Finally they were satisfied. Both wiped the sweat from their foreheads and nodded to each other. There must have been thirty kilos of chains wound around Simon, secured in different places with four padlocks. They had hardly used the ropes, except in two places where they had brought them in as an afterthought, just to tighten the chains.
The men took a couple of steps back and contemplated their handiwork. They were quite satisfied, and you could see why. It looked utterly impossible to escape from the web of metal they had created.
Simon opened his eyes and Anna-Greta's stomach contracted. Around the fettered man was an empty circle perhaps twenty metres deep.
Alone.
Anna-Greta thought: Alone. Simon looked so horribly alone in that moment. Someone who had been ejected from the community, utterly disarmed. And now they were going to throw him in the sea. There was a powerful element of degradation about the whole thing: an individual allowing other people to do this to him. A second after Simon opened his eyes, it was as if he had caught a glimpse of that very thing. It was that expression that made Anna-Greta's stomach contract, before it disappeared and Simon looked from one man to the other and said, Are you satisfied? Are you convinced that I can't escape?'
Ragnar grabbed hold of one of the chains and pulled at it, then shrugged and said, 'Well, I certainly couldn't do it.'
Someone in the crowd shouted, 'You want to do that with your cows, Ragnar, then they won't go running off!'
People from Domarö laughed, the rest didn't get the joke. Simon asked the two men to carry him to the edge of the jetty, which they did. Anna-Greta and Johan moved back to make room, and Simon ended up only a metre or so away from them. Simon's eyes met Anna- Greta's, and a smile flitted across his lips. Anna-Greta tried to smile back, but couldn't quite manage it.
'And now,' said Simon, 'I would like to ask a third person to pull the sack up around me and secure the top.'
Before anyone had time to step forward, someone further back shouted, 'What about the handcuffs, then? What's happening with them?'
Suddenly Simon looked a little bit scared. He closed his eyes without speaking. Then he nodded to Göran, who stepped forward with the handcuffs and asked, 'Are you sure about this?'
'No,' said Simon. 'But I suppose I'll have to give it a try.'
Göran scratched the back of his neck and looked as if he couldn't quite decide what to do. Situations like this had presumably not formed part of his training at the police academy. In the end he fed the handcuffs through the chains and locked them around Simon's wrists.
By this stage Anna-Greta had folded her arms tightly across her chest to stop herself from chewing at her nails. She examined Simon's face, trying to gauge how much of this latest turn of events was merely theatre, part of the show, or if Simon really wasn't sure if he could do it. It was impossible to tell.
The photographer took some pictures of Simon as he stood there out on the edge of the jetty. A man Anna-Greta had never seen before-a Stockholmer, judging by his slender hands-stepped forward and declared himself willing to tie the sack. Simon turned to Johan and said, 'Would you like to check one last time?'
Johan pulled at the chains, and as he did so Anna-Greta saw Simon lean forward and whisper something to him. Then Johan took a step back and nodded. The Stockholmer pulled the sack up around Simon and tied the top with a piece of rope.
It looked horrible. The brown sack right on the edge. It was a point of darkness, of finality. People seemed to sense this; the banter and the jokes had died away, and there was absolute silence now.
'Throw me in,' said Simon's voice from inside the sack.
Five seconds passed. Then ten. Still there was silence, and no one volunteered. It wasn't irrevocable yet. They could open the sack, undo the chains. But once the sack was in the water, there wasn't much anyone could do. The sea was six metres deep off the jetty.
If Simon failed, the person who had pushed the sack into the water would be responsible. People looked at each other, but no one stepped forward. Simon was moving inside the sack, they could hear the chains squeaking slightly as the links rubbed against one another. A couple of cameras clicked. Still no one.
'Throw me in the sea.'
Presumably it would have been easier if Simon had said something ordinary and amusing, such as Am I supposed to stand here all day?' or 'The chains are starting to get rusty in here', but obviously he wasn't interested in relieving the dramatic tension.
And yet it seemed he might have to. After a minute, still no one had come forward. People were beginning to feel uncomfortable. Perhaps this was how it felt when Jesus told the person who was without sin to cast the first stone.
Suddenly the muscular man from Nåten cleared his throat, and without further ado he stepped forward and shoved the sack. It hit the water with a dull splash, and a collective gasp ran through the crowd. People pushed forward to look, and Anna-Greta had to fight to avoid being nudged into the water by the surge.
There wasn't much to see. A stream of bubbles rose from the sack as it sank, but after thirty seconds the last bubble had burst on the surface, and there was only the dark water to be seen. Those who had been hoping to see something of Simon's struggle were disappointed; it was impossible to see beyond a depth of three metres.
When one minute had passed, people began muttering to each other: did anyone know how long a person could actually hold their breath? Would it be possible to bring the man up if he didn't succeed? Did anyone have the keys to those padlocks?
Another minute passed, and now a large number of people were becoming anxious. Why hadn't anyone attached a safety line to the sack, why hadn't a time limit been set, after which they should try to rescue the man, why…?
The man who had pushed the sack into the water appeared to be the most anxious of all. He was staring down into the water, and the body that had been so confident in its strength and authority now seemed to have sunk in on itself; his movements were jerky, his eyes were flicking here and there, his hands constantly rubbing against each other.
Anna-Greta stood there motionless, hugging herself. Hard. All around her people were looking from their watches to the surface of the water, back and forth, but Anna-Greta had fixed her gaze on Gåvasten lighthouse, far away in the distance. She stared at the lighthouse and waited. Waited for the splash as Simon's body broke the surface, the sudden intake of breath.
But it didn't come.
When three minutes had passed, someone shouted out, 'But he's going to die!' A murmur of agreement was heard, but still no one did anything. Anna-Greta tore her gaze away from the lighthouse, and couldn't help herself from looking down at the surface of the water. It was black and empty. Nothing was moving.
Come on. Come on now, Simon.
She could see it right in front of her, she could see right through the water, past the limit of normal visibility, right down to the bottom where Simon lay battling among the mud and rusty bits of metal. She saw him escape, saw the sack open and saw him push away from the seabed, up towards the light.
But that wasn't what happened. What did actually happen took place inside Anna-Greta. Something that had been sunken and thrown away freed itself down there in the darkness, broke the chain she had wound around it and swam towards the surface. It rose up through her body and fastened in her throat in a lump. She wanted to cry.
I love this bloody man.
She started to tremble.
Love. Don't disappear.
Her eyes filled with tears when someone behind her shouted, 'Four minutes!' and she clamped her hands together, pressed them against her heart and cursed herself because it was already too late, it was going to happen again, it was going to…