Åke Edwardson - Frozen Tracks

“I checked with Skövde again,” said Ringmar. “No sign of anything at Carlström’s place, no tire tracks, and they’d have seen those in the newly fallen snow if there’s been any.” Ringmar adjusted the two-way radio. “And old man Smedsberg is saying nothing in his cell.”

“Hmm.”

“And now it’s starting to snow,” said Ringmar, looking skyward through the windshield.

“It’s been looking dull for ages,” said Winter.

“The tracks will disappear again,” said Ringmar.

They’d discovered a new, faster way of getting to Carlström’s farm. It meant that they didn’t need to pass Smedsberg’s house.

It seemed to have been snowing quite heavily on the plain.

Winter hadn’t announced their visit in advance, but Carlström seemed to take it for granted.

“Sorry to disturb you again,” said Winter.

“Save it,” growled Carlström. “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“Yes, please.”

Carlström went to the wood-burning stove, which seemed to be on all day long. It was warmer in the little kitchen than anywhere else Winter could imagine. Hell perhaps, but Winter thought that was a cold place.

The heat in this kitchen could induce him to fall asleep in midsentence.

“It’s a terrible situation,” said Carlström.

“Where could Mats be now?” Winter asked.

“I don’t know. He’s not here.”

“No, I’ve gathered that. But where could he have gone?”

Carlström tipped coffee into the saucepan straight out of the tin, which was covered in rust.

“He liked the sea,” he said eventually.

“The sea?”

“He didn’t like the flats,” said Carlström. “It looks like a sea, but it isn’t a sea.” Carlström turned around to face them. Winter noticed a warmth in his eyes that could have been there all the time, but he hadn’t detected it. “He could go and fantasize about the sky up there, the stars and all that, and the sealike plain.”

“The sea,” said Winter, and looked at Ringmar. “Do you know any of the places he used to go?”

“No, no.”

Carlström came with the coffee. There were small cups on the table that looked out of place, elegant. Winter looked at them. They told him something.

It was linked to what had inspired him to come here.

Ringmar told Carlström about Georg Smedsberg.

Carlström muttered something they couldn’t hear.

“What did you say?” asked Winter.

“It’s him,” said Carlström.

“Yes,” said Ringmar.

“Just a minute,” said Winter. “What do you mean by ‘it’s him’?”

“It’s his fault,” said Carlström, staring down at the little cup hidden inside his big hand. His hand was twitching. “It’s him. It wouldn’t have happened but for him…”

Winter saw. It was coming to him now, he knew why they’d had to come out here again. He remembered. He stood up. Jesus

Christ.

He’d seen it the second time, or was it the first? But he hadn’t thought, hadn’t realized.

“Excuse me,” he said, and went back into the hall; the ceiling light with no shade cast faint light onto the upper part of the cupboard in the far corner where there was a little collection of photographs in old-fashioned frames gleaming vaguely gold or silver. That’s what Winter had seen, only a passing glimpse of something you find in every home, and he’d seen the face, the second from the left, and it was a young woman with blond hair and blue eyes and the reason why he remembered, why he had re-created this photo in his mind’s eye, was her features that he had recognized later, yesterday, or whenever the hell it was, on Christmas Eve, in his office. Her face had stuck in his memory, her eyes, they were transfixing him now, that remarkable piercing quality that almost made him want to turn around to see what she was looking at straight through his head.

He went closer. The woman’s face had a cautious smile that ought to have vanished by the time the photograph was taken. The similarity to Mats Jerner was astonishing, frightening.

He had seen that face previously as a framed portrait on a desk on the other side of the table in Georg Smedsberg’s kitchen. He could see that in his mind’s eye as well. The woman in that portrait was middle-aged, and smiling a cautious black-and-white smile. It’s my wife, Smedsberg had said. Gustav’s mom. She left us.

He heard a shuffling sound, Carlström’s slippers.

“Yes,” said Carlström.

Winter turned around. Bertil was standing behind Carlström.

“It was many years ago,” said Carlström.

“What happened?” was all Winter could say. Open questions.

“She was very young,” said Carlström. He sank down onto the nearest chair, the only one in the hall. He looked at Winter’s face, which was a question mark.

“No, no, I’m not Mats’s father. She was very young, like I said. Nobody knows who he was. She never said.”

Carlström made a sort of gesture.

“Her parents were old, and they couldn’t cope. I don’t know if it killed them, but it all happened quickly. First one then the other.”

“Did you look after her?” Winter asked.

“Yes. But that was after.”

“After what?”

“After the boy. After she’d had him.”

Winter nodded and waited.

“She came back without him. It was best, she said.” Carlström squirmed on the chair, as if in pain. Winter felt wide awake, as if he’d been resurrected. “I guess they had some kind of contact, but…”

“What happened next?”

“Then, well, you know what happened. Then she met h… She met him.”

“Georg Smedsberg?”

Carlström didn’t answer, as if he didn’t want to utter the man’s name.

“He did it,” said Carlström, and now he looked up. Winter could see tears in his eyes. “It was him. It is him. He ruined the boy.” He looked at Winter, then at Ringmar. “The boy was damaged before, but he ruined him altogether.”

“What… How much did Gerd know?” asked Winter.

Carlström didn’t answer.

“What did she know?” said Winter again.

“They’d already had the other boy by then,” said Carlström, as if he hadn’t heard the question.

“The other boy? Do you mean Gustav?”

“She was already getting on in years by then,” said Carlström. “One came early, the other one late.” He squirmed on the chair again, and it creaked. “And then… and then… she vanished.”

“What happened?”

“There’s a lake in the next parish,” said Carlström. “She knew. She knew. She wasn’t… wasn’t healthy. Not before either.”

Carlström bowed his head, as if in prayer, Our father… thy kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven; Carlström’s head dipped farther. “I had to look after him, Mats. When she couldn’t cope. He came here.” Carlström stood up slowly. “You know about that.”

How much did the social services know? Winter thought. It was unusual for a single man to be allowed to take charge of a child. He’d wondered about that before. But Carlström had been regarded as safe. Had he been safe?

“I’d tell you where Mats was if only I knew,” said Carlström.

“There’s one other place,” said Ringmar.

They didn’t speak as they drove through the fields. The distance seemed shorter this time. Smedsberg’s house was hidden by the barn as they approached from this direction. The mixture of dusk and snowfall made it difficult to see. The road was a part of the field that stretched as far as the horizon that couldn’t be seen. There were no tracks on the road in front of them. There were no tracks outside the house when Winter turned in and parked some twenty meters away. If there had been any tracks, they’d been covered up by the snow.