Rites of Spring

by Anders de la Motte

  He waves a dismissive hand.

  ‘Oh, I just lost the thread. I’d eaten badly, had too little sleep, and I just ran out of energy. But you saved me.’ He reaches out and takes her hand. ‘Without you I’d have fucked up completely. I really am grateful, Thea.’

  She smiles at him, pleased that he appreciates her sacrifice. Tries not to think about the risk she has taken.

  ‘What was that interviewer asking about?’

  ‘I don’t . . .’

  ‘He mentioned a third girl who died.’

  David slowly shakes his head. ‘It’s a tragic story. A young girl was murdered in the forest back in the Eighties. Absolutely not something we want associated with the restaurant – that’s why I didn’t quite know what to say, but you rescued the whole situation.’

  He releases her hand and stands up. Takes out his phone.

  ‘Sorry, I have to take this.’

  Only when he’s left the room does Thea realise that she didn’t actually hear his phone ring.

  *

  She waits until dawn, then goes back to the coach house and changes into dry clothes. It’s stopped raining, and the sky is pale blue, streaked with pink. Dr Andersson won’t be here for several hours, and Thea is too anxious to sit around and wait for her. She decides to take Emee for a walk in the forest.

  The ground is sodden after the storm. The track is full of puddles, and raindrops sparkle on the spiders’ webs that have survived the downpour. Thea lights up a secret cigarette, takes several deep drags and blows out the last traces of the panic attacks. However, it isn’t the residue of the PTSD that worries her the most.

  David tried to trivialise the whole thing, but it’s obvious that he didn’t want to talk about the dead girl. Why not? If she died in the Eighties, he must have been a child when it happened.

  She’s finished the cigarette by the time she reaches the glade and the Gallows Oak. Emee has beaten her to it, and is sniffing around the base of the tree with great concentration.

  Something has happened to the ancient oak. There is a black mark on the trunk that wasn’t there yesterday. Thea moves closer. Emee has started scratching among the leaves at its roots.

  The black patch begins right at the top and runs down the trunk like a jagged scar, splitting the Green Man’s face in two before it reaches the ground. This must have been where the lightning struck last night. The force and violence of the strike are both horrible and fascinating. She touches the scar. The edges are blackened, the rough bark has been burned away and in the centre she can see the paler wood inside the tree. The smell of charring lingers in the air.

  Emee is still scratching, becoming more and more agitated.

  ‘What have you got there, sweetheart?’

  Thea crouches down. The scar is broadest at the bottom, as if the power culminated when the electricity reached the ground. It has burned a hole in the trunk, and Emee is kicking up earth and fragments of wood, half-barking and half-whimpering with excitement.

  ‘What is it, Emee?’

  Thea can see something shining. She gently moves Emee to one side and reaches within. Her fingers touch a smooth, cold object. She tries to pick it up, but the hole is too small. She breaks off some of the wood to make it bigger. Emee wants to help, but Thea moves so that her own body is in the way. The dog isn’t happy, but co-operates.

  The object is partially buried in a brownish mixture of rotten wood and dried flowers. With a little persuasion, she manages to get it out and discovers that it’s an old paint tin with a lid, about twenty centimetres high and half as wide. The label is gone, the surface pitted with rust. Thea has also brought out an almost fresh wood anemone. It must have been one of the bunch she pushed into the Green Man’s mouth yesterday, which suggests that the tin once went in the same way. A very long time ago, judging by the state it’s in.

  She shakes it gently; it rattles. Emee has sat down beside her with her tongue out and her head on one side. She seems to be as curious as Thea is.

  The lid is stuck fast, as if it is determined to preserve its secret at all costs. Thea manages to insert one of her keys beneath the lip. The metal bends and creaks, then suddenly the lid flies off.

  Thea tips the contents into her hand. A small figure comes out first, then a few dry leaves. The figure is no more than ten centimetres in height, and is made up of two twigs woven together. The longer twig has been bent in the middle to form a loop, giving the figure a head and a body. The ends provide the legs, and the shorter twig, twisted just below the loop, creates a waist and arms.

  For a second she thinks of her father. The wooden doll he carved for her when she was little. She quickly pushes away the thought.

  There’s something else inside the tin, a rolled-up piece of paper. Thea puts down the figure and fishes it out, only to discover that it is in fact an old, faded Polaroid photograph. She smoothes it out as best she can.

  The photo shows a dark-haired young woman in a white dress. She is standing on a flat stone with her arms folded across her chest, her head inclined slightly. Her eyes are closed, and in her hands she is holding two antlers.

  Strangely distorted trees can be seen behind her, and on either side of the young woman stand two figures – children, judging by their height. Their faces are concealed by animal masks that remind Thea of the artwork on the dining-room ceiling in the castle. Hare, fox, owl and deer.

  Each child is holding the end of a length of ribbon tied around the woman’s wrists. It almost looks as if they are keeping her there on the stone. She is very beautiful, a kind of delicate, naïve beauty that exists only in the narrow gap between childhood and adulthood.

  The photograph is taken in daylight, and yet there is something unpleasant about the whole thing: the children, the masks, the lovely young woman, the stone and the warped trees. It is somehow reminiscent of a horror film, an impression that is reinforced by the flat perspective and the faded colours.

  Someone has written on the white border beneath the image:

  Walpurgis Night 1986. Come to the stone circle at midnight.

  Then three more words. Thea reads them aloud.

  ‘The spring sacrifice.’

  7

  Walpurgis Night 1986

  I notice them staring at me. Not just the boys in school, but the teachers too, the fathers, the old men in the town square. All of them.

  Most of them do it secretly when they believe no one is watching, but I can feel their eyes on me. I know what they think of Elita Svart. What they want to do to me.

  S

  chool was over for the day, the bus shelter was empty. Arne checked behind the seating at the football pitch, drove past the kiosk. Then he headed down to the common, where the villagers had built a huge bonfire ready for the Walpurgis Night celebrations. Right on the top, leaning against a T-shaped structure, was a figure approximately the height of a man. It was made of interwoven twigs and branches, the head formed by a loop. Arne had seen it many times, in countless variations: a representation of the Green Man.

  His big sister Ingrid used to tell terrifying stories of the Green Man and his ghostly horse, just as the residents of Tornaby had done for generations. Arne hated to admit it, but there was something about that faceless object that still made him shudder.

  He spotted a few kids on the far side of the bonfire, and wound down the window. They looked at one another when they saw the police car, then picked up their backpacks and turned their bicycles around, ready to disappear.

  ‘David!’

  ‘Hi, Uncle Arne.’ The boy let go of the handlebars, looking relieved. ‘Cool car!’

  Arne nodded with satisfaction. ‘What are you up to?’

  ‘Nothing.’ The answer came much too quickly.

  ‘So what are you doing tonight?’

  David shuffled uncomfortably and looked at his friends. Arne was trying to remember their names; he knew they often hung around at Ingrid and Bertil’s place, but he’d never taken much notice of
them. The girl was adopted, Chinese or Korean or whatever, and the boy with the cropped hair was a Pole whose parents were something important at the plastics factory. Behind them was another terrified face that presumably belonged to that crazy seamstress’s boy.

  ‘Nothing special. We’ll probably check out the bonfire,’ David replied.

  ‘You’re not going to do anything stupid?’

  ‘Of course not!’

  David shook his head, and the other three joined in.

  ‘Good. By the way, I don’t suppose you’ve seen Elita Svart?’

  For a second it was as if the little group froze in the middle of shaking their heads. Only their eyes moved, darting from side to side like frightened little sparrows. Arne fixed his eyes on his nephew. David opened his mouth a couple of times, but nothing came out.

  ‘No, we haven’t, have we, David?’

  The little adopted princess had spoken. She gave David an encouraging nod.

  ‘No,’ he mumbled.

  ‘She’s older than us. We don’t hang out together,’ the girl added.

  ‘I see. Remind me of your name?’

  ‘Jeanette, but everybody calls me Nettan.’

  ‘Your father’s the headmaster at Tornaby school, isn’t he?’

  ‘Yes. And Mum’s on the council.’

  The kid was glaring at him in a way that both irritated and amused Arne.

  ‘You don’t say.’

  He sucked in air between his teeth. It was obvious that these kids were up to something; could he be bothered to find out what it was? He ran his thumb and forefinger over his moustache. What could a gang of spoilt twelve-year-olds come up with in Tornaby? The answer was simple: nothing that was of any interest to him.

  ‘Just behave yourselves,’ he said sternly. ‘Otherwise the Green Man might come after you.’

  He pointed to the figure on top of the bonfire, and much to his satisfaction he saw four young faces turn a little paler.

  8

  ‘Hi, Margaux, it’s me again. I promised to tell you about Tornaby. The people here are perfectly ordinary, the kind who mind their own business and do the right thing. They have neatly mown lawns, and the local paper comes out on Sundays. A safe place – on the surface at least. I can’t stop thinking about that photograph.’

  D

  r Andersson is nearing retirement age, a well-built woman with several double chins and small, square glasses. She’s wearing an oilskin coat and cargo pants, and groans loudly with the effort of clambering out of her little white Toyota to shake hands.

  ‘Thea – lovely to meet you in person.’ Her handshake is firm, her palm slightly sticky. ‘That was a hell of a storm we had last night. Thunder and lightning – in April! Did you survive?’

  ‘More or less – we still don’t have any power. David’s trying to get hold of a generator for the fridges and freezers.’

  ‘Oh dear – let’s hope it’s back on soon, Thea.’

  The doctor clearly likes to repeat names – not an unusual trait among those who work with people. The Toyota is new, and the name of the local car dealer is displayed on the doors in big letters. This seems strange for a local GP, but Thea already knows that this whole set-up is kind of strange.

  ‘Have you settled into the coach house?’ Dr Andersson cranes her neck as if she’s trying to see in through the windows.

  ‘Absolutely – we’re getting there!’ A white lie. The boxes of their possessions remain largely untouched.

  ‘Excellent! The sooner the better, that’s what I always say.’ The doctor remains where she is for a few seconds, as if she’s hoping to be invited in, then she gives up and gestures towards the car. ‘OK – jump in!’

  Thea locks the door of the coach house. She’s put the old paint tin in her room, and tucked the Polaroid photograph in her inside pocket. Has the tin really been inside the Gallows Oak since the spring of 1986? It’s like a mysterious greeting from the past. Who was the beautiful young woman? Who were her four masked attendants? Why were they dressed like that?

  Come to the stone circle at midnight. The spring sacrifice.

  She thinks back to the question the TV interviewer asked, the topic David was so keen to avoid. The girl who died in the forest in the Eighties. Hadn’t the interviewer referred to her as the spring sacrifice?

  *

  Dr Andersson drives past the old stables and heads for the castle. David’s car is still parked by the east wing, along with several other vehicles belonging to various trades.

  ‘How’s it going? Will the restaurant be ready in time?’ the doctor asks as they pass by.

  ‘I think so. David’s working around the clock.’

  ‘Ingrid’s told me a little bit about what’s going on. The foundation has put a lot of money into the renovation.’

  Thea suspects this statement is in fact a question, but she refrains from commenting. Dr Andersson continues along the avenue, then turns right onto the main road. The name is misleading; it’s actually a strip of bumpy tarmac with no line down the centre, meandering between oilseed rape fields and clumps of trees.

  ‘So, Thea, as you already know this job is something of a special arrangement. It’s funded by the Bokelund Foundation and a number of private sponsors, such as our local car dealer.’ The doctor pats the steering wheel with something that could be affection. ‘It’s just a part-time post, and we’ll make home visits as well as holding a surgery in the community centre. It’s all pretty straightforward – cleaning wounds, giving flu jabs, peering into people’s ears and throats, pulling splinters out of fingers and so on.’

  She slows down to let an approaching tractor pass by. Sounds her horn and waves cheerily at the driver. ‘Little Stefan. He’s worked at the castle for many years. Needless to say, the life of a GP is nowhere near as eventful as life with Doctors Without Borders. The idea behind this arrangement is for the residents of Tornaby to have access to their own doctor, someone who’s part of the community. A bit like the way things used to be, if you know what I mean. The surgery must be open on Monday and Tuesday mornings. People are used to that. Otherwise you can plan your schedule to suit you, and make sure you post it on the homepage on the Friday of the previous week at the latest. Freedom with responsibility, so to speak.’

  Thea nods. Her mother-in-law has already explained all this, but as long as the doctor is talking, she’s not asking intrusive questions.

  ‘As I’m sure Ingrid’s told you, the Bokelund Foundation exists to promote the good of the community. And this is a wonderful job – the best I’ve ever had, in fact.’

  There is a faint hint of sorrow in Dr Andersson’s words, a suggestion that there may be more to this story. But not right now.

  The road straightens out, a central line appears along with speed bumps and road signs, plus an electronic board wishing drivers a pleasant day as long as they stay below forty kilometres an hour.

  ‘I’m sure you know the village well by now – you must have been here lots of times.’

  Thea nods, even though it isn’t true. Prior to the past week, she had only visited Tornaby once before, and now they usually drive straight through the village. David has never wanted to come here. Thea hasn’t asked why, because she didn’t want any reciprocal questions about the area where she grew up. However, following the interview and his weird behaviour this morning, she can’t help wondering if there’s a particular reason why they’ve stayed away. Something to do with a dead girl.

  She thinks about the Polaroid in her pocket. Maybe the talkative doctor can tell her what it’s about? But first they have to get to know each other better.

  *

  In the eastern part of the village the houses date from the 1950s. Gradually the landscape changes – leafy gardens, tall flagpoles, white picket fences. The year of construction is painted on several façades, always from the early twentieth century. One of the largest houses belongs to Thea’s in-laws.

  Tornaby boasts the almost obligatory pizzeria,
a combined ice-cream and fast-food kiosk, plus an ironmonger’s that is fighting for survival against the big DIY chains. The fire station resembles a Lego model with its red door and little turrets. The post office is long gone, but there is still a small Konsum supermarket, plus a branch of Sparbanken, where her father-in-law was once the manager.

  The church is located on a patch of higher ground, surrounded by tall poplars. It is built of depressing grey sandstone blocks, and has several side naves plus an enormous tower, which makes it look far too large in comparison to the rest of the village.

  ‘The oldest stone church in Skåne,’ Dr Andersson informs Thea as they pass by. ‘The crypt and one wall were built back in the 1000s, but this area was an important religious hub long before Christianity made its mark. Tornaby is named after the hawthorn – hagtorn – which was a sacred tree in pre-Christian religions.’

  Thea murmurs something in an effort to sound interested.

  The red-brick community centre is diagonally opposite the church. David was educated here until the age of twelve, when the school moved to the uninspiring concrete box down by the sports ground. That’s more or less all Thea knows about his childhood, apart from the fact that he used to hang out with Nettan and Sebastian, who are now his business partners.

  She thinks of the photograph again, the children in the masks, the young woman. Walpurgis Night 1986, that’s thirty-three years ago. David was twelve, Thea was fifteen. A completely different person from the one she is now.

  TORNABY COMMUNITY CENTRE, announces an unnecessarily large sign at the end of the drive. And in smaller letters: DOCTOR’S SURGERY, FOLK MUSEUM, MEETING ROOM, CAFÉ, CHARITY SHOP. Two women, each with a pushchair, are chatting beneath a cherry tree. They wave as the doctor pulls into the car park.

  ‘A lot of families with young children move here,’ she says. ‘The new road has helped, and in two years we’ll be linked to the local train service.’ She parks the car, still talking as she extricates herself from the driving seat with some difficulty. ‘This place is perfect for families. There’s a strong community spirit – everyone knows everyone else. This centre is key – a meeting point, thanks to the Bokelund Foundation and the parish council. They’ve also put pressure on the politicians to make sure we keep the school – much better than bussing all the children to Ljungslöv, as so many of the other small villages have to do. We also have a Facebook group you ought to join, Thea. That’s where you’ll find out most of what goes on in the village.’