Åke Edwardson - Sail of Stone

There was also another movie… it was the same thing, a character on a motorcycle, and it was an obvious wink at Fellini’s film. What was the other one called? He saw a village and a sea… it was called Local Hero. And as he recalled it was filmed somewhere in Scotland, a small community by the sea where everyone was suspicious of newcomers.

“Isn’t it to look for fingerprints?” said Osvald.

“Maybe,” said Winter.

He thought of the letter that had come a month earlier and that had caused Axel Osvald to journey away toward his death. He looked at his son and saw that he was thinking about that too.

“Are you going to compare ?” said Osvald.

“Maybe,” said Winter.

“But surely you don’t think that…”

Winter didn’t answer. The moped went by for the fourth time. It must be different mopeds, but in that case they sounded completely identical. He saw that film from Scotland pass by in his mind for a few seconds. The houses were close together. There was an inn. An artsy type ran it. He and an American had discussed selling a beach.

“That’s completely idiotic,” said Osvald. “That would mean Grandpa was still alive.” He got up from his chair. “Do you really think he is?”

“What do you think?”

“No, no.”

“What did your father think?”

“Not that. Not that it’s… like that.”

“Are you sure?”

“Maybe he hoped it was. At one time. But that’s another story.”

Belief. Or hope. Was it different? In Winter’s world, in the world where he had thus far spent most of his time, in his adult life, belief and hope sometimes slid into each other.

“I want to ask you about one more thing, Erik,” said Winter.

“What is it, Erik?” said Osvald.

“Do you have any photographs at home of your grandfather when he was young?”

Osvald moved his hand up to his forehead again. He rubbed his hair. He was standing in the middle of the floor.

“Anything other than that probably doesn’t exist,” he said. “We only remember him as young, you know.”

“Is there a picture?” asked Winter.

“Yes,” Osvald said, and left the room.

Bergenhem was standing four rows away from the truck, which seemed to sway in the wind when the cover moved. He could see that it was stretched over a van, which was peculiar. He looked at his watch. He had been sitting there for half an hour. He got out and approached the truck. He looked toward the entrance, where hundreds of people were going in and out and pushing carts full of flat packages. IKEA’s business idea was flat packs, and they sailed around the world. All over the world people bought the packages and assembled their homes, their worlds. Bergenhem still had a scar on his knuckles from trying to assemble a TV stand in which the predrilled holes in the hard-as-stone glued sheets of beech didn’t match the hardware. He had sworn and bled. But it had been cheap. In the end he had pounded in the screws with a hammer.

He looked at his watch again, at the truck again. He walked toward the entrance.

Half an hour later the parking lot began to empty.

The truck was still there.

Bergenhem began to realize what had happened.

Fifteen minutes later the truck was alone in its row. Bergenhem understood perfectly now. He called Meijner.

Harbour Office. It looked the way it always had, mostly like a wall against the sea. He had parked outside the shipyard and walked back along the quays. There was no wind.

It fit in. It was quiet here, a quiet no one wanted to have. Peterhead had taken over everything now, or almost everything. The shipyard behind his back was empty and quiet. A hammer strike coming from there would have caused passersby to jump. But there were no strikes.

He himself had held a hammer in there, in the red dust.

Suddenly he turned around, right in front of the fish market, which was partially built on poles above the water. People streamed out on their way to the buses that waited in the parking lot. He heard American voices, like sheep bleating their way up to the buses. Brae-brae-brae-brae.

In one of the docks there were still boats with meaningful existence, trawlers from here and from the horn: the Three Sisters, Priestman, Avoca, Jolair, Sustain. A familiar name: Monadhliath.

That couldn’t be right.

A man came up onto the quarterdeck. He walked by as fast as he could, with his eyes on the Marine Accident Investigation Branch on the other side.

He shifted his gaze. He didn’t need any reminders.

Absolutely nothing had happened to the houses behind the shipyard. The stone walls were like the bottom of the sea; it would take millions of years to get them to change, to wear away. He walked up and down Richmond. It took four minutes; the street wasn’t even a hundred yards long. He had lived in number four. The windows were black. The door was new, of a type of wood he didn’t recognize. It could be from a ship. It ought to be. The wind from the sea that swept through Richmond Street was the sea, as damp as the sea. Anyone who walked here became wet and cold. Not right now, the wind was from the south, but often otherwise.

The street was one of ten identical ones. Without the names no one would be able to find their way home. The shipyard workers had been too drunk to remember which street was theirs. Even though most of them could read, at least the names of their streets, their birth certificates; the family had been able to read the death certificates. It was a hard life; it was cold. He hadn’t been here during the terrible years, and yet he had been so close. He had burned away most of the memories. It hurt to return. He knew how it would feel.

At the Marine Hotel, a single room cost twenty-five pounds. Back then, that had been his livelihood for a month.

He walked around the building. The bar had been moved. There was a notice about the “Cunard Suite” by the entrance. It had been there then, too.

He stood in the cramped hallway to the reception area.

It was the same smell.

Jesus.

“Can I help you, sir?”

She wasn’t from that time. Her hair was blond. Her skirt was long; that was unusual on a young person. She didn’t look at him, really. It was surprising that she had seen him at all.

“I just wanted to…,” he said, and that was all, and he turned and went out again, and up past Forsyths and Moray Seafoods, up the hill to the square.

The old hotel looked untouched. No bombs had fallen on it. He had to sit down on one of the benches in front of the city hall. It wasn’t a city hall anymore, he could see that much. Old folks were going in and out; some seemed to be fifty years older than him. An old person was sitting on the bench across from him, sitting and sleeping in the pale autumn sun.

It was here. It was here. He had panicked and never returned. This was where it started.

It was all the people, thousands, tens of thousands.

The war was over. What was it, the twentieth anniversary of the monument? Yes. Maybe. They had celebrated peace, and that monument, which was twenty years old. It had been so crowded that he thought it might become hard to breathe.

He looked at the monument; naturally, it was still there, in front of the city hall in the old part of the square. You could touch it.

The War Memorial.

The memorial for the dead of the first great war.

In Proud and Grateful Remembrance.

Their Name Liveth For Ever.

That’s what it looked like. But that’s not how it was.

He got up with his memories and crossed the street. He had stood here, among all the others. Then he had turned around. There was a sound. A clicking sound.