“How will we get them to the station?” Ingrid asks.
Elsa shakes her head.
“I don’t know,” she says. “I think all we can do is walk them there as though there’s nothing wrong. It’s not so far. If we go just before the train leaves there’ll be no time for anyone to stop us.”
Ingrid sighs softly. The night makes it sound bigger than it is.
“Will you go with them?” she asks.
“Yes,” says Elsa. “I’ll take them to Stockholm. My daughter lives there.”
“Margareta,” says Ingrid.
Elsa nods, though she doesn’t know if Ingrid can see it.
“And what about Staffan?” Ingrid asks.
“I’ll write to him,” Elsa says. “Once we’ve arrived. When they’re … when we’re safe.”
Far from Silvertjärn.
Far from Pastor Mattias.
“I don’t understand how this could happen,” Elsa says softly, vulnerable words she would never have let herself utter in the light of day.
“Nor I,” Ingrid replies quietly.
Neither of them mentions the name Elsa knows they are both thinking. Neither of them mentions Aina. Aina, who throbs in Elsa’s chest with every heartbeat. Her beloved, her baby. What sort of mother abandons her own daughter?
The baby starts moving and whimpering again, and Elsa gets to her feet. Her knees are shaky and her neck is stiff; she’s too old to be sleeping on anything that isn’t a bed.
Elsa leans in over the girl, picks her up and rocks her gently, but this time the baby won’t be soothed. Her cries are only getting louder. Elsa is always amazed by infants’ cries. That such a small body can make such a noise.
She tries to calm her, cradles her and hushes her, but the baby won’t stop. If she doesn’t quiet down soon it might draw prying eyes to the school.
Elsa blinks at a sudden light. Ingrid has lit a bare candle in her hand.
“Where’s the rag?” Ingrid asks, looking around.
“We’re out of milk,” Elsa says, nodding at the corner where she left the empty bowl.
“Perhaps she can suck on the rag,” Ingrid suggests, but Elsa shakes her head.
“She’s hungry,” she says. “That won’t help.”
Elsa’s stomach begins to tie in knots. She looks around and gives a start when she sees that Birgitta has woken up. Of course she has; only the dead could sleep through the shrill wails filling the room. She has sat up slightly in the bed, her eyes fixed on the girl.
Little Kristina starts up again with renewed voice, and Elsa makes a decision. She cautiously steps over to Birgitta. Birgitta doesn’t look at her. She’s looking at the baby.
Does she understand who she is? Does she see that she’s her daughter?
Elsa can’t imagine that she does.
But still.
When Elsa reaches the edge of the bed Birgitta does something inconceivable: she holds out her arms. At first Elsa hesitates, but then she places Kristina in Birgitta’s outstretched hands.
Her hold is awkward and uncertain, presumably uncomfortable, and although Elsa is afraid to correct her too much, Birgitta holds the baby gingerly—cautiously—while Elsa adjusts her arms.
When Elsa unbuttons Birgitta’s dress she can see her stiffen, but she lets Elsa continue. Elsa is ready and waiting to sweep Kristina away at the slightest hint of agitation, but Birgitta doesn’t make a sound.
Elsa folds back the front of her dress, exposing a swollen, blue-veined breast. Then, placing her hand under Kristina’s back and heavy head, she lifts her to the nipple.
The baby keeps on crying. By now Elsa can sense how tense Birgitta is, how close she is to breaking point.
But then something happens. Kristina’s little mouth finds the nipple and latches on. The cries stop, replaced by the muffled sound of her starting to suck.
Elsa’s shoulders drop. She lets go and takes a step back.
“Ah,” she hears Ingrid say. Nothing else. When Elsa turns around to look at her, her eyes are twinkling with tears.
Elsa quickly dries her eyes and forehead with the back of her hand. She doesn’t know what she is witnessing. She doesn’t know if Birgitta understands what she is doing, or what is happening.
Perhaps this might be something resembling hope. Elsa isn’t sure. All that she is sure of is the quiet instinct that rises up inside her when she sees Birgitta nurse her daughter.
She can’t leave Aina in Silvertjärn.
NOW
I slowly open the door to the girls’ bedroom.
Tone is sitting in the far corner of the room. She’s chosen not to lie on either of the two beds, or to sit on the padded seat at the desk, but to huddle up below the fallen wardrobe, in the small triangular space formed between the wardrobe, wall, and floor.
She doesn’t look at me when I come in, just rocks back and forth on the spot, her forehead pressed to her knees.
“Tone?” I say quietly, against my better judgment.
She doesn’t reply, but makes a quiet, drawn-out sound that is muffled by her thighs. I take this to mean she can hear me.
My body is tense and my armpits sweaty, but when I look at her like this it’s hard to be afraid of her; she looks more like someone to pity than fear. As I stand here looking at her, it dawns on me that she hadn’t seemed threatening in the alleyway, either. She had run away from us, not toward us—fearful, not aggressive. And even when kicking and trying to break free, she had seemed more like someone fighting for her own life.
“I’ve brought you some water,” I say. I take a few steps into the room and around the bed, but then she hunches up even more.
“Don’t worry,” I say. “It’s OK. I’ll put this down here, see?”
I try to keep my voice calm and neutral.
I put the water jug on the ground a few feet in front of her, then raise my hands to show I’m not dangerous. I take a few steps back and sit on the desk chair. The seat is hard, but it’s more comfortable than the floor.
She
