The Cruel Stars of the Night (22 page)

Twenty-eight

The container had been picked up and yet more cubic meters of the family’s history had been carried away Laura had asked the driver where he dumped everything.

“It can be burned, and in that case it’ll end up in the furnace in Bolän-derna,” he answered, casting an indifferent eye into the container.

She had an impulse to follow the container truck, and see all the junk tumble into an enormous burning inferno, catch fire, and literally go up in flames.

Now a new container stood in the driveway Laura dragged out several bags from the garage and furniture from the house and the container was already half full. Her activities attracted a certain attention on the street. Many of the neighbors had already found a reason to walk past “the Dream House,” they slowed their pace and stared with curiosity at what the Hin-dersten woman was tossing out.

There was talk. Some speculated that she was on her way to leaving the neighborhood. Others believed she was cleaning up after her father. A rumor had arisen that she was going to do a large-scale renovation of the house. Someone had seen her run half naked from the house to the garage. Another could tell that she had heard mysterious, shrill sounds from the upper story.

From having been relatively quiet for a time, the gossip had now gained new momentum and the house stood in the center of the neighborhood’s attention.

Laura noticed her neighbors’ interest but ignored their curious looks and questions. She worked on purposefully. Where this drive came from she wasn’t sure. She was still going to leave everything—the house, Uppsala, and Sweden. But she didn’t want strangers to touch the objects, books, and furniture. It was up to her and no one else to settle the score with her former life.

The upper floor was the hardest, not because she had to carry everything down the stairs but because that’s where the most painful memories were.

Two rooms were full of Alice Hindersten’s belongings. They were of little value and would only fetch a couple of thousand at an auction, Laura thought. The objects of the greatest value were most likely the old Jugend-patterned flower vases and a shaving mirror with a light wooden frame, probably birch. These things had been stored upstairs for as long as Laura could remember. The last few objects had been carried up shortly after her mother’s death. A great deal had probably been thrown away.

For the first time since she had started to clean, Laura became hesitant. She could hardly stand to touch anything, much less throw them into the container.

She sat down on a stickback chair and looked at that which had been Alice’s life. Laura knew that the gigantic America-trunk that took up almost a square meter contained dolls and other toys. Once she and Alice had looked through the trunk together. What had attracted Laura the most that time were the paper bookmarks from Alice’s childhood. Some worn and frayed at the edges, others well-preserved and carefully packed into different envelopes, depending on their theme. What Laura remembered above all was the envelope with angels.

She opened the lid and breathed in the smells of her childhood. Numb with the pain of longing she picked aimlessly through the objects. The old doll with the lace dress had belonged to her grandmother and was probably one hundred years old. The dress looked moth-eaten and in addition it had a large tear on the front, a “skorsa” as Alice would have said. Laura wrapped the doll in her arms, rocked it, and mumbled some words of comfort.

Laura lingered in the room for over an hour, unable to carry anything down and throw it away.

It was getting dark when she returned to the first floor. Her hunger had somehow strangely abated, but her throat was dry from all the dust and she opened a new bottle of wine.

When she had downed half a glass there was another ring at the door. She put the glass down with care and tiptoed into the hall.

“Hello,” she heard someone call out in a low voice and she ran up, turned the lock, and threw the door open.

“You came,” she whispered.

Stig Franklin brushed past her into the hall.

“We have to talk,” he said and scrutinized her half-naked body. “You’re not wearing very much. Aren’t you cold?”

Laura shook her head, elated and smiling.

“Are you hungry?” she asked and in that moment became ravenously hungry herself. It was as if his visit had awakened her from a kind of sleep mode and now when her bodily functions were switched on the hunger immediately returned.

“No,” he said curtly.

“Surely you can have a glass of wine.”

“I can’t stay long.”

“That’s what you said last time,” Laura said with a smile.

“Have you been drinking?”

“Only half a glass.”

She was familiar with his views on alcohol. Jessica had inculcated Stig with ambivalence and guilt.

“It’s a Valpolicella that you have never tasted, I promise.”

“No thanks, I’m good.”

Laura immediately went into the bedroom.

Stig remained standing in the hallway, unsure about how to proceed with what he had to say. He looked around in the increasingly bare house.

“What are you doing?” he yelled. “Are you getting rid of everything?” He received no answer. He had an hour, then he had arranged to meet Jessica in town.

Laura returned, now in an old dressing gown.

“I have to shower,” she said and before he had time to react she went into the bathroom.

Stig walked into the living room. He sat down in the only armchair left but got up again just as fast and walked into the kitchen, looked until he found a clean glass, poured out a little wine, and sat down at the kitchen table.

He felt it would be easier to talk to Laura here. He took a sip and had the feeling that Jessica saw him. He took another sip. How would Laura react? He prepared himself for the worst but it had to be ended. Jessica was no dimwit. She would soon find out about his visits and then things would be untenable when Laura returned to work.

He heard splashing from the shower and again felt desire stir in his body but he told himself to be strong and resist the temptation to be seduced. He had made his choice and in all honesty it was not even a difficult one.

He poured himself more wine and had a bite to eat. He could see her, soapy, her head tilted back and the dark hair hanging down. What fascinated him most—which was making him feel more and more uncomfortable on the hard kitchen chair—was Laura’s complete abandonment in bed. She didn’t seem to have any restraint.

He and Jessica had a pretty good sex life but Laura was something extraordinary. Jessica was controlled, it almost seemed as if she could press different buttons to regulate her emotions. Even the timing of her orgasm seemed to be something she had a button for. She always had one, as if she ran a program where the end point was a given. Afterward she washed herself fastidiously. Now he was used to it, but in the beginning it had felt a bit strange that she never lingered in bed. No, up like a spring and into the bathroom for the obligatory and scrupulous body wash, as if she wanted to scrub away every particle that came from him. It was rare that she came back to the bedroom. Instead she often went off to the computer or even to the laundry room to start the dryer or put a load in the washer.

I wonder how she will give birth, he asked himself and couldn’t help smiling a little. She probably has some program for that as well. Into the delivery room, plop, and then out again. Not that that was happening any time soon. Not yet, she said. She probably had a time plan for that as well, he thought, not without bitterness.

Stig drained his glass, stretched out, and opened the refrigerator but it was as bare as the rest of the house. The sound from the shower had stopped. Stig got up, adjusted his pants in the crotch, and sank down on the chair again.

The door to the bathroom opened and suddenly Laura was in the kitchen. She smiled and Stig found himself smiling and felt very much at ease.

“Was it nice?”

She nodded. Her hair gleamed black, scented with an unfamiliar shampoo. Laura leaned against the fridge.

She grabbed the bottle in order to fill her glass and discovered that it was a little less than half full.

“You did want some after all,” she said. “Didn’t it taste good? It should actually be aired for an hour or even more.”

Stig marveled at her calm. She again placed herself with her back to the fridge.

“We have to talk,” he said and decided to look at her. He wanted her to sit down. It would feel safer with a table between them but Laura didn’t move.

She nodded and Stig launched in.

“We have to talk,” he said with unnecessary hardness and immediately regretted it when he saw her expression. “Don’t get me wrong,” he went on. “I like you a lot. You are attractive, very attractive.”

He looked out the window, unable to continue, swallowed and made a new attempt.

“Jessica watches me like a hawk. I think she senses something.”

“She isn’t a problem,” Laura said.

“Yes, she is.”

“Stig, we love each other, it’s that simple. We always have.”

He stared at her.

“It won’t work,” he said flatly.

Laura smiled.

“Don’t worry about Jessica. She’s a bitch and you know it. It’s me you want, isn’t it? Look at me!”

Laura tugged on her belt and the dressing gown fell open.

Stig stared at her half-bared body.

“What have you done to your thighs?”

“I dreamed about you and I scratched myself in my sleep.”

“I have to drive,” he said, sniffling, rising on unsteady legs.

“You’re not driving anywhere.”

Twenty-nine

“Could it be the bananas?”

Ann Lindell shook her head.

“I don’t think so,” she said with a worried expression.

Damn it, she thought, not now, not today.

Erik had vomited after snacktime.

“He was droopy for a while,” Gunvor, the preschool teacher, went on, “but after that we didn’t notice anything else. It was full steam ahead all afternoon.”

“It must have been something that passed quickly,” Ann said, who was finding it harder now to hang on to her expression of concern.

“He normally eats a banana,” Gunvor continued.

“He seems happy now,” Ann said and checked in his cubby to see if she had missed something.

“There’s a meeting next Tuesday, did you see that?”

Ann hadn’t seen it but nodded. She guessed that there was a paper pinned to the notice board.

“A lot going on at work right now?”

“You could say that,” Ann said with an attempt at a smile and took aim for the exit.

“It’s stressful here too, I have to say. Pernilla is sick and Lisbeth is at a workshop and we’re not allowed to take in any substitutes. Luckily we have an intern and he’s wonderful. Have you met him? He’s only seventeen.”

Lindell shook her head.

“Thanks for today! See you tomorrow,” she called from the door.

There didn’t seem to be anything much wrong with Erik. He walked quietly by her side to the car. Ann strapped him into the child seat and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

“Banana,” he said and giggled.

“Mommy’s going out tonight. Görel’s coming over. That will be fun, won’t it?”

Erik didn’t reply, but there was nothing remarkable about that. He talked, and could be a real chatterbox but only when it suited him. For long periods of time he was completely silent only to explode into a torrent of speech.

Ann Lindell told herself she had no reason to feel guilty. How often did she ask Görel to babysit and find something to do of her own accord? Once a month, not more, and then it was often about work or a parent-teacher meeting.

Now she was going to meet Morgansson for a second time, but they were not going to the movies. Instead they were going to have dinner down by the river. He had called and asked her out. Ann had accepted without hesitation but had immediately called Görel as if she wanted her friend’s approval.

Ann felt less nervous this time. She had gotten to know her colleague somewhat and could relax. But at the same time it was more serious now because this was date number two. It felt as if tonight would determine whether it would go any further.

Görel was going to come as early as five thirty. Görel was great. She had her own children, two girls, and she was straightforward in a way that Ann appreciated. No empty chatter, a sense of closeness without intrusive curiosity, and sometimes a raw humor that took Ann by surprise but made her laugh out loud.

Görel lived with Leffe. He was a carpenter and had helped Ann install windows to enclose her balcony. This was the only luxury she had permitted herself and she didn’t regret it. It was fantastic to be able to sit out on the balcony as early as April and experience the first warmth of spring, or set the table for a Sunday dinner there in September and have the illusion of living in more southerly climes.

Erik started to talk once they were in the stairwell and continued without interruption when they reached the apartment. Ann had to bring him into the bathroom when she was going to shower, because if he didn’t get answers to his questions he became inconsolably grumpy. Now he was perched on his stool, philosophizing. Ann commented on everything in a seasoned manner and from time to time threw in a counterquestion.

Ann couldn’t drop the thought of her find in Petrus Blomgren’s house. It was as if the photograph had imprinted itself on the mirror in the bathroom.

“To my beloved Petrus,” she said.

“What?”

“Mommy’s talking to herself,” she said and continued brushing her hair.

Who was the woman? Did her existence even have any significance at all for the case? Ann decided to call Sammy.

“Too bad for Allan,” Sammy said when Ann told him about the snapshot. “That’s a real oversight. But why didn’t you bring it up? I don’t get it.”

“I don’t know,” Lindell said honestly.

Of course she had thought about it. It wasn’t simply because she didn’t want to embarrass a coworker who had been sloppy. There were also other motives.

Erik appeared dragging his snowsuit.

“Play,” he said.

“Wait a minute,” Ann said to Sammy, lowering the receiver. “It’s too late to go to the playground. Görel will be here soon. Mommy has to work.”

Erik didn’t say a word, looked at her with his wisest expression and lumbered off with the gear.

“It may not even be important,” she said as she continued her discussion.

“I guess,” Sammy said but Lindell heard his doubt.

“What should we do?” she asked.

“What should
you
do?” Sammy shot back, grinning.

They discussed the matter for a long time. Lindell felt a growing sense of relief. Her judgment and decision to keep this information to herself had been hers and hers alone and she was the one who would perhaps end up taking the heat for it but talking about the problem made her feel better.

“I don’t believe in this queen plot,” Sammy said for a second time.

“Who does?”

“Ander and Allan,” Sammy said. “They sound like a circus act. ‘Come and see tonight’s act: Ander and Allan!’”

He made her laugh. Erik stood by her feet and laughed along.

“We’ll talk more later?”

“You bet we will,” Sammy said, and Lindell was touched by his words.

Thirty seconds after she put the phone down the phone rang. She picked up, convinced it was Sammy who had thought of something else, but the call came from Ödeshög.

“Hello Ann, I just wanted to see how you were doing. I’ve seen on the television how things are going there in Uppsala.”

Ann sat down at the kitchen table. Yet another thing she felt guilty about. Ann called her parents all too seldom and she visited them even more rarely. Since Erik was born they had of course come for several visits but the contact between them was getting thinner and thinner. She didn’t know why. Odeshog was a finished chapter. She had no ties there anymore other than the fact that her parents still lived there.

Ann had no siblings and felt some pressure to be a good daughter. Erik’s birth had done some good in deflecting her mother’s at times intrusive though well-meaning intentions, even if her mother had a great deal to say about the circumstances. She touched frequently on the fact that the boy didn’t have a father.

Ann talked about the murder case for a while, shooting down the worst exaggerations of the media and trying to present the work in as sanitized a form as was humanly possible. Her parents were never curious in a positive way. They lamented the fact that Ann had such a depressing job. Ann was never quite clear on what profession they would have been pleased with. Most likely they would have complained about any job that she had had.

Her mother was in good health, her father somewhat unwell as usual. He had not stopped smoking despite his doctor’s orders. Bertholdsson’s youngest had moved away from home. The nearest neighbor had chopped away at the spirea hedge they had in common so it would probably never flower again.

That was, in short, the information that Ann received. Why don’t you tell someone who gives a damn, she thought unkindly, but tried to sound attentive.

They ended the conversation with the usual exhortations from her mother’s side, directed mostly at Erik’s well-being, and Ann’s half promises to visit soon.

Görel turned up and while Ann finished getting ready they chatted about this and that. Görel was like that, she mixed up big and small things into a single conversation. It could be the Prime Minister Göran Persson, discussions about the House of Music, or a new laundering technique.

“You can use regular dishwashing liquid,” she claimed and pinched Ann’s skirt at the same time. “This one is really cute. Where did you get it?”

“I can’t remember,” Ann said truthfully.

“It’ll be coming off quick tonight,” Görel said with a guffaw.

“What are you talking about?”

“This is the second time you’re seeing him. And you aren’t exactly a nun.”

“But Görel, I don’t want to . . .”

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to embarrass you. Bring the man home if you like and I’ll sneak off without a word. I promise! But I do want to see what he looks like.”

At exactly eight o’clock—the cathedral on the other side of the Fyris River announced the time—Ann Lindell stepped into the I & I Kitchen and Bar.

Charles Morgansson was sitting at the bar, but could just as well have been sitting in the kitchen since he was involved in a lively conversation with one of the cooks.

He broke off at once when he saw Ann, stood up, pulled out a bar stool, and made a gesture of invitation. She had certain problems getting up there in her tight skirt.

“So, here we are again,” Morgansson said in a knowing tone, after she had managed to get herself up.

Lindell looked around. There were many more customers tonight than last time. Two cooks were busy in the open kitchen and someone that Lindell assumed was new. He looked desperately young but was chopping vegetables at a frenetic pace and with a seriousness that demonstrated that he intended to make the mark.

“So are you done scoping the place out?”

A tall ungainly lug of a bartender towered over them from the other side of the counter. He would have looked rather forbidding had it not been for his eyes which revealed a more congenial personality.

“Perhaps a glass of white wine for the lady?”

Lindell got the impression that he didn’t like to be contradicted and she nodded obediently.

“This here is Tall Per,” Morgansson explained. “He graduated from Örebro Grammar School with a C in comportment.”

“But a B in organization.”

They bandied words back and forth while the Närke native poured out a glass of wine and drew a couple of glasses of beer.

Lindell smiled to herself, tasting the wine and peeking at her colleague from the side. He looked comfortable. She felt relaxed and a surge of anticipation. Her life had all too long been a series of disappointments and duties, with Erik as the only real source of happiness. Her work, which had earlier meant so much—not in terms of a career, which everyone always seemed to talk about, but rather the feeling of being able to make a difference—had slowly but surely changed character. Or was she the one who had changed?

Let it be like this for a while, she thought and took another sip of wine. When she turned to Morgansson he was looking at her.

“This feels good,” he said and Ann was pleased at the straightforward comment.

She nodded. Tall Per retreated and disappeared into the hidden regions behind the kitchen. Morgansson put the menu in front of her. She was ravenous and decided to get the gambas to start and the anglerfish as a main course.

“Great choice,” Tall Per said when she had communicated her order, and she felt as if she had finally received his approval.

They sat there for three hours. Ann called home once and everything was fine. They said almost nothing about work. In part this was because they were out in public, in part because neither one of them was interested in engaging in a form of overtime at the restaurant.

Ann told him about her background, but skipped Edvard. She imagined her colleague had heard that story anyway. When she started in on Erik, Morgansson looked more distracted.

“You don’t have any children?”

He shook his head but said nothing and Ann let the subject drop.

Charles told her about his thirteen years at the Umeå Police. They found that they had similar experiences. Both of them had come from smaller towns and ended up working in large cities.

“I felt as if I knew everyone back home in Storuman, but in Umeå I didn’t get to know very many people,” Charles said. “I don’t miss Umeå but I am homesick for Storuman.”

Ann thought about whether there was any place she missed but she didn’t think so, definitely not Ödeshög. She caught herself starting to think about Laura Hindersten but did everything to push those thoughts away.

Charles paid as he had offered to do, and Ann did not object.

When they got up from their seats she was gripped by anxiety. They hadn’t said anything about the rest of their evening. Maybe he took for granted that he was going to go home with her? He knew she had a sitter.

They walked out onto the street together accompanied by Tall Per’s thunderous thanks but then Morgansson ran back inside, said something to the owner, and returned just as fast.

“I’ve called you a cab,” he said. “I’ll pay,” he added when he saw her confused expression.

She opened her mouth to protest but he held his hand up.

“No buts. I said I was going to treat you and that includes transportation.”

So her evening ended with her sitting alone in a taxicab chauffered by a chatty young man. Ann sat in the backseat and watched as the buildings and people swept past outside and she didn’t know what to think. What she felt very sure of, however, was what Görel would think.

When she entered the apartment there was just a lone lamp on in the living room. The soft sound from the loudspeakers sounded like whispers. Görel must be reading, Ann thought, and was suddenly upset about how the evening had ended. It would have been better if she had stayed home.

“Hello, I’m out here!” she heard Görel call out, and Ann heard a nuance to her voice that betrayed she thought Ann had company.

“It’s me,” Ann said.

Görel came out into the hall.

“Alone?”

Ann nodded.

“What kind of a man is he?”

“It feels fine this way, really,” Ann said.

“It feels fine?” Görel sniffed.

Ann turned around, hung up her jacket, and pulled off her boots. Görel waited silently behind her back. Ann wished her friend would keep talking.

“Has everything been calm here?”