The Farm

by Tom Rob Smith

  I was ashamed and considered making a qualified reply, defending myself, but in the end decided for a simple admission:

  ‘It’s true.’

  ‘How? I knew as soon as they arrived that they were struggling. That’s why I’d always pay for your father when we drank together, that’s why when we invited them to parties we never asked them to bring anything expensive, like salmon or meat.’

  Amid my humiliation, the mystery of why he’d asked my mum to bring potato salad was solved. It was an act of charity, with a touch of condescension. Håkan paused, assessing my reaction. I was unable to protest. Having completed his attack, he now turned to his defence:

  ‘No one is more upset about Mia than me. I have done everything expected of me. To have my role publicly questioned by a man who did nothing for his parents, a man who wasn’t even aware that his mother was shouting murder at every shadow, well, it is offensive. You’re upsetting my wife. You’re insulting my friends.’

  ‘No insult was intended.’

  Putting on his gloves, Håkan had the demeanour of a man disappointed that the fight had been so one-sided. But before he left I quickly added:

  ‘All I want are some answers, not for me, but for my mum, and right now, despite your efforts, there are none. We don’t even know how Mia left your farm.’

  Perhaps Håkan saw in me a flicker of my mum’s belief, because it was the only time I witnessed him lose control over his words:

  ‘You couldn’t even spot that your own parents were broke. What use could you be? This visit isn’t about helping your mother and it certainly isn’t about helping me. You feel guilty. You’re trying to feel better about yourself. But you’re not allowed to do it by nosing around in my life, in my community, insinuating that we’ve done something improper. I won’t have it!’

  Composing himself, Håkan gave one final twist of the knife:

  ‘Unlike many here, I don’t believe there’s any shame in losing your mind. And maybe she didn’t know it, but I like Tilde. She was strong. Her problem was that she was too strong. She shouldn’t have fought me so hard. There was no reason for it. She got it into her head that I was her enemy. I could’ve been a friend. I see your mother in your face. But I see none of her strength. Chris and Tilde have brought you up to be soft. Children rot when they’re indulged in too much love. Go home, Daniel.’

  With that, he left me standing in the snow.

  Driving back to the farm, I felt no anger towards Håkan. His remarks had not been unfair. However, on one important point he was wrong. I wasn’t motivated by guilt. My task was not pointless. There were answers here.

  At the farm I set about trying to find the words my mum had written on the walls. I hadn’t seen them anywhere during my week. Searching in earnest, I eventually noticed that a cabinet had been moved. There were small scratches in the wood floor around the base of the legs. Pulling it back, I was disappointed to see just one word:

  Freja!

  One name, surrounded by space, just like the email she’d sent me –

  Daniel!

  I’d already discussed with my dad the issue of my mum’s handwriting, wanting to know who’d written the lost diary, the disturbing journal found in a rusted steel box. My dad had explained that my mum was ambidextrous. Over the summer, he’d caught her, late at night, writing on the old papers uncovered in the ground. She’d composed the fictional diary with elegant brown ink and using her left hand.

  I picked up the phone, calling my dad. He was surprised by the lateness of the call. Without any of the usual pleasantries, I asked:

  ‘Dad, why did you move the cabinet to cover up the writing on the wall? Why didn’t you want anyone else to see it?’

  He didn’t reply. I continued:

  ‘You didn’t pack up the farm. You left the boat to freeze in the river. But you took the time to cover up one word.’

  He didn’t reply. I said:

  ‘Dad, when you phoned me from Sweden to tell me Mum was sick, you said that there was a lot I didn’t know. You said Mum could become violent. But she wasn’t violent over the summer. And she didn’t hurt anyone. What were you referring to?’

  Silence again, so I asked:

  ‘Dad, did Mum kill Freja?’

  Finally he replied:

  ‘I don’t know.’

  He added, barely audible:

  ‘But if she did, it would explain a great deal.’

  • • •

  Unable to sleep, I climbed out of bed and dressed. I made a Thermos of strong coffee and on the embers of the iron stove warmed a roll filled with several thick slices of mild Swedish cheese, allowing it to soften. I packed a small bag, bringing with me a change of clothes and my notebook and pencil, carrying them as mascots, symbols of intent, rather than items being put to any practical use. Leaving the farm on the darkest night of the year, I drove across country, northwards and east, towards the great lake where my mum had swum and where Freja had drowned. For much of the journey I was the only car on the road. When I arrived at my grandfather’s farm it was the break of dawn, with a sky evenly split between night and day.

  From my mum’s description of life on this farm my grandfather must have heard my car approach. It took just a single knock for him to open the door, as though he’d been waiting behind it. In this way, the two of us met for the first time. His hair was an attractive white, the hair of a goodly wizard, but it had been slicked down, forming uneven greasy icicles. At eight in the morning he was dressed in a black suit and waistcoat, with a grey shirt and a black tie – funeral attire. An inappropriate desire to hug him came over me, as though this was a reunion. He was a stranger unknown to me for my entire life, yet he was still family and family had always been precious. How could I not feel warmth towards him? Whatever problems there’d been in the past, I wanted him to be part of our small circle. Right now I needed him. With my mum in hospital, he was our only connection to the past. It might have been my foreignness, or my familiarity – maybe, as Håkan claimed, I had a touch of my mum in my face – regardless, he knew who I was. He said, in Swedish:

  ‘You’ve come looking for answers. There are none here. Except for the one you already know to be true. Little Tilde is sick. She’s always been sick. I fear she will always be sick.’

  He called my mum ‘Little Tilde’ without contempt or affection. There was a studious blankness about his voice. His sentences were polished, as if pre-prepared, spoken with so correct a balance of gravitas that they felt devoid of any emotion.

  I entered my grandfather’s farm, built with his own hands when he was younger than me. Laid out over one floor, with no stairs or cellar, it was old-fashioned and surprisingly snug considering how much land he owned. The décor hadn’t been changed for several decades. In the living room I noted the smell my mum had referred to, she’d called it the smell of sadness – stale air singed by decrepit electric heaters and curling flypaper. While he prepared coffee I was left alone and studied the walls, the awards for his white wild-meadow honey, the photographs of him and my grandmother. She was plainly dressed and sturdy, reminding me of Håkan’s wife. As for my grandfather, evidently he’d always taken pride over his appearance. His clothes were well tailored. Unquestionably he’d been handsome, and immensely serious, never smiling, even when being handed a trophy, a stern father, no doubt, and an upright local politician. There were no photos of my mum on the walls. There was no trace of her on this farm.

  Returning with the coffee and two thin ginger biscuits, each lonely on a separate plate, I could smell his lime cologne for the first time and wondered if he’d dabbed some on while waiting for the coffee to brew. He told me that guests were arriving from the church to stay in his spare room, so unfortunately he could give me no more than an hour. It was a lie, one he’d devised in the kitchen in order to limit the amount of time I could talk to him. I had no right to be upset. I’d shown up unannounced and unexpected. Nonetheless, to be set a time limit was a rejection and hurtful. I
smiled:

  ‘No problem.’

  While he poured the coffee I offered a brief account of my life by way of introduction, hoping he’d latch on to some element of interest. He picked up his gingerbread biscuit and snapped it neatly in two, placing both halves beside his coffee. He sipped the coffee, ate one half of the biscuit, and said:

  ‘How’s Tilde now?’

  He wasn’t interested in me. There was no point wasting time on trying to build a connection. We were strangers. So be it.

  ‘She’s very ill.’

  If he couldn’t offer emotion, I’d settle for facts:

  ‘It’s important that I find out what happened in the summer of 1963.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘The doctors believe it could help with her treatment.’

  ‘I can’t see how.’

  ‘Well, I’m no doctor . . .’

  He shrugged:

  ‘The summer of ’63 . . .’

  He sighed:

  ‘Your mum fell in love. Or in lust, I should say. The man was ten years her senior, he was working on a nearby farm, a summer labourer from the city. Little Tilde wasn’t even sixteen at the time. The relationship was discovered. There was a scandal—’

  I sat forward, raising my hand to interrupt as I’d done when my mum was telling her version of events. I’d heard this story before. But it had been told about Freja. Perhaps my grandfather had muddled the names.

  ‘Don’t you mean Freja fell in love with the farm labourer?’

  My grandfather was suddenly alert. So far he’d addressed me with a melancholy weariness, not so now:

  ‘Freja?’

  ‘Yes, my mum told me that Freja fell in love with the farm worker. Freja – the girl on the nearby farm, the girl from the city, that scandal was about Freja, not my mum.’

  My grandfather was troubled, rubbing his face, repeating the name:

  ‘Freja.’

  ‘She was my mum’s closest friend. They ran away together once.’

  The name meant something to him. I couldn’t tell what.

  ‘I can’t remember the names of her friends.’

  I found the remark extraordinary:

  ‘You must remember! Freja drowned in the lake! My mum never got over the idea that you believed she was responsible for Freja’s death. That’s why she left. That’s why I’m here.’

  He looked up to the ceiling, frowning, as though there were a fly that had caught his attention. He said:

  ‘Tilde is sick. I can’t unpick her stories for you. I won’t sit here trying to make sense of her nonsense. I’ve done enough of that in my life. She’s a liar. Or a fantasist, take your pick. She believes her own stories. That’s why she’s ill.’

  I was confused, partly by the vehemence of his reaction, mostly by the inconsistency. I said:

  ‘I shouldn’t have interrupted. Please finish telling me what happened.’

  He was only partially soothed by this request and concluded his summary with a new-found briskness:

  ‘Your mum’s head was full of dreams. She imagined living happily ever after on a farm, with her lover, just the two of them. The rules of society and decency be damned! The farmhand had told her romantic lies to persuade her to sleep with him and she’d believed them. She was gullible. After the affair was terminated, the farmhand was sent away. Tilde tried to kill herself in the lake. She was rescued from the water, spending many weeks in bed. Her body recovered, her mind never did. She was shunned. She was an outcast. At school her friends disowned her. The teachers gossiped about her. What did she expect? She shamed me terribly. I was disgraced. I put aside my dreams of running for a national government post. The scandal ruined my ambitions. Who would vote for a politician with a daughter like that? If I can’t bring up my own child what right do I have to make the laws for others? I found it hard to forgive her. That’s why she left. It’s too late for regrets. Consider yourself lucky she suffered a breakdown this summer and not sooner, when you were a child. It was only a matter of time.’

  It was remarkable that my mum had brought me up with such love and affection – she couldn’t have learned those sentiments from him.

  Even though we’d been speaking for only forty minutes of the allotted hour my grandfather stood up, ending our talk:

  ‘You must excuse me. My guests will be here soon.’

  In the gloom of the hallway he gestured for me to wait. At a side cabinet, using a fountain pen dipped in a pot of ink, he wrote his telephone number on a card:

  ‘Please don’t turn up uninvited again. If you have any questions, ring. It is sad that it must be this way. We are family. And yet we will never be family. We lead separate lives now, Tilde and I. She chose that way. She must live with the decision. As her son, so must you.’

  Outside I walked to my car, turning back for one last glance at the farm. My grandfather was at the window. He let the curtain fall, a declaration of the finality of this goodbye. He wanted me to understand that we’d never see each other again. Taking out my keys, I noticed a smudge of ink on my finger from where I’d clasped his card. In the daylight I saw that the ink wasn’t black, it was a light brown.

  • • •

  In a nearby town I booked into the only available accommodation, a family-run guesthouse. I sat on the bed and studied the brown ink smudge on my thumb. After having showered and eaten a cold meal of potato salad, rye bread and ham, I phoned my dad. He knew nothing about Mum’s alleged affair with the young farmhand. Like me, he queried my grandfather’s memory, reiterating that Freja had engaged in the affair. I asked for the name of my mum’s old school.

  Situated on the edge of town, the school building appeared to be new, the old premises demolished. I worried that too much time had passed. The school day was over and there were no children in the grounds. I rattled the gate, expecting it to be locked shut, but it swung open. Inside I wandered the corridors, feeling like an intruder, unsure whether I should call out. I heard the faint sound of singing and followed it upstairs. Engaged in an extracurricular class, two teachers were leading a singing rehearsal with a small group of students. I knocked on the door, quickly explaining that I was from England and looking for information concerning my mother, who’d attended this school over fifty years ago. The teachers were young and had only worked at the school for a few years. They explained that I wasn’t authorised to access the school records so there was nothing they could do to help. Despondent, I remained at the door, with no idea how to overcome this obstacle. One of the women took pity on me:

  ‘There is a teacher from that time. She’s retired now, of course, but she might remember your mother, and if she does, she might agree to talk to you.’

  The teacher’s name was Caren.

  Caren lived in a village so small I guessed there were no more than a hundred houses, a single shop, and a church. I knocked on the door, relieved when it opened. The retired teacher was wearing knitted moccasins. Her home smelled of freshly baked spiced bread. As soon as I mentioned my mum, Caren reacted:

  ‘Why are you here?’

  I told her it would take time to explain. She asked to see a photograph of my mum. I showed her my phone, finding a photograph taken in the spring before she’d left for Sweden. Caren put on her glasses and studied my mum’s face before saying:

  ‘Something’s happened.’

  ‘Yes.’

  She didn’t seem surprised.

  Her home was warm, but unlike the electric warmth in my grandfather’s farm this heat was welcoming, emanating from a log fire in the living room. The Christmas decorations were handmade. There’d been no decorations in my grand father’s house, not even an Advent candle in the window. In further contrast with my grandfather’s farm, there were photos of her children and grandchildren on the walls. Despite her telling me that her husband had passed away last year, this was a home full of life and love.

  Caren made me a cup of honey-sweetened black tea, declining to speak while making the tea and forcing
me to be patient. We sat by her fire. Steam rose from the bottom of my trousers, wet from the snow. With a touch of the schoolteacher about her, Caren instructed me not to rush, to tell her everything, in the proper order – her prescriptions reminding me of my mum’s rules for narration.

  I told the story of my mum. At the end, with my trousers dry, I explained that I’d travelled here to test my theory that the death of Freja, accidental or not, might be a defining event at the centre of my mum’s illness. Caren stared into the fire while speaking:

  ‘Tilde loved the countryside more than any child I’ve ever taught. She was far happier playing in a tree than in a classroom. She’d swim across lakes. She’d collect seeds and berries. Animals adored her. But she did not make friends easily.’

  I asked:

  ‘Except for Freja?’

  Caren turned from the fire, looking directly at me:

  ‘There was no Freja.’

  • • •

  Under a full moon I returned to my grandfather’s farm, parking far enough away that the engine couldn’t be heard. I walked through snow-covered fields, arriving at the clump of trees near his farmhouse, the place where my mum had constructed a shelter and where, she’d told me, she and Freja had spent time. A hundred or so pine trees grew among moss-covered boulders, a pocket of wilderness that couldn’t be farmed. And though my mum had described climbing a tree and looking down on Freja’s farm, there were no buildings nearby. I decided to climb anyway, to see the world as my mum had seen it. The branches of the pine tree were at right angles to the trunk, like rungs on a ladder, allowing me to reach two-thirds of the way up before they became too fragile. Perched there, looking out across this landscape, I saw that I was wrong. There was a building nearby, much smaller than a farm, camouflaged by thick snow. From high above I saw the spine of the roof – a black notch cut into the blanket of white.