As I stare at the tower something suddenly blows past me on the ground, something pale and rectangular.
Even before I catch up with it and pick it up, I know what it is.
A canvas. One of Torun’s blizzard paintings.
“So you’re back, are you, Mirja?” says a man’s voice. “Where have you been?”
I turn around. It’s Ragnar Davidsson, the eel fisherman,
walking toward me from the house. He is wearing his shiny oilskins, and he is not empty-handed.
In his arms he is carrying a great bundle of Torun’s paintings-fifteen or twenty of them.
I remember what he said about them in the outbuilding: It’s all just black and gray. Just a lot of dark colors… looks like crap.
“Ragnar…” I say. “What are you doing? Where are you going with my mother’s pictures?”
He walks past me, without stopping, and replies, “Down to the sea.”
“What did you say?”
“There’s no room for them,” he shouts back. “I’ve taken over the storeroom in the outbuilding. I’ll be keeping the eel nets there.”
I look at him in horror, then at the ghostly white light of the northern lighthouse. Then I turn my back on the sea and the wind and hurry back to the house and Torun.
30
The wind along the coast had increased to storm force. The gusts shook the car, and Tilda clutched the wheel tightly.
Blizzard, she thought.
The falling snow whirled across the road like a black-and-white film, spinning in the beam of the headlights. She slowed right down and leaned closer to the windshield so that she could make out the road ahead.
The snowfall looked more and more like thick white smoke swirling in across the coast. Drifts were beginning to form everywhere that the snow was able to stick, and they quickly turned into banks.
Tilda knew how quickly it could happen. The blizzard transformed the alvar into a white, ice-cold desert and made it impossible to travel by car anywhere on the island. Even the snowmobiles would sink and get stuck in the drifts.
She was on her way north now, with Martin still following
her. He wouldn’t give up-but she had to forget him and concentrate on looking ahead.
Snowdrifts covered the road, and it was difficult for the wheels to grip the surface properly. It felt like driving through cotton wool.
Tilda was looking out for the headlights of approaching cars, but everything was gray beyond the falling snow.
When she was somewhere in the region of the peat bog, the road in front of the car disappeared completely in the driving snow, and she looked in vain for markers showing where the edge of the roadbed was. Either they had already blown away, or nobody had put them out.
She noticed in her rearview mirror that Martin’s car was getting closer-and that was partly what caused her to make a mistake. She looked into the mirror for a second too long, and didn’t notice the bend ahead in the darkness. Not until it was too late.
Tilda turned the wheel as the road curved to the right, but not enough. Suddenly the front wheels sank down into the snow.
The police car stopped with a violent bang. A second later she felt an even bigger bang and heard the sound of breaking glass. The car was pushed forward and stopped, stuck in the ditch by the peat bog.
Martin’s car had driven into hers.
Tilda slowly straightened her back behind the wheel. Her ribs and the back of her neck seemed okay.
She floored the accelerator to try and pull back up onto the road again, but the back wheel spun around in the snow, unable to find a grip.
“Shit.”
Tilda switched off the engine and tried to calm down.
In the rearview mirror she saw Martin open the car door and step out into the snow. The wind made him stagger slightly.
Tilda opened her door as well.
The storm came roaring across the road, and the gray-black landscape made Tilda think of the picture of the blizzard she had seen at Eel Point. When she stepped away from the car, the wind grabbed hold of her and seemed to want to drag her out onto the peat bog, but she fought against it and felt her way along the side of the police car.
The front of the car was pushed right down into the ditch. The car was at such an angle that one of the back wheels, the right-hand one, was actually in the air.
The whirling snow had begun to pile up against the doors and was already covering the tires.
Tilda fought her way back along the side of the car, with her hand on her police cap to keep it in place, and made her way over to Martin.
She had finally decided how she was going to treat him: not like her former tutor at the police academy, not like her former lover, but like an ordinary mortal. A civilian.
“You were too close!” she said through the wind.
“You slammed the brakes on!” he shouted back.
She shook her head. “Nobody asked you to follow me, Martin.”
“Well, you’ve got a radio car,” he said. “Call the breakdown truck.”
“Don’t tell me what to do.”
She turned her back on him, but knew he was right. She would call-although presumably every breakdown truck would be working flat out tonight.
Martin got back in the Mazda and Tilda struggled back to the warmth and quiet of the police car. Once inside she used the radio to call Borgholm for the second time-and this time a rasping voice actually came back over the loudspeaker.
“Central control?” she said. “1217 here, over.”
“1217, received.”
She recognized the voice. Hans Majner was manning the radio, and he was speaking more quickly than usual.
“What’s the situation?” asked Tilda.
“Chaos… more or less complete chaos,” said Majner. “They’re wondering whether to close the bridge completely.”
“Close it?”
“Overnight, yes.”
In that case the winds over the island had already reached storm force, Tilda realized-it was only in extremely bad weather that the Öland bridge was closed to traffic.
“And where are you, 1217?” asked Majner.
“By Offermossen on the eastern road,” said Tilda. “I’m stuck.”
“Understood, 1217…Do you need help?” Majner actually sounded as if he cared as he went on: “We’ll send somebody out, but it’s going to take a while. There’s a truck jammed across the road on the hill by the castle ruins, so all our cars are down there right now.”
“And the snowplows?”
“They’re only working on the main roads… the drifts keep on coming back.”
“Understood. It’s the same here.”
“But you’re okay for a while, 1217?”
Tilda hesitated. She didn’t want to mention the fact that Martin was with her.
“I haven’t got any coffee, but it’ll be fine,” she said. “If it gets colder, I’ll just make my way to the nearest house.”
“Understood, 1217, I’ll make a note of that,” said Majner. “Good luck, Tilda. Over and out.”
Tilda replaced the radio microphone and stayed where she was behind the wheel. She couldn’t decide what to do and looked in the rearview mirror, but a thick blanket of snow had already covered the rear windshield.
In the end she picked up her cell phone and called a number in Marnäs. She got an answer after three rings, but the wind was howling so loudly outside the car that she couldn’t make out the words. She raised her voice.
“Gerlof?”
“Speaking.” His voice sounded quiet and distant.
“It’s Tilda!” she shouted.
There was a scraping noise in her ear. The reception was dire out here, but she heard his question:
“Surely you’re not out driving in the blizzard?”
“Yes, I’m in the car… on the coast road. Near Eel Point.”
Gerlof said something inaudible.
“What?” Tilda yelled into her cell phone.
“I said that’s not so good.”