“That’s a very funny line, actually. What he’s really saying is that he’s
only a fictional character.”
“The statement is so paradoxical that we can certainly emphasize it with
a new section.”
“What did you mean by that?”
“Oh, nothing, Sophie. But we did say that Novalis’s fiancee was called
Sophie, just like you, and that she died when she was only fifteen years and
four days old ...”
“You’re scaring me, don’t you know that?”
Alberto sat staring, stony faced. Then he said: “But you needn’t be
worriedthat you will meet the same fate as Novalis’s fiancee.”
“Why not?”
“Because there are several more chapters.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that anyone reading the story of Sophie and Alberto will
know intuitively that there are many pages of the story still to come. We have
only gotten as far as Romanticism.”
“You’re making me dizzy.”
“It’s really the major trying to make Hilde dizzy. It’s not very nice or him,
is it? New section!”
***
Alberto had hardly finished speaking when a boy came running out of
the woods. He had a turban on his head, and he was carrying an oil lamp.
Sophie grabbed Alberto’s arm.
“Who’s that?” she asked.
The boy answered for himself: “My name is Aladdin and I’ve come all the
way from Lebanon.”
Alberto looked at him sternly:
“And what do you have in your lamp?”
The boy rubbed the lamp, and out of it rose a thick cloud which formed
itself into the figure of a man. He had a black beard like Alberto’s and a blue
beret. Floating above the lamp, he said: “Can you hear me, Hilde? I suppose
it’s too late for any more birthday greetings. I just wanted to say that Bjerkely
and the south country back home seem like fairyland to me here in Lebanon.
I’ll see you there in a few days.”
So saying, the figure became a cloud again and was sucked back into
the lamp. The boy with the turban put the lamp under his arm, ran into the
woods, and was gone.
“I don’t believe this,” said Sophie.
“A bagatelle, my dear.”
“The spirit of the lamp spoke exactly like Hilde’s father.”
“That’s because it was Hilde’s father—in spirit.”
“But. . .”
“Both you and I and everything around us are living deep in the major’s
mind. It is late at night on Saturday, April 28, and all the UN soldiers are
asleep around the major, who, although still awake, is not far from sleep
himself. But he must finish the book he is to give Hilde as a fifteenth birthday
present. That’s why he has to work, Sophie, that’s why the poor man gets