When Daniel finally tipped the body into the water the large ship was already quite close.
The body did not sink. It remained floating near the boat.
Someone shouted to him, a man with a peaked cap and gold buttons on his coat. Daniel didn’t listen. He tried to force the body under the surface, but it was no use. A lifeboat was lowered over the side and some seamen rowed quickly over to their skiff. Sanna had pulled the dirty blanket over her head, but she kept on humming. Daniel could hear that it was a hymn. The man with the peaked cap grabbed hold of the gunwale.
‘What the hell is going on here? Did you kill him?’
The seamen began to pull up the body. There was another boat next to the lifeboat. Two seamen had guns in their hands.
The body was now halfway out of the water. Hans Höjer’s face had turned yellow. One eye was half open, as if even in death he wanted to know what was going on around him.
‘This man has been murdered,’ said Roslund. ‘I’ve seen plenty in my day, but never a little black devil like this all alone out on the Sound. Why is the girl hiding under the blanket?’
Daniel thought he ought to say something. but Sanna, who kept humming underneath the blanket, upset him and made it impossible for him to find the words.
At that moment there was a whistled signal from the big ship. It cut through the dawn and scared some seagulls from the water.
‘Hell,’ said Roslund. ‘What’s the King doing up so early?’
He turned round and saluted. A man with a grey beard was standing at the railing. Next to him were two men dressed in black and white. One had a tray in his hand, the other a towel.
‘What’s going on?’ asked the man with the grey beard.
‘I don’t know, Your Majesty. But we discovered someone trying to throw a corpse overboard.’
People had begun gathering at the railing of the big ship. A woman appeared but the man with the grey beard waved her away.
‘Who’s hiding under the blanket?’
One of the seamen pulled off the blanket. Sanna closed her eyes and held her hands in front of her face. She kept humming, louder now, and she was rocking back and forth.
‘Bring them aboard,’ said the King. ‘But perhaps it would be best to tie up the Negro boy. Quite a remarkable wake-up call, I must say. The sun comes up in the mist and the first thing one sees is a little black boy who has committed a murder.’
Roslund pointed to two of the seamen. One of them took off his belt and tried to grab Daniel’s hands, but Daniel sank his teeth into the man’s wrist. The seaman yelled and let go of Daniel, who began climbing overboard. There was nothing else to do now. Once again his journey home had been interrupted. Now he was surrounded by men in white who wanted to tie him up, so he might as well die. He would then drift deep in the sea until he finally reached home. That would be better than being buried in the earth behind Hallén’s church, where nobody would ever find him.
He made it only halfway into the water. The person who caught him was not one of the seamen but Sanna, who suddenly cast herself over him. He tried to pull himself loose, but she held on, and she was strong. He bit and struggled, but she didn’t seem to care.
‘I won’t!’ he screamed. ‘I want to go home!’
Somewhere inside him his old language welled up and cut through all the words he had been forced to learn. Be and Kiko were inside him, their voices shouted at Sanna, and they struggled as much as he did. They didn’t want to let go of him now that he was so close.
‘We’re not going to drown!’ Sanna screamed. ‘We’re going back home, no matter what happens. We’re going home.’
Daniel realised that Sanna had betrayed him. She wouldn’t let him die. She forced first Be and then Kiko to release their grip. Two of the seamen dragged him aboard and tied his hands behind him with the belt. He no longer resisted. He just closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep, to force his heart to stop beating. He felt himself lifted up and carried off and then he lay utterly still.
When he opened his eyes the man with the grey beard was standing watching him. The whites of his eyes were bloodshot.
‘Hardly one of my subjects,’ he said. ‘Not even in the remotest villages in Norway can one find the like. A Negro.’
The man looked at Captain Roslund, who stood next to him.
‘What does the girl say?’
Roslund snapped to attention and held his arms rigid at his side.
‘To be honest the girl doesn’t seem very bright, Your Majesty. She says that they were sailing to the desert. And that the man just died. Dr Steninger was unable to find any wounds on the body. He asks for permission to carry out an autopsy.’
‘On the Drott? Are corpses to be cut open on the King’s yacht? On my holiday trip to Kristiania? Permission denied!’
Roslund stamped on the deck, saluted, turned on his heel and left.
Daniel lay on a sail that had been spread out. Someone had placed a pillow under his head. All around people stood looking at him, but it was the man with the grey beard who was the most important. He stood closest, and there was a distance between him and the others. Daniel thought that he recognised his face. He had seen him before.
‘I think he recognises Your Majesty,’ said a man with a short stubby moustache.
Then Daniel remembered. In Alma and Edvin’s sitting room there was a picture on the wall. The picture was of the man who was now looking at him. Once Daniel had asked who he was, and Alma had said he was King Oskar and then a number that he didn’t recall.
He sat up at once. The grey-bearded man took a quick step backwards.
‘Careful,’ he said. ‘It’s possible the boy cannot be trusted. What does the girl say?’
‘She’s crying, Your Majesty.’
‘But before — what did she say about the boy?’
‘She said that his name is Daniel and he’s from an African desert.’
‘But I definitely heard him speaking Swedish, in a Skåne dialect.’
‘She said that they come from a village near Tomelilla.’
‘And they were just off on a sailing trip?’
‘He wanted to go back to the desert.’
The man who was the King held out his hand and was given a handkerchief. He wiped his mouth and then dropped it on the deck.
‘A peculiar dawn,’ said the King. ‘One awakens too early and immediately one has the most remarkable experience. Bathe the boy and put some clothes on him. They need food. See to it that the girl stops crying. Then I want to hear their story. What’s happening with the dead man?’
‘He is being taken ashore, Your Majesty.’
The King nodded and turned to go. A woman leaned over towards Daniel. She smelled strongly of perfume. She looked at him and then burst out laughing.
Daniel passively submitted to everything. He was bathed, given new clothes and a coat with yellow buttons. Then he was led into a room where Sanna was waiting. She was wearing a dress and her mouth was wide open.
‘The King!’ she shrieked. ‘We’re on the King’s boat.’
‘You should have let me drown. Why didn’t you let me sink to the bottom?’
She didn’t hear him. She tugged on her dress, her eyes still big with disbelief.
‘It’s the King,’ she said again, and Daniel saw that she had tears in her eyes, but whether they were from fear or joy he couldn’t tell.
Sanna had pulled him back into the boat. She had been stronger than Be and Kiko and she had betrayed him.
He knew that he must have revenge, but he didn’t know how.
The door opened. A man with a gold ribbon over his shoulder came in.
‘His Majesty awaits,’ he said in a wheezing voice.