stuff, expensive clothes…” And Lars-Gunnar had understood. “It’s not about money,” he’d said. But he’d realized that in the eyes of the villagers, that’s exactly what it would look like. That he begrudged Nalle having things. That Nalle had to do without. That when Nalle finally had the opportunity to do something that would be fun… So Lars- Gunnar had to give in. All he could do was get out his wallet. And everybody said to him how nice it was that Mildred was so good to Nalle. Lucky for the boy that she’d moved here.
But Mildred wanted to see him go under, he knows that. When her windows got smashed, or when that idiot Magnus Lindmark tried to set fire to her shed, she didn’t report it to the police. And so there was talk. Just as she’d intended. The police can’t do anything. When you really need them, all they can do is just stand there. It really got to Lars-Gunnar. He was the one who had to put up with the embarrassment.
And then she turned her attention to his place on the hunting team.
It might be the church’s mark on the paper. But the forest belongs to him. He’s the one who knows it. It’s true that the cost of the lease has been low. But really, in all fairness, the hunters ought to get paid for shooting. Elk cause enormous damage to the forest, chewing the bark of the trees.
The autumn elk hunt. Planning with the other guys. Walking through the forest in the early morning. Before sunrise. The dogs are excited, pulling on their leads. Sniffing at the gray darkness deep in the forest. Somewhere in there is their quarry. The hunt itself, during the day. Autumn air, the sound of dogs barking far away. The sense of togetherness when you’re dealing with the kill. Struggling with the body in the slaughterhouse. Chatting around the fire in the cabin in the evening.
She wrote a letter. Didn’t dare bring it up face-to-face. Wrote that she knew Torbjorn had been convicted of breaking the law on hunting. That he hadn’t lost his firearms license. That it was Lars-Gunnar who’d sorted it all out. That he and Torbjorn couldn’t be permitted to hunt on church land. “It isn’t only inappropriate, but also objectionable in view of the fact that the church is intending to offer protection to the she-wolf,” she wrote.
He can feel the pressure squeezing his chest as he thinks about it. She would plunge him into isolation, that’s what she wanted. Make him into a fucking loser. Like Malte Alajarvi. No job, no hunting.
He’d talked to Torbjorn Ylitalo. “What the fuck can we do?” Torbjorn had said. “I’ll be glad if I can just hang on to my job.” Lars-Gunnar had felt as if he were sinking into a swamp. He could see himself in a few years. Growing old, stuck at home with Nalle. They could sit there like two idiots, gawping at game shows on TV.
It wasn’t right. All that business about the license! It was nearly twenty years ago, after all! It was just an excuse to do him some damage.
“Why?” he’d said to Torbjorn. “What does she want to do to me?” And Torbjorn had shrugged his shoulders.
A week went by without him speaking to a single soul. A foretaste of what life would be like. In the evenings he drank, just so that he could get to sleep.
The night before midsummer’s eve he was sitting in the kitchen having a little celebration. Well, maybe celebration wasn’t quite the word. Shut in the kitchen with his own thoughts. Poured himself a drink, talked to himself, drank the drink on his own. Went to bed in the end, tried to sleep. It was as if something was thumping in his chest. Something he hadn’t felt since he was a child.
Then he got in the car and tried to pull himself together. He remembers he almost put the car in the ditch when he was reversing out of the yard. And then Nalle came running out in just his underpants. Lars-Gunnar thought he’d fallen asleep hours ago. He was waving and shouting. Lars-Gunnar had to switch off the engine. “You can come with me,” he said. “But you need to put some clothes on.” “No, no,” said Nalle, refusing to let go of the car door. “It’s okay, I’m not going anywhere. Go and put something on.”
There’s a kind of fog in his head when he tries to remember. He wanted to talk to her. She was going to fucking listen to him. Nalle fell asleep in the passenger seat.
He remembers hitting her. Thinking: That’s enough. That’s enough now.
She wouldn’t stop making a noise. However much he hit her. Rattling and squeaking. Breathing. He dragged off her shoes and socks. Shoved her socks in her mouth.
He was still furious when he carried her up to the church. Hung her up by the chain in front of the organ pipes. As he stood up there in the gallery he thought it didn’t matter if anybody came, if anybody had seen him.
Then Nalle came in. He’d woken up and came stumbling into the church. Suddenly he was standing down there in the aisle gazing up at Lars-Gunnar and Mildred with huge eyes. He didn’t say a word.
Lars-Gunnar sobered up at once. He was angry with Nalle. And suddenly terrified. He remembers that very clearly. Remembers dragging Nalle to the car. Driving away. And they didn’t speak. Nalle didn’t say anything.
Every day Lars-Gunnar was expecting them to come. But nobody came. Well, they came and asked if he’d seen anything, of course. Or knew anything. Asked him the same questions they were asking everybody else.
He remembered he’d put his work gloves on. They’d been in the trunk of the car. He hadn’t done it intentionally. Hadn’t been thinking about fingerprints or anything. It had just been automatic. If you’re using a tool like a crowbar, you put your gloves on. Pure luck. Pure luck.
And then everything carried on as usual. Nalle didn’t seem to remember anything. He was just the same as always. Lars-Gunnar had been just the same as always too. He slept well at night.
I was lying there like a wounded animal, he thinks now, as he stands there with this woman at his feet. Like an animal that lies down in a hollow, but it’s only a matter of time before the huntsman catches up with it.
When Stefan Wikstrom rang he could hear it in his voice. That he knew. Just the fact that he was ringing Lars- Gunnar, why would he do that? They saw each other when they were hunting, but he didn’t have anything to do with that milksop of a priest otherwise. And now he was ringing up. Telling him the parish priest seemed to be changing his mind about the future of the hunting team. Bertil Stensson might suggest to the church council that it was time to revoke the lease. And he talked about the elk hunt as if… as if he had something quite different to say about the whole thing.
And when Stefan rang, the fog in Lars-Gunnar’s head cleared. He remembers standing by the jetty waiting for Mildred. His pulse throbbing like a jackhammer. He looked up at the priest’s house. And somebody was standing at the upstairs window. He didn’t remember that until Stefan Wikstrom rang.
What did he want with me? he thinks now. He wanted power over me. Like Mildred.
Lars-Gunnar and Stefan Wikstrom are sitting in the car on the way to the lake. Lars-Gunnar has said he’s going to lift the boat out of the water for the winter and chain down the oars.
Stefan Wikstrom is whining about Bertil Stensson like a baby. Lars-Gunnar is listening with only half an ear. It’s all about the hunting permit and the fact that Bertil doesn’t appreciate the work Stefan does as a priest. And then Lars-Gunnar has to listen to his unbearable infantile babble about hunting. As if he understood anything about it. The little boy who got his place on the team as a present from the parish priest.
The constant babbling is confusing Lars-Gunnar. What does he want, the priest? It feels as if Stefan is holding the parish priest up to Lars-Gunnar as a small child holds up its arm when it’s fallen over. Kiss it better.
He has no intention of being under the thumb of this little runt. He’s prepared to pay the price for his actions. But that price is not going to be paid to Stefan Wikstrom. Never.
Stefan Wikstrom keeps his eyes on the section of the road that can be seen in the headlights. He gets carsick really easily. Has to keep looking ahead.
A sense of fear is beginning to steal over him. He can feel it writhing in his stomach like a slender snake.
They talk about all kinds of things. Not about Mildred. But her presence is tangible. It’s almost as if she were sitting in the backseat.
Stefan Wikstrom thinks about the night before midsummer’s eve. How he stood by the bedroom window. He saw somebody standing next to Mildred’s boat. Suddenly the person took a few steps. Disappeared behind a little log cabin on the museum’s land. He didn’t see anything else. But he thought about it afterward, of course. That it was Lars-Gunnar. That he’d had something in his hand.
Even now, he doesn’t think it was wrong not to tell the police. He and Lars-Gunnar are among the eighteen members of the hunting team. That makes him Lars-Gunnar’s priest. Lars-Gunnar is part of his flock. A priest lives by different laws from normal citizens. As a priest, he couldn’t point the finger at Lars-Gunnar. As a priest, he must be there when Lars- Gunnar is ready to talk.
This was another burden laid upon him. And he accepted it. Placed it in God’s hands. Prayed: Thy will be done.
