by Anne Holt
“Aksel Seier?”
Fear was about to strangle him. The woman pronounced his name in a way that he hadn’t heard since 1966. He wasn’t named Aksel Seier any longer. His name was Axel Sayer, drawn out and round. Not hard and precise: Aksel Seier.
“Who’s asking?” he managed to say.
She held out her hand. He didn’t take it.
“My name is Johanne Vik. I work at Oslo University and I’ve come because I would like to talk to you about being wrongly accused of the rape and murder of a child a long time ago. If you want to, that is. If you can bear to talk about it now, so many years later.”
Her hand was still held out toward him. There was a kind of defiance in the gesture, an insistence that made him open his mouth and press air down into his lungs before grasping it.
“Axel Sayer,” he said in a hoarse voice. “That’s what I’m called now.”
The cotton candy lady padded toward them from the beach. She walked around the fence and gasped loudly and demonstratively before exclaiming:
“Female visitor, Aksel! I’ll say!”
“Come in,” said Aksel, turning his back on the pink sweater.
Johanne didn’t know what she had expected. Even though she had had a clear picture of what Aksel Seier looked like, she had never thought about what his surroundings would be like, what his life in the States was like. She stood in the doorway. The living room opened onto the kitchen and was full of things. The only furniture was a small coffee table with a worn sofa and a roughly made kitchen table with a single wooden chair. But it was still hard to see where she should put her feet. There was a big dog in one corner. She stiffened in fear. It was only when she looked again that she saw that the fur was carved hair by hair from wood and that the yellow eyes were glass. In the opposite corner there was a galleon figurehead hanging from the low ceiling. It was a big-bosomed woman with a distant look in her eyes and deep red, nearly purple lips. Her golden yellow hair flowed down over her arched body. The figure was far too big for the room. It looked like it might fall from the wall at any moment, in which case the woman would crush an army of what looked like tin soldiers that were spread out in a tremendous battle covering about two square yards of the floor. Johanne stepped gingerly toward the army and squatted down. The soldiers were made of glass. Tiny blue jackets, individualized soldiers with bayonets and cannon, hats and marks of rank, fighting against the Confederate soldiers in gray.
“They’re so . . . so incredibly beautiful!”
She picked up a general to look at him more closely; he sat securely on his horse, some distance from the raging battle. Even his eyes were clear, light blue with an indication of black pupils in the middle. His horse was foaming at the mouth and she could almost feel heat coming off the sweating animal.
“Where . . . did you make this? I’ve never seen anything like it in my life!”
Aksel Seier didn’t answer. Johanne heard the rattle of pans. He was hidden by the countertops.
“Coffee?” he asked in a strained voice.
“No, thank you. Yes, actually . . . if you’re making some. But don’t make it just for me.”
“A beer.”
It didn’t sound like a question.
“Yes, please,” she said with some hesitation. “I’d love a beer.”
Aksel Seier straightened up and kicked the cabinet door shut with his foot. He looked relieved. The fridge groaned reluctantly when he took out two cans. The annoying hum dissolved into a moan. Rays of sunlight forced their way through the dirty windows. Dust danced in the patches of light outlined on the floor. A cat appeared from nowhere over by the kitchen. It purred and rubbed against Johanne’s legs. Then it disappeared again through a cat door. Beside the galleon figure, behind the soldiers, was a fish barrel with rusty hoops. A plastic doll in a Sami costume was standing on the top. The colors, which had once been strong and clear, red and blue and yellow and green, had faded to tame pastels. The doll looked blankly at the opposite wall, which was covered by an impressive piece of embroidery, a wall hanging really. The motif started lifelike in one corner, a medieval knight ready for a jousting tournament, in his coat of armor with lance raised. This then became abstract and flowed into an orgy of colors up toward the right.
“I must . . . did you make all these fantastic things?”
Aksel Seier stared at her. He slowly raised the beer can to his mouth. He drank, then dried his mouth on his sleeve.
“What did you say?”
“Is it you who . . .”
“When you came. You said something about me being . . .”
“I have reason to believe you were wrongly convicted.”
She looked at him and tried to say something more. He took a step back, as if the sunlight from the kitchen window bothered him. He gave a slight nod and the shadow from his mop of hair, heavy and gray, hid his eyes. She looked at him and regretted having said anything.
She had nothing more to offer him. No redress. No restored honor. No compensation for lost years, both in and out of prison. Johanne had come over the ocean, more or less on impulse, with nothing in her luggage other than an old woman’s absolute conviction and a lot of unanswered questions. If it was true that Aksel Seier had been wrongly convicted of the awful crime, the most horrible attack—how did he feel right now? How must it feel finally, after all these years, to hear someone say: I think you are innocent! Johanne had no right to do this. She should not have come.
“I mean . . . Some people have studied your case more carefully . . . One person . . . She is . . . Can we sit down?”
He stood, frozen. One arm hung loosely by his side, swinging almost imperceptibly to the beat of his heart, backward and forward, forward and back. He held the beer can in his left hand. He was still hiding behind his greasy hair; his eyes were small slits of something she could not recognize.
“I think it would be better if we sat down, Mr. Seier.”
A snuffle came from his throat. An involuntary noise, as if he really wanted to swallow but had something stuck in his throat. He sniffled again, almost a sob; his whole body was shaking and he put down the beer can.
“Mr. Seier,” he repeated, in a hoarse voice. “No one has called me that for many years. Who are you?”
“Do you know what?”
She carefully retreated from the battle tableau on the floor.
“I’d like to ask you out, to a restaurant. We could get something to eat and then talk about why I’m here. I think I’ve got a lot to tell you.”
It’s a lie, she thought. I have practically nothing to tell you. I have come with a thousand questions that I need to have answered. It’s important for me and for an old woman who is keeping herself alive so she can hear the answers. I’m fooling you. I’m pulling the wool over your eyes. I’m using you.
“Where can you get a decent meal around here?” she asked instead, in a light tone.
“Come,” he said and walked toward the door.
When she moved to follow him, she stepped on the general. The breaking noise was deadened by the rough floor. Horrified, she lifted her foot. The glass figure was smashed to smithereens, tiny shards of blue and gold stuck to the sole of her shoe.
Aksel Seier stared down. Then he lifted his face toward her.
“Do you really believe that? Do you really believe in my . . . innocence?”
He turned away at once, not waiting for a reply.
TWENTY-ONE
The new girl was named Sarah. Even though she was a year younger, she was as big as Emilie, so it was a bit difficult to comfort her. Just like with Daddy. Emilie wanted to comfort him so much when Mommy died. After the funeral, when the house wasn’t full of people who wanted to help them anymore, he didn’t want her to see him crying. But she knew how he was feeling. She heard him, at night, when he thought she was asleep, with a pillow over his head to make sure that she wouldn’t hear. She wanted to comfort him, but it was impossible because he was grown up. He was bigger than her. T
here was nothing she could say or do. And when she did try, he put on a big brave smile, got out of bed, and made waffles and talked about the holiday they were going to have in the summer.
It was almost the same with Sarah. She cried and cried, but was just a bit too big to be comforted. Emilie was actually very glad that Sarah had come. It was much better when there were two, and particularly good that they were both girls and even better that Sarah was nearly the same age as her. That was all that Emilie knew about Sarah. What her name was and how old she was. Every time they tried to talk, Sarah started to cry. She sniffed something about a bus and a grandmother. Maybe her grandmother was a bus driver and Sarah thought she would come and rescue them in the same way that she sometimes still thought that Mommy was sitting in her red dress with plum diamonds in her ears, watching over her.
Sarah hadn’t realized it was best to be nice to the man.
After all, he was the one who brought them food and drink and a horse for Barbie a while back. If Emilie smiled and said thank you and was nice and polite, the man smiled back. He seemed to be happy, kind of, and more pleased when he looked at her. Sarah had bitten him. As they came into the room, she sunk her teeth into his arm. He howled and hit Sarah hard on the head. She started to bleed just above her eye. There was still a big cut there and the blood hadn’t dried and scabbed yet.
“You have to be nice to the man,” said Emilie, and sat down on the bed beside Sarah. “He brings food and presents. It’s best to be polite. I think he’s actually quite kind.”
“He hi . . . hi . . . hit me,” sobbed Sarah and felt her eye. “He said he was Mom . . . mo . . .”
It was impossible to hear the rest. Emilie felt a bit dizzy. She got that old feeling again, the horrible, sickening feeling that there was no oxygen left in the cellar. The best thing was just to lie down and close her eyes.
“He said he was Mommy’s new boyfriend,” Sarah whispered tearfully.
Emilie didn’t know if she’d been asleep. She licked her lips. Her tongue tasted of sleep and her eyes felt heavy.
“Mommy’s got a new boyfriend who I was going to meet to . . . tomo . . .”
Emilie sat up slowly. It was easier to breathe now.
“Try to breathe slowly,” she said—that was what Mommy used to say to her when she was crying so much that she couldn’t speak. “Breathe deeply. In and out. There’s plenty of oxygen here. Do you see that opening in the ceiling?”
She pointed and Sarah nodded.
“That’s where he sends oxygen down to us. The man, that is. He sends down lots of oxygen to the cellar, so we can breathe, even if there are no windows. Don’t be scared. You can borrow my Barbie. Is your grandma a bus driver?”
Sarah was exhausted. Her face was white and covered in red blotches; her eyes were so swollen that they were nearly closed.
“My Granny’s an electrician,” she said, talking without crying for the first time.
“My mother is dead,” said Emilie.
“My mother has a new boyfriend,” said Sarah and wiped her nose.
“Is he nice?”
“I don’t know, I was going to meet . . .”
“Don’t cry anymore now.”
Emilie was annoyed. The man could hear them. Even if he wasn’t there, he might have microphones somewhere. Emilie had thought about that a lot. She had seen things like that in movies. She almost didn’t dare to look carefully. To begin with, when she first came here, she had walked around the room looking for something, without knowing exactly what. She found nothing. But you could get microphones that were so small you could fit them in a molar tooth. They were so small that you couldn’t see them. You needed a microscope. Maybe the man was sitting somewhere listening to them and watching them as well. Because you could also get tiny cameras. As small as a nail head, and there were lots of nails in the wall. Emilie had seen a film once, called Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. It was about a slightly mad but rather sweet dad who did all sorts of experiments in the attic. The children touched something they weren’t supposed to touch and shrunk until they were very, very small, like insects. No one could see them. The man could see her. She was sure he had a TV screen and a headset and knew exactly what they were doing.
“Smile,” she whispered.
Sarah started to cry hard again. Emilie put her hand over her mouth.
“You have to smile,” she ordered, and pulled up her lips into a grin. “He’s watching us.”
Sarah twisted out of her grip.
“He said that he was Momm . . . Mommy’s boy . . . boyfr . . .”
Emilie squeezed shut her eyes again and lay down on the bed. There was barely enough room for the two of them. She pushed Sarah away and turned her face to the wall. When she squeezed her eyes shut as hard as she could, it was almost as if there was light in her head. She could see things. She could see Daddy looking for her. He had a flannel shirt on. He was looking for her among the wildflowers at the back of the house; he had a magnifying glass and thought that someone had shrunk her.
Emilie wished that Sarah had never come.
TWENTY-TWO
There was now a sea of flowers to mark the spot where Emilie Selbu’s bag had been found, on the quiet path between two busy roads. Some of the flowers were withering, others were already dead. And in among them all, fresh roses in small plastic containers. Children’s drawings fluttered in the evening breeze.
A group of teenagers cycled by. They were shouting and laughing, but lowered their voices as they cycled around the flowers and letters. A girl of about fourteen put her foot on the ground and stood still for a few seconds before swearing loudly and clearly, then shook her head and pedalled frantically after the others.
The man pulled his hat farther down over his eyes. He slipped his other hand into his trousers. Did he dare get even closer? The thought of standing on the spot, the very place where Emilie was taken, exactly where she was abducted, made his balls burn. He lost his balance and had to press his hip against a tree to stop himself from falling. He groaned and bit his lip.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Two people appeared behind him. They popped up out of nowhere, from behind a dense bush. Surprised, he turned toward them, his penis still in his hand; it went limp between his fingers and he tried to smile.
“Noth . . . nothing,” he stammered, paralysed.
“He . . . he’s jerking off, for Christ’s sake!”
It took them two minutes to render him harmless, but they didn’t stop there. When the man dressed in paramilitary gear stumbled into the police station, pushed by a newly established group of neighborhood vigilantes, his right eye was already swollen and blue. His nose was bleeding and it looked as if his arm was broken.
He said nothing, not even when the police asked him if he needed a doctor.
TWENTY-THREE
Are you sure you don’t want to speak English?”
He shook his head. There were a couple of times when he didn’t seem to understand what she said. She repeated herself in different, simpler words. It was hard to say whether it helped. His expression didn’t change. He didn’t say much.
Aksel Seier had ordered a filet mignon and a beer. Johanne was happy with a Caesar salad and a glass of ice water. They were the only guests at The 400 Club, a rural mix between a restaurant and a diner, only seven minutes’ walk from Ocean Avenue. Aksel Seier had walked toward his pickup, then shrugged and gone on foot when Johanne insisted. It was too late for lunch and too early for dinner. The kitchen was working on half steam. Before the food arrived on the table, Johanne had told him all about Alvhild Sofienberg, the old lady who was once so interested in Aksel Seier’s case, but then forced to drop it. And now, many years later, Alvhild wanted to find out why he had been sentenced and then released so suddenly nearly nine years later. Johanne described the futile search for the case documents. And finally, in a kind of casual postscript, she explained her own interest in the case.
The food arrived. Ak
sel Seier picked up his knife and fork. He ate slowly, taking time to chew. Again, he let his hair fall over his eyes. It must be an old trick; the coarse gray hair became a wall between him and her.
Uninterested, she thought. You seem completely uninterested. Why did you bother to come here with me? Why didn’t you just throw me out? I would have accepted that. Or you might listen to what I’ve got to say and then say thank you and good-bye. You could get up now. You could finish your food, accept a free meal from a past you had hidden and forgotten and then just go. It’s your right. You have used so many years trying to forget. And I’m ruining it all for you. I’m crushing you. Go.
“What do you want me to say?”
Half the meat was still on the plate. Aksel put his knife between the teeth of the fork and drank the rest of his beer. Then he leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest.
I was expecting some enthusiasm, she thought. This is absurd. Here I am thinking I’m an angel, a messenger bringing good tidings. I want . . . what do I want? Ever since I read your story—from the moment I realized that Alvhild was right—I’ve seen myself in the role of the fairy godmother who would right all wrongs. I would come here and tell you what you already know: that you’re innocent. You are innocent. I want to confirm that for you. I’ve come all the way from Norway and you should be . . . grateful. Damn it, I want some gratitude.
“I want absolutely nothing,” she said quietly. “If you want, I can go.”
Aksel smiled. His teeth were even and gray and didn’t suit his face. It was as if someone had cut out an old mouth and sewn it somewhere it didn’t belong. But he smiled and put his hands down on the table in front of him.
“I’ve dreamed about what it would be like to have . . .”
He searched for the right word. Johanne was unsure whether to help him or not. There was a long pause.
