The Hakkapirelli Life
by Kjetil Jansen
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Table of Contents parts: 1, 2, 3 |
part 1
Done feeding Pegasus II, Marie trotted from the stable back into the red-painted summer house. She whistled as she changed the water in Fluffy’s bowl. The cat, a white Persian, was obviously outside doing cute cat stuff. She could hear Thomas feeding clothes into the washer, slow and clumsy as always. She slipped into a yellow bikini and a light blue beach skirt and examined herself in the mirror. Nice, but not perfect. You can never get too rich, too slim, or too tanned.
Her flipflops clattered merrily as she descended the narrow path to her private beach. She took timeouts to sample the wild strawberries leaning into the path, searching for her fingers. Thomas had brought down a mattress, books, fresh papers and magazines, and a cooler with assorted ice cream.
The hours ticked pleasantly by. She noticed several moon jellyfish had got stuck close to the shore. She liked moon jellyfish, their purple circles and translucent optimism, as if a child had been commissioned to create a jellyfish that doesn’t sting you. She put on her snorkel and pushed them out to safety before she went for a refreshing swim. After skimming The Lancet and another hundred pages of Infinite Jest, she fell asleep on the mattress.
When Marie returned to the house, the shuttlecock-shaped washing lines were rotating slowly around their base. She felt the clothes. Soft and dry. She glanced at her flower garden. Cranberry, foxglove, spring crocus — all the species she cherished — from giant sunflowers to tender forget-me-nots. Fluffy sat by the door, greeting her with her eyes. She fed her a whole tin of mackerel. Friday treat. Oh, Seinfeld is on. The reception wasn’t the best. Thomas had promised to check on the outside antenna, but he was afraid of heights.
She got herself a Coke and moved out to the balcony. Situated on the top of a chalk cliff, she had a splendid view of your typical Norwegian skerries, dots of islands as if the ocean wanted to write something. Fluffy on her lap, purring like a rusty lawnmower. Through a plexiglass square, she watched the waves that made it past the islands gently surge against the busy end of the cliff, six hundred feet down. She showered and changed into a black bathing suit and a white cap, found a bundle of carrots in the fridge, and did a pit stop. Pegasus II made happy horse noises as she brushed him. Thomas had cleaned the stable. Good for him.
She felt anticipation bubbling as she descended the stairs to the slide. She paused to drink from the groundwater spring that served it. Clear and fresh. Fluffy was up on the roof, white on red, wagging her tail, abandoned. Not for long, my sweet. She lay flat on her back with her hands on her neck and was carried through a spectacular view of the bay before she swerved down into the tunnel. The pillared slide divided and came together in a myriad of possibilities, this time zipping through giant kaleidoscope crystals, as someone had dropped a paintbox on a stegosaurus.
After a final curve above the idyllic south coast village Arensand, she was triumphantly delivered into the hotel’s penthouse apartment pool. She found herself a towel monogrammed with her own initials, dried off, and changed into white cotton trousers and a red top. She decided on yellow moccasins.
Her mum and dad owned hotels all over the world. This was the first and still the finest, at the very top of UNESCO’s world heritage list. She went down to the harbor just as fishermen were bringing in the day’s haul in six-oared rowboats, yoles and dories. She bargained shrimp from an affable, weatherworn skipper, and after a visit to the bakery and the general store, she was back in the penthouse with bagels, mayonnaise, and lemon juice. Absolutely scrumptious, or shrimpalicous, as Daddy liked to put it. She kept the shells for Thomas to make himself soup later.
Time for a walk among the clustering white-painted houses. She helped a small boy patch up a wound on his knee, showed a Portuguese backpacking pair the direction to the bus station, tuned a street musician’s guitar, and explained the rules to three girls playing hopscotch.
Still a bit early for her rendezvous, she sat down on a bench in the town square. The guitar man wasn’t half bad, earned a decent stream of coins. A boy with yellow curls lost the grip on his balloon as he stooped to drink from a water fountain and managed to reclaim it in the nick of time.
Suddenly it got darker.
“You are blocking my sun,” she said, without looking. No change. Someone was pulling her leg. With so many friends, it was a small miracle she hadn’t bumped into one yet. Careful coughing. The sun-stealer was a slight man with brown corduroy pants, black gabardine boots and a morning dress jacket with an unfeasibly large bowtie. He carried with him a bundle of round cardboard cartridges which he threw down to the ground. His face went bright red as he began to trample them, methodically, as handling mammoth tubes of toothpaste. But his eyes were steadily friendly, in a geeky fashion.
“Honorable ingenue! Besotted by your divine countenance, all must be undone. Abominations! Maladroitnesses!”
He made her a proposition. As a photographer, he was working on an assignment for Hakkapirelli, the highly respected car tire manufacturer. Marie wondered, not aloud, how you could stay in such a business without being respected.
“A calendar. Twelve female models. What a waste! From now till the end of time, every month shall be you and nothing but.”
“You had me at Hakka.”
He bowed deeply whilst backtracking. “I will make myself scarce. I must progress to find you the finest weaves.”
Marie smiled. “You will find a recirculation bin on the corner of Mackerel Lane and Mackerel Drive.”
His face became even more plum. “I understand. How very droll your charming hint! Outstanding! I obliviate my tantrum posthaste.”
She watched him leave, a cardboard porcupine. What a funny creature. That was intense. Steeplechase jockeying, her solo ballet tour, principal bassoon in London Symphony Orchestra, she had to revise her schedule. And find the time to get some clothes. She could do better than that guy for sure. The best boutiques, well aware of the advertisement value, gave her stuff for free in heaps.
“Welcome to Arensand Video Emporium! How may I be of assistance? Do rewind, unless you have rented Son of the Mask or Mannequin.”
“And hello to you, Jasmin.”
“I’ll close up shop. Elisabeth and Vivian are as always on standby in the back room slash girl cave, together with lashings of chocolate and potato chips and a brand-new VCR.”
She hugged it out with the girls.
“Elisabeth. You need to use an elastic brush to give your lashes better lift and volume.”
“Thank you. I will bear that in mind.”
“Jasmin. You have a pear-shaped body. I have got three words for you. Belts. Belts. Belts. Without one, your jacket should be long enough to reach the lower part of your thighs.”
“That sounds like good advice. Jacket goes in bin. Right... now!”
“And Vivian. White kajal works for you and your small eyes, but what have I said about too much foundation?”
“I am sorry, Marie. I can do better. Why don’t you choose today’s movie. You are so good at it.”
“We choose together as we always do,” Jasmin said. They circled the aisles. Elisabeth bravely tried to not really get what the movie was about, while Vivian preferred to read the cover synopsis out loud. They both wanted excitement, romance, and thrills.
“Do you want me to cut through?” Jasmin asked.
“I could watch them all day, but please do.”
Jasmin cleared her throat and clapped her hands. “Ladies! I am proud to bring you, fresh from our under the counter secret seedy stash, Steamship to Death, starring Rondo Hatton and Sylvia Sidney.”
“In the same movie?”
“That shouldn’t be humanly possible!”
We are in a government building. Hatton, in a white Navy uniform, walks into Sidney’s secretarial office and makes himself comfortable on the edge of her desk, trading flirty innuendo with her while drinking milk out of a coconut using a straw.
“A coconut? They are not filled with milk. It is made from the meat of the fruit.”
“Stand down, Elisabeth!”
Sidney looks soft-focus sensational with her heart-shaped face, wavy curls, and a pillbox hat. Hatton slides closer as Sidney parts her lips for a possible kiss. The door opens, and a man littered with chest ribbons enters. He is a full general and Sidney’s father.
“Phew! That was a close call.”
“He is a rough one, Hatton.”
“I didn’t know if he was going to kiss her or slap her.”
“Like all your boyfriends!”
“Vivian, could you remove some of your accessories?”
“My what?”
“Your bling. They rattle when you get excited.”
“Fair enough.”
The admiral gives Hatton a mission. Travelling with the family, the youngest son of a stock baron billionaire has mysteriously vanished from the ocean liner RMS Olympic only hours into its maiden voyage. There is a lot of hoopla surrounding this luxury Atlantic crossing. People gather in betting offices to place bets on the hour of its New York arrival.
“Yes! A movie in black and white is nothing without spinning newspaper front pages.”
The incident is hushed down. To facilitate the investigation, Hatton and Sidney will travel incognito, masquerading as newlyweds. Only the captain (Peter Lorre) knows their true identities. Sidney’s father is not pleased, but he has a boss too. The Olympic is waiting for them, pretending to need vital instruments, just east of Southampton.
“I am confused. Where are they going?”
“You have heard about the Atlantic, haven’t you?”
“I thought that was the name of the ship.”
“Shouldn’t the fact that they are now on a plane and the name Southampton lift your fog?”
“There are probably millions of Southamptons in America!”
The billionaire son is nowhere to be found. The weather gets increasingly worse. Iceberg stock footage. There is a lot of baccarat, sophisticated dining at the captain’s table, and risky repartee in striped pyjamas and three different immaculate silky nightgowns.
“They actually want us to believe the honeymoon cabin has two separate beds. I love this movie.”
“I want to adopt it.”
Some tools are missing from the engine room, but the always sweaty chief blames it on his novice assistant greaser. Then, a murder. A cabin girl strangled to death. Is it connected to the disappearance?
“Pass me the bowl before Jasmin eats everything nougat.”
“Could we try a little quiet?”
The investigation is at a standstill. Everybody is a suspect. Eight days behind schedule, the liner is hours from docking. Sidney finds her way to the telegraph office, distracts the man on guard, and reads through the telegrams. Nothing of interest. Hatton decides to break his cover. Together with the stock baron, he persuades the captain to halt the ship. He reluctantly agrees. They get 24 hours. The gathered passengers vehemently disagree. Hatton makes a speech about duty and justice. The passengers applaud and Sidney falls in love with him.
The vessel is searched from top to bottom, to no avail. Ten hours gone, the missing person’s brother begs Hatton to call it off. The family has suffered enough. They want to get off the ship and mourn in peace. After a mysterious conversation with the novice greaser, Hatton joins the family on deck. Birds. Shore. The Statue of Liberty salutes the joyless parade.
“Did you see that?”
“What?”
“On the smallest skerry. A red house.”
“A lighthouse.”
“No. An ordinary house. So close to the water.”
“How do you know it was red?”
“Did you see it, Marie? Are you leaving?”
“I have to. I have to go.”
“By all means.”
“We’ll pause the movie.”
“Right. Who is sitting on the remote?”
“Why is everyone looking at me?!”
Vivian handed the remote to Marie. She pressed play and the wall began to shine and flicker, as if candles were used to mimic fireworks behind it. The wallpaper bulged and stretched as the wall tore itself open, creating a jagged door sliding aside. Jasmin shaped her mouth to a silent goodbye. A scattering of pigeons.
* * *
Copyright © 2022 by Kjetil Jansen
