Johan Theorin - The Darkest Room

“Okay.”

“In any case, you’re not going to be sitting around in the office much; quite the opposite, in fact,” said Holmblad. “That’s the idea of the local policing reforms: you need to be out there, a visible presence on the streets. The focus is traffic offenses, criminal damage, petty theft, and break-ins. The less complex investigations. And youth crime, of course.”

“Suits me,” said Tilda. “I stopped a modified scooter on the way here.”

“Good, good.” Her boss nodded. “So you’ve shown that there’s a police presence here again. And next week is the official opening ceremony. The press have been invited. Newspapers, local radio… You’ll be available then?”

“Of course.”

“Good, good. And I expect your work here will be… well, I know you’ve just come from Växjö, and here on the island you’re bound to be working more independently. For

better or worse. More freedom to organize your working day as you wish, but also more responsibility… I mean, it takes half an hour to get here from Borgholm, and the station there isn’t manned all the time. So if anything happens, it could take a while before you get any help.”

Tilda nodded. “At the police training academy we often practiced situations where backup was delayed. My tutors were very keen on-”

Majner snorted over by his desk. “The tutors at the training academy haven’t got a clue about the reality of the situation,” he said. “It’s a long time since they were out on the job.”

“They were very competent in Växjö,” said Tilda quickly.

This was like sitting right at the back in the police van as a new recruit-you were expected to keep your mouth shut and let the older ones do the talking. Tilda had hated it.

Holmblad looked at her and said, “All I’m saying is that it’s important for you to bear in mind the long distances here on the island before you go into a problematic situation alone.”

She nodded. “I hope I’ll be able to deal with any problems that arise.”

The police chief opened his mouth again, possibly to continue his lecture-but at that moment the telephone on the wall rang.

“I’ll get that,” he said, striding over to the desk. “It might be from Kalmar.”

He picked up the phone.

“Marnäs police station, Holmblad.”

Then he listened.

“Where?” he said.

He was silent again.

“Right,” he said eventually. “We’d better get out there.”

He put the phone down.

“That was Borgholm. The emergency number has had a call about an accidental death on northern Öland.”

Majner got up from his empty desk. “Local?”

“By the lighthouses off Eel Point,” said Holmblad. “Anyone know where that is?”

“Eel Point is south of here,” said Majner. “Four or five miles, maybe.”

“Okay, we need to take the car,” said the chief of police. “The ambulance is already on its way… evidently it’s an accidental drowning.”

Once the two lighthouses had been built, there was a sense of security around Eel Point, for both ships and people. At least that’s what the men who built them believed, they believed that life on the coast was safe and secure for all time. The women knew this was not always the case .

Death was closer in those days, it came into the houses .

In the hayloft of the old barn there is a woman’s name, hastily carved into the wall: BELOVED CAROLINA 1868. Carolina has been dead for more than a hundred and twenty years, but she has whispered to me through the wall about what could happen at Eel Point-in what is sometimes referred to as the good old days .

– MIRJA RAMBE

The manor house is large, so large. Kerstin goes from room to room, searching for Carolina, but there are so many places to look. Too many places on Eel Point, too many rooms in the house.

And the blizzard is on its way, it feels like a weight in the air outside, and Kerstin knows there isn’t much time.

The manor house is solidly built and will not suffer in the storm, but the question is how the people will be affected. A blizzard makes everyone gather around the stoves like lost birds, waiting for it to pass.

A difficult summer with poor harvests on the island has been followed by a harsh winter. It is the first week in February, and so bitterly cold on the coast that no one goes outside unless they have to. But the lighthouse keepers and the ironworkers still have to do their shifts over in the towers, and today every fit man except Karlsson, the master lighthouse

keeper, is out on the point getting the lighthouses ready for the snowstorm.

The women have remained in the house, but Carolina is nowhere to be found. Kerstin has searched every room on both floors, and has been up among the beams in the attic. She cannot talk to any of the other maids or the wives of the lighthouse keepers, because they are not aware of Carolina’s condition. They may have their suspicions, but they do not know for certain.

Carolina is eighteen, two years younger than Kerstin. They are both housemaids working for Sven Karlsson, the master lighthouse keeper. Kerstin regards herself as the one who thinks things through and is more careful. Carolina is more lively and more trusting-in some ways she is just as adventurous as Kerstin’s older sister Fina, who went to America last year-and that means she sometimes has problems. Recently Carolina’s troubles have increased, and she has told only Kerstin about them.

If Carolina has left the manor and gone out into the forest or off toward the peat bog, Kerstin will not be able to find her. Carolina knew there was a blizzard on the way-is she still so desperate?

Kerstin goes outside. In the snow-covered inner courtyard the wind comes sweeping down from the sky, whirling between the buildings, unable to make its escape. The blizzard is approaching; this is just a premonition.

She hears a scream that quickly falls silent. That wasn’t the wind.

It was a woman screaming.

The wind tears at Kerstin’s kerchief and pinafore, making her lean forward. She forces open the door of the barn and steps inside.

The cows moo and move uneasily as she searches among them. Nothing. Then she climbs the steep staircase up to the big hayloft. The air is freezing cold up here.

Something is moving over by one of the walls, below

the big mound of hay. Faint movements in the dust and the shadows.

It is Carolina. She is lying on the hay-covered floor, her legs immobile beneath a dirty blanket. Her breathing is weak and wheezing as Kerstin comes closer; her expression is one of shame.

“Kerstin… I think it just happened,” she says. “I think it came out.”

Kerstin walks over to the blanket, full of foreboding, and kneels down.

“Is there anything there?” whispers Carolina. “Or is it just blood?”

The blanket over Carolina’s knees is sticky and wet. But Kerstin lifts one corner and nods.

“Yes,” she says, “it’s come out.”

“Is it alive?”

“No… it’s not… complete.”

Kerstin leans over her friend’s pale face.

“How are you feeling?”

Carolina’s eyes are flickering all over the place.

“It died without being baptized,” she mumbles. “We have to… we have to bury it in consecrated ground so that it won’t walk again… It will be a lost soul if we don’t bury it.”

“We can’t,” says Kerstin. “The blizzard is here… we’ll die if we go out on the road.”

“We have to hide it,” whispers Carolina, struggling to breathe. “They’ll think I’ve been whoring… that I tried to get rid of it.”

“It doesn’t matter what they think.” Kerstin places her hand on Carolina’s burning forehead and says quietly, “I’ve had another letter from my sister. She wants me to go to America, to Chicago.”