For the Missing

by Lina Bengtsdotter

  Now, Charlie thought. This is when I go upstairs, to Betty’s room. She downed another half-glass of wine and told herself it wasn’t going to kill her, and if it did, maybe that was fate or whatever. The circle would be complete.

  She walked up the steep steps, crossed the landing, opened the creaky white door to Betty’s bedroom and crossed the high threshold. Then she paused for a moment. Her knees were shaking, then she got a grip on herself and went straight over to the window and drew back the curtains. The evening light streamed into the room.

  She looked over at the bed. It was made. Who had got rid of the vomit-stained sheets and put on clean ones?

  Charlie looked at the clothes rail with Betty’s clothes. Her favourite red dress was there, dusty and tired next to old fur coats. She walked over and buried her face in one of the coats to catch Betty’s unique smell, but it just smelled old. Then she turned to the dressing table. Memories rushed past like a slide show. Betty slumped across the table with her arms dangling at her sides. The buzzing of flies. Charlie had known instantly. Yet even so, she had rushed in, knocked Betty off her chair and tried to arrange her limp body in the recovery position. Betty was already cold, but Charlie had still slapped her face and tried to breathe life into her. She didn’t know how long she had kept it up. A minute? An hour? In her next memory, she was in the forest, undergrowth was tearing at her face, but she didn’t feel any pain. She didn’t feel anything at all.

  An accident, they told her later. Betty must have made a mistake with her dosage. The sleeping pills in combination with the alcohol – it had been too much for her body.

  Charlie pulled out the white chair and sat down at the dressing table. It had been Betty’s most cherished possession because it had belonged to her mother, grandmother and … Charlie didn’t know how far back it went. How many times had she stood next to Betty when she prepared for a party, admiring the way she brushed out her thick, dark hair, put on perfume and red lipstick. Sometimes, Charlie would lean forward with her lips puckered and Betty had painted them a light shade of pink and then she had tilted her head and said it was just nuts how dashing she looked. In the top drawer was a powder brush, an old mascara and a dried-up bottle of nail polish. In the other was a small jewellery box. Charlie couldn’t recall ever seeing it before. When she opened the lid, a dancing ballerina with a tattered tulle skirt popped up. She pulled out the tiny drawers inside the box. They contained plastic rings, a few brooches, something that looked like a swimming badge and furthest down, under all of that, was … Charlie held up the small necklace with the red stone. She certainly was no jewellery expert, but something about it made it look expensive. The chain was too short to be worn around the neck. She wrapped it twice around her wrist and studied the red stone. It wasn’t until she was putting the rest of the jewellery back that she noticed the photograph at the bottom of the box. A girl of about thirteen with a pale, serious face. It wasn’t Betty, that much Charlie knew. But who was it and why did she look so familiar?

  That evening

  They staggered down the road with arms linked. Rebecka started to sing: ‘I’ve been a wild rower for many a year.’

  ‘Rower!’ Annabelle laughed so hard she had to stop. ‘Did you say rower?’

  ‘Yeah, isn’t that how it goes?’

  ‘I’ve been a wild rover,’ Annabelle said.

  Rebecka thought her version was better. It gave her a fun mental image of it, of a drunk crazy person rowing about in a boat.

  I’ve been a wild rower for many a year, and I’ve spent all my money on whiskey and beer.

  Annabelle told her to be quiet. She wanted to sing something more serious.

  ‘Like what?’ Rebecka said.

  Maybe that song they’d sung at the end of year ceremony in school.

  ‘What fucking ceremony?’

  Annabelle reminding her that they’d only ever sung together at one end-of-year ceremony, in year ten, had done nothing to help. Rebecka laughed and said she had no memory of that. It felt like so long ago. But she remembered the song: ‘That’s What Friends Are For’.

  The lyrics were banal, but even so, they made Annabelle feel mournful. Before they knew it, it wouldn’t be her and Rebecka any more. A few years ago, they’d made a promise, that they would never, ever part. How many girls had promised each other that? Annabelle thought now. And how many had kept their promise?

  When they got to the chorus, they started belting it out.

  Rebecka suddenly stopped dead.

  ‘What?’ Annabelle said. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I heard something.’ Rebecka peered into the woods. ‘Didn’t you hear that?’

  Annabelle shook her head. How could she have heard anything when they were singing at the top of their lungs? But Rebecka was sure; she’d heard a sound in the forest. What the fuck could it be?

  Annabelle told her the forest was full of animals. And Rebecka retorted that they’d better hope so, they’d better hope it had been an animal.

  ‘What else would it be?’ Annabelle nudged her. ‘You always get so damn paranoid when you drink.’

  ‘And you get too damn relaxed. Never mind then, but don’t blame me if some fucking lunatic comes at us from behind.’

  ‘You really shouldn’t watch so many horror films, Becka.’

  41

  Charlie was lying on the bed in her old room, studying the wood grain in the ceiling. She remembered having seen shapes there as a little girl, but now all she could see was … wood. She heard the faint patter of mouse feet from the floor above. Her thoughts wandered up to the attic. As a child, she had used to imagine the sounds in the house came from the ghost of the man who had lived at Lyckebo before them. He had hanged himself in the attic. Betty had told her that as a lovely little bedtime story one night. Yes, and of course it was sad and all those things, but one person’s loss is another’s gain, because if that man had gone and killed himself somewhere else, she would never have been able to afford the house, because, well, of course, the price had to go down when everyone in town knew what had happened there. Charlie thought about all the subsequent tragedies that had taken place at Lyckebo. The house would be incredibly hard to sell, she realised now. Her only hope was probably finding a buyer from Germany or Norway. With the house’s proximity to the lake, garden and forest, maybe that wouldn’t prove impossible.

  She didn’t feel like reading any of the books she’d brought from Stockholm and was just about to start looking for a young adult book on her shelves when she remembered Annabelle’s library books. She still hadn’t returned them. She got up and fetched the bag from her suitcase. The top book was Jane Eyre. Charlie had read it, but it was a lifetime ago. Maybe she needed a contrast to all the dark violence she’d been ploughing through lately. But this one wasn’t from the library, she realised, because there was no barcode on the back and someone had written a message on the flyleaf.

  I hope you’ll like it as much as I do.

  Rochester

  Charlie fetched her phone and called Anders.

  ‘Rochester,’ she said when he picked up.

  ‘Come again?’

  ‘Annabelle calls him Rochester. That’s the nickname that starts with an R and sounds English. Rochester is the married man who has a relationship with the governess in Jane Eyre. The one who has a crazy wife in the attic. Has Annabelle been babysitting for anyone? Have we missed her having a babysitting gig?’

  ‘I reckon we would have heard about that by now,’ Anders said. ‘Besides, we’re not focusing as much on this potential lover any more. I mean, I’m sure you understand why.’

  ‘Has Svante confessed to anything?’

  ‘You know I’m not supposed to talk to you about this.’

  ‘But since you already are, has he confessed to anything?’

  ‘Nothing, he won’t even confess to the rape. Which actually only proves that he’s capable of lying. But he’s a hard nut to crack. And according to his friends he stayed at Val
l’s all night, until dawn.’

  ‘Friends who wouldn’t dare say otherwise,’ Charlie said.

  ‘Exactly. We’re trying to find a contradiction in his story, but without further evidence, without a body or even an explicit motive, it’s not easy.’

  ‘Do look into whether she babysat for anyone, though,’ Charlie said. ‘Do it anyway. Ask the priest, all the men around here who have children.’

  ‘Charlie,’ Anders said. ‘I’m grateful for all your help, but the idea is for you to not participate in the investigation, for you to rest and …’

  ‘I can’t just switch off from one day to the next, can I?’ Charlie coughed. She was close to tears again, but she didn’t want Anders to know how devastated she was. ‘You need me,’ she said more quietly. ‘I can rest when we’ve found her.’

  ‘No. You need to listen to Challe now.’

  Charlie took a deep breath and said she was. She let her silent tears drip down onto her T-shirt.

  ‘Maybe you’re too personally involved in this?’ Anders said. ‘Maybe it’s hard for you to keep it at arm’s length because … well, because you grew up here.’

  Maybe that’s an advantage, Charlie wanted to counter, but she knew her voice would break if she did.

  ‘I think,’ Anders went on. But Charlie never found out what he thought, because before he could say another word, she had hung up.

  42

  Charlie was woken up at five by birdsong and sunshine. She was sweating even though she had kicked her cover off. She had had a dream about Annabelle. The two of them had been walking along the gravel road behind the village shop. They’d walked in silence, hand in hand. And then someone had called them. When they turned around, Charlie had seen a small barefoot girl in a white nightgown. The girl moved quickly towards them. She had appeared to age as she approached; first, she turned into a young woman, then a middle-aged one, and when she reached them, she was a skeletal, white-haired old lady. And yet, there was no doubt that she was Betty.

  You’ll never be a dancer, Charline, she said and smiled. Anything but a dancer, sweetheart.

  Then Betty had grabbed Annabelle’s wrist and started walking.

  I have a garden full of cherries, Charlie heard her say. It’s almost like paradise out there. I got it cheap. One person’s loss is another’s gain, as they say.

  Charlie had been unable to scream or run after them. All she could do was stand there, watching as Betty and Annabelle disappeared over the horizon.

  She had been so close to something in her dream. She tried to go back to sleep, but it was impossible. At seven, she got up and poured a large glass of water from the jug Susanne had brought. The sun was already warm. Another day of sizzling heat.

  She would stay away from the investigation; she had promised herself that after speaking to Anders yesterday. Challe was already angry with her; she should dedicate herself to showing that she knew how to obey orders and wasn’t mentally unstable. But it was going to be impossible, she realised now, impossible to quit the investigation just like that. Annabelle was still missing and Charlie was one of the people who had come to find her, and this mishap with the journalist … it didn’t render her incapable of finding the girl. She was feeling increasingly sure she hadn’t said anything about the video. Why would she have? Granted, she had a way of making a fool of herself when she’d been drinking, but leaking privileged information about a case? She would never do that; that much she knew about herself. After drinking her coffee, she went inside to fetch Jane Eyre. Surely no one could object to her giving Annabelle’s book back to her parents?

  Betty’s red Monark bicycle was where it had been left under the eaves of the woodshed. The pump was attached to the frame. Charlie pumped the tyres and checked the brakes.

  It was downhill all the way to Nora and Fredrik’s, but even so, sweat was streaming down her back by the time she arrived. She leaned the bike against the fence and started walking up towards the house. The lawnmower hadn’t moved.

  Fredrik opened the door.

  ‘Has something happened?’ he said.

  Charlie said nothing had.

  ‘What do you want?’ said Nora, who suddenly materialised behind her husband. ‘What now?’

  ‘I just have a few questions about a book. Nothing major has happened.’

  ‘And we’re supposed to believe that?’ Nora gave her a look full of scepticism. ‘Given what the newspapers have been writing. But I assume you have nothing to tell us about that video either?’

  ‘Don’t believe everything you read in the paper.’

  ‘Who am I supposed to believe then? Why won’t you tell us anything?’

  ‘I’m on sick leave,’ Charlie said. ‘I’m no longer working on the case.’

  ‘Then why are you here?’ Nora gave her a vacant look. ‘Why have you come here, talking nonsense about some book.’

  ‘I just wanted to return it.’ Charlie gave Nora Jane Eyre. ‘You asked us to return the books to the library,’ she said, addressing Fredrik, ‘but this must be Annabelle’s own. I thought you might know who gave it to her. There’s a message in it.’

  Nora stared at her without speaking.

  ‘Is everything okay?’ Charlie asked.

  ‘Where did you find that?’ Nora pointed to the red stone on the bracelet around Charlie’s wrist.

  ‘This? It was my mother’s.’

  ‘And who is your mother?’

  What’s it to you? Charlie wanted to say. She had no desire to tell Nora anything about herself. Even so, she told them straight, that she was Betty Lager’s daughter.

  Nora was still staring at her.

  ‘Is there something …’

  ‘Leave,’ Nora said. ‘Leave now.’

  ‘I think it would be best if you left now,’ Fredrik said.

  ‘But …’ was all Charlie managed, because Nora took a step forward and shoved her in the chest.

  ‘What are you doing, Nora?’ Fredrik grabbed his wife’s shoulders.

  ‘I want her out of here,’ Nora said, pointing at Charlie.

  ‘What’s the matter with you?’ Fredrik tried to pin down Nora’s wildly flailing arms.

  ‘Get out of here!’ Nora screamed. ‘I don’t want you here, Charline.’

  There and then

  It starts with the loudly meowing cat. The spirit says: Silence it for good.

  ‘There’s only one way to take that,’ Rosa says gravely. And then they head outside to look for it. The shouty ginger tabby is never hard to find. Rosa squats down and calls to it. The cat runs over and rubs herself against her legs. Rosa picks her up and they walk over to the brimming water barrel under the gutter in the back garden.

  ‘Now you just grab her and hold her tight,’ Rosa says and holds the meowing animal out to Alice. ‘Just push her down.’

  Alice shakes her head. She can’t do it, not to an innocent animal.

  But Rosa says it’s not about the cat, it’s about an order from the spirit; that if she doesn’t do it, something horrible will happen to them, and she doesn’t want that, does she?

  Alice wants to tell Rosa that she doesn’t believe in spirits, that she’s not going to drown a cat, no matter what Rosa says. But instead, she pushes the clawing, hissing animal down into the water, looks into the yellow, petrified eyes staring up at her.

  It’s impossible. She can’t do it. The cat gasps for air when she lifts it back out. It looks so tiny and sad with its fur clinging to its body. But it’s not trying to scratch any more, it’s not struggling. It’s just breathing fitfully with its eyes closed.

  ‘I can’t,’ Alice whispers.

  ‘Then I guess I have to do it myself,’ Rosa says and snatches the cat from her hands. It’s still not resisting, just hangs there like a wet rag. A faint meow is heard before Rosa pushes it back down into the water.

  Alice turns around and claps her hands to her ears. She feels like she can’t breathe. It’s as if she’s the one who’s drowning.

&n
bsp; Afterwards, they bury the cat in Larsson’s field. The cows watch them wide-eyed when they come carrying the wet bundle.

  ‘Don’t be upset, Alice,’ Rosa says. ‘Don’t you know drowning’s the best way to go? Just ask your dad. All sailors know it’s the best way to die. But next time,’ Rosa says as they walk away from the cat grave, ‘next time, you won’t let me down. Because you know I’d do anything for you, right?’

  And Alice nods. She knows.

  ‘Because if you do, we can’t be friends,’ Rosa goes on, wiping her dirty hands on the dry grass. ‘You have to be prepared to do anything for your friends. Never forget who saved you.’

  A few weeks later, Alice’s mum tells her their neighbour found four abandoned kittens with the same coat as that ginger tabby who always meowed so loudly. They were brand new, she says, their eyes were still closed. The ginger tabby must have been run over because no mother would ever leave her babies like that.

  Alice can’t sleep that night. She thinks about the abandoned kittens whose eyes will never open, thinks about the sticky little bodies, hears them whimper with hunger, sees their mouths trying to find something to suckle.

  Alice doesn’t want to contact the spirits any more. She tells Rosa.

  Why?

  Because of that thing with the devil. How can they know it’s not the devil moving the glass?

  Rosa says you just know. And if she were Alice, she would obey the spirit. Because she thinks it might be because Alice is disobedient that her mum never gets better.