by Sten, Viveca
I feel so sorry for him. He turned bright red and could hardly get a single word out. He’s very shy, I think, but wise and smart; I can see it in his eyes.
June 14, 1927
I played with Missan this afternoon. She has to be the cutest cat on the island, and she’s so clever—she understands everything I say. Then she lay on my knee, purring away.
June 20, 1927
Tomorrow is Midsummer’s Eve. I’m so looking forward to it! Visitors are coming from all over the place, from Harö and Möja, and I’m sure the lighthouse keepers from Grönskär will sail across too as they usually do. In the morning we will row over to Kroksö to gather flowers and birch twigs to decorate the pole.
If only Mom would let me join in the dancing, like André. She says I have to turn thirteen first. I really, really wish she would let me; it would be wonderful!
Nora shivered. The cold was getting to her, and she had started to lose feeling in her toes. Time to go home to her warm house; Thomas and Margit would be over for coffee soon.
She ran her hand over the black cover of the notebook and smiled. It was eighty years since Karolina had written her diary, but she lived on through her words.
Nora stood up, but she couldn’t bring herself to put the shoebox back in the drawer. There was something fascinating about Karolina’s account of days gone by.
She went into the kitchen and dug out a plastic bag from under the sink. Maybe Karolina’s account of her everyday life would take Nora’s mind off her problems and help her to get to sleep at a reasonable hour.
Sandhamn 1926
The fear that seized him when he realized the shotgun was gone was worse than anything he had ever experienced. His nose was bleeding, but he didn’t care.
He slithered down the last part of the rock and stared into the cloudy water. It might be several yards deep; it was impossible to see more than an inch or two below the surface. He would never be able to find the gun. Father would be livid.
He kept on looking, but the only thing he saw was the reflection of his own terrified eyes. Guns were expensive, and he knew how careful his father was when it came to money.
Blood dripped from his nose, forming a little puddle on the rock. It trickled into a crevice and mingled with the rainwater.
Thorwald knelt down and stuck his arm in the ice-cold water, but there was nothing there. His arm was freezing, but he tried over and over again.
Then he heard footsteps. His father must have gone around and made his way to the water’s edge. Feverishly Thorwald thrashed in the water with his hand.
“Where’s your gun?” Gottfrid was standing right behind him.
“I don’t know,” Thorwald whispered. “Please don’t be angry, Father. It slipped out of my hand. I didn’t do it on purpose, I swear I didn’t.”
The look in his father’s eyes was enough to shut him up. As was the heavy blow that followed. It knocked Thorwald sideways, and he hit his head on the flat rock. When he tried to get up, he could barely hear in his right ear. He tried to focus, but everything was spinning. It was a few minutes before he managed to get to his knees, and he still felt dizzy and disoriented when he stood up.
“Take off your clothes.”
Thorwald hesitated. What did Father mean?
“You heard what I said—or you can go in with your clothes on.”
Clumsily Thorwald got undressed. The temperature was scarcely above freezing, and he immediately started shaking.
“In you go, and don’t come out until you’ve found the gun.”
Gottfrid’s voice was low but left Thorwald no choice.
He made one last attempt to peer through the gloom, then he took a deep breath and took the plunge.
The water was pitch black; he couldn’t see a thing, and the icy cold pierced his body like a series of barbs. It wasn’t as deep as he had thought; he soon touched the bottom, but all he could feel was slimy seaweed and tangles of rockweed. He fumbled blindly for the gun, terrified to come up without it, and forced himself to stay down as long as he could. He felt as if his lungs were about to burst.
Air, he needed air.
As he broke the surface he was looking straight into his father’s eyes. Gottfrid was crouching on the flat rock, staring at his son as if he wished he were dead.
“Have you found it?”
“Please let me come out, Father—please!”
His voice sounded like a five-year-old’s, a high, shrill, childish voice that even Thorwald didn’t recognize. His teeth were chattering so hard that the words came out in short, staccato bursts.
“I’ll do anything you want, I’ll never drop anything again, just let me come out! I’m freezing to death.”
Thorwald started to cry. He had never been so cold in his entire life. If he stood on tiptoe, the water reached his chin; his fingers were numb, and he could no longer feel his feet.
I’m going to die, he thought. This time I’m going to die.
He remembered when he’d stolen the apples, and his father had picked up the straight razor. He’d been afraid that his father was going to kill him, but he’d escaped with just a bare scalp. Now he was in trouble again, and it was no one’s fault but his own. He deserved to die. He was worthy of no other fate.
Gottfrid sighed heavily as he gazed out to sea, beyond Thorwald. For a few seconds he seemed completely absorbed in his thoughts, as if an old memory had popped up, overshadowing his son’s pathetic sobs.
Thorwald took a deep breath and dived one last time. He groped across the seabed in the icy water, and suddenly his fingers closed around something long and hard.
He had found it.
With stiff muscles he moved slowly toward the shore. He held out the gun, and his father took it, then hauled the boy out. Thorwald remained on his knees as if in prayer; he couldn’t move. His legs were shaking so much he feared they’d never again support his weight.
Gottfrid set off toward the boat. Summoning the last of his strength, Thorwald managed to get to his feet. He struggled to pull on his clothes, then stumbled after his father who was already sorting out the boat. He pushed it into the water and clambered in.
On the trip home Gottfrid uttered not one word. He sat behind Thorwald with a grim expression in his face, his heavy breathing mixing with the sound of gunfire from the neighboring reefs and skerries.
Thorwald rowed as fast as he could to try and raise his body temperature. His hands were so stiff with cold that he was scared of losing his grip on the oars.
I don’t deserve to live. The words pounded inside his head, over and over again. He thinks I’m useless. His son is a worthless, useless idiot. He doesn’t care whether I live or die.
It was several days before he recovered, and he remained hard of hearing in his right ear for the rest of his life.
CHAPTER 30
Hanna Hammarsten opened the door. Thomas introduced himself, and she let him in without hesitation.
“Marianne’s in the kitchen,” she said quietly.
“Is her husband back?”
Hanna shook her head. “No, not until this afternoon. I think he had to sign some papers for the pathologist, if I understood correctly.”
Thomas nodded. Regardless of the tragedy that had befallen Marianne and Anders Rosén, the demands of bureaucracy were implacable. The process knew no mercy.
He followed Hanna into the warm kitchen. A fire was crackling in the old-fashioned wood-burning stove, but the cozy atmosphere contrasted sharply with the woman sitting at the table.
Marianne Rosén looked appalling. Her hair was uncombed, and she was gaunt and hollow-eyed. She was wearing a warm navy-blue cardigan, but she looked frozen solid. She clung to her coffee mug as if for dear life. She looked up as Thomas came in.
“How are you?” he said gently.
“Not good.”
“I realize things are very difficult right now, but I do need to ask you a few questions. I’ll keep it as brief as possible.”
S
he gave a faint nod.
Hanna sat down next to Marianne and took her hand.
“It’s about a former boyfriend of Lina’s,” Thomas began. “His name is Jakob Sandgren—do you know him?”
“The Sandgrens’ son,” Hanna interjected. “They have a house in Trouville, not far from us. I know the parents. Why do you ask?”
“Your daughter, Louise, told us that he and Lina were together last summer, and that he didn’t treat her too well.”
Hanna glanced at Marianne, who showed little reaction to Thomas’s words. She stared into her coffee with no change of expression.
“I don’t remember,” she said eventually. “I don’t know anything anymore.”
Hanna caught Thomas’s eye. “Come with me—we can talk about this in the living room.”
She got up and left the kitchen, and Thomas followed her into a large room with windows on both sides. A generous sectional sofa dominated the space, and the coffee table was strewn with newspapers.
Hanna sat down on the sofa. Thomas thought she must be around forty-five years old; she was slender, with shoulder-length brown hair, and she was wearing jeans and a thick sweater.
“Marianne is devastated. Maybe I can answer some of your questions so she can rest for a little longer.”
“Sure.”
“You wanted to know about Jakob Sandgren?”
“Like I said, Louise told us that he and Lina were in a relationship last summer, and that it wasn’t”—he searched for the right expression—“without problems. I’m trying to find out more; I’d appreciate anything you can tell me.”
Hanna nodded and settled back.
“A lot of kids enjoy being out here for the summer. There’s plenty of work, and they can have fun and earn some money at the same time. Lina and Louise worked in the bakery and the kiosk; there’s a whole bunch of them, and everyone knows everyone else. Jakob Sandgren was part of the gang.”
She made a face.
“They do party. And they drink too much; it’s hard to avoid. As a parent, you’re just glad they’re out here on the island instead of in town, where you don’t have a clue where they are or what they’re doing. It feels safer here; it’s an island, after all.” Her voice wobbled. “At least that’s the way it felt until Lina disappeared.”
“How well do you know Jakob Sandgren?”
“I know who he is. We don’t socialize with his parents, but we say hello if we bump into them in the village.”
“Did you know he mistreated Lina?”
“I didn’t know about it until after they’d split up.” She hesitated. “Louise told me how Jakob had behaved; she was very upset about it. I believe he actually hit her a few times.”
Thomas’s ears pricked up. Louise hadn’t admitted that there was physical violence, but she had avoided answering Margit’s direct question.
“Are you sure?”
Hanna nodded, distaste written all over her face.
“Louise hinted that he’d slapped her from time to time—that was how she put it, but she didn’t want to go into detail, and I didn’t want to push her too hard.”
“Why not?”
Hanna sighed. “Do you have kids?”
Thomas shook his head.
“It’s not always easy to communicate with teenage girls. Everyday chat is OK—how was school today? What are you doing this weekend? But when it comes to important things, like relationships, friends, how boys should treat girls . . .”
She broke off and ran a hand through her hair.
“And besides, it was hard to believe, if I’m completely honest. Jakob Sandgren is a parent’s dream: he’s good-looking and incredibly polite, or at least he was on the few occasions when I met him. He’s at the Stockholm School of Economics now; he started in the fall. You need top grades to get in there.” She spread her hands wide. “Then again, Louise doesn’t usually lie to me.”
“When did you find out about this?”
“Let me see, when was it?” Hanna leaned back on the sofa and thought for a moment. “Maybe around the end of September, a few months after it had happened. After the fact, anyway.”
“What made Louise bring it up?”
“We’d been watching a TV show together, about teenage relationships and the importance of being able to set boundaries. Afterward Louise wanted to talk about what Lina had been through; she couldn’t understand why Lina had let things with Jakob go on for so long.”
“Have you spoken to Marianne about this?”
Hanna shook her head; she looked troubled.
“No, I haven’t.”
“Why not?”
“Louise told me in confidence, and Lina had already split up with Jakob. It was too late to do anything about it, and Louise would have gone crazy if she found out that I’d told Lina’s mom. She would never trust me again.”
“And you didn’t speak to the boy’s parents either?”
“No . . . Maybe I should have. I hate the idea of a young man abusing his girlfriend, but I didn’t know what to say. I’d heard it secondhand from Louise, and like I said, I barely know Jakob’s parents.”
“How much do you think Marianne knows about this?”
Hanna frowned and ran her hand over a cushion. It was covered in a floral fabric that matched the sofa.
“I doubt she knows anything at all.”
She picked up the cushion and hugged it—a vulnerable gesture that Thomas had seen before.
“I think Lina kept a lot to herself. Louise is much more open with me than Lina was with Marianne. Lina thought her mom was way too overprotective.”
Hanna’s eyes brimmed with unshed tears, and she pushed back her hair once more.
“But it didn’t do any good, did it? She’s dead.”
“Thank you so much for telling me all this,” Thomas said. “Do you happen to know the names of Jakob’s parents, and where in the city they live?”
“Urban and Lena; they have an apartment in Vasastan, if I remember right.”
As soon as Thomas had closed the front door behind him, he took out his cell phone. Erik Blom answered right away.
“I need you to check out a guy called Jakob Sandgren. He’s around twenty, and his parents live in Vasastan. Their names are Urban and Lena Sandgren, and they also have a house on Sandhamn. Find out as much as you can about the kid and his family.”
“OK. Anything else?”
“Bring him in for questioning tomorrow morning when I’m back. And contact Anders Rosén, Lina’s father—see if he knows anything about this.”
He switched his phone to the other hand. “By the way, how’s Kalle doing with the profiling? Has he come up with anything?”
“Not that I know of, but we’ll be in touch.” Erik broke off and started coughing. “Sorry about that. Oh, I spoke to Victor Sjöström, Lina’s boyfriend from Uppsala. I got hold of him a little while ago.”
“And what did he say?”
“Same as before: that he spent the weekend of November 4 in Härnösand. Not much else; he seemed very shocked by the whole thing.”
“Did you ask if Lina was interested in rituals or blood sacrifices?”
“Yes—he’d never heard her talk about anything like that. He didn’t really understand what I meant.”
Thomas ended the call and mulled over what Erik had said. Victor Sjöström was probably telling the truth, and right now there were more important things to follow up on.
Jakob Sandgren, for example.
Sandhamn 1927
Kristina hurried on ahead with her basket over her arm. Vendela plodded along behind her, already out of breath even though they had only been walking for a few minutes.
Thorwald brought up the rear, eyes downcast, hardly even looking where he was going.
They were on their way to the sand field to pick mushrooms. Thousands of flowers bloomed in the sand each spring, and at this time of year, the fungus known as man on horseback or yellow knight was in plentiful supply; it flourished
among the sparse pine trees. The dark-yellow caps were often hidden in the sand, and it took skill to find them. Vendela was the best; she had often gone mushroom picking with her mother when she was a little girl.
Gottfrid had gone to Stockholm on the steamboat; it had something to do with work, and he would be away for four days. The atmosphere at home had lightened considerably.
Before long, they reached their goal, and the search could begin. Vendela stood back and surveyed the field for a little while. The ground dropped away steeply; large amounts of sand had been removed over the years to use as ballast on the big ships. This had been going on since the eighteenth century, and the pit was like an open wound inflicted without any thought about the fact that it would never heal.
People said a little boy had once suffocated when he tried to scramble out and the sand came cascading down over him. Whenever the story was told, Vendela refused to listen; she didn’t want to know whether it was true or not. It was too dreadful to think about.
To the left they could just see Sandhamnshåle, the narrow but deep sound through which a number of vessels passed on their way to the capital. Several large ships were anchored on the right, waiting for the pilot to come and guide them.
Vendela wished she could sail away to Möja, where some of her siblings still lived. How she longed to go back there! She could feel something inside her at its breaking point, and she took a deep breath to hold it all in.
“Look, Mommy!” Kristina called from the edge of the trees. She was holding up two mushrooms.
“Good girl!” Vendela moved her basket to the other hand and set off toward the children.
Thorwald saw her coming and straightened up. Vendela contemplated him with sadness. Her son was an awkward, unhappy boy who struggled in school. He was shy, and rarely dared open his mouth, particularly when Gottfrid was around. His grades were nowhere near as good as his father thought they should be, and the stricter Gottfrid was, the worse Thorwald did. Most of all he struggled with reading and writing; he just couldn’t seem to make any progress.