They stand in silence as the ambulance drives away.
‘He loves you, doesn’t he? The strongest love is unrequited love – that’s what he wrote in his favourite book. It’s you he’s referring to.’
Per doesn’t answer.
‘You were riding Nelson that night,’ she goes on quietly. ‘You were dressed as the Green Man. You were the father of Elita’s child.’
Eventually Per shakes his head slowly. ‘I loved her, more than I’ve ever loved anyone else. But we were so young, all three of us. Hubert helped me to get dressed up, then he hid in the forest and watched. The plan was to scare the kids, pay them back for all the crap Elita had had to put up with over the years. Hubert and I weren’t too keen on the idea, but Elita insisted. She wanted to kill off her old self. We were going to fly away from here together, become something better.’
‘You’d arranged to go to Paris, to Hubert’s aunt. That’s why Elita had her passport in her suitcase. The three of you were going to stay with her until Elita had had the baby. Maybe even longer.’
Per nods. ‘We were dreamers, dreaming of something different. Something bigger. And for a few weeks it actually felt real, as if we could actually do it. A ridiculous dream, of course. Doomed to crash and burn.’
‘So tell me about Walpurgis Night.’
‘Nelson was nervous. Everything frightened him. He reared up, then took off. Galloped all the way home with me clinging to his back. I didn’t know what had happened until Hubert showed up in the stable. He said Nelson had kicked Elita, and that she was dead. He’d laid her on the sacrificial stone. It was all over. I was in total shock, I couldn’t speak. Hubert took care of the horse, then drove me home. Told me not to say a word to anyone. He said the whole thing was an accident, it wasn’t my fault.’
He shakes his head again.
‘I should have said no, but I was terrified of my father and the count. I didn’t have the guts to look them in the eye and admit what I’d done. So I kept quiet, and suddenly Leo was in custody, Hubert was sent away to England, and I was alone with our secret. The children identified Leo, and I suppose I wanted to believe that he really had done it, that I wasn’t responsible for her death. When he confessed, I felt a huge sense of relief. For a while, at least.’
He takes a deep breath.
‘Deep down I knew the truth, but I chose to keep quiet like the pathetic coward I am.’
‘And Hubert didn’t say anything either,’ Thea says. ‘Because he didn’t want to see you get into trouble. He never told his father that he wasn’t a murderer, not even when the count took away the castle and the land.’
‘As I said, Hubert is the most unselfish person I know. Time for me to try and be more like him, don’t you think?’
He pats her arm, then turns and walks over to one of the police officers.
‘There’s something I need to tell you,’ she hears him say. ‘Something I’ve kept quiet about for far too long.’
92
‘The story is almost over, Margaux. There is only one chapter left, and a confession. My own.’
Sister Aubert is sitting in the staffroom when she hears agitated voices in the corridor.
She has worked at the clinic for four years, and enjoys her job. She gets on well with the other nurses and the doctors, especially Dr Roland, who is unfortunately too shy to ask her out. She’s decided to give him another two weeks before taking matters into her own hands.
The voices are coming closer. The door opens to reveal Sister Papin and Sister Ribot, her closest colleagues.
‘Another message has arrived,’ says Sister Ribot. ‘From the Swede.’
Sister Aubert gets to her feet. Leaves her coffee and accompanies the two women to room fourteen.
The patient is a doctor, she knows that. The woman suffered a severe head trauma over a year ago during a bombing raid in Syria, and has been in a coma ever since. She will probably never regain consciousness, but her body hasn’t given up. It continues to fight on, and as long as it does that, all they can do is wait and pray.
The patient has many visitors. Her family and friends are often here, sitting by her bed and chatting to her as the doctors have recommended. The family has even installed a telephone answering machine so that friends can leave little messages for her.
Every afternoon at four o’clock, Sister Aubert or one of her colleagues presses the button and plays the latest messages. They usually leave the room, but not when she has called. The Swede. That’s what they call her, even though they know her name is Thea.
It is all Sister Papin’s fault. She was the one who started listening to the Swede’s story, then passed it on to the others.
A story about a castle and a dead girl.
As the days went by they all found a reason to be in room fourteen at four o’clock to hear the next instalment. Sat there in silence while the Swede told the tale of how she had slowly begun to untangle old secrets.
They have no idea whether the story is true. Maybe the Swede is making it up, maybe it’s something she’s read in a book, but they don’t care. They simply sit there together and sometimes, although she knows it’s impossible, Sister Aubert gets the feeling that the patient is listening as intently as they are.
They thought it was all over when the ambulance drove away with poor Hubert, and Per finally revealed what had happened on that Walpurgis Night so many years ago. Several weeks have passed since then – but now there is a new message.
They hurry along the corridor, close the door of room fourteen behind them. Settle down around the bed as usual, before Sister Ribot presses ‘Play’.
‘Hi, Margaux, it’s me,’ says the Swede. She doesn’t sound quite as unhappy as she normally does. ‘I’m sorry it’s been so long; things have been a bit chaotic here. Ingrid and Arne have been arrested and are waiting to go to court. The police dredged the canal and recovered the pick-up and the Ford with the remains of Lasse, Eva-Britt and Lola inside, just as Kerstin said. The women will probably be buried next to Elita. For some reason that feels like a kind of consolation, that she won’t have to lie there alone anymore.
David has decided to sell the restaurant. He’s not going to work for a while; he wants to take care of his father. Nettan and Sebastian have returned home. I think they, like David, are relieved that the truth has finally come out. Jan-Olof definitely feels that way. His fall was a pure accident, and he’ll make a full recovery.
Hubert has promised to look after Emee for a while. The two convalescents will get better together, as he puts it. Neither he nor Per will face any charges. Elita’s death was also an accident, after all.
It was a lynx that killed the deer. The glycol Emee ingested came from a bait trap set by Erik Nyberg. A stupid idea, according to Per. Hubert made Erik pay the vet’s bill by way of an apology.
I also found out that it’s Hubert and Per who pay for the upkeep of Elita’s grave, and sometimes lay flowers upon it – but I’m sure you’d already worked that out, just as you’d worked out that it was Arne who locked me in the cellar at Svartgården, and who left the Green Man figures on my windscreen. As he said outside the hunting lodge, he was trying to scare me off so I’d stop digging.
I honestly don’t think Arne is a bad person. None of them are, not even Ingrid. She loves Bertil, her family and Tornaby. She’d do anything to protect them. In that respect she has certain similarities with my father. I’ve written his reprieve petition, in case you’re wondering. I might be angry with him, I might never be able to forgive him, but I can give him that.