‘He screamed at me,’ the CEO said. ‘Isn’t it incredible? Screamed.’
They all left. On the street he and the woman in silk found themselves walking in the same direction towards their cars. She picked up their small talk where they’d left it. Dan was relieved that she chatted effortlessly on. At one point, though, she stopped and regarded him under a street light and said grey at the temples gave a man’s face character. Her own hair was red and frizzled, a gauze in the damp air about her head. She walked closely in now, measuring her step to his with clowning acrobatics. As they crossed the street she took his arm. Through the silk blouse he felt her breast slap against him each time she skipped to keep in step. When they reached her car she turned. He kissed her on the forehead. By now it was obvious to both of them that these were ritual movements. They embraced. Then she said to follow her car. But she was going to have to kick him out after an hour or so. That was the phrase she used. Kick him out. She said that Henrik’s plane wasn’t due until nine but he was the type who could turn up hours in advance.
Dan thought briefly of the long drive home, the night ferries, the cold empty house. He said, ‘All right.’
In the lift, going up, they kissed. At the apartment door she told him he’d have to be quiet or he’d wake the children. He asked how old they were. She said old enough to talk.
In bed his mind closed down, his body took over. She gave a cry as she came. He thought of the children she had warned him about and sure enough, a few moments later, there was a noise from the door handle followed by a child’s voice. ‘Mummy, I can’t open the door.’
‘Fucking shit!’ the woman muttered. Out loud she said sharply, ‘Go back to bed!’
‘I heard a noise,’ the child wailed. A girl of seven or eight.
‘Go back to bed now!’
‘I’m frightened.’
‘The fuck you are,’ the woman muttered. To Dan she whispered, ‘I better go and see. She’s capable of waking her sister.’ And then, out loud, she called, ‘Go back to bed and I’ll come and tuck you in. Go now or else I shan’t come!’ She put a hand on Dan’s scrotum. ‘Hang on, I’ll be straight back.’
When she came back he had dressed.
‘They’re both awake now,’ she whispered. ‘While I’m in there with them you can let yourself out. Close the flat door quietly.’
He nodded.
Down on the street he felt badly about everything – the woman whose name he realized he couldn’t remember, the children, Henrik too. What the hell had he been thinking of, going back there with her?
Drizzling rain filled the street as far as he could see. No sign of life anywhere. Dismal. Black. Five o’clock on a wet Sunday morning.
Driving home he thought of men he had known who had grown old with dignity. Connie’s father among them. His own father too. Clearly he himself was not of their number.
By the time he reached the empty predawn ferry he was telling himself that there was nothing wrong with bodily instinct, even if undignified – shallow, witless, asinine. He sensed a boundary somewhere there that wasn’t easy to see in the dark.
It was nearly seven when he got home. He took a shower, splashed cold water on his face and drank coffee before he settled down to work. At eight o’clock Gabriel Rabban opened the kitchen door, which was never locked, nodded to him as he passed on his way to the little hall and climbed the stairs.
Later that morning Sune Isaksson came.
‘Must have been fun last night!’ was the first thing he said. ‘I hear you drove off the ferry at six thirty. Whoever she is, bring her to my birthday party.’
There was the sound of a slap from upstairs. Fresh plaster being trowelled on a wall.
‘Still working well?’
‘Sure.’
‘You’re getting on with him?’
Dan didn’t answer at once. He was uncertain what to make of Gabriel Rabban. For one thing, the confident manner Gabriel adopted didn’t seem to come naturally. Beneath it he was wary, as though on the lookout for the slightest sign of condescension, let alone disrespect. Dan read this as a street stratagem, a way of showing that he took shit from no one. He had almost certainly seen brutality in Iraq and maybe elsewhere too, brutality of a kind Dan was not likely ever to know. Here, on this quiet island, there was probably no other way for someone like Gabriel to express his defiance except as attitude, using the drab emblems of immigrant assimilation, the low-slung jeans, the huge filthy sneakers.
‘Not as well as I’d like to. I have the feeling he doesn’t quite trust me. I mean we’re both outsiders. We should have more in common.’
‘Don’t fool yourself. His mother’s Swedish, yours isn’t. You have an accent. He doesn’t.’
‘Why is he so defensive then?’
‘Because you may have a foreign accent but you look like a Swede. Tall, fit, fair-haired. You disappear in the flock. He stands out, even if his voice is the right voice. On the telephone he’s Swedish in a way you’re not, but one glance at him, at the tan skin, the pitch-black hair and he’s an outsider and always will be, whereas you belong. He won’t take any favours from you, Dan. He’ll regard them as condescension. He’s a Swede in every way except being seen as one. To him you only look the part.’
‘How’s the family regarded here?’
‘All in all respected. They were once farmers themselves. And they’ve lost everything – not only their farm but their daughter, their son-in-law, three of their four grandchildren. All of them had their throats slit. To most people their getting the land over at Bromskär is seen as justice of a kind. Otherwise it’ll go to the state and who will that help? But the will is being contested.’
‘Who by?’
‘You might say by rumours. Rumours that they’re not what they seem to be.’
‘And where are the rumours coming from?’
‘Who knows?’
‘You do, Sune. If anyone does you do.’
‘What do you want me to say? I told you before, you’re not going to get me to add rumours about rumours!’ Sune’s warm laughter filled the room.
‘What is it these rumours are questioning? Whether they’re really refugees?’
‘Oh they’re refugees all right. Christian refugees from northern Iraq. There are thousands and thousands of them in Sweden but in general they’re concentrated in a few places, Malmö, Södertälje and so on. Industrial towns with jobs. The rumour that’s going around is no one knows the Selavas.’
‘You said they saw an ad in the paper?’
‘Through the labour exchange. A widow was looking for a Christian refugee couple with farming experience. The job description suited them and they arrived with their grandchild Jamala. They soon realized they needed help to run the farm so they went to France to visit Josef’s relatives and bring someone back with them. The someone was Gabriel. He’s young, he’s strong, he’ll have a future here.’
‘Is all that true?’
‘Oh yes. A lot of Christians are fleeing from northern Iraq. The only survivor from their daughter’s family is Jamala. She was two at the time. They hid her as soon as the gunfire started. Have you seen Jamala?’
‘Gabriel’s the only one I’ve seen.’
‘Jamala’s a sweet kid. She’s twelve now but she’s still traumatized. She should be in a special school but they don’t want to send her yet. They’re educating her at home.’
‘Is that allowed?’
‘Presumably someone is turning a blind eye for the moment.’
Turning a blind eye sounded so unlike the normal bureaucracy that Dan was about to ask Sune more when the sound of trowelling stopped upstairs and Sune said it was time for him to go.
‘I’ll run you home,’ Dan said.
‘Thanks but Nahrin is at the shop, she’s going to pick up Gabriel and myself there. I’m invited for dinner. Believe me, it’s not something to miss.’
He stopped in the kitchen doorway.
‘How about my birthday party? Ho
w many are you bringing?’
‘I told you. I don’t know anyone.’
‘Whoever she was last night she’s bound to have a friend. Get them both to come.’
‘You’re not listening. I don’t know anyone.’
‘You know Lena Sundman.’
‘I don’t know her. And I don’t intend to.’
‘Someone else then. Good-looking guy like you, you won’t even have to try. Just bring a couple of willing ladies to my party and I’ll die a happy man.’
Two days later Sune was back. This time he asked straight off about Lena Sundman.
‘What are you two up to?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You went walking together. Over near Herräng. With another fellow and a woman with a dog.’
‘Jesus Christ!’
‘What do you expect? Her father was born here, she belongs to the island. People know that she’s back.’
‘Nothing to do with me,’ Dan said stubbornly.
Sune sat astride the chair, his arms, thick and hairy, resting on its back. His shirt was open at the top. New-grown chest hair foamed up against his throat.
‘Dan, there’s no reason you shouldn’t see all you want of her. Just be careful, that’s all.’
‘Careful? I don’t even know her. And I’m not likely to meet her again.’
‘You will. She’s going to be on this island a lot in the months to come. There’s a battle going on between her and the Selavas.’
‘I’ll give it a miss.’
‘Too late for that. You drove her over in the dark to check they were there. Stopped in front of their house to look.’
‘Look? It was practically night.’
‘To see if the lights were on. And she sent you flowers by taxi the next day. With the directions to the driver so incomplete he had to stop and ask where you live. You think that was an accident? You think the whole island doesn’t know about it? She’s young but she’s no fool.’
Dan poured him his whisky. After a slow swallow he went on.
‘Don’t get me wrong, I’m very fond of Lena, always have been. She still drops in to see me now and then. But she’s somehow got off on the wrong foot with the Selavas family and I don’t think she likes me telling her that. It’s not just a legal question, it’s a moral one. The Selavas are getting old, they’re refugees with absolutely nothing except a deaf-and-dumb child they want to give a start to in life, the kind of start Lena never got. That’s what I tell Lena, that she’s on her way out of all that now, she’s on her way up. She’s attractive, she’s intelligent, she’s energetic and she’s come through what sounds like a nervous breakdown to me although she calls it a ‘down period’ in her life. Anyway she’s been given a clean bill of health to tackle her future now and that’s exactly what she’s doing. She’s on her way to creating a new life for herself in Stockholm. She already has successful people who want to help her. She doesn’t need a run-down farm to survive, not the way the Selavas do.’
He talked on in a richly blended mix of local cadences and standard Swedish. It was easy to feel comfortable, even sheltered listening to his deep melodic voice. Outside, the darkening afternoon was silent.
‘Why didn’t her father stay on and take over the farm?’
‘Farming didn’t interest him. Women did. In order to get out he went to teachers’ training college about the same time as I got into KTH.’
‘Is he still alive?’
‘No. He died of a heart attack quite a while back. Somewhere over on the West Coast.’
Sune sipped his whisky again then stretched his arms and placed his hands far in on the table, leaning back as he did it. At such moments Dan sensed the dull pain that rose inside him. His fingers were widespread, his nails strong and straight as chisels. When he’d relaxed again he looked up.
‘Lena’s not a kid any longer, she’s a woman. Men can’t prey on her the way they used to. If they try, they get what they deserve. You’re not one of them. That’s all I wanted to say, Dan.’
‘This business of the farm, does she have anything to back up her claim?’
Sune sipped again, slowly, an excuse to reflect.
‘She tells people she has letters from Solveig Backlund. Whereas the Selavas have a will signed in the presence of witnesses. But Lena is all set to fight. If she shows an interest in you, just make sure you keep it sexual, that’s all I wanted to say.’
He stretched again, easing into another thought. ‘People here hold you in some esteem, Dan, they admire you for sticking it out. If you have an affair with a younger woman now, believe me they’ll understand, they’ll see it as a sign you’re getting back into life again. Maybe Lena could be that woman. I’m not saying she couldn’t. But maybe her tough childhood has also taught her to manipulate people without necessarily realizing she’s doing it.’
‘You could say that of any of us, tough childhoods or not. To be honest, what little I’ve seen of Lena Sundman I find tiresome. And I don’t think I’ll be seeing any more.’
‘Aren’t inheritances a curse though? They bring out the worst in everyone.’
Dan shrugged, indicating that the subject didn’t concern him. The yard outside was rapidly blackening out of dusk into night.
‘The Selavas have been working their backs off over there for two years, keeping the place afloat. Gabriel’s a huge help but he’s eighteen now, he can do what he wants. Their great fear, of course, is that he’ll go back to France. Truth be told it seems he got into a little trouble down there when he was younger.’
‘So you’ve landed me with a juvenile delinquent? Thanks a lot!’
‘It was nothing serious. From what I’ve understood he wanted to get in with a crowd of older boys. Since he was under age at the time there wasn’t much would happen to him if he was caught borrowing a car so he was the fall guy when they went joyriding. He was finally put in a youth home for a while. After he got out his family decided it was best he come here where he was needed.’
As the thaw continued vestiges of so many hidden things came to light: last year’s leaves with their smell of rot and change, mysterious, sweet; giant granite boulders that emerged and looked as if they’d been placed there for a purpose. Dan returned from his walks physically tired but now, for the first time since coming out here, he felt buoyed by the hosanna of life all around him.
On one such afternoon, when he was in the bathtub before going to Sune’s birthday party, the doorbell rang. He went downstairs in his dressing gown and saw Lena Sundman standing outside.
‘Am I too early?’
‘Too early for what?’
‘Sune’s party.’
He stared at her blankly.
‘He asked me to pick you up. Didn’t he say anything?’
Still damp from the bath, Dan stood frozen a moment in the doorway before he reluctantly showed her in. Beneath her overcoat she wore a short black cocktail dress. She saw the new double bed that had been delivered from Norrtälje. It filled much of the end wall in the living room.
‘This where you set your seduction scenes?’
‘It’s here because the bedroom isn’t ready yet.’
‘Last time I only got as far as the hall. Now we’re talking bedroom. I’m not sure I can take the pace.’
Dan picked out clothes from the closet in the entrance and said he’d be back in a few minutes.
Sune Isaksson was alone when they arrived. He complimented Lena on her cocktail dress, telling her she looked lovelier than ever. In return she gave him her smile. Dan could see they were both a little on their guard. Was it because of the Selavas and the farm? She did kiss Sune’s cheek though, and then they talked about the old days when she lived here on the island and about her father who’d been at school with Sune.
‘People lived a different life here then,’ Sune told Dan. ‘There were plenty of fish in the sea, they sailed their boats into Stockholm to sell their catch on the quays. No one got rich but no one went hun
gry either. They all knew what the changes in the weather meant, the colour, the movements of the water. It was another world.’
He served champagne and said he wondered if birthdays should be celebrated.
‘I mean what is it? Another step towards the final silence. Birthday cards should offer condolences instead. So sorry! One more year gone, one less left.’
Refilling Lena’s glass he eyed her.
‘You haven’t changed,’ she said, ‘have you?’ The remark was dry but there was an underlying note of something gentler, like the shadow of an old pattern on a well-washed garment. ‘What are you up to nowadays?’
‘Still at the Institute.’
‘What is it you do there?’
‘Mesocopic systems.’
‘Meso what?’
‘It’s the interface between the microscopic world, where chance determines things, and the macroscopic world, where it doesn’t.’
‘So. Weird stuff.’
‘Right.’
‘Aunt Solveig always said you’d end up in trouble.’
Sune laughed, the old laugh with his head back, his hands on the table. He told Dan people out here had thought him odd even when he was young.
‘That Isaksson boy!’ Lena said, mimicking the local accent.
Sune laughed again. He emptied his glass, poured more champagne, and told Dan that bubbles moved faster through lead than attitudes changed out here. He said there were elderly islanders who had never been to Norrtälje, let alone Stockholm.
In the Name of Love Page 9