The jacket and the lifebelt carried his body, and when he turned his head he saw lights. They were a long way off, but they were glittering. The lights of Öland. His only option was to start swimming towards them.
He kicked his legs ten times, then rested for a while, using the belt to support him, then kicked out ten times more. Slowly, he made his way towards the shore. The lights were getting closer; he could see little houses now.
The dark coast came into focus, and at last Jonas felt the rocks beneath his feet. He had reached the shore.
He could hear a splashing sound; was someone following him? He looked around, but saw only black water. The Sound was in complete darkness; there was no sign of the lights of a ship out there.
But perhaps the dead had jumped in the water after him, perhaps they were slowly swimming towards the shore right now...
He crawled out of the sea, water pouring from his shorts and top; he wriggled out of the lifebelt and lay there on the pebbles. He was utterly exhausted, but terror at the thought of the dead made him get to his feet.
Where could he hide?
Whereabouts on the island was he?
The shore was less steep here, and he realized he was further north. He saw a row of boathouses up on the ridge, all in darkness apart from one small wooden hut with a faint light in one window.
Jonas stumbled towards it as quickly as he could and finally he made it. He tugged at the handle, but the door was locked. He started hammering and shouting for help, and at last the door was opened.
Not by a zombie, not by a madman wielding an axe, but by an old man who looked as if he had just woken up. He stepped aside, welcoming Jonas into the warmth and the light.
Jonas almost fell in. The water from his clothes dripped on to a soft rug beneath his feet, but he could do no more. He collapsed.
The man was still staring at him, the door still open to the night.
‘Shut the door,’ Jonas whispered. ‘Lock it! They’re after me!’
‘Who’s after you?’
‘The dead. From the ship.’
Gerlof
Gerlof had been woken by strange vibrations, a racket that made him think he was lying in his bunk on board a ship. Then he opened his eyes and remembered that he had decided to spend the night in the boathouse in order to get some peace and quiet. But the walls were actually shaking.
Could it be an earthquake? Slowly, he got out of the camp bed, but it was only when he put in his hearing aid that he realized what was going on. Someone was hammering on the door, and a high voice, somewhat muted by the wood, was shouting, begging to be let in.
‘I’m coming,’ Gerlof muttered.
He pulled on his trousers and his guernsey so that he would be warm and presentable, then opened the door.
Out of the darkness a boy came hurtling in; he almost fell over the doorstep. He was wearing a lifejacket and soaking-wet clothes; Gerlof had never seen him before.
‘Dear me,’ Gerlof said. He couldn’t think of anything else to say.
The boy was kneeling on the rag rug, shaking like a leaf. He looked over at the doorway with terror in his eyes.
‘Shut the door,’ he whispered. ‘Lock it! They’re after me!’
‘Who’s after you?’
‘The dead. From the ship.’
Gerlof closed the door and turned the key.
‘Someone’s after you? What are you talking about?’
The boy crawled further into the boathouse. He stopped when he reached Gerlof’s narrow bed, and clung to it, still staring at the door. He didn’t look at Gerlof; his expression was blank, trapped in fear. He was holding his breath, and appeared to be listening. Gerlof listened, too, but nobody tried the handle or knocked on the door.
He made an effort to stay calm. Should he be afraid? He was still half asleep.
Slowly, he lit several candles on the table, to chase away the shadows. Then he took a couple of steps towards the boy. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Jonas.’
‘And what exactly has happened, Jonas? Can you tell me?’
Finally, the boy met Gerlof’s gaze. ‘There’s a ship out in the Sound,’ he said. ‘A big ship... It came straight at me. I climbed aboard.’ Pause. ‘From my rubber dinghy.’ Pause. ‘But they were all dead.’ Pause. ‘All except one. He had an axe.’
‘And he’s the one who was chasing you?’
‘The ghost,’ the boy said, raising his voice. ‘The ghost was on the ship. He was fighting with the dead!’
The boy took a deep breath, and a single tear rolled down his cheek. Gerlof waited until he had taken a few more deep breaths before reaching out and gently unfastening the lifejacket. Then he said firmly, ‘That was no ghost.’
‘Wasn’t it?’
‘No. Shall I tell you why?’
The boy nodded.
‘Because ghosts can’t cope with water.’ Gerlof slipped off the lifejacket and carried on: ‘My grandfather always used to say that you should make your escape by boat if you saw a spirit of some kind. So, whatever you saw tonight, it was no ghost, Jonas. I promise you that.’
The boy looked doubtful, but seemed to calm down, even though he was still glancing anxiously at the door.
Eventually, Gerlof went over and opened it again. He heard a sharp intake of breath behind him, and said reassuringly, ‘I’m just going to have a look. And see if I can hear anything.’
There was probably nothing to worry about but, just to be on the safe side, he picked up a weapon. It was a long orthoceras which he kept as an ornament. He had found it on the shore; it was the shell of an extinct cephalopod that had become fossilized after several million years under extreme pressure on the seabed.
The stone felt pleasingly heavy, like a cudgel, as Gerlof stepped out into the darkness, into the mild night. The shore around the boathouse was dark grey, the water like a black abyss down below. He moved silently, listening hard, but he could hear only the lapping waves.
He walked away from the patch of light by the door and gazed out across the Sound. A few white pinpricks of light glimmered over on the mainland but, otherwise, there was nothing to see.
He switched his hearing aid to the setting for background noise, then straightened up and listened again.
Now he could hear something in the night, a distant rumbling sound out at sea. He recognized the dull throbbing — he had heard it just before he went to bed. But now it was coming from the north, and it was heading away. He fiddled with the hearing aid, trying to turn up the volume, but the rumbling slowly died away.
He waited for another minute or two, then he heard the waves splashing on the shore, rattling the pebbles as the swell of a vessel passing through the Sound reached the land.
He went back inside and locked the door.
‘There’s no one out there,’ he said. ‘No ghosts.’
Jonas didn’t say anything, so Gerlof went on, ‘My name is Gerlof.’
‘I know,’ the boy said. ‘You’re Kristoffer’s granddad.’
A friend of Kristoffer, Gerlof’s youngest grandchild. Now he recognized the boy. He had seen him just a few days ago, at the midsummer dance. He was a member of the Kloss family.
‘Are you Jonas Kloss?’
The boy nodded, staring at the door again. ‘He hit the dead people on the ship with an axe.’ Pause. He thought for a second, then continued, ‘And he asked about an old American. He said, “Where’s Aron, the Swedish-American?”’
A Swedish-American? Gerlof thought.
‘And the man who was holding the axe, Jonas... Did you recognize him?’
The boy shook his head. ‘I don’t know... I don’t know his name.’