The Bomber

LIES

I had my assurance from the start. The world was a stage, set to deceive me, and the people around me were all part of the drama. The object was to make me believe it was all for real: the land, the forest, the fields, the farmer's tractor, the village, the village shop, and the mailman. The world beyond the distant Furu Hill was a blurred set piece. I was constantly listening for false tones of voices, patiently waiting for people to give themselves away. When I left a room, I would quickly turn around just as I reached the door to get a glimpse of the people inside as they really were. It never worked. In the winter, I would climb the snow heap outside the drawing room window and peer inside. When I wasn't present, people took off their masks, leaning their tired heads in their hands and resting. They talked in low tones, sincerely at last- artlessly, intimately, earnestly, and truly. When I was on my way in, they all had to step into their uncomfortable bodies again, these frames that didn't fit them, with their embittered faces and false tongues.

I was absolutely certain that it would all be revealed to me on the day I turned ten. Then all the people would come to me in the morning with their real bodies, dressing me in white. Their faces would be peaceful and true. I would be carried in a procession to the barn in the thicket on the other side of the road. And there the Director would be waiting by the entrance. He would take me by the hand and lead me into the Kingdom of Enlightenment.

He would explain everything to me.

Sometimes I would find my way to the old barn. I can't say exactly how old I was, but I had short legs, the woolly drawers itched, and my thick oilskin trousers made it difficult to walk. Once, I got stuck in the snow, up to my waist.

The barn was deep in the thicket, in what remained of a meadow. The roof had fallen in, the gray timbered walls were a shimmering silver glimpsed between the brush. One part of the gable end was sticking up like a signal to heaven.

The square entrance was on the farther short side; on my way around the building, I would stroke the rough walls. The hole was positioned a bit from the ground; it was difficult to get up.

Inside, time stood still: dust in the air, slanting rays of light. The double feeling of sheltering walls and open sky was intoxicating. The floor also had begun collapsing. I had to be careful as I moved around.

Down there, under the floor, lay the stage entrance. I knew that. Somewhere below the rotten planks, Truth lay waiting. Once I screwed up courage and crawled down to examine the ground and find the way to the light. But all I found was hay and dead rats.

WEDNESDAY 22 DECEMBER

It was Annika's turn to do the nursery run, so she could stay in bed for a while after Thomas had left. Only two days remained until Christmas Eve. She was in the home stretch. It was amazing how little was required for her to win back her courage to face life. After an hour in town, some gingerbread baking, and a good fuck, she was ready to face the vultures afresh. For once, she'd had a whole night without any kids in the bed, but now they were awake and came rushing into the bedroom. She scooped them up and romped about in bed with them for so long they were late leaving for daycare. Ellen had invented the 'Meatball Game,' which consisted of tickling each other's toes while screaming 'meatballs, meatballs!' Kalle liked playing airplane, with Annika lying on her back and balancing him on her feet high above. The plane would crash at regular intervals amid shouts of joy. Finally, they built a house with all the pillows, the duvet, and Thomas's big pajamas. Then they quickly ate their strawberry yogurt with honey puffs and made sandwiches for lunch. They just made it in time for morning assembly. Annika didn't hang around.

It was still snowing. The dirty sludge lay in drifts along the side of the road. Ever since the City Council had been divided into smaller district councils, all ploughing had ceased. She wished she had the energy to be politically active.

She was lucky with the bus. She picked up the paper by the entrance and took the elevator upstairs. Annika greeted the postboys outside the newsroom entrance. When she saw one of them dragging in the second lot of the day's mail, she felt gratitude toward Schyman. Things had been easier since Eva- Britt Qvist had resumed her mail-opening job.

She picked up a copy of the rival tabloid by the newsdesk and grabbed a coffee on the way to her office. Eva- Britt was in her usual place and said a surly 'hello.' Everything was normal, in other words.

Berit had done a fantastic job on the wife of Stefan Bjurling. The story was the center spread with one single picture of the woman and her three children sitting on the family leather couch in the suburban terraced house. 'Life Must Go On,' was the headline. The woman, who was thirty-seven and called Eva, looked collected and serious. The children, who were eleven, eight, and six years old, were looking wide-eyed straight into the camera.

'Evil appears in many shapes here on earth,' Eva said in the piece. 'It would be foolish to think we're exempt from it here in Sweden just because we haven't had a war since 1809. Violence crops up where you least expect it.'

She had been making pancakes when the police had rung the doorbell to bring her the news of her husband's death.

'You simply can't break down when you have three kids,' Eva was quoted. 'Now we have to make the best of it and get on with our lives.'

Annika studied the picture for a long while. A feeling of something being wrong nagged her. Wasn't this woman a bit too calm and collected? Why didn't she express any feelings of grief and despair? Oh, well, the text was good and the picture worked. It was a good piece. She pushed away her feeling of unease.

As usual, Patrik had done a solid job with the technical analysis and the police hunt. The hypothesis that the same person lay behind the two bombings was still valid, even though the explosives hadn't been exactly the same. 'The blasting action was considerably smaller this time,' the police press officer said. 'Preliminary lab reports seem to suggest the explosive agent was either of a different kind or that a different configuration was used.'

At the next meeting of the senior editors she would recommend they gave Patrik a permanent contract.

Her own piece with Johan Henriksson's photo of the builders in Satra Hall had been given a whole page. It was okay.

She leafed on, leaving the Bomber behind and reaching the WAK section, short for Women and Knowledge. Within the office, these pages were of course never referred to as anything other than the 'wank' pages. Today, the wank pages had employed the reliable trick of writing about some new American pseudo-psychological book, spicing it up with examples of some well-known Swedish women. The title of the book was The Ideal Woman, written by a woman with a hyphenated name and very thin nose, the kind you only get by surgically removing half of it. Apart from a small photo of the author, the story was accompanied by a five-column photo of Christina Furhage. The readers were told of a book that AT LAST gave all women a chance to become a truly IDEAL WOMAN. Next to this was a small piece outlining the main facts about Christina Furhage. Annika realized that the myth of the murdered Olympic supremo was germinating. Christina Furhage, it said, was a woman who had succeeded at everything. She had a fantastic career, a beautiful home, a happy marriage, and a gifted daughter. Furthermore, she had taken good care of herself; she was slim and fit and looked fifteen years younger than her age. Annika got a stale taste in her mouth, and it wasn't only from the cooling coffee. This was not quite right. Christina's first marriage had gone to pot, her first child had died or disappeared some way or another, her second child was a pyromaniac, and she herself was blasted to smithereens in a deserted sports stadium by someone who hated her. That was the reality. And this person also hated Stefan Bjurling, she could swear to it.

She was about to go for a second mug of coffee when the phone rang.

'Come here,' a man said. 'I'll tell you everything.' He was crying. It was Evert Danielsson.

Annika bagged a pen and a pad and called a taxi.