Dexter Haven.’
‘C. K. Dexter Haven,’ she repeats.
‘Esquire,’ he adds. Looking down, Sheldon then says, ‘And grandson. Paul. Paul Haven.’
‘May I have your passports, please?’
Sheldon turns to Paul and says, ‘She wants our passports. The ones with our names on them.’
He turns back to the receptionist. ‘Actually, my dear girl, there is bad news and good news there. The bad news is that we were robbed of our bags — passports included — not less than an hour ago when coming in on that fancy train you have from the airport. The experience was so traumatic that my boy actually wet himself. But I say this to you in confidence — I wouldn’t want to embarrass him, even at his age. But the good news is that my office faxed them over to you before we left, so luckily you have copies. And please, could you make me two more? I’ll need them for the police report tomorrow morning and for the embassy, so they can issue us new ones for the sad journey home.’
There is a moment when nothing is said.
As the slender, inviting, stylish woman opens her mouth to speak, C. K. Dexter Haven raises his hand and says, ‘But no need to do it now. Thank you for the offer. Our day has been so long, so tiring, that — given my age, I’m eighty-two — I think it’s best if we address the matter in the morning. What I would like to do, however, is give you cash for the room now so we can settle accounts. And then, I’d like one of your bellboys to go out to a local shop and buy my grandson some clothes. Socks, sneakers, trousers, underpants, a shirt, and a nice jacket for walking in the woods. Charge it to the room, and bring it up as soon as possible.’
The woman is trying to speak. She makes the sorts of gestures one proffers when trying to contribute to a conversation. Some hand movements. An occasional open mouth. Eyes narrowing and widening, with the practised head-tilt being used for emphasis. But such subtleties are, against Sheldon, like whispering to an elephant. Sweet and pointless.
‘Mr Haven, I’m sorry that…’
‘Of course. So am I. And with the medication missing that I use to offset the side effects of my cancer, I’m so grateful to have been robbed in a country filled with such kind people. This is what they say in America. The Norwegians are the kindest people. If I make it home alive, I’ll confirm that message. And if I die before returning to my native land, the boy will do it for me.’
It was a nice room.
Sheldon found a station playing cartoons in Norwegian. Paul sat quietly on the bed with a bottle of Coke watching Tom chase Jerry. Sheldon sat next to him, doing the same.
‘I had an idea for a television commercial once,’ Sheldon says. ‘Picture this. First shot across the field of wheat and wild flowers, all in golden shades. The sound of insects buzzing away. You can feel the heat. The next, gentle ripples on a pond. A dreamlike patina on the water. Then, splash! A dog jumps in. The camera tracks him as he gently but single-mindedly swims from left to right. Then, coming into view on the right side, an empty Coke bottle floating in the pond. The dog — a golden retriever — takes the bottle in his snout, huffs and puffs as he turns back. He gets out, shakes, runs out onto a dock with the bottle where there is a boy lying on his back, lazing away under the clouds. The boy, without looking, picks up the bottle and tosses it back into the pond. Then, as the dog jumps back in, the words appear on the screen. ‘Coca-Cola. Summertime.
‘It eats you up! There’s nothing you can do! It reaches into your gut and plucks your piano string! But what do you do with an idea like that? Nothing. You send it in, they steal it. Meanwhile, I don’t have my own soft-drink company.’
Paul says nothing. He has not uttered a word since they met. Has not so much as smiled.
But a child does not know how to manage silence. About the need to keep comedy and tragedy as close to one another as humanly possible — as close as pathos and words will allow — to try to shut out the voices of the dead. He is only a little boy. He is enveloped in the silence of terror, where words fail and every utterance slips from reality like raindrops from a leaf. He is not old enough to distract himself with games, is not yet adept at finding solace from dialogue and drama. He is defenceless. His mother is dead. And this is why Sheldon will never leave him.
‘God made the world, said it was good,’ says Sheldon aloud. ‘Fine. But when did he re-appraise?’ he asks as Tom chases Jerry on the television.
‘OK, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, well, he re-appraised before the Flood. Before Noah made the arky-arky made of hickory barky-barky. But that was a while ago. And it’s not like he went back to the drawing board. He just smudged it all out, except for the ark. I think we’re due for some reconsideration. Not necessarily the same juvenile response, like a kid crumpling up a bad drawing and pretending it never happened, leaving Noah with a question. The question was “Why me?” Unable to answer it, he hit the bottle. Personally, I’d like to see some growth in God. Some maturation. Some responsibility. Some admission of guilt. Some public testimony about his negligence. The trouble is, God is alone. No one to push back. Set him straight. No Mrs God. I’m not the first one to think this, I suspect.
‘Now, you might say, being as you are St Paul and therefore a theologian and a philosopher, and possibly the most interesting person in history, that it is impossible for God to make amends, because how does he know when he’s done wrong? After all, does being all-knowing include self-knowledge? As He is the source of everything, can he possibly deny His own actions and condemn them? Against what? What’s the yardstick other than himself?
‘So, I have an answer, and thanks for asking. The answer lies in the biblical story of masturbation. I wouldn’t mention this, not at your age, but seeing as you don’t speak English and you’ve been through worse today, it’ll cause little damage.
‘Onan. We remember him as the one who spilled his seed. The original jerk-off. But what happened there? Onan had a brother, and his brother and his wife couldn’t conceive. For whatever reason, God decides that the family needs a child, so — as was the custom in those days, when people seemed to be replaceable — God tells Onan to go into his brother’s tent and
‘And so the real question becomes, why couldn’t I instill some of that in my own son so he could have had the courage to stand up to me, deny me my own failings, and refuse to go to a futile war that killed him? So he could have outlived me. Why couldn’t I have given more of that… whatever that is… to my son?’
Then Sheldon looks at Paul, who is staring at the screen.
‘Now come here, and let’s get your wellingtons off.’
Chapter 6
Rhea and Lars left the police station and then rode around the city for hours, looking for Sheldon. Their search was random at first. They rode through neighbourhoods close to the centre, and up and down the most popular roads. Karl Johan’s Gate. Kristian IV’s Gate. Wergelandsveien by the new Literature House. Up Hegdehaugsveien onto Bogstadveien, and then all around Majorstuen. Back to Frogner Park, down into Frogner, down to Vika, down to the port.
Then they chose locations. There was a synagogue, but no sign of Sheldon. There was an all-day topless bar, but no sign of Sheldon. There were bookstores, but no sign of Sheldon.
Lars suggested they stay overnight in town. Someplace nice. Someplace expensive. Perhaps the Grand Hotel? But the Grand Hotel had no rooms, so they stayed nearby at the Continental.
Lars slept deeply. He was exhausted.
Rhea stared into the ceiling, her life playing backwards and forwards.
The breakfast in the Hotel Continental this morning is good, but Rhea is not hungry. She dips her finger into
