Lars Kepler - The Hypnotist

Suddenly Erik spots someone standing in the trees where the ground slopes down toward the bog. It’s a slender woman with a double-barreled shotgun, which she drags along the ground, letting it bounce gently against the blueberry bushes and moss.

The police have not spotted her, and she has had no opportunity to see them. Erik keys in the number of Joona’s mobile phone, which begins to ring in the car. It’s lying next to him on the driver’s seat.

Without any urgency, the woman wanders between the trees, shotgun in hand. Erik realizes a dangerous situation could arise if the woman and the police take each other by surprise. Despite his promise to Joona, he has no choice. He gets out of the car. “Hi, there,” he calls.

The woman stops and turns to look at him.

“Chilly today,” he says quietly.

“What?”

“It’s cold in the shade,” he says, a little louder this time.

“Yes,” she replies.

“Are you new here?” he asks, walking towards her.

“No, I borrow the house from my aunt.”

“Is Sonja your aunt?”

“Yes,” she says, with a smile.

Erik goes up to her. “What are you hunting?”

“Hare,” she replies.

“Can I have a look at your gun?”

Obligingly, she breaks it and hands it over. The tip of her nose is red. Dry pine needles are caught in her sandy-coloured hair.

“Evelyn,” he says calmly, “there are some police officers here who would like to talk to you.”

She looks anxious and takes a step backwards.

“If you have time,” he says, with a smile.

She gives a faint nod and Erik shouts in the direction of the house. Joona emerges with an irritated look on his face, ready to order Erik back to the car. When he sees the woman he stiffens.

“This is Evelyn,” says Erik, handing him the shotgun.

“Hello.”

The colour suddenly drains from her face, and she looks as if she’s going to faint.

“I need to talk to you,” Joona explains, in a serious voice.

“No,” she whispers.

“Come inside.”

“I don’t want to.”

“You don’t want to go inside?”

Evelyn turns to Erik. “Do I have to?” she asks, trembling.

“No,” he replies. “You decide.”

“Please come in,” says Joona.

She shakes her head but begins to head for the house anyway.

“I’ll wait outside,” says Erik.

He walks a little way up the drive. The gravel is covered in pine needles and brown cones. He hears Evelyn scream through the walls of the house. Just one scream. It sounds lonely and despairing, an expression of incomprehensible loss. He recognizes that scream well from his time in Uganda.

Evelyn is sitting on the sofa with both hands clamped between her thighs, her face ashen. On the floor by her feet is a photograph in a frame that looks like a toadstool. It’s a mother and father- her mother and father- sitting in something that looks like a hammock, with her little sister between them. Her parents squint into the bright sunlight, while the little girl’s glasses shine as if they were white.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” says Joona.

Her chin quivers.

“Do you think you might be able to help us understand what’s happened?” he asks. The wooden chair creaks under his weight. He waits for a while, then continues. “Where were you on Monday, December seventh?”

She shakes her head.

“Yesterday,” he clarifies.

“I was here,” she says faintly.

“In the cottage?”

She meets his gaze. “Yes.”

“You didn’t go out all day?”

“No.”

“You just sat here?”

She makes a gesture toward the bed and the textbooks on political science.

“You were studying?”

“Yes.”

“So you didn’t leave the house yesterday?”

“No.”

“Is there anyone who can confirm that?”

“What?”

“Was anyone here with you?” asks Joona.

“No.”

“Have you any idea who could have done this to your family?”

She shakes her head.

“Has anyone threatened you?” She doesn’t seem to hear him. “Evelyn?”

“What? What did you say?” Her fingers are still tightly clamped between her legs.

“Has anyone threatened your family? Do you have any enemies?”

“No.”

“Did you know that your father was heavily in debt?”

She shakes her head.

“He was,” says Joona. “He owed money to criminals.”

“Right.”

“Could it be one of them who- ”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“You don’t understand anything,” she says, raising her voice.

“What is it we don’t understand?”

“You don’t understand anything.”

“Tell us what- ”

“I can’t!” she screams.

She is so distraught that she begins to cry, straight out, without covering her face. Kristina Andersson goes over and hugs her, and after a while she grows calmer. She sits there motionless, the policewoman’s arms around her, as occasional sobs shudder through her body.

“There, there,” Kristina whispers reassuringly. She holds the girl close and strokes her head- and then suddenly screams and pushes Evelyn away, straight onto the floor. “Goddammit, she bit me… she fucking bit me!”

Kristina looks in amazement at her fingers, covered in blood seeping from a wound in the middle of her throat.

On the floor, Evelyn hides a bewildered smile behind her hand. Then her eyes roll back in her head and she slumps into unconsciousness.

Benjamin has locked himself in his room. Simone is sitting at the kitchen table with her eyes closed, listening to the radio; it’s a live broadcast from Berwald Concert Hall. She tries to imagine life as a single person. It wouldn’t be all that different from what I have now, she thinks ironically. I might go to concerts, galleries, and the theatre, as all lonely women do.

She finds a bottle of single-malt Scotch in the cupboard and pours herself a drop, adding a little water: a weak yellow liquid in a heavy glass. The front door opens as the warm notes of a Bach cello concerto fill the kitchen; it is a gentle, sorrowful melody. Erik stands in the doorway looking at her, his face grey with exhaustion.

“That looks good,” he says.

“Whisky,” she says, handing him the glass.

She pours herself a fresh drink; they stand opposite each other and raise their glasses in a toast, their expressions serious.

“Difficult day?” she asks quietly.

“Pretty difficult,” he replies, with a pale smile.

He suddenly looks so worn out. There is a lack of clarity to his features, like a thin layer of dust on his face.

“What are you listening to?” he asks.

“Shall I turn it off?”

“Not on my account- it’s beautiful.” Erik empties the glass, holds it out to her, and she pours him another. “So Benjamin didn’t get a tattoo, then,” he says.

“You’ve been following the drama on voicemail.”

“Just now, on the way home. I didn’t have time before- ”

“No.” She breaks in, thinking about the woman who answered when she called the number last night.

“I’m glad you went and picked him up,” says Erik.

She nods, thinking about how all emotions are interconnected, how no relationship is autonomous and separate, how everything is affected by everything else.

They drink again, and suddenly she notices that Erik is smiling at her. His smile, with those crooked teeth, has always made her go weak at the knees. She thinks how she would love to go to bed with him now, without any discussion, any complications. One day we will all be alone anyway, she says to herself.

“I don’t know what to think,” she says tersely. “Or rather… I know I don’t trust you.”