The funfair had been set up in the harbour area next to the square, with brightly coloured carousels and stalls selling burgers and sausages. There were lots of cars, and Uncle Kent couldn’t find a space on the square, so he parked in a disabled bay behind the harbourmaster’s office.
‘We won’t be long,’ he said. ‘I’ll just have to pay the fine if we get a ticket.’
Niklas didn’t say anything; he didn’t seem particularly happy this evening. But Uncle Kent carried on talking as the three of them got out of the car: ‘We’ll go over to Mayer’s place and ring the doorbell, see if he’s at home.’ He looked at Jonas. ‘If he’s there, JK, and if you’re sure he was the guy you saw on the ship, then we’ll have a little chat with him, find out what happened. But you don’t need to stay around for that... OK?’
Jonas nodded. His heart was pounding, but he also felt as if he had grown since this morning. He was suddenly at the centre of everything. He was important — he was a witness.
The three of them walked past the harbour and the funfair. Jonas looked at the flashing lights and caught the aroma of grilled sausages and fresh popcorn. He would have loved to look around the stalls, buy some sweets and check out the second-hand videos, but Uncle Kent marched on, shaking his head.
‘Look at all this crap,’ he said. ‘Marnäs is a real magnet for people peddling cheap tat in the summer. It’s all sell, sell, sell.’
Once they had passed the fair, he increased his speed and turned into a narrow side street. He led the way to a couple of apartment blocks north of the harbour, with a view over the dark-blue Baltic.
‘Number eight, that’s where he’s supposed to be living,’ he said. ‘Second floor.’
He opened the door, held it to allow Jonas and his father to go in, then let it close behind them.
The cool stairwell felt eerily silent.
Kent set off up the stairs. ‘Keep behind me, JK,’ he said quietly. He was moving more cautiously now, and didn’t switch on the light. Niklas stayed at the back, as if protecting their line of retreat.
They reached the second floor and saw two doors. MAYER was on a handwritten label on the left-hand door. Jonas’s pulse rate shot up when he saw it; he felt as if the name were leaching evil into the stairwell.
But Uncle Kent didn’t seem in the least concerned. He stepped forward and pressed the doorbell. For a long time.
Jonas was even more frightened when he heard the sound of the bell; he felt as if he were back on board the ship. He noticed a peephole in the door, just like the one they had at home in Huskvarna. Perhaps someone was standing there, spying on them.
Peter Mayer. The man with the axe.
But no one answered the door. Uncle Kent waited, rang again, waited. Eventually, he sighed. ‘Damn,’ he said. ‘No one’s home, JK. We’ll have to go back to Villa Kloss.’
Jonas was relieved. A little disappointed, perhaps, but mainly relieved.
They left the building; it was even darker now. The streetlamps around the harbour had come on and the people visiting the fair looked even more shadowy.
Jonas moved a little distance away from his father and his uncle so that he could look at the rides. They ought to let him have a go on something now, maybe the dodgems or the cannonball, but he knew they wouldn’t.
Beside the harbour was Moby Dick, the only pizzeria in Marnäs. Jonas had eaten there with Mats and their father the summer before last. The place was packed tonight, of course. There were tables outside and every one was occupied, with people drinking and laughing and smoking. Sunburnt golfers in white caps and blue polo shirts, sailors in blue jackets, cyclists with helmet hair.
Summer visitors. Jonas couldn’t take his eyes off them.
A tall guy in a black denim jacket was moving between the tables, carrying a takeaway pizza; he had a shaven head and his eyes were darting all over the place.
Jonas stared at him for a long time.
Time had slowed down; his heart was thumping.
He made himself look away after a while, as if everything was perfectly normal — but he was absolutely certain who he had seen. He stopped, turned around and gently tugged at his father’s arm.
‘There,’ he whispered.
‘What?’
‘It’s him.’
Niklas stopped. ‘Who?’
‘The man from the ship.’
‘You mean Mayer? Where?’
Jonas tilted his head in the direction of the pizzeria, where Peter Mayer had just reached the pavement. He was about to walk past them, heading down towards the harbour.
‘Kent!’ Niklas called out.
‘What?’
‘Over there.’
Niklas pointed, and Kent turned his head. He spotted Peter Mayer and stopped dead.
A second later, Kent took off, straight across the street. ‘Hey!’ he shouted. ‘Pecka!’
The man looked over his shoulder and froze for a few seconds. Then he began to move in the opposite direction, faster and faster. Away from the crowd and from Kent Kloss.
‘Hang on!’ Kent yelled. ‘I just want to...’
At that point, Peter Mayer dropped the pizza box and fled — but he was running away from his apartment block, heading west with long strides, away from the lights. He didn’t look back.
Jonas watched as Uncle Kent also broke into a run, following Peter Mayer down the street.
‘I’ll get the car!’ Niklas shouted.
Uncle Kent nodded, and kept on running.
Niklas placed his hand on Jonas’s shoulder. ‘Come with me, Jonas.’
Jonas was intending to obey and took a few steps behind his father. Then he hesitated in the crush on the pavement, and on an impulse turned back. He wanted to see what happened; he decided to follow Uncle Kent. He set off slowly, then began to move faster.
‘Jonas!’
He heard his father calling him but didn’t stop.
He felt good as he ran. He wasn’t the quarry tonight, he was the hunter. A member of the Kloss family.
He moved through the shadowy crowd, but Kent was wearing a pale windcheater and was easy to see. Jonas watched as he ran across the street, heading west. Away from the shops and houses. Jonas could just make out another figure, his shaven head shining.
Jonas ran after them, as third man.
Soon there was no one else around. Jonas passed the last building, then the last streetlamp, and carried on into the darkness.
It was cold here, and pitch black until his eyes adjusted. Jonas blinked and saw grey shadows up ahead.
Uncle Kent was passing the church. Peter Mayer stopped by the roadside, looked around, then disappeared into the birch forest.
Kent leapt across the verge and followed him.
When Jonas reached the same spot, he saw a path leading through the trees, so he, too, leapt over the verge and on to the path.
The deep-green darkness of the forest closed around him with a faint soughing. But he could hear other sounds among the trees: the cracking of twigs. The birches surrounded him like grey pillars; he zigzagged between them and increased his speed.
Suddenly, the forest fell away, and Jonas found himself in a meadow, or an unploughed field. It was covered in grass and illuminated by a cracked light up in the sky — the white moon, which was almost full.
He saw two figures moving in the moonlight, one pursuing the other. They were on the far side of the field, where the forest began again, and both quarry and hunter disappeared among the trees.
Jonas followed them, and found another path. He was tired now, but scared and excited at the same time. Tonight, he wasn’t alone, as he had been on the ship. His father wasn’t far behind, and Uncle Kent was somewhere in the forest.