We, the Drowned - Carsten Jensen [200]
A month later, his two sisters, Emma and Johanne, bade farewell to their husbands—both solid, sensible men who'd jointly run the Boye shipping company. They'd managed to maintain a precarious balance in their wartime account books; they'd lost men and ships, but never money, and when afterward they felt the time had come to make the big change from sail to steam, they were ready to help launch that future.
But the flu had other plans.
For a second time and then a third, half the town accompanied a Boye coffin out onto Ommelsvejen. Those who died at home rather than at sea got to have a bit of a fuss made of them: in keeping with the old tradition, the funeral procession was led by girls who scattered greenery over the cobbles to prepare the deceased's path to paradise. Then came the hearse, drawn by a black horse.
Within weeks of one another, one by one, Farmer Sofus's heirs were laid to rest. The first time it didn't strike us that anything significant was happening, but by the third time we knew that we'd buried a lot more than three men.
"Well, that's the captain and the two first mates gone," said Petersen the stonemason, scratching his neck with the flat cap that rarely left his head. "So it's only able seamen left now."
We called Petersen the Collector of the Dead, because whenever anyone died, Petersen would carve a little statuette of them in wood. He was always sizing us up from beneath the brim of that cap: not in exactly the same way as the undertaker, but close enough. No sooner had a man been buried than his figurine would appear on a shelf in the Collector's workshop, which was right opposite the cemetery—convenient both for him and his customers, since the shiny stones, with their crosses, doves, angels, and anchors, didn't have to travel far. The Collector's workshop was the cemetery in miniature—except that here you could view the dead themselves, rather than their graves. The Collector never offered his carvings to the next of kin: when asked why, he'd reply that he didn't want to offend anyone. His little wooden figures always resembled their subjects, but in a crude way. In his hands, a big nose grew bigger, a bent back became more hunched, and the bowlegged seemed to carry an invisible barrel between their knees. Almost all of the deceased had had nicknames, and the Collector captured them in his likenesses. Smiling innocently, he said it was through sheer lack of skill, rather than ill will, that his figurines found themselves with slightly exaggerated peculiarities.
"Be patient with me," he said. "It's the best I can do."
The Collector was busy during the influenza. By day he'd carve and polish his gravestones, while at night he'd sit with his pipe in his mouth and carve wood. More and more figures appeared on his shelf.
"Who'll sail the ship now?" he said to Captain Ludvigsen. The captain, nicknamed the Commander, had come to order a gravestone for his wife. Answering his own question, he continued, "The women. Just you wait. Watch Klara Friis. Mark my words. The women will take over."
Ludvigsen shook his head. "Women don't know a damn thing about running a business."
"I didn't say they did. All I said was that they're in charge now."
IN THE NIGHT, when he was alone, Knud Erik cried. He couldn't do it in front of his mother. After all, he was her little man. And men, both big and small, don't cry in front of women. When Albert died, Knud Erik had steeled himself for his mother's tears. He'd be the one to comfort her in her second mourning. He'd be the man at her side, whose job it was to shoulder her worries and her grief. He could do that: he'd prepared himself for it. And her red-rimmed eyes and joyless face always confirmed he was indispensable. He was the only one who understood her, the only one who listened with such attention.
He placed a hand on her arm one day as she sat staring