The Swimmer

by Joakim Zander

  Mahmoud had no time to react before Cyril was moaning and gasping for air on the granite floor, both hands over his crotch. Klara’s kick had been as explosive as it was precise. She squatted down beside him, and swept a jet-black lock of hair from her eyes.

  ‘Where are they?’ she whispered. ‘Inside the apartment? On the street? Answer, or I swear I will kill you.’

  Cyril looked up at her. His eyes were moist and he whimpered faintly, like a dog.

  ‘They’re not here,’ he hissed. ‘I don’t know where. On the street, maybe, I don’t know, I promise.’

  ‘Where’s your car?’ Klara’s voice was steady and as cold as the rocks of the archipelago.

  ‘In the inner courtyard,’ he said.

  ‘Give me your keys and your wallet.’

  Cyril hesitated and looked up at her in surprise.

  ‘Come on, Klara, we can surely solve—’

  She silenced him with a slap across his cheek. Cyril swore and tried to grab her hands, while rolling over on his side. But Mahmoud stopped him with a kick just below the left knee. Cyril howled and rolled onto his back.

  ‘Give her the keys,’ Mahmoud said. ‘Come on, can’t you see she’s serious?’

  Cyril motioned toward the apartment.

  ‘On the hall table,’ he said, defeated. ‘Both the keys and the wallet.’

  Mahmoud stepped over him into the apartment.

  ‘What’s the pin code for your cards,’ Klara said.

  ‘Now!’

  Cyril muttered a four-digit code.

  ‘You better hope you’re telling the truth,’ Mahmoud said as he came back out onto the landing with the wallet and keys in hand.

  Klara stood up and brushed off her pants. Mahmoud grabbed her hand and led her away from Cyril. But just before they reached the stairs, she let go and went back over to Cyril, who had managed to rise to his knees. She bent down, grabbed his chin, and bent it upward, forcing him to look her straight in the eye.

  ‘By the way,’ she said with a voice that was completely empty of emotion. ‘It’s over, asshole.’

  45

  December 20, 2013

  Paris, France

  Mahmoud threw open the door to the courtyard, their footsteps still echoing behind them in the stairwell. A lonely lamp lit the small, narrow parking lot. It was snowing more than before. A thin layer covered about a dozen cars in front of them.

  ‘Which one is his?’ Mahmoud said.

  ‘A blue Jaguar.’

  ‘Discreet.’

  It took no more than a few seconds to find it. Mahmoud unlocked it and hopped into the tobacco-colored, worn leather seat. Klara sat down next to him.

  ‘Oh my God, Klara,’ Mahmoud said and turned toward her. ‘What did it say in that message you got? I mean, you turned into Lisbeth Salander up there.’

  Klara stuck her hand into her pocket and took out her BlackBerry. She held it up to Mahmoud. The message was short: they’re going to kill you. stay hidden. / george.

  ‘George?’ Mahmoud said.

  ‘I only know one George.’ Klara said. ‘A Swedish guy I met a few times at parties in Brussels. He looks like a Wall Street jerk and works for a lobbying firm. I really have no idea what he has to do with any of this.’

  She shook her head, as if trying to wake up from a dream.

  ‘It’s so sick,’ she said. ‘I could see that something was wrong as soon as Cyril opened the door.’

  Mahmoud just nodded. His brain was filled to the breaking point, impossible to penetrate. He also shook his head.

  ‘We have to get out of here,’ Klara said. ‘Who knows how much time we have.’

  Mahmoud turned the key, and the Jaguar started with a growl. The wipers scraped the thin layer of snow from the windshield. In the hidden storage compartment between the seats Klara found a remote control for the gate facing the street, while Mahmoud maneuvered the car out of its parking spot. He drove up to the gate and stopped, then turned to Klara.

  ‘There’s no way of knowing what’s on the other side of that door,’ he said.

  She just stared straight ahead and nodded, something intractable in her ice blue eyes.

  ‘Might as well find out,’ she said and pressed the single red button on the remote.

  The gate responded with a humming sound, and started to rise slowly.

  Mahmoud revved the engine and threw another glance at Klara.

  ‘You’re tougher than you seem,’ he said.

  ‘Just you wait,’ Klara replied.

  Before the door was fully open Mahmoud pressed down on the gas pedal and released the clutch. The car’s six-cylinder engine rumbled, the tires spun a few times before taking hold. There was only a centimeter or two to spare between the car roof and door, as they shot out onto Avenue Victor Hugo. Sparks flew as the bumper scraped against the curb. The tires skidded on the slushy asphalt, and Mahmoud struggled for control of the steering wheel. Cars honked and braked. Some pedestrians looked out from under their umbrellas to see what was going on. Soon Mahmoud and Klara were driving down the street at high speed. Melting snow ran in rivulets down the windshield.

  ‘Is anyone behind us?’ shouted Mahmoud.

  Klara turned around, craning her neck to see.

  ‘I don’t know. The damn snow. I can’t see out the rear window. Yes, wait! A black van! It was parked on the sidewalk when we arrived. They’re after us. Fuck!’

  There was less traffic now. Mahmoud remained in second gear and maneuvered the Jaguar into the left lane. Floored the gas. Passed two cars and slipped back into the right-hand lane. He barely heard the honking of oncoming traffic, didn’t notice their fists and middle fingers. The only thing that mattered was getting away.

  ‘What about now?’ he shouted to Klara.

  Klara turned around in her seat again, straining to see.

  ‘I can’t see them.’

  Sirens were blaring somewhere. In the rearview mirror Mahmoud saw the faint blue lights of police cars.

  ‘Are those coming after us?’ Klara said.

  Mahmoud shrugged, focusing on the road, the wet asphalt, the snow that wouldn’t stop falling.

  ‘Who knows? Maybe your boyfriend got fed up and reported us for stealing his car.’

  ‘He’s not my boyfriend. Anymore.’

  They were approaching an intersection. Mahmoud saw the traffic lights turning yellow. He changed lanes and floored the gas pedal. Sink or swim. He barely noticed a car veering onto the sidewalk to avoid them. The sirens were blaring behind them. The black van. Still in the left-hand lane he drove straight toward the red light. The oncoming traffic seemed to be standing still, paralyzed by their recklessness. He spun the wheel. An intersection was approaching at breakneck speed. To the right there seemed to be an alley that led, straight and narrow, like a tunnel through some well-polished Parisian balconies. He put all his money on that one card and swung hard to the right. The tires screeched on the asphalt, but didn’t lose traction. The sound of sirens subsided.

  ‘Where are they? Do you see them?’ Mahmoud shouted at Klara. He had no idea what he was doing.

  ‘Over there!’ she said, pointing to the left. ‘A grocery store with parking underneath. Drive down there!’

  Mahmoud saw the sign. supermarché casino. An arrow to a parking garage. Fifty yards. He didn’t slow down until he started turning the wheel. The car jumped and shook as it went over the low curb. The grocery store appeared to be open. A bar was down in front of the entrance to the parking lot. Mahmoud stopped, rolled down the window, and pressed the green button. It took forever for the bar to rise. They rolled down a curved ramp and into the garage.

  ‘Where are they? Do you see them?’

  Mahmoud’s eyes were fixed on the rearview mirror.

  ‘Nothing so far,’ Klara said.

  The garage was another world. Small families were pushing shopping carts toward their station wagons under cold fluorescent light. Children and parents. The absolute normality of it was al
most shocking. Mahmoud had forgotten that there was such a thing as a normal, real world. A world where he wasn’t wanted for murder. A world where he wasn’t threatened with automatic weapons, didn’t beat up promising French politicians, didn’t watch old army buddies get shot in the head. He parked the Jaguar in a vacant spot. Calmly. Like any normal Parisian Friday shopper. After he turned off the engine, he rested his head against the steering wheel. Its walnut frame was cool and soothing against his forehead. He released his desperate grip gently. His knuckles ached.

  Klara had already opened the passenger door.

  ‘Come on, damn it,’ she shouted into the car. ‘We don’t know how much time we have.’

  46

  December 20, 2013

  Paris, France

  They couldn’t find the stairs fast enough, so they took the elevator up from the parking lot, crammed into opposite corners by shopping carts. Bing Crosby sang ‘Silent Night’ over the crackling speaker. The elevator walls were covered by ads for deals on foie gras, oysters, and champagne. Parisian Christmas food. Klara glanced at Mahmoud. He was grinding his teeth, his eyes locked on the worn elevator door in front of them.

  Klara was also focused and on edge. She felt aware of every muscle in her body, and every thought was clear and simple, concentrated.

  The doors opened and the shoppers and their carts detached themselves, leaving the oversize elevator one by one. Finally it was just Klara and Mahmoud left. They looked at each other. Klara shrugged.

  ‘Let’s go.’

  They stepped out under the fluorescent lights in front of the checkout counters of the Supermarché Casino. And nothing happened. Just Christmas decorations and Friday shoppers.

  ‘Did we make it?’ Klara said.

  Mahmoud looked around, tense, almost crouching, as if he couldn’t believe his eyes.

  ‘It almost seems like it,’ he said. ‘Maybe they got stuck back at the red light.’

  They began moving hesitantly toward the exit.

  ‘No black van,’ Mahmoud said, peering out of the windows.

  When the automatic doors slid open, Klara saw her immediately through the heavy snowfall. Across the street, flooded by the light from the streetlamps. Those eyes from yesterday, from earlier today. Ponytail. No more than thirty yards away from them. And she saw them too.

  ‘They’re here!’ screamed Klara as she turned and grabbed Mahmoud’s arm to pull him back into the store.

  ‘They’re here!’

  But Mahmoud’s arm felt heavy. Pulling her down toward the floor instead of inside toward the store. The automatic doors on the street side closed silently.

  ‘Come on, we have to get out of here!’ she screamed, crouching down, and grabbing his arm.

  The glass doors exploded in a shower of small crystals. Time stopped. Klara threw herself onto the floor in front of the cash registers. Behind her a shelf of sparkling wine, displayed enticingly at the entrance, collapsed. Crushed bottles mixed with the glass from the door. The sweet smell of cheap wine. Screams and chaos. Customers threw themselves to the floor in panic all around her. From the speakers Bing Crosby sang, ‘Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way.’ Klara kept pulling on Mahmoud’s arm.

  ‘Come on! Come on!’

  She turned toward him. Mahmoud lay on his back in the middle of the crushed glass. His brown eyes were wide open and blank in the unforgiving fluorescent light. On his forehead, just above the right eye, Klara saw a small black hole.

  It was only then that she saw the blood.

  Huge amounts of red, sticky blood spreading like a living mass, like a halo, around the back of his head, mixing with the spilled wine.

  ‘Moody, Moody, come on, come on!’

  She tugged at his arm, trying with all her might to get him to the protection of the checkout lanes or anywhere else. As if there were any kind of protection. Everywhere people were screaming, carts were being overturned, goods were being crushed against the concrete floor. He was too heavy. She couldn’t budge him.

  Instead she bent over his face, down to the neck she’d kissed so many times, so long ago. Her jeans were soaked with his blood, and stuck to her knees. Broken glass cut into her palms as she laid her cheek against his mouth. Groped with her fingers against his neck. But there was nothing there. No breath. No pulse. Only his brown eyes, from which all life had vanished.

  Her adrenaline was pumping. ‘Was this it?’ she wondered.

  She raised her eyes. She could see a man and woman running through the falling snow. Something heavy and black in their hands. Weapons.

  ‘Moody! Moody!’

  Panic. Shock. The first, almost unidentifiable, feeling of a sadness so deep it scared her far more than the murderers outside. It took her a split-second to decide not to die. A flash through her mind. An unprecedented clarity. She’d never stopped loving Mahmoud. She had repressed it but not forgotten. And she couldn’t let it end here. Shot down like a dog, extinguished, spilled onto the dirty floor of a grocery store. Portrayed as a murderer and a terrorist. It couldn’t end here.

  ‘I love you, Moody,’ she whispered with her lips against his.

  Then she released his arm, got up, and ran past the checkouts, past the crouching customers, into the store. Somewhere in the background, she heard the sound of sirens.

  She ran through the glass and the wine and the chaos. She couldn’t hear the screams and sobs. Her head was completely empty as she zigzagged through the shelves. She didn’t look back.

  Farther into the store a strange calm reigned. Customers moved cautiously in the direction of the cash registers, uncertain of what was happening. At the back of the store stood an unmanned deli counter. All the staff seemed to have moved toward the entrance. Klara rounded it and ran through a pair of swinging doors into a messy stockroom. A man in a white apron and hairnet, who apparently hadn’t noticed the chaos at the other end of the store, shouted at her. Klara barely registered him; she had eyes only for the green emergency exit sign. The bloody jeans clung to her legs.

  She pressed the handle of the emergency exit door with her elbow, trying to avoid driving the shards of glass any deeper into her palms than they already were. The door led out to a loading dock on the back of the store. A thin layer of snow covered the ground. The snow was falling fast and diagonally in the twilight. A short hop down from the loading dock, and she was in a courtyard. The bloody soles of her shoes left red tracks as she ran across the snow, out through an exit with a yellow traffic bar, and onward to a side street where the snow had already melted away. She turned left. It wasn’t until after she had run a hundred yards across the pavement that she looked back over her shoulder. No one was following her.

  47

  December 20, 2013

  Northern Virginia, USA

  A single stroke. Two. Three. Breath. I close my eyes and shut out water, thoughts, memories.

  A single stroke. Two. Three. Breath. I’m a torpedo that never exploded. A dud.

  I break the rhythm, swim four strokes without breathing. Then five. Six.

  I turn at the far end, the soles of my feet touch the tiles for a moment. The force of my push moves up my calves and my thighs. I feel how my energy is converted, how the power turns to meaningless speed. I stay underwater much longer than is efficient. Half of the pool, longer. Long past the point where the momentum is overcome by the resistance of the water. And farther still.

  I continue downward. Allow the speed to slow further, let my legs stop kicking, my arms rest. I empty my lungs. The pressure on my eardrums. The sound of air bubbling out of my nose, my mouth, as I sink. The roughness of the pool bottom against my chest. The slippery, shiny paint of the black lines. Lungs tightening and shrinking in simulated, fruitless breaths.

  But it doesn’t help. Not even that helps. The thoughts. The memory. I said my prayer. My only prayer. Nothing helps.

  Afterward I lie bent over the edge, heaving, hyperventilating. It’s been three hours since I found my daughter
’s name in our databases. Three hours since my prayer ceased to be answered. Three hours since I could no longer hide from my past.

  I sit in the Mazda, waiting for something, anything, to fall into place. I hold the steering wheel so tightly that my knuckles whiten. It feels like if I let go of the steering wheel I’ll be swept away. All that I chose not to see. Now it breaks over me like a tidal wave. The shame is so strong it pushes me back against the imitation leather seat.

  On my screen in Langley, I saw the inquiries and reports about my daughter from Paris and Brussels. I read everything I could find. Everything my clearance allowed. There wasn’t much. Open media. Summary. Nothing about us. Nothing about the background or reasons. Nothing about the shadows. But I know anyway. Their fingerprints are unmistakable. The Arab boyfriend and the silencers on their guns. Files in our register that I don’t have access to. The fact that there even are files I can’t access. Code names and classified documents. Secrets piled on secrets.

  In the glove box is the thin manila folder I never opened. My leverage. My only chance to save her, to save myself. My past for her future.

  My steps rustle across the frosty grass. Tasteful spotlights illuminate the glued-on granite, the white wood, the hollow Masonite columns in imitation Colonial style next to the slate stairs. The prefabricated American dream. A paper-thin Potemkin house at the far end of the economic reach of the middle class. A testament to success that looks like it could be blown away by the first strong gust of wind.

  I stand at the foot of the stairs and look up at the dark windows. The beige folder in my hand. I have been a dead thing. A broken branch in the river of history. Docilely, I’ve let myself be swept along by the slightest current. It’s over now. A strange calm descends upon me as I ring the doorbell.

  Susan opens the door surprisingly quickly, considering it’s nearly midnight. She’s still wearing office clothes, skirt and blouse, as anonymous as any middle manager. Her face is still tight, stressed, and inscrutable, not adapted to the home. Maybe she just walked in the door.