Excerpts from
Days with Diam or Life at Night
By Svend Åge Madsen
SAN
"You´re lying here because I love you," I say at last.
"What do you mean by that?" she teases. "What about Mea?"
"I mean that I am going to make these three days my whole life," I reply on a sudden impulse.
"Here, a life in a cottage, surely that´s not what you´re going to offer me? Miles away from everything."
"No, come on, we´ll go off into the world, we´ll go off and live life."
I have leapt up. Her voice puzzles me so much that I don´t always know what to say.
"You don´t mean that," she says, sitting down. She shakes her hair so it falls into place. "You´re not like that at all."
"No, you´re right. So let´s do it for that very reason."
Now, I obviously do mean it. I even feel quite keen. Once more, I have transformed myself into another person.
Another five minutes and we are once more in the car, bumping along the uneven track. Now it is me driving.
She fiddles with the heart hanging round my neck.
"If you meant anything with all this," she murmurs close to my ear. "Then you´d fix this thing so the side with me on is always showing."
"No, sometimes your side deserves to be closest to my heart."
She switches on the car radio. It emits a langorous melody played on a tenor sax.
"How would you like me to look when we get to the hotel?" she asks cheerfully.
She holds up her hair and looks like a tight-lipped, but beautiful, colonel´s wife. She wraps her scarf around her head, draws up her collar, and looks like some angelic nun.
"Or would you rather have a witch?" she says, making an effort to look menacing.
While I´m convincing her that she is the sweetest witch I have ever met, we get so close to the side of the road that I have to stop.
"You´re mine for three days," I comment thoughtfully between two kisses.
She looks at me in surprise: "Oh, so that´s what you think?"
It is already morning when we reach the town. Of course there are no parking spaces anywhere near the hotel we have decided on.
She jumps out, goes into the hotel to reserve a room, and is welcomed by an admiring hall porter. I drive on to get rid of the car.
When, at last, I find a parking space, I realise that in all decency we must have some luggage with us. I hurry to buy a suitcase and a few things to throw into it, and when I´ve managed to find the hotel again I act as though it´s so heavy that my back is breaking under the strain of carrying it.
Diam is not in the lobby. She must have gone up to our room. I ask the porter to show me where I can find the lady who has just arrived. He looks at me indignantly, and explains that this is contrary to the rules. He is only allowed to show the way to the men who are staying in the rooms.
I am most graciously allowed to take a look at the register of guests. According to the list, three couples have arrived on this particular day. I don´t know which of them is me. All the names are in the porter´s handwriting.
I make a quick decision. Diam has not made my choice easy. She has made either a pastor, a colonel or a director of me.
I slip out, run round the corner, and in a department store there I buy a distinguished-looking military cap. I stuff my hair up into it, smooth my moustache and march proudly into the hotel.
"I am Colonel Gahl," I say in my most stentorian voice. "Would you please show me up to my room?"
The porter gives me a sceptical look. I glance around absent-mindedly, slapping myself noisily and rhythmically on the thigh with my right hand.
He shows me right up to the door. He knocks and says respectfully, "The colonel has arrived, madam."
An august voice virtually sings out to me: "Splendid, do come in, beloved."
The porter pushes me maliciously into the lioness´s embrace. I am received with surprising kindness. It takes me the better part of two minutes to wriggle out of the embrace while eagerly explaining something to the effect that this is an unfortunate misunderstanding. The lady seems reluctant to consider the misunderstanding as unfortunate, but finally I manage to extricate myself.
I run down the corridor and slip out through a back door.
It would be like Diam to have made a pastor of me. I stuff the cap into my case. At a newspaper stand I buy a paperback with a black cover. I turn my jacket collar up a little more and go back to the hotel.
The porter gives me a dubious look as I unconcernedly stride across to the counter.
"I am Pastor Tromin. Would you please be so kind as to show me to my room."
I make sure to keep my hand over the letters revealing that the book is entitled Alpha One.
The porter mutters something under his breath and leads me to Mrs. Tromin´s door.
"Mrs. Tromin, your husband is here," he says in a rather peculiar tone.
"Oh dear," replies a submissive voice from inside. "Just a moment, I´m coming."
There are sounds of hurried activity behind the door, a chair is overturned, a cupboard opened and closed twice, and meanwhile the porter fixes me with his disgusting eyes.
"Do come in, dear," the unknown voice says at last. "I looked dreadful, I didn´t want you to see me like that."
The door has opened. The lady, who has obviously not finished her personal toilet, has her back to me and is busy in front of the mirror. The door closes silently behind me.
"I´m so sorry, madam. I had to put on this act in order to get in touch with you."
She looks at me as though she were seeing sights.
"Who are you?" she gasps.
"I am a vision," I reply. "We have started using more up-to-date methods."
"Get out, or I´ll call my husband," she shrieks.
"With pleasure. If you refuse this offer, it´s your own fault," I reply in a meaningful voice.
And then I quickly withdraw.
When I reappear in the lobby again the porter only discovers me when I breathe a cloud of smoke from my cigar into his face. But the effort only makes me cough myself.
"I am Mr. Levon, the company director," I murmur, scattering a few coins on the counter. "My room."
The porter suddenly seems to wake up when he catches sight of the banknote sticking out of my pocket.
I have a feeling that he makes a long detour on the way to my room, like a zealous taxi driver expecting to be paid in relation to the distance driven.
He knocks on the door.
"Excuse me, Miss," he says, with a cruel smile. "Your husband´s here."
Translated by W. Glyn Jones
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