She's Never Coming Back

46

Ylva saw that Mike and Sanna had come home for the evening and switched to a TV channel. Gosta had connected her only a few months ago. The TV was her greatest luxury and she often left it on. For some company and noise, if nothing else.

At this time in the afternoon, they showed old sitcoms. Ylva loved the studio laughter, it made her feel all warm.

She had ironed the day’s laundry and had even managed to polish a couple of candlesticks – in other words, she’d accomplished quite a bit.

It was well into autumn now, and Ylva had long since laid her plans to escape on hold. She was undeniably an idiot, just as Gosta said. He was happy enough with her sexual performance, though; he even said she was a natural talent, born to it.

‘But you get a lot of practice, too.’

She thanked him, mustered the courage to ask if they might let her clean the house, after all. She promised she’d do a good job.

He said he’d think about it. Ylva felt certain that sooner or later she’d be given the chance. He had been generous recently, spoiling her with food and books.

There wasn’t any reason, really, to risk it all by trying to escape.

‘Wait, wait, wait.’ Mike held his hands up in front of him.

Calle Collin stopped talking. He’d told Mike the background, that his original intention had been to interview Ylva about the fact that three of her classmates had died so young, but then the managing editor for Family Journal, who lived locally, had told him that Ylva had been missing for more than a year.

‘So you’re a journalist,’ Mike said, and looked very disapproving.

‘For the weeklies,’ Calle said. ‘I’m not a news reporter.’

‘And you want to write about dead people?’

‘Well, yes … no. But …’

‘But what?’ Mike said. His face was bright red and his daughter looked at him with a worried expression.

‘I just think it all seems a bit odd,’ Calle said.

‘What?’ Mike barked.

‘That three out of four are dead and the fourth is missing.’

‘What are you talking about? Three out of four? Three out of four what?’

‘The Gang of Four,’ Calle said, and looked down at the table, embarrassed.

‘The Gang of Four?’ Mike repeated, shaking his head.

Calle met his eyes. It was now or never.

‘Ylva used to hang out with these three guys: Johan Lind, Morgan Norberg and Anders Egerbladh. The four of them terrorised the school. Morgan died of cancer. Anders was murdered in Stockholm. Johan died in a motorbike accident in Africa. I wondered if there might be a connection. With your wife’s disappearance.’

The girl turned to her father, looked at him in suspense.

The veins on Mike’s forehead were throbbing, his chest was heaving, his lips were tight. When he spoke, it was in a very low voice, almost a whisper.

‘I have never heard anything about the individuals you’ve just mentioned, so I assume that they can’t have made much of an impression on my wife. And if you don’t leave people alone to grieve in peace, I’ll have something to say to your boss at Family Journal. In fact, I think I will anyway. And now I want you to stand up and get out of my house and never show your face here again.’

‘But, but, I just—’

‘Now.’

Calle got up and left.

47

Calle Collin rested his forehead on the window of the airplane, felt the cold plastic against his skin. The plane accelerated down the runway and he was pushed back into his seat. He wasn’t a frequent flyer and by this point in the flight his mind would usually be racing through scenarios where the plane would crash, killing everyone on board. Most of these had the plane breaking in two in mid-air, and the passengers being sucked out into the dark, cold air, where they floated helplessly just long enough to reflect on their sins, before plummeting to the ground.

But this time, Calle’s head was full of other scenes. He imagined Michael Zetterberg contacting the managing editor of Family Journal. Maybe he’d call her, or just bump into her on a Sunday walk. And then he would tell her what had happened. That some crazy reporter from Stockholm had looked him up, wanting to talk about Ylva’s disappearance. He’d implied that Ylva hadn’t been the nicest of girls and then he’d mentioned a bunch of dead classmates and generally been rather unpleasant.

What’s more, this individual said that he was working for Family Journal. Was that true?

Calle could just imagine the managing editor listening carefully, her anger rising, and then saying that she did in fact know who Ylva’s husband was talking about, and that it was totally out of order and she promised, promised, to contact the reporter immediately and put a stop to all this nonsense.

The next scene that filled Calle’s mind was the telephone conversation that would ensue: the bollocking he’d get, his contract terminated. Then the gossip.

That Calle Collin, what happened to him? He used to be a really good journalist and a decent guy. Evidently he’s lost it completely now.

His third thought, and by this time the plane had landed and was taxiing towards the gate at Arlanda, was Jorgen. That terrible man with his pockets so full of money that he had nothing better to do than to cultivate the self-invented myth that he was an interesting eccentric.

It was his fault. Everything. Even if he wasn’t exactly behind it all.

Instead of waiting for the bus, Calle hopped into a taxi.

‘Lidingo, please.’

He turned on his mobile and called Jorgen.

‘I’m on my way over,’ Calle said. ‘We need to talk.’

‘There was someone here today,’ Marianne said.

‘Here?’ Gosta asked.

‘Here, on the street. He asked where Grontevagen was. He was going to see Mike. Called him Michael.’

‘Right.’

Gosta sounded vaguely interested, but carried on looking through the paper.

‘Gay,’ Marianne said. ‘He was their age, spoke with a Stockholm dialect.’

‘A poof from Stockholm, stop the press.’

Marianne sighed, tired of her husband.

‘There was something about him,’ she said. ‘It was almost like he recognised me.’

‘Did he introduce himself?’

‘Of course not.’