The Spectator Bird

This night’s installment of the diary opens on May 12 at the countess’s family home in Ørebyslot, Lolland. The castle is an immense edifice built in the Dutch Renaissance style. Manon, wife of the “wicked” brother, greets Ruth, Joe, and Astrid, who at first seems delighted to be back in the place where she was raised. The castle, with its many exquisite rooms and amenities, is more opulent than anything that Joe has ever seen. However, the library, “famous” for its many tomes and journals on horticulture and game management, seems to make Astrid and Manon uneasy. Astrid’s discomfort increases when they enter the dining room and she sees seven plates set out for lunch. Since the only other guests she was expecting were her grandmother and her 10-year-old nephew, there should only be six. A nervous look passes between her and Manon.

Minutes later, the mysterious guest arrives: a heavily pregnant woman named Miss Weibull of about 40. She snorts upon hearing Astrid’s name. The latter, though keeping her composure, is clearly furious at having to eat lunch with Weibull, and Joe wonders if the woman might be a governess; though certainly not a peasant, she lacks the look of “quality.” She does, however, radiate a smug sense of entitlement. After an awkward few minutes, the last lunch guest arrives: Astrid’s ancient grandmother, who is led in on a servant’s arm. Her eyes resemble “cobwebbed” windows in an all-but-abandoned house.

Joe opens a line of conversation with the old lady, who probes him about his mother. Joe explains that both his mother’s parents died of smallpox when she was an infant and that she was brought up by some people named Sverdrup. To his amazement, that name sends a shockwave through the room, halting all conversation. Though his hosts quickly recover, Joe is bewildered. He also notices that Miss Weibull suddenly seems very interested in him. After the old grandmother has been led away, Weibull tells Joe, “Hun var min moders veninde!” (“She was my mother’s friend!”) (125). Weibull then leaves the room, and the countess explains that Weibull’s mother was a Sverdrup, adding that the full story is “incredible.” She promises to tell them about it later. Still smarting from his faux pas, Joe suggests that he and Ruth leave, but Manon and Astrid will not hear of it. To entice him to stay, Astrid tells him the way to the Sverdrup cottage.

While Ruth takes a midday nap, Joe walks to the cottage and finds it to be in better shape than he expected: tidy, well-kept, picturesque, like a “postcard.” It does not evoke any sense of recognition in him. As he passes the gate, a young woman appears in the door. She resembles Miss Weibull, who, as a Sverdrup, may be a relation. After an hour or two of sightseeing, he passes the cottage again, and this time sees a man come out. This is Astrid’s brother, Eigil Rødding, a “jock”-like, brutish man with a sportsman’s competitive streak and an aristocrat’s casual egotism.

Overtaking Joe on the castle driveway and hearing his English, Eigil guesses at once who he is and presses him to play tennis. Joe has not held a racket in almost a year, but he was formerly a professional player and agrees. Though over a decade older than Eigil and out of shape, he still manages to tie the younger man over two sets. Eigil is pleased to have matched himself against a worthy opponent, always in short supply on Lolland. Giving Joe a quick automotive tour of his estate, which he says is “the most scientifically run estate in Denmark, perhaps the world” (137), Eigil shows off his farms, orchards, dairies, kennels, and cornfields, as well as Bregninge’s port, which he owns and uses to ship out the innumerable fruits of his industry. Many of these are hybrids that he created. Joe notices very few peasants or workers at these places, which are run almost like factories. There are no weeds, pests, or waste to detract from the perfect final product, which seems honed to the specifications of some immaculate blueprint or formula. Joe can’t help remembering, and mentioning to Eigil, Blixen’s comparison of his father to Dr. Faustus. Eigil scoffs, lauding his father as a visionary who was unfairly “hounded” by the masses despite using his scientific genius only for good, to create “new” things.

While driving, Eigil sights a stag on his land. Shouting that it has “bad” horns, he tries (and fails) to kill it with a rifle. Later, giving Joe a tour of his private museum, he boasts that the lands of his estate have been continuously inhabited for 6,000 years and that the archaeological record shows no incursions by other tribes; his father was very proud of his “unmixed” bloodline. Eigil adds that if humans would only apply the science of breeding to their own genetic improvement, they could raise a race of “supermen.” Unfortunately, he says, the masses would recoil in “sentimental” horror from any such largescale experiments, especially after Hitler gave eugenics a bad name. He asserts that his own bloodline comes as close as possible to the superman ideal.

Joe pushes back, arguing that genetics are too complicated, with too many variables, for even the most brilliant humans to manipulate; furthermore, “mongrelization” often yields benefits not immediately apparent. He suggests that wiping out “inferior” creatures or “pests” may actually hurt the environment. Eigil agrees to disagree and finally drops Joe off at the castle; he does not come in himself, to honor his sister’s wish not to see him. Inside, Ruth greets Joe with consternation since he returned much later than expected and because Astrid’s grandmother has suffered a heart attack or stroke. As night descends and Joe and Ruth retire to their bedroom, there is still no word on whether the grandmother is alive or dead.