Professor Andersen's Night by Dag Solstad

he had been looking forward to it himself because they, especially the young wife, Mette, so evidently and candidly had been looking forward to it. He recollected that he hadn’t even cancelled the table he had reserved yesterday evening, a table for three at Palmehaven. But he would have to do that when he arrived in Oslo. He felt a bit sorry for his colleague, who probably didn’t have much cash, starting a second family had its costs, even for a professor of literature, especially when the possessions of one’s former life were to be divided in two, and not a penny less, he reckoned, bearing in mind what he knew about his colleague’s ex-wife. It had therefore been something for them to look forward to, having dinner with the lavish colleague from Oslo (Professor Andersen). They had fixed up a babysitter, too, and then he, Professor Andersen, had just done a runner from the whole thing. It wasn’t on. No, it wasn’t on.
    In the taxi from Fornebu Airport to Skillebekk he tried to calm himself down, but couldn’t. He was too tense. He hastily opened the main door of the building where he lived, and went quickly up the stairs and unlocked the door to his apartment. He went straight over to the window. The curtains were drawn back, but there was no sign of anyone in there. In other words he had to prepare himself for a wait. Waiting took a long time, remarkably long it seemed, although he tried, and partly succeeded, to do some routine work, such as washing up, putting a load of washing in the machine, reading a little in a book, Thomas Mann’s
Joseph and His Brothers
, which he held in high regard, but this idle waiting and unbearable tension, and almost panic-stricken fear that it would turn out that the suspicion he’d had, when he woke up in a daze in Trondheim earlier that day, had been justified, was followed by a tremendous feeling of relief when he caught a glimpse of a shadow that passed through early in the afternoon, in a room where the light still hadn’t been turned on. Then the light was turned on. He felt relieved, although he couldn’t be certain who was in there, but he thought it might be the youngish man who had been standing there on Boxing Day in the evening, though he couldn’t be absolutely certain before the man appeared at the window. He did so not long afterwards, and it turned out that it was him. He was still there, then, and Professor Andersen could breathe a sigh of relief. But just then he was gripped by anxiety. Professor Andersen’s reflexive consciousness surfaced suddenly and anxiety flowed through his body. For what was really about to happen to him? For the relief he felt now was actually frightening. Really it ought to have been quite the opposite. He was feeling relieved because he, the murderer, was still there. Imagine if Professor Andersen’s suspicion in Trondheim this morning had been right! That he had vanished, and wouldn’t turn up again, that he had just borrowed the apartment for Christmas and now had left it again, and quite simply disappeared out of Professor Andersen’s life, what a relief that ought to have been! When that wasn’t the case, but on the contrary quite the opposite, it made Professor Andersen extremely worried. He was concerned about himself, and more intensely than he could remember ever having been before. He was so concerned about himself that he noticed he was trembling and sweating from pure anxiety. ‘I’m damned,’ he thought. ‘Now it has happened. I’m not able to go through with this.’ But he couldn’t put a stop to it. With alert self-scrutiny he observed himself as if through a transparent membrane. He couldn’t reach himself through this film. He was, indeed, a damned soul. Behind this transparent membrane. He came home from Trondheim four days after Christmas Day, and up until after New Year’s Day his powers of observation and concentration were directed at the window on the other side of the street, and at the figure