When the professor complained she was unapologetically rude. That worked, she knew. Insolence, an unwillingness to discuss things reasonably, vulgarity-that was what the academics in the neighborhood found the most distressing.
She flaunted her poor taste, dressed even worse than her father, entertained loud acquaintances who sat in the white garden furniture and carried on noisily long into the night.
Her father was oblivious to it all. He only went out into the garden a few times a year when he walked around and talked in a concerned way about the increasing state of disarray but without doing anything about it. Sometimes he would say that they should hire someone to help prune the old fruit trees but nothing was done. In the garden there were wild apple-oaks that blew down during fall storms, groaned under the weight of moldy fruit that was never harvested.
The state of disrepair both inside the house and in the garden became more extensive. Why did she keep living there? Sometimes her colleagues asked her this but she couldn’t answer. She tried to explain it in terms of financial considerations, but that was a lie, everyone knew that. She offered reasons such as the need to take care of her confused father. That was more satisfying but was still not completely satisfying.
Sometimes she claimed she felt so comfortable in the old house that she could never get used to a modern apartment or townhouse. But people around her shook their heads, concerned that she was taking after her father.
She sat at the kitchen table with the same feeling of liberation she had felt a month ago. The radio had been on that time. The Swedish people had just voted no to joining the European Monetary Union and the kitchen was filled with commentary that did not interest her in the least. She had not even voted.
She looked out of the window, turned off the radio, and was overcome with the silence. The room shrunk. The dark green kitchen cabinets seemed to bulge out, to be coming closer. The kitchen counter-covered in dishes-seemed to expand with deep breaths.
A moment of regret, or rather, reflection, came over her like a tremor, but disappeared just as quickly. The way she had chosen left no room for doubt. Or rather, the path her life had taken was not the result of a conscious decision, was how it seemed to her. She had given herself up to a wave, a force that was now mercilessly carrying her forward, simply forward. No history, no reflection, simply a kind of quiet rush, hard as flint, that far exceeded her father’s emotions at reading those beautiful words. His euphoria was relative and fragile. He was weak. She was strong.
Words, words, words, into infinity. She did not want them, the artfully arranged, duplicitous assurances that people surrounded themselves with. She silenced the words and eradicated their falseness.
Laura felt that she now commanded two worlds. Now she could step out into reality without anxiety or anticipation. She carried a shield, an armor against which the words bounced off.
“You seem happier,” a colleague said in the lunchroom a few weeks after her father’s disappearance.
“It’s the only way,” Laura answered cryptically.
The colleague was pleased, thought she could see a new Laura, convinced it was because her suffocating life with her father was over, that a new Laura was being born in the midst of longing and grief. Horrible, but true.
“Maybe we could go out sometime,” the colleague had suggested.
Laura shook her head.
Kerstin was one of the better ones, but did Laura want a confidant? No, Kerstin would not understand the feeling of liberation. Laura was and would remain alone.
“My father may have been murdered and you think I should go out and enjoy myself?” she said and left the room.
Four
The task of going door-to-door in the area around Petrus Blom-gren’s house did not take long. Sammy Nilsson and Bea Andersson, who were in charge of this, could afterward report that there were altogether some twenty properties. Fourteen of these were permanent residences and the rest were summer cottages.
No one had seen or heard anything. There was not even any gossip, no hints or speculation, simply disbelief that something so horrible could happen in Vilsne and that it was Petrus Blomgren who was the victim. No one had a bad word to say about the victim. Sammy and Bea listened to the testimony without being able to discern any criticism between the lines. Blomgren was well-liked, highly thought of even, in the area. Neighbors had only praise for his still life, his industriousness, and concern for his nearest neighbor, Dorotea. An older man talked about Blomgren’s love of nature, another about how admirable it was that even though Blomgren was a bachelor he managed to keep everything as clean and tidy as he did, and a third, the Kindblom couple, told them that their children when they were young would go up to “Uncle Petus” and there be treated with candy and sometimes, on Thursdays, with freshly made pancakes and homemade jam.
“Jumkil’s Mother Theresa,” Sammy Nilsson summarized and glanced at Bea to see if she had anything to add, but she only nodded.
“I see,” Ottosson said and turned to Lindell.
She and Fredriksson had spent the day trying to bring order to the state of Petrus Blomgren’s paperwork.
“At the Föreningsspar Bank they were unusually helpful,” she said after a moment’s hesitation.
She and Fredriksson had decided that he was the one who would present their findings but he had not turned up.
“Actually Allan is the one who was supposed to…” Lindell began.
“Take us through what you know,” Ottosson said, unusually brusque.
“All right, as you like. Blomgren had seventy-six thousand kronor in his savings account. There are very few transactions. He received his pension, took out a couple of thousand every month. The last withdrawal was six days ago. Two thousand. In the house we have recovered around nine hundred kronor in cash.”
“No cards?”
“No, he only had one account and no bank cards.”
“Could there be accounts at other banks?” Sammy Nilsson asked.
“No, the guy at the bank didn’t think so. Blomgren had been with the Föreningsspar Bank his whole life, though it was called something else before.”
“The Förenings Bank,” Fredriksson said, who had just come through the door. “It became the Föreningsspar Bank a good many years ago,” he continued and sat down at the table.
“In addition, for many years Blomgren had a donation by direct deposit set up with Doctors Without Borders. They received four hundred kronor every month. He recently raised the amount. Earlier it was three hundred.”
“That’s strange,” Ola Haver inserted. “I would have expected Save the Children or converting the heathens, but Doctors Without Borders is unexpected.”
“The guy at the bank also asked about this, but Blomgren gave no particular reason,” Fredriksson said. “Maybe he saw a TV program about them?”
“No large withdrawals recently?”
“No,” Lindell said. “As we said, everything was in order. No unexpected transactions.”
“He kept a will at the bank,” Fredriksson said. “I talked to the lawyer who drew it up three years ago. It was at Blomgren’s behest. He came alone to the lawyer’s office and had a prepared document that he wanted the lawyer to look through. It didn’t take long. All assets go to Doctors Without Borders, with the exception of twenty thousand to his neighbor, Dorotea Svahn, and ten thousand to Jumkil Church.”
“Damn,” Sammy said.
“It’s hardly credible that Doctors Without Borders or the church board have death squads posted in the countryside,” Haver said, “and Dorotea probably can’t kill a fly.”
“That was sweet of Petrus,” Bea said. “I don’t think Dorotea is so well off.”