We, the Drowned - Carsten Jensen [224]
Over and over we debated the possible outcomes. What if Kristian Stork's courage failed at the last moment? Or what if Anton's aim failed him again?
The big day came. We went to the field off Vestergade where we'd often met for battles against South. They turned up too, with their leader, Henry Levinsen, who stood there with his new nose, crooked but healed, on show. They hadn't brought weapons. Like the rest of us, they were here to witness Anton's triumph or defeat. All in all we must have been about fifty boys.
It had just stopped raining, and the black mud made it heavy going.
Kristian Stærk positioned himself in the middle of the field, and Knud Erik tried to balance the apple on his head, but it kept rolling off. We hadn't held a dress rehearsal, and most of us considered this a bad omen. Kristian had to twist his long, greasy hair into a kind of cushion before the apple would stay put. His ears kept rocking. We were reminded of Anton's joke about them: that they looked like wings getting ready to carry his head off to another body. Without doubt that was precisely what Kristian Stork's ears wanted to do right now.
Anton faced him and their eyes met, like those of two duelists. Then Anton started walking backward, narrowing his eyes as though in concentration—but he kept going until it was clear he'd have no earthly chance of hitting the apple: in fact we even doubted that an arrow could travel that far. Knud Erik yelled at him to stop and come back a bit. Anton refused, and it took a lot of arguing before he agreed to shoot from a distance of fifteen paces. Kristian, in the meantime, had grown so confused that he'd dislodged the apple again.
Finally, everything was ready. Anton put the shaft to the string and drew the bow, narrowing his eyes until they were almost shut. Quite a few of us thought the arrow would go as wide as the bullets he'd aimed at the stork, because Anton had lost his knack.
But this time, Anton didn't miss. It wasn't the apple he hit, though. It was Kristian Stærk.
We'd barely registered the twang of the bowstring before Kristian doubled up with a howl and buried his face in his hands. The undamaged apple hit the ground, but none of us saw it fall. We could see that the arrow was stuck into something behind Kristian's hands, but not exactly what. Then Kristian straightened up and roared up at the sky as if he'd lost his mind. It sounded scary; after all, he was almost a fully grown man. He threw back his head so he could scream even louder. The arrow stayed attached for a bit, then fell to the ground. Its tip was red.
Vilhjelm was the first to reach Kristian, a handkerchief at the ready. Anton didn't stir. It seemed he needed time to digest his defeat before he could even begin to take in that he'd shot Kristian Stærk. Later we often discussed which was worse: the damage to his reputation or the injury he'd inflicted.
Finally he snapped out of it. He ran toward Kristian but stopped a few feet away. "He needs to go to Doctor Kroman," he said, in a voice that he managed to make completely matter-of-fact.
He was still our leader, and when he spoke we all calmed down, though several of the younger boys continued to shriek in fear when they saw how Vilhjelm's handkerchief had gone red from the pouring blood.
Anton went over to Kristian, who was still clutching his face and roaring. "Let me see where I hit you," Anton said, sweeping Kristian's hair back.
"Don't you touch me," Kristian howled. Nevertheless he took his hands away from his face, and we could see that the blood was coming from his right eye, which was now a mess of red.
Anton took Kristian by the hand, just as he'd done with Henry Levinsen when the flowerpot holder got shoved over his ears. Henry would probably have been reminded of it too, if he'd still been present, but the members of South were long gone. "We'll tell them that he got a twig in his eye," Anton said, and looked around the gang with his old authority.
Together, with Kristian still screaming his head off, we walked