Хеннинг Манкелль - After the Fire

I was nudging the skiff towards the water when I realised that Louise had followed me.

‘I’ll come with you,’ she said.

‘Where? To the tent?’

‘To the police.’

‘I don’t want you to come with me.’

‘I don’t care. You won’t be able to cope.’

There was an old cork float in the skiff. I picked it up and threw it at her.

‘You’re not coming with me!’ I yelled. ‘Why do I need someone with me when I know I didn’t set fire to my house?’

I didn’t wait for an answer; I just slotted the oars into the rowlocks. Needless to say, one of them slid straight into the water. As I reached for it, just as my grandfather had reached out when he grabbed and killed the deer, I was soaked by a wave. I don’t know if Louise was still standing on the shore but I rowed out stern first so that I didn’t have to look. When I had rounded the headland I turned the skiff. There she was, arms folded. She reminded me of a Native American chief, watching as the white man in a Chinese shirt rowed towards his fate and his half-rotten tent.

I lay awake most of the night, longing for something to drink. I wanted to get drunk, to liberate myself from the insanity of being called in for questioning by the police. When I eventually fell asleep, it was with the perception that I had come close to crossing a line. How would I cope with growing older, with a burned-out house and with the experience of living in a no-man’s-land where no one asked after me? Or where everyone thought I had gone crazy and started running around with cans of petrol and a box of matches?

Even my daughter was starting to regard me as more and more of a burden. I was no longer the longed-for father who had finally come into her life.

When I woke at dawn, I might as well have been drunk the night before. Tiredness made me feel hungover. I crawled out of my sleeping bag and went outside. The sea was grey, the air cold, the wind still light but somehow threatening, as it can be sometimes when a storm is approaching. Two eider ducks were bobbing up and down on the water. I clapped my hands and they flew away — heading directly north, oddly enough. I watched them until it was no longer possible to make them out against the sky.

I didn’t row back to the island until the afternoon. The caravan smelled fresh and clean when Louise opened the door. We ate a simple dinner but didn’t talk much. Afterwards she walked down to the boathouse with me.

‘Why were you signalling with the torch?’ I asked her.

‘I wasn’t. You must have been seeing things.’

There was no point in asking again. If she didn’t want to tell me, then she wouldn’t.

We were both people who lied, I thought. But we lied in different ways.

—

I slept just as badly over the next few nights. The days were all the same, all uniformly grey. I walked around my skerry trying to prepare myself for what was waiting for me at the police station.

The evening before the interview, we had food in the caravan, played a game of cards. Once again Louise accompanied me down to the jetty.

‘I’m coming with you tomorrow,’ she said.

‘No.’

We didn’t say any more.

That night I slept heavily; I was exhausted. My last thought was that I hadn’t taken my morning dip for several days, which was depressing.

I rowed back to the island in the morning feeling well rested at last. However, when I reached the boathouse I discovered that the boat with the outboard motor was missing. I knocked on the door of the caravan, but there was no reply. When I went in I saw that the bed was made and Louise’s rucksack was gone. She hadn’t left a note.

I called her mobile; there was no answer, and I wasn’t able to leave a message. I slammed the door behind me as hard as I could. A piece of the roof edging came away. I left it dangling and went and sat down on the bench by the boathouse. I knew my daughter well enough to realise there was no point in waiting and hoping she would be back in time to enable me to get to the police station.

I did what I had to do: I called Jansson. As usual he answered right away, as if he were sitting there with the phone in his hand. He was like a striking cobra.

‘There’s nothing wrong with my engine this time,’ I said. ‘But I need a lift to the mainland.’

‘When?’

‘Now.’

‘I’m on my way.’

‘Thank you.’

I ended the call before he could ask why I couldn’t use my own boat.

My clothes were still in the caravan. The dangling roof edging was in the way of the door, so I ripped it off and threw it on the grass. I chose the least dirty Chinese shirt, then searched around to see if Louise might have hidden a bottle of wine or spirits, but I couldn’t find anything.

I sat down on the bench and waited. Jansson arrived after precisely twenty-six minutes. Of course he noticed that my boat was gone, but he didn’t say anything. Perhaps he thought he was transporting a prisoner, because he knew my interview with the police was scheduled for today.

We travelled to the mainland without exchanging a single word. He refused to accept any payment when we arrived, but I placed a one-hundred-kronor note under a fishing spoon on the seat and walked away without mentioning that I would need a lift back when the police had finished with me.

Nordin was outside the chandlery cleaning seagull shit off a window. We said hello; I had the distinct feeling he also knew where I was going.

Before I left the quayside I looked around the harbour, but there was no sign of my boat. I didn’t understand where Louise had gone. Perhaps I should be worried? I pushed the thought aside; she wasn’t the kind of person who would put herself at risk unnecessarily.

Oslovski’s house was deserted. The curtains were closed, no sign of life. I picked up my car and set off. Once again I had to brake to avoid a fox that ran across the road. When I had recovered from the shock I thought angrily that the next time it appeared in front of my car, I would do my very best to kill it. The fox was running towards Golgotha, even though it didn’t know it.

It took an hour to reach the town. About halfway there was a modest little roadside cafe where I usually stopped. It’s always been there; I remember it from when I was a child. In those days it was run by a lady who wore bright red lipstick, and spoke in an almost incomprehensible dialect. I remembered fizzy drinks and a plate of meringues. Today I drank coffee and chewed on one of the dry Mazarins that seem to have infected every cafe in our country.

I was the only customer. I could see myself at the empty tables, in different manifestations and at different ages. The loneliness is palpable when you are surrounded by empty tables and chairs.

The door opened and a woman with a wheeled walker manoeuvred her way in. I remembered Harriet’s slow progress across the ice a few years earlier. I couldn’t picture myself with a walker. The thought was terrifying, revolting. Would I really want to live if my legs wouldn’t carry me?

The woman bought a cinnamon bun and drank a glass of water. The waitress carried the tray for her as she groped her way along, feeling for the edge of the table and the chair before she sat down.

I wondered what she was thinking. In my eyes the earth was already dragging her down. She was slowly fading away, and eventually she would disappear completely.

I picked up my coffee, poured it into a paper cup and left the cafe. I had never had anything to do with the police before, apart from routine business such as renewing my passport or reporting some minor damage to my car when someone drove into it on one occasion. Now I was suspected of a serious crime. I knew I was innocent, but I had no idea what conclusions the police had reached.