The woman fell silent for a while, listening to someone on the other end of line. She glanced at Sibylla, who promptly looked the other way.
'I see… yes. No, I won't. And if you don't accept my complaint I'll take it elsewhere.'
The woman pocketed her mobile. Her dog got up. 'Kajsa, come on!'
The woman and her dog crossed the street. Sibylla still did not move.
'Don't go in there.'
Sibylla smiled at the woman.
'Why not?'
'It's crawling with police in there, but out of sight. You don't know they're there until you get a gun shoved in your face. No idea what they're up to. Made me furious, I can tell you.'
Sibylla nodded.
'Sure, thanks. I think I'd rather avoid all that.'
The woman and her dog wandered off, leaving Sibylla breathing deeply. It must have been Uno Hjelm. The allotments' own little old Judas. Fuck him.
She had to get away. Fast.
How long could she stand living like this? Surviving, that's one thing. She could do that. She had done it. But being on the run…?
She was hurrying now, feeling that they were already at her heels. God, how could Hjelm have spotted her? Surely he couldn't have recognised her from the photo in the newspapers? If so she was lost, unsafe anywhere.
She had to change her hair. She was close to Ringen now. There were plenty of people about and she could just mingle with the crowds. But weren't people staring at her? How odd it was. What about the man walking towards her, why did he look at her like that? Her heart was beating hard. She looked down and the man walked past her.
If she told them the truth, would they believe her? Couldn't they understand that she had simply wanted to sleep in a proper bed, just for once? She would have paid him later. Of course she would have! She had… lost her wallet. Really.
Lots of people were converging on the underground station. She kept walking.
But – where was she going?
Once on Renstierna Street she changed direction and walked up the steps leading to the Vitaberg Park with Sofia Church towering above her like a fortress. She was tired and needed to sit down for a while. Turning, she checked the deserted path sloping down towards the street. No one had followed her.
The silence inside the church seemed solid, tangible. Just inside the door was a glass-fronted cubby-hole. An elderly man peered at her through the glass and nodded. He seemed friendly. She nodded too, before taking her rucksack off and stepping inside.
The church was empty apart from someone sleeping in one of the pews, a man with his hair in a pony-tail. The pony-tail guy was vaguely familiar, she'd seen him a couple of times at the City Mission Centre. Now he was in a deep sleep, his jaw drooping toward his chest. She sat down in a pew at the back with her rucksack at her feet. Closed her eyes.
Peace and quiet, simply. It was all she wanted.
The man in the cubby-hole coughed. The sound reverberated between the walls. Then the silence solidified again.
God hears your prayers. It said so on a poster near the door.
She opened her eyes again and spent some time examining the huge altarpiece. Over very many years, very many people had put their lives in His hands. They built enormous edifices for the worship of their God and turned to Him in their prayers. When she was little, she too prayed to Him. ‘If I should die before I wake, I pray to God my soul to take.' Then: 'Dear God, look after mummy and daddy and make it so they don't die.' He must have heard that bit, since they were apparently getting on very nicely, thank you. 'When I lie down and go to asleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.' Keeping my soul seems to have slipped His mind. Maybe He is wholly on their side?
Well, on all their sides, the sides of those who fit in.
Where did the Stationmaster's prayers end up? He jumped off Vast Bridge last month, after realising that his fourth detox treatment had failed. Was anyone up there listening to Lena? She used to be on the Salvation Army's food vans, but had to stop because she had an inoperable brain tumour. Exactly what had Lena done to deserve that? What about Tova? Or Jonsson? Or Smirre? All dead, after subsisting for years in his or her own special living hell. Presumably none of their prayers were ever heard.
God, this prayer story of Yours simply doesn't wash.
Come to think of it, what about Jorgen Grundberg? Whatever he might have been punished for, why bring me into it? Am I supposed to be punished for something? And if so, WHEN will my punishment be over and done with?
She sighed, rose and heaved the rucksack onto her back. There was no peace to be found here. She left the church without looking at the man in the cubby-hole.
The sun was setting when she came out of the church. She stepped back to see the church clock. Quarter past five.
She would really have liked sleeping in a bed tonight, but hotels were too risky and she didn't even dare try the Klara doss house. They were always short of room, so if she got a bed then someone who hadn't and was in the police's bad books, might well do a little informing to make up for past sins.
She felt for the purse round her neck. She was tempted to draw on her treasure, for the first time since she made up her mind about saving. A real drinking session, so she could forget for just one night.
Shit. What stinking, rotten luck.
She turned into the lane leading to Skane Street. About twenty yards along was a charming small piece of cultural history, a green door set in a wooden fence painted a nice shade of red. To the right of the door the fence joined the gable-end of a humble wooden house. She stopped and examined the wall of the house. The hatch of what might have been the coal-chute was almost level with the ground and had been nailed into place. A second opening about a metre up had a door with only a peg through a hasp to hold it shut.
She looked around. The park was empty.
In a moment she had taken off her rucksack, opened the little door and climbed inside.
Thursdays were our days, the days when he came to me. If I close my eyes, I can see him open the garden gate down by the road and start walking along the gravel path towards me. I remember how I felt warmth from my heart spreading through my whole body. He always took such care wiping his shoes on the doormat. There he was, wrapping me in his strong arms. Dear Lord, this was love and not sin. Love, such as You have taught us it should be. I thank You for letting me experience it.
Every time he came I had prepared the house as nicely as anyone could wish. I wanted him to realise how much I had been looking forward to seeing him. Every time I hoped he would not leave. But staying was impossible and he always left at four o'clock in the afternoon. When that hour struck I knew I had another seven days of waiting ahead and seven endless nights, full of longing to see him again. Now my whole life is such a night.
Yet I thank You, God. I am grateful for your guidance. You have shown me what I can do to help him enter Your realm, so that I can rest assured that he will be there for me when my time comes. Thank You God for letting me be your ally in the sacred work of correcting the errors of the unjust on Earth.
Lo! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable nature must put on the imperishable and this mortal nature must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:
'Death is swallowed up in victory.'
'Oh Death, where is thy victory?'
'Oh Death, where is thy sting?'
The sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.