Читать книгу The Ice People 08 - Under Suspicion - Margit Sandemo - Страница 7

Chapter 2

When Hilde Joelsdatter had fed the animals - just one cow, three chickens and a cat - she returned to the small, dark hut.

She took off her dress and stood in her slip while rinsing her face and hands in a wooden bowl. Her movements were slow and absentminded. Then she tidied up in the room that served as a living room, kitchen corner and her bedroom. Her father had the only chamber there was in the house to himself.

She could see that he hadn’t come home yet. The neighbouring village had called for him the day before. Some cow carcasses were to be buried, which was also one of the Night Man’s many duties. He had reckoned on being back by evening, but he hadn’t managed that by the look of it.

Hilde replaced the violets on the table with some bird’s-foot trefoil.

‘I believe it’s my birthday today,’ she thought. ‘Maybe I should bake a cake to celebrate it? No, I’d better not.’

She used to do this when she was younger, and her father had said it was a waste. So she had stopped that. Anyway, twenty-seven was nothing to celebrate, was it? She had better forget all about it. Her fingers gently caressed the delicate petals of the flowers and she gazed into the distance.

The years had passed and she didn’t know what had become of them. They had disappeared without a trace. Once she had had dreams and yearnings and wept during the lonely nights. Now she no longer wept, and the dreams were forgotten.

She reminded herself of her mother’s words on her deathbed: “Stay with Dad, Hilde! You’re all he’s got now. Be a good daughter to him.”

And Hilde had promised and she had really tried. Only it was difficult sometimes because her father was never satisfied. He would never notice when she had done something nice in the house, the little that was possible, and he never appreciated her daily care. If there was no beer or schnapps left, he would take out his frustration on her, saying that he couldn’t understand how she could be so absent-minded.

He railed against all the injustice he had to endure: what so-and-so had said, how they looked down on him. But someday he would show them. He really would! He remembered old insults that went back many years and he would chew on them like old meat bones. Always the same old complaints mixed with new offences. And Hilde was damn well going to listen to it all. If she said yes or no at the wrong point, he would fly into a rage and be grumpy for several days, finding fault with everything she did.

Hilde was lost in her own thoughts. Her promise to her mother had been sacrosanct. She would never dream of breaking it but... Her thoughts went back to the years that had passed by. Dismal, each and every one of them. Her mouth twisted into an unconscious, bitter smile.

Once her father had had a colleague from Christiania visit him. He was an executioner’s assistant like him. Filthy, getting on in years, and horrible to look at. In those days, lonely as she was, had she not thought of him at night? Just because he was a living human being, the only man she had seen for many years. How poor and lonely could a person become?

Hilde had no mirror, not even a window pane to see her own reflection in. All she had was the pond down in the valley, so she didn’t really know how she looked. Not all that bad was how she felt at the age of eighteen. Now she had stopped even looking in the pond.

Her hair was nice. She could see that, of course. It was golden and had never been cut, so it reached to the hollow of her knees when it was loose. It was thick and slightly wavy by the forehead and temples and more wavy further down.

Her thoughts came in a steady stream. Once – oh so many years ago now – she had looked at all the young people dance in the glade of the forest, and she had felt a pain in her chest. On the way home, a young lad had gripped her and asked her to sit down in the dewy grass and talk. Hilde couldn’t believe her own ears. A man wanted to speak to her! He didn’t look all that charming and his face was covered in spots, with patches of ugly stubble here and there.

She had done as he had asked her to do and sat down to chat. But she couldn’t think of any words, so her vocabulary quickly dried up. Then he had put his arm around her waist and put his face close to hers. “Don’t say anything about this to anybody, OK?” he had whispered, “because otherwise the whole village will tease me.”

Hilde had closed her eyes, breathing deeply. ‘I’m not that lonely after all,’ she had thought. And then she had got up and dashed away with tears of humiliation and misery streaming down her face.

She woke up from her daydreams. She remembered that something had happened in the meadow above Linden Avenue yesterday evening. What a lot of people had gone running along! It seemed as if they had found something or other. And there had been a bonfire all through the night. But it was not for her to go down there. She was an outsider.

When her mother was still alive, she was able to socialise with others, but now it was impossible. She never doubted her duty to take care of her father, but then she never discussed anything with him either. If he was angry or in a bad mood – which he usually was – she just kept quiet.

She knew very well that she was becoming an almost silent recluse, but what could she do to prevent it? It was only the cat and the other animals that got to hear her voice. They could hear that it was full of love, although it was rusty because of a lack of practice.

Andreas had no idea how badly wounded the executioner’s assistant was, but at least he was still alive. Now and then a miserable groan could be heard from the cart.

When Andreas pulled up in front of the small hut by the edge of the forest, he was surprised to see how clean and neat everything seemed. Poor, yes, but everything was in good shape. Not a broken beam or plank to be seen. Flowers had been planted in a remarkably small, hedged garden, and a cat was cozying up on the threshold.

He knocked on the door. Nobody answered. Not a sound could be heard.

Andreas waited for a moment. Then he shouted:

“I’m Andreas Lind of the Ice People. From Linden Avenue. I’ve brought you Joel Night Man. He’s been hurt.”

After a brief moment, shuffling steps could be heard moving across the floor and the door was opened with a jerk. Then the steps vanished once more.

He carefully seized the wounded man, who moaned loudly, and lifted him off the cart. Then he carried him into the small, dark room and put him on the bed.

He could hear somebody in the small bedroom. Andreas cast a glance about the place. Everything was spick and span. Women’s garments hung on a few beams, and he thought that it was probably her bed that he’d put Joel on.

“Hilde Joelsdatter,” he then said. “Shall I put your father in his bedroom?”

The door opened slowly. Hilde stood in the doorway with a small scarf pressed against her face so that all you could see was her shy glance.

He had never seen Hilde, the daughter of the executioner’s assistant, before and he was actually quite surprised. She was taller than he had expected – almost as tall as Mattias, he thought. Her face, the little he could see, was well taken care of, and so were her clothes. She smelled clean.

And what a hair she had! It curled beautifully about her face and was plaited in a long braid. Never before had he seen such long, thick hair.

Andreas was extremely baffled. Here she walked about, day in and day out, keeping everything neat and tidy, and nobody came to see it. Nobody had visited in maybe fifteen years. The unpleasant father was the only other person here, who wouldn’t be particularly cheerful company.

Despite her shyness, Andreas thought that this woman must possess surprising strength.

“Would you please help me move him,” he said as kindly as he could, because he could sense that she was embarrassingly shy.

Without a word, she took hold of her father’s legs and together they carried him into the small chamber, where there was hardly room for them all.

Hilde looked at Andreas out of the corner of her eye. A memory suddenly came back to her. She had once climbed up onto the ridge a long time ago. There she had stood, looking over the countryside right out to the fjord and across the ridges that were hidden by a blue haze in the distance. She felt a pang of emptiness inside, a feeling of being drawn towards something she could never reach. She felt the same sensation now.

“Would you please help me move him?” he had said. He had been speaking to her! Was there not something despicable in those words? ‘Would you please help me move him?’

Andreas was the first presentable young man she had ever seen. Debonair, with a pleasant voice and a kind demeanour. In Hilde’s inexperienced eyes, he was a miracle. Andreas Lind of the Ice People didn’t look at all bad in anybody’s opinion, although he was not exactly unique. He was stocky like his father and grandfather, tall and with a broad chest and a good-natured expression. The dark colours in his hair and eyebrows were charming and his smile was warm and trustworthy.

At that moment, Hilde was very much aware of who she was.

Andreas said something to her about a blanket that had been crumpled, and she swiftly bent down over her wounded father to straighten it.

At that moment, Mattias came in.

Hilde stiffened and sent them a glance of panic. Once more, she lifted her scarf to her head.

“Here comes the doctor,” explained Andreas. “Mattias Meiden. I sent for him. He’s my relative.”

She bent her head, confused. She had a pretty face - that much they had managed to see. Not so young, but with fine, almost classic features. There was no similarity between her and her father.

Mattias, who greeted her so politely that she instinctively dropped him a curtsy, bent over Joel Night Man. Meanwhile Hilde fetched a bowl of hot water and began to wash her father’s face with a clean cloth.

Now and then she would cast a frightened glance at Mattias and Andreas, as if she expected a torrent of mocking abuse.

Mattias sent her a kind smile – and nobody could smile in a more calming way than him. They saw that her shoulders began to drop slightly as she gradually began to relax.

The executioner’s assistant gained consciousness and moaned for a short moment.

“By God, you’re killing me, you damn bitch!” he said through his nose with swollen lips and aching teeth. Then he was unconscious once more.

Hilde bit her lip at the sight of her father’s terribly wounded face.

“He’ll recover. Don’t worry!” said Mattias.

Hilde looked questioningly at them.

“It was hardly his fault,” said Andreas, and Hilde immediately looked at him. “I can well imagine what has happened. They wanted to blame him for the murders.”

She instinctively looked out of the window that faced the meadow.

“Yes, it was down there,” said Mattias. “Did you know that?”

She shook her head.

“Haven’t any of your friends told you about it? There Are four dead women.”

“Friends?” she said in a toneless voice.

Andreas and Mattias exchanged telling glances. The daughter of the executioner’s assistant had no friends.

“Four women?” she said in her thin voice. She was somewhat braver now as none of them had mocked or teased her.

But she was still on guard because her shifty glance betrayed it. Like a snail which is always ready to draw into its shell at the least sign of danger.

“Yes, four women,” answered Andreas. “They were killed. Do you know anything about it? Have you seen or heard anything this spring or last autumn?”

She tried to think and now that they were waiting for an answer, they could allow themselves to look at her openly. Her eyes were thoughtful, with a slightly sad and dreamy expression in them. She gave a strangely confused, despondent impression. But she was clean, beautiful and straight-backed, definitely attractive to look at.

“Nooo,” she answered nervously.

“If something comes to mind, please let us know,” said Mattias.

She nodded and then once more was reminded of her place in society and blushed. She restrained herself before she could apologise for having had the nerve to say something.

“I think it’s best if we pretend that your father is dying,” said Mattias. “People are agitated right now, and they’ve found a scapegoat. If we say that he’s close to death, they’ll stay away, and the guilty ones will have a bad conscience. But, to be on the safe side, keep the door locked for the next couple of days. ”And ...” he hesitated, “You’d better not go out when it’s dark.”

When she understood that they were about to leave, she got a nervous and eager look in her eyes.

“Oh, but please don’t refuse a refreshment,” she said shyly. “I’ve got cakes and honey juice. I’ll bring them in a moment.”

They sensed that she made an effort to speak in a well-educated manner. She was already on her feet and dashed to and fro between the kitchen corner and the pantry.

They looked at each other. Both were sufficiently understanding to say thank you although they were late in their various tasks.

She was so eager. She placed a bowl and a wooden plate with beautifully, artistically made cakes on the table.

‘Oh, for heavens sake!’ thought Mattias. ‘They were baked for Christmas. Weren’t they nice! And nobody had eaten them. Nobody had seen them at all.’

Then she asked them, her hands waving nervously, to sit on the planks that served as the seats in the house. She herself stood in the background, checking that her guests were not short of anything. She was restless and was quite unable to stand still. She went over to the table time and again to correct something, move the plate, the flower vase ...

The cakes were as hard as stone but they dipped them discreetly in the honey juice and praised Hilde for making them look so attractive. She turned away but they saw her happy, radiant smile. So they forced themselves to eat a few more of the rock-hard cakes before they said thank you and prepared to leave.

“We’ll be back tomorrow,” promised Mattias. “To see how your father’s doing.”

She nodded and found a slender purse to pay the doctor. But he smiled and refused to take any money.

“We can always talk about that later. I may need to call in several times before your father’s well. Goodbye, Hilde Joelsdatter, and thank you for a lovely meal.”

The two men walked silently down the hill, each one deep in his own thoughts. They didn’t need to turn round to know that Hilde stood in the farmyard, gazing at them.

“One knows so little about one’s neighbours,” said Andreas.

“Yes,” said Mattias. “I heard that you mentioned the werewolf and did so very gently. That was good ...”

When they were out of sight, Hilde went inside again. She looked about the place and was surprised. She felt that something had changed.

This was where they had sat. She knew that those places would never be the same. She gently touched the beams in the wall which they had leaned their shoulders on. They had touched her wooden bowl. And this was where the doctor had bent over her father. Now the blanket was crumpled, he had said, so they had both smoothed it out.

He had noticed the flowers on the table. A shame she hadn’t picked some more. In preparation for tomorrow, she would... Tomorrow they would be back. Or maybe only the doctor? The one with the kind eyes.

Hilde went in to check on her father, but he was sleeping or was unconscious. Then she went outside and gazed towards Linden Avenue.

Brand waited for Andreas and Mattias just as they were arriving at home.

“Dad has summoned the whole family,” he said. “You’d better go over to Linden Avenue.”

The entire Norwegian part of the family sat in Brand’s and Matilda’s parlour. Matilda had baked a barley cake and served it with thick cream. The two young men looked at each other, moaning quietly. Hilde’s Christmas cakes lay heavily in their stomachs.

Are breathed heavily. His grey-white beard made him appear masterful and patriarchal.

“The discovery of the dead women has put us in a fix,” he said. “I want to discuss the matter with you in detail before the bailiff interrogates us. You know how vulnerable we are when it comes to witchcraft. So we need to know who we can rule out entirely.”

“But Dad,” replied Brand. “Surely you don’t suspect any of us? And you don’t believe in werewolves, do you?”

“Of course not! But we’re exposed and must be able to defend ourselves. Those who are under suspicion must count on our support. Now and in the future. What worries me is the witch rope.”

The others nodded. The slender and agile Eli, who was sixteen, sent a questioning glance at her foster mother, Gabriella: May she take another barley cake? Gabriella nodded absentmindedly. The girl still needed to put on some weight. Kaleb sent Eli a stern glance but said nothing. Both he and Eli stood outside the circle of suspects as did Yrja and Matilda. However, all four of them felt deep loyalty towards their dear ones.

“We must discuss the relatives of the Ice People one after the other,” began Are. “Above all, we can exclude Cecilie and Tancred and his young daughter, Lene. Surely we agree on that?”

“Yes,” replied Gabriella. “And the same goes for Tarjei’s son, Mikael.”

“Yes, of course,” said Are, who always looked sad when Mikael was mentioned. “On my side there’s me, Brand and Andreas to discuss. Shall we agree that we exclude Andreas, who found the deceased and was quite shaken afterwards? Actually, I’ve never seen him so agitated.”

“Yes,” said the others. “We’ll rule him out.”

“Good!” continued Are. “On Liv’s side of the family there’s herself, Tarald, Mattias and Gabriella. Is there anybody I’ve forgotten?”

No, nobody had been left out. Then Tengel and Silje’s descendants were listed one after the other.

“What’s all this business about witchcraft anyway?” said Kaleb. “Nine different pieces of string tied together – what does that mean?”

Are smiled. “This is where it would have been nice if we could have asked one of the afflicted. But there’s nobody we can ask now. The only one who has a small amount of supernatural powers is Cecilie because she masters the art of telepathy. But she’s in Denmark and hardly knows about witchcraft. And Mattias, who keeps the Ice People’s supply of witchcraft remedies, has probably never used them, have you?”

“No,” answered Mattias.

“I think there’s somebody you’ve forgotten,” said Liv gently. She was still dignified and youthful even at seventy one. “You forget that I possess quite a lot of knowledge, although I always try to suppress anything that’s evil.”

“You?” asked a surprised Are.

Liv smiled sadly. “You must remember that I’ve seen seven generations of the unfortunate afflicted among the Ice People.”

“Seven? But that’s impossible!” exclaimed Mattias.

“It’s true. I met Hanna, the witch. I was only three years old but I remember her. She’s someone you never forget. There was also another witch in the Valley of the Ice People of the same generation as Hanna – so there can be more than one who’s afflicted in each generation – but I never met her. My mother, Silje, was the only one who saw her. Then I met Grimar, Hanna’s helper, who was one generation younger than her. That makes two. Then there’s my dear, late Dad, Tengel the Good. In my generation there was our cousin, Sol, who was like a sister to us. Trond I only knew as a lovely, happy boy. I had no idea that he was struck, not until afterwards.”

Liv’s voiced was filled with sadness. “Kolgrim we all knew. In the tragic history of the Ice People, nothing gives me so much pain as thinking of poor Kolgrim’s fate. And Are and I were the only ones to see Gabriella’s little, accursed daughter.”

She held her breath for a moment and continued: “My Dad taught me about our clan’s power bit by bit, but I learned most from dear Sol. She was wild and unhappy but also full of joy and zest. She liked to illustrate what she was capable of. Although I’d never dream of practicing witchcraft, I still know a lot about it.”

“What about the knots?” asked Yrja.

“Well,” smiled Liv, “they have nothing to do with death or violence. It’s is just something you make when you don’t want the neighbour’s cow to produce so much milk. I insist that it has no effect whatsoever when it comes to witchcraft. Sol thought it was useless, and so do I.”

“Well, then, why did that woman have the string in her hand?” asked Tarald.

“I have no idea. Maybe it’s a sign that she practised magic. Or was at least interested. You must remember that witchcraft depends entirely on the person who practises it. If I tried, nothing would happen at all. But Sol was simply born with that talent. She could do the most incredible things just with telepathy. Are and I saw it for ourselves.”

“Do all of the Ice People who are struck have this ability?” asked Kaleb.

“More or less. Sometimes the legacy manifests as pure evil, and sometimes it’s dormant, as with Trond ... Hanna and Sol had supernatural powers and so did my Dad, but he didn’t want to use them.”

“Wait a minute,” said Gabriella. “Grandma says that it can be dormant ...”

Liv nodded. Are began to speak: “Precisely. You hit the nail on the head. This is what I now fear: that one of us possesses this evil power and the rest of us know nothing about it.”

“I don’t think so,” said Yrja spontaneously.

“Well, it’s very unlikely,” said Are. “But it’s why I’ve summoned you here, to discuss the possibilities.”

“First of all,” said Tarald impatiently, “Mum and Uncle Are have lived for seventy years without anybody noticing something! So we can count them out.”

The others agreed.

“Thank you,” smiled Are. “That leaves Brand, Tarald, Mattias and Gabriella.”

“You can rule out Gabriella,” said Kaleb immediately. “She’s slogging away at our small orphanage from morning till night, then tumbles into bed. As far as I know she hasn’t been out of the house on her own in the past year.”

“Not even to visit Linden Avenue or Graastensholm in the evening?”

“Gabriella? Nobody’s as afraid of the dark as she is! I even have to follow her to the bathroom!”

“And I know of someone who drops asleep in his chair every evening,” said Yrja. “I almost have to blow the horn so that he can wake up and waddle to bed.”

The others smiled. Everybody knew that Tarald liked a dram every evening – without indulging in drinking sprees. Tarald had always been the weakest among the descendants of the Ice People. Most of them were great personalities for better or for worse, but Tarald had a weakness of character and was fairly nondescript. He had only kept his dignity thanks to Yrja.

Nobody could deny he was the epitome of kindness, though. He was also a clever landowner, but his life was marked by fickleness and a tendency to choose the simplest way out without considering the consequences.

Liv gazed at her only son with concern. Could Tarald be capable of such atrocities? Surely not. Besides, Yrja supported him, and you couldn’t find a more honest person than her. If she had suspected her husband, she would have made him understand the evil he had done, made him explain why and stand by his actions. Then she would fight like a lioness to have him acquitted.

Despite Tarald’s weak character, Liv just couldn’t imagine him as a murderer of women. And all the others were above suspicion by virtue of their character. And what about Tarald as a werewolf? No, that was even more absurd!

Liv had often pondered the character of her two children. Cecilie was so strong, a true descendant of the Ice People... but Tarald probably took after his grandfather, the useless Jeppe Marsvin, who had seduced the young Charlotte Meiden and then just disappeared.

“And I can vouch for Brand,” said Matilda with a nervous smile. “I’m the type who always knows where my loved ones are, so I can’t see how he’d have the time to walk about and murder women.”

“No,” added Andreas. “He’d have to get to know them first, wouldn’t he? I mean: surely four unknown women wouldn’t accidentally come to this remote spot just to be killed, would they?”

“Unless they were witches that would meet here,” said Kaleb.

“No, you have got to stop,” exclaimed Mattias. “You’ve excluded just about everybody and who’s left? Me! What sort of a conspiracy is this?”

They all laughed. Mattias as a criminal? That was quite impossible. Such sweet and harmless werewolves didn’t exist.

A maid entered the room. “The bailiff’s here,” she said, looking frightened.

He was shown in.

“I see that the clan is gathered,” he began. “That’s good because then I won’t have to drive around so much.”

“Do you have any news?” asked Are.

“Magic is at the heart of it.”

“I doubt that,” said Liv matter-of-factly.

“Why would the women have those knots on them otherwise?”

“I asked myself that same question,”said Liv. “It seems so unmotivated. If they had been real witches, they would have had a string with three knots plaited into their hair. That’s the sort of method such women would use. They would assert that Satan himself had tied the string when they were at the Brocken.”

The bailiff stared at her. After a long pause, he was able to speak again.

“Well, that’s what they had, each and every one of them. And here I was believing that this was a kind of fashion for women!”

Liv held her breath. “Then they were witches after all! This changes the whole matter!”

Everybody knew what she meant: that one of the Ice People could well have been involved. Apart from Tengel the Good, the relatives who had inherited the gift had never been able to resist the temptation of using their witchcraft.

Liv looked around the room. Are? No, he was not the least bit interested in supernatural things. What about those who had married into the family then? Eli, poor little thing, who had a loving home with Kaleb and Gabriella? No, she was scared of her own shadow. Yrja? Oh, no. Liv knew her daughter-in-law just as well as she knew herself.

She hardly knew Matilda, but the stout farmer’s wife was even more down-to-earth than her husband, Brand.

The bailiff gave them all a stern glance. “Of course, everybody knows that there’s always been something peculiar about your clan. So I for one am in no doubt – one of you is behind these atrocities. And I’ll find out which of you it is!”

Liv got up.

“No,” she said. “No, no and once again no! Before you came, bailiff, we discussed this possibility because we know very well that our family has talents which other people don’t have. However, none of those present here have the talent for magic. And, more importantly, none of us could have done it because we didn’t have the opportunity. You can ask as much as you want. You’ll soon discover than none of us has been alone long enough to have murdered four women. These murders weren’t just a case of running up to the edge of the forest and killing the first woman who happens to come by. There’s no road up there where you can meet people at random. Unless you’re a werewolf that kills senselessly at each full moon, you’d have to have met these women somewhere else. So when were we supposed to have met these women?”

“We’ll find the answer to that one, Baroness,” said the bailiff sternly.

“Well, you just go ahead then,” answered Liv and sat down once more.

Mattias coughed gently. “Excuse me,” he said, looking gently at the bailiff. “As a doctor, I’d like to take a closer look at the deceased. Maybe I can establish how those women lost their lives?”

“Ah, you’d like that, wouldn’t you now!” barked the bailiff. “They were witches. Those types should be burned as quickly as possible. So it’s already been done.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” groaned Andreas and got an angry glance from the bailiff.

“I know that they didn’t die of natural causes. They had great scratch marks on their clothes and body. Magic and ghosts have killed them, which is all that can be said on the matter!”

Now Brand was irritated. “Before you become too certain that one of us committed the crime, you should take other people into consideration as well.”

The others in the family knew that Brand’s anger with the bailiff would never fade. The bailiff had attacked Brand’s beloved family – which would never be forgiven!

“I won’t forget anybody,” said this churl of a public figure. “Joel Night Man and Jesper Klaussøn are under observation.”

“Joel Night Man is dying,” said Mattias softly. “He was assaulted by people from the village last night, so you may need to solve another murder.”

The bailiff mumbled something or other which they couldn’t hear and began cross-examining them. Half an hour later he left the farm in an angry mood. He hadn’t found one single hole in their wall of proof for their innocence. When he had left, they all agreed that the bailiff was a fool.

“What a lot of stupid questions he asked!” exclaimed Andreas. “Even I could have done it better.”

“Yes,” said Are. “I couldn’t agree more. The man hasn’t a clue what he’s talking about. If we have to put our trust in that fool of a bailiff, it won’t be long before we’ll all be dangling from the gallows. Andreas, you must carry out your own investigations. You’re smart enough to do that.”

“Thank you,” smiled Andreas. “Well, it’s quite a tempting offer. I’ll get started straightaway: Granddad, where were you when these women were killed?”

“Wait, who’s taught you to interrogate? The bailiff?” laughed Are. “I want to solicit the assistance of Kaleb. He’s quite knowledgeable about law and order.”

“Certainly,” answered Kaleb.

“Splendid,” said Are. “Then I think you should hurry to Jesper’s hut, before the bailiff arrives there. Brand, you must go along, too, because Jesper’s your old friend.”

Brand promised and they soon left. Many of them wished that Cecilie and Alexander had been there. Nobody could solve complicated matters with the same authority and efficiency as those two.