Poona Bai.'
'Could you say her name again?' Kalle said uncertainly.
Gunder did as he was asked.
Kalle had finally collected himself. 'Shall I take her back to your house?'
'No, bring her here, please. To the Central Hospital. My sister's married name is Dahl. She's in a neurology ward on the tenth floor.'
'I need the flight number,' said Kalle. 'An awful lot of planes land there.'
'I forgot it at home. But it lands at six o'clock. From Frankfurt.'
Gunder sensed his despair was taking over. He thought of the fear that would grip Poona when she couldn't find him.
'Kalle,' he whispered. 'She's my wife. Do you understand?'
'No.' Kalle sounded frightened.
'We were married in India on August 4th. She's coming to live in Elvestad.'
Kalle stared wide-eyed through his front window. 'I'm leaving right away!' he cried. 'Stay with your sister, I'll take care of this.'
'Thank you!' said Gunder. He wanted to cry with relief. 'Tell Poona I'm so sorry.'
Kalle started the car, but did not flick on the meter. A few minutes later the white Mercedes was roaring down the E6.
He went back to Marie's room. No change. To think that she could not breathe on her own. He imagined her lung as a flimsy balloon speared by the sharp bone splinters. Then it had collapsed. They had re-inflated it and reshaped it. The doctor had said that the cuts would heal on their own. This, too, was good. He looked at the clock. A nurse appeared at regular intervals. She looked at Gunder and smiled. Told him he needed a break, to go and get a bite to eat.
'I couldn't face food,' said Gunder.
'I'll get you a drink.'
Slowly he began dozing. The respirator was starting to make him sleepy; it was exactly like clockwork. Sucking the air out of Marie, forcing it back in, sucking it out. The time was 5.58 p.m. He thought, Poona's plane will be landing now. I hope to God that Kalle will have made it. That he will find her in the crowd. He stared down at his sister. Then it occurred to him that he had not asked a single question about the accident. What about the other car? What about the people in it? Why hadn't anyone said anything? He was smitten by the horrifying thought that perhaps someone had died. That Marie would wake up to a nightmare. He thought of Karsten who still knew nothing. Was he sitting somewhere with a foaming beer in front of him, perhaps listening to the raucous bellowing of German drinking songs? Soon Poona will be getting her luggage, he thought, and she too knows nothing of what has happened. Kalle is looking for her now. He could see clearly his greying head standing out among the crowd. The nurse reappeared. Gunder summoned up his courage.
'What actually happened?' he said. 'The accident. What did she hit? Another car?'
'Yes,' the nurse said.
'What happened to the other driver?'
'He's not doing so well,' the nurse said.
'I do need to know what happened,' he pleaded. 'She may wake up and ask me. I need to know what to say!'
She looked at him gravely. 'He's here. But we couldn't save him.' She bent over Marie and pulled up her eyelids. He saw the dead expression in them and gulped. A man had died and perhaps it was Marie's fault.
Then another nurse arrived. She held a cordless phone in her hand. His heart leapt in anticipation. It was Kalle.
'I couldn't find her,' he said, out of breath. 'She must have gotten another cab.'
Gunder panicked. 'You didn't see her at all?'
'I looked everywhere, and they paged her, but she must have got her luggage and cleared customs really quickly. I asked at the information desk if anyone of that name had been there looking for help and they paged her while I was waiting, but no-one came.'
'What time did you get there?' Gunder stammered.
'I'm not quite sure. I drove as fast as I could,' he said unhappily.
Gunder felt sorry for Kalle, who now had a bad conscience for no reason at all.
'She's probably gone to your house,' Kalle suggested. 'Perhaps she's sitting on your doorstep. I'll drive up there now.'
'Thank you,' Gunder said.
He handed the phone back. The nurses looked at him enquiringly, but he said nothing. He could not face talking any more. Marie could not hear him anyway. An eternity passed and a message was passed to him that Poona had not been waiting at the house. Perhaps she had not been on the plane at all, Gunder thought, bewildered. Perhaps it would be all right to contact Lufthansa? They could confirm whether she had been on the flight. Once more he went out to the payphone and called the airport. Eventually they confirmed it. Poona Bai had travelled with Lufthansa from Frankfurt. The plane had landed on time at 6 p.m. Gunder went back up in the lift. Looked at his sister in the bed. His body felt heavy and infinitely tired. Reluctantly he got up again and left the room. Stopped in the doorway of the duty sister's office. Explained that he had to go because something had happened, but he promised to return. Please would they call if there were any developments?
They looked at him in surprise. But of course they would call. So he went home. Sat behind the steering wheel lost in his own thoughts and was nearly home when a car swept towards him at great speed. It was way over on his side of the road. He threw his wheel sharply to the right and gasped. His heart skipped a beat. Things could happen so quickly! Why don't you get started sooner if it's that important! he snapped at the mirror. The rear of a white Saab disappeared round a corner.
It was 9.30 p.m. when he let himself in. He sat at his desk and looked at the photograph of him and Poona. The evening came and then the night. Everything inside him was in turmoil. Had she misunderstood? Should he call the police? Surely they couldn't just start a manhunt? Where would they look? He sat up the whole night. Every time he heard the sound of a car he leapt out of his chair and pulled the curtain aside. There is an explanation for everything, he thought. Any minute now a taxi would draw up in front of the house. She would be with him at last. He glanced at the telephone. It did not ring. That meant that Marie was still unconscious and had no awareness of her own condition, or of the man in the other car who had died. Of Poona who had not arrived.
He sat all the time with the photograph in his hand. Looked at the odd yellow bag she always wore around her waist. He had never seen anything like it. He remembered how she kissed him on the nose and caressed his face with her warm hands. How she lifted up his shirt and hid her face in there. She would sit like that and listen to his heart. He lifted up the photograph close to his eyes. Her face was so tiny. It disappeared altogether behind his fingertip.
Chapter 5
The next day, August 21st, a police car drove slowly along the highway towards Elvestad. The white bonnet gleamed in the sunlight. Two men stared through the windscreen. They could make out a crowd of people in the distance.
'There,' Skarre said.
They saw a clearing to the left. A meadow, surrounded by dense wood. Inspector Konrad Sejer looked towards the edge of the wood where a police team was working. The whole meadow was cordoned off. There had been created a passageway, through which they would apparently have to pass. People got out of their cars quickly and headed out into the tall grass. It was already flattened in places. This furrow, Sejer thought, will stand out like an open wound for a long, long time. A number of bystanders had also gathered on the road. Youngsters on bikes, a few cars. And the press, of course, denied any closer access for now. Their camera lenses glinted aggressively. Sejer was easy to recognise by the way he walked. The long body moved steadily across the meadow. There was never anything hasty or rash about him. Similarly he always thought before he spoke. Young people who did not
