of her spine. It’s like a special gift, the fact that Lisa who is so fond of dogs has a lover whose back is like a puppy’s tummy. Or perhaps a wolf’s stomach.
“What is it with you and that wolf?” asks Lisa.
Mildred has had a real wolf spring. She got ninety seconds on the evening news program, talking about wolves. There was a concert, with the proceeds going to the wolf foundation. She’s even preached a sermon about the she-wolf.
Mildred turns onto her back. She takes the cigarette from Lisa. Lisa doodles on Mildred’s stomach with her finger.
“Well,” she says, and it’s obvious she’s making a real effort to answer the question. “There’s something about wolves and women. We’re alike. I look at that she-wolf and she reminds me of what we were created for. Wolves are incredibly patient. Just imagine, they can live in polar regions where it’s minus fifty degrees, and in the desert where it’s plus fifty. They’re territorial, their boundaries are set in stone. And they roam for miles, completely free. They help each other within the pack, they’re loyal, they love their cubs more than anything. They’re like us.”
“You haven’t got any cubs,” says Lisa, regretting it almost immediately, but Mildred isn’t offended.
“I’ve got you lot,” she laughs.
“They’re brave enough to stay in one place when it’s necessary,” Mildred continues her sermon, “they’re brave enough to move on when they have to, they’re not afraid to fight and attack if need be. And they’re… alive. And happy.”
She tries to blow smoke rings while she thinks about it.
“It’s to do with my faith,” she says. “The whole of the Bible is full of men with a major task to do, a task that comes before everything, wife, children and… well, everything. There’s Abraham and Jesus and… my father followed in their footsteps in his work as a priest, you know. My mother was responsible for where we lived, visits to the dentist, Christmas cards. But for me Jesus is the one who allows women to start thinking, to move on if they have to, to be like a she-wolf. And when I’m starting to feel bitter and weepy, he says to me: Come on, be happy instead.”
Lisa carries on doodling on Mildred’s stomach, her index finger traces a path across her breasts and her hip bones.
“You know they hate her, don’t you?” she says.
“Who?” asks Mildred.
“The men in the village,” says Lisa. “The ones on the hunting team. Torbjorn Ylitalo. At the beginning of the eighties he was convicted of hunting crimes. He shot a wolf down in Dalarna. That’s where his wife comes from.”
Mildred sits bolt upright.
“You’re joking!”
“I’m not joking. He should really have lost his gun license. But Lars-Gunnar is a policeman, and you know how it is. And it’s the police authorities who decide these things, and he used his contacts, and… Where are you going?”
Mildred has shot up off the kitchen sofa. The dogs come rushing in. They think they’re going out. She doesn’t take any notice of them. Pulls on her clothes.
“Where are you going?” asks Lisa again.
“Those bloody old men,” says Mildred furiously. “How could you? How could you have known about this all along and not said anything?”
Lisa sits up. She’s always known. After all, she was married to Tommy and Tommy was a friend of Torbjorn Ylitalo. She looks at Mildred, who fails to fasten her wristwatch and pushes it into her pocket instead.
“They hunt for free,” snaps Mildred. “The church gives them everything, they won’t let a single bloody person in, least of all women. But the women, they work and sort things out and have to wait for their reward in heaven. I’m so bloody tired of it. It really does send out a message about how the church regards men and women, but enough is damned well enough!”
“My God, you can swear!”
Mildred turns to Lisa.
“You ought to try it,” she says.
Magnus Lindmark was standing by his kitchen window in the dusk. He hadn’t switched on the lights. Every contour, every object both inside and outside had become blurred, begun to dissolve, disappearing into the darkness.
However, he could still see Lars-Gunnar Vinsa, the leader of the hunting team, and Torbjorn Ylitalo, the chairman of the hunting club, walking up the road toward Magnus’ house. He hid behind the curtain. What the hell did they want? And why weren’t they driving? Had they parked a little way off and walked the last part? Why? He had a really bad feeling about this.
Whatever they wanted, he was bloody well going to tell them he didn’t have time. Unlike those two, he did actually have a job. Well, okay, Torbjorn Ylitalo was a forester, but he didn’t do any bloody work, nobody could pretend he did.
Magnus Lindmark didn’t often get visitors nowadays, not since Anki and the boys left. He used to think it was a pain in the ass, all her relatives and the boys’ friends coming round. And it wasn’t his style to pretend and smile sweetly. So in the end her sisters and friends used to clear off when he got home. That had suited him down to the ground. He couldn’t do with people sitting around rabbiting for hours. Hadn’t they got anything else to do?
They were on the porch now, knocking on the door. Magnus’ car was in the yard, so he couldn’t pretend he wasn’t home.
Torbjorn Ylitalo and Lars-Gunnar Vinsa came in without waiting for Magnus to open the door. They were standing in the kitchen.
Torbjorn Ylitalo switched the light on.
Lars-Gunnar looked around. Suddenly Magnus realized what his kitchen looked like.
“It’s a bit… I’ve had a lot…” he said.
The sink was overflowing with dirty dishes and old milk cartons. Two bags crammed full of empty stinking cans by the door. Clothes he’d just dropped on the floor on his way into the shower, he should have chucked them in the laundry room. The table covered in junk mail, letters, old newspapers and a bowl of yogurt, the yogurt dried up and cracked. On the worktop next to the microwave lay a boat engine in bits; he was going to fix it sometime.
Magnus asked, but neither of them wanted coffee. Nor a beer. Magnus himself opened a Pilsner, his fifth of the evening.
Torbjorn got straight down to business.
“What have you been saying to the police?” he asked.
“What the fuck do you mean?”
Torbjorn Ylitalo’s eyes narrowed. Lars-Gunnar’s stance became somehow heavier.
“Let’s not be stupid, Magnus,” said Torbjorn. “You told them I wanted to shoot the priest.”
“Crap! That cow of a detective’s full of crap, she…”
He didn’t get any further. Lars-Gunnar had taken a step forward and hit him with a blow that was like having your ears boxed by a grizzly.
“Don’t you stand there lying to us!”
Magnus blinked and raised his hand to his burning cheek.
“What the fuck,” he whimpered.
“I’ve stuck up for you,” said Lars-Gunnar. “You’re a bloody loser, I’ve always thought so. But for your father’s sake we’ve let you into the team. And we’ve let you stay, despite your bloody antics.”
A hint of defiance flared in Magnus.
“Oh, so you’re a better person than me, are you? You’re superior in some way, are you?”
Now it was Torbjorn’s turn to give him a thump in the chest. Magnus staggered backwards, cannoning into the worktop with the back of his thighs.
“Right, now you just listen!”
“I’ve put up with you,” Lars-Gunnar went on. “Going out shooting at road signs with your new gun, you and your pals. That bloody fight in the hunting lodge a couple of years ago. You can’t hold your drink. But you carry on boozing and do such stupid bloody things.”
