Stallo

by Stefan Spjut

  ‘Did you want something?’ Torbjörn finally asked.

  There was a whooshing sound, and the next moment the man with the masked face rushed forwards with the axe raised above his head. But Torbjörn was already on his feet. He rammed his shoulder into the man and with his left hand grabbed the arm holding the axe. Susso screamed as they collided.

  Locked together they fell to the ground and rolled over and over, grunting and panting. Snow and sparks flew around them. Boots scraped and thudded.

  ‘Drop the axe!’ yelled Torbjörn. ‘Drop the axe, for fuck’s sake!’

  The overweight man seemed uncertain about leaving the shelter of the trees. He had raised the butt of the rifle to his shoulder and stepped to one side, and was following the fight with his eyes. From time to time he raised his rifle but did nothing more than take aim before lowering it again.

  The scarf had slipped from the face of the man lying on the ground and he bared his teeth in a wet grin. Susso realised it was the same man who had tailed her in the park. He had long grey hair and looked about sixty. It did not take long for Torbjörn to overpower him and end the fight. The axe landed a short way off and Torbjörn was trying to hold the man and press him into the snow to get him to keep still. It soon became too much for the older man. His chest was being crushed and his face was turning a deep blood-red. A couple of veins stood out on his forehead. Torbjörn had landed a few forceful punches across his mouth and blood-stained saliva was oozing from his lower lip. The only part of him that had not given up was his eyes.

  They burned with rage.

  ‘Shoot then!’ he yelled at his companion.

  When Torbjörn heard the rasping command he rolled onto his side, using the older man’s body as cover. Immediately the man came to life. Perhaps he was cunning enough to have been lying there gathering his strength. The fight picked up again but it was not long before Torbjörn regained the upper hand. He pressed one of his elbows hard against the man’s jaw. Powerless, the man turned his cheek to the ground and spat out red flecks, which were absorbed by the snow.

  ‘Shoot,’ he mumbled. ‘Shoo-o-o-t!’

  A faint click was heard from the little trigger on the rifle as the barrel was raised. The younger man’s cheek fell in folds against the oily surface of the rifle butt as his eye peered through the crosshairs of the sight.

  Susso realised she had to do something. The axe was too far away, so she reached for the thermos and sprinted a few steps until she was a couple of metres away from the man with the rifle. Then she threw the thermos with all her strength.

  She missed. But the man was so surprised when the thermos flashed past his eyes that he stumbled backwards, and Susso reached him quickly. She hurled herself at him, grabbed hold of his rifle and tried to pull it away from him. The man was stockily built but had been caught unawares, so when Susso shoved her boot into his stomach and pressed as hard as she could she managed to snatch the gun away from him.

  Hands flailing, the man fell backwards and crashed into a greying spruce, which clawed at his jacket, ripped off his cap and covered him in a sheet of snow. Almost immediately he was up on all fours, studying Susso, who was standing with a firm grip on the rifle a few metres above him. He got up and loped down the slope. After about ten metres he stopped and turned round. He was breathing so hard it looked painful.

  ‘What are you going to do now?’ he shouted, resting his hands on his knees, panting and dribbling saliva. ‘You little slag!’

  He spat out the words, sneering at her.

  Susso raised the rifle but the man did not attempt to move. He stood where he was, his fair hair standing on end above his perspiring forehead, and glared at her with a disdainful expression.

  Was he stupid? She had a good mind to fire off a shot between his legs just to see the fear hit him like a fist in the face. On the other hand, she wasn’t convinced he would be afraid – at least, not so it would show. He’s crazy, she thought. A fucking psycho.

  ‘Susso …’

  Torbjörn was standing behind her, tall and at an angle, as if he had hurt his leg. He was very pale and sucking in short gasps of air between his tense lips.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, pulling her jacket, trying to get her to leave, to get back to the snowmobile.

  ‘But what about him?’ she said, wrenching herself free and pointing the barrel at the man, who had picked up his cap and was brushing it off.

  ‘Forget him. We’re leaving.’

  The older man was lying stretched out beside the fire. Although Susso was unwilling to look at him, her eyes were drawn to the lifeless face. His eyelids were dark grey and blood had dried in the stubble on the slack chin. His leather gloves were fur-lined and enclosed wrists that were skinny.

  ‘What have you done? Is he dead?’

  Without answering Torbjörn put on his helmet, grabbed the handle of the starter cord and with a powerful pull started the engine. As he turned the snowmobile the headlight swept the trees around them. He stood up, letting the engine nose forwards, finding its own way. Exhaust fumes mingled with the smoke from the dying fire.

  It took a while for Susso to realise it was time to jump on, because she was shaken and most of her concentration was fixed on the direction the man in the military-green trousers had taken.

  Reluctantly, she stood the rifle against the snowmobile, picked up her helmet and pressed it onto her head, feeling the lining cold against her cheeks. Then she climbed up behind Torbjörn and rested the weapon on her knees.

  ‘Leave it there!’ he shouted.

  ‘Not fucking likely!’

  Before he accelerated away he leaned forwards slightly, and Susso, who had rested one hand on his shoulder, moved with him. They drove down in the same tracks they had made on their way there, and not until they had reached the trail and Torbjörn had accelerated as hard as he could, the wind blowing bitingly cold against Susso’s throat, could she gather her thoughts and get them in some kind of order.

  The police arrived at Holmajärvi only thirty minutes after Susso had phoned. It must be a county record, I said to them as they stepped out of the patrol car, but either they didn’t hear or were pretending not to. No doubt they are used to dealing with people who are agitated and want them to get there instantly. Every minute seems like an eternity when something terrible has happened.

  Torbjörn was sitting in the cabin knocking back coffee topped up with something stronger by Roland. He was leaning heavily on the solid pine table, pulling at the hairs on his lower arm, convinced he had killed the man he had been fighting with. I suggested he phone his parents, but Susso gave me such a sharp look that I backed away.

  When the police returned a couple of hours later without having found even a trace of blood, and Torbjörn had convinced himself that they had been looking in the right place – on the laminated map the police inspector had unfolded Torbjörn had pointed out exactly to the millimetre where the attack had taken place – I saw the misery in his tense face dissolve in relief. He began firing questions at them instead, encouraged by the alcohol and the adrenalin that was probably still rushing through his body, but of course the police had nothing to say. All they had to go on was the statement he and Susso had given them. They were clearly puzzled and spoke quietly among themselves. The woman, her hair pulled back in a short ponytail, moved away to make a phone call, and then sat in the car and talked over the radio. I heard her mention the moose-hunting rifle.

  ‘A class one weapon,’ she said. ‘A Remington.’

  Susso explained that she had seen one of the men following her the previous evening, and that she thought it was all related to the kidnapping of Mattias Mickelsson, there was no other explanation, but the police were only mildly interested in that theory. They wanted a detailed, factual account of what had taken place, and nothing else. It was insulting and almost off-hand, the way they dismissed Susso when she tried to explain how it was all connected. I did my best to convince them she was telling the truth, but in th
e end I had to go outside and stand in the cold. I was hot from the warmth in the cabin and my suppressed rage, and as I stared at the patrol car, a V70 with a fringe of icicles at the front, only then did it occur to me that of course they knew who Susso was – they knew very well who was phoning when the call came through. That she was a Myrén.

  It was morning, bitterly cold with a high, cloudless sky, and Seved was clearing snow when he heard the door of the camper van creak. The stocky man squeezed through the doorway with a grunt and upturned a plastic bottle. It gurgled quickly as it emptied, leaving a yellowish-brown hole in the snow. The big man flashed Seved a grim look and then disappeared inside the van. When he came out again he was wearing his sunglasses and a peaked hat. His cheeks were red and blotchy. No doubt it had been a cold night.

  ‘You’ve got to get the boy outdoors,’ he said. ‘Make sure he plays out here for a bit.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘He can build a snowman or whatever the hell he likes, just as long as he’s out of doors.’

  He took out his mobile and looked at it as he lifted it up towards the pearl-grey sky. He was annoyed with the reception, that much was clear.

  ‘You haven’t heard from Börje?’

  Seved shook his head.

  He made sure the boy played outside for a few hours during the morning, and for a couple of hours in the afternoon as well. Signe had found a sledge somewhere and she pulled him round and round the yard with seemingly limitless energy, and the boy thought it was fun.

  Even the foxshifter seemed to enjoy it. Seved caught a glimpse of him by chance in the darkness inside the barn door. He was standing there, staring out, and when Signe and the boy came into view he stepped out to watch them. And even though he wasn’t smiling, because he could hardly do that, he gave the impression of feeling something other than the deep sorrow Seved always thought he could see in his expression.

  Börje came home late that evening. He sat in the kitchen, coughing. There was a spreading purple bruise above his top lip and one of his eyes was swollen. Seved asked nothing because there was nothing he wanted to know. It was not until the following morning, when he heard Lennart’s gruff tone, that he realised there had been a screw-up in Kiruna.

  Susso sat in Torbjörn’s kitchen reading the newspaper. Torbjörn was cooking. He was holding a fork that he jabbed into the saucepan from time to time.

  The attack at Holmajärvi was reported in the paper, and as she read the article Susso regretted speaking to the reporter who had phoned. She must have been suffering from shock to a certain extent, but she also felt she had to tell them about it. The police had shown little interest when she told them why she thought that she, in particular, had been attacked, but the newspapers had listened. Except they made it look as if she was convinced it was Mattias’s kidnappers who had tried to attack her, and when she saw it all in black and white, it did not look very logical.

  *

  ‘I want to get away,’ she said. ‘Last night I slept at Mum’s – well, I didn’t sleep exactly. I lay awake most of the night. I keep thinking of those men who turned up at Holmajärvi. I know they won’t come but it feels like they will. I don’t want to stay here. Not until the police have picked them up. So I can find out why. That’s almost the worst thing, not knowing what I’ve done. It’s got something to do with Mattias, I get that. But not why someone would want to kill me.’

  ‘Going away for a while might not be such a bad idea,’ said Torbjörn, nodding.

  ‘Can’t you come with me?’

  ‘Well, it’s a long way,’ he muttered. ‘What do you think, fifteen hundred kilometres, times two?’

  ‘Eleven hundred.’

  He lifted the saucepan from the stove, and as he tipped the macaroni into the colander his face disappeared in a cloud of steam.

  ‘I don’t know if I want to travel that far in your car,’ he said.

  Susso leaned her elbows on the table and picked at her thumbnail.

  ‘Let’s take Mum’s car. She’s said she’ll pay for everything. Food, hotel – the lot. She wants me to leave town as well. She’s afraid too.’

  ‘She seemed angry in Holmajärvi,’ he said.

  ‘That’s what happens when you’re scared.’

  He nodded.

  ‘She wants to leave as soon as possible. Tomorrow, preferably.’

  ‘Is she coming as well?’ asked Torbjörn, looking surprised.

  ‘Well, yes, of course.’

  ‘But she, like, hates me.’

  ‘No, she doesn’t,’ Susso said, folding the paper so that Torbjörn could set the saucepan down on it. ‘Your mum, maybe. But not you.’

  Seved and Signe were building with Duplo bricks at the kitchen table with the boy when Börje walked in through the door. He stood by the sink for a while, watching them. They had built a castle with battlements for the mouseshifter, which was sitting on the table, watching.

  ‘Bengt,’ said Börje, and when the boy did not react he leaned across the table, trying to catch his eye, but no eye looked back.

  ‘Bengt,’ he repeated, louder.

  The boy raised his hand and scratched the side of his nose, and when he had hidden his hand under the table again he said quietly, almost in a whisper:

  ‘I’m not called that.’

  ‘Yes, you are. You are now.’

  ‘I’m called Mattias,’ he insisted.

  ‘Not any more.’

  The boy was silent.

  ‘The quicker you understand your name is Bengt, the better it will be,’ Börje said kindly. ‘It will be easier that way. I promise.’

  When the boy lifted his head, tears had welled up in his eyes and started to stream down his cheeks. He was holding a plastic brick but seemed unsure what to do with it.

  ‘But that’s not my name,’ he said, his voice high-pitched from crying. ‘I’m called Mattias. And I want to go home!’

  Börje took a deep breath and tried to keep calm. But he did not succeed.

  ‘No!’ he roared, slamming his fist onto the table and making the boy jump. The mouseshifter fell to the floor, making an unhappy chattering noise. ‘Your parents don’t want you any more, don’t you understand that? They’re not able to look after you. They can’t afford it! I’m looking after you. I’m your daddy now and you should be pleased about that. You should be grateful about that. Because where else would you have gone? You would have ended up in a foster home, and you wouldn’t want that. They’re nasty places.’

  After he had said this he bent down and picked up the little creature.

  ‘This is your home now. You’ve got to understand that! And your name is Bengt. It says so in the papers, the adoption papers.’

  The boy lowered his head. It was shaking.

  ‘Play with Jim now,’ said Börje, dropping the little object onto the table. ‘Otherwise he’ll think you don’t want him.’

  Torbjörn must have been standing waiting in the entrance hall because he came out as soon as we pulled up outside his apartment building. He seemed a bit shy when he said hello to me. He looked away quickly. We had not met since that awful day in Holmajärvi and I suppose we were unsure of each other. To be honest, I’d always had a problem with him because his mother had turned my life upside down, but that was hardly his fault. Even so, I held it against him. It’s easy to blame anyone who is even remotely involved.

  Susso was curled up in the back under her jacket, with her feet up on the seat, so Torbjörn had to sit in the front. He rested his backpack on his knees as if he was going to be getting out any minute. I told him to put it in the back, and he did so immediately. My voice had sounded unintentionally abrupt and so I hurried to thank him for coming with us.

  He nodded and looked out of the window.

  ‘And thank you for saving Susso’s life.’

  ‘She saved mine,’ he mumbled.

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but we’re the ones who got you involved in all of this. Our family.’

  He didn�
�t answer.

  *

  South of Överkalix we pulled in at the Vippabacken motorway cafe to get something to eat. It was my decision: I hadn’t been there for fifteen years at least. A wooden sculpture of a Laplander stood outside the door, welcoming in the customers, and I remembered him. We had both aged fifteen years since last time. Even the stuffed bear was still there. It was standing in the small shop and staring into the restaurant, its gaping lips as black as liquorice. I said hello to it.

  *

  While we waited for the food I walked around looking at all the stock. The restaurant resembled a disorganised living-history museum but everything was for sale – even the bear in the entrance. I thought I could probably learn a thing or two from the place.

  There was a stuffed jay and a stuffed pine marten. A conductor’s bag with empty coin dispensers, and a spinning wheel. Reindeer antlers at various stages, and moose antlers, shovelshaped and pronged. Small landscape paintings with animals. A salmon spear. A bicycle with an old-fashioned saddle. Bread paddles, second-hand and new. Stickers with pictures of moose and the Swedish flag. Chests − the ones that were not empty were locked. Christmas-tree baubles, single or in bunches. Fishing line. A Finnish harp. A yoke with rusting hooks. A bear trap with a diameter the size of a hula hoop. Father and Mother Christmas dolls, with steel-rimmed spectacles. Old wooden pulleys. Nostalgic postcards and posters. Wooden ladles. Leather gloves and woollen gloves. Trolls with huge noses and tangled hair, with labels showing they came from souvenir wholesaler Allan Flink in Järpen, which is also where some of my stock comes from.

  Sitting in a tiny painted chair right at the back was a doll, an old bronzed Sami man with a miserable expression. His traditional coat fitted badly and he had lost his left hand. All that was left were a few dangling threads.