Beyond All Reasonable Doubt

by Malin Persson Giolito

  All the outer archipelago was open to the south, but the question was whether the more sheltered inlets were iced out yet. Sophia ran her finger along the nautical chart she had unfolded across the seat next to her. Gålgryte, Mjölkö, Vidingsöra. Fejan, Mysingen, Svartlöga, Sunnansund, Vattungarna. Huvudskär.

  I’ll make it work, she thought.

  The director called out to her as she began to loosen the rope at the stern. He was sitting on the pier with his colleagues, not far away. They’d opened one of the bottles she’d brought and were raising their glasses to Sophia.

  “Totally nuts,” she heard him shouting as she started the engine. It didn’t sound like he was laughing any longer. But the men were full of smiles. One of them placed two fingers to his temple in a salute; another waved.

  She raised her arm to wave back. Then she turned the boat seaward. How far she traveled, exactly where she ended up — it really didn’t matter.

  * * *

  —

  Once she had put Gräddöviken behind her, she sailed into the wind, turned on the autopilot, and raised the mainsail. Up on deck she turned her face into the breeze and let the icy air shock her lungs. After unfurling the jib, she turned off the engine. She settled in at the rudder, pulled up the hood of her down jacket, and tied the drawstring tight so only a small opening remained.

  A white-tailed eagle glided on outstretched wings just above the mast. From the foggy coast came the faint odor of metal and freshly sawn timber. Two gray gulls shrieked, coasting over the foaming water; they veered away and were gone.

  She passed south of Lidö, island of the wide-faring, without encountering a single boat. The farther out she got, the harder the wind blew.

  The hull burst through the swells. Each time Titteli met a wave, water was tossed over the deck and a cascade of icy drops hit her face like tiny nails. Despite her thick mittens, Sophia’s hands ached with cold and her fingers were stiff around the rudder. Now and then she had to put her mouth to the gap at her wrist and blow her mitten full of warm air. When that didn’t help, she shoved her hand under her bottom to get her circulation going.

  But Sophia didn’t want to slow down. Three tons of boat roared beneath her body, rollicking, and she let the sails out even more.

  She rounded Fejan at beam reach from the starboard side; she passed south of Botveskär sailing downwind; she headed east into the waterway. At some points, the snow was still visible on the northern slopes.

  The wind rushed across the sea; each time the water grew dark ahead of the boat, Sophia’s body tensed. She planted both feet against the footwell as the boat tilted another few centimeters to the side. Then she sat down. Two or three hours, time disappeared. Sweat broke out over her back.

  * * *

  —

  When dusk caught up to her, she had reached Idskär. The bay was on the leeward side. Sophia furled the jib, brought in the mainsail, and started the engine.

  By the time she’d set the anchor and moored the boat ashore with a rope and spike, her clothing was glued to her skin with sweat. She went belowdecks and turned up the heat. She boiled a pot of water on the stove and tossed in half a box of bow-tie pasta and four lamb sausages.

  The propane heater had been on throughout the journey, yet she was shaking with cold. When the food was ready she drained the water and added two large pats of butter. She pulled the sleeping bag from its cover, crawled into it fully clothed, and began to eat straight from the saucepan. By the time she’d finished eating, the worst of the stiffness in her joints had eased. Her hands had softened up a little and when the berth felt a little warmer she shuffled up and peed in a bucket, which she then set on deck. Then she closed herself in and gazed through the porthole. In the summertime she liked to climb up the rocks to the range marker on top and sit there while the sun went down. She wasn’t about to do so today, but she did watch the last of daylight filter across the island. Sea smoke had settled on the bare cliffs.

  She pulled the curtains and put the pot back on the stove. As the water boiled for tea, she made up the berth with sheets and extra blankets. Then she changed into dry underlayers and warm wool socks and drank the tea so fast that she burned her tongue and the roof of her mouth. As she crammed herself into the berth, a gull cried forlornly. Otherwise, it was silent. Perfectly silent. She fell asleep immediately.

  THREE

  41

  What was wrong with people? On Midsummer’s Eve? Sophia swore. A clicking sound was coming from the fax machine. The alarm was already set, and she was holding the front door to the office. Typical. Of course, she would be the one who had to follow up on this, whatever it was coming out of that machine. She was the only one left at the office; all her colleagues were already stuck in traffic or standing in line at the state liquor store. It was Midsummer, for God’s sake. Even Sophia was supposed to get some time off.

  Since her solo sailing trip in March, Sophia hadn’t had time to take the boat out more than twice. Now she was finally about to have the chance, and in only two hours she was supposed to pick up Grandpa Sture. After a few disastrously rainy and cold June weeks, the weather was decently warm at last. The rental car was illegally parked down on the street. She really didn’t have time for any surprise faxes.

  Sophia sighed. One minute. If only it had come in one minute later. Then she would have been gone already.

  The alarm was beeping faster and faster. And the fax was still making sounds. The alarm would be armed any second now. She had to have locked up and left by then. Who used a fax anymore? She hadn’t received a fax from a client in years. Who would be sending anything to Gustafsson & Weber on the morning of Midsummer’s Eve? Was it a foreign client? Were there any active cases that might necessitate a message from abroad? Did Lars have clients like that? Or was it one of Björn’s deportation cases? Some foreign authority?

  The realization hit her suddenly, and full force. She let go of the door and it closed behind her. Her bags dropped to the floor.

  There was only one thing it could be. As incredible and unexpected as this was, it had to be. They’d even joked about it, she and Hans Segerstad, that they were expecting word on Christmas Eve.

  Because what did the Supreme Court do if they wanted to avoid publicity and lots of questions? They handed down decisions on a day when no one was reading the paper and all the journalists were on vacation. The last time Thomas Quick had been granted a new trial, the court had announced the decision on Maundy Thursday. As little attention as possible. And today was Midsummer’s Eve.

  Sophia’s heart was pounding. The alarm box had started its incessant beeping to announce that it was armed. She turned it off as quickly as she could and headed straight for the reception desk. The fax machine was right next to it.

  The Supreme Court. Of course, the justices would use the fax. They probably still wrote their decisions by hand. Or used Dictaphones with cassettes you could no longer buy at a regular store. Let the secretaries type them out. Corrected their spelling errors with Wite-Out. But why would they hand down the Ahlin decision so soon?

  Sophia felt her palms grow damp. It was stuffy in the cramped area behind the reception desk. She could hear her own breaths coming like quick pants — she sounded like a frightened animal.

  Could they really have decided already? In only three months? And if they had, what did it mean?

  She picked up the phone, searched for Hans Segerstad’s number, and placed the phone in front of her on the table. The sheets of paper were fed out of the fax front side up, last page first. But she didn’t look at them; she couldn’t look yet. No reading until it was all there.

  She might be wrong. It could be something else entirely. Anything but Stig Ahlin’s petition for a new trial. She might be getting all worked up for nothing. An advertisement? A mistake? The Migration Board, a district court, some client or attorney who was out in the countryside where
the Internet didn’t work very well. She glanced quickly at the stack of paper. Nope, she recognized the seal of the Supreme Court. It was unmistakable.

  But why did the Supreme Court want to avoid attention? Which criticism were they afraid of? Did it mean a new trial had been granted, or did it indicate the opposite? What was their reasoning? Sophia squeezed her eyes shut as hard as she could. White dots danced inside her eyelids. The pages kept chugging out. Her head began to swim, and she opened her eyes again, staring at the wall, at the bulletin board that hung there.

  It’s too many pages to be anything else, she thought. Her heart pounded even faster. An icy drop of sweat made its way from her armpit to her waist. It was followed by two more. It can’t be, it has to be — it’s the only possibility, isn’t it?

  The machine clicked one last time, then fell silent. It was done. Sophia picked up the pile of paper, gasped for breath, and began to read.

  Her knees went weak just a few lines in. She steadied herself against the wall and slid to the floor, sitting with the papers in her lap. After five minutes she took her phone from the table and woke it up to call Hans Segerstad. Her hands were shaking too hard to hold the phone, so she placed it on the pile of fax paper and turned on speakerphone.

  When Hans Segerstad answered, she couldn’t produce a single word. It was impossible.

  Hans Segerstad allowed for her silence. For a long time they just sat there, he in Uppsala, she in Gamla Stan, on the floor beside the fax machine, her phone in her lap and her trembling hands next to it, palms up.

  He had to be the first to speak.

  42

  “Congratulations,” Sophia said when she called to share the news.

  “Thanks,” Stig responded.

  Now he and his fellow prisoners were eating lunch.

  Before they sat down in the unit cafeteria, someone had glanced up from the laminate floor, gazed at a point just past Stig, and mumbled, “No fucking way.” Someone else had raised a hand to thump him on the back. As if they were friends, as if they had anything in common. But that hand had changed its mind halfway there. The thump had turned into a skewing blow, a pat glancing off Stig’s shoulder.

  Stig had said thanks to them too.

  The kitchen team had managed to score near-beer for their Midsummer lunch without going over budget. But there was no appreciable improvement to the general mood. One of the guards tried to raise a glass and sang half a verse of a dirty song before he realized it might not be the best choice of mealtime entertainment, if you were celebrating Midsummer in the sex crimes unit of Emla Prison.

  They ate their herring in the ensuing silence. Someone got up to turn on the TV. The lead guard came in and said that Stig would be allowed to call the journalist at TV4. The administration was going to let Stig give the extended, recorded interview the editorial staff at Primetime 60 Minutes had requested.

  “Have you been given a date for trial?” one of the guards wondered.

  They hadn’t. The newly appointed prosecutor had asked for an extension period to get acquainted with the case. But according to Sophia Weber, it shouldn’t be too long. The Supreme Court’s decision to grant a new trial had been formulated in such a way that the trial itself should happen quickly. There were extraordinary reasons to grant the trial, it had said. “Extraordinary reasons” was strong wording.

  When it was time for dessert, Stig suddenly felt nauseated. He excused himself and went to his room, where he lay down on his bed.

  He knew he should be happy. He knew he should celebrate. He knew that if all went as expected, he would soon be free, in two or three months. That was sensational. A judicial miracle. A new chance, a window to a new life.

  Maybe. He couldn’t be certain. Because he’d been to the court of appeals before. That was almost fourteen years ago, but his memory was crystal clear. He recalled the evasive glances of the judges, the lead judge’s rapid blinking, the feeling of paralysis that had come over Stig when it was all over and his attorney explained the final costs.

  Stig Ahlin had been granted a new trial. His case would be heard once more. But nothing was a given, not yet. As part of the petition Sophia Weber had demanded that the Supreme Court free Stig Ahlin immediately. This request hadn’t been granted, only the new trial. It was hard to speculate what that might mean. Sophia Weber said it didn’t mean a thing. But Stig wasn’t sure he believed that. Nothing was certain.

  Never knowing — not when, not how, not where. That terror had settled in his body. This wouldn’t make it go away. It would always be with him, like chronically aching joints.

  * * *

  —

  “I’m sorry.”

  Stig wasn’t listening. He dug through his pockets for his debit card. He had it somewhere; he’d put it there before leaving his room. He found it and handed it to the man who ran the canteen. But the man didn’t accept it; he just shook his head.

  “I’m sorry. It hasn’t arrived yet.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Was there anything else? Were you going to purchase anything? Or was that all?”

  “But…”

  Stig was in line at the canteen. Behind him stood eleven of the sixteen inmates in his corridor. The whole group had only thirty minutes to select and pay for their goods. If they didn’t manage in time, they would have to wait until next week. Stig Ahlin waved his debit card urgently.

  “I don’t understand. I received confirmation that it was delivered. Early last week. It must be here. You’ll have to check again.”

  “That’s too bad. But unfortunately, I can’t…”

  The canteen owner glanced quickly to the left. Stig followed his gaze. There stood one of the guards, who refused to look at him. Instead he turned his whole body away. The owner looked back at Stig. He raised his voice, steadier now.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “But I don’t see a package for you here. And you know you have to show the delivery slip; how else could I check? There must have been a mistake.”

  “A mistake?”

  Stig lowered his hand and the card. The inmates were only allowed to have ten CDs. When he’d gotten the delivery confirmation he got rid of some of the discs he already had. But the slip was back in his room. The prison canteen was only open once a week, Stig visited it each time, and it was always the same man working on their day. He never had a substitute, aside from the five weeks of vacation he got a year. Stig didn’t need to show a slip. He’d never had to before. Why should he now? Why today, all of a sudden, when he’d never had to do so?

  “It must have been delayed.”

  The man didn’t as much as blink. All the hesitation in his voice was gone. He straightened a bundle of newspapers instead.

  “Is there anything else you’d like? Otherwise I’ll have to ask you to —”

  “Are you sure that’s not it?” Stig pointed past the man. There, on a shelf behind the counter, was a package. Of the very size his CD orders usually were.

  “Absolutely sure.”

  The canteen man didn’t look at it. But he whirled around, picked up the flat package, and placed it in a drawer in front of him without looking at the address, without giving it to Stig. He closed the drawer again.

  “It will probably arrive next week. You’ll have to come back then. The mail can be slow during vacation season. And some things just get lost.”

  The canteen man turned his eyes on the next man in line. It was Anders, one of Stig Ahlin’s pedophile neighbors, who was just over forty and had been convicted of sexually abusing boys so young they didn’t yet have pubic hair.

  Pedophile Anders looked like a caricature of himself. Fat, bad teeth, eternally greasy hair. He bought a toothbrush. When the canteen man turned his back, Anders pulled two more toothbrushes from the shelf and stuck them up his sleeve. Stig noticed but didn’t say anything. The canteen man turned to Sti
g while he accepted Anders’s payment.

  “We’ll have to see what happens with your package.” He smiled. As if this was funny.

  “Right,” said Stig.

  The canteen man glanced at the guard again. Was he smiling too?

  “But naturally I can’t be certain. I can’t promise anything. If worse comes to worst I suppose you can file a formal complaint. I’m sure your amazing lawyer can help you out.”

  * * *

  —

  The TV crew from Primetime 60 Minutes was allowed to come into the daytime unit. They’d been promised two hours. When they offered him makeup, Stig declined.

  “This is how I look,” he said. They would have to settle for that.

  Ten minutes were spent readying the gear: a camera, sound-recording equipment, a spotlight, and a reflector screen. But then the interview began. It was important for Stig to get into the swing of things, to start talking. For as long as possible.

  Stig felt remarkably relaxed. This was the building in which some of his fellow inmates devoted themselves to painting or furthering their education. He came here himself, now and then, to pick up one of the books that had been moved after they’d had to close the library. This was where the food team prepared their meals. The atmosphere was homey. But it was something else that caused him to relax.

  Lasse Wilander had said hello to him. He had squeezed his hand and looked him fully in the eye. It was his manner in doing so that Stig recalled faintly, from another time. The photographer had done the same. And the woman they had with them.

  They all greeted him in the same way. With something resembling respect. It wasn’t with hatred, in any case.