I had absolutely no recollection of seeing him among those working in vain to extinguish the blaze. How could I not recall his characteristic face, his bald head, his height and his slightly reedy voice?
‘I don’t remember anyone who was there,’ I replied. ‘But thank you for trying to help.’
‘What happened?’
‘It was definitely nothing to do with the wiring you renewed,’ I reassured him.
‘You didn’t leave a candle burning?’
‘No. We’ll have to wait and see what conclusion the investigators reach.’
I almost told him that I was probably suspected of arson, but I managed to stop the words before they flew out of my mouth.
‘I need electricity,’ I said. ‘I’m living in the caravan at the moment; I need light and heat.’
‘I’ve already thought about that. I can come over today.’
I was due to pick up Lisa Modin in three hours.
‘Tomorrow,’ I said. ‘And could you bring some outside lights and some lamps that I can use inside the caravan, if you have any?’
Kolbjörn promised he would be there the following day; we agreed on seven thirty. I put the phone in my pocket and went down to my boat, which started first time. I headed for the skerry with no name. I switched off the engine, flipped it up and made my way in using an oar. The bottom of the boat scraped against the rock. There was no need to make it fast because I would be able to see it from wherever I was on the skerry. The wind was a south-westerly, and the waves were lapping against the stern.
I found a few bones from a herring gull on the rocks. I had been finding such things, including entire skeletons, ever since I was a child. But I didn’t want to think of the skerry as a graveyard. I went down to the hollow between the two rocks; beyond lay the open sea, with the odd reef barely visible on the horizon.
When I was little I used to think of the reefs as the backs of whales, emerging from the sea.
I still do.
I paced out the hollow; the caravan would fit. With ropes and a block and tackle it wouldn’t be impossible to transport it from a ferry to the spot between two dense clumps of alders. I decided to carry out the plan that had come into my mind the previous day. I was sure that my daughter would approve. I was going to relocate the caravan.
I walked around the skerry. The wind felt fresh out here, with no islands to get in its way.
I got back in the boat and headed for the harbour. There was still an hour to go before I was due to meet Lisa Modin. I went to see Nordin and asked if he had ordered my wellingtons. He had. He looked almost insulted at the question.
I also bought a life jacket for Lisa. I have an old one that I never use. After mooring the boat I had taken it out from the little storage area in the stern, and had tried in vain to wipe off the oil and fish scales.
I was astonished when I paid for Lisa Modin’s life jacket. Nordin agreed that it was expensive, but of course he didn’t set the price.
Some construction workers were sitting in the cafe drinking coffee. They were in the middle of resurfacing the jetty where the coastguard patrol boats are moored. Apparently one of them had spotted a perch a few days earlier, and there was a loud discussion about whether he might have been mistaken. Everyone knows that perch has practically died out in the archipelago. I haven’t seen any in the water by my boathouse for almost three years. The odd shoal of dace has drifted by, but nothing else.
I listened distractedly to their conversation. The Baltic Sea was dying. Its decline was insidious. Parts of the seabed invisible to the naked eye were already dead, leaving nothing but a sterile underwater desert. The increasingly intense algae blooms were like an outbreak of psoriasis every summer. The sea was shedding its skin while being suffocated at the same time.
The construction workers left without reaching any agreement on the existence or otherwise of the perch. I was alone in the cafe. Veronika was in the kitchen, listening to the radio. I had noticed that she turned down the volume when I came in.
Veronika is the granddaughter of one of the last pilots out here. She has a brother who was born with hydrocephalus and lives at home with his parents. Veronika has a small apartment squeezed in between the grocery store and the cafe.
She is friendly and attentive, but permanently anxious, afraid of doing something wrong or saying something inappropriate. Sometimes I think she will always be here in the cafe, serving customers until old age takes its inevitable toll. I wonder what she really longs for. There must be something.
I went to the toilet and contemplated my reflection in the mirror. It was what it was. My hair was thinning but neatly combed. My expression was grim. I attempted a smile. I tried to picture Lisa Modin without any clothes on. I immediately felt embarrassed.
I discovered a mark on the blue Chinese shirt I had put on this morning, a small flaw on the collar. This made me so angry that I was on the point of ripping off the shirt and throwing it in the bin in the toilet, but I managed to calm myself down. If I pulled up my jumper by a few centimetres, the flaw wouldn’t show.
I still had twenty minutes before Lisa Modin was due to arrive. I went to the grocery shop and bought a brioche loaf. The place was just as empty as the cafe had been. There were hardly any people left on the islands, just as there were hardly any fish left in the sea.
I went down to the boat and waited. There was a light breeze blowing across the water. A rain front was building over to the east, but it was unlikely to reach us before the evening.
The construction workers were banging away on the jetty, the smell of asphalt filling the air.
I looked down into the water. No fish. Not even a little shoal of whitefish.
Ten o’clock. No sign of a car. Had she decided not to come after all?
At that moment a pale blue car came racing down the hill; the driver slammed on the brakes when it reached the parking area. Lisa Modin got out. She was wearing the same jacket as the previous day. I stood up and waved. In my eagerness I exaggerated the gesture; the boat rocked and I almost fell in the water. I banged my knee on one of the oars and sat down in the bottom with a thud. I don’t know if she noticed; I was back on my feet by the time she reached the boat.
‘Sorry I’m late,’ she said.
‘No problem.’
I took her handbag and helped her into the boat. She was wearing gloves. I gave her the life jacket and cast off. She settled down on the seat in the middle with her back to me. I headed out of the harbour and increased my speed. Nordin was standing outside the chandlery smoking his pipe. He’s one of the few people I know these days who stubbornly refuses to give up smoking.
Lisa Modin didn’t say a word throughout the whole journey, she just sat gazing out across the islands, the rocks and the open sea. A sea eagle drifted high above us on the thermals. That was the only time she turned to me. I nodded towards the bird, which appeared to be suspended on invisible strings.
‘A golden eagle?’ she called out.
‘Sea eagle.’
Those were the only words we exchanged. I slowed down as we approached my jetty. The site of the fire was clearly visible. I manoeuvred carefully into the boathouse.
She didn’t need any help getting ashore. We went straight up to my burned-out house. She walked around the blackened remains once, twice, the second time in the opposite direction. I stood by the charred apple tree, watching her. For a brief moment she reminded me of Harriet when she was young, although Harriet had never had such short hair. Suddenly I didn’t know if my desire was focused on a memory or on the woman walking around the ruins.
Lisa rejoined me, shaking her head.
‘What happened?’