‘Oh,’ said the Tarantula, ‘you were never in the dark about that.’

He’d met her several times. On his face I saw the special fondness he entertained for characters. So she’d been a character, Ingrún, and I pictured her as a character now: small, munched-down teeth and a jutting nose that grew spongy with age. Late in life she had carried round a paunch like a drum swollen with booze, arms, legs and neck poking out as though she were a doll made of chestnuts. And when she got sick of hauling it around, she let herself be flown to Denmark, where she took up residence on the oncology ward at the Rigshospital. 47

‘There she was, haranguing people left, right and centre, while the nurses tiptoed along the skirting boards white as sheets. She wasn’t allowed her Smirnoff, of course, so your mother had a grand old time as the hospital’s resident bootlegger.’

The Tarantula laughed cheerfully.

Ma gave a modest shrug.

Later I went down to the harbour. The air sang low and light blue above the fjord. I felt disorientated. From a distance the dead danced away hand-in-hand, but close up the whole thing dissolved into particles and tendrils. I felt entwined in Great-Aunt Ingrún’s chestnut arms. I had her now around my neck, as well.

Along the quay the last small groups were drifting homeward. Visitors to the boat race, students in their bobble hats. Some of them had arrived on the ferry to watch the football.

It was a first-division showdown. Uncle Laurus had remarked politely that one of my cousins played for the home team.

The cousin’s handsome, unfamiliar face was smeared with grime and bleeding from the nose for most of the match. Every time the wind took the ball, the players went for each other. The clouds fed on the mountain, came rolling down and laid a cowl of rain over the pitch. The spectators in their national dress stood damp and mute. A few 48stayed in their cars, shining the main beams across the turf.

The one time the home team scored, the Tarantula’s arms flew into the air. He howled, and I cheered as much as I could. We were the only ones.

The wind tugged at hats and wet skirts.

The bottles of Absolut were passed from hand to hand.

They were merrier now, these red-cheeked men and women, ennobled by their clothing, trickling past me and casting faint reflections onto the grey disc of water in the harbour. I trudged off in my big winter coat, unmistakeably a tourist.