“Maybe we should take a little break,” said the woman from social services, putting her arm around Kristin.
Sven-Erik nodded and switched off the tape recorder. Kristin Wikstrom, the social services woman and Sven- Erik left the room.
“Why don’t you want to talk to us?” asked Anna-Maria.
“Because you don’t understand anything,” said Benjamin Wikstrom. “You don’t understand anything at all.”
“That’s what my son always says to me. He’s the same age as you. Did you know Mildred?”
“It’s not her on the drawing. Don’t you get it? It’s a self-portrait.”
Anna-Maria looked at the drawing. She’d assumed it was Mildred. But Benjamin had long dark hair too.
“You were friends!” exclaimed Anna-Maria. “That’s why you had those cuttings.”
“She understood,” he said. “She understood.”
Behind the veil of hair, slow tears dripped onto the surface of the desk.
Mildred and Benjamin are sitting in her room at the parish hall. She’s invited him for meadowsweet tea with honey. She’s been given the tea by one of the women in Magdalena who picked the leaves and dried them herself. They’re laughing because it tastes bloody awful.
One of Benjamin’s friends was confirmed by Mildred. And through his friend he and Mildred got to know one another.
“So what did you think?”
It’s a thick book. Really thick. Lots of writing, in English. Lots of colored pictures too.
It’s about “the gate” to the unbuilt house, to the world you create. It’s encouraging you to create the world you want to live in for all eternity, through various rites and in your head. It’s about the way you get there. Suicide. Collectively or alone. The English publisher has been sued by a group of parents. Four young people took their lives together in the spring of 1998.
“I like the idea that you create your own heaven,” she says.
Then she listens. Passes him tissues when he weeps. He does that when he’s talking to Mildred. It’s the feeling that she cares that starts him off.
“He hates me,” he says. “And it doesn’t make any difference. If I cut my hair and went around in a shirt and smart trousers and worked hard at school and became chairman of the school council, he still wouldn’t be satisfied. I know that.”
There’s a knock on the door. Mildred frowns in annoyance. When the red light’s showing…
The door opens and Stefan Wikstrom walks in. It’s actually his day off.
“So this is where you are,” he says to Benjamin. “Get your jacket and go and sit in the car. Now.”
To Mildred he says:
“And you can stay out of my family’s business. He’s wasting his time at school. The way he dresses is enough to make you throw up. He does everything he can to embarrass the family. With every encouragement from you, I can see that. Giving him tea when he’s truanting from school. Did you hear what I said? Jacket, car.”
He taps his watch.
“You’ve got Swedish now, I’ll give you a lift.”
Benjamin stays where he is.
“Your mother’s sitting at home crying. Your form tutor rang and wondered where you were. You’re making your mother ill. Is that what you want?”
“Benjamin wanted to talk,” says Mildred. “Sometimes…”
“You should talk to your family!” says Stefan.
“Yeah, right!” shouts Benjamin. “But you just refuse to answer. Like yesterday, when I asked if I could go along with Kevin’s family up to the Riksgransen ski center. ‘Get your hair cut and dress like a normal person, then I’ll talk to you like a normal person.’ ”
Benjamin stands up and picks up his jacket.
“I’ll cycle to school. You don’t need to give me a lift.”
He rushes out.
“This is your fault,” says Stefan, pointing at Mildred as she sits there, still holding her teacup.
“I feel sorry for you, Stefan,” she replies. “The landscape around you must be very desolate.”
“We’re letting him go,” said Anna-Maria to the prosecutor and her colleagues. She went out to the rest area and asked the woman from social services to take mother and son home.
Then she went into her office.
She felt tired and dispirited.
Sven-Erik called in to see if she wanted to go out for lunch.
“But it’s three o’clock,” she said.
“Have you eaten?”
“No.”
“Get your jacket. I’ll drive.”
She grinned.
“Why?”
Tommy Rantakyro materialized behind Sven-Erik.
“You need to come,” he said.
Sven-Erik looked at him grimly.
“I’m not even speaking to you,” he said.
“Because of that business about the cat? I was only kidding. But you need to hear this.”
They followed Tommy to interview room two. A woman and a man were sitting there. They were both dressed for the forest. The man was quite tall; he was holding a khaki cap from the army surplus store in his fist, and he was wiping the sweat from his brow. The woman was unnaturally skinny. Had those deep furrows above her lips and in her face that you get from smoking for many years. Bandana on her head, berry stains on her jeans. Both of them stank of smoke and mosquito repellent.
“Please could I have a glass of water,” said the man as the three detectives entered the room.
“Just leave it!” said the woman, in a tone that indicated that nothing the man could say or do would be right.
“Could you just tell us again what you told me?” asked Tommy Rantakyro.
“Oh, you tell them!” the woman snapped at her husband.
She was clearly stressed; her eyes flickered from one detective to the other.
“Well, we were north of Lower Vuolusjarvi picking berries,” said the man. “My brother-in-law’s got a cabin out there. Amazing cloudberries when the time’s right, but at the moment it’s lingon…”
He glanced up at Tommy Rantakyro who was gesturing to indicate that the man really ought to get to the point.
“Anyway, we heard a noise during the night,” said the man.
“It was a scream,” his wife stated firmly.
“Yes, yes. Anyway, then we heard a shot.”
“And then another shot,” supplied his wife.
“Oh, you tell them, then!” snapped the husband.
“I said, didn’t I, I said you’re going to have to talk to the police! I said that.”
