Until Thy Wrath Be Past
Page 26
That bloody Hjalmar! What the hell does he think he’s playing at? There’s not a grain of sense in that flabby skull of his. He lets himself crumble under pressure. But not Tore. He has a family to think about. Laura. His sons. Even if they are grown up now. And Mother and Father. Tore has been running the firm more or less on his own ever since he was fifteen. He has never had a week’s holiday in the whole of his adult life. He has worked and taken on more responsibility. Worked and taken on more responsibility. And for what? So that his brother can take it all away from him? No.
Tintin is the first to hear the scooter. She raises her head and listens. At which point Vera barks. Only then do Martinsson and Hjalmar hear the sound of an engine coming closer. Hjalmar gets up and looks out of the window.
“Bad news,” he says. “It’s my brother.”
Martinsson jumps up – but where can she go? Out the door? What would happen then?
“There’s no time for that,” Hjalmar says. “He’s here.”
Martinsson hears the snow scooter’s engine being switched off.
Now he’s getting off the scooter, she thinks. Now he’s going to come in.
Hjalmar turns to Martinsson and speaks. The words come tumbling out of his mouth faster than they have ever done in his life.
“Get into the bathroom,” he says. “Lock the door. There’s a window. Climb out. Run down to the river and across it. Stick to the scooter tracks. They’ll have frozen over and with luck will take your weight. It’s your only chance. I’ll try to slow him down. But I can only talk to him. I can’t lay a hand on him. I simply can’t lay a hand on Tore.”
The bathroom door locks from the inside. Martinsson fumbles with the hasp: she has to lift up the handle in order to thread the the hasp through the metal ring. The window is tiny, high up in the wall above the toilet. Martinsson stands on the toilet lid and releases the window catches. Using both hands, she opens the window. There are bottles of shampoo and detergent on the window ledge. She tosses them out into the snow. Then she grabs hold of the window frame and heaves herself up onto her elbows until she is hanging halfway out of the window. She wriggles through it until her hips are resting on the ledge. It is further up from the ground than she expected. She will have to do her best to avoid breaking her neck when she tumbles out.
This is going to be disastrous, she thinks, as she thrusts herself head first through the window.
At that same moment Tore Krekula flings open the door of the cottage.
“Where is she?” Tore says to his brother.
Hjalmar says nothing. Vera stands up and starts barking. As does Tintin.
“In there?” Tore says, nodding in the direction of the bathroom. Marching over to the door, he tugs at it.
“Come out of there!” he shouts, banging on the door so hard that it rattles against the frame.
“What the hell have you told her?” he says to his brother. “Tell me!”
“The truth,” Hjalmar says.
He is still sitting on the the sofa.
“The truth!” Tore says, mimicking his brother’s voice. “You thick, bloated arsehole!”
He kicks the bathroom door in. It flies open instantly. Thuds against the washbasin.
Tore peers inside. Empty. But the window is wide open.
Martinsson falls headlong out of the window. Lands on her back like a beetle. The snow is wet and soft, so she is unhurt; but it is nearly impossible to get up. She struggles in vain to stand.
Manages in the end. Her head is at the top of her body, and her feet at the bottom. But with every step, she sinks into the snow up to her waist. The river had seemed very close, but now it seems far, far away. She fights her way through the deep snow. Sinks down after every step. Her muscles tremble with the strain. The sun is broiling. Sweat pours off her. If only she can get as far as the snow-scooter tracks. The frost has hardened them. They will support her and she will be able to run across the river to the other side.
Tore looks out of the window. Down towards the river. Sees the prosecutor wading through the snow. She manages to crawl up onto the icy snow-scooter tracks, and is heading for the river. What is she thinking? That she can get away?
“Is the ice thick enough to take the scooter?” he says to his brother.
“No,” Hjalmar says.
The dogs are restless. They are running around in circles and howling.
Tore does not believe his brother.
“You’re lying,” he says.
He pulls on his gloves. He will drive after her and mow her down. She is dead. She is already as good as dead.
When he opens the door, Tintin sneaks out.
Martinsson runs along the scooter track towards the river. It is like a strip of shiny ice on top of the powdery snow. She is a reindeer calf on wobbly legs. The wolf is not far away. Her limbs are exhausted after wading through the deep snow. She finds it hard to stay on the track. Her temples are throbbing. Her strenuous efforts have produced a bitter taste in her mouth.
She hears the sound of an engine behind her, and looks round. It is Tore on the snow scooter.
He will run her down. She will die in the snow, her insides mashed to a pulp, blood pouring out of her nose and mouth. Run, run.
Tore drives down the slope towards the riverbank. He is standing up on the scooter. The engine is roaring. He is catching her up. It will not take long. Martinsson stops and turns to face him.
I’m not going to survive this, she thinks.
He is only ten metres away now. She shuts her eyes.
She thinks about her farmor. How she always smelled slightly of the cowshed and tobacco smoke. How she used to get up at the crack of dawn and light the fire in the kitchen stove. Martinsson would drink tea with honey and milk, and eat a cheese sandwich. Her farmor would drink coffee and smoke her hand-rolled cigarettes. Martinsson thinks about her father. How he and Farmor and Martinsson would sit at Farmor’s place stemming lingonberries. They each have a tray. Under one edge of the tray is a folded newspaper. The sound of the hard berries rolling across the tray and down towards the side, where the stemmed ones gather. Pulling off the stems and leaves, they nudge the trimmed berries so that they roll down the sloping tray. Martinsson finds spiders and other creepy-crawlies that must be rescued and released outdoors.
Then she hears the sound of the scooter sinking through the ice. The ice gives way with a crash. The engine bubbles away in the water, but finally falls silent. She hears Tore Krekula screaming.
When she opens her eyes only the rear end of the scooter is sticking out of the water. It is sinking rapidly. After a few seconds there is no trace left of it or of Tore. No sign at all. The ice crackles and sings as if glasses were floating in the water. Soon there is no trace left of the hole. A thick layer of slush covers the water where he sank. The ice seems to be rocking. A wave of terror flows over Martinsson.
She feels the ice beginning to sink beneath her feet. It becomes like a hammock. She sinks further and further. Although the ice does not crack and break, she is horrified to see how the hole she is standing in is filling with water. It comes up to her ankles, then her knees.
Tintin comes running towards her across the ice.
“Get away!” Martinsson shouts. “Be careful! Get away!”
But the dog comes closer and closer.
From his window Hjalmar sees his brother disappear through the snow-covered ice. Then he sees the dog struggling as far as the frozen scooter track and scrambling up onto it. Then it races off towards Martinsson.
“Oh God!” he says, and really does mean it as a prayer.
Martinsson is standing in the middle of the ice, as if she herself is frozen. She shouts at the dog, trying to make her turn back. It is as if the prosecutor is standing in a bowl.
Then the ice collapses beneath her feet. Hjalmar sees her flailing arms. The next second she has disappeared.
I am flying in circles above the river. Me and three ravens. Round and round. I see Hjalmar co
me out of his cottage. He closes the door behind him carefully, so that Vera cannot sneak out. Then he starts running. But he doesn’t run very fast. He’s running along the scooter tracks made by his brother, but they haven’t had time to freeze yet, and are soft and mushy. When he reaches the riverbank, he sinks up to his waist in the snow.
He is stuck. He can’t move. He struggles, but it is like being cast in concrete.
“Rebecka,” he shouts. “Rebecka! I’m stuck in the snow!”
I croak with the ravens. We land in the trees. Cut through the air with our loud, rasping, ominous-sounding cries.
The ice sinks. The water rises. Martinsson is getting wet.
She is up to her knees in water. Then she hears the crust of ice over the old snow-scooter tracks cracking. The next moment she is immersed.
Snow and ice fall over her. She gropes for the edge of the hole, searching for something she can hold on to. She hears Hjalmar shouting her name. He shouts that he is stuck in the snow.
The ice is thick, half a metre at least, but loose; it just keeps breaking. She is lying in a soup of ice and snow. Whenever she tries to grab onto the edge of the hole, the ice breaks and falls onto her in big chunks.
Tintin comes running over to the hole.
Hjalmar cannot see Martinsson; the edge of the hole is too high. But he can see the dog.
“The dog!” he shouts. “The dog’s coming after you!”
And then he sees the dog fall into the hole. The edges are not strong enough to support her.
He hears Martinsson yelling.
“Oh, hell!” she screeches.
And the dog is howling like a banshee. Screaming with fear. Then it falls silent. Is fully occupied with trying to stay alive. It is swimming for all it is worth and scratching at the edge of the hole, but the ice just crumbles away.
Martinsson gropes for the edge of the hole with one hand and grabs hold of Tintin’s fur with the other.
The current is strong; she can feel it trying to drag her legs under the ice. She cannot resist it; it is too strong. The cold is sucking her strength away.
She summons all the strength she can muster and kicks hard with both legs. At the same time she tries to lift Tintin up by her fur.
Tintin scrambles up. She claws her way onto the ice. And it holds her.
“Shout to the dog,” Martinsson yells to Hjalmar. “Shout to her!”
Hjalmar shouts, “Come on, girl! Over here! There’s a good girl!”
The dog makes her way over to him. Teetering with exhaustion the last few metres. Staggers up to Hjalmar. Collapses by his side.
“Have you got her?” Martinsson shouts.
Her legs are sliding under the ice. As if someone were pulling her feet.
“Have you got her?”
Hjalmar responds, sobbing.
“I’ve got her. She’s here with me.”
“Don’t let go of her,” Martinsson shouts.
“I’m holding on to her collar,” he shouts. “I won’t let go.”
Now she cannot shout to him any more. She has to . . . She has to . . . Try to resist.
Martinsson struggles in vain as her hips are pressed up against the edge of the hole and she finds herself almost lying on her back. She is well on the way to being dragged under the ice. Snow is tumbling over her face. She wipes it away, only now realizing how fiendishly cold she is.
She cannot resist any more. Her shoulders are under the edge of the ice. The current is tugging at her, pressing her body against its underside.
Then she hears Hjalmar starting to sing.
Hjalmar has a hold of Tintin’s collar. He is holding on to her with a grip of iron. She is shivering.
He tries once again to lift himself out of the snow, but it is impossible.
Martinsson shouts and asks if he has the dog. He tells her that he does.
He holds on to the dog and thinks yes, he has her. She is all he has just now. At least the dog is alive. It is going to live. It starts whimpering. It sounds as if it is crying. It lies down in the snow and whines.
And then Hjalmar also starts crying. He cries for Wilma. For Martinsson. He cries for his brother and for Hjörleifur. For himself. For all the fat stuck in the snow as if in a vice.
And then he starts singing.
It starts of its own accord. At first his voice is hoarse and unpractised, but then it becomes more forceful, stronger.
“I lay my sins on Jesus, the spotless lamb of God,” he sings. “He bears them all and frees us from the accursed load.”
It is several years since he heard that hymn. But the words come without any hesitation.
“I bring my guilt to Jesus, to wash my crimson stains white in his blood most precious, till not a spot remains.”
The early spring sunshine scorches the glittering white snow on top of the ice. There are no human beings for many kilometres around apart from Martinsson, in the hole in the ice, and Hjalmar, in the snow. The shadows lie blue in the scooter tracks and in the footprints where dogs and people have sunk down into the snow today.
Martinsson is lying in the water. Most of her body is under the ice. Over the edge round the hole she can see the tops of trees at the perimeter of the forest on the other side of the river. She did not manage to get that far. The firs have black trunks and are laden with cones near their tops.
The birches are spindly. In the south these slender-limbed trees will be blossoming now. Flowering magnolias and cherry trees will be gracing the parks like young girls in their best frocks. Here the birches are thin, but not in the least like young girls. Knobbly, straggly and bent like old crones, they stand at the edge of the forest looking out for spring.
It wasn’t really that far, Martinsson thinks apathetically as she gazes at the trees. I ought to have kept on running. I shouldn’t have stopped. That was stupid.
Hjalmar is singing his head off on the other bank. His voice is not all that unpleasant. “O guide me, call me, draw me, uphold me to the end; and then in heaven receive me, my saviour and my friend.” As he comes to the climax of the hymn, the ravens seem to want to join in. They caw and croak up in the trees.
Then Martinsson panics as the water comes up over her mouth, her nose.
And the next moment she has been sucked under the ice. Its underside is sharp and uneven. She glides helplessly along with the current through the black water. She rolls over, the back of her head hits against the ice, or maybe it is a stone. She does not know. Everything is black. Bump, bump.
Mella, Stålnacke, Olsson and Rantakyrö clamber out of Mella’s Ford Escort next to where Hjalmar’s and Martinsson’s cars are parked.
“I have a nasty feeling about this,” Stålnacke says, looking towards the forest where a wisp of smoke is coming from one of the chimneys.
“Me too,” Mella says.
She has her gun. So do her colleagues.
Then they hear someone screaming. The silence all around them makes the sound even more dreadful. It is a scream that does not seem to want to end. It is inhuman.
The police officers look at one another. Nobody can bring themselves to say anything.
Then they hear a man’s voice shouting, “Shut up! Stop screeching!”
They don’t hear anything else as they race for all they are worth along the old snow-scooter track. Rantakyrö, who is the youngest, is in the lead.
Martinsson glides along beneath the ice. There is no air. She struggles and scratches in vain.
The cold threatens to split open her skin. Her lungs are bursting.
Then she bumps against something with her knees and her back at the same time. She is stuck. She is stuck, crouching on all fours. The current has pushed her into the riverbank. She is on her hands and knees on ice-cold stones, with the sheet of ice above her back.
The ice is flexible. It has become thin and brittle in the shallows. She pushes through it and is able to stand up. Her lungs suck in fresh air. Then she starts bellowing. Screams and screams.
She screams and screams until her voice cracks.
“That’s enough!” he shouts in the end. “Shut up! Stop screeching! Come and get the dog.”
Tintin is lying motionless by his side.
Then Martinsson starts to cry. She wades through the brittle ice and onto dry land, sobbing loudly. Hjalmar starts laughing. He laughs until his stomach aches. He has not laughed for many years – maybe just occasionally when there was something funny on the television. He can hardly breathe.
Martinsson walks up to the cottage to fetch a spade. She vomits twice on the way there.
When Mella and her colleagues reach the cottage, they see Martinsson and Hjalmar down by the riverbank. Hjalmar has sunk into the snow; they can only see the top half of his body. Martinsson is digging away the snow from around him. Her clothes are soaked through, as is her hair. Her coat has been flung on the ground. Blood is pouring from a wound in her head. Her hands are also bleeding, but Martinsson does not seem to notice. She is digging away frenetically. Hjalmar has started singing again. “He heals all my diseases, he doth my soul redeem. Hallelujah.” Snow is flying in all directions.
The police officers approach cautiously. Rantakyrö and Olsson put away their pistols.
“What’s happened?” Mella says.
Neither Hjalmar nor Martinsson answers.