I wake up in the morning when it’s time to get up, approximately when the Morning Rain starts to fall. I’m not a morning person, but I force myself to get up and do my morning toilet. After that I carry out a simple exercise program, then I go down to breakfast. After having carefully read the newspaper, I go back up to my room. Take care of my things. I have time for a walk in the garden before lunch.
In the afternoons I sometimes still go into the city. Especially on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I go to Nick’s, have a coffee, and look over at the doorway to 32 Uxbridge Street.
If Emma Rabbit comes, I follow her. Not always, but it does happen.
Eric comes to see me at Lakestead House. More often than he needs to. I don’t want to forbid him. He does it for his own sake.
I can’t tell him that Emma Rabbit has lied to us. That she’s not fatherless at all, but rather that she has a father who’s a dove.
There are situations where what is good isn’t obvious.
Not to tell is to withhold. To withhold is to betray. To tell is to tear down something that has been built up for a long time. If Eric knew that his Emma had long been keeping a secret from him, it would crush him.
Why has she chosen to keep her father secret? I don’t know. Is the reason perhaps reasonable? Perhaps there’s a simple explanation? In order to set yourself in judgment over another animal, you have to close your eyes to the whole truth.
I never close my eyes.
I know that my life isn’t Eric’s. That his life isn’t mine. We have become two individuals for certain reasons. There are reasons in the background. The truth, which for me is a part of goodness, means nothing to him. Emma Rabbit means everything to him. She has become who she is through a long series of events which, thanks to their definite sequence, have defined her character. She has her reasons to conceal her father. I don’t know them, I can’t set myself in judgment over them.
I keep silent.
Not a word passes my lips.
This is how I might think, in the afternoons as I walk along the coast.
This is how I was thinking today, as I was walking along the coast.
I spoke every third or fourth idea out loud to myself. When the black clouds drew in over the mainland in the afternoon, I got raindrops on my tongue. Then, as usual, the gates of heaven opened. I hurried back home. For those who wish, rusks and tea are served in the afternoon. I myself waited until dinner, which I ate early.
In the evenings, I reflected.
At night, I slept.
CHAPTER 25
Eric, what a surprise!” said Archdeacon Odenrick, but there was no joy in his voice.
Eric was standing one step inside the threshold to the archdeacon’s office, not knowing what he should do. Outside the small, aperture-like windows he glimpsed reality in the form of buildings and streetlights, but he had a strong, unpleasant feeling that he would never return out there again. He closed the door behind him and tried to gather his courage.
“Come in, come in,” the archdeacon invited with a smile that was broad and warm.
Eric tried to smile back, but was unsure whether he succeeded. Slowly he walked over to the ample visitor’s armchair that stood in front of the archdeacon’s massive desk, and which he’d never dared sit in when he was little. Now he sat down, but he sat on the edge of the armchair, straight-backed, and with his paws in his lap. He still hadn’t said anything.
“Eric, that you come to visit this late…” said Odenrick.
“Yes,” the bear finally forced out.
“You were passing this way, or…?”
“Yes, exactly.”
“But no one visits a deacon so late in the evening without some purpose, do they?” said Odenrick.
Eric nodded in shame, found out.
“There’s no problem, no hurry. How are your parents? I see them all too seldom nowadays.”
Mother and Father. That was a topic of conversation to dwell on. It was solid ground. Eric told what he knew about his mother and her hardships at the ministry, and for a few minutes they helped each other choose the best desserts she’d served over the years. For once Penguin Odenrick, who was also close to Eric’s father, asked whether Eric had reconciled yet with Boxer Bloom. Eric shook his head. No, they still hadn’t spoken since…for