Harbour

risk that it will come looking for us.'

''It'', Simon interrupted. 'What do you mean by 'it'?'

'The sea. It comes looking for us and it takes us. Wherever we are.'

Simon shook his head dubiously. 'But you go to Norrtalje, you go to Stockholm sometimes. We go over to Finland on the ferry, you and I. It's all been fine, up to now.'

'Mm. But you've suggested going further afield now and again. To Majorca, places like that. And I've said no, because…then it might think I'm trying to get away.'

Anna-Greta licked her index finger, ran it around the rim of the glass and produced a sound. A lonely, wailing sound rose from the glass and spread through the room like the voice of a ghost. A perfect note, so pure and clear that it seemed to strengthen itself by using the air as a sound-box. Simon placed his hand on Anna-Greta's finger to silence it.

'But this sounds crazy,' he said. 'You mean the sea goes ashore and finds you? That just doesn't happen.'

'It doesn't need to,' said Anna-Greta. 'It exists everywhere. It's connected to everything. The sea. The water. It doesn't need to go anywhere. It already exists everywhere.'

Simon took a bigger swig of wine. He thought back to the experience he had had the previous day. When he held Spiritus in his hand and saw how the water ran through everything, how everything basically consisted of water. Now he widened the perspective in his mind, and saw all the seas connected by rivers, creeks, streams. The veins of water running through the bedrock, the bogs and the pools. Water, water, everywhere.

It's right so far, hut…

'I'm just wondering what you mean by 'take'. How does it 'take' you?'

'We drown. In the most unreasonable places. In a little creek. In a puddle. In a handbasin.' Simon frowned and was about to ask the logical follow-up question, but Anna-Greta pre-empted him, 'No. I have no idea how it happens. Nobody has. But those who…belong to Domaro and try to get away…they are found drowned, sooner or later. Usually. Those who stay, survive. Usually.'

Simon placed his hand on top of Anna-Greta's, which was still resting on the rim of her glass. 'But this just sounds completely-'

'It doesn't matter what it sounds like. That's the way it is. We know that. And now you know it too. To use a word that has fallen out of use, we are damned. And we live with it.'

Simon folded his arms over his chest and flopped back against the sofa. It was a lot to take in at once, to put it mildly. The answers he had been given led to even more questions, and he didn't feel as if he could cope with much more tonight. The small amount of wine he had drunk was enough to make him sleepy, since he wasn't used to it.

He closed his eyes and tried to see everything in front of him. The fishermen who had made their pact with the sea, how it had continued and propagated itself over the years, continued and spread like the sea itself, seeping into every crack.

Seeping into…

He smacked his lips as he thought about the water he had drunk from the well at the burnt-down house. The faint taste of salt, the sea that had found its way in. The taste was gone now, replaced by the biting sweetness of the wine. Without opening his eyes, Simon asked, 'Do I belong to Domaro as well now? Am I also…damned?'

'Presumably. But only you can know that.'

'How do I know?'

'You just know.'

Simon nodded slowly and took a sounding in the very depths of himself, let the plumbline sink down through the darkness, the unspoken, the things he knew without being able to put them into words, and found that he reached the bottom sooner than expected. The knowledge was there, but he had not had the tools to find it. He belonged to the sea. He also belonged to the sea. Perhaps he had done so for a long time.

'Something has happened,' said Anna-Greta. 'That's what we met to talk about today. This business with Sigrid. As far as we know, no one has ever…come back.'

'But she was dead.'

'Yes, but even so. It's never happened before.'

'So what does it mean?'

Anna-Greta stroked his knee. 'Well, that's what we were discussing. When we were interrupted.'

Simon yawned. He tried to put into words one of the many questions writhing around in his head like indolent serpents, but before he managed it Anna-Greta said, 'There's something I want to ask you as well.'

'Oh yes?'

Simon yawned again, he just couldn't help it. He waved his hand in front of his mouth to indicate that he would have taken away this yawn if he could, but it just wasn't possible.

Anna-Greta tucked her legs up on the sofa and wrapped her arms around them. Simon sat there blinking, amazed at her suppleness and agility as she built her own little fortress around her like this. It must be fifteen years since he'd been able to do that, if then.

She leaned her chin on her knees and looked intently at him. Then she asked, 'Will you marry me?'

Despite his best efforts Simon was overcome by yet another enormous yawn which broke his eye contact with Anna-Greta. He held up his hands as if to say No more, no more, and said, 'That. Is the limit when it comes to what I can cope with during the course of one day. We can talk about that tomorrow.'

What are you looking at?

Anders woke to an unfamiliar aroma, unfamiliar sounds. The aroma was coffee, the sounds were someone moving around in the kitchen, opening drawers and cupboards. He lay in bed for a while and pretended that everything was normal. That the person who had made the coffee and was busy in the kitchen was someone he loved and wanted to be with. That it was another beautiful morning in a good life.

He folded his hands over his stomach and looked out of the window. A cloudy sky with patches of blue, a lovely and probably quite cold day in the middle of October. The smell of coffee was tempting, and he heard the clink of china from the kitchen.

Cecilia is making breakfast. Maja is sitting at the kitchen table, busy with something. I am lying here, ready and rested in…Maja's bed…

The fantasy was fraying at the edges. The dirt in his body after yet another evening's drinking and smoking made its presence felt. He looked at his fingers. They were slightly yellow, black beneath the cuticles, and they stank of tobacco. His mouth felt sticky and he leaned over the edge of the bed, found a plastic bottle a third full of diluted wine. He picked it up and drank, hair of the dog.

OK. Back to reality.

The excitement of the previous evening had faded. What Elin had told him about Henrik and Bjorn's disappearance had seemed feverishly promising at the time, but in the cold light of morning he could see that this wasn't necessarily the case. The two events were separate. There wasn't necessarily any connection, and even if there was, what could he do? Nothing.

He heaved himself out of bed. The floor was cold beneath his bare feet, and he pulled on cold socks and a cold T-shirt. The headache began to pound at his temples. He dragged on his jeans and went into the kitchen.

Elin was just putting bread and cheese on the table. She looked up and said 'Good morning'. In the bright morning light from the kitchen window she looked fucking awful. He grunted in reply and got a new carton of wine out of the larder, opened it and took a couple of big gulps. Elin was watching him. He didn't care. The headache was getting worse and he screwed up his eyes, massaged his temples.

'You've got a pretty big problem with alcohol, haven't you?' she said simply.

Anders grinned as a quip he'd heard from a stand-up comic shot out of his mouth, 'I'm a drunk and you're ugly. I can stop drinking.'

Silence fell, and that was the way Anders wanted it. He poured himself a cup of coffee and looked at the clock. It was after eleven. He had slept longer than usual. Despite Elin's escape attempt during the night, perhaps