by Unknown
His thoughts wandered. He suddenly remembered his own father, who had been a low-ranking party official, and how he had been taunted and mistreated during the Cultural Revolution. His father had told him how he and the other ‘capitalist swine’ had had their faces painted white by the Red Guards. Because evil was always white in colour.
Now he tried to think of the people in the silent houses that way. They all had white faces; they were the demons of evil.
The lights gradually went out. Two of the houses were now in darkness. He waited. The dead had been waiting for more than a century, he only needed to cope with a few hours.
He took off his right glove and felt with his fingers the sword hanging at his side. The steel was cold; the sharp edge could easily cut through his skin. It was a Japanese sword he had come across by chance on a visit to Shanghai. Somebody had told him about an old collector who still had a few of these much prized swords left after the Japanese occupation in the 1930s. He had found his way to the unremarkable little shop and not hesitated once he had held the sword in his hand. He had bought it on the spot and taken it to a blacksmith who had repaired the handle and sharpened the blade until it cut like a razor.
He gave a start. The door of one of the houses opened. He drew back further into the trees. A man came out onto the steps with a dog. A lamp over the door illuminated the snow-covered garden. Liu Xan gripped the sword tightly, screwed up his eyes and carefully observed the dog’s movements. What would happen if it picked up his scent? That would ruin all his plans. If he was forced to kill the dog he wouldn’t hesitate. But what would the man do, the man standing in the doorway smoking?
The dog suddenly stopped and sniffed the air. For a brief moment Liu Xan thought it had detected him. But then it started running around the garden once more.
The man shouted to the dog, which ran inside immediately. The door closed. Shortly afterwards the light went out.
He continued waiting. At midnight, when the only light came from a television screen, he noticed that it had started snowing. Flakes fell onto his outstretched hand like feathers. Like cherry blossoms, he thought. But snow doesn’t smell; it doesn’t breathe like flowers breathe.
Twenty minutes later the television was switched off. It was still snowing. He took out from his anorak pocket a small pair of binoculars fitted with a night-vision device and slowly scanned all the houses in the village. He couldn’t see any lights. He put the binoculars away and took a deep breath. In his mind’s eye he envisaged the picture that Ya Ru had described to him so many times.
A ship. People on the deck like ants, eagerly waving with handkerchiefs and hats. But he couldn’t see any faces.
No faces, only arms and hands, waving.
He waited a bit longer. Then he walked slowly over the road. He was carrying a little torch in one hand and his sword in the other.
He approached the house on the very edge of the village, heading west. He stopped to listen one last time.
Then he went inside.
Vivi,
This narrative is in a diary written by a man called Ya Ru. He had been given an oral report by the person who first went to Nevada, where he killed several people, and then continued to Hesjövallen. I want you to read it so that you can understand all the other things I’ve written in this letter.
None of these people are still alive. But the truth of what happened in Hesjövallen was bigger, far different from what we all thought. I’m not sure that everything I’ve written can be proved. It’s probably not possible. Just as, for instance, I can’t explain why the red ribbon ended up in the snow at Hesjövallen. We know who took it there, but that’s all.
Lars-Erik Valfridsson, who hanged himself in a police cell, was not guilty. At least his relatives ought to be told that. We can only speculate about why he took the blame on himself.
I understand that this letter will wreak havoc with your investigation. But what we are all searching for, of course, is clarity. I hope that what I have written can contribute to that.
I have tried to include everything I know about the case in this letter. The day we stop searching for the truth, which is never objective but under the best circumstances built on facts, is the day on which our system of justice collapses completely.
I’m back at work again now. I’m in Helsingborg and will expect you to be in touch, as there are a lot of questions, many of them difficult.
With best wishes,
Birgitta Roslin
7 August 2006
Epilogue
Birgitta Roslin did some shopping in her usual supermarket on the way home from work that same day in August. While standing in the queue at the checkout, she took one of the evening papers from its stand and leafed through it. On one page she read in passing that a lone wolf had been shot in a village north of Gävle.
Neither she nor anybody else knew that the same wolf had crossed into Sweden from Norway through Vauldalen one day in January. It had been hungry and not had anything to eat since finding the remains of a dead moose in Österdalarna.
The wolf had continued eastward, passed Nävjarna, crossed over the frozen Ljusnan River at Kåböle, and then vanished again into the vast forests.
Now it was lying dead on a farm near Gävle.
Nobody knew that on the morning of 13 January it had come to a remote village in Hälsingland by the name of Hesjövallen.
Everything had been covered in snow then. Now summer would soon be over.
The hamlet of Hesjövallen was empty. Nobody lived there any more. In some of the gardens rowanberries were already glowing red, with nobody to admire the splendid show of colour.
Autumn was closing in on Norrland. People were beginning to prepare themselves for another long winter.
Author’s Note
This is a novel. That means that what I have written has a background in reality, but not all parts are a realistic reproduction of events that took place. I don’t think there is anywhere by the name of Hesjövallen – I hope my scrutiny of maps was sufficiently meticulous. But that the president of Zimbabwe is Robert Mugabe at the time of writing is an indisputable fact.
In other words, I have written about what could have happened, not necessarily what actually did happen. In the world of fiction that is not only a possibility, but the basic prerequisite.
But even in a novel, the most important details ought to be correctly presented, whether they refer to the presence of birds in present-day Beijing or whether or not a judge has a sofa provided by the National Judiciary Administration in his or her office.
Many people have assisted me in my work on this book. First and foremost, of course, Robert Johnson, who once again has worked persistently and meticulously with regard to establishing facts. But there are many more who, if named, would make this list very long. Not least many people in Africa with whom I have discussed the book.
I am not going to mention anybody else by name but hereby express my sincere gratitude to everybody concerned. The story itself is naturally my own responsibility and nobody else’s.
Henning Mankell
Maputo, Mozambique
January 2008
Table of Contents
Cover
Table of Contents
Copyright
Also by Henning Mankell
Contents
The Man from Beijing
PART 1: The Silence (2006)
The Epitaph
The Judge
PART 2: The Railroad (1863)
The Way to Canton
The Feather and the Stone
PART 3: The Red Ribbon (2006)
The Rebels
The Chinese Game
PART 4: The Colonisers (2006)
Bark Peeled Off by Elephants
Chinatown, London
Epilogue
Author’s Note