“It was God himself, Rebecka,” says Thomas earnestly.
She recognizes the serious tone of voice and the attitude. This is how he looks and sounds when he wants to impress important matters upon his listeners. His whole being is transformed. It is as if he were a block of stone that has thrust up through the earth from under the ground, with its roots in the earth’s core. Gravity, strength and power through and through. And yet, at the same time, humility before God.
Why is he putting on this performance for her? No, it isn’t for her benefit. It’s for Curt. He’s… he’s handling Curt.
“What about the children?” she asks.
Thomas bows his head. Now there is something fragile in his tone. Something frail. It’s as if his voice can barely manage the words.
“If you hadn’t…” he begins. “… I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to forgive you for forcing me to do this, Rebecka.”
As if he has been given an invisible sign, Curt removes his right glove and takes a coil of rope from his pocket.
She turns to Curt. Forces her voice past the lump blocking her throat.
“But you love Sanna,” she says. “How can you love her and kill her children?”
Curt closes his eyes. He continues to sway gently to and fro as if he doesn’t hear her. Then his lips move silently for a while before he answers.
“They are shadow children,” he says. “They must be put aside.”
If she can just get him talking. Gain some time. She has to think. Follow his thread. Thomas is letting him talk, he daren’t do anything else.
“ ‘Shadow children’? What do you mean?”
She tilts her head to one side and rests her cheek on her hand just as Sanna does, makes a real effort to keep her voice calm.
Curt speaks straight out into the room with his eyes fixed on the kerosene lamp. As if he were alone. Or as if there were some being inside the light itself, listening to him.
“The sun is behind me,” he says. “My shadow falls before me. It walks in front of me. But when I step into it, the shadow must give way. Sanna will have new children. She will bear me two sons.”
I’m going to be sick, thinks Rebecka, and she can taste minced elk meat and bile surging up through her body.
She gets up. Her face is as white as snow. Her legs are trembling under her. Her body is so heavy. It weighs several tons. Her legs are like spindly toothpicks.
In a second Curt is in front of her. His face is twisted with rage. He screams at her so loudly that he has to draw breath after each word.
“You… were… told… to… sit… down!”
He hits her in the stomach with enormous force and she folds forward like a clasp knife. Her legs lose their last vestige of strength. The floor comes rushing up to meet her face. Grandmother’s rag rug against her cheek. Unbearable pain in her stomach. A long way above her, agitated voices. A rushing, ringing noise in her ears.
She has to close her eyes for a little while. Just for a little while. Then she’ll open her eyes. That’s a promise. Sara and Lova. Sara and Lova. Who’s screaming? Is it Lova, screaming like that? Just for a little while…
Benny the locksmith unlocks the door to Curt Bäckström’s apartment and disappears. Sven-Erik Stålnacke and Anna-Maria Mella stand there on the dark staircase. Only the lights from outside shine in through the window facing the yard. Silence. They look at each other and nod. Anna-Maria has undone the safety catch on her pistol, a Sig Sauer.
Sven-Erik goes in. She hears his tentative hello. Anna-Maria stands guard outside the open door.
I must be out of my mind, she thinks.
The bottom of her back is aching. She leans against the wall and takes deep breaths. What if he’s in there in the dark. He might be dead. Or lying in wait somewhere. He could rush her from inside and knock her down the stairs.
Sven-Erik switches on the light in the hallway.
She peers in. It’s a one-room apartment. You can see straight into the combined living room and bedroom from the hall. It’s a peculiar place. Does someone really live here?
There isn’t a stick of furniture in the hall. No desk with bits and pieces and the mail. No mat. Nothing hanging on the coat stand below the hat pegs. The living room is empty too. Almost. There are some lamps standing on the floor, and a huge mirror hangs on the wall. The windows are covered with black sheets. Nothing on the windowsills. No curtains. A single pine bed up against the wall. The coverlet is pale blue machine-quilted nylon.
Sven-Erik comes out of the kitchen. He shakes his head imperceptibly. Their eyes meet. Full of questions and foreboding. He walks over to the bathroom door and opens it. The light switch is on the inside. He stretches out his hand. She hears the click, but the light doesn’t come on. Sven-Erik remains standing in the doorway. She can see him from the side. His hand taking out his key ring. He has a small torch on it. The narrow beam of light in through the door. The eyes narrowing so that they can see better.
Perhaps she makes a movement that he sees out of the corner of his eye, because his hand flies up to stop her. He takes one step into the room. One foot over the threshold. Her back is tense and aching again. She clenches her fist and presses it against her spine.
He comes out of the bathroom. Rapid steps. Mouth open. Pupils like black holes in a face made of ice.
“Ring,” he says hoarsely.
“Ring who?” she asks.
"Everybody! Wake up the whole bloody lot of them!"
Rebecka opens her eyes. How much time has passed? Thomas Söderberg’s face is floating just below the ceiling. He looks like the eclipse of the sun. His face is in the shadows, and the kerosene lamp hanging behind his head forms a corona around his brown curls.
Her stomach is still hurting. Worse than before. And over and above the pain, outside the pain, is something warm and wet. Blood. She realizes with terror that Curt didn’t punch her.
He stabbed her with a knife.
“This isn’t exactly what we planned,” says Thomas Söderberg firmly. “We must reconsider.”
She turns her head. Sara and Lova are lying head to tail on the bed. Their hands are tied to the bedposts. Bits of white cloth are sticking out of their mouths. On the floor by the bed lies a torn-up sheet. That’s what they’ve got in their mouths. She can see their chests moving up and down rapidly as they fight to take in enough air through their noses.
Lova has a cold. But she’s breathing.
Keep calm, she’s breathing. Fuck, fuck.
“The idea was,” says Thomas Söderberg thoughtfully, “the idea was to set fire to the cabin. And we were going to give you the keys to your snowmobile so you could get away, just in your nightdress or a T-shirt. You’d take the chance, of course; who wouldn’t? With the storm and the windchill factor when you’re traveling by snowmobile, I reckon you’d have got about a hundred meters at the most. Then you’d have fallen off and frozen to death in a matter of minutes. It would have shown up as a simple accident on the police report. The cabin catches fire. You panic, leave the kids and rush out just as you are. You try to escape and freeze to death just a little distance away. No major investigation, no questions. Now it’s going to be more difficult.”
“Are you intending to let the children burn to death?”
Thomas bites his lip thoughtfully as if he hasn’t heard her.
“I think we’ll have to take you with us,” he says. “Even if your body burns, the mark of the stab wound might still be there. I can’t risk that.”
He breaks off and turns his head as Vesa Larsson comes in with a red plastic gasoline can in his hand.
"No gasoline," says Thomas angrily. "No accelerants and no chemicals. Anything like that will show up in a technical examination. We’ll set fire to the curtains and the bedclothes with matches."
He nods at Rebecka.
“We’ll take her with us,” he continues. “You two go and spread a tarpaulin over the trailer.”