The Year of the Hare - Arto Paasilinna [54]
“Really.”
“Yes.”
“So we’re going to get married?” he asked.
“That’s what you’ve been insisting, over and over, for days.”
So now he was in yet another situation. The hare was not here, but in its place there was . . . this woman. Leila. Rather young, and lovely. His body thrilled with happiness, and a flush of power went through him: a woman, a woman had come to him! Young, healthy, and vital! He wanted to take a closer look.
She was smart, desirable. Beautiful hands, long fingers. He held them, squeezed them tentatively. Nice, very nice. Her face was alluring—a perfect nose, and blue-gray eyes, rather large, no makeup, but long lashes—delightful—her mouth large, good, good, and such lovely teeth!
“Hm! You wouldn’t mind getting me the newspaper?” he asked. He didn’t need the newspaper: it was a stratagem to make her move. He wanted to watch her rise from the table, see her whole body walking across the room. He loved the way she rose from the chair: her hair bobbed adorably over the table as she turned.
To this extent, everything was ideal.
As she went to the newspaper rack by the door, it was obvious how lovely her figure was, perhaps her best feature of all. A massive joy flooded Vatanen’s weary heart. And as she came back, he noticed how womanly her hips were: she swayed like a ship of dreams! Marvelous! Wonderful!
He didn’t look at the newspaper. He thrust it aside and took her by the hand.
“I’m already married.”
“That makes you both married and engaged,” she said. It seemed to be all the same to her.
“You knew?”
“I know everything about you. I’ve been listening to you for over a week! You can’t imagine how well I know you. And I’m counting on this: we’ll be married someday, and you’re going to come and live with me.”
“But suppose my wife won’t give me a divorce?” he asked, knowing his wife.
“She will. I’m a lawyer,” Leila said. “But first of all there’s another little matter: you’ll have to give me complete power of attorney. You may not recall it, but in Helsinki you beat someone up—the secretary of the Junior League of the Coalition Party—and you made quite a mess of him. I’m going to take the case on. I don’t think you’ll be sentenced for a first offense.”
20
Humiliation
Vatanen took a dive into the slushy snow. A shot rang out, very close, then another. Buckshot fusilladed into the spruce trees. He dared not move. He could hear the irritable mumbling of drunken men.
“Damn it, he got away.”
“Unless we dropped him.”
Their voices moved farther away, but Vatanen didn’t dare get up or try to escape yet.
Things had taken a very nasty turn. The hare was fleeing through the forest at Karjalohja with two great hounds at its heels, and Vatanen was crouched near a ridge, fearing for his life.
How on earth had it come to this?
Vatanen and Leila had left Turku to spend the New Year in Helsinki. Her vacation over, Leila went back to work. Vatanen signed the power of attorney and moved in with her. After a week or two, he got a job repairing a summer villa at Karjalohja, a lakeside hamlet about fifty miles from Helsinki. A room required wallpapering, and the sauna was in a bad state inside and needed fixing up. A nice job for wintertime. He settled into the villa with the hare.
Now it was February already, and the previous evening a rowdy, disagreeable crowd had blown in, out for a big time in the villa next door. They heated the sauna and started an all-night rave. Men, and women with them, dashed naked onto the frozen lake, skidding and taking off on the slippery ice; car engines revved all night long in the floodlit drive—off for more booze, or to fetch more guests. The veranda was loud with endless yammering—the threat of communism in Finland and the free world, and so on—and now and then there were scuffles.
Vatanen didn’t get a wink all night, and the hare was on edge. Annoying headlights beamed across the walls and ceiling, and it