Camilla Lackberg - The Ice Child

She had purposely left the one remaining upstairs room for last. Louise’s bedroom. It was next to Peter’s, and when she took out the photo, she had to steel herself for what she knew she would see. The contrast was so bizarre. While Peter’s room had been so nice, Louise’s room looked like a prison cell, and it had essentially been just that. Erica ran her finger over the big bolt that was still on the door, although it hung loose from several screws. A bolt that had been installed to keep the door securely locked from the outside. To keep the child in.

Erica held up the photo as she stepped inside. She felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. The room had an eerie air about it, but she knew this had to be her imagination. Rooms and houses possessed no memory, no capacity for recalling the past. No doubt it was the knowledge of what had happened in this house that was making her feel so uneasy in Louise’s room.

The room had been virtually empty. The only thing inside was a mattress on the floor. No toys, not even a proper bed. Erica went over to the window. Boards had been nailed across it, and if she hadn’t known better, she would have guessed this had been done after the house was abandoned. She glanced at the photograph. The same boards were evident back then. Here a child had been locked inside her own room. Tragically, that was not the worst thing the police had discovered when they came to the house after being notified of Vladek’s murder. Erica shuddered. It felt as if a cold wind was sweeping over her, but this time it wasn’t because of a broken window. The chill seemed to be coming from the room itself.

She forced herself to stay there a while longer, refusing to succumb to the strange mood. But she couldn’t help breathing a sigh of relief when she emerged into the hall. Cautiously she made her way down the stairs. There was only one more place to see. She went into the kitchen where she found the cupboards empty and gaping, all the doors having been removed. The cooker and fridge were gone, and the mouse droppings in the spaces where they had once stood showed that rodents had been roaming freely, both inside the house and out.

Erica’s fingers trembled as she pressed down the handle on the cellar door to open it, encountering the same strange chill she’d noticed in Louise’s room. She cursed as she peered into the intense darkness, realizing that she hadn’t thought to bring along a torch. She might have to wait until another time to explore the cellar. But she fumbled her hand over the wall and finally located an old-fashioned switch. When she turned the knob, by some miracle, the cellar light came on. It was impossible for a light bulb from the seventies to be still functioning, so someone must have replaced it.

Her heart was pounding as she went down the stairs. She had to duck to avoid cobwebs, and she tried to ignore the creepy feeling on her skin as she imagined spiders slipping under her clothes.

When she reached the cement floor, she took a few deep breaths to calm her nerves. This was just an empty cellar inside an abandoned house. Nothing more. And it did look like an ordinary basement. A few shelves remained, and an old work bench that had belonged to Vladek, but no tools. Next to it stood an empty oil can, and several crumpled old newspapers had been tossed in a corner. Nothing startling to look at. Except for one small detail: the chain, about three metres in length, which had been fastened with screws to the wall.

Erica’s hands shook badly as she searched for the right photograph. The chain was the same as back then, merely rustier. But the shackles were missing. The police had taken them. And in the police report, she’d read that they had been forced to saw them off, because they couldn’t find the key. She squatted down and picked up the chain, weighing it in her hand. It was heavy and solid, clearly sturdy enough to have restrained a much larger person than a thin and undernourished seven-year-old girl. How could anyone do that to a child?

Erica felt a wave of nausea rise to her throat. She was going to have to take a break from visiting Laila. She didn’t know how she could face her again after coming here and seeing with her own eyes these traces of the woman’s wickedness. Photographs were one thing, but as she held the cold, heavy chain in her hands, she had a much clearer idea of what the police must have found on that day in March 1975. She felt the same horror they must have felt when they came down to the cellar and discovered a child chained to the wall.

A rustling in the corner made Erica stand up abruptly. Her pulse again began racing. Then the light went out and she screamed. Panic seized hold of her and she started taking short, shallow breaths. Close to tears, she fumbled her way towards the stairs. Odd little sounds were coming from all directions, and when something brushed against her face, she screamed again. She flailed her arms about until she realized that it was just another cobweb. Feeling sick to her stomach, she threw herself in the direction where the stairs ought to be and then had the breath knocked out of her when she ran right into the railing. The light flickered and then came back on, but she was so filled with terror that she grabbed hold of the railing and dashed up the stairs. She missed one of the steps and hit her shin, but then managed to stumble the rest of the way up to the kitchen.

Gratefully she fell to her knees after slamming the cellar door closed behind her. Her leg and midriff were bruised, but she ignored the pain, focusing all her attention on breathing calmly. She felt a bit ridiculous as she sat there, but her childhood fear of the dark never seemed to go away, and in the cellar sheer terror had surged through her whole body. For a few minutes she had experienced a little of what Louise must have felt down there in the basement. The big difference was that she had been able to rush upstairs to the light and freedom, while Louise had been chained down there, in the dark.

For the first time a real awareness of the girl’s fate struck her with full force, and Erica bowed her head and wept. She was crying for Louise.

Martin studied Marta as she switched on the coffeemaker. He had never met her before, but like everybody else in the Fjällbacka area, he knew of the veterinarian and his wife. She was as beautiful as everyone had said, but it was an inaccessible type of beauty, and the slightly cold impression that she gave was further enhanced by the fact that she was remarkably pale.

‘Maybe you should talk to someone,’ he now said.

‘You mean a pastor? Or a psychologist?’ Marta shook her head. ‘I’m not the one who’s in a bad way. I’m just a bit … upset.’

She looked down at the floor but then raised her head to fix her gaze on him.

‘I can’t stop thinking about Victoria’s family. They finally got her back, only to lose her again. Such a young and talented girl …’ Marta fell silent.

‘I know. It’s awful,’ said Martin. He looked around at the kitchen. It wasn’t exactly ugly, but he could tell that the people who lived here didn’t care much about home decor. Everything seemed to have been put together haphazardly, and even though the room appeared to be clean, there was still a faint odour of horse.

‘Do you have any idea who could have done this to her? Are other girls in danger?’ asked Marta. She poured the coffee and sat down across from him.

‘That’s not a question we can answer.’ He wished he had a better reply, and his stomach clenched when he thought about how worried all the parents of young girls must be right now. He cleared his throat. It would do no good to get caught up in those kinds of thoughts. He needed to focus on doing his job and find out what happened to Victoria. That was the only way he could help them.