The Savage Altar (15 page)

“What do you mean by ‘sensitive’?” she asked, and noticed Kristina squirm slightly.

“This isn’t easy to talk about,” said Olof. “But there are times when she finds it difficult to cope as an adult. Difficult to maintain the boundaries for the girls. And sometimes she’s found it difficult to look after them and herself, hasn’t she, Kristina?”

“Yes,” replied his wife obediently.

“She has actually spent a whole week lying in a darkened room,” Olof Strandgård went on. “We took care of the girls then, and Viktor sat and fed Sanna with a spoon, like a child.”

He paused and gazed steadily at Anna-Maria.

“She wouldn’t have been able to keep the girls without the support of the family,” he said.

Okay, thought Anna-Maria. You really do want to convince us of how frail and weak she is. Why? A neat and tidy family like you should be trying to keep a low profile about something like this, surely.

“Don’t the girls have a father?” she asked.

Olof Strandgård sighed.

“Of course,” he said. “She was only seventeen when she had Sara. And I…”

He shook his head at the memory.

“… I insisted they get married. They had to go before the highest authority, as they say. But the promise they made before God didn’t stop the young man from abandoning his wife and child when Sara was only one. Lova’s father was a passing weakness.”

“Can you give me their names? We’d like to get in touch with them,” said Sven-Erik.

“Certainly. Ronny Björnström, Sara’s father, lives in Narvik. At least, we think so. He doesn’t have any contact with his daughter. Sammy Andersson, Lova’s father, died two years ago in a tragic snowmobile accident. He was driving over a lake in early spring and the ice didn’t hold. Terrible thing.”

No, that’s it, if I’m going to avoid doing it in the armchair, thought Anna-Maria, heaving herself up.

“I’m sorry, but could I…?” she began.

“In the hall on the right,” said Olof Strandgård, getting up as she left the room.

The bathroom was as pristine as the rest of the house. It smelled of something synthetic and flowery. Presumably from one of the aerosols on top of the cupboard. In the toilet bowl hung a little container with something blue in it that ran down along with the water when you flushed.

Clean, clean, clean, thought Anna-Maria as she walked back through the hall to the living room.

“We’re very worried about the fact that Rebecka Martinsson has our girls,” said Olof Strandgård once she was settled in the armchair again. “They must be shocked and terrified by what’s happened. They need a calm, secure environment.”

“That isn’t something the police can get involved in,” said Anna-Maria. “Your daughter is responsible for the care of her children, and if she has handed them over to Rebecka Martinsson, then—”

“But I’m telling you, Sanna isn’t reliable. If it hadn’t been for my wife and me, she wouldn’t have custody of them today.”

“It still isn’t a police matter,” said Anna-Maria in neutral tones. “It’s Social Services and the courts who decide to remove custody from unsuitable parents.”

The softness in Olof Strandgård’s voice disappeared instantly.

“So we can’t expect any help from the police, then,” he snapped. “I shall of course be contacting Social Services if necessary.”

“But don’t you understand,” Kristina Strandgård suddenly burst out. “Rebecka tried to split up the family before. She’ll do everything she can to turn the girls against us. Just like she did with Sanna that time.”

The last comment was addressed to her husband. Olof sat with his jaws clamped shut, staring out of the window. His whole body was rigid, his hands clenched on his knees.

“What do you mean by ‘with Sanna that time’?” asked Sven-Erik gently.

“When Sara was three or four, Sanna and Rebecka Martinsson shared a flat,” Kristina Strandgård went on, her voice strained. “She tried to break up the family. And she is an enemy of the church and of God’s work in this town. Do you understand how it makes us feel, knowing our girls are in her power?”

“I understand,” said Sven-Erik sympathetically. “How exactly did she try to break up the family and work against the church?” “By—”

A look from her husband made her swallow the rest of the sentence.

“By what?” probed Sven-Erik, but Kristina Strandgård’s face had turned to stone, and her eyes were fixed on the shiny surface of the glass table.

“It’s not my fault,” she said in a broken voice.

She repeated it over and over again, her gaze on the table, not daring to look up at Olof Strandgård.

“It’s not my fault, it’s not my fault.”

Is she defending herself to her husband, or is she accusing him? thought Anna-Maria.

Olof Strandgård became his gentle, considerate self once again. He placed his hand lightly on his wife’s arm to silence her, then stood up.

“I think this has been a bit too much for us,” he said to Anna-Maria and Sven-Erik, and the conversation was at an end.

W
hen Sven-Erik Stålnacke and Anna-Maria Mella emerged from the house, the doors of two cars parked in the street flew open. Out jumped two reporters equipped with microphones wrapped in thick woolen socks. A cameraman was right behind one of them.

“Anders Grape, Radio Sweden’s local news team,” said the first one to reach them. “You’ve arrested the Paradise Boy’s sister—any comment on that?”

“Lena Westerberg, TV3,” said the one who had the cameraman in tow. “You were first on the scene of the murder—can you describe what it looked like?”

Sven-Erik and Anna-Maria didn’t reply but jumped into the car and drove off.

“They must have asked the neighbors to tip them off if we turned up,” said Anna-Maria; in the rearview mirror she could see the journalists walking up to the parents’ house and ringing the doorbell.

“Poor woman,” said Sven-Erik as they pulled out onto Bävervägen. “He’s a cold bastard, that Olof Strandgård.”

“Did you notice he never mentioned Viktor by name? It was ‘the lad’ and ‘the boy’ the whole time,” said Anna-Maria.

“We need to talk to her sometime when he’s not home,” said Sven-Erik thoughtfully.

“You should do that,” said Anna-Maria. “You’ve got a way with women.”

“How come so many pretty women end up like that?” asked Sven-Erik. “Fall for the wrong kind of guy and sit at home like miserable prisoners once the kids have moved out.”

“I’m sure there aren’t more pretty ones who end up like that than any other sort,” said Anna-Maria dryly. “But the pretty ones get all the attention.”

"What are you going to do now?" asked Sven-Erik.

"Have a look at the album, and at the videos from the church," replied Anna-Maria.

She looked out through the car window. The sky was gray and leaden. When the sun couldn’t fight its way through the clouds, it was as if all the colors disappeared, and the town looked like a black-and-white photograph.

“B
ut this just isn’t acceptable,” said Rebecka, looking in through the cell door as the guard unlocked it and let Sanna Strandgård out into the corridor.

The cell was narrow, and the stone walls were painted an indeterminate shade of beige with splashes of black and white. There was no furniture in the tiny room, just a plastic mattress placed directly on the floor and covered in paper. The reinforced window looked out over a path and apartment blocks with a façade of green corrugated tin. It had a stale, sour smell of dirt and drunkenness.

The guard accompanied Sanna and Rebecka to the interview room. Three chairs and a table stood by a window. As the women sat down, the guard went through the bags of clothes and other bits and pieces Rebecka had brought with her.

“I’m so glad they’re letting me stay here,” said Sanna. “I hope they don’t take me to the proper jail in Luleå. For the girls’ sake. I’ve got to be able to see them. They’ve got furnished holding cells, but they were all occupied, so I had to go in the drunks’ cell for the time being. But it’s really practical. If anybody’s been sick or something, they just hose it down. It’d be good if you could do that at home. Out with the hose, sluice it all down, and the Friday housework would be done in a minute. Anna-Maria Mella, you know, the little pregnant one, said there should be a normal cell today. It’s nice and light. From the window in the corridor you can see the mine and Kebnekaise, did you notice?”

“Oh, yes,” said Rebecka. “Just get a makeover expert round here and a family with three children can move in shortly and sit there beaming.”

The guard handed the bags to Rebecka with a nod, and left the room. Rebecka passed them to Sanna, who rummaged through them like a child on Christmas Eve.

“What gorgeous clothes,” smiled Sanna, her cheeks flushed with pleasure. “Look at this jumper! Pity there isn’t a mirror in here.”

She held up a red scoop-neck jumper with a shiny metallic thread running through it, and turned to Rebecka.

“Sara chose that one,” said Rebecka.

Sanna dipped into the bags again.

“And underwear and soap and shampoo and everything,” she said. “You must let me give you some money.”

“No, no, it’s a present,” insisted Rebecka. “It didn’t cost that much. We went to Lindex.”

“And you’ve got books out of the library. And bought sweets.”

“I bought a Bible too,” said Rebecka, pointing to a small bag. “It’s the new translation. I know you prefer the 1917 version, but you must know that one by heart. I thought it might be interesting to compare.”

Sanna picked up the red book, turning and twisting it several times before opening it at random and flicking through the thin pages.

“Thank you,” she said. “When the Bible Commission’s translation of the New Testament came out, I thought all the beauty of the language had been lost, but it’ll be interesting to read this one. Although it feels odd, reading a completely new Bible. You get used to your own, all the underlining and the notes. It might be really good to read new ways of putting things, and to have pages without any notes. No preconceptions.”

My old Bible, thought Rebecka. It must be in one of the boxes up in the loft in Grandmother’s barn. I can’t have thrown it away, surely? It’s like an old diary. All the cards and newspaper cuttings you put in it. And all the embarrassing places underlined in red, they give a lot away. “As the hart longs for flowing streams, so longs my soul for Thee, O God.” “In the day of my trouble I seek the Lord, in the night my hand is outstretched and grows not weary, my soul refuses to be comforted.”

“Did it go all right with the girls today?” asked Sanna.

“In the end,” replied Rebecka tersely. “I got them to school and nursery anyway.”

Sanna bit her lower lip and opened the Bible.

“What is it?” asked Rebecka.

“I’m just thinking about my parents. They might go and pick them up.”

“What is this thing with you and your parents?”

“Nothing new. It’s just that I got tired of being their property. You must remember how things were when Sara was little.”

I remember, thought Rebecka.

R
ebecka runs up the stairs to the flat she shares with Sanna. She’s late. They should have been at a children’s party ten minutes ago. And it takes at
least twenty minutes to get there. More, probably, now that it’s snowed. Maybe Sanna and Sara have gone without her.

Please, please, she thinks, and notices that Sara’s winter shoes aren’t in the entrance hall. If they’ve gone, I don’t have to have a guilty conscience.

But Sanna’s boots are there. Rebecka opens the door and takes a deep breath, so she can get through all the explanations and excuses whirling around in her head.

Sanna is sitting on the floor in the hallway, in the dark. Rebecka almost falls over her, sitting there with her knees drawn up to her chin and her arms around her legs. And she is rocking back and forth. As if to console herself. Or as if the very rhythm could keep terrible thoughts at bay. It takes a while for Rebecka to reach her. To get her to talk. And the tears come at the same time.

“It was Mummy and Daddy,” sobs Sanna. “They just came and took Sara. I said we were going to party and we were going to have lots of fun this weekend, but they wouldn’t listen. They just took her with them.”

Suddenly she gets angry and hammers on the wall with her fists.

“What I want doesn’t matter,” she screams. “They don’t take any notice of what I say. They own me. And they own my child. Just like they used to own my dogs. There was Laika—Daddy just took her away from me. They’re so frightened of being alone with each other, they just—”

She breaks off and the rage and the tears turn into a long, drawn-out wail from her throat. Her hands fall helplessly to the floor.

“They just took her,” she whimpers. “We were going to make a gingerbread house, you and me and Sara.”

“Ssh,” says Rebecka, stroking the hair from Sanna’s face. “It’ll be all right. I promise.”

She dries the tears from Sanna’s cheeks with the back of her hands.

“What kind of mother am I?” whispers Sanna. “I can’t even defend my own child.”

“You’re a good mother,” Rebecka reassures her. “Listen to me, it’s your parents who’ve done something wrong. Not you.”

“I don’t want to live like this. He just comes in with his spare key and takes what he wants. What could I do? I didn’t want to start screaming and pulling at Sara. She’d have been terrified. My little girl.”

A picture of Olof Strandgård forms in Rebecka’s head. His deep, reassuring voice. Not used to being contradicted. His permanent smile above the starched shirt collar. His cardboard cutout wife.

I’ll kill him, she thinks. I’ll kill him with my bare hands.

“Come along,” she says to Sanna, in a voice that brooks no disagreement.

And Sanna gets ready and goes with her like an obedient child. She drives the car to where Rebecka wants to go.

K
ristina Strandgård opens the door.