For that reason the same thing happened as so often happened with Singer. He got lost in his own thoughts. In his thoughts he invited Nils Hartvigsen to come over, and then seated him in a chair right there, next to his own armchair, while he himself got up to pace back and forth in the rather cramped living room of the rowhouse apartment as he talked to Nils Hartvigsen, who in his imagination was sitting in a chair, occasionally offering some remark, and — this was something Singer emphasized — Nils Hartvigsen was able to avoid putting on that sympathetic expression, displaying great solicitude, speaking in that subdued tone of voice people assume when talking to a newly widowed man, and instead he was as upset as Singer was, although hopefully for different reasons, because otherwise there was no use in him sitting there, in Singer’s imagination, to listen to what Singer was saying.

  “Did you hear that Merete and I were going to get a divorce?” Singer began. No, that wasn’t how he’d begin, because he knew that Nils Hartvigsen knew, and only in reality could Hartvigsen have denied it, but he wasn’t actually here, merely his imaginary figure was present. And the imaginary Nils Hartvigsen couldn’t offer him any reply to this question, either in the affirmative, as Singer believed he would, or in the negative, which is what he hoped. He couldn’t talk to the imaginary Nils Hartvigsen, and so he sent him away. Instead he happened to think of the husband of his colleague who had hosted the dinner party well over four years ago, and whom he’d often met since then, and whom he liked very much. He thought he should call him and ask him to come over for a visit, because he needed someone to talk to. He was certain that he would come over immediately, considering the circumstances, but if he did come over, and Singer began talking about what he wanted to talk about, then he was afraid that the husband of his colleague would feel uncomfortable, because even though Singer liked him very much and could imagine telling him just about anything, they weren’t exactly friends, and what Singer wanted to confide in him were things that it was difficult to confide in anyone other than your closest friends; and so the husband of Singer’s colleague would feel uncomfortable because Singer regarded him as such a close friend, which was not how he’d ever thought of Singer. So Singer decided not to call him but instead invited him over as an imaginary friend. What prevented him from actually calling him was the fact that he was not a friend in reality, but he could just as well invite him over in the capacity of an imaginary friend. And that’s what he did. The man came over, sat down in the armchair on the other side of the coffee table, and Singer, who would soon get up to pace back and forth in the cramped living room of the rowhouse apartment, got right to the point and said:

  “Do you know that Merete and I were going to get a divorce? And then this happened. If this hadn’t happened, we would have been living apart very soon, and continuing our lives separately, Merete and her daughter here in Not­odden, and me somewhere else. Now Merete’s dead, and I’ll go on living here together with her daughter, Isabella, as her stepfather. What do you say to that?”

  The other man, the husband of his colleague, didn’t answer. He paused to think for a long moment before replying.

  “How awful, Singer,” he said.

  “That Merete’s dead? Or that we were going to get a divorce?”

  “Both,” said the other man. “Both. I have to say it’s awful. You must be feeling just awful right now.”

  “Yes,” replied Singer, “I feel awful. But why, why? Those two things have no connection. The fact that Merete and I were going to get a divorce, that’s something we’d both agreed on, and it may be sad, in a way, but it’s not really awful, is it? We had agreed to get a divorce. Things just couldn’t go on any longer between Merete and me. So why do you call that awful? Okay, I’ll tell you why, it’s because she’s dead. But the fact that we were going to get a divorce and the fact that she’s dead have nothing to do with each other. The fact that she’s dead doesn’t make the fact that we were going to get a divorce awful. It’s nothing to get upset about. But you’re still upset, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, I’m upset,” said the other man. “I have to admit it.”

  “But they have nothing to do with each other. Don’t you see, it’s pure coincidence.”

  “Yes, I know that,” said the other man, “but I still feel shaken. I feel so sorry for you.”

  “When you heard that Merete was dead, did you also think it was awful and did you feel sorry for me?”

  “Yes, but in a different way. I would have said that I felt such sympathy for you. But not sorry for you, I think that’s how it is, I have to admit,” said the other man.

  “Admit. Feel sorry,” said Singer pensively.

  He got up from the armchair and began pacing back and forth as he talked to the imaginary man sitting in the other armchair.

  “But that’s wrong. Surely you must realize that. You know there’s no reason to feel sorry for me. We both wanted to get a divorce, it was decided. Then Merete was killed in a car accident. I’m completely blameless. It was the other driver who is the guilty party. He’s the one you should feel sorry for, if you can. I am not to blame.

  “How strange that I even have to say that,” Singer went on. “To you sitting here, I have to say that I am not to blame.”

  “I didn’t say that you’re guilty,” replied the other man. “You’re the one talking about such notions. I simply said that now that I’ve heard you were going to get a divorce, her death seems even more awful.”

  “Why? Oh, don’t say it, I can say it myself. Because of the guilt I’ll have to live with, right? But I have no reason to feel guilty.”

  “No, you have no reason to feel guilty,” sighed the other man. “That’s not what I mean. It’s the fact that you’re robbed of the grief that I assumed you felt, and that I had such sympathy for, until I heard that you were going to get a divorce because the two of you could no longer live together. Listen here, what I mean to say is, it was awful to hear that you had decided to get a divorce, and then Merete gets killed right afterward, those are two sad things. Even though they can’t be compared, of course,” he added, possibly in an attempt to offer solace.

  Singer sat back down. He sat there for a long time, staring straight ahead.

  “Death is too shitty,” Singer said. “It’s impossible to comprehend. Not only intellectually but also emotionally. It makes us such liars. Everything we say, all the facts, become distasteful when we’re confronted with death. If I told you what I’m feeling now, you’d be sick to your stomach. I’ve only told you a tiny piece, given you a small, precise bit of information, meaning that several weeks before Merete was killed, we had decided to get a divorce. That the man who received word of her death, in his capacity as the one closest to her in this life, was in reality, by virtue of a mutual decision, a man who would ostensibly no longer be in her life. And it makes you uncomfortable to hear that, this simple, precise bit of information. I should have kept it to myself. Yes, I know that, but I had to confide in somebody. Confide? Why do I say confide? There’s nothing to confide. And yet I’m confiding in you. I shouldn’t have done that. Because when I do that, something despicable emerges. Not because Merete and I were going to get a divorce. But because I’m saying it now, after Merete is dead, and before we got divorced.”

  “These are difficult matters you’re dealing with,” said the other man, the husband of Singer’s colleague. “Wouldn’t it be best to wait a while before thinking about them? Allow yourself a little distance first?”

  “What you’re accusing me of is that I didn’t love her. You’re accusing me of no longer feeling any love at seeing her. That’s why you feel sorry for me. And it’s true, I didn’t feel any love at seeing her anymore. But I still feel grief.”

  “I know that you feel grief,” said the other man. “Yes, I can see that; you’re sitting here completely heartbroken with grief, that’s why you’re talking the way you are.”

  “Yes, but I don’t feel any personal grief. My grief is general, if you can understand what I mean. When I tell you about my grief, are you willing to listen?” The imaginary man nodded. And Singer went on.

  “I picture Merete’s face in front of me, at the moment of death. Her expression of disbelief as she realizes what is about to happen. It’s not hard to imagine, it’s almost impossible not to imagine it. A person has only a few expressions to display to others, after all. Just think about how you form an image of another person, there are maybe three or four typical expressions, no more. It’s the other person’s distinctive character, captured in an image. I knew all of Merete’s expressions, and I had stopped loving them. Truth be told, her expressions no longer told me anything. But the look of disbelief on her face, her expression at that moment when it happened — that stays with me. And it makes me feel grief. General grief. Because that face, that expression — I can’t reconcile myself to that, not even now. They contain a nothingness there’s no use trying to remove. For me. The wear and tear between us cannot be erased. Merete’s expression from that first period when we fell in love, for example, I can’t re-create it, and her disbelief from that time, the same that I’m now picturing, at the moment of death, no, I can’t re-create it. The wear and tear is what I see, the irritation, it’s there, even in the horror. Do you understand?”

  “No,” said the other man. “No, I don’t think I can follow you on that path. But I’m listening.”

  “You will understand me if you try,” said Singer.

  “In that case, I can’t try,” said the other man. “But I’m here, and I’m listening.”

  “So I don’t feel any personal grief,” Singer went on, after another pause. “But Merete’s face as she dies, as the thread of life is brutally severed, and she knows it. I can imagine that, and I feel a stab of pain. Confronted with death, I’m so helpless, and in a completely shattered way. What in the world is a human being when confronted with death? What does this illogical state that I’m in actually mean? That I feel a pang of guilty conscience because my wife is dead, and we were going to get a divorce? There’s no connection, and yet you can hear the way I’m talking, maybe you can even hear how you reply. Both things are the result of a bad decision. But it’s not something we can regard sensibly. It’s there, the bad decision. We, or at least I, have no problem accepting it, but it’s there, and we have to accept it. Does this have anything to do with the human condition? Even though we see the bad decision, that doesn’t stop its effect. It exists. Confronted with death, we are shaken to our core by something we know is a bad decision, a stupidity of elementary logic. Because that is what it is. It’s stupid, it’s too stupid. And yet it shakes me, and you, I can see that, you’re just as scared as I am by what I’m saying. Is this the equation? In that case, I don’t understand it. Perhaps it’s wrong. I’m not to blame. Do you hear me? I am not to blame.”

  “Yes, I hear you,” said the other man, the imaginary man. “And I didn’t say that you’re to blame. You’re the one who is blaming yourself.”

  “But you’re still shaken?”

  “Yes,” said the other man, “I am.”

  “Why?” asked Singer. “Tell me now in your own words why you feel so shaken about what I’m saying. It would be of great importance for me to know.”

  Silence descended. Both of them sat in silence, lost in their own thoughts, almost as if they’d dozed off, because by now it was very late at night. When Singer looked up and glanced over at the other man, he saw that he was no longer there. He was gone. Singer was horrified.

  “Come back!” he shouted. “I have a lot more to tell you. I’ve hardly even begun.”

  Fortunately, the other man came back and calmly sat down in the armchair again.

  “Go on,” he said. “I’m listening.”

  “Isabella will live with me,” said Singer. “What do you say to that?”

  “That’s nice of you,” said the other man, “because you didn’t have to do that. She’s not yours, after all.”

  “Are you being ironic?” asked Singer warily.

  “No,” said the other man, “although it’s an irony of fate that you are now going to take care of Isabella. If Merete had lived, you would never have had to see her again.”

  “What do you mean by that?” asked Singer.

  “Nothing,” replied the other man. “I’m just pointing out an ironic fact.”

  “Yes, it’s strange,” said Singer. “Because, as you say, I didn’t have to do this. On the contrary, you might even say. Merete’s family would have been glad to take her in, they’ve even said as much.”

  “Do they know?” asked the other man.

  “Know what?”

  “That you and Merete were going to get a divorce.”

  “No,” said Singer. “I couldn’t tell them. Not now. And I don’t think Merete has — I mean, had — told them about it either. They know nothing about it.”

  “So they’re living under a happy illusion that everything was fine between their deceased daughter and her husband, now a widower?”

  “Yes.”

  “Isn’t that rather difficult for you to deal with?”

  “Not really,” replied Singer. “It’s something that I have the least difficulty dealing with.”

  “Ah, so that’s how it is. Even though you know that if they’d known about it, they wouldn’t have let you take Isabella, at least not without a protest. Her parents would have found it unacceptable for you to keep the child; you must realize that.”

  “Yes, I realize that. But I couldn’t tell them. It was too late to say anything. Since Merete never managed to tell them, for one reason or another, I can’t tell them now that I cared so little for their deceased daughter that I was thinking of moving out. Or, vice versa, that she cared so little for me that she was just waiting for me to move out of her home. Well, maybe the latter was something they could have tolerated hearing,” Singer added with a little smile. “But I thought it would be too difficult to say that.”

  “You thought it would be too difficult to say that? Meaning you didn’t want to hurt them?”

  “Well, as I said, if I’d told them, truthfully, that Merete was just waiting for me to move out, then it wouldn’t have been as hurtful. No doubt it would have come as a shock to them, but they would have felt sympathy for me, and I could have simply left. But it was terribly difficult for me to say those specific words. You have to believe me, it may sound banal, but that’s how it was. I couldn’t bring myself to tell them. And so I’m left with Isabella.”

  “You’re left with Isabella?” exclaimed the other man. “That wasn’t necessary. It wasn’t even right for you to keep her. When they said they wanted Isabella to grow up within their family, to live with her uncle, you could have simply nodded and said that was probably for the best. You could have told them that you didn’t feel capable of taking care of her, or something like that, and you were happy to leave Isabella in such safe hands.”

  Singer nodded.

  “Yes,” he said. “You’re probably right. But I didn’t do that. And why didn’t I? I don’t know. That’s what I’m trying to understand. Actually, I do understand, but I can’t say it.”

  “You can’t say it?”

  “No, I know why, but I can’t find the right words. What I know, and can say, is that within a few weeks I was supposed to have moved out of this apartment. For good. The thought of that doesn’t make me feel bad. It didn’t make me happy, but I accepted it. I would have done it because I wanted to start a new life, approaching the age of forty as I am. I was actually looking forward to it. When I divorced Merete, her daughter Isabella would also disappear from my life. I wouldn’t have had anything more to do with her. I was fully prepared for that, she had never meant anything special to me. When I was out of her life, she would quickly have forgotten me; maybe she’d have a vague childhood memory of me, so hazy that she could hardly place it other than as a shadowy image in her subconscious, which her mother could have no doubt told her was the man she’d been married to for a brief time in the eighties. And I had nothing against this, ending up as a hazy shadow in the world of her imagination, almost as nothing; I actually liked the idea. Oh, just think if Merete hadn’t died right now but three months later instead, then we would have been divorced, and I’d be living in a different town, maybe Fredrikstad, because I have a job announcement from the Fredrikstad library lying over there on the desk, but I didn’t have time to send in an application. That would have canceled out everything. Then I could have shown up at the funeral, discreetly sitting down in one of the middle pews and leaving right afterward, without going to the reception, because it would have been enough for me to attend the funeral. ‘Singer was there too,’ they would have said. ‘Yes, Singer showed up, he came to offer his condolences, he seemed very moved.’ And then I could have gone back to Fredrikstad and my new life.”

  “You can do that now,” said the other man. “You can go to the parents of your deceased wife, let’s say in a week or two, and tell them that, after further consideration, you’ve decided you can’t take on the responsibility for Isabella after all. That won’t be hard to explain, and Merete’s parents will be very happy. Then everything will be rectified, in line with the real circumstances.”