Far Afield

  “Eh,” said Heðin, through his wet cigarette. He waved Jonathan over.

  Jonathan was nervous about introducing Wooley, but Heðin took the situation in hand. “My friend Jonathan,” he announced, “and his friend from America.”

  “Wooley,” said Wooley.

  The other young man nodded shyly. Then nobody knew what to say.

  “So, so, so,” said Heðin. “Terrible weather.”

  “I reckon so,” said Jonathan.

  “So, so, so,” said Wooley.

  This was getting nowhere. “I want some fish,” said Jonathan.

  “No fish,” said Heðin.

  “Because of the weather?”

  “Yah.”

  “I reckon so,” said Wooley. That wasn’t his cue; both Jonathan and Heðin looked at him. He smiled.

  Heðin became loquacious. “No fish, Jonathan, no fish today, no fish tomorrow, maybe no fish for a week!” He shook his head. “Winter,” he said, as if this explained it.

  “No fish all winter?” Jonathan asked.

  “Can’t fish in a storm like this,” said Heðin’s friend.

  “And does it storm like this all winter?” Jonathan was fearful of the answer.

  The village boys laughed. “Most of the time,” said the friend.

  “But not all the time,” Heðin added. “And you get good fat cod after a storm like this. They get fat from eating so much during the storm.”

  “So, so, so,” said Heðin’s friend.

  The conversation was over, that meant. “I reckon so,” said Jonathan. They could have omelets; he was glad Sigurd had insisted on the eggs. But that left lunch up in the air, and he was hungry. “Let’s go back to the store and get something for lunch,” Jonathan said to Wooley in English.

  “Lunch, dinner, breakfast,” said Heðin, also in English. “Morning, nighting—”

  “Night,” said Jonathan.

  “Okay,” said Wooley.

  Sigurd wasn’t surprised to see them. “No fish, hah?” He grinned. “Here.” Jonathan was touched to see that he had made a pile of things they might want: cabbage in a can, a wizened hard salami, a package of crackers, some dehydrated vegetable soup, and some more potatoes. Jonathan bought them all.

  “See you tonight,” said Sigurd.

  “One last stop,” Jonathan said as they set off again, gripping their paper bags tightly because the rain was turning them to pulp. But at the post office, where all the old men had gathered for their morning meeting, usually held on the dock, the slow, careful postmaster said, “No mail today.”

  “No boat?” Jonathan asked. He knew the answer already.

  “No boat tomorrow, either,” snapped Jón Hendrik. “You two are going to have a nice long visit.”

  “How long?” Jonathan ventured.

  “This storm?” Jón Hendrik sniffed the air.

  “Three days,” said one of the other old men.

  “No. Four days,” said Jón Hendrik. “Four days.” He nodded sagely.

  “But the boat—the boat will come, won’t it?”

  “How can it?” Jón Hendrik asked.

  Indeed, as they walked back out into the storm, Jonathan did not see how the boat could come. The harbor was a mass of yellow-flecked, roiling foam, and the sea beyond had gone black. “Hmm,” he said, looking at this hopeless scene.

  “Happens all the time on Fugloy,” Wooley said. “Sometimes the boat doesn’t come for a week.”

  “I reckon so,” said Jonathan. It seemed to be the most appropriate response.

  A full bottle of Aalborg aquavit, its seal unbroken, was standing on Sigurd’s kitchen table when they arrived. Jón Hendrik had a glass of something else, probably his bad brandy. A newer version of the terrible cake Jonathan remembered from the summer sat on a plate, already impaled by a knife.

  Jonathan got drunk quickly. He was used to eating more than he had eaten that day, and the liquor went right to his head. More than that, he wanted to get drunk, had been wanting to get drunk for several days. It was compensation for everything—the weather, the lack of fish, Wooley snoring in the guest room, Daniela’s damned silence, his long night’s brooding. He put back two stiff shots and skidded into the now-familiar condition of blur.

  Blurred, Wooley was no longer his responsibility. As they’d walked through town in the windy night, Jonathan had worried that Wooley would galumph over Sigurd’s delicate sensibilities or not give Jón Hendrik the proper amount of respect, and that he would have to trail Wooley all evening, mending the fences he broke. This now seemed ridiculous. Wooley was a phenomenon; Sigurd and Jón Hendrik would have to contend with him—just as Jonathan had been doing for the last twenty-four hours.

  Wooley and Sigurd were trading names of people on Fugloy.

  “Jørgen? Jørgen hjá Jákup, who married Anna, the one with the sister who moved to Iceland?”

  “Yes. Now he’s got a big boat, goes out to Spitzbergen.”

  “So, so, so. I was at his wedding.”

  “Now he’s got a little grandson, born this winter.”

  “So, so, so.” Sigurd chewed this over and began on another cud of information. “How about that old Johannes, whose father came from Nolsoy?”

  “He’s still alive, but he’s too old to walk now.”

  Jonathan was bored by this, so turned his foggy attention to Jón Hendrik.

  “So. Jón Hendrik,” he said.

  “Is this your kinsman?” Jón Hendrik asked.

  “No. He’s just another American.”

  “He’s a strong man,” said Jón Hendrik. He looked at Jonathan, then back at Wooley. He leaned close to Jonathan and, breathing liquor-laced tobacco on his cheek, said, “He doesn’t speak very good Faroese. You should teach him.”

  “He won’t be here long,” Jonathan said. He put more aquavit in his glass.

  “But you learned fast,” said Jón Hendrik.

  “I’ve been here six months.” Could it be true? Had he gotten anything done? He took a drink.

  “You speak good Faroese,” Jón Hendrik said. “You don’t use Danish words. Pure.”

  “Do you listen to that radio show about the language?”

  “Pah!” Jón Hendrik made a face. “I don’t need to be told how to talk.” Then, with a grin, “Do you listen to it?”

  “No. I had a good teacher, in America.”

  “A Faroe man?”

  “No. He was Norwegian.”

  “The Norwegians are the best,” said Jón Hendrik. “Not like those terrible Danes.”

  “How about the Icelanders?” asked Jonathan.

  “They lisp,” said Jón Hendrik. He fell into silent admiration of his brandy glass.

  Sigurd and Wooley had run out of steam too. Jonathan yawned. Then everybody else yawned. In the silence the rain beat on the tin roof. Wooley smiled at Jonathan, a conspiratorial, quick smile.

  “So, so, so,” Sigurd said. “Two Americans in Skopun. Will you miss us, when you go home?”

  The storm was worse in the morning, when Jonathan woke with a hangover. He stumbled downstairs. Wooley was drinking coffee in the rain-dark kitchen. Thunder rang out from the mountain behind the village, and long sharp trails of lightning split the black sky above the sea.

  “Wow,” said Jonathan. Here was bad weather with a vengeance.

  “This could be the worst of it,” Wooley said. “Coffee?” He raised the pot. “Or I could make a fresh one.”

  Jonathan had the sensation of being Wooley’s guest, which he did not like. “I’ll do it.” He turned on the lamp above the table and bustled about, rinsing the pot, wiping the counter, claiming his kitchen.

  “I bet this breaks tomorrow.” Wooley nodded as he spoke.

  “I hope so.” Jonathan looked to see if Wooley had been insulted by the hidden hope for his departure; he was guzzling his coffee contentedly. Jonathan was eager for coffee. His head felt spiked, as if a stake had been pounded through his temple.

  A new fusillade of thunder shoo
k the windows and doors in their frames. Something heavy and made of metal was blowing about outside, crashing into concrete and thudding along the wet ground. This noise set Jonathan’s teeth on edge. He peered into the pot to see when the coffee would be ready. And then the lamp started to flicker. The power ebbed and surged a few times and vanished, taking with it the hot plate and Jonathan’s hopes for coffee.

  “Shit.” He dropped into a chair and put his head in his hands. “That’s it for cooking.” He glared at the hot plate.

  “That may be it for heat, too,” said Wooley. “I think your kerosene pump is electric.”

  “No. I have to do it by hand.”

  “Right, you fill it by hand. But I think then the fuel is pumped in by a motor.”

  Wooley was, of course, correct. The temperature of the hallway was a frigid preview of the temperature of the kitchen by evening, and in the time it took to find the now-silent motor, Jonathan’s hands and feet began to tingle with cold.

  “We’ll have to keep the kitchen doors shut,” Wooley said. “It’ll stay warm for a while, and maybe the power will come back.” He opened the refrigerator. “Let’s eat everything we don’t have to cook.”

  “I’m not hungry,” said Jonathan. His head was throbbing.

  “We need to eat, to stay warm.” Wooley was piling cheese and butter and jam and bread on the table. “How about raw eggs? You like those? We could shake them up in some milk.”

  “Don’t,” Jonathan said, “please don’t.” He sat down. “Can I finish your coffee?”

  “Sure.” Wooley was rooting in the refrigerator. “Blood sausage?”

  “Go ahead.” Jonathan swirled the last of the coffee in his mouth, trying to negate the taste of bile and aquavit. He noted a slight improvement—but how much better he would feel with a whole cup of coffee, and without the prospect of a heatless, lightless, endless day with Wooley. He lurched to the window and scanned the houses around his; there wasn’t a light in any of them. Smoke, however, plumed into the air above Petur’s roof. Heðin’s characterization of his little brother as “conservative” applied to the whole family: they had kept their peat-burning stove. Jonathan splashed some water on his face. “I’m going next door for a minute,” he said.

  “I’ll come with you,” Wooley said, with his mouth full of cheese.

  “That’s okay.” Jonathan rushed into his clogs and slicker. “I’ll be back in a second.”

  Crossing the twenty feet between his door and Petur’s, Jonathan got chilled through and wet. He walked in without knocking, a true Faroese visitor, and kicked his clogs off in the hall. Little Jens Símun sat at the table working on a coloring book while Maria tended to a pot that put forth the worst smell Jonathan had yet encountered in these islands.

  “So, so, so,” said Maria. “Sit down and have a temun.”

  “Are the stems of trees green?” Jens Símun asked.

  Desire for coffee and company other than Wooley’s warred with nausea from the smell. “What are you cooking?” asked Jonathan.

  “Ræst kjøt. Meat before it gets hard rotten. It smells bad but it tastes good.” Maria covered the pot. “We are used to the smell, but I know visitors don’t like it.” She pointed the coffeepot at Jonathan. He nodded.

  “It’s lucky you kept your peat stove,” he said.

  “Are they green?” Jens Símun held up a green crayon and waved it.

  “No, they’re brown.” He took a wonderful gulp of coffee. “We’ve got no heat or light.”

  “Yes. Petur went out with Jens Símun to try to fix the power. Come for dinner. I can make you an egg again, if you don’t like the meat.”

  “The American who’s staying with me likes ræst meat.”

  “What’s his name?” asked Jens Símun. “He’s very tall. Also, he’s got a stupid coat.”

  “Shh,” said Maria, but she smiled.

  “His name is Jim,” said Jonathan. “I think his coat’s stupid too.” He’d almost gotten used to the smell, and the coffee had changed his mood entirely.

  “What are these?” Jens Símun pushed his book toward Jonathan and pointed to the bottom of the page.

  “Those are a flower we call tulips. They can be white or red or yellow.”

  “And are the stems brown?”

  “Green.” Jonathan turned to the front of the book. “Where did you get this?”

  “It’s a Danish book. My cousin Lisabet sent it from Down There.”

  “Lisabet who’s the mother of the baby, Petra?”

  Maria nodded. “She’s getting another baby, from a Danish man this time. So she’ll come home soon, I think.”

  Jonathan had a quick, intense vision of the unknown Lisabet’s white and swollen body beneath him; maybe, after this baby was born, she’d like a baby from an American man. Featureless, fecund Lisabet dissolved into Daniela with her mocking gaze. When was this storm going to end, so that Wooley could leave and Daniela could arrive? “Where’s Heðin?” he asked; he was now ready to enlist Heðin’s help in luring Daniela across the fjord that separated them.

  “On the dock. They are taking the small boats out of the water.” Maria lifted the lid off the pot.

  “I’d better go home,” said Jonathan. The smell was remarkable. This fresh whiff of it was overpowering—like a combination of boiled sweaty feet and singed hair. “I have some eggs I could bring,” he offered. “In case,” he said quickly, “I don’t like the meat.”

  “I have eggs,” said Maria.

  “What time is dinner?”

  “When you come. It’s always when you come. In America, do people eat at a special time?”

  “No, not exactly. They tell you to come at a special time, though.”

  “Why?” Maria asked.

  “I’m not sure,” said Jonathan. “It probably has to do with the kind of food we eat.” He was floundering around. “Food that’s ready at a particular time—I mean, that takes a particular amount of time to cook.”

  “All food is like that,” Maria said. “You just make it ready by evening.”

  Jonathan thought of a few things that would not do well just being “ready by evening,” such as fettucini Alfredo and trout poached in white wine, but he decided not to go further into the matter. The details of American dinner invitations—come at seven-thirty, bring red wine, wear a jacket because Professor Hoopla will be there—seemed at this moment complicated and fundamentally unfriendly. “Different customs,” he said to Maria, but saying this underscored his growing sense of having entered a limbo where America and the Faroes were equally foreign. It was like trying to give Sigurd population statistics. He kept seeing the information about his own country from their point of view—and finding it crazy. He would take refuge in a homey understanding of Faroese ways only to be slapped back to an uncomfortable position as an American by some terrible smell: uncomfortable because he could no more now imagine himself standing at an oak door with a brass knocker, wearing a tie and holding a bottle of Medoc, than he could picture eating rotten meat. He was floating around in cultural hyperspace; nothing felt right.

  And now, back to Wooley. Jonathan put on his clogs and dashed home.

  “We’re invited for dinner,” he said. “They’ve got an old-fashioned stove.”

  “Who’s this family?”

  “Brother of Sigurd, where we were last night. Petur and his wife, Maria—who’s also the granddaughter of Jón Hendrik, the grandfather of Sigurd and Petur, the old man last night.”

  “First-cousin marriage?”

  “Second. Different grandmothers. I don’t quite follow it.” Jonathan didn’t like the sound of that. “I’ve got it written down,” he added, “in a notebook.”

  “Yeah, I’ve got all sorts of shit written down too. I never look at it.” Wooley laughed.

  Jonathan saw himself eight months from now on a hot Cambridge afternoon, with a stack of notes beside him and a blank sheet in the typewriter. “Oh, God,” he said, dropping into the chair next to Wooley.
“What are we doing here?”

  “Fieldwork,” said Wooley promptly. “Going nuts in a kitchen during a gale is just a typical fieldwork routine. You think Evans-Pritchard and all those other hyphenated guys didn’t lie around in their hammocks and wonder what the fuck they were doing?”

  Jonathan laughed for the first time since Wooley’s arrival. “I suppose they did. They never write about it, though.”

  “He lost all his notes, I think. Didn’t they fall out of a canoe and sink to the bottom of the Nile?”

  Jonathan shook his head. “What would you do if that happened? I can’t imagine it.”

  “Well, I’d just wing it. I think he went back and repeated his study. The English are compulsive.” Wooley drummed on the table with the butter knife. “Maybe he just wasn’t ready to go home.”

  “How could you ever be ready?”

  “You mean, like, finished?”

  “Partly that.” Jonathan took a breath. He had an urge to confide in Wooley. After all, he was an anthropologist too. Maybe Jonathan’s trouble was a standard professional one. “I think I have a case of advance culture shock,” he announced. Wooley looked puzzled. “When I think of Cambridge, it seems even stranger than this place. I feel so far away from it I might as well just stay here.”

  “Everyone always thinks they can stay,” Wooley said.

  “You said you might.” Jonathan spoke sharply; that everyone sounded patronizing.

  “I’m just kidding myself, I guess.” Wooley appeared unperturbed admitting this. “In the end—”

  “You’re always an outsider, right?” Jonathan broke in.

  “No.” He held the knife straight up for emphasis. “I think in the end you become one of them. And that isn’t what I’m after. I like being an outsider. I like that distance—that sort of queasiness. So I figure, when I get home, I’ll feel like an outsider there for a while.”

  “And then you’ll go off into the field again so you can maintain your outsider status indefinitely?” Jonathan intended this as sarcasm, but Wooley received it as a reasonable suggestion.