The Evenings

  “No,” Joop said smiling. “Various methodologies have been advanced for combating it,” Frits said, “but that is all quackery; science, in such cases, is virtually powerless. But there are means to disguise the void. That is not something I have learned from any book; you could have known it yourself, but you refuse to look around you.”

  “I see nothing, go on,” said Joop. “Listen,” Frits went on, “when the bald opening becomes awfully large, you can take the hair on the sides, which you first allow to grow quite long, and comb it across. Comb it up, over the top and towards the middle.” “Shouldn’t I put pins in it?” Joop asked. “Bah,” Ina said. “No, you must plaster it down well with some sort of pomade,” Frits continued. “I admit that a coiffure like that runs counter to the Western European fashion of our age, but it does hide the baldness completely.”

  His mother stirred the tea in the pot. He looked at his father, who was engrossed in a book. “One also has those,” he said, “who lose more and more hair at the front all the time, with growth only at the back of the head. They let it grow long there. When they go to the barber they have him trim it a bit on the sides, but not at the back: they have a whole thicket growing down their neck. They believe that it does not matter where the hair grows, as long as they adhere to the prescribed quantity as a whole.” He finished his tea and laid his chin in his hands.

  “How about if I go by and see Bep Spanjaard?” he said to himself. “I haven’t done that in weeks. If no one is at home, Jaap and Walter are not far away.” He went into the hall and put on his coat, stuck his head through the doorway and said: “Good evening.” “Don’t make it too late,” his mother called out. In the kitchen he drank a few big gulps of water and left.

  Outside, a few drops of rain fell now and then, driven by weak gusts of wind. “It is a fairly dark night,” he thought. “We just might get some heavy showers. But the air is brisk. I am feeling much better.”

  He followed broad thoroughfares to the centre of town and, just before reaching a square, turned right into a dimly lit alleyway; there he walked slowly, perusing each doorway on his left, until he reached a house where the second-floor windows were brightly lit. On one side the house was adjoined by a warehouse, on the other by an office building: a long, white sign on the front read “Insurance”. “Between these two,” Frits said quietly, “this is it.” He pulled the handle of the doorbell. “Who’s there?” a woman’s voice called out. “Van Egters, Frits,” he said. “Who’s there?” the voice repeated. “It is me, Frits,” he shouted. “Which Frits?” “Frits van Egters,” he shouted, “friend of Louis, of Frans and Bep. An old acquaintance.” “Oh, well then why don’t you say so?” he heard the woman say, less loudly now. The door opened.

  “You are definitely of a suspicious bent, Bep,” he said, climbing a narrow, steep set of stairs. “Am I there yet?” he asked loudly as he reached the first-floor landing. “No, one more,” the voice above him said. He climbed on and arrived at a landing where a door stood open. “Yes, come in,” the voice called, and when he reached the threshold a young woman of thickset stature came to meet him. She was dressed in a loose-fitting gown and wore her dark-blond hair in a roll around her head. Her complexion was fresh, as was the skin on her arms, which were bared to above the elbows. “It is too bad about the teeth,” Frits thought, “they could be a bit comelier. But she is certainly a sweet girl.” He shook her hand and said: “You are faint-hearted, I notice. Fearful? Mild neurotic disorders?”

  They entered a deep room which stretched from the front to the back of the house, with windows at both ends. The old, wood-stained floor was covered in part by a rush mat. Wicker chairs were arranged around a white table, and to the silk-plastered walls a variety of photos, frameless, were stuck with paper mounts. The bright ceiling lamp shone from behind a plate of frosted glass.

  “Fearful? Yes, fearful,” the girl said, giggling. “Just plain scared. Someone rang the bell last night at one o’clock.” “Aha,” said Frits. “Have a seat,” she said. Frits sank down into one of the wicker chairs. “So the doorbell rang,” Frits said. “And what was it?” “I don’t know,” she replied. “I was too afraid to move.” “You could have looked out of the window?” Frits said. “No, no,” she said. “Did they ring the bell again after that?” he asked. “No,” she answered, “not after that.”

  “Listen, Bep,” he asked, “do you live all alone in this house? What is downstairs?” “Yes,” she said, “downstairs is the workroom, upstairs is the attic.” “And the houses next door? Who is there at night?” “Next door? No one. That is a warehouse”—she pointed in the direction from which Frits had come—“there is never anyone there. And that”—she turned around—“is an office. People are there only during the day.” “So you are here all alone?” Frits asked. “No one downstairs, no one upstairs. No one on that side, no one on this side. And it is night. Boo-hoo-hoo. My, my. Do you make sure there’s a valid token in the electrical meter whenever darkness falls? Just imagine if the guilders were used up or a fuse blew. Total darkness. Oh, help, help.” He puckered his lips and said slowly: “Oo-hoo. Hoo. Hoo.”

  “Be sure to help yourself to some cookies,” she said, placing a tin on the table. “I could never live in a house all alone like this,” Frits went on. “Hoo. Darkness, night, voices, inexplicable sounds.” “Knock it off,” Bep said. “Of course,” Frits said, “you are, by nature, highly strung. But you do hear strange, inexplicable sounds. Am I right?” “Yes,” Bep said. Her expression was frozen in a laugh, but no sound came out. “When I was in the kitchen last night,” she said, “I was sure that I heard someone in the living room. Someone sitting down in a chair.”

  “Ah, there you have it,” Frits said slowly, in a subdued voice, “now we are making progress. One is in the kitchen and someone enters the living room. He sits down in the wicker chair. You hear it clearly: first the sound of someone pulling up a chair, then the cracking as their full weight is committed to the seat. You walk slowly, in deepest dread, down the hall, towards the room—” “Yes, exactly,” said Bep, “that’s right.” “Very carefully, all atremble, you peek around the door,” said Frits, “but there is no one there. Am I right?” “Yes,” she said.

  “And those footsteps in the attic, you hear those quite often as well, don’t you?” “All the time,” she said, nodding vigorously, “all the time.” “And you don’t dare to go for a look, not when you’re alone in the house,” he said. “Boo. God only knows what it could be.” “No, no,” she said.

  “Still, it is dangerous to live on one’s own,” he went on. “You could be murdered in your bed at night. You think there is no one in the house. But how certain can you be? How do you know that someone hasn’t crept in before closing time? I find it very plucky of you, that you dare to be here alone at night. Even if there were two of you, you would not be completely safe. Like that old couple in Haarlem.” “Watch, now she’s going to ask: what was that about?” he thought.

  “A couple in Haarlem?” Bep asked, “what was that about?” “What do you mean?” Frits asked. “You said something about old people, the two of them, something happened,” she said.

  “Oh,” Frits said. “Nothing that out of the ordinary. A burglar came through the toilet window. The old woman saw him. He struck her on the head, at least twenty times, with a chisel, until she told him where the money was. They went to the money and then the old man came in. He tried to put up a fight. But he was seventy-seven years old. The burglar stabbed him, until he fell to the floor. A little later he was dead. Then the fellow took the money and was gone. The woman tried to sound the alarm. But too late. I don’t know whether they ever found the culprit. The only thing is—oh, well, perhaps I’d better not talk about that.”

  “Yes, tell me,” Bep said. “I almost forgot my tobacco,” said Frits, taking his box out of his coat pocket and rolling two cigarettes. “The fat one is for you,” he said, “one must not forget one’s manners.” A sudden series of cold shi
vers ran through him, and he felt his left eyelid tremble. “A nasty thing, how long the feeling sticks with you,” he thought.

  Bep took a few deep drags of her cigarette and blew the smoke out slowly, bit by bit, in little clouds. “Remarkable,” he thought, looking at her legs, “that she wears no stockings, even in December. Dark flesh, imbrued with blood.” “What was it, then?” she asked. “Come, tell me.”

  “It was the blood,” Frits continued. “The old man was dead; all life had left him. And the woman they took to the hospital. Because that’s not particularly helpful, you know, twenty blows and stabs with a chisel. But then the burglar. He must have been covered in blood. They were able to follow the bloody tracks for eight hundred metres through town. It must have been dripping off him. Hideous things. I swear, that’s the way it went.”

  “And if it didn’t happen that way,” Bep said, “you would have come up with it yourself. From what I hear, you can’t do without such things.”

  “The devil take me,” said Frits, “it is a delight to me each and every time. Those reports like: child killed by exploding grenade. Glorious. Deferred suffering from the war. That is always a joy. They always start off so cosily, those reports.” “The seven-year-old son,” he said in an impassive voice, “of the Karels family, agriculturalists in Breda, attempted on Wednesday afternoon to dismantle a small anti-aircraft shell with a claw hammer.” He clapped his hands once, softly. “I’ll wait till you’ve blown off steam,” Bep said.

  “It always ends,” he went on, “with: he will have to do without his left hand. Or: the child breathed his last on the way to the hospital. Or: the boy shuffled off this mortal coil. Well put, don’t you agree? Shuffled off this mortal coil. Here we see a poet at work.” He clicked his tongue. “Another lovely one is: a six-year-old playmate, who was watching from a little distance, was struck by shrapnel in the stomach and legs. My, my. Hideous things. And so young, those children. Wonderfully poignant.”

  “Would you like some coffee?” Bep asked. “There’s milk on the stove.” “A bit early for coffee,” Frits said, “but nice, yes. Please.” She went into a little alcove to one side, separated from the living room by a floral curtain. Soon she came back with two cups of coffee. “Did you remember to wipe the dredgings off the rim?” he asked. She did not reply.

  “How is your leg?” he asked, once she was seated. “Does it still itch so badly?” “The last few days, almost not at all,” she answered. “Let’s have a look,” Frits said.

  She stuck out her right leg and turned it so he could see the inside. A trail of brown and dark-red spots ran from the ankle almost to the knee.

  “Advancing steadily, I see,” he said. “Is it still festering?” “No, oh no,” she said. “That doesn’t prove anything,” Frits went on, “the suppuration has probably internalized. The pain will only come once the bone membrane has been damaged. At least you have time left till then.” “Oh, you,” Bep said. She pulled down the hem of her gown. “Of course, why not, go right ahead and dismiss all serious counsel,” he said. “But the day will come when you will need a little chair”—he rocked from side to side—“to shuffle from door to door, just like that man who comes by every year. You remember him, don’t you? He had no legs, or almost no legs. No, his legs were paralysed. He went from door to door selling pencils in his chair, wrenching it from one leg to the other. I am the man, who comes by every year. Didn’t you see him in your neighbourhood?” “No,” said Bep.

  “Then you missed a great deal,” Frits went on. “Are you still seeing the specialist? What does he do, what does he say? Cold-water massage?” “Oh, come on,” she answered, “he prescribes that grey ointment. That makes it itch even worse. He says it needs to erupt.” “Do you think that will get rid of it?” Frits asked. “No,” she answered, “I don’t know. He always says: Oh. Well, my. I’ve asked him so many times: Doctor, what is it? Then he says: If it must have a name, it is related to eczema.”

  “Talking, they’re good at that,” said Frits. “Enough to drive you into the arms of a quack. That costs you not only your money, but your nerves as well. But sometimes it helps. Why haven’t you seen a good wonder doctor yet? A competent layer-on of hands?” He slapped his thighs. “The Koo-way methodology. I feel good. I still feel good. I feel better. Oh, I’m already feeling so much better. I’m already better than I just was.” “I wonder if this will work,” he thought.

  “On Monday I went to a fellow like that,” Bep said, smiling. “Bingo,” Frits thought, “just as I suspected. Bull’s-eye. A flower in my buttonhole.” “So you actually did,” he said. “Where was that? Did you have to wait long?”

  “On Vlierstraat,” she said. “Zaber, that’s his name. The two of us went. Nutty people in the waiting room. You’d die laughing, if you heard those stories.” “Who went with you?” Frits asked. “Lies,” she answered. “I went in, we went in together.” She pushed back a strand of hair that had fallen over her forehead. “That man asked: are both of you here for treatment? No, I said, only me. Then he wanted me to look at him. I couldn’t help laughing. He says: You have a problem with your leg. Let me see it. He looked at it and then I had to look at him again. He said: There is something you are afraid of. What is it? I said: I’m not aware of anything. A whole lot of questions, then he said: You are afraid that it is tuberculosis.” “Of course,” Frits said, “that’s the most likely thing.” “I had no idea,” Bep said. “He asked me: do you have faith in me? We couldn’t help laughing the whole time. If necessary, yes, I said.” “Very good,” Frits said, “and then he started feeling your leg.”

  “No,” Bep said, “he ran his hands over it, but never actually touched it.” “A true gentleman,” said Frits. Bep held her leg out again and used both hands, palms face down, to make caressing motions from top to bottom. “And afterwards, each time,” she said, “he flapped his hands, as though they were wet. You should have heard it. His knuckles cracked something fierce. Like he was slapping his hands against a cupboard.” “And the two of you sitting there, laughing the whole time,” Frits said. “We almost died laughing,” she continued, “and he went on with that for at least ten minutes. The man must be exhausted when he gets home.” “Did it help?” Frits asked. “I don’t know,” she answered, “but when I left, I noticed that it had stopped itching.”

  “Voilà,” said Frits, “and then came the bill. How much did he charge?” “Two fifty. But first he asked very politely whether I could afford it.” “Well, how about that,” Frits said, “for ten guilders you’ll be shot of the whole thing. He pinches you on one side and the consumption goes flying out the other. Gangway! The triumph of modern science. Will you keep going back?”

  “Why not?” Bep said. “I went to see my mother. She said: If it helps, keep going to him. Fine by me, as long as she’s willing to pay.” She squeezed her leg and drew it back again.

  “That is how superstition enters the world,” Frits said. “In Dordrecht you once had a very famous uroscopist. My aunt told me about her: it’s a true story. The woman became very wealthy. As a girl, she had worked as a whore in Rotterdam. She had a coach and a driver and a page in livery, who showed the people to their seats in the waiting room. She would hold the piss over a flame in a glass retort and tell you what was wrong with you. She gave them herbs, the same herbs to every patient, but they only found that out later on. One day a farmer came to her. He was from Dubbeldam, I believe. He brought a bottle full of his old mother’s piss with him. The woman says: She is recovering, she’ll be better within a few days. Ha, yes, that’s exactly what she said.” “This is another of your nasty stories,” Bep said.

  “No, let me go on,” Frits continued. “So she says: She’ll be better soon. But within a week the old mother was dead. Do you know what that farmer did then? He filled a bottle with pig’s piss and went to town. He goes to the uroscopist, but the lady doesn’t suspect a thing. Holding the retort over the flame, she says: ‘Wonderful, she’s making good progress.’ Th
en that farmer kicked up a huge fuss, it must have been something to behold. The newspapers got wind of it too. She had to sneak out of town and they smashed all her windows. Wonderful.” “I am feeling pretty lousy,” he thought. “If I don’t get to bed too late, I’ll be fresh in the morning.”

  “Have you seen The Green Pastures?” Bep asked. “It’s that race film, isn’t it?” Frits asked. “No, I haven’t seen it.” “Do you know whether it’s any good or not?” she asked. “Yes,” he replied, “I’ve heard many good things about it.” “Because I’m going tomorrow evening,” Bep said. “Where is it playing?” Frits asked, “it’s not on anywhere at the moment, is it?” “No,” she said, “it’s a special midnight screening at The Lantern. At eleven thirty. A benefit for the Free Podium.” “Oh,” said Frits, “I’d like to go too. How much is it?” “A guilder,” Bep said. “Do you think I can still get a ticket?” he asked. “I still have to pick them up,” she answered, “then—yes, that’s two—yes, I can do that. Come by here tomorrow night. We’ll all be here.”

  “Who?” Frits asked. “Eduard, Louis, Jaap and Joosje,” she answered. “Oh, good,” Frits said, “shall I give you the money right away?” “No,” she said, “we can do that then.” They were silent for a time. “There’s still some work I need to finish,” Bep said. “I have to develop a few prints for tomorrow.” “Yes,” Frits said, rising to his feet, “I must be going anyway.” He walked over to a bookcase and took down a toy rabbit from against the wall on the top shelf. He held it in his hand. It was made from coarse, light-brown wool, with a white belly. Resting it on his arm, against his chest, he said: “Sweet, isn’t it? Sweet little rabbit. He’s sweet. It always brings tears to my eyes, every time I see it.” “You think he’s nice?” Bep asked. “You can borrow him. Would you like to take him?” “Can he stay at my house for a couple of weeks?” asked Frits, petting the animal. “I’d like that.” He placed it on the table and buttoned his coat.