At last…at last Isabel appears on the stage. The bright stage lights force her to blink. And all these eyes observing her are like a wall she has to push away in order to move forward. Her mother and Lars are sitting out there somewhere in the dim and jam-packed gymnasium, holding hands as usual. With quick, short steps, Isabel finds her place and lies down on the sofa.
Her heart…her heart starts beating in her chest, throat and ears. Suddenly she is not only nervous but afraid, too. Why? She certainly does remember her lines in Danish all right.
In school in Playa Verde you always had to memorize. At any moment, Señor Barros could ask you about the capitals of different countries, the world’s largest rivers, and the names of the Spanish conquistadors and the founding fathers of Chile. And Isabel was quick to give the right answers. If only she were back in Playa Verde and Señor Barros was asking the class: What’s the name of the author who wrote “The Swineherd”? Then she would promptly and confidently answer: Hans Christian Andersen!
But Isabel is in Vestervig’s school now, in the middle of a school play, and is waiting for Mette, the princess who has kissed the swineherd, to come tumbling in and exclaim, “Oh, nej!” And immediately Isabel, the Lady-in-Waiting, will “wake” and say what she has to say…in Danish and without hesitation: “Hvad sker der, min princess? De ser jo so oprørt ud!!” Which she knows should be pronounced: “Va squea ra, min pgrinses? Di sea llo so obgreort ud!” Then Mette will repeat: “Oh, nej!” And the next line, which Isabel has tucked in her memory, is: “Fortæl, fortæl Princess, hvad sker der??” And this should be pronounced: “Fotchel, fotchel, pgrinses. Va squea ra?”
Countless times she has read the Danish text, and as many times she has, both aloud and to herself, recited it the way it should be recited. Strange people, the Danes, they don’t talk the same way they write.
But what is it that makes her so afraid?
Isabel clenches her fists to give herself courage. But instead it seems as if the fear spreads along her back and legs. And her heartbeat—it is unbearable. Beautiful Diosito, help me, she says to herself. You can always ask God for help if you’re afraid—that’s what Father Facundo and Sister Antonieta said to the children of Playa Verde.
Her mother and Lars—she must make them proud of her! After only two months in a Danish school and already she is in a play. Since she came to Vestervig’s school, she has tried her best to do everything as well as possible. It has to go well; it just has to.
Once again Isabel recreates the sound of the first answer in her inner ear: “Va squea ra, min pgrinses? Di sea llo so obgreort ud!” And then the next, which comes right after Mette’s second line; “Oh, nej!” and which sounds like: “Fotchel, fotchel, pgrinses. Va squea ra?”
Yes, here in Vestervig, Isabel wants to be just as good at remembering things as she was in school in Playa Verde.
Playa Verde—so far from the nearest city. It took two hours for the old, crammed bus, moving slowly and coughing like Father Facundo, to come out of the mountains, and then you could see the whole port city of Valparaiso, far below, pasted to the sea, spread across the coast and the hills like a huge spider web of streets and buildings. And late in the afternoon, the bus got ready to return to Playa Verde. People were already streaming into the bus stop on the Plaza Independencia—whole families with shopping bags and boxes, older school children, and those working in offices, in the harbor, or selling goods in the streets, and, of course… the eternal drunk who sold those birds that were just as noisy in their cages as he himself on the bus. And once again the old bus pulled itself out of the port city and found its pot-holed and dusty road, first up the hills, then up the mountains and into the forest, where farm workers and laborers with their shovels, rakes, and wheelbarrows were gathered up. And you rode helter-skelter together while the drunken man sang and the birds made a racket and people asked him to shut up because he was intolerable. And right after the police station the sea appeared, the deep endless blue to the right of the bus, and soon you would be back in Playa Verde, where everyone knows each other and what is going on that evening, the next day, and all the coming days, and you talk with one another in the same way that you write…and you speak Spanish with everyone and not only with your mother, like here in Vestervig where no one but her mother speaks Spanish and all the rest speak Danish.
From Playa Verde to Vestervig. It seems to Isabel that one day she was in Playa Verde on her way to the supermarket in Valparaiso and the next day they lived in Vestervig with Lars. It was because of the cardboard box, the cardboard box jammed with goods and so heavy that they could barely carry it out of the supermarket. And there she walked with her mother—the many streets down to the bus stop on Plaza Independencia, while the cardboard box weighed them both down and threatened to burst. Suddenly the big gringo showed up—blond hair, eyes so blue as if they were made of glass. He talked funny and he lifted the box without any effort, and they continued, all three, down the street. At the Plaza Independencia the gringo and Isabel’s mother talked together while people all around them bellyached because the bus was late again. Isabel drew hopscotch squares on the ground, took her hopscotch stone—an empty can of shoe polish—out of her pocket and began hopscotching. Once in a while she lifted her eyes from the lines on the ground—and saw her mother smile like she had not smiled in a long, long time. Her mother and the gringo, who was called Lars, continued to see each other, later they wrote to each other, and then came that strange day when her mother held Isabel by the hand and prayed to God and San Cristobal, the protector of travelers, because they were to set out on a long journey to Denmark—to Lars in Vestervig.
Time passes so slowly when you have to wait. Your body gets stiff and your fear grows. Isabel figures that Majken, the other Lady-in-Waiting, must already be on stage, not too far from her and already combing her hair in front of the big mirror on the back wall of the stage. But Isabel cannot hear anything. Is she still alone on stage? The whole play will be ruined if she turns her head and opens her eyes to look around. And yet, what if she tried… just a little bit? Isabel doesn’t know whether it’s because she is afraid or because she isn’t able to, that she can’t move her body the least bit.
Oh, Diosito…in Playa Verde she was always confident when she stood in front of the teacher and the other students, or in front of the whole school, for that matter. Isabel repeats the necessary sentences again: “Va squea ra, min pgrinses? Di ea so…so…” But it is as if her memory drains away to nothing. God! How is it the first line continues? Was it…Di sea llo sodan…? Or…Di er so…so… These Danish sounds seem to flow into each other—until a shiver runs through her body and makes it cold. Because she has forgotten how the sentence continues!
She skips to the next sentence, the one that began with “Fotchel, fotchel…” and meets again this terrifying emptiness within her head. She strains to remember, but without success. Her memory seems locked tight—it can no longer find the right sounds.
If only she were alone and far away, like in the days after her father left when she drew hopscotch squares in the sand on the little beach in Playa Verde. She drew the lines with a branch the waves had washed ashore, but she did not hopscotch. Every once in a while she stopped and looked toward the tiny houses of Playa Verde at the foot of the green mountains—and there is the tiny wooden house where her mother cries and to which her father will never return. Only the sea and the wind keep her company, and she stares once more at her hopscotch squares but she doesn’t hopscotch…some tears fall and become dark little dots as soon as they hit the sand, but then the wind comes, as tireless as the sea, and the dark dots disappear and suddenly it’s as if the tears never fell. If only Isabel could cry now, here in Vestervig…but she knows she must not do that.
Her mother and Lars are sitting out there waiting anxiously for her to get up and perform. The packed gymnasium, the teachers, and the girls and boys in the play are waiting, too. A whole world is waiting for Isabel, who is lying motionless, gripped by an anxiety greater than herself. The sounds she was able to remember until a moment ago are gone…and will not come back. Oh beautiful Diosito! What has gone wrong?
In Playa Verde nothing would have gone wrong. In Playa Verde she never would have disappointed her mother; she never would have disappointed anyone. But Playa Verde is farther away than ever. Playa Verde—the tiny houses between the green mountains and the sea that hums day and night and the most at night. And the creaking wooden church, the altar with the crucified Jesus, who has to suffer so mankind can find the way to Heaven. And old white-haired Father Facundo, who takes care of the church’s garden while he talks to sleepy Yaco, the stray dog that is in reality his, or perhaps the church’s… who knows? On Sundays, Sisters Antonieta and Pilar come from Valparaiso, both young and good-humored; they teach the catechism… about the Trinity and the Resurrection and the Sacraments and a whole lot of other things children don’t really understand at all. On the other hand, they all understand the difference between Heaven and Hell. Into heaven come all the souls of good people after death…and everything is beautiful, and the angels of God look after them. Hell is just the opposite…the evil ones burn in flames while they are tortured by the Devil and his little devils. In one place you have a beautiful time; in the other a horrible one. But both Father Facundo and Sister Antonieta have said children always go to Heaven because the things they do wrong, they don’t do on purpose.
And it is not on purpose that Isabel has forgotten what she has to say—Diosito lindo, not on purpose. She wants with all her heart to make mother and Lars happy and proud of her. Her heart; it’s beating so hard, it seems it will explode any moment. What is happening around her? She would like to be far away from everyone and everything, but she has to be on the sofa and wait…Wait for what? Oh, God!
With great clarity, Isabel remembers the time she asked Sister Pilar whether it was possible to see the soul. It is in the backyard of the church, and the Sister is sitting on a wooden chair facing the children, who are sitting on the ground while she explains that once in a while it is possible to see the soul—like a floating puff of breath that comes out of the mouths of children who have just died. Children are not sinners, and so this little soul-puff flies right up to Heaven, where the Lord and all the angels welcome it.
Unexpectedly, Isabel feels a blow inside her chest—like a pain moving up out of her throat and making her mouth open slightly. The pain shoots more quickly upward and hits the darkness behind her closed eyes. And in a short, nearly imperceptible moment, a light explodes inside Isabel’s head. Immediately after, she is weightless and floating both inside her body and out in space simultaneously. Strange, she is not afraid. On the contrary, everything seems so quiet and peaceful. Then she detaches herself slowly from her body until she can no longer sense the sofa on which she is lying. And there is nothing to be afraid of. Things are just as they should be.
Now Isabel hears the shouts of children and adults right around her—“Isabel! Isabel!” And she sees a crowd of adults with their children, who are running around in circles on the Plaza Verde square when she is a little girl, three years old, who is holding her mother’s hand. And Isabel feels the reassuring joy at holding her mother’s hand and waving to the children running around in the square. Isabel is both inside and outside herself as a little girl—now a little girl at her fourth birthday party, and there are grownups and noisy children around the table. Her father and mother stand in the doorway smiling joyfully because Isabel is blowing out the candles on her birthday cake. The children shout: “Isabel!” Her mother shouts: “Isabel, darling. What’s happening?”
The light in the candle flames grows and grows—that’s what’s happening, Isabel thinks fleetingly. And the light rises and grows big—big as the sun, like a shining ball deep in the heavens…in the heavens where the angels of the Lord sing so beautifully when they bid the good souls welcome. The song fills the space and forgives every wrong thing you have done without thinking about it. “How beautiful…Diosito lindo, how beautiful it is.” Isabel’s inner voice comes out of her heart and becomes one with the angels’ song, which forgives and welcomes.
Isabel feels herself being shaken, being slapped in the face. And she sees herself from above while she is still lying on the sofa in her Lady-in-Waiting dress. Lars is standing on the stage, too. Right next to him is Mette, dressed like a princess, and Majken, as a Lady-in-Waiting. “Isabel! Isabel!” they say while they are crying. Her mother and the drama teacher are kneeling over her. Her mother shakes her, slapping her face. Sobbing, she cries: “My darling! My darling come back!”
Suddenly Isabel is back in her own body and in a flash looks up at her mother’s tearful face. Isabel can’t understand her mother’s concern. Why is she crying? And again she is up above, looking down at herself lying motionless on the stage, surrounded by desperate people. The song of the angels reaches her again. And she turns away from the stage. The heavens spin round in huge whirls, opening a path in the center, right in front of her—and at the end of that heavenly path is the radiant ball, God in all his splendor. And Isabel is happy, happier than she has ever been.
“Isabel, darling—don’t leave me!” Her mother is crying and keeps on shaking her and pinching her cheeks.
Isabel hesitates, she finds herself between Heaven and a life in Heaven and her mother and life in Vestervig. She loves her mother, and that is the only reason she would return to a life in Vestervig.
And it is right now, Isabel knows—it is right now she has to choose.
HERMAN HESSE - Siddartha
ARTHUR KOESTLER - Gladiators
MIKA WALTARI - The Egyptian
HENRY MILLER - Sexus
JOSEPH CONRAD - Heart of Darkness
