The Christmas Hypothesis

by Anna Blix

  She stretched out her hand. “I’m Emma.”

  “Niklas.” He took her hand. It was only the first day, and he already had a partner.

  8

  Due to a misunderstanding at Oslo Gardermoen involving Niklas’s expired passport, there was a delay before he finally arrived in London. He took the express train from the airport into Paddington Station, where he stepped out onto the gum-dotted pavement and stopped to take in the picture. London in November was warm — unbelievably warm. It was also wet, grey and noisy.

  So this was where they came from. The children who had written all those letters. England. Even though Niklas had visited London eighteen years ago, when he attended a conference as a PhD candidate, he had not quite remembered it like this. Somehow, he must have managed to blank it out. The rain, the noise, the soot. The smells. People everywhere, cars, taxis and buses. Engines, horns, voices and exhaust, invading his personal space, competing for attention.

  A man came out of the station and bumped into him from behind. “I do apologise,” he said and hurried onwards.

  Niklas stepped aside, out of the way of people exiting and entering the station. He pressed himself against the dirty brick wall of a newsagent.

  There he stood and watched how people flowed past him, on foot and in cars. Traffic lights, which changed from red to amber to green, opened the floodgates to the stream of traffic going one way and closed them to others. Over and over again, cars and pedestrians were taking turns to flood the junction.

  It was afternoon and dusk was falling. Christmas lights were turned on in shop windows, blinking erratically in an array of colours. Above the road, suspended from wires running all the way down the street, dangled large electric snowflakes, vibrating with light.

  People darted frantically in and out of shops as if they were cuckoos in a clock, carrying bags and bags of presents. Seasonal tunes blared from within the small gift shop next to the newsagent, encouraging shoppers to part with their hard-earned money. The whole scene was a strange sight that, against the warm November afternoon, was completely bizarre.

  Christmas commerce in London was not like any Christmas Niklas had ever experienced. Preparations didn’t start in November at the polar station. There, things continued exactly as normal until around one week before Christmas when, struck by a sudden inspiration, Peter might decorate the kitchen with a garland of tinsel he kept tucked away in a cupboard the rest of the year. Then, on Christmas Day, to top it all off, the two men shared a drink and some Finnish gingerbread biscuits that Niklas had sent for. They would sit up late and slot one of Peter’s old comedies from the nineties into the DVD player. Eventually, Niklas nodded off, and Peter returned to his room. That was it. No lights, no presents — especially no singing — and that was the way Niklas liked it.

  England was something completely different. The British went all-in with everything that sparkled, and the whole of London seemed like one giant, garishly mismatched Christmas tree.

  Before Niklas could even think about what he was supposed to be doing in this city, he needed to deal with what was most pressing — finding a place to stay the night. He reluctantly left his safe spot by the wall and walked down the street. People were coming towards him as if they were trying to knock him over. He dodged them best he could, and elbowed into others as he did so. Businessmen and women, tourists with rucksacks, all sorts of people who all had one thing in common — everyone carried an umbrella. Niklas didn’t own an umbrella.

  “Excuse me,” he said to a man with a black umbrella, who charged at him. “Where can I find a hotel in this area?”

  The man stopped. “You can find a hotel anywhere. They come thirteen to the dozen. Your problem is finding a room.”

  The man with the umbrella frowned at Niklas as if he waited for him to speak, but Niklas couldn’t think of anything more to add. He could only think about the strange room-less hotels they must have here in London. Either it was a new invention they had come up with while he was in the Arctic, or the man had meant to say “Your problem is finding a room that is free”. The two men stood there looking at each other, but after a while, the man with the umbrella must have grown tired and walked on.

  Sure enough, Niklas soon came across a nice-looking building with a sign that read Royal City Hotel. It had conical green shrubs in pots symmetrically placed on either side of its entrance, and a red carpet leading up to the brass-handled double-doors. He stepped inside and was hit by a stream of hot air. Another red carpet took him up to the front desk, behind which stood a young lady with a professional smile.

  “Do you have rooms?” Niklas asked.

  The young lady smiled sympathetically. “We’re fully booked until Christmas.”

  This was a setback. Niklas glanced at his Casio. It was already five o’clock.

  “I’m very sorry, but this is our busiest time. Would you like to make a reservation for January? London in January can be wonderful. Don’t forget, you’ll have all the sales then. Plenty of bargains.” The lady tilted her head to one side.

  Niklas left, disappointed. It would have been nice if they had a room for him. His legs were tired, and his feet ached, but he kept walking down the road, and soon he stood in front of the next hotel. Underneath a sign which read The Little Teapot Hotel hung a picture of a teapot. The sign looked dirty and the paint was flaking off. He entered a dim lobby, which smelled of damp. Niklas decided he couldn’t be too choosy.

  “Does this hotel have rooms?” he said to the tired-looking man behind the front desk. Niklas didn’t mind that the hotel wasn’t as nice as the first one he had tried. Of course, the nice hotels would be fully booked already, what had he been thinking? This one would do just fine.

  “We’re completely full. Sorry.”

  Niklas surveyed the lobby. Damp brown stains were discolouring the ceiling and the wallpaper was peeling off. He noticed that behind the tired-looking man was a grimy pegboard of keys hanging under their corresponding room numbers.

  “Then why are there so many keys hanging there?”

  “Because everybody hasn’t checked in yet, Sherlock. I can assure you, we’re fully booked for tonight and the rest of the week.”

  Niklas left The Little Teapot Hotel with a nagging feeling in his stomach. The receptionist had likened him to Sherlock Holmes, the logical mastermind. Niklas felt flattered by the comparison, but he still knew that this would be a hard nut to crack. He kept going into every hotel he could find, luxury five-star ones, to cheap hostels — he didn’t mind. All he wanted was somewhere to sleep. But wherever he asked for a room, he was met with the same reply: “Fully booked.”

  As he walked on, he found himself on less busy streets, and the hotels came further apart. Darkness fell. Shop staff brought in their signs, turned off the lights and rolled down steel shutters in front of their doors. Commuters stopped pouring in and out of the Underground stations.

  He wondered what was happening back at the station. What Tom was doing right now. Probably strutting about, beaming out smiles left and right and working his charm on anybody who would fall for it. And taking over his job. Doing his research, using his equipment, teaching his students. Even the teaching—

  “I heard it has snowed in Scotland.” Two ladies approached Niklas on the pavement. He stepped out into the road to let them pass. They continued at a brisk pace without noticing him.

  It might snow in Scotland for all he knew, but in London, the rain kept falling. It had soon found its way through the worn seams of his hopelessly inadequate red parka, and he was now soaked through. His jeans clung to his legs, and the water had even seeped into his snow-boots. Niklas shivered as the rain, which had earlier felt so warm, was now chilling him to the bone. Still, he had no choice but to aimlessly walk up and down the streets of London.

  The roads narrowed and shops and hotels became sparse, in favour of residential houses. Fear came creeping in. What was he going to do? What if he didn’t find anywhere to stay? He sat on t
he doorstep of a closed chip shop, resting his chin in his palms. He wished he had brought the flask from his desk drawer. The vodka would at least have numbed him from the cold. By now, the Italian student, Giulia, must have thrown it away with the rest of his things. Unless she had kept it for herself. Niklas chuckled. He hoped she had.

  It had been a bad idea coming to London. Follow the paper trail — what had he been thinking? How was that supposed to help him? He should have swallowed his pride and gone with Juha to Helsinki. He should have accepted a position at the university, no matter how it made him feel. People did things like that all the time. Why should he be different?

  He reached into his pocket and pulled Sophie’s violet-scented letter out. He smelled it and realised how hungry he was. Right now, he would have eaten one of those violet sweets if someone had offered him one.

  “And you want your scooter for Christmas, Sophie,” he said to the letter. “I’m sorry I can’t help you with that. But I really hope you get one.”

  “Scoot!” A voice rang from behind. Niklas stiffened. He shoved the letter back into his pocket. A man strode up to him, shouting, “You’ve got to shift. Go somewhere else!”

  “What?”

  “This is a restaurant — my restaurant.” The man pointed to his own chest. “You can’t sit here!”

  “Sorry, I didn’t know anybody was in there.”

  “I live in the flat above. Looked out the window and saw you sitting here. Good thing I spotted you, or you would’ve frightened away my customers all night.”

  Niklas looked around. There was not a person in sight. “I’ll go,” he said. He got up, but he didn’t leave. “Do you think I could come inside for a little while? I can pay you.”

  The man scoffed. “What do you think this looks like? A bloody homeless shelter? Go, before I call the police!” The man made a sweeping motion with his hand. Niklas hurried off.

  “Get yourself a job!” the man called after him.

  Niklas continued down the road, cold and hungry. He passed row after row of houses. Lights were on behind drawn curtains. Families having dinner together behind closed doors. Any one of them could be Sophie’s family, but the chance of that would be one in a million.

  He walked aimlessly through residential streets for another half an hour, without a trace of any hotels or other places to stay. He had given up hope of finding somewhere to sleep that night. But if he kept on walking anyway, slowly moving forward one step at a time, morning would eventually come. He would be allowed indoors — inside a train station. Then he could get himself back to Heathrow airport and buy a ticket to Helsinki. Coming here without a plan had been a big mistake.

  There must have been something about the way the headlights from a passing car fell on the small Victorian house in front of him that made Niklas stop and look at it. Like most other houses he’d seen in London, it was built in brown bricks. The little front garden had a low metal railing, shielding it from passers-by on the pavement. In a bed under the window, somebody had planted flowers that were in bloom, even though it was November. The windows were dark and curtains drawn, but from a wooden post hung a sign which read Mrs Dollimore’s B&B.

  9

  Clare Sheldon set off after breakfast to check on the herd. Normally, the animals didn’t need any supplementary feeding this time of year, but today, she decided to take two buckets of reindeer pellets, to give them a well-deserved energy boost after the freezing night up on the mountain. The Scottish Highlands could be an inhospitable place, and yesterday had seen the first snowfall of the season. Deep snow had blanketed the hills by the evening, but today was a clear day and even though the temperature was below zero, the sun’s rays were greedily eating away at the snow cover.

  She opened the trailer door and secured the buckets with ropes before she sat in the front and slid the seat forward. Her dad had been the last person to drive the car, but for the last couple of days, he’d been in bed, down with a nasty cold. It was hard work running the farm without his help, but she had no choice. Jobs had to be done. She looked up towards his bedroom window when she started the car. The curtains were drawn. He must still be asleep.

  She drove her four-by-four, with the converted horse trailer in tow, up the slopes of Ben Bolgach, one of the many hills of the Grampian range. The winding lane was nothing but a dirt track, half-hidden under snow and with deep ditches on both sides, guiding meltwater down from the hills. Clare could see she was the first person to drive up the mountain this morning, and she guessed she would be the only one for the entire day.

  Her thoughts wandered to the letter that had come in the post yesterday. The one her dad didn’t see. She had been standing at the kitchen sink, watching as the postman walked up the stony drive. There was a thud as the post dropped onto the doormat. The telephone directory, a few bills and, at the top of the pile — the letter. She knew immediately what it was.

  She brought it up to her room, where she read it, sitting on her single bed. Then she hid it underneath the socks in the top left drawer of her dresser—

  Suddenly, the wheels lost traction and the car skidded across the snow, towards the edge of the road. Clare slammed on the brakes and turned the steering wheel sharply to the right. There was a grinding noise as the anti-skid system set in, but nevertheless, the vehicle’s movement was out of her control. In slow motion, she drifted off the road and into the soft terrain, where she finally came to a stop.

  She exhaled through tight lips. She had let her concentration slip momentarily, and driven too fast on the icy surface. She had always thought of herself as a good driver, and it irritated her that she had let this happen. And today of all days — just what she needed, this morning. As if she was not busy enough looking after the farm on her own. She banged the horn with her gloved fist. It let out an annoyingly cheerful beep.

  She sighed and started the engine back up again, putting the gear stick in reverse. She let the clutch up slowly while gradually increasing pressure on the accelerator. At first, the wheels span, tearing up snow and digging into the mud. Clare eased off and tried again. She’d have to go all-in, or she’d never get back up. She floored the accelerator and released the clutch. The car sprang into motion as the wheels found traction and bounced backwards onto the lane, where it stopped.

  Clare’s heart was racing. She took a minute to calm herself. Then she patted the dashboard. “Thank you. I knew you wouldn’t let me down,” she said. She had owned the vehicle for five years and driven it in all weathers. It had never disappointed her, and she was particularly grateful it didn’t do so today. She drove slowly the rest of the way, with her full attention on the road.

  She parked in a passing bay near the summit of Ben Bolgach. It was close to the spot where she had last seen the herd. She turned off the engine and stepped out of the car. She breathed in the clean morning air. It felt crisp, filling her lungs. She looked out across the soft rolling hills of the Scottish Highlands. It was a spectacular view; perhaps the most beautiful she had ever seen these hills. Patches of rusted heather and green lichen peeked out through the glittering snow. The bright sun created highlights and deep blue shadows in the quilt of sharp contrasts draped over the undulating landscape.

  At the bottom of the nearest valley, she spotted the herd. Fifty reindeer standing close together. Their impenetrable coats keeping them warm in the winter cold. Heads crowned with antlers were raised over grey and brown backs. Some of the reindeer were grazing the tough lichen, a plant low in nutrients and hard to digest, but which the reindeer had adapted to over thousands of years. It was what they wanted, and all they needed to thrive.

  This was a life fit for a reindeer. Roaming the mountains freely in a large herd, grazing plants that could be found in their native habitats. It was a healthy herd, established in the 1960s by her grandfather, who had imported them from Lapland.

  Clare made her way down the steep slope, careful not to lose her footing on the frozen ground. She carried one bucket in
each hand and had thrown a halter with a rope over her shoulder, in case she needed to hold an animal still while examining it. In her pocket was her notebook, with an up-to-date list of every single reindeer, including their earmarked number, name, age and gender.

  When she reached the herd, she took a handful of pellets and held it out to the nearest reindeer, a beautiful grey doe, around three years old, with large antlers. She gave Clare a suspicious look, before she decided she had seen this woman before and she probably didn’t pose a threat. Her soft nose tickled Clare’s hand when she munched up the pellets. While she finished chewing, Clare ran her hands over her back and down her legs. The doe was in good health, with vigorous muscle and a lustrous coat. She ticked the doe off her list, and then she carried on with the rest of the animals.

  One of the last reindeer she checked on was an old buck. He looked a wee bit scruffy and walked with a slight limp. Clare ran her hand down his legs. He winced as she touched his right front knee and there was a slight swelling. Better take him back down to the farm, where she could keep an eye on him. She slid the halter over his head, while feeding him pellets from her other hand.

  The reindeer followed her obediently back to the trailer at the top of the hill. Clare tied him up while lowering the ramp. “Come on, there’s nothing to worry about, we’re just going for a ride.” She kept the short rope in a firm grip as she led the animal into the dark stall, before she buckled the door behind him.

  She turned the car around carefully and guided it at a low speed down the winding mountain track. She didn’t want to end up off the road again, especially not now she had an animal in the back.

  Clare parked the four-by-four back at the steading, a building whose original parts dated back to the eighteenth century. It was built in stone, with a slate roof, and it had a stony, uncultivated garden. It had originated as a sheep farm, so there was a large timber barn and two fenced-off enclosures, where the reindeer were kept at times when they were not roaming free on the mountain.