Lene Kaaberbol - Death of a Nightingale

Also by Lene Kaaberbl and Agnete Friis

The Boy in the Suitcase

Invisible Murder

Copyright 2013 by Lene Kaaberbl and Agnete Friis

English translation copyright 2013 Elisabeth Dyssegaard

Published by

Soho Press, Inc.

853 Broadway

New York, NY 10003

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kaaberbl, Lene.

[Nattergalens Doed. English]

Death of a nightingale / Lene Kaaberbl & Agnete Friis;

Translated from

the Danish by Elisabeth Dyssegaard.

p cm

Originally published as Nattergalens Doed, in Danish.

eISBN: 978-1-61695-305-8

I. Friis, Agnete, author. II. Dyssegaard, Elisabeth Kallick, translator.

III. Title.

PT8177.21.A24N3713 2013

2013016761

v3.1

Contents

Cover

Other Books by This Author

Title Page

Copyright

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5: Ukraine, 1934

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9: Ukraine, 1935

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13: Ukraine, 1934

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17: Ukraine, 1934

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24: Ukraine, 1934

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31: Ukraine, 1934

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34: Ukraine, 1935

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38: Ukraine, 1935

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41: Ukraine, 1935

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44: Ukraine, 1935

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48: Ukraine, 1935

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56: Ukraine, 1935

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61: Ukraine, 1934

Acknowledgments

Audio file #83: Nightingale

Go on, says a mans voice.

Im tired, an older woman answers, clearly uncomfortable and dismissive.

But its so exciting.

Exciting? Theres a lash of bitterness in her reaction. A bit of Saturday entertainment? Is that what this is for you?

No, I didnt mean it like that.

They are both speaking Ukrainian, he quickly and informally, she more hesitantly. In the background, occasional beeps from an electronic game can be heard.

Its important for posterity.

The old woman laughs now, a hard and unhappy laughter. Posterity, she says. Do you mean the child? Isnt she better off not knowing?

If thats how you see it. We should be getting home anyway.

No. The word is abrupt. Not yet. Surely you can stay a little longer.

You said you were tired, says the man.

No. Not that tired.

I dont mean to press you.

No, I know that. You just thought it was exciting.

Forget I said that. It was stupid.

No, no. Children like exciting stories. Fairy tales.

I was thinking more along the lines of something real. Something you experienced yourself.

Another short pause. Then, No, let me tell you a story, the old woman says suddenly. A fairy tale. A little fairy tale from Stalin Land. A suitable bedtime story for the little one. Are you listening, my sweet?

Beep, beep, beep-beep. Unclear mumbling from the child. Obviously, her attention is mostly on the game, but that doesnt stop the old woman.

Once upon a time, there were two sisters, she begins clearly, as if reciting. Two sisters who both sang so beautifully that the nightingale had to stop singing when it heard them. First one sister sang for the emperor himself, and thus was the undoing of a great many people. Then the other sister, in her resentment, began to sing too.

Who are you talking about? the man asks. Is it you? Is it someone we know?

The old woman ignores him. Theres a harshness to her voice, as if shes using the story to punish him.

When the emperor heard the other sister, his heart grew inflamed, and he had to own her, she continued. Come to me, he begged. Oh, you can be sure he begged. Come to me, and be my nightingale. Ill give you gold and beautiful clothes and servants at your beck and call.

Here the old woman stops. Its as if she doesnt really feel like going on, and the man no longer pressures her. But the story has its own relentless logic, and she has to finish it.

At first she refused. She rejected the emperor. But he persisted. What should I give you, then? he asked, because he had learned that everything has a price. I will not come to you, said the other sister, before you give me my evil sisters head on a platter.

In the background, the beeping sounds from the childs game have ceased. Now there is only an attentive silence.

When the emperor saw that a heart as black as sin hid behind the beautiful song, the old woman continues, still using her fairy-tale voice, he not only killed the first sister, but also the nightingales father and mother and grandfather and grandmother and whole family. Thats what you get for your jealousy, he said and threw the other sister out.

The child utters a sound, a frightened squeak. The old woman doesnt seem to notice.

Tell me, she whispers. Which of them is me?

Youre both alive, says the man. So something in the story must be a lie.

In Stalin Land, Stalin decides what is true and what is a lie, says the old woman. And I said that it was a Stalin fairy tale.

Daddy, says the child, I want to go home now.

Gum?

Natasha started; she had been sitting silently, looking out the window of the patrol car as Copenhagen glided by in frozen shades of winter grey. Dirty house fronts, dirty snow and a low and dirty sky in which the sun had barely managed to rise above the rooftops in the course of the day. The cars tires hissed in the soap-like mixture of snow, ice and salt that covered the asphalt. None of it had anything to do with her, and she noted it all without really seeing it.

You do speak Danish, dont you?

The policeman in the passenger seat had turned toward her and offered her a little blue-white pack. She nodded and took a piece. Said thank you. He smiled at her and turned back into his seat.

This wasnt the bus, as they called itthe usual transport from Vestre Prison to the courtthat Natasha had been on before. It was an ordinary black-and-white; the police were ordinary Danish policemen. The youngest one, the one who had given her the gum, was thirty at the most. The other was old and fat and seemed nice enough too. Danish policemen had kind eyes. Even that time with Michael and the knife, they had spoken calmly and kindly to her as if she hadnt been a criminal they were arresting but rather a patient going to the hospital.

One day, before too long, two of these kind men would put Katerina and her on a flight back to Ukraine, but that was not what was happening today. Not yet. It couldnt be. Her asylum case had not yet been decided, and Katerina was not with her. Besides, you didnt need to go through Copenhagen to get to the airport, that much she knew. This was the way to Central Police Headquarters.

Natasha placed her hands on her light blue jeans, rubbed them hard back and forth across the rough fabric, opened and closed them quickly. Finally, she made an effort to let her fists rest on her knees while she looked out at Copenhagen and tried to figure out if the trip into the city brought her closer to or farther from Katerina. During the last months, the walls and the physical distance that separated them had become an obsession. She was closer to her daughter when she ate in the cafeteria than when she was in her cell. The trip to the yard was also several meters in the wrong direction, but it still felt soothing because it was as if she were breathing the same air as Katerina. On the library computer Natasha had found Google Street View and dragged the flat little man to the parking lot in front of the prison, farther along Copenhagens streets and up the entrance ramp to the highway leading through the woods that sprawled north of the citys outer reaches. It was as if she could walk next to him the whole way and see houses and storefronts and trees and cars, but when he reached the Coal-House Camp, he couldnt go any farther. Here she had to make do with the grubby satellite image of the camps flat barrack roofs. She had stared at the pictures until she went nearly insane. She had imagined that one of the tiny dots was Katerina. Had dreamed of getting closer. From the prison, it was twenty-three kilometers to the Coal-House Camp. From the center of Copenhagen it was probably a few kilometers more, but on the other hand, there were neither walls nor barbed wire between the camp and her right now. There was only the thin steel shell of the police car, air and wind, kilometers of asphalt. And later, the fields and the wet forest floor.