She crossed one leg over the other, their length showing to advantage.
‘Guess what happened yesterday,’ she blurted out suddenly.
‘Go on,’ I said.
‘Some divers found a body at the bottom of Lake Mester. They were amateurs, and it must have given them quite a shock. At first they thought it was a rotten tree trunk. But it turned out to be a man, and he’d been there some time. He’d gone missing at the beginning of April, isn’t that terrible? Presumably he’d gone skiing and went through the ice. Then he must have thrashed about in the water, quite alone and helpless. But at least the poor soul will have a grave now, that must be a comfort to the family, don’t you think? But he must have been an awful sight. After so many months in the water.’
She clasped her hands in her lap. Her two gold rings glowed. Sunlight fell obliquely into the room and found us as we sat, each on our own chair, and slowly we were warmed through and through.
‘When does your case come up?’ she asked.
‘Oh, that could take some time. People often spend several months on remand. Some as much as a year, so it’ll be a bit of a wait.’
Something else came to her, and she became enthusiastic again.
‘D’you recall that elderly chap with the hip flask?’ she queried. ‘Who always sat on the bench drinking.’
‘Yes, I remember him well,’ I answered, in a somewhat subdued tone.
‘He’s completely disappeared,’ she said. ‘And the police have put him on the missing persons’ register.’
‘Oh?’ I said. ‘Missing? Disappeared?’
‘It seems he had a daughter who lives and works in Bangkok. She’s never had much contact with him, but there’s obviously been a few words now and again. Then, suddenly, he wasn’t answering the phone. Over a long period. Now she’s gone to the police, and they’ve started looking for him. There was a piece in the paper recently, with a picture, too. “Have you seen this man?” And I had, so many times. He’s been staggering around the park all these years, poor man. So I got in touch with the police.’
‘Did you phone?’ I asked inanely.
‘Yes, I phoned. You know, with what information I had. That he hung around the park and that sort of thing, just in case they didn’t know. You two had a certain amount of contact, didn’t you? Wasn’t he an acquaintance of yours?’
I almost shot up from my chair.
‘No, no!’ I countered rapidly. ‘Most certainly not. We weren’t acquainted at all!’
‘But I thought I saw the pair of you together a couple of times, over at your house. Did I make a mistake?’
‘Yes, that’s totally wrong. We never exchanged a word. I mean, I know who he is, but we never had anything to do with one another, I don’t know where you got that from! Did you really tell the police that we were acquainted?’
‘Oh, do forgive me,’ she said quickly, assuming a worried expression. She placed a hand in front of her mouth, and hung back a good while. ‘But I’m afraid I also told the police that I saw you together. You live in that red house at Jordahl, don’t you? The small house with the covered veranda?’
I nodded dumbly.
‘Yes, I’ve seen you there several times, you sometimes cut the grass in front of your house with a scythe. And I saw Mr Jagge up there at your house a few times, can I really have been so wrong?’
‘Mr Jagge?’ I queried uncomprehendingly.
‘Arnfinn Jagge,’ she replied. ‘That’s his name. I only mentioned it in passing to the police, that he was occasionally at your house at Jordahl. Of course, I didn’t know your name, but they knew the house. So it’s possible they may make contact with you in case you can tell them anything. I’m dreadfully sorry if this causes any difficulties for you. You see, I was so certain.’
She tried to settle herself again. But a deep furrow had appeared in her brow.
‘Maybe they’ve been to your house to ask about him,’ she reasoned, ‘not realising you’re in here; and the one hand doesn’t know what the other’s doing. That’s what it’s like in all government departments. It’s so strange when someone suddenly vanishes like that, don’t you think? But they’ll find him all right. One fine day. Even the man at the bottom of the lake was found eventually. Right tends to triumph in the end,’ she concluded.
I had no answer to that.
Ebba’s news had made me feel faint. As if I didn’t have enough on my plate already, what with the case pending, the wrongful case. My finger found a hole in the chair seat, bored its way in and pulled out a thread which I twiddled with almost frenetic fervour. While I tried to come to terms with the situation. While I did my best to regain control.
‘What about your case?’ Ebba asked. ‘Are you very worried about it?’
I assured her that I wasn’t. I pulled myself together and sat up, my voice was strong and steady.
‘I’m innocent, you know,’ I explained. ‘And there’s something about the truth. It gives one strength.’
Chapter 30
I told Margareth about the hidden pattern I believed I’d found in my life, and she listened attentively. She nodded occasionally, and agreed. She also felt part of some larger plan, that her life was inching towards a particular end, an end that had been ordained for her alone.
‘I simply drift along,’ she said, ‘there’s no point in questioning everything. There are so many answers you never get. No, it’s just a case of girding yourself up and doing your duty. All this how and why, and what’s the real meaning behind everything, I’ve given up caring about that.’
Margareth and I were standing in the gleaming prison kitchen, frying enough meatballs to feed twenty. Margareth made the mixture and I moulded the small round balls in my hand and placed them in the browning butter. Immediately there was an angry hissing, and a delightful smell.
‘But that doesn’t mean it’s impossible to get away,’ I heard Margareth say. ‘We can leave the things that are familiar to us and find a new purpose. When we really have to. Start a new life in a different place. Don’t you think so, Riktor?’
She had spoken my name again, and my heart leapt. I stood with a meatball in my hand, the raw mixture was cold and sticky to the touch, and I had to struggle against a sudden urge to throw it across the room, watch it splatter on the opposite wall. And slide slowly down the white tiles towards the floor. These were the kind of whims that would flash through my head. But I kept calm. I was in the process of developing a degree of self-discipline I’d never mastered before. It was because of the routine and the narrow cell, there wasn’t any room to let fly, it was like being firmly contained inside a cylinder.
‘You’re probably right,’ I said, ‘it’s quite possible. But today I was talking to a young man who’s in jail for the eleventh time. He certainly hasn’t managed to get out of the rut. The eleventh time. That only means one thing. He’s lost.’
‘That’s a bit cruel,’ Margareth cut in.
‘No, I’m just being a realist,’ I said.
She wanted to know if I’d met the Russian. She described him as huge and awe-inspiring, completely bald and with a large tattoo on his forehead, which had originally depicted a scorpion, but over the years had stretched a bit at the edges, and now looked more like a great cockroach crawling across his brow. He was in for armed robbery, and he bullied the other prisoners to such an extent that the management was considering putting him in solitary.
‘I’ve met him in the exercise yard,’ I replied. ‘He asked me what I’d done to my teeth. Whether I’d filed them down on purpose, or if they’d just gone like that. So I told him they were the teeth I was born with. That’s the only contact I’ve had with the Russian.’