Blackwater (21 page)

And eleven suicides in six years, four of them messy.

On county-fair days, he usually did conjuring tricks, coins coming out of people’s ears and crotches. No one had expected that of him.

He never risked ignoring an abdomen. But on this June night, it was a retired teacher up in Tuviken with palpitations. She often had them. Although he had done an ECG on her and knew it was a benevolent arrhythmia, he gave in. That was idiotic – she would demand more and more house calls – but he fell for the temptation of the road, the emptiness of mind, the roar of the engine and the radio on low. Mile after mile, as far as he liked – for he could no longer sleep.

Barbro had not said a word about Midsummer Eve. She had remained silent, busying herself with her clothes and working materials, some packed into cardboard boxes and suitcases. But they had still been in her workroom when he left.

He lied to the teacher in Tuviken and said he happened to be passing on his way to a call nearby. She wanted to know where and her curiosity stabilised her heart better than the quinine. He was given a cup of coffee, unable to refuse since it was real coffee and dark brown, and that banished any last thoughts of sleep. Anyhow, the murky hour would soon be over. Streaks of mist were floating, lit through in the watercourses. He saw elks munching, though sometimes they turned out to be lichen-covered blocks of stone.

He would be home again in less than an hour, and Barbro would be lying in the bed he was to lie in. That was why he was driving through forests and marshlands, driving without noticing the scents or the harsh damp.

Every day, his conscience tormented him over what had happened, though she didn’t believe him. It had been happening for a long time and still nothing had been said about it. But he was certain of inevitable misfortune. Necrosis.

He was driving far too fast along a narrow dirt road that often ran alongside lakes sliced through by the wash behind divers and goldeneyes. The dark waters by the shores were as glossy as metal and there were reflections above the depths in the middle of the lakes, some pinkish like skin with blood running through it, others shimmering blue like the whites of children’s eyes. Under the anaesthetic of speed, he had emotions. But they were not pure.

Back in Byvången, there was an unaccustomed east light over the village, illuminating the wrong houses. All was still. As he drove up the hill past the council offices, he noticed the curtains were drawn across in the police office, grey curtains with a pattern of blue-grey and yellowish-green leaves, and he thought he could see a light behind them. The curtains were quite thick but there were strip lights behind them.

I must, he thought. Now.

He knocked on the window pane and the crack widened between the curtains. Then Vemdal came out and opened the door. He looked grey, patches of pigmentation from his sunburn uneven over his face, his blood retreating inwards. A slightly sour smell came from him.

He said nothing, but went on ahead into his curtained office. Birger had expected piles of papers, files and card indexes, but it was almost empty. A pad of paper lay on the green underlay; Vemdal had drawn spiral patterns with a ballpoint all over the top page and two words written and filled in over and over again: N
asi
G
oreng
. Above the pad was the cage with the rat in it, sitting perfectly still, its eyes fixed on Birger as he sat down in the chair opposite.

‘Thanks for phoning,’ said Åke.

That was just what he hadn’t done. But then he remembered having phoned about Lill-Ola and the oddities in his freezer and boiler room. Vemdal sounded as if Birger had looked in on any ordinary afternoon, not at three o’clock on a Monday morning.

‘We searched that boiler room.’

‘What did he say about it?’

‘Made a hell of a fuss about human rights. Though nothing worse than they usually do north of Östersund. I’d got my papers from the prosecutor. Lill-Ola was up there on Midsummer Night. So we raked out the boiler and swept the floor. He had burnt rubber boots and unplucked birds. Well, his wife did it for him, of course. Bojan.’

‘So they weren’t sleeping-bag feathers?’

‘Could have been both. They’re being analysed. He said he had told her to burn two capercaillie that had been in the freezer too long. That’s a load of shit.’

‘I saw the capercaillie packets in the freezer. The first time I opened it.’

‘He had a pair of Three Towers boots standing in the porch. The footprint we found by the tent was from the toe of a new Three Towers boot. It looks as if he got his old lady to burn several pairs. But not the pair we think he was wearing.’

The rat spun round, its rump sliding on the board that was the floor of the cage.

‘You’ve still got it then?’

‘I can’t just let it go.’

They both looked at the rat and it stared back.

‘The girl’s parents are coming,’ said Vemdal, as if he had found some kind of solution.

He had said her name was Sabine Vestdijk. Suddenly, Birger wished he didn’t have to listen to this.

‘Her father has a watchmaker’s shop in Leiden.’

Daughter of a watchmaker. Three days ago.

‘Do they have to see her?’

‘I don’t know whether they’re bringing anyone else with them. Otherwise they probably do have to.’

Birger thought about the wound in her cheek, that gaping brown gash. They would be able to cover up everything else.

‘Are you sleeping OK?’ he said.

Vemdal shook his head. Should Birger offer him some sleeping pills? He was said to be too quick to prescribe sedatives. The pill doctor.

‘I should have told you something else when I phoned.’

Vemdal didn’t look up.

‘I know,’ he said.

‘You know?’

‘Yes. I suppose you mean about your wife. That she was with Dan Ulander.’

‘Yes, anyhow it wasn’t our boy with her,’ said Birger. ‘Saying Ulander was her son was supposed to be some kind of joke.’

‘She went with him up to Starhill to see how the commune lived. Then she stayed the night there. But he went to Nirsbuan. He wasn’t sure when Annie Raft was coming, so he slept there.’

Of course, decent people like Vemdal didn’t smirk. They tried to smooth things over. That was almost worse. The rat was quite still, looking at Birger. The cage was small so it could turn round in it, but no more, and it had arranged its exercise timetable accordingly. It regularly turned, a swift movement, its long hairless tail curling outside the cage. There was a rustle, then its hindquarters and the smooth little head with fuzzy ears had changed places.

‘What are you going to do with it?’

Vemdal didn’t answer. He was staring at the rat, which was staring at Birger. But Vemdal’s eyes were unseeing. Of course it would be disagreeable to kill it, a healthy animal. Its coat was brown, gleaming over its back and hindquarters, its rump heavy and dragging. It had survived.

‘The cage is too small.’

‘She probably let it run loose,’ said Vemdal. ‘They hug them and fondle them. Have them lying round their necks.’

‘They shouldn’t. Rats carry nasty parasites.’

‘The parents didn’t know about it. Maybe it was a recent acquisition. We’ll ask at a pet shop. Try to to find out what they did once they’d arrived in Sweden.’

He picked up a pencil and poked at the rat. It didn’t move, but lowered its head and glared at him.

‘There are three possibilities. That someone was after them. Someone who caught up with them here. Or that they knew someone up here.’

‘In Blackwater?’

‘At the commune, perhaps. Or that fat Yvonne in Röbäck and her matadors. They deny it. But they’d do that in any circumstances.’

‘But it’s the third possibility you believe in? A drunk. Some madman.’

Vemdal shook his head.

‘We shouldn’t really believe anything. Not at this stage. That woman who found them, Annie Raft, she saw someone. A foreigner. That would indicate someone was after them. But it’s difficult to get up there by car without anyone noticing.’

Birger knew that was true. Every car on the forest tracks was seen by someone. It always was. You couldn’t sneak in, couldn’t escape those who saw and wondered what you were up to – putting out nets in someone else’s waters, poaching, dumping something. But no one had seen a car driven by an Asian youth.

Indonesian? Nasi Goreng, it said on the pad.

Åke Vemdal ought to get some sleep. His mouth was dry, you could tell by the sound of his voice. He was sure to have a headache. The air was stale, though Birger no longer noticed it.

‘He might have gone to Blackwater on a moped. Though how far can you go on a moped? It doesn’t make sense. There were tracks of a moped on the path, almost all the way to the Strömgren homestead. And back. But we haven’t found a moped with tyres that match. Not yet. They’ve got one up at the Brandbergs’. But the boy has run away. He took the moped and went off the evening after the assault. He was afraid of his brothers and father. That was early evening, about seven o’clock, but all the same we’d like to take a look at the moped tyres.’

‘Have you found him?’

‘No, nor the moped.’

Why is he here in his office? Birger wondered. There’s something wrong. It’s not just that he can’t sleep.

‘What sort of girl was this Sabine Vestdijk, do you know?’

‘Enterprising. That man Ivo Maeterns hadn’t particularly wanted to go with her, it seems, but she persuaded him. They lived in the same residential area. They hadn’t been going out together or anything. I mean they weren’t in love. Though perhaps they became involved. Both lots of parents had had postcards from Gothenburg, but nothing after that. The peculiar thing is that his trousers are missing, and all his personal belongings. His parents knew roughly what he had with him – camera, bird books and that kind of thing, wallet, driving licence and student card. But we don’t think any of her things are missing. There were feathers in the tent zip. If the man who did it opened the tent and stole the passport and the rest, then it’s odd that he wasted time closing the zip again. The knifing was done in a panic. Or rage, perhaps. Quickly, anyhow. She got the brunt of it. The doc counted eleven knife wounds on her and eight or so on him. That’s just preliminary. Hard to count properly, for some of them were only scratches. He could see nothing. And they must have moved, thrashed around. So we don’t know. And the man really hadn’t got any trousers, not anywhere.’

He had started swallowing and licking his lips, as if he had only just realised his mouth was dry. Then, without looking at Birger, he said:

‘When we were out at Blackreed River that night.’

‘Yes?’

‘Did you see me all the time?’

‘We were close to each other, weren’t we? But I don’t know whether I actually saw you. We were fishing.’

The rat rustled and Birger felt a wave of nausea. He sat as still as he could, looking down at the grey-green linoleum and swallowing saliva.

‘I must go,’ he said. He reckoned he smelt the rat now, probably his imagination, but he had to go. He had wanted to tell Vemdal to go home. He ought to offer him something to make him sleep. But he could say nothing.

When he entered the house, there had been a change. He could sense it as tangibly as if the furniture had been moved around, although everything looked much as usual. The framed watercolours in the hall gleamed, but he knew she had gone. The house was empty.

Tomas had gone on an inter-rail trip. That had been arranged long ago. They had said goodbye that morning, but Barbro had said nothing about leaving.

He told himself he ought not to give way to forebodings and believe that he knew. So he went upstairs and opened the bedroom door, not bothering to be careful. The room was light and empty.

When he got back from his district surgery that afternoon, the house greeted him with silence and light. At that time they would normally have had tea. He grabbed a beer and spread liver pâté on some bread. He was going to tackle the decorating. It was quite light until eleven at night now. He thought she’d probably phone, but he wasn’t exactly counting on it. When he finally heard the telephone, it took him some time to climb down off the trestle and go into the hall. But she didn’t give up. The phone went on ringing until he picked up the receiver. She was ringing from a public phone, but she didn’t say where.

‘I’ll be away for a while,’ she said. ‘I must think this over. You can understand that.’

Think
this
over, but she didn’t say what. He was angry, though he had no right to be. That morning he had been woken by the alarm clock after a couple of hours’ sleep. Then he had been furious and felt at the same time a deep, pure longing for her. But once he was properly awake and had got up, he no longer had any pure feelings. He felt shame more than anything else.

Their conversation had been brief. But she promised to keep in touch. She sounded friendly. No doubt she too had a sore conscience. On the Sunday evening, he had asked her why she wasn’t saying anything.

‘What about?’

‘You’re packing but you won’t talk to me.’

‘What is there to say?’

She had looked hostile. He hadn’t dared go on, but he thought she was right; he knew what she meant. You never say anything yourself.

When the telephone call was over, he took another beer out of the fridge and went and sat down on the tall trestle. With his back to his handiwork, he gazed straight out into the pale-green wreaths of birch leaves. I could go to Östersund now, he thought. Without having to lie. Park outside the Sulky. Straight there, no involved detours. Stay the night and drive to work at about five. It could be done.

You never say anything. No. What should he have said?

We’ve always lived like this. You’ve said what had to be said, Barbro. You’ve been articulate. Not in a facile way, either. You’ve really thought things through. Emotionally. Politically. Or near enough.

Meanwhile this had happened. But what the hell should I have said? What would I have called it?

Like this, Barbro. I’m in Östersund. It’s January and stinking cold. Council meeting on the distribution of resources. But I’m sitting there thinking I’ll never get the car started without an engine heater. And sure enough, I can’t. By then it’s late. We’ve been to Chez Adam and had dinner. So I phone home to tell you I’m staying. I phone from a hotel called the Sulky. Can’t be bothered with a tow that late at night, and the car’s horribly iced up.