She empties the rest of the cat food into the bowl and waits for George to come racing in, but there is no sign of her. Laura washes her hands and wipes them on her trousers before she goes looking for the cat. George is sitting in the hallway. She looks at Laura and miaows loudly.
‘Bye, puss,’ Laura says, heading for the front door.
But the calculator in her brain has kicked in. How long does a tin of cat food last? How many days can a cat survive in the middle of winter?
Gärdsnäset belongs to her now. The land, the house, all the rubbish, and the cat. Besides which, it’s not fair to take out her anger on poor George. Maybe she could ask Håkansson to find a new owner?
She sighs and turns back.
‘OK, George, you’re going for a ride in my car,’ she says, trying not to think about all the cat hair that will end up on the white leather upholstery.
However, just as she’s about to grab the cat, George shoots off through a door that is standing ajar.
Laura swears. Maybe it would be easier to leave George here, get Håkansson to collect her. But then she hears the miaowing again, louder this time, as if George is calling to her. Hesitantly she follows the sound, ducking to avoid the cobwebs hanging from the ceiling. She nudges the door with her toe to avoid touching the handle. The hall is so full of crap that she doesn’t realise which room it is until the door swings open.
She inhales sharply.
The fitted carpet, the ladybird wallpaper that has begun to come away just below the ceiling. Her old drawings, the shelf of childish pottery, the little oil painting that she was once so proud of. Everything is exactly as she remembers it. The moonlight shining in through the window reinforces the sense of unreality.
She takes a couple of steps into the room.
The floor is clean, the bed neatly made. There is a toothbrush on the bedside table. Waiting for someone. For a guest who never came.
Laura perches on the edge of the bed. The duvet cover is faded from frequent washing, she can’t make out the motif, but she knows that it was once a unicorn. She runs her hand over the soft fabric.
George jumps up onto the bed, rubs her face against Laura’s arm, then settles down.
Laura unbuttons her jacket, lies down and curls her body around the cat. The bedclothes smell of soap powder, as if they were washed not long ago. George begins to purr.
The nymph is reflected in the picture above them. In the moonlight it is just possible to make out the dark patch on her shoulder.
She did the painting two years before the fire, and yet it is impossible not to see the young woman with the burned back as a kind of horrible omen.
She closes her eyes, draws George closer. The cat continues to purr. The smell of the room and the warm body beside her is so very familiar. For a few brief moments it is as if time has stood still. She is fifteen, almost sixteen, and 13 December 1987 is still to come.
There is still a chance to put everything right.
To avert the disaster.
11
Winter 1987
Iben’s father’s truck was parked right outside the cabin. Laura didn’t really want to leave her room, but she knew that Hedda and the others would find it strange if she didn’t come to say goodbye, so she dried her tears, splashed her face with cold water, pulled on her jacket and went out.
Ulf Jensen was tall and muscular, with an angular face. As usual he was wearing a tracksuit and a woolly hat with the athletics club logo.
‘Hi, Laura – welcome home,’ he said. ‘Are you still trying to teach people how to talk properly?’
Laura smiled dutifully. One summer when they were little, she’d tried to teach Iben to speak Swedish without a Skåne accent. Ulf clearly enjoyed the memory. Unlike Laura, who was finding it difficult to look at Iben right now.
Ulf had an air of confidence, something that made everyone listen to him without any need to raise his voice. People liked him, but at the same time they were a little afraid of him. He owned a construction company, was a member of the local council, and also worked as a trainer in the athletics club. No one ever talked about Iben’s mother; Laura didn’t know why. She’d heard Hedda say that Sofia Jensen had left the family when Iben was little, and never contacted them again.
Ulf had built a small training facility for Iben and her half-brothers at home at Källegården: a running track, a long-jump pit, a concrete circle for discus and shot put. Laura had occasionally wondered what it would be like to have Ulf Jensen as a dad instead of her own.
‘OK, Iben – time to go home.’
Laura stiffened as Iben put her arm around her.
‘We haven’t had the chance to talk properly, just you and me.’
‘No . . .’ Laura tried to sound normal.
‘I’ve got training tomorrow evening, but maybe we could meet at Wohlin’s after school? Four o’clock?’
‘Great.’
‘Thanks for this evening, Hedda,’ Ulf said as he got in the truck. ‘And don’t hesitate to call me if you see or hear anything. We have to catch that bastard.’
‘What did he mean by that?’ Laura asked when they’d left.
Her aunt took a deep breath.
‘There have been a couple of fires around the lake during the winter,’ she said. ‘Ulf and a few others have got the idea they weren’t accidental.’
‘What, you mean somebody started them deliberately?’
‘That’s what they’re saying.’ Hedda shrugged. ‘But there’s no evidence. Just a lot of talk.’
She put her arm around Laura and led her towards the house.
‘Time for bed, I think. Jack’s going to lock up the cabin for me. You must be worn out, my little princess.’
Laura looked around for the others. She could hear Jack moving around inside the cabin, keeping out of Ulf Jensen’s way as usual. She didn’t know why, but right now it felt kind of nice.
Peter and Tomas were already on their mopeds. Milla was standing between them; she seemed to be saying something quietly, because both boys were leaning towards her.
‘Goodnight!’ Hedda called out. All three waved in response.
Laura wanted to ask her aunt about Milla – what she was doing here, why Hedda hadn’t mentioned her in her letters, but she felt completely exhausted. All she wanted to do was collapse into her bed and put this evening behind her.
Laura woke in the middle of the night, as she often did after a long-haul flight. She lay there for a few minutes, then realised she wasn’t going to be able to get back to sleep.
Her mind was racing. She replayed the afternoon and evening, analysed every comment, every glance, every little gesture.
Iben knew how she felt about Jack. Jack knew how she felt about him. And yet they’d gone behind her back. The thought was so painful that she had to get up.
Quietly, she slipped out of bed, taking care not to disturb George, who was curled up in a ball by her feet. She opened the walk-in closet door. There was a piece of foam rubber stuck to the bottom – a relic from the summer when Laura had caught her leg on the sharp corner. Her mother still didn’t know about the incident, or the two stitches she’d needed in her shin.
Under the plastic matting inside was a wooden hatch. When she pulled it open, a gust of cold air struck her.
She’d discovered the crawl space under the house a few summers ago, when Hedda had needed her help to fix a blocked drain. She’d seen the inspection hatch and worked out that it must lead straight into her bedroom.
Ever since then, the crawl space had been her secret hiding place. She lowered her upper body through the hole and directed the beam of her torch at the nearest pillar. She groped behind it and brought out an old cigar box with the word MONTECRISTO on the lid.