into a deep depression. He’s been living temporarily in a flat in Stockholm that belongs to a friend. I don’t think he’s capable of doing much of anything at the moment.’
‘Do you know where he is right now?’
‘I have no idea. Sometimes he disappears for a while. No one knows where he goes.’
‘So what about you? How do you deal with your mother if she’s so difficult?’
‘Who said that I deal with her? I don’t think anybody can handle that woman.’
He shook his head as he leaned forward to check the tag on the ear of the next sheep to be weighed.
‘It’s nothing but constant trouble with Mamma, and it never ends. Whenever one problem is solved, the next one arrives like a letter in the post.’
‘How often do you see each other?’
‘Every once in a while, usually only if I stop by to have coffee with her. We talk about meaningless things for an hour, and then I leave. I just let all her drivel run off me like water off a duck’s back. Simon and Mikaela have had a harder time of it. They’re like sponges, soaking up all her complaints. They end up feeling annoyed and insulted. They have a symbiotic relationship with her. If she feels bad, they do too; if she’s happy, then they are too. It’s never been like that for me.’
‘Why do you think that is?’
‘Maybe because I’m older and had time to get to know Pappa before my parents were divorced and he disappeared out of our lives. I managed to form my own impression of him, and of Mamma and their relationship. I’ve always known that things weren’t nearly as one-sided as Mamma tries to make them out to be.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I can’t explain it. And I don’t really want to talk about it.’
‘Do you know whether your mother has ever received any threats, or whether someone would want to harm her?’
‘Threats? I’ve never heard about anything like that. And she would have mentioned it, because she always wants to get us involved in the smallest details of her daily life. Like telling us that she burned the soup or that she can’t find her slippers.’
‘What about someone who might want to harm her?’
Andreas gave Knutas an inscrutable look.
‘A person may have the will, but that’s not always enough,’ he said tersely.
Then he went back to his work. The next sheep was waiting to be weighed.
WALPURGIS EVE WAS the most beautiful it had been in years. Usually the day was cold with a strong wind, but this time the sun was shining and it was so warm that it felt as if summer was just around the corner.
Johan had worked all weekend putting together reports for both Regional News and the national news broadcasts, so he’d been given the day off. It had been hectic for both Johan and Pia after Alexander Almlov died. The outcry about the assault case had overshadowed the murder of Viktor Algard. Big demonstrations were staged in Visby, protesting against violence and the politicians’ lack of interest in providing services for young people. Instead, they had voted to shut down recreation centres, lay off school counsellors and cut funding for education, after-school programmes and sports activities. The investment in the new conference centre had once again come under fire. How could anyone justify spending millions of kronor for that sort of building when the island’s young people had nowhere to go when they weren’t in school?
Johan and Pia had compiled reports that were broadcast as part of the national news seen all over Sweden. The series they had planned was now put on the fast track; at the same time, it was given much more space in the news programmes than they could ever have imagined. Johan noted with satisfaction that so much attention was being focused on youth violence that now all the editorial pages and news programmes were concentrating on how to deal with the problem. But everything came at a price. This time it had cost a sixteen-year-old boy his life.
Johan had hardly even had time to miss Emma and Elin. But now that he was on his way out to Faro, he could barely contain himself. He stood on the deck of the ferry with the sea wind blowing in his face, finally relaxed enough that he could stop thinking about work. He was going to devote himself to what was most important – namely, his family.
Emma’s parents lived at the northernmost tip of the island, near the great sand dune called Norsta Auren. Their white limestone house stood all alone, with only a low wall separating the property from the beach. On one side was a bird promontory, which attracted ornithologists wanting to study the enormous number of seabirds that occupied the spit of land. On the other side of the house was the long, sandy beach, which extended for several kilometres. The light-coloured, fine-grained sand on the beach, which was several hundred metres wide in places, reminded visitors of sun-drenched July days in the Caribbean or South Pacific. The shoreline curved in a gentle arc, reaching all the way to the lighthouse, which was Faro’s furthest outpost.
When Johan turned his car on to the bumpy, narrow road leading to the house, Emma and Elin came walking towards him, hand in hand. He stopped the car and jumped out. He saw Elin’s joyous face and Emma’s warm eyes. He pulled both of them into his arms, giving them a big hug.
After dinner with Emma’s parents, they took a bike ride out to Ekeviken, a lovely beach and summer-house area about a kilometre to the south. All the preparations for Walpurgis Eve had been carefully made, and the bonfire would be lit at eight o’clock. During the past month, people who lived in the vicinity had gathered wood for the pyre, which now loomed, tall and stately, in the middle of the beach. The entire island was involved in the celebration. Small booths set up along the shore were selling sausages, coffee and Gotland specialities such as leg of mutton, saffron pancakes, honey and blue raspberry jam. The vendors were also offering lambskins, ceramics and other handicrafts made on the island. Children dashed about, tossing as many branches as they could find on to the pyre before it was lit.
A choir of young people wearing their white graduation caps was singing ‘Winter Spills Out of Our Mountains’. Not that there were any real mountains on Gotland. The highest point was Lojsta Heath, which was no more than 82 metres above sea level.
Johan squeezed Emma’s hand. This holiday was something he sorely needed.
The last notes of the song faded, and then a former cabinet minister, who lived on Faro in the summertime, climbed up on the improvised stage. He was a tall, blond and athletic man in his forties who seemed to have everything going for him. He was youthful, charming and also terribly handsome, at least according to the ladies, including Emma. The hundred or so people who had gathered fell silent, turning their attention to the stage. Even the kids who had been romping around with their dogs stopped to listen. There was something magical about the man; with his golden locks and hand-knitted sweater, he seemed the very epitome of the healthy, sporty and confident Swede. As if he’d stepped right out of the pages of a Dressmann catalogue, thought Johan sourly.
Of course his speech was a big hit, filled as it was with warmth and a sense of commitment. Johan was amused to see that Emma looked utterly enraptured as she applauded along with everyone else.
The former cabinet minister concluded his performance by tossing the first burning torch on to the pyre while the choir sang another rendition of their springtime song. Everyone joined in, and an enchanted mood settled over the crowd. The fire rose up towards the sky, which had now grown dark, and the flames glittered in the reflection on the water’s surface. The words of the song drifted out over the sea, and Johan was again filled with the joy of being a family man. He hadn’t been to a Walpurgis Eve celebration since he was a boy. He put his arm around Emma and kissed the top of her head.
Her hair smelled of shampoo and wood smoke.
EARLY AFTERNOON. THE rain is beating against the windowpanes.
I was woken a moment ago by the insistent beeping of a refuse lorry backing up. It was entering the ugly alleyway outside my bedroom window.
I have a merciless encounter with my reflection in the bathroom mirror. My face is mute and blank. I’m trying to spare myself. My eyes are two black stones, without intensity or life. My lips are dry and cracked from not speaking or having contact with anyone else. The pills I take dry out my body from the inside, and my skin feels more taut every day that passes. My hands are chapped. As my body dries up, my brain is also shrivelling. I’m finding it increasingly hard to keep my thoughts straight; they keep merging, creating incomprehensible patterns inside my head, impossible to dissect. In most cases, I just leave them there in a tangled heap, like a ball of yarn that has unrolled and then become hopelessly snarled. Impenetrable.
I’ve been sitting in the kitchen, watching the refuse lorry and all the activity surrounding that rumbling behemoth that is now blocking the entire street. The kitchen window faces the same alley. Sometimes it’s liberating
