somewhereâHaraldâs love of reading
had been passed on when the boy was still a child. Harald recognized with the first few words, Dostoevsky, yes, Rogozhin speaking of Nastasya Filippovna. âShe would have drowned herself long ago if she had not had me; thatâs the truth. She doesnât do that because, perhaps, I am more dreadful than the water.â
D uring the period of awaiting trial there are no proceedings in a criminal case with which the papers may feed sensations to the public. When the first reports of the Lindgard son accused of killing a man were published, there was a tacit hush formed around the arrival of the member of the Board of Directors at his office. Newspapers were turned face-down on the headlines or removed from where his eyes and those of others might meet above them. The chairman did not know whether, in the privacy of the Board Room, there should be a formal expression of sympathy and concern for the colleague held in high regard, and his wife, in their time of troubleâthat was the phrasing he would have usedâor whether it was more tactful and helpful to evade any official attention, the sort of thing that would be remembered although not recorded in the minutes, a kind of conviction-once-removed, going on record against Lindgard, the biological father, at least, of a crime. It was decided to make no statement from the Board. Individual members found appropriate moments when they condoled with him briefly, to limit embarrassment on both sides. The general attitude to be adopted was to show him that of course, the whole
thing was preposterous, some ghastly mistake. He thanked them, without concurring; they took this to mean simply that he did not want to talk about the ghastly mistake. Most of them had sons and daughters of their own for whom such an act would be equally impossible.
The period was dealt with on the only model within Lindgardâs and his colleaguesâ experience: a remission in an illness about whose prognosis it is best not to enquire. In the menâs room one day a colleague with whom he had been a junior together and who had more concern for frankness of human feeling than about maintaining some convention of his dignity, spoke while peeing. As if it were a double relief:âWhen thereâs ever anything I can doâIâve no idea what that might beâdonât hesitate for a moment, or for any reason. It must be hell. I never know whether to talk about it or not, Harald; how youâd feel. Whatever kind of frame-up it isâit must be agonizing to deal with, knowing it just couldnât be, itâs out of the question.â
Lindgard had washed his hands. He was pulling the roller towel fastidiously to serve himself with a dry length. Now he spoke in this tiled enclave devoted to humble body functions.
âIt isnât out of the question.â
His colleague righted himself, stood in shock. It hadnât been said. There are some things itâs not fair to have been told, the speaker will regret the telling the moment it has been done. He went quickly to the door and then turned and came back, put the flat of his hand on Lindgardâs shoulder-blade exactly where the son had made his gesture of communication when he met his father and mother for the first time in the visitorsâ room.
Few of the doctorâs patients connected her with one of the cases of violence they might have read about. There were so many; in a region of the country where the political ambition of a leader had led to killings that had become vendettas, fomented by him, a daily tally of deaths was routine as a weather report; elsewhere,
taxi drivers shot one another in rivalry over who would choose to ride with them, quarrels in discotheques were settled by the final curse-word of guns. State violence under the old, past regime had habituated its victims to it. People had forgotten there was any other way.
She did not work within a
had been passed on when the boy was still a child. Harald recognized with the first few words, Dostoevsky, yes, Rogozhin speaking of Nastasya Filippovna. âShe would have drowned herself long ago if she had not had me; thatâs the truth. She doesnât do that because, perhaps, I am more dreadful than the water.â
D uring the period of awaiting trial there are no proceedings in a criminal case with which the papers may feed sensations to the public. When the first reports of the Lindgard son accused of killing a man were published, there was a tacit hush formed around the arrival of the member of the Board of Directors at his office. Newspapers were turned face-down on the headlines or removed from where his eyes and those of others might meet above them. The chairman did not know whether, in the privacy of the Board Room, there should be a formal expression of sympathy and concern for the colleague held in high regard, and his wife, in their time of troubleâthat was the phrasing he would have usedâor whether it was more tactful and helpful to evade any official attention, the sort of thing that would be remembered although not recorded in the minutes, a kind of conviction-once-removed, going on record against Lindgard, the biological father, at least, of a crime. It was decided to make no statement from the Board. Individual members found appropriate moments when they condoled with him briefly, to limit embarrassment on both sides. The general attitude to be adopted was to show him that of course, the whole
thing was preposterous, some ghastly mistake. He thanked them, without concurring; they took this to mean simply that he did not want to talk about the ghastly mistake. Most of them had sons and daughters of their own for whom such an act would be equally impossible.
The period was dealt with on the only model within Lindgardâs and his colleaguesâ experience: a remission in an illness about whose prognosis it is best not to enquire. In the menâs room one day a colleague with whom he had been a junior together and who had more concern for frankness of human feeling than about maintaining some convention of his dignity, spoke while peeing. As if it were a double relief:âWhen thereâs ever anything I can doâIâve no idea what that might beâdonât hesitate for a moment, or for any reason. It must be hell. I never know whether to talk about it or not, Harald; how youâd feel. Whatever kind of frame-up it isâit must be agonizing to deal with, knowing it just couldnât be, itâs out of the question.â
Lindgard had washed his hands. He was pulling the roller towel fastidiously to serve himself with a dry length. Now he spoke in this tiled enclave devoted to humble body functions.
âIt isnât out of the question.â
His colleague righted himself, stood in shock. It hadnât been said. There are some things itâs not fair to have been told, the speaker will regret the telling the moment it has been done. He went quickly to the door and then turned and came back, put the flat of his hand on Lindgardâs shoulder-blade exactly where the son had made his gesture of communication when he met his father and mother for the first time in the visitorsâ room.
Few of the doctorâs patients connected her with one of the cases of violence they might have read about. There were so many; in a region of the country where the political ambition of a leader had led to killings that had become vendettas, fomented by him, a daily tally of deaths was routine as a weather report; elsewhere,
taxi drivers shot one another in rivalry over who would choose to ride with them, quarrels in discotheques were settled by the final curse-word of guns. State violence under the old, past regime had habituated its victims to it. People had forgotten there was any other way.
She did not work within a
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