Was it important for Singer to appear as a mystery to those around him? At this point in his life? Aside from his stepdaughter Isabella, for whom he was responsible, and Inge­mann, who was his old, although unfortunately no longer good friend, Singer hadn’t developed close ties to anyone during the seven years that had passed since he’d moved back to Oslo. He didn’t socialize with his colleagues in his spare time, for example; he never invited any colleagues to his home, and he was never invited to any of their homes either. Nor did he ever go out with them, to a café after work, or make arrangements to go to a soccer match with anyone. Nothing of that nature had occurred. He participated in gatherings under the auspices of the library — public lectures in the evenings, author readings, etc. — and he went to the Christmas party and other social events in connection with his job, including seminars, which did have a certain social and festive quality. Otherwise, seized by restlessness or boredom, or a feeling of nothingness, he might seek out the old cafés of his youth, to see if anyone was there, and they usually were, but when he saw them, he felt merely depressed, as previously described in the scene recounting Singer’s return to the capital seven years earlier. Mostly he wandered about alone on this earth, if you exclude his two relationships: with Isabella, who was his responsibility, and with Inge­mann, who was his inescapable friend. It didn’t bother him. The days passed, one after the other, and were gone without him really missing them, but now and then he would be taken aback and think: Where did they go? He didn’t know whether he was happy or unhappy; but I can’t be unhappy, he thought, it would be meaningless to make such a claim. Although, I might be, but my unhappiness is the kind that it would be meaningless to point out. Even to myself.

  Yet there was something mysterious about his existence, and that was something he wanted to emphasize. He was a mystery to himself, no one could deny him the right to make that claim. His life proceeded in a metaphorical state in the basement of the Deich­man Library where he guarded the books. There he sat, taking part in serious, slightly morose discussions with like-minded colleagues about archive techniques and alternative cataloging systems — labyrinthine diagrams of the stacks, improvements to determining a book’s whereabouts — and to what extent these could be inserted in a meaningful way into the computer systems. Discussions on a high, even sublime level, but unfortunately of no interest whatsoever and completely incomprehensible to anyone other than the initiated librarians in the Deich­man’s deep vault. For them, the initiates, Singer could finally perform his little trick of holding a book spine forward and down, in this way opening the pages and airing them as he closed the book with a dry little bang, the trick that had been so unsuccessful when he performed it for a quiet, vital child some years ago, but now: the others, the initiates, his colleagues, chuckled with admiration. Singer was in his element. Singer the mystery. Singer who had nothing against appearing to be mysterious to others, because in this way he was regarded by them in the same way that he, often with bewilderment, regarded himself; except that the others didn’t regard him with bewilderment, but instead with more of a respectful amazement, a slow whistle, like when he showed up on the screen as an audience member for the popular but completely idiotic TV show Casino. They hadn’t expected that. By nature he was sort of an intellectual, after all; in fact, they probably regarded him as some sort of failed intellectual since he possessed no particular external brilliance. They hadn’t expected that, seeing Singer as an audience member for the popular TV show.

  Now they’re wondering, because now they realize they haven’t figured him out. They haven’t captured Singer in their self-composed concepts of who he is. They can’t say — as they had thought and at no time doubted — that Singer, he’s such and such, that’s who he is. No, Singer is a festive audience member in the studio, he was one of them, during the show Casino, appearing clearly on the TV screen, delightedly immersed in whether the main player, a contestant, is going to win a car in the lottery of life, this man who goes around here contentedly in his worn-out clothes. Ha, ha, thought Singer. Look at that festive and delightedly excited audience member on TV! That’s Singer, that’s him. The slightly reserved Singer, who keeps so modestly and deliberately in the background, with his mild sense of humor and his self-effacing manner. Strange. There must be some incomprehensible crack in Singer’s personality, they might have said, almost respectfully. And what sort of connections must he have? Someone who plies him with special tickets to those kinds of shows? Strange, Singer thought they would say, among themselves, and to themselves. That’s how he thought he appeared, as Singer the mystery in the eyes of others. He liked thinking that. Singer the mystery. His own bewilderment at not being able to come to grips with himself — merely continuing on while he stood outside and watched the whole thing — became transformed into a respectful wondering in the eyes of others. That was certainly something. That’s something, by God, thought Singer when he analyzed his own life as he sat in the apartment on Suhms gate and stared at the wall with his forty-seven-year-old stare. At least it makes me stand up straight, he thought. For a moment, he added. Because I’m going to die, after all. And what good does it do me that I’ve been a mystery both to myself and to others?

  Now he was standing in his own apartment on Suhms gate and looking on with a sense of relief as Inge­mann handed the three fanned-out tickets to Isabella so she could take two of her girlfriends along to the newest show on TV-Norge. His days as an audience member were finally over, he’d achieved his goal. But Inge­mann had something more to offer on this Sunday morning. He wanted to extend an invitation. And it was for Singer. Inge­mann invited Singer to a party he was hosting up in Nydalen, a promotional party, or whatever it was, in the fancy offices up in Nydalen. This was not the first time Inge­mann had invited him to a party in the offices of his company up in Nydalen, but previously Singer had always declined, for various reasons, saying, for instance, that he didn’t have clothes that would be suitable in such a modern setting, or that he personally wouldn’t fit in, that it wasn’t his milieu, that he’d be an outsider, etc., etc., there were any number of reasons, and he would tell Inge­mann some of them. But this time he said yes. When was it? On Friday in about two weeks.

  “Well, that’s kind of short notice. But I’ll come.”

  When he said it was short notice, Singer meant that there wasn’t much time for him to obtain the necessary outfit so he could attend Inge­mann’s big party. He had to get a new suit, and a suit that was modern, which he didn’t have. First he’d have to find out what modern suits looked like, it wasn’t enough to take a look at Inge­mann right now, since he wasn’t dressed the way he’d dress for the party, instead he was wearing casual attire and not a suit, or whatever was considered modern these days for attending a promotional party. Then Singer would have to get the money for this type of suit, or modern outfit, if, contrary to expectations, it should turn out that it was not considered modern to wear a suit at all. And he didn’t have the money. In his forty-eighth year he was still living hand to mouth, as the provider for himself and a teenage girl, on his fairly lousy librarian’s salary. He was used to pinching and scraping, as they say, or at least used to say. Frugality was in his blood, and he had no regrets about that. But now it would have been good if he’d had enough financial wiggle room so he could afford to buy a fashionable suit, or a fashionable set of clothes.

  Well, there was a solution, and he’d have to make use of it, even though it had been years since he’d last done so. He got out the envelope that contained Adam Eyde’s betting systems and took out the little system. He sat down at the dining table in the dining room and soon covered the whole table with betting slips he’d filled out according to Adam Eyde’s little system. He took them over to the nearest betting office, paid his money, and got his slips stamped in the required manner. Then all he had to do was wait until Saturday when the betting results were announced. But it didn’t work. It took a while after the results were announced before he had gone through all his slips, but when he’d done so, it turned out that the system hadn’t worked. He’d lost everything he’d bet, money that he really couldn’t afford to spend. The days until his next paycheck were going to be fairly meager, and he wouldn’t be able to buy himself a trendy suit or trendy set of clothes. He’d bet everything, and lost. Luck had deserted him, as frequently happens for someone who bets everything on one card and has no opportunity to try again. Because he didn’t have an opportunity, the party was on Friday, and the next chance he’d have to make use of Adam Eyde’s little system was on Saturday, meaning the day after the party. As things now stood, he couldn’t go to Inge­mann’s big promotional party in the offices up in Nydalen.

  He considered other solutions with some desperation; for example, he got out the two old suits he owned and hung them up on the balcony to air out, in the faint hope that an airing out would help. It didn’t. He saw that at once when he brought them back inside. He couldn’t attend a promotional party in modern offices up in Nydalen wearing either of these suits, one more impossible than the other; the light-colored one, which in spite of everything he regarded as slightly more modern and comme il faut than the dark one, was actually worse. He thought about asking Inge­mann for help, maybe he could borrow a suit from him, though that was impossible right from the start, since Inge­mann had an entirely different body type, but maybe Inge­mann knew someone in his social circle who had the same body type, someone whom Inge­mann — by offering some excuse, which Singer couldn’t think up but no doubt Inge­mann could — might persuade to lend a nice suit which he wouldn’t personally be wearing on Friday, even though he was going to the same party. But it was the last part of this statement that extinguished Singer’s dream of being able to attend the party, because it meant that Singer would arrive wearing a suit that was undoubtedly modern and comme il faut enough, but would be recognized with a broad grin by another of the party’s guests, and this wasn’t something that the forty-seven-year-old librarian from the Deich­man Library’s metaphorical basement wished to endure. He stayed home, without telling Inge­mann that he wouldn’t be attending.

  But Isabella and two of her girlfriends went to the new TV show at TV-Norge and sat there, young-lady-like and lovely, as part of the audience. Later Inge­mann again appeared at the apartment on Suhms gate. He didn’t say a word about the fact that Singer hadn’t shown up for his party, but he did invite him out to a restaurant. Isabella showed up as soon as she heard his voice in the apartment and stood nearby, listening to what they were talking about. Inge­mann joked with her, saying something about the birdlike appearance of girls her age, girls who seemed so light and fluttery and amusing, and Isabella laughed her “bubbling young-lady” laugh. After that he took from his pocket three more tickets for the next episode of TV-Norge’s new TV show, and held them out to her in the same fanned-out form as last time. Isabella beamed, glancing triumphantly at Singer who had failed to attend Inge­mann’s party, even though she’d heard Inge­mann invite him and Singer say yes without hesitation; on the contrary, he’d said yes with a hint of anticipation in his voice. Then Inge­mann and Singer left the fifteen-year-old teenager at home and went to the Theater Café to have dinner. During dinner a beautiful woman in her midthirties showed up and sat down at their table; she was Inge­mann’s new flame, as Singer understood. This disappointed him slightly, since he’d wanted to have a talk with Inge­mann about Isabella, about how difficult it was to be responsible for her, especially now, as her roots to her childhood were beginning to lose their hold. Last summer, as usual, she’d spent two weeks with her grandparents in Not­odden. She’d left, as usual, with happy anticipation, but she’d come home in an indifferent mood. She no longer derived any benefit from visiting her grandparents in Not­odden. That part of her life was over. But if that was true, then what did she have left?

  He still thought that he could talk to Inge­mann about such matters, and in complete confidence, or at least as far as it went. This in spite of the fact that little to nothing of what Inge­mann said continued to hold any great interest for him, and also, in spite of the fact that what he actually felt like telling Inge­mann, which was no longer very much, he was having trouble putting into words, and the words he did try, in his own mind, to say, as a means of practice or a test, while he sat in an armchair in the living room at home, came out in such a way that he honestly doubted Inge­mann would understand, or even attempt to fully comprehend; instead the words would probably seem like nonsense to Inge­mann, even though he still considered him to be his best friend, actually his only friend, and the one in whom he could picture himself confiding. Now and then it seemed to Singer that Inge­mann actually felt sorry for him, and that he’d invited him out to the Theater Café mostly to cheer him up, to breathe some life into him, infuse a little fun into the dreariness of his daily life. This did not please Singer, and he hoped he was wrong.

  But when the beautiful woman in her thirties showed up, and he realized this was Inge­mann’s new flame — she was not the first, new flames were constantly showing up at Inge­mann’s side, and at his table — Singer felt a pang. They were both close to fifty by now, and with the same background, from the same town, and yet how different they had turned out, and just the thought that Inge­mann actually felt sorry for him seemed to Singer completely unbearable. What had he done with his life? This was the thought of a man who, not for a single moment, harbored any conviction that his life could have been any different.

  But he was still in the middle of it. Isabella was now stretching out more directly, more purposefully, toward her coming woman­hood, and she was more Isabella an sich than ever. She turned sixteen, she turned seventeen, and she was in secondary school. She was still a quiet girl, with a serious look to her face, but she’d developed a sense of independence that made her more amenable than obedient. For example, she filled her days with her own rhythm, which meant they no longer ate dinner together in the dining room. Singer’s assertion that a dining room was meant for dining, and a kitchen was meant for preparing the food that should be eaten in the thus-designated dining room, no longer made any impression on the young lady, who usually sat with one or two of her girlfriends in the kitchen eating noodle soup, while Singer steadfastly clung to his old habits and ate his dinner in the dining room. He was fast approaching fifty and was fully aware that if his daily life weren’t marked by some solemnity and by constantly repeated, though simple, ceremonies, it would be difficult to seize hold of and endure it, at least for a man so marked by irreparable loneliness, or distance, as he was. Isabella had also found herself a part-time job so she was able to earn her own spending money, something that had made Singer tell her, a bit clumsily, that he would give her money for anything she needed, she just had to tell him, and provided she really needed it, or wanted it, because things weren’t that bad for him financially, he assured her, almost mumbling, even though, he had to admit, he might have given her a different impression occasionally, but she shouldn’t take what he’d said so seriously, because that wasn’t what he’d meant. But Isabella simply brushed him aside and said that she liked having a part-time job, and that all her girlfriends had jobs too.

  The apartment on Suhms gate was now filled, as before, with music from the TV, and from the CD player in her room, the door of which was usually closed, and now the scent of perfume also hovered over the rooms, from Isabella herself and from her girlfriends, who sashayed about the apartment. They would stand at the veranda door, which could be opened if the weather permitted, and stare outside, while the room behind them resounded with music, often from a TV that was on although no one was watching it. They would stand next to the curtain hanging in front of the window of the veranda door and stare outside at the future, the way it appeared from a window or a half-open veranda door, on Suhms gate. Singer might let himself into the apartment at the end of his workday at the Deich­man and find the place filled with young ladies like that. He would sit down in his armchair with his newspaper, ready to read. Around him sashayed the young ladies, very quietly, with their silver-toned voices.