by Stefan Spjut
He hovered the cursor over a light-brown headland.
‘That’s where it was. By the road here.’
There were two properties on the headland, but no addresses or telephone numbers.
‘You’re going to have to phone National Land Registration,’ said Mats. ‘Or the council.’
‘Or a neighbour,’ Susso said. ‘We could phone someone who lives close by, someone whose number we could get hold of.’
‘There’s no point,’ Gudrun said.
‘Why not?’ Susso asked, straightening her glasses.
‘If it’s true he isn’t human, or whatever you want to call it, and he knows someone who lives on the headland, do you think they are going to tell you where he is?’
Susso folded her arms.
‘Yes, I do,’ she said. ‘If they hear what he might be mixed up in.’
Gudrun shook her head.
‘We have to go there.’
‘To Gränna?’ said Torbjörn, looking at Gudrun.
‘An unannounced visit is our only hope,’ she said.
‘But how far away is it?’ Susso said.
Gudrun shrugged.
‘Three hundred kilometres,’ said Mats.
Gudrun’s mouth was pursed and ringed with deep lines.
‘We can’t turn back now.’
Animals were not allowed in the hostel, Seved was pretty sure about that, so he left the cage in the car, hidden under a blanket. He would have to get it later, after reception closed. There was a girl sitting behind the glass, no older than twenty, if that. He mumbled the false name he had used to book the room and paid. The girl gave him a key with the room number engraved on a plastic tab. He took the lift up to a narrow corridor with green vinyl flooring and found his room at the far end on the right.
It was considerably bigger than he had expected. A bunk bed of white-painted steel stood on one side of the window and a single bed on the other. He felt relieved as he put his bag down on the table. The thought of having to sleep in the same room as the shapeshifting lemming had been worrying him ever since Lennart had ordered him to drive to Kiruna. For a while he had even considered booking two separate rooms, but this room was big enough for him to stash the cage far from the bed. On the table lay a pile of folders. Tourist brochures. He sat down and opened one of them. It showed a map of the town surrounded by advertisements. Hotel Kebne: the hotel that raises your expectations. Café Safari. The Nanking restaurant. He turned the map over. Kiruna is special, it said.
Gunnar Myrén Ltd. There was a picture of a light aircraft, which made him remember what the newspaper had said, that Susso Myrén’s grandfather had been an aerial photographer.
He had no plans to go and see the shop. Lennart had said there would probably be too many people there. He had written down the sister’s address on a piece of paper, and also the address of her fiancé. If she was not at one address, he would be sure to find her at the other.
He ought to get going straight away. According to Lennart, this was an urgent matter. But he knew, as he sat in the silent, spartan room, that he was going to wait a while. He had to prepare himself mentally. Brace himself. That was what he told himself, anyway. In reality he wanted to put it off as long as he possibly could.
Until he no longer had any choice.
What the shapeshifter was going to do to the sister was unclear to him, nor did he know how much he would have to do to her himself. And what could he resort to if he failed to get anything out of her? He had seen what the little creatures in the box had done to the policemen in Årrenjarka, but he was not nearly as good at handling them as Torsten was. But of course Lennart knew that. He would not have allowed him to take the thing with him unless he had been confident of its influence over human beings.
Or was Lennart getting desperate? Was he allowing himself to be controlled by something other than the objective common sense he was always guided by? Was he afraid? Or had someone else told him to deal with Susso Myrén? That bloke Erasmus, perhaps?
And why was there such a rush? She would be home again all in good time. Börje made him believe that it was something else, that there was more at stake than simply shutting her up.
There was someone further south she must not come into contact with.
But who?
He looked at the clock. It was nearly eight. Reception closed at ten. That meant he could rest for a while. He needed that. The snow was piled up in a huge drift outside the window and the light from the street lamps was falling in strips through the slats of the Venetian blind. Without removing his jacket or his shoes, he lay down on the bed with his hands clasped over his chest and stared up at the ceiling. For the first time in ages he would be able to sleep without the worry of being woken up by the old-timers. He appreciated the murmur of voices coming through the hostel wall. Unfamiliar voices. Indistinct. Soon he was asleep.
Mats had recommended the Mas Grill when they asked him if there was a place nearby where they could get something to eat. When Susso and Torbjörn walked in and went to look at the illuminated menu board above the counter, the man working there glanced at them and then went back to watching television. Susso thought he was probably on his tea break. In front of his feet, under the table, was a pair of slippers. A second man quickly appeared, ready to take their order.
Susso pushed her hands into her pockets and realised that she was not really that hungry after all.
The door opened and Gudrun came in.
They all sat down at a table at the back of the restaurant. The tablecloth was flattened under a sheet of glass that reflected the wall lamps and the lighting above the petrol pumps outside. Susso studied the gaudy pattern of the tablecloth with its small birds sitting on snow-covered branches and star-shaped ginger biscuits hanging from red ribbons.
They sat in silence for a while. All Susso had was a can of soft drink.
‘Have you told the police we’re going to Gränna?’ asked Gudrun.
‘I put it in the email,’ Susso said. ‘When I sent the film.’
‘Has he answered then?’
‘I don’t know about the email. But they’ve got your number.’
‘Perhaps you ought to ring Edit as well?’
‘Not yet. There’s no point if we can’t get hold of anyone who knows who the Vaikijaur man is. I don’t want her to say anything to Mattias’s parents, either, in case they start getting their hopes up.’
‘It’s lucky we’ve got Torbjörn with us,’ Gudrun said. ‘This isn’t entirely risk free, you know.’
‘What do you mean?’ he said, finishing off his hamburger.
‘He might have relatives down here, or accomplices, and here we are, snooping around. We already know what they’re capable of.’
‘They won’t still be living there,’ Torbjörn said.
‘Why not?’
‘It’s not usual for a house to have the same owner for a quarter of a century,’ he answered. ‘It’s more likely someone else lives there now.’
‘It’s not that unusual either,’ Gudrun said, wagging her head. ‘And even if it isn’t the same owner now as it was in 1980, they’re certain to know who lived there before and can give us the name. I’m sure that we’ll find them sooner or later. And then, as I said, who knows what might happen.’
Susso sat with her hand around her drink can, looking at the television.
‘Have you ever been to Gränna?’
Gudrun wiped her mouth with a napkin.
‘Yes, I have,’ she nodded. ‘It’s at such an angle it drives you mad.’
‘What do you mean, angle?’
‘It slopes,’ Gudrun said, moving her hand in a diving gesture towards her plate. ‘Everything is built on a steep slope. If you fall over at the top of the town, you won’t stop until you’ve rolled all the way down into Lake Vättern.’
Did it get into his mind? Could it really radiate that far?
It seemed impossible, but that’s what he was thinking as he sprinted down
the corridor towards the lift. It felt as if the little creature had been inside him, as if it had tunnelled into his head from far, far away.
Why else would he have woken up?
It was almost one thirty and he must have slept heavily.
The car windows were white and opaque and the roof glittered. What the hell was he going to do if it had frozen to death? When he opened the door, which had stuck to the frame in the extreme cold, he was relieved to hear signs of life coming from the cage. After only a second or two, the shapeshifter had forced its vibrating fear into his consciousness.
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I know.’
He took the blanket-covered cage in his arms, shut the car door with his foot and walked swiftly to the entrance. His head was pulsating. It felt as if it would split open.
The little shapeshifter must have calmed down a little because once they were in the lift the pressure in Seved’s forehead eased. He closed his eyes and leaned his head against the wall.
They had taken the left exit at the roundabout south of Gränna and knew they were close now. Susso sat up and looked from side to side through the car windows. A lake appeared on the left-hand side of the road, widening out in a southerly direction towards an expanse of water beyond the sound. There were small islands out there, clusters of forest that had torn themselves away and were drifting to the far side.
‘It must be here,’ Gudrun said, easing her foot off the accelerator pedal. ‘This must be Lake Bunn.’
Susso protected her eyes from the blinding reflection of the sun and leaned against the window, which was scaly with dried, dirty water. A carpet of pines covered the distant hills, following the ridges like a fur coat.
To think it was so hilly. She would never have thought that of Småland. Earlier, when the motorway had quite unexpectedly run alongside Lake Vättern, she had been astounded by the precipitous, lacerated rocks and the brilliance of the ice-covered lake dissolving into a remote mist. It had not even occurred to her that Lake Vättern would be here. A sea encompassed by land. A deep gash.
The sight of the mountains rising up on the opposite shore of Lake Bunn had a similar effect. It struck her that this part of the country was completely unknown to her. It had always existed on the map, but only there. She had never been here, not even in her thoughts.
‘It’s first right after the beach,’ Susso said, squashing herself between the two front seats and pointing. But Gudrun did not need any directions. Torbjörn, who had been woken by the ticking of the indicator, hooked his fingers over the door handle and pushed himself upright.
‘Are we there?’ he asked.
In the flattened grass at the side of the road were double wheel tracks that turned off towards the lake and followed the shoreline. NO UN UTHORIS D VEHI LES, a notice said. The missing letters had worn away from the metal disc and the post leaned and was disfigured by rust. Torbjörn knocked on the window to draw their attention to the sign, and Gudrun muttered something. The Passat crept along. Susso was looking in the other direction at a yellow brick building standing beside the main road.
A couple of cycles were propped against the wall and a rag rug was hanging over the veranda railing.
‘This can’t be it, can it?’
‘No,’ Gudrun said, without looking. ‘That’s a different house. We’ve got to go out on the actual headland. Assuming that’s possible.’
Down towards the lake, alder and birch saplings were growing in a tangled mass and the lake shone through the gaps in the foliage. Gudrun had leaned so far forwards her chin was almost touching the steering wheel.
The track was bordered on one side by a garden fence marked with round patches of lichen. The fencing criss-crossed at right angles and at every join was a small square of grey-green chipboard, partly eaten away by the damp. Beyond the fence, ground elder was growing in huge clumps, huddled together in the cold. Raspberry canes formed a stiff mesh in the background. Someone had tied a cat-shaped plastic reflector on the fence.
‘There’s no one here,’ said Torbjörn. ‘You can tell from the grass that no one has driven here for a long time.’
It came to an end in front of two tall wrought-iron gates with an ornate pattern of welded feathers. A plastic-coated chain with a hefty padlock linked the gates together. The posts were made of stone capped with black steel. There were two yellow plastic signs that read UNAUTHORISED ENTRY PROHIBITED and BEWARE OF THE DOG.
‘If the dog is as old as the signs, then we don’t have to worry,’ said Gudrun, turning the wheel.
Next to the gates was an old storage shed. The red paint on the wooden panelling had worn away, exposing long strips of silvery-grey wood. It had two sets of double doors with hand-wrought iron hinges, held shut with steel bars. Gudrun drove up to the shed, reversed and parked with the rear of the Passat facing the gates.
‘Well, here we are then.’
Susso had not expected it to look quite so sealed off. It made her think. The gate and the signs were signals that could not be misunderstood. They were not welcome. There was little chance they would get any answers here.
She stayed where she was in the car.
‘What kind of people live here, anyway?’ she said. ‘More Laestadians?’
‘Perfectly normal people,’ Gudrun said, looking at the gates in the mirror.
‘Normal?’ Susso said.
Gudrun nodded.
‘Signs like this are generally put up for good reason.’
*
There was a wind blowing up from the lake and a waft of sodden vegetation hit Susso. A smell of ditches. The clumps of reeds slumped behind the trees and were silent. The only sound came from the motorway in the distance. Susso had put a few printouts of the Vaikijaur man’s face in a plastic folder, which she rolled up as she approached the gates.
Gudrun craned her neck and stood peering through the gates. She had turned up the collar of her jacket and pushed her hands into her pockets.
‘Is it there, do you think?’
They could see a white-rendered stone house with a semicircular extension at the edge of the forest a few hundred metres away. The facade was made darker by the shadows thrown onto it by the trees, making it look as if half the building was painted dark grey. All the windows of the extension had curtains that were shut. A house with closed eyes. Was this where he had run to?
Torbjörn slammed the car door and clicked open the lid of his snus tin.
After he had inserted a pouch of snus under his lip and shoved the tin back in his pocket he repeated his earlier remark, saying that there was no one here.
How could he know that? Susso stepped up to the fence connected to the gate posts. It was low enough for her to straddle the pointed slats and swing her legs over without difficulty. She then glared at her mother, who clumsily lifted one leg. Her long jacket got caught and Torbjörn came to help free her.
Susso walked purposefully towards the white house. She was holding the roll of photographs tightly. They were documents proving she had the right to be there, though she had no idea what she was actually going to say when they found someone. That made her nervous because this meeting must not go wrong. It was likely she would only have one chance.
Ringing on people’s doors was something she did every day in her job, but approaching like this was something entirely different.
And then to start talking about trolls …
Naturally the word ‘troll’ was not one she could use.
She was here about a person, a very unusual little person, but a person nonetheless. Possibly one mixed up in child abduction. A person wanted by the police. And she had a picture of him.
On the two visible sides of the house were many doors, all of them made of glass. She aimed for the nearest one. The door had a column on each side supporting a little balcony with an iron railing, and Susso thought it looked like the main entrance. There were stone steps up to the house and the railings were made of wood. It looked rather makeshift. She ran up the
steps and knocked on the door. Two knocks followed by four in quick succession. The pane of glass rattled.
When no one opened she peered in.
There was a small console topped with marble. There were paintings but she could not make out what they were because of the reflection in the glass. An umbrella was hanging from the coat rack, along with a wooden hanger and a small shoehorn in light-green plastic, all on different hooks. It looked abandoned.
Gudrun and Torbjörn stood close together under the birch trees, watching her as she returned to them with her arms folded. She shook her head and walked past them.
The second building was a little further off.
The trail they followed wound behind a dense grove of tall spruce trees. Torbjörn walked behind Susso, muttering that he was sure there was no one out here on the headland. If there was, they would have seen a car.
‘They could have come by bus,’ Susso said irritably.
She walked quickly, swiping at the yellow blades of grass with her rolled-up folder, looking down at the ground.
‘People who live like this don’t travel by bus,’ he said.
He was right, of course, but even so she walked on. The trail to the Vaikijaur man ended here, in this place. They had to find someone to talk to; they had travelled over three-quarters of the country to get here. She was about to say that when she came to a halt. She had caught sight of a small wooden sign in the grass to the side of the trail. BJÖRKUDDEN, it said. Just beyond it were three large rocks piled on top of each other. On the top rock someone had painted an ugly laughing face. The nose was covered with warts. Large ear lobes were weighed down by rings. In the grinning mouth a front tooth was missing. The hair was a cushion of moss.
‘Have a look at this,’ she said. ‘Could this just be a coincidence?’
‘Well of course it is,’ answered Torbjörn, looking up at the treetops to emphasise how little the stone troll interested him. ‘It’s like a garden gnome,’ he went on. ‘If we hadn’t come here to ask about a troll, you would never have bothered about it.’
