After the Fire

by Henning Mankell

  The wind had got up. Jansson pulled his old woolly hat low down over his forehead. He looked like a frozen animal, standing there steering his boat. I tried to prepare myself for the forthcoming encounter with my daughter, if she had returned. The important thing was not to lose my temper. I couldn’t bear the thought of us staring at one another with loathing.

  However, I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to be alone, or whether I wanted her to stay. I couldn’t make up my mind.

  I sat facing the direction in which we were going. The wind was against us and felt cold on my skin. I caught sight of something black, breaking the surface of the water. If it was a log we could easily have an accident. I waved my arms at Jansson, trying to tell him to veer to one side, but he misunderstood me and cut the engine.

  ‘There’s something in the water,’ I shouted.

  Jansson swung to the side and moved the boat slowly forward. He spotted the object that I had seen, but we still couldn’t make out what it was. Jansson stood up, steering towards it with one foot. During all those years as a postman in the archipelago he had come across many strange, sometimes frightening things in the sea. He once found a human body, almost completely decomposed, which was never identified. After that incident he came to my little private clinic by the boathouse and complained that he was sleeping badly. He said he had the feeling that the body had been partially eaten, and as there were unlikely to be any flesh-eating monsters in the Baltic Sea, he had started to imagine it was the remains of a cannibal’s supper.

  This time it was a dead seal. Not a cub, but a fully grown grey seal. It stank. The eyes had been pecked out by gulls or eagles. Jansson prodded it with the boathook while breathing through his mouth.

  ‘It’s been shot,’ he said. ‘With a shotgun.’

  Using the boathook as a pointer, he showed me where the pellets had hit the back of the animal’s head.

  ‘It’s pure vindictiveness,’ Jansson said angrily. ‘Someone has amused themselves by shooting the seal without bothering to deal with it afterwards.’

  ‘Let’s go,’ I said. ‘If it’s dead, there’s nothing we can do.’

  ‘I ought to tow it ashore and bury it. I don’t want it lying here stinking.’

  ‘You can do that when you’ve dropped me off,’ I said firmly.

  I looked away; Jansson increased his speed.

  As we turned in towards the jetty, I could see that my boat wasn’t there. Louise still hadn’t come home. Jansson noticed the same thing.

  ‘Your boat isn’t here,’ he said as he hove to.

  ‘Louise had a few errands,’ I said.

  I quickly unloaded my bags, then gave Jansson two hundred kronor before he had time to protest. I placed the notes under the bailer so they wouldn’t blow away. He reversed out, no doubt heading back to bury the stinking seal. I waved and carried my bags into the boathouse.

  It had been drizzling on and off, but at the moment it was dry. It didn’t look as if Louise had been back to the caravan during the day: everything was exactly the same as when I had changed my clothes in the morning.

  I sat down on the bed and called Directory Enquiries to find out the number for Veronika’s cafe. It was a while before she answered. In the background I could hear the sound of lively customers, even though it was still only afternoon. Veronika seemed stressed.

  I asked if she had been in touch with Nordin’s family. She had, and she now knew that Nordin had suffered a serious brain haemorrhage. His prospects were uncertain. She gave me the number of the hospital and I jotted it down on the back of a magazine about health food that Louise had brought with her.

  ‘It sounds as if you’re busy,’ I said.

  ‘There’s a very strange event going on here,’ she replied.

  ‘What do you mean, strange?’

  ‘A young woman has won twenty-five thousand kronor a year for the next twenty-five years, so she’s invited all her friends to a party, in the middle of the day. It’s important income, both for me and the cafe.’

  ‘Do I know her?’

  ‘I shouldn’t think so. Her name is Rebecka Karlsson; she’s twenty-two years old and she’s never had a job. Nor has she been to college. She lives at home with her parents, who have always supported her. He’s a blacksmith, and her mother is a care assistant in an old people’s home. It’s disgusting, a person like that winning so much money!’

  I expressed my agreement and we ended the call. I went back outside. The ruins of my house looked eerie in the dull afternoon light.

  Something dangling in the sooty apple tree caught my attention. When I got closer I saw that it was a message left by Louise. She had clearly used the same pen with which I had made a note of the hospital’s phone number: Top of the hill!

  Nothing else. Just those four words. I looked around to see if there were any further notes in the alders and oaks, but their branches were empty. I suspected that the most important part of the message was the exclamation mark at the end. She wanted me to go up to the top of the little hill where my grandfather’s bench was located: there were no other hills on the island.

  When I got to the top I was expecting to find another note from Louise, but there was nothing on the bench or attached to the little juniper bush. I sat down, wondering if I had misunderstood her. Or did she want me to sit here wondering about some wild goose chase?

  I gazed out across the sea, and then I understood. My boat was drawn up on the nameless skerry where I had pitched my tent.

  I went back down to the caravan and dug out the old pair of binoculars that had been there ever since Harriet’s day. Now I could see Louise. She was sitting on a rock on the eastern side of the skerry with her back towards me, looking out over the sea. I stared at her until the effort of holding the binoculars made my hands begin to shake.

  It was cold, and it had started drizzling again. I didn’t understand my daughter. She probably didn’t understand me either. In spite of all our efforts, we were doomed to misunderstand one another.

  I returned to the caravan, switched on the light, plugged my phone into the charger and wondered what Louise was actually up to. Dusk fell. I took the torch and went up the hill to check on her. She had lit a small fire outside the tent, but she was sitting in the shadows; I couldn’t see her even with the binoculars. She was hiding in the darkness in a strange game of cat and mouse.

  She must know I’m here, I thought. She must have heard Jansson’s boat. And she probably suspects that I’m sitting on this bench looking over at the skerry.

  I was suddenly overwhelmed by exhaustion. From my years as a doctor I could remember a similar tiredness after long days and nights on call. Laboriously I got to my feet. Back in the caravan I made myself something to eat; it was far too salty and had a metallic taste, but I ate every scrap, then lay down on the bed.

  When I woke up I didn’t know where I was at first. Something in my dream was holding onto me. I was standing on the jetty, watching Harriet swim towards the land. But she wasn’t swimming in the sea, she was in the forest pool in Norrland that I had once promised to show her, the pool we had finally visited the year she died. In my dream the wind was not soughing in the tops of the trees around the pool; instead there was a whining noise that sounded like some kind of machinery. It was unbearable to listen to.

  I sat up. It was ten o’clock; I had been asleep for a long time. There was no sign of Louise. I called her phone, but she didn’t answer. I started to leave a message but broke off after a few words. What was the point? I made coffee. The wind had picked up, and it was pouring with rain. I lay down again; all I wanted to do was go back to sleep.

  Instead I grabbed my torch and went out into the rain. The mossy rocks were even more treacherous now, and I fell over twice on my way up to the bench. When I eventually made it I could see that the fire on the skerry had gone out, or been extinguished. The place was in darkness.

  So Louise had decided to stay over there. She had taken over my tent and left me the ca
ravan.

  My wet hair was plastered to my forehead. I flashed the torch a few times, but needless to say there was no response.

  I slithered down the hill, wondering why Louise was torturing me like this. I sat down at the table and began to play patience. It didn’t come out, of course. I gathered up the cards and made a decision.

  Tomorrow I would ask Louise to leave my islands. I couldn’t have her here.

  I lay awake for hours. The pillow carried the faint scent of the soap she used, which made it impossible for me to stop brooding over why she was out there in the darkness in my tent.

  Over and over again I got up, flicked through books and magazines that had been here since Harriet’s time.

  I might have dozed for an hour or so around daybreak, but when the autumn morning filtered through my window, I got up. I had a cup of coffee, then went up the hill with Harriet’s binoculars. There was no sign of movement around the tent. The flap was closed.

  I knew exactly what to do now. I bailed out all the water that had gathered in the skiff and set off for the skerry. The sun had just risen above the horizon, and the water shone like a mirror. It was the coldest autumn day so far this year. Several gulls were screaming and fighting over some invisible prey a short distance away. It might have been the rotten seal, if Jansson hadn’t already towed it ashore and buried it under a pile of seaweed and sand.

  I rowed around the skerry. When I had only a few strokes left before the depths turned into a steeply shelving shallow leading onto the rocks, my gaze fastened on something that appeared to be floating just metres below the surface. I slowed down and leaned over the side. At first I couldn’t make out what it was, then I realised it was part of a drift net that had broken free, and was now at the mercy of the winds and the currents. It was festooned with dead fish, a diving duck and ribbons of seaweed. I had never seen an escaped fishing net before. As I gazed down into the silent water, the net reminded me of a prisoner who has scaled a high wall and is now fleeing for his life. Or perhaps it was more like a stray dog, and no one knew where it was going.

  The sun disappeared behind a bank of cloud, and I could no longer see the net. I clambered ashore on the far side of the skerry, then hauled the boat up onto the rocks, taking care not to make any noise. I secured the mooring rope with a heavy chunk of stone that had fallen away, then made my way towards the tent. I couldn’t be sure that Louise wasn’t lying awake in there. If she heard footsteps outside, she might be scared. I didn’t want that. Even if we regularly launched symbolic attacks on one another, I didn’t want to frighten her.

  I crouched down, put my ear to the fabric of the tent and listened. Could I hear her breathing or not? The sun slipped in and out behind the scudding clouds. I straightened up and went over to the sheltered spot where I usually build a fire. The surface of the rock was blackened from my earlier efforts. Louise had chosen a different place that was less suitable. I gathered up branches, twigs, a plank from an old fish box that had drifted ashore, and covered the whole lot with moss. Then I lit a fire. There wasn’t a breath of wind; the smoke rose straight up into the sky.

  I settled down to wait. I had yet to decide how I was going to explain my presence outside the tent.

  I fed the fire with more branches and twigs. From time to time I scrambled around the skerry in order to keep the cold and the tiredness at bay.

  One hour passed, almost two.

  I heard something from inside the tent, but at first I couldn’t work out what it was. I moved closer, put my ear against the side.

  My daughter was weeping. I hadn’t seen her cry since Harriet died. She was sometimes unhappy, downhearted, but never enough for the tears to fall. At least not as far as I was aware.

  It was upsetting, hearing her cry. I had no idea what to do. I went back to the fire, thinking that it was probably best if I left and returned to the island. But I couldn’t put out the fire without her hearing the hiss of the water as I doused the flames.

  I sat there listening to my daughter. I looked at my watch so that I would know how long she cried for. She stopped after fifteen minutes. She must be in terrible pain, I thought.

  Silence. I carried on waiting.

  I heard her yawn, then she opened the tent flap. The zip stuck, as it always did for me. Her hair was standing on end. It was a few seconds before she noticed me; she froze in the opening as if she couldn’t decide if I really was there. Then she got to her feet and went behind one of the rocks that provides shelter from the east. When she came back she had combed her hair. She fetched the pillow from inside the tent and sat down by the fire.

  ‘You could have made some coffee, seeing as you’re here,’ she said.

  I didn’t reply. I had no intention of asking any questions until she explained why she had taken the boat when she knew I had to get to the police station. Just like her mother Harriet, she has the ability to confuse people when she doesn’t have the upper hand, and then she steers the conversation in a completely different direction.

  I always thought I was considerably more intelligent than Harriet, but I have come to realise that my daughter is a dangerous opponent.

  ‘How did it go?’ she asked.

  ‘How did what go?’

  ‘The interview with the police. Did they beat you up like you said in your message?’

  ‘With batons.’

  She suddenly seemed tired. She became someone else, pale and shrunken. I thought vaguely that she must have looked exactly like that when she was a child, when she lived with Harriet and didn’t even know I was her father.

  ‘Can’t we have a conversation like adults for once?’ she said.

  ‘They didn’t beat me up. They suspect me of having started the fire, but they have no evidence. And I didn’t do it, either deliberately or by accident.’

  ‘So how did it happen?’

  ‘I want answers just as much as you do.’

  Louise got up, went into the tent and came back with a bottle of water. She constructed a stand so that she could hang the coffee pot above the fire, then she fetched the Thermos flask and my cup, which I had left in the tent. She gave me the mug and kept the cup for herself. There were a couple of spoonfuls of instant coffee in the bottom of the mug.

  A gust of wind came from nowhere and blew smoke in her face. The smell of the fire reminded me of the night my house burned down.

  ‘I might as well say it here as anywhere else,’ Louise suddenly blurted out. ‘And I might as well tell you now as later.’

  I don’t really like the taste of instant coffee. It brings back those long years as a medical student when I never drank anything else.

  I put down the mug. Her words made me feel anxious. I thought about Harriet and her incurable illness. Was there something wrong with Louise too? My heart was pounding, just as it had when I rushed out of the burning house a few weeks ago.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ I said. ‘It sounds serious.’

  ‘It is.’

  I kicked over my mug, and coffee splashed over the side of the tent.

  ‘Tell me, please.’

  ‘I’m pregnant.’

  She hurled the words at me as if I were a crowd to whom she was delivering an important message.

  Curiously enough, they instantly evoked a memory, something I thought I had long since forgotten. Before my relationship with Harriet, when I had just started medical school, a young woman had stood in front of me, radiant with happiness, and told me she was pregnant. She was studying to be some kind of chemical researcher. We had met at a student party. Untroubled by whether what I was saying was true or not, I had showered her with declarations of eternal love, painting a picture of our future together, our family. She had believed me. Now she was pregnant. I faced her happiness with dumbstruck horror. I didn’t want children, not with her or anyone else. I remember her heart-rending despair when I more or less forced her to have an abortion. If she didn’t go through with it, I told her, I would leave her. Which I did
anyway, as soon as she had got rid of the foetus.

  Now Louise was hurling those words at me. She wasn’t radiant with joy, however; there was a kind of caution about her, as if she were simply stating something that had to be said.

  I couldn’t take it in. I had never imagined her as a mother. I don’t think Harriet had either. I had once asked her about Louise’s boyfriends, and she had simply replied that she knew nothing about her daughter’s sexuality. I never asked again. From time to time, when Louise disappeared or returned from her mysterious trips, I had naturally wondered if there was a man in the background. I had never found any evidence of a secret lover. I must admit that I do poke around in her bags and pockets now and again, but I’d never come across the slightest hint about that part of her life.

  ‘Did you hear what I said?’

  She impatiently interrupted my train of thought.

  ‘Of course. But it might take me a while to understand it.’

  ‘I’m pregnant. It’s fairly straightforward, wouldn’t you say?’

  ‘You don’t get pregnant on your own.’

  ‘That’s the only question I won’t answer,’ she said. ‘The identity of the baby’s father is my business.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because that’s how I want it.’

  ‘Do you know for sure who it is?’

  I didn’t have time to think that question was a mistake before she leaned across the fire and punched me in the face; I didn’t realise my nose was bleeding until the blood trickled down onto my top lip. Louise didn’t say anything, even though she must have seen it. I had a dirty handkerchief in my pocket; I scrubbed at my face and the flow of blood stopped.

  ‘I won’t ask,’ I said. ‘And of course I have no doubt that you know who the father is. How far gone are you?’

  ‘Three months.’

  ‘And everything is as it should be?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘You think so?’

  ‘I haven’t been to see a doctor, if that’s what you’re wondering.’

  ‘You have to make an appointment!’

  We weren’t conversing; as usual we were sparring with one another. My phone rang; a welcome interruption.