Johan Theorin - The Darkest Room

They continued on down to the sea, where the wind grew stronger and colder. The sun was starting to set, and the sky had lost its blue glow.

“There’s the wreck!” shouted Livia when they had almost reached the shore.

“The wreck!” echoed Gabriel.

“Can we go out there, Daddy?”

From a distance it still bore some resemblance to the hull of a ship, but as they got closer it looked more like a pile of broken old planks of wood. The only thing that hadn’t been smashed to pieces was the keel: a warped wooden beam half buried in the sand.

Livia and Gabriel walked all the way around the wreck, but came back disappointed.

“It can’t be fixed, Daddy,” said Livia.

“No,” said Joakim, “I think it’s had it.”

“Did everybody on the boat drown?”

She was always talking about people drowning, thought Joakim.

“No, they survived,” he said. “I’m sure the lighthouse keepers helped them get ashore.”

They walked southward along the damp sandy shore. The waves swirled up onto the sand, and Livia and Gabriel tried to walk as close to them as possible without getting soaked. When a big wave came rushing toward them, they jumped out of the way, screaming and laughing.

After a quarter of an hour they had reached the stone jetty that sheltered the lighthouses. Livia ran over to it across the sand and clambered up onto the first block of stone.

This was where Katrine had gone just three weeks ago. Straight along the jetty and down into the water.

“Don’t go up there, Livia,” called Joakim.

She turned and looked down at him. “Why not?”

“You might slip.”

“I won’t.”

“You might. Come down, please!”

In the end she climbed down again, silent and sullen. Gabriel looked at his sister and his father, unsure which of them was right.

They walked past the stone pathway out to the lighthouses, and Joakim had an idea that might put Livia back in a good mood.

“Maybe we could go and look inside one of the lighthouses,” he said.

Livia turned her head quickly. “Can we?”

“Sure we can,” said Joakim, “as long as we can unlock the door. But I know where there’s a bunch of keys.”

He led the way back up to the house, unlocked the kitchen door, and as usual quelled the impulse to call out to Katrine as he walked in.

In one of the kitchen cupboards was a metal box that the agent had passed on, containing documents relating to the history of the house. The old bunch of keys was also in

the box-an iron ring with a dozen or so keys, some of them larger and heavier than any he had seen before.

Gabriel wanted to stay indoors where it was warm; he wanted to watch a video of Pingu the penguin. Joakim inserted it into the machine.

“We won’t be long,” he said.

Gabriel just nodded, already caught up in the film.

Joakim picked up the clanking bunch of keys and went out into the cold again, with Livia beside him.

“So, which one shall we choose?”

Livia thought it over and pointed. “That one,” she said. “Mommy’s lighthouse.”

Joakim looked at the north tower. That was the one that no longer flashed-even though he did think he had seen a light there just once, at dawn on the day Katrine had walked out along the stone jetty.

“Okay,” he said. “We’ll try that one.”

So they walked out into the sea along the stone pathway and took the left fork where it split.

They reached the little island. In front of the metal door of the lighthouse stood a polished slab of limestone, big enough for both father and daughter to stand on.

“Okay, let’s see if we can get in, Livia…”

Joakim looked at the padlock and chose a key that looked as if it might fit, but it was too big for the keyhole. The second key he chose fit into the hole, but wouldn’t turn.

The third key fit too, and when Joakim got a firm grip he was actually able to turn it, although it took some effort.

He pulled on the handle as hard as he could.

The door opened slowly on stiff hinges, but stopped after six or seven inches.

It was because of the big limestone slab. The winter waves and ice-or perhaps the grass growing around it-had pushed it upward over the years, and the bottom of the door was catching on it.

When Joakim grabbed hold of the upper part of the steel

door, it bent outward an inch or two more, but refused to open.

He peered inside, with the sense that he was looking into a black mountain crevice.

“What’s inside?” asked Livia behind him.

“Wow,” he said, “there’s a skeleton on the floor.”

“What?”

He turned and smiled at her wide-eyed expression.

“I’m only joking. I can’t see much… it’s almost pitch black.”

He stepped back onto the stone slab and let Livia take a look.

“I can see some stairs,” she said.

“Yes, that’s the staircase leading up into the tower.”

“It’s curved,” said Livia. “It goes round… and up.”

“Right up to the top,” said Joakim, and added, “Wait here.”

He had spotted a rectangular piece of rock down by the water, and went down and fetched it. This gave him a good threshold to stand on.

“Can you move back a bit, Livia?” he said. “I’m going to try and climb in and push the door open from the inside.”

“I want to come in as well!”

“After me, maybe,” said Joakim.

He stood on top of the piece of rock, bent the upper part of the door outward as far as he could, and squeezed in through the opening. He just managed it-he was glad he didn’t have a beer gut.

The daylight disappeared once he was inside the lighthouse, and he could no longer hear the wind from the sea. He stepped down onto a flat cement floor, and felt thick, curved stone walls around him.

Slowly he got used to the darkness and looked around. How long was it since anyone had been inside the lighthouse? Several decades, perhaps. The air was dry, as in all buildings made of limestone, and every surface was covered with a powder of gray dust.

The stone staircase Livia had seen started almost at his feet and spiraled up along the walls, around a thick pillar in the center of the tower. It disappeared up into the darkness, but somewhere up there he had the impression of a faint light, presumably from the narrow windows in the tower.

Someone had left things on the floor. A couple of empty beer bottles, a pile of newspapers, a red and white metal can with the word CALTEX on it.

Next to the stone staircase was a low wooden door, and when Joakim pushed it open a little way he saw even more trash: old wooden boxes piled on top of one another, empty bottles, and dark green fishing nets on the walls. There was even something that looked like an old mangle in there.

Someone had been using the lighthouse as a dumping ground.

“Daddy?”

Livia was calling him.

“Yes?” he replied, and heard the echo of his voice bouncing up the spiral staircase.

Her face peered in through the doorway. “Can I come in too?”

“We can try… Can you climb up onto the rock, then I can try and pull you in?”

As soon as she began to squeeze herself through the opening, he realized he wouldn’t be able to bend the door outward and pull her inside at the same time. She could easily get stuck.

“I don’t think this is going to work, Livia.”

“But I want to come inside!”

“We can go over to the southern lighthouse,” he said, “and maybe we can-”

Suddenly Joakim heard scraping noises from above. He turned his head and listened.

Footsteps. It sounded like echoing footsteps high up on the spiral staircase.

The noise was coming from the tower. It was his imagination,