After the Fire

by Henning Mankell

At that moment a pale blue car came racing down the hill; the driver slammed on the brakes when it reached the parking area. Lisa Modin got out. She was wearing the same jacket as the previous day. I stood up and waved. In my eagerness I exaggerated the gesture; the boat rocked and I almost fell in the water. I banged my knee on one of the oars and sat down in the bottom with a thud. I don’t know if she noticed; I was back on my feet by the time she reached the boat.

  ‘Sorry I’m late,’ she said.

  ‘No problem.’

  I took her handbag and helped her into the boat. She was wearing gloves. I gave her the life jacket and cast off. She settled down on the seat in the middle with her back to me. I headed out of the harbour and increased my speed. Nordin was standing outside the chandlery smoking his pipe. He’s one of the few people I know these days who stubbornly refuses to give up smoking.

  Lisa Modin didn’t say a word throughout the whole journey, she just sat gazing out across the islands, the rocks and the open sea. A sea eagle drifted high above us on the thermals. That was the only time she turned to me. I nodded towards the bird, which appeared to be suspended on invisible strings.

  ‘A golden eagle?’ she called out.

  ‘Sea eagle.’

  Those were the only words we exchanged. I slowed down as we approached my jetty. The site of the fire was clearly visible. I manoeuvred carefully into the boathouse.

  She didn’t need any help getting ashore. We went straight up to my burned-out house. She walked around the blackened remains once, twice, the second time in the opposite direction. I stood by the charred apple tree, watching her. For a brief moment she reminded me of Harriet when she was young, although Harriet had never had such short hair. Suddenly I didn’t know if my desire was focused on a memory or on the woman walking around the ruins.

  Lisa rejoined me, shaking her head.

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘I was asleep, and I woke up because the room was full of a searing light. I ran straight outside.’

  ‘I spoke to Bengt Alexandersson on the phone. He said the cause of the fire is still unclear.’

  ‘Did he say anything else?’

  ‘No. Just that the cause of the fire is unclear.’

  I immediately felt that she wasn’t telling the truth. Alexandersson must have said something else. Did she know that I was suspected of having set fire to my own house?

  I turned away and slowly walked back to the boathouse and the bench. I no longer had the desire to invite her into the caravan for a cup of coffee. She followed me and sat down beside me with her notepad and pen in her hand.

  ‘How do you survive?’ she asked.

  ‘You get out of the house as fast as you can.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant. How do you survive when you’ve lost everything you own?’

  ‘We really need very little in order to live.’

  ‘But what about all the memories? The family heirlooms? The photograph albums? The floors you have always walked on, the wallpaper you have seen every day, the doors you have opened and closed?’

  ‘The most important memories are preserved in my mind. I can’t weep over the fact that everything is gone. I have to decide what to do. I have no intention of allowing the fire to steal my life.’

  ‘Are you going to rebuild the house?’

  ‘I don’t know yet.’

  ‘But you were fully insured, of course?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Including the contents?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  She jotted a few things down. I noticed that she used shorthand. She was still wearing her gloves. I ought to ask her what Alexandersson had really said.

  She suddenly pulled a face and bent her head. I could see that she was in pain.

  ‘I’m wondering if I’ve slipped a disc,’ she said. ‘But maybe it’s just a stiff neck?’

  I got to my feet.

  ‘I run a kind of doctor’s surgery from this bench,’ I said. ‘Would you like me to check?’

  She looked as if she thought I was joking.

  ‘I could examine you,’ I said quietly. ‘It will only take a couple of minutes.’

  She hesitated, but then she took off her scarf and unbuttoned her jacket. I felt her neck, gently pressing the vertebrae. Then I asked her to move her head and neck according to my instructions. I suspected it could well be a slipped disc, but she would need an X-ray to confirm my diagnosis.

  Her body was warm. I wanted to rest my face against her skin. I asked her to carry out a few unnecessary movements just so that I could leave my hands where they were.

  She put her scarf back on and promised to go for an X-ray. I suggested that we go into the caravan for a cup of coffee while we continued our conversation. First of all she took a couple of photographs of me sitting on the bench with the sea in the background, then she wanted me to go and stand right at the end of the jetty looking out to sea. I did as she said.

  The caravan was very cramped with two people inside it at the same time. I sliced the brioche and set it out on a plate and served coffee in mismatched cups, which were all I had. I sat at the table on a stool, while Lisa sat on the bed with a cushion behind her back. She asked me about the history of the house and the island, how long I had lived there and how I saw my future.

  The last question was the most difficult to answer. I simply said that I hadn’t yet made any decisions. The fire was still burning inside me.

  ‘That’s a beautiful way of putting it,’ she said. ‘Beautiful and terrifying.’

  When she didn’t appear to have any further questions, I asked her how she had ended up working for the local newspaper. She told me she had split up with her husband and left Strängnäs, where she had been working for another local paper. She had moved here a year ago for the job, and I had a feeling that she wasn’t particularly happy.

  She had no children. I didn’t ask, she just told me.

  ‘What will you be doing in ten years?’ I wondered.

  ‘Hopefully something I can’t even imagine today. What about you?’

  ‘I’ll give the same answer as you.’

  ‘But you’ll still be here? In a new house?’

  I didn’t reply. We sat in silence as the alder branches tapped against the roof of the caravan.

  ‘I’ve never been out in the archipelago before,’ she said. ‘Strangely enough. Now I can see how beautiful it is.’

  ‘It has a particular beauty just before the winter. There’s nothing lovelier, although some people see it as desolate and frightening.’

  ‘I heard about one of the outer skerries where poor fishermen and their families used to live long ago. Apparently you can still see something of the foundations of their houses, and no one can understand how anyone could survive out there. I’d like to see that. But if I’ve understood correctly, no one is allowed to go ashore?’

  ‘That’s only during the birds’ breeding season. You can go there at this time of year.’

  ‘Have you been there?’

  ‘Many times. I can show you if you like.’

  She immediately accepted my invitation.

  ‘Next Wednesday?’ she suggested. ‘If you have time? I realise you have a lot to think about at the moment.’

  ‘I’ve got all the time in the world.’

  We carried on talking about the fire. She asked me to describe my former house, room by room. I told her about the rough oak timbers in the walls, how the trees had been felled in the northern reaches of the archipelago and dragged across the ice by horses. My grandfather had told me that one of the wagonloads had gone down near a small insignificant shallow that was known as Kejsaren, for some reason. Even if the ice was thick, treacherous cracks could appear in the vicinity of shallows or close to long shorelines. The horse, which according to my grandfather was called Rommel, had gone straight through the ice along with the driver, who was only twenty years old. No one had been around, no one had heard the screams. It wasn’t until late at nig
ht that the search had begun, by flickering torchlight. The following day the crack had sealed itself, and neither horse nor driver were found until the spring came and the ice loosened its grip.

  I felt as if I was walking through my house once more. The cumulative impressions left by several generations had been obliterated in just a few short hours. Invisible traces of movements, words, silences, sorrows, suffering and laughter had disappeared. Even things that are invisible can be reduced to soot and ashes.

  As we walked down to the boathouse I was already looking forward to Lisa’s return. Right now that was more important to me than the blackened ruins of my house.

  I dropped her off in the harbour by the petrol pumps. We shook hands. I waited until she got into her car and drove off.

  Back on the island I discovered that Jansson had been to collect his phone. He had placed a bag of freshly baked crisprolls in the metal box.

  Jansson is a man of many talents. On one occasion he revealed that he was interested in how people had executed one another over the centuries. It turned out that he knew everything about strange, barbaric methods of execution. I listened in astonishment and with growing revulsion to the catalogue of human brutality until he abruptly stopped, as if he had realised that he had said too much.

  But the most remarkable thing about Jansson is his clear, sonorous tenor voice. On Harriet’s last birthday he surprised us all by suddenly getting up from the table in the midsummer twilight and singing Schubert’s ‘Ave Maria’, the sound echoing across the water. We were all deeply moved and equally taken aback. No one knew he had such a powerful voice. However, when he was subsequently asked to join the church choir, he said no. No one has heard him sing since that birthday party, when Harriet sat with a garland of flowers in her hair just a few weeks before she died.

  I took the crisprolls up to the caravan, where I sat down and made a list of all the things I had to sort out. I also looked at my financial situation and discovered that, thanks to my thriftiness over the years, it wasn’t nearly as bad as I had feared. I had around two hundred thousand kronor in various bank accounts, plus a quantity of stocks and shares.

  I opened a couple of tins and made myself something to eat, then went for a walk around the island. When I got back I fetched an old transistor radio from the boathouse. I didn’t expect it to work, but when I put in the new batteries I had remembered to buy the previous day, it actually made a noise. I listened to a lecture by a professor at the University of Lund who was talking about the healing properties of magnetism. As a doctor I obviously don’t believe in the miraculous power of magnets, but the professor had a pleasant voice. I didn’t really care what he was saying.

  Then came the news and the shipping forecast. The outside world becomes more incomprehensible with each passing day. I am losing track of which terrorist groups are killing each other. A Palestinian boy had been burned alive outside Jerusalem. This terrible bulletin ended with a report about a group of rebels in Iraq who had been crucified by their opponents. Their hatred was based on different opinions on what constituted the true religion. Both parties believed that they were serving the same god.

  There was no god in my caravan. Perhaps he wandered around the island at night? Perhaps he slept in the boathouse? I had no intention of ever letting him in here, not even if he was frozen stiff. When it came to contact with gods, I was capable of inhumane behaviour.

  I woke early the following day. During the night I had dreamed of an armada of ancient motorboats surrounding the island. The beams of their headlights shone at my caravan with such intensity that it reminded me of the fire. I woke up thinking the caravan must be burning. I ran out into the darkness stark naked. My heart carried on pounding for a long time, even after I had realised it was only a dream.

  I lay awake for ages. The wind rocked the caravan slightly, like a vessel bobbing around on its moorings.

  Eventually I dozed off and slept until six o’clock. I went down to the boathouse and took my morning dip. The thermometer was showing seven degrees. The yellow Chinese shirt served as a towel once more. I made coffee and sardine sandwiches. Just to be on the safe side, I checked the tin to make sure it didn’t say ‘Produce of China’, but in fact the fish had made the long journey from Lagos in Portugal.

  At seven thirty Kolbjörn arrived in his big aluminium ferry. Apart from his electrical expertise, he also has an in-depth knowledge of different forms of marine propulsion. This particular vessel was driven by a jet stream, which meant it didn’t need a propeller.

  We chatted for a while down by the jetty. He had brought some outdoor lights as well as a couple of table lamps for the caravan.

  The electric cable to my island comes ashore on the south side. There is a sign to say that dropping anchor there is forbidden. I asked Kolbjörn if he would like a cup of coffee, but he declined; he wanted to get straight down to work. He had only glanced in passing at the site of the fire; it was as if he would prefer not to see it.

  I asked if he needed an unqualified labourer. Once again he declined; he would rather work alone. When I wondered whether we should discuss his fee for the job, he muttered something unintelligible in response.

  I knew he would charge me next to nothing. As far as he was concerned, I was a person in dire straits who needed support.

  My mobile rang. I didn’t recognise the number and when I answered I heard an eager voice wanting to sell me outdoor furniture made of durable plastic. Before I ended the call in an outburst of rage I gathered that the price had been slashed now the summer was over. The salesman didn’t call back.

  As I slipped the phone in my pocket I heard the throb of an engine; it was the coastguard. This time Captain Pålsson was at the helm, with Alexandersson and a man I had never seen before on board. They hove to next to Kolbjörn’s ferry and came ashore. Alexandersson was in uniform, while the other man wore an overcoat with blue overalls underneath.

  Alexandersson introduced him.

  ‘Detective Inspector Sture Hämäläinen. The police are investigating the cause of the fire too.’

  Hämäläinen was short and chubby, and his face was so pale I thought he was wearing white make-up. He shook my hand.

  ‘It’s just routine,’ he said. ‘Apart from anything else, you’ll have problems with the insurance if the cause of the fire can’t be established.’

  He spoke Swedish with a Finnish accent. At least he wasn’t made in China, I thought grimly.

  We went up to the house. Kolbjörn and Alexandersson nodded to one another.

  ‘I’m not a pyromaniac,’ I said. ‘Why would I set fire to my own house?’

  I was speaking to Hämäläinen, but he didn’t reply. He was staring at the ruins. I wasn’t even sure if he had heard what I said. Then he began to walk slowly around the plot.

  ‘Why are the police involved?’ I asked Alexandersson. ‘Do you really think I’m responsible for this?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘What does he think he’s going to find?’

  ‘The cause. He’s very good.’

  ‘Let’s hope you’re right.’

  I noticed that I was getting annoyed. Alexandersson understood. We didn’t say anything else.

  Kolbjörn was busy fixing up an external light down by the boathouse.

  ‘Who’s the stranger?’ he wanted to know.

  ‘A detective inspector who’s going to try and find out if I set fire to my own house.’

  Kolbjörn dropped his screwdriver. I bent down and gave it back to him.

  ‘I’m not an arsonist,’ I said. ‘I’m going shopping. There’s a flask of coffee in the caravan.’

  I didn’t go shopping. I chugged aimlessly around the islands instead, then I decided to go out to Vrångskär, the skerry I would be visiting with Lisa Modin in a few days.

  I went ashore, pulled the boat up behind me, then found a place to sit under a distorted pine tree where the ground was dry.

  I could see storm clouds gathering
on the distant horizon. I gazed out to sea, thinking that soon I would have to decide what I was going to do.

  Had my life gone up in flames? Did I still have the desire to imagine anything beyond the humiliation of old age? Could I find a new will to live?

  Basically it came down to just one question: did I want to rebuild the house or should I let Louise inherit the site of a fire?

  I carried on staring out to sea, hoping that an answer would drift ashore. But nothing turned up.

  However, I did make up my mind that I wouldn’t wait any longer; I was going to move the caravan to the skerry and the hollow between the two rocks. No doubt Kolbjörn would be able to run a cable from the island to the skerry; he wouldn’t hesitate to break the law if that was what it took to solve an emergency energy issue.

  The decision gave me the strength to get to my feet. I went down to the boat, breaking off one of the last roses of the summer on the way, and set off for home.

  The two boats were still there. Kolbjörn was in the process of fixing up the wiring in the caravan, while Alexandersson and Hämäläinen were still at the site of the fire.

  ‘Have you found anything?’ I asked.

  I couldn’t help noticing the fleeting glance they exchanged. It worried me, but it also irritated me. A mixture of worry and anger leads to fear.

  ‘What have you found?’ I persisted.

  ‘Indications that the fire started simultaneously in several places,’ Hämäläinen said.

  ‘What kind of indications?’

  ‘There are signs that an accelerant was used.’

  ‘So the fire was started deliberately?’

  Hämäläinen grimaced and shook his head. Alexandersson looked troubled, scraping his foot at the ash around the foundations.

  ‘So I’m suspected of starting the fire,’ I said.

  Hämäläinen shrugged, then looked me straight in the eye.

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘Did I what?’

  ‘Start the fire.’

  I turned to Alexandersson. ‘Who is this fucking Finn you’ve brought with you?’

  I didn’t wait for a response, but stormed off down to the caravan. Kolbjörn, who was outside balancing on a ladder, could see that I was upset. But he didn’t say anything.