to pay him a visit. The duck observed Relling though, its electronic sensors sharpened beyond the humanly conceivable. It bounced to the air, flew over the drawer and landed on one of the computers at the far end of the workshop.
“Wooooo,” Relling made sinister gestures turning to the duck knowing that the duck had recognised him. The dentist enjoyed intimidating the plastic-metal creature that was only an unnatural twist of nature to him. Something that shouldn’t exist. “I will cut the throat of your duck one day,” the dentist said turning to him.
He liked Relling. “Go ahead,” he said. “The head contains only 50% of the visual sensors. The processor is in the body close to the batteries surrounded by metal plates.”
Relling tried to think of something pertinently funny in response, but couldn’t. “You win then.”
He introduced Gregers. Relling showed an immediate dislike for the young Werle. “The car outside is yours?” the dentist asked, but not caring to listen to the answer, told Hedvig: “Let’s go, and catch this bird.” Hedvig laughed; she knew Relling, the bald-head as she called him, could never catch the state-of-the-art robot. The duck obeyed only her and Hjalmar.
“Molvik will be here in a moment with his laptop. Would you be so kind to install some things on it?” the dentist almost commanded him to do so. He nodded. “Turn off the duck, will you?” he asked Hedvig, and with that Molvik appeared. They started installing.
He could hear some muttering over his shoulders, Hedvig was teasing Gregers and Relling, and they did likewise. An hour or so must have passed, when they finished. He noticed that Gregers and Molvik, contrary to Gregers and Relling, found soulmates in each other. They were actually all having a good time, like it wasn’t the middle of a weekday. They lived in a welfare society. They all had too much time to think, he thought.
Unexpectedly Relling got hold of Hedvig, lifted her, caught her by the ankles. She was hanging up-side down. Then bald-head put her down.
“My lens,” Hedvig cried out and looked offended. She wasn’t a child any more to be picked up like that.
“What happened?” Gregers asked.
“The contact lens fell out from my left eye.”
“Nobody moves then,” the dentist said, laughing at Hedvig’s annoyance.
“There it is,” Gregers squatted and picked up the lens.
“Give me,” Hedvig said and grasped for it as if it was the most vital thing in her life. “I can’t see anything without my contact lenses.”
“Just like my father without his glasses,” Gregers said. “You’re a blind mouse.”
“Blind mouse, blind mouse,” Relling said.
“Ha, ha, ha,” she looked humiliated.
The dentist stopped teasing her. “We better get going,” Relling told Molvik, who was discussing some far away island resort with Gregers.
“Call me,” Molvik told the young Werle, and left with the dentist, with his laptop under his arms.
For some time there was silence. Then Hedvig said: “I have to go and do my homework.” He thought that was something for a change as he heard her go up the stairs.
“Finally alone again,” Gregers said. “We can talk.”
“Talk about what?” he wasn’t in the mood of discussing anything with anyone. He wanted to sob alone. Some sort of dislike started emerging in him for Gregers, perhaps partly because he was a Werle, partly because he was so successful with Hedvig. Of course he knew that an older man appealed to girls of her age, especially coming from far away exotic places with a red sports car that had rocket engines. But still, knowing this didn’t make him feel any better. He had raised her; Gina was often away for days due to her job. He had been the one by her side when she was sick, or got into trouble. He was too attached to her.
“Let’s talk about the future. Our future,” Gregers said. “So as I told you I want you to be my right hand. Our first project would be the duck. Your duck. Soon you will have money flowing in.”
“That would be good,” he said morosely, not really caring. “I still couldn’t pay back all my debts that I took for my studies, and the mortgage for this place. We spend virtually all money we make.” He thought about the ten-year-old family car of his and the red sports car.
“You can forget about all that.”
“Why?” he asked. “Why are you trying so hard to be nice?”
Gregers wasn’t ready for a question like that, had no prepared answer. “A man of your calibre deserves better than what you have. You’re talented...” Gregers seemed to be fighting with himself whether to say more or not, finally deciding that it was better not to at this moment.
“Maybe your father is right, and no one would care to buy a duck like that.”
“No, no,” Gregers shook his head, and there was a fierceness about him. “Yesterday dad did mention something concerning a new project of his, involving artificial puppet robots. He must have meant the duck. Strangely he didn’t say anything about you being involved.”
“But...”
“I have been to many places, Hjalmar, I have seen many things. But interestingly, I found that people were very much alike. Regardless of culture and social system; they had similar dreams. There were losers and there were winners. My father is a winner in this system here. He doesn’t really know anything, is not talented like you...”
“How can you say something like that?” He was flattered, his ego satisfied.
“It’s true,” Gregers continued. “My father never had a genuine idea of his own. He used the ideas of others, he pretended they were his. He wants to steal your idea as well. But I’m not going to let him.”
“Why are you so angry at your father?” he asked. “Is it because of your mother?” He remembered Gregers’ mother as a kind and gentle creature doomed to wither away in the claws of a Werle. She had drunk herself to oblivion.
“Possibly. But there are many other reasons as well. I simply don’t understand why people put up with him. Why do you work for him?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “What else could I do? I should be happy to have a job at all. It’s difficult to find a regular job nowadays.”
“I see. He successfully plays on the fears of people. He created himself a position from where he can decide on their fate.”
“That’s the way the world works.”
“But that’s wrong.”
He got upset. “It’s easy for you to speak, you’re his son. You’re rich. But some people are not rich. So they have to do what they have to do to make a living.”
“It’s classical slavery,” Gregers said.
He didn’t know what to say to that. He denied the possibility of being a modern slave. He thought he was doing the things he liked. He remembered someone telling him that: “you should consider yourself very lucky if your hobby turned out to be your job.” And his hobby turned out to be his job indeed. He didn’t even have to work late hours either. But right now he didn’t feel lucky nor happy.
“The young Werle,” his father exclaimed arriving from work. “Haven’t changed much all these years. Only your hair is a bit longer.” They shook hands. “Sure had a lot to do today.”
He sighed. He knew his father didn’t actually do any work. Chief Werle only exercised a dubious kindness by employing him. He couldn’t really say it was because of compassion for his father.
“Young Werle, you like hunting?” the old man was quite a fanatic hunter once. Gregers made a hardly visible nod. “Then let’s go.” His father laughed, Gregers stared questioningly. “We are not going to the woods, or anything. It’s all here, in the computer,” the old man explained.
“This is the newest hunting program,” he said. “Has splendid graphics.”
They all sat down in front of his father’s personal computer. Gregers and the old man went hunting in the woods, they played in multi-player mode, some people also joined them from the net. He watched them, listened to their ejaculations of joy at shooting virtual animals. He intensely observed his father, the grey hair, the majestic facial features, his still perfect timing. When he had been a child he often accompanied him to the woods. The fresh air, the strange silence, the whole atmosphere had made a great impression on him, a longing for nature had been imprinted in his heart. Nowadays they didn’t go to the woods claiming they had no time, they had too much work to do. As excursions they went to the new shopping centres instead. He wondered why. And then he wondered about other things as well. He wondered why Gina could never show any signs of tender respect for him. He was a man of no bad habits, he didn’t drink except on special occasions, and he didn’t smoke. He didn’t womanise. Gina had told him once at a party that he was dry. Simply dry. Meaning lifeless, and uninteresting. He thought that the furry Werles, both young and old, were not dry in contrast. They were usually deemed beasts, the gable of sexual pleasure. They were interesting. They drank, they smoke, they womanised and they were ugly. He sometimes wished he could be like that, go to unknown women and whisper abhorrent things in their ears. But he couldn’t. He thought of himself as an old fashioned character, and that’s what others said about him. Now he should have hated Gina. Now that he got assertion of her affair with chief Werle. Anyone, but chief Werle. That ugly beast had got her too. One part of his mind told him that he should immediately cut all his ties with Gina, another part that he shouldn’t bother about the past. But how could he live with a woman who gave herself to someone he hated the most in the world? Silly question, he was being a male chauvinist, someone who wanted to own women. A woman had at least as many rights as he did. He should be happy to have a woman by his side being such a dry and tidy person, not like those countless lonely, unhappy buzzards. And what would he do without Gina? They had one home, one car, so to say one financially connected life. He couldn’t afford to pay mortgage and study debt and live on his wages, despite that his salary ranked top considering the world standard. He earned a lot, but it was virtual, because the costs of living were so high as well. What would happen to his father? Besides, when he thought of her now he couldn’t deny that he loved her. Those lips, those eyes... What a damn pussy he was! He should go to her and finish their relationship with a slap. He had never assaulted Gina physically, or as a matter of fact as far as he knew mentally in any way. She had told him that if he dared touch her she would leave him at once and take Hedvig with her. Actually, he never considered doing so either. He thought it would have been wrong. Of course the Werle type could do it, and get away with it. Gregers’ mother had shown marks of beating many times, but had never complained officially. Gregers himself had been quite brutal with women as far as he could remember, and yet... and yet they kept running back to him. And if Gina left or rather forced him out of their home he couldn’t accept the possibility of not seeing Hedvig every day. She was the best thing in his life.
“Your father is good,” Gregers said. “He is the winner.”
“Well...,” the old man looked thrilled, raising his eyebrows with joy. “I’m not bad, not bad at all.” He sensed something phoney about his father’s joy; it wasn’t like the happiness he had shown in the woods even when he had no luck with hunting. It was superficial.
He noticed first the black limousine outside. There weren’t many of the kind, but he knew chief Werle had one. Chief Werle had never visited him before.
“Here you are,” chief Werle said as he stepped into the workshop. His father’s joy and excitement disappeared at once; he pushed the rolling computer desk from himself. Gregers didn’t look all that happy at seeing his father either. There was a momentary silence, and lack of movement. Chief Werle grazed his eyes on the surroundings, and nodded reassured. “The material you sent today is absolutely outrageous,” the boss broke the silence turning to him, and sounding irritated. “No wonder the way this place looks.” He was stunned. He was used to having to correct something at least a dozen times before it being accepted by the company, he was used to getting responses like: “no, no, no, you just didn’t understand what we wanted”, and he always had this gut feeling that it wasn’t him who didn’t comprehend the matters. He always felt humiliated; despite his most eager attempts what he did was never good enough. He had a higher degree and a better education than most of the executives, yet they always had to show him that he knew nothing.
“And you,” chief Werle said to his father “7 o’clock is not 7.08 or 7.11.”
“But the bus...”
“Don’t come with that bus got caught up in the traffic jam nonsense,” chief Werle was almost shouting. “The next time you are late by as much as half a second you’ll be fired. This is a company, not the woods; every second counts.” The old man was near to crying.
“You are a great leader, dad,” Gregers said contemptuously. He thought his disdain was like his father’s, except it was directed at different kinds of people. “You are great at humiliating your best workforce.”
“My best workforce?!” chief Werle turned red, and was close to raging. “Take a look at this.” He glimpsed at a paper with unrecognisable scribble over Gregers’ shoulders. “This is what your friend and future right hand sends as company presentation for the most prestigious international fair. All our livelihoods may depend on whether we can make good deals there or not. Is this what I’m supposed to put forward to the board?”
“I don’t understand,” he whispered.
“Of course you don’t understand,” chief Werle shouted. “You don’t understand anything.”
He went to the computer of largest capacity in the room, and opened the files in question. The others watched as the presentation viewed on the screen without a hitch. He was thinking. There were two possibilities he could think of. Either something happened with the material on its way to its destination, or there was a system incompatibility. He phoned the head computer engineer, then said: “It seems the company test-ran a new system today that may have interfered with data handling. They opened the presentation files just now in the computer lab, and it runs smoothly.”
Chief Werle didn’t look pleased. “You computer geeks always mass something up. You always have to make something simple into something difficult.” Before closing the entrance door, chief Werle looked back at the old man his fingers pointing warningly and said: “Be in your office by 7.00 tomorrow, or else...”
Gregers coughed. “I’m terribly sorry for all this.”
“It’s not your fault,” the old man said, his vigour gone.
“What did he mean... the way this place looks?” he asked. He looked around, and tried to be objective. The room seemed to him clean and tidy.
“I honestly don’t know.” Gregers thought for a moment. “But he always bugged my mother that she didn’t keep order at home. She cleaned the house twice daily, and still it wasn’t good enough for him.” Gregers’ face showed deep and unrelenting sorrow. “He could afford it, but he never hired a housekeeper.”
“Yes, your mother was a fine lady,” the old man said rummaging in his memories. He thought about his mother, Nora, but he could only remember faintly. She had left them after his father went to jail, and he hadn’t seen her since. He heard rumours that she had married a rich businessman overseas, and became quite a society lady, the type one would refer to as Madam.
“What is this big silence?” Hedvig asked as they could hear her coming down the stairs. “Hi grandpa.” She turned demandingly to Gregers: “I’ve finished my homework.” He thought this amounted to her ordering Gregers to take her for a ride.
He was more than happy to help her, for he wanted to be alone. “Why don’t you show Hedvig the new mall?” he asked Gregers, who sensing a majority desiring him to take her for a ride, agreed.
The old man said that he would go for a walk. They all knew that going for a walk only meant going to the nearest pub. Old Ekdal went for walks several times every day, always coming back filled with energy.
As the door closed behind them he sank into self-loathing melancholy. He should have worked on his project, improving artificial intelligence and developing the duck concept. He should have continued working on it despite not receiving any positive response. Nothing should have stopped him from continuing his research. It was his dream. Yet, he couldn’t think. Every time he tried to concentrate on it he confronted the same questions, the same desperation. He couldn’t remember exactly when the questions had entered his head one by one; there were always more and more of them. First they had been a mere side-track, a slight annoyance. Later they led to exasperation claiming his entire thinking capacity, not leaving room for any other thoughts.
He was thinking about his life. He looked around in the silent workshop, listened to the rain pouring outside. Everything was grey, the afternoon was well advanced. Only the computers buzzed now and then as they received information and sorted it.
What was wrong with him? Was it the way he looked? What kind of a strange and ugly animal he must have been! They all hated him. They all hated and despised him. And the worst of it was that he didn’t know why. The way that Werle humiliated him and his father. And he didn’t even feel complacent for having been proven to be innocent. He was right, but it mattered very little. Chief Werle would hate him even more for being right, for not being able to rebuke him even more in front of his father and best friend. What mattered was what chief Werle thought. Because chief Werle had the power. He wished he wouldn’t be such a chicken, he wished he wouldn’t care about the consequences and he could break chief Werle’s neck with a twist. And then Gina of course... he would have to do something with her as well. The woman liked to masquerade her so precious independence. She went out on Saturdays; it was her time to fool around as she put it. On such occasions she would dress really seductive. He imagined her, the short black skirt, the tight red blouse... damn, she sure was pretty. He sighed. He thought about himself. He was a family man, a relic of the past. In his youth he hadn’t been too popular with girls. Later they seemed to like him, but this liking had been different. He had perceived it as a sign that they wanted to settle down, to have a family, and he was a nice guy. This had always bugged him for being a nice guy only meant that he would make a good husband. Now he thought he didn’t want to be a good husband whose purpose was for them not to be lonely, to raise the kids and to accept a partly self-inflicted denial of his personality. He didn’t want to be a nice guy who was good in the weekdays, but simply boring for parties. He wanted to be like Gregers, the son-of-a-bitch, not referring to his mother, he pondered. He wanted to get out of this relationship. There were these memories; memories he could not really visualise or grasp. He blamed them for the questions that kept his mind tied. They came from the abyss of time. Like the combined memories of his ancestors, ape-man, the first mammals appearing on the Earth and beyond. He couldn’t root them out, he couldn’t force 5 billiard years of evolution out of his head. He sincerely tried, he attempted to accept the way the world worked nowadays, the structure and hierarchy of society he lived in. But the harder he tried the harder the memories bothered him, they pressed their way into his soul. When he thought again about the Gina ready to party while feeling sexually attracted to her, he felt anger and shame. Society said: “This is normal. It is wrong to possess someone.” The memories said: “NO.” Nothing else, just no with capital letters. It was up to him to interpret the no, while the yes was all too well worked out, and had round answers to his silly questions. This was all the more disturbing; he was brought up with a behaviour pattern that the abyss couldn’t accept, but it didn’t show him any alternatives either. Should he beat up chief Werle? What good would that do? Would it make him happier? His society part rejected such notions as stupid; violence would lead nowhere. He would pay a much dearer price for such an action than it was actually worth. The memories didn’t care about the consequences though, they kept telling him: “Do it.” Society answered: “Shame on you for even having these thoughts.” He felt like a culprit even without having committed anything.
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