Karin Fossum: Bad Intentions

The seventh book in the Inspector Sejer series, 2010

Translated From The Norwegian By Charlotte Barslund

First published with the title Den onde viljen in 2008 by J.W. Cappelens Forlag AS, Oslo

The lake, which was commonly known as Dead Water, lay like a well between steep mountains, and anyone who tried to wade into it would sink up to their knees in its soft mud. On the shore, partially hidden by spruce trees sat a small log cabin. Axel Frimann was looking out of the window. It was almost midnight on 13 September and the moon cast a pale blue light across the water. There was something magical about it all. At any moment, Axel imagined, a water sprite might rise from the depths. Just as the image came to him, he thought he saw a ripple in the water as though something was about to surface. But nothing happened and a smile, which no one noticed, crossed his face.

He turned to the other two and suggested that they should go rowing. ‘Have you seen the light?’ he said. ‘It’s really cool.’

Philip Reilly was reading. He tossed his long hair.

‘Yes, why not?’ he said. ‘A trip on the lake. What do you say, Jon?’

Jon Moreno was lost in the flames in the fireplace. The fire made him feel warm and dizzy. In his hand he held a blister pack of anti-anxiety pills and every four hours he pressed one through the foil and put it in his mouth.

Did he want to go out on the lake?

He looked at Axel and Reilly. There is something about their eyes, something evasive, he thought, but then again, I’m not quite myself, I’m ill, I’m taking medication, calm down, they’re my friends, they just want what’s best for me. But he did not want to go out on the lake, not in the middle of the night in the cold moonlight. He did not trust himself completely. In here by the fire he felt safe, in here between the timber walls, in the company of his friends, because they were his friends, weren’t they? He tried to catch Reilly’s eye, but Reilly had got up and was fumbling with something on a shelf.

‘It’s important that you get some exercise,’ Axel said. ‘Sitting still only makes your anxiety worse. You need to get your blood circulating, get it delivering oxygen to your cells. So come on.’

Jon did not want to let them down. They were doing this for him, they wanted him to have some fun and he did not have much of that at the hospital. Only endless days where nothing ever happened, spent wandering up and down the corridors. They were smiling at him, encouraging him now, Axel with his dark eyes, Reilly with his grey ones. So he got up from the chair and put the blister pack in his pocket. He never went anywhere without it. He reached out for his mobile which lay on the table, but changed his mind. His anxiety hummed through his body like an electric current. Somewhere a demon is flicking a switch, on and off, on and off, he thought, and I can’t breathe.

‘Put your jacket on,’ Axel said. ‘It’s chilly.’

Jon looked around for his jacket. He could not remember where he had put it, but Axel found it and brought it over. Reilly blew out the paraffin lamp and a sudden darkness descended upon them. Jon knelt down to lace up his boots. A knot and a bow followed by another knot. Axel and Reilly waited.

‘What about the fire?’ Jon asked.

‘We won’t be gone long, there’s no danger,’ Axel said. ‘Come on.’

‘Shouldn’t we put the fireguard in front of it?’

Axel shrugged. ‘All right.’

He disappeared into the kitchen and they heard him scrabbling. Then he returned with the fireguard and placed it in front of the fire. The cast-iron fireguard was decorated with two wolves baring their teeth.

Jon looked at the wolves and at his two friends.

‘We ready to go then?’ Axel said.

Reilly nodded. Jon stuck his hands in his pockets. Axel patted him on the shoulder. His hand was warm and comforting. Trust us, the hand said, we only want what’s best for you, you’re among friends.

It was Friday the 13th of September. They went out into the dark night and fetched the oars from the shed.

A narrow path led down to the shore of Dead Water.

The boat lay bottom up among the reeds, green and swollen like a pea pod. Axel and Reilly took hold of it and turned it over. It was filthy and slimy on the inside and by the light of the moon they saw a reptile scurry over the side and disappear.

‘A lizard,’ Axel remarked.

Jon stood with his hands in his jacket pockets. He stared at the boat with apprehension. He did not want to sit on the dirty thwarts. Axel read his mind and wiped them with the sleeve of his jacket.

‘Sit at the stern,’ he ordered him.

Obediently Jon stepped into the boat. He looked down at the black water. Perhaps there was no bottom, only mud that went on for ever. It might be good to let yourself sink, he thought, stop the fear flowing through your body for good. An explosion in his head, a burning sensation in his lungs and it would be all over. Axel and Reilly pushed off and the boat glided smoothly through the reeds. Jon felt it rock from side to side. He sat very still on the thwart, a skinny lad with small hands. His gaze wandered across the landscape, the steep mountains which surrounded the lake. Axel and Reilly each took an oar, fumbling at first until they found their rhythm. The boat gained speed.

‘Look at the light,’ Axel said.

The moonlight was cold and pale. Everything around them had acquired a metallic sheen. Reilly concentrated on rowing. The boat moved steadily across the lake, the water dripped like silver from the oars. Jon gripped the thwart with both hands. He was surrounded by darkness and black water. His fear gnawed at him like a sharp tooth.

Axel broke the silence.

‘And what about your psychologist, Jon? Can you talk to him?’

‘Her,’ Jon corrected him. ‘Her name’s Hanna Wigert. Yes, I can talk to her.’

‘How old is she?’ Axel wanted to know.

‘Forty, I think,’ Jon said. ‘Besides, she’s a psychiatrist.’

‘Same thing, isn’t it?’ Axel declared.

‘No,’ Jon said. ‘It’s not the same thing.’

The men rowed with long, steady strokes.

‘And you talk about whatever you like?’ Axel probed.

Jon looked the other way. ‘I suppose so. Mostly about when I was little,’ he said. ‘But it wasn’t when I was little that things went wrong.’

He felt disoriented. In the moonlight Axel’s face was blue and white, and his eyes were black hollows.

‘But your dad left you,’ Axel said. ‘That couldn’t have been easy?’

Jon curled up on the thwart.

‘People lose each other all the time,’ he said, ‘and they carry on anyway. As I did. It was fine, we managed fine.’

Axel’s oar sliced like a knife through the water.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘this is fun. But we all know what this is really about. Don’t we, Jon?’

Everyone in the boat fell completely silent.

Jon’s head dropped, he was having trouble breathing. Hanna had told him what to do when this happened. Stand up, she had said, so that your lungs have room to expand. But he was scared of standing up in the boat so he stayed huddled up, struggling to breathe.

Reilly mumbled a verse he had learned by heart.

‘“If God were to punish men according to what they deserve, He would not leave on the back of the earth a single living creature: but He gives them respite for a stated Term: when their Term expires, verily God has in His sight all His Servants.”’