Cecilia carried on upwards as she squeezed Anders' hand. She had a tendency towards claustrophobia, and from that point of view the lighthouse was an absolute nightmare. The thick stone walls rising up so close together swallowed every sound, and the only light came from the open door down at the bottom and a fainter source of light higher up.
After another forty or so steps it was completely dark behind them, while the light above them had grown stronger. From somewhere up above they could hear Maja's voice, 'Hurry up! Come and see!'
The staircase ended at an open space in a wooden floor. They were standing in a circular room where a number of small windows made of thick glass let in a limited amount of light. In the middle of the room was another open door in a tower within the tower, with light pouring out.
Cecilia sat down on the floor and rubbed her hands over her face. When Anders crouched down beside her she waved dismissively. 'I'm fine. I just need to…'
Maja was shouting from inside the tower and Cecilia told him to go, she would follow shortly. Anders stroked her hair and went to the open door, which led to another spiral staircase, this one made of iron. The light hurt his eyes as he climbed the twenty or so steps up to the heart and the brain of the lighthouse, the reflector.
Anders stopped and gazed open-mouthed. It was so beautiful.
From the darkness we ascend towards the light. He made his way up the dark staircase, and it was a shock to reach the top. Apart from a whitewashed border right at the bottom, the circular walls were made entirely of glass, and everything was sky and light. In the middle of the room stood the reflector, an obelisk made up of prisms and different coloured, geometrically precise pieces of glass. A shrine to the light.
Maja was standing with her nose and hands pressed against the glass wall. When she heard Anders coming, she pointed out across the ice, towards the north-east.
'Daddy, what's that?'
Anders screwed his eyes up against the brightness and looked out over the ice. He couldn't see anything apart from the white covering, and far away on the horizon just a hint of Ledinge archipelago.
'What do you mean?'
Maja pointed. 'There. On the ice.'
A gust of wind made the powdery snow whirl up, moving like a spirit across the pristine surface. Anders shook his head and turned back to face the room.
'Have you seen this?'
They examined the reflector and Anders took some pictures of Maja through the reflector, behind the reflector, in front of the reflector. The little girl and the kaleidoscope of light, refracted in all directions. When they had finished Cecilia came up the stairs, and she too was amazed.
They ate their picnic in the light room looking out across the archipelago, trying to spot familiar landmarks. Maja was interested in the graffiti on the white wall, but since some of it required explanations unsuitable for the ears of a six-year-old, Anders took out the information leaflet and started reading aloud.
The lower parts of the lighthouse had been built as early as the sixteenth century, as a platform for the beacons lit to mark the navigable channel into Stockholm. Later the tower was added and a primitive reflector was installed; at first it was illuminated using oil, then kerosene.
That was enough for Maja, and she was off down the stairs. Anders grabbed hold of her snowsuit.
'Just hang on, sunshine. Where are you off to?'
'I'm going to look at that thing I said I could see.'
'You're not to go too far.'
'I won't'.
Anders let go and Maja carried on down the stairs. Cecilia watched her disappear.
'Shouldn't we…?'
'Well yes. But where can she go?'
They spent a couple of minutes reading the rest of the leaflet, and learned that the Aga aggregate had eventually been installed, that the lighthouse had been decommissioned in 1973 and had then been taken over by the Archipelago Foundation, which had put in a symbolic hundred-watt bulb. These days it ran on solar cells.
They looked at the graffiti and established that at least one instance of sexual intercourse must have taken place on this floor, unless of course it was just a case of wishful thinking on the part of the writer. Then they gathered their things together and set off down the stairs. Cecilia had to take her time because of the palpitations, the pressure on her chest, and Anders waited for her.
When they got outside there was no sign of Maja. The wind had started to get up and the snow was swirling through the air in thin veils, glittering in the sunlight. Anders closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. It had been a fantastic outing, but now it was time to go home.
'Maaaja,' he shouted. No reply. They walked around the lighthouse, looking out for her. The rock itself was only small, perhaps a hundred metres in circumference. There was no sign of Maja anywhere, and Anders gazed out across the ice. No small red figure.
'Maaaja!'
This time he shouted a little more loudly, and his heart began to beat a little more quickly. It was foolish, of course. There was no chance that she could have got lost here. He felt Cecilia's hand on his shoulder. She was pointing down at the snow. 'There are no tracks here.'
There was a hint of unease in her voice too. Anders nodded. Of course. All they had to do was follow Maja's tracks.
They went back to where they'd started from, by the lighthouse door. Anders poked his head inside and shouted up the stairs, just in case Maja had come back and they hadn't heard her. No reply.
The area around the door was covered in footprints made by all of them, but there were no tracks leading off to the right or left. Anders took a few steps down the rock. He could see their own tracks leading up towards the lighthouse from the ice, and Maja's footprints heading off in the opposite direction.
He stared out over the ice. No Maja. He blinked, rubbed his eyes. She couldn't have gone far enough to be out of sight. The contours of Domarö merged with those of the mainland, a thicker line of charcoal above a thinner one. He turned to face the other way, catching Cecilia's expression: concentrated, tense.
There was no sign of their daughter in the opposite direction either.
Cecilia passed him on her way out on to the ice. She was walking with her head down, following the tracks with her eyes.
'I'll check inside the lighthouse,' Anders shouted. 'She must be hiding or something.'
He ran over to the door and up the stairs, shouting for Maja but getting no reply. His heart was pounding now and he tried to calm himself down, to be cool and clear-headed.
It just isn't possible.
It's always possible.
No, it isn't. Not here. There's nowhere she can be.
Exactly.
Stop it. Stop it.
Hide and seek was Maja's favourite game. She was good at finding places to hide. Although she could be over-excited and eager in other situations, when she was playing hide and seek she could keep quiet and still for any length of time.
He walked up the stairs with his arms outstretched, stooping like a monkey so that his fingers brushed the edges where the staircase met the wall. In case she'd fallen. In case she was lying in the darkness where he couldn't see her.
In case she'd fallen and banged her head, in case she…
But he felt nothing, saw nothing.
He searched the room at the top of the stairs, found two cupboards that were too narrow for Maja to be able to hide in. Opened them anyway. Inside were rusty, unidentifiable metal parts, bottles with hand-written labels. No Maja.
He went over to the door leading to the upper tower, closed his eyes for a couple of seconds before he went inside.
She's up there now. That's where she is. We'll go home and we'll file this with all those other times she's disappeared for a while and then come back.
Next to the staircase was a system of weights and chains, the cupboard containing the light's mechanism secured with a padlock. He tugged at it and established that it was locked, that Maja couldn't be in there. He went slowly up the stairs, calling her name. No reply. There was a rushing sound in his ears now, and his legs felt weak.