‘I’m the one who rang you before, a few hours ago. I wanted to ask you a few questions.’
He got no reply. Instead Wennberg clapped a hand to his mouth. Kristoffer was confused. Maybe the man was sick or something. The deep furrows in his unshaven face testified to a hard life. His hair was grey and bushy, and the hand he’d put to his mouth shook in a disturbing way. A stale smell of old cigarettes infiltrated the pizza aroma, and Kristoffer began to regret that he’d come. Torgny looked like somebody Kristoffer might turn into if he weren’t made of sterner stuff. As always, when faced with someone else’s obvious weakness, he felt a slight contempt.
Torgny lowered his hand.
‘Is it really you, Kristoffer?’
In the moment that followed, all his senses took on a sharpness he had never felt before. Everything froze.
‘How do you know my name?’
And when Torgny replied, the door he had always searched for opened up wide. He dropped the pizzas and wanted nothing more than to run away from there.
‘Because you look just like your mother.’
F
earing tranquillity I upheld chaos, unaware of the deep domicile
of joy in my sheltered
breast.
Axel read the words he had written. He didn’t know where they had come from, he just wrote them all of a sudden, and for a short while he thought he was back. Such a long time had passed since the spirit of creativity had granted him a rewarding day of work. To fix the words to the paper had seemed like hard physical labour, since none of them voluntarily wanted to find their place. The story he was trying to tell faltered through thirty pages; stacked on the desk they constituted an insult if the time it had taken to write them were taken into account. None of his characters wanted to settle down in the life he was trying to give them. The delivery date he had rashly promised the publishers was fast approaching, and Gerda had informed him yesterday that someone from the bank had rung looking for him. He still hadn’t rung back, well aware of what they would tell him. With the money from the Society for the Promotion of Literature prize, the advance from the publishers, and the Swedish Church writers’ grants, he had kept the household running since the summer, but now the money was starting to run out. He had asked for a reprieve on his mortgage interest and the bank had granted it – with compound interest on the interest he was already unable to pay, naturally. Conscious of his profession and its irregular income, the bank had regarded the house as sufficient security, but now the
deadline had passed and he knew the banker would want to discuss a solution to the problem.
With hindsight it was plain to see that he and Alice had had delusions of grandeur when they bought this desirable home. Everything it seemed to represent had blinded them, since it fitted so perfectly into their vision of the future. Back then in the mid-fifties Alice had still been writing, and with the relatively steady income from two writers the monthly mortgage had seemed reasonable. But reality had brought a different future than the grandiose one they had envisioned for themselves. He was now expected to support the whole household while she moped about like a martyr, drowning her sorrows in other people’s books, vintage wine and TV. Soon he would need to have a talk with her about money. Explain that they would have to let Gerda go and possibly sell the house and buy something smaller.
That conversation was not something he was looking forward to.
He heard the telephone ring. A single ring before it stopped. He glanced at the clock. It could very well be the bank looking for him again. Only a minute passed before there was another ring. He shoved back his chair irritably and got up.
Gerda was still on the phone when he entered the kitchen. She was standing with her back to him and didn’t hear him come in, which gave him a chance to listen in.
‘I can leave him a message, but unfortunately he can’t be disturbed right now because he’s working… No, I’m sorry, that’s not possible.’
There was silence for a few seconds before Gerda with a repeated ‘no’ tried to get a word in edgewise. If it was the bank she was talking with, their persistence was highly alarming.
‘She is unfortunately not available at the moment, either. I’ll have to take down your number and ask him to call you
back… Yes, in that case you may ring again. Yes. No, that’s not possible. I don’t know, but I’ll tell him that you asked. Goodbye.’
Gerda hung up with a heavy sigh. She crossed out something on her notepad and put down the pen.
‘Who was that?’
She gave a start before turning round.
‘I think it was that woman. She didn’t give her name but asked for both you and Mrs Ragnerfeldt. She doesn’t have a telephone so she didn’t leave a number.’
‘She asked for Alice?’
Gerda nodded. How could he possibly create anything under these conditions? Four months had passed since Torgny’s startling visit, but aside from the letters that arrived periodically he hadn’t heard a word about what had happened in the meantime. Torgny hadn’t contacted him, and Axel had been grateful for his absence.
‘How did she sound?’
Gerda thought for a moment.
‘Furious is probably the best description. She wanted to know if you had read her letters.’
Both of them fell silent and looked at the doorway as they heard Alice coming down the stairs. She still knew nothing about all the letters and had stopped asking whether he’d heard from Torgny about the fate of the lovesick woman. She came into the kitchen and gave them an indifferent look on her way to the refrigerator. She had decided to get dressed for a change.
‘I see everyone’s as cheerful as usual. Did somebody die, or is it just the normal afternoon chatter?’
She took out a jug and went over to the cupboard to get a glass.
Axel and Gerda looked at each other. If the circumstances had been different he would have enjoyed the moment. For the first time he encountered an empathy in Gerda’s glance, and he was willing to convince himself that it had happened
voluntarily; that meant a lot to him. But now the circumstances were different, and the situation evoked anything but pleasure. It was time to tell Alice, before Halina rang again and Alice picked up the phone. If she mentioned the letters Axel would have to admit that he had kept the truth from her, and then run the risk that Alice would demand to read them. She was well aware of his inability to throw anything away.
‘Alice, could we sit down for a minute? Let’s go into the library.’
He didn’t want to talk about it here in the kitchen in front of Gerda. He might have to omit certain details, which Gerda would consider lying.
Alice looked up when she heard the gravity in his voice.
‘Nothing has happened to Jan-Erik, I hope?’
‘No, no, it’s nothing serious, there’s just something I’d like you to know.’
She took her glass and headed for the library. Axel gave Gerda a look, but her attention had already shifted elsewhere. She was reaching for the jug that Alice had left on the worktop, to put it back in the fridge.
‘It’s about that woman, you know the one Torgny was here telling us about, Halina or whatever her name was.’
‘Yes?’
Alice was looking at him attentively. She was sitting in one of the library’s armchairs, with her back straight and one leg crossed over the other. Axel had sat down in the other one, and it struck him how long it had been since they’d sat here together. They’d bought the armchairs when they moved in. They were much too expensive but hand-picked to fulfil their mutual dream of the future. The library was the first room they furnished, intending it to be the heart that would give life to the house. There, in the armchairs, they would sit together in the evenings when they ventured out of their inspiring conversational rambles.
Now the armrests had been worn by the arms of others,
and the conversations had wandered off somewhere and never returned.
‘That woman sent me some letters recently. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to concern you.’
‘What sort of letters?’
‘I haven’t read them. I threw them out.’
The glass of juice she was raising to her mouth stopped halfway.
‘You did? You threw out letters you received?’
Her voice was full of suspicion, but he intended to stand by his words. And he hadn’t read the letters, after all.
‘Yes, I did.’
She took a sip and set down the glass.
‘Unbelievable. What does Torgny say? He should know if she’s taking her medication or not. He said that was all she needed.’
‘I haven’t spoken with him.’
‘Why not?’
Axel gave a deep, genuine sigh.
‘Because I’m so bloody tired of the whole affair. I thought that the less I worried about it the better.’
She plucked a little fleck from her trouser leg.
‘Then ring and ask her what it is she wants.’
‘She didn’t leave a phone number.’
‘Torgny should know it, shouldn’t he?’
He sighed.
‘To be honest, I have no desire to ring him about this. You heard for yourself how he stood here defending her. You can say what you like about Torgny, but I actually feel sorry for him now that she’s sending letters to me.’
‘Didn’t you notice anything when you met her in Västerås? I mean, didn’t she seem strange?’
Axel shook his head.
‘I hardly spoke to her. She was there with Torgny and they sat at the other end of the table after dinner. I don’t understand why she decided to latch onto me.’
‘No, it’s hard to believe.’
She said the words with a thoughtful expression as she looked the other way, apparently unaware of the insult. As if the words had simply come naturally to her.
‘So she told Torgny that the two of you had a fling together there in Västerås?’
‘Yes, obviously.’
She sat in silence for a moment and then cocked her head to one side and looked at him.
‘I take it you didn’t?’
‘Alice.’ He used his most reproachful tone of voice.
There had been a time when a lie would have been fruitless. She used to know every shift in his gaze, every nuance in his voice, every shadow that passed across his face. But the mere thought of lying to her would then have still been unthinkable.
‘I had to ask. It would explain her behaviour at least. And I certainly have no idea what you do on all your trips.’
‘I actually don’t travel that much. I went to five Book Day events last autumn, that’s all. You’re more than welcome to come along next time if you’re interested.’
‘No, thanks.’ There was both indulgence and sarcasm in her reply.
‘I’d be grateful if I didn’t have to go, either. You know what I think about that sort of thing,’ he said.
She didn’t answer, and it occurred to him that she might not know this about him. A lot had happened since they stopped sharing their thoughts with each other.
‘Anyway, she apparently rang today and asked for you.’
She looked up. ‘For me?’
‘Well, for me too, but when Gerda said that I wasn’t available she asked for you. I want you to hang up at once if she rings again and you happen to answer the phone. But hopefully she won’t call again.’
‘Why did she ask for me?’
‘No idea. It’s difficult to make sense of any of this. But
she’s obviously not altogether mentally stable, so maybe there’s nothing to understand.’
Alice got up and went over to one of the bookshelves. She took down a framed photograph of Annika and absentmindedly wiped off the glass before she put it back. At that moment Axel realised that he hadn’t seen Annika for several days. But then he remembered there had been talk of some riding camp over the weekend.
Alice turned round.
‘I think we should call the police. I don’t understand why we have to tolerate such behaviour. There must be some way to make her stop. Isn’t it illegal to keep on harassing someone like this?’
‘I don’t think it is. The only thing she’s done is send me letters.’
‘She rang too.’
‘Yes, but that may have been a one-off. We’ll have to wait and see what happens. Imagine what the press would do if they got hold of this. The tabloids love this sort of story.’
Alice sat down again. The conversation faded out to silence.
Outside it had begun to grow dark. Neither of them made a move to leave; they just stayed sitting in the armchairs they had splurged on once upon a time in another life. Axel was oddly affected by the memories that came washing over him. All the work they had put in when the dream had still been alive. The person selling the house had owned it since it was built, and the price was relatively low because of the renovations it needed. Axel’s father had helped out with things they couldn’t do themselves, such as the plumbing and new joists for a ceiling. Otherwise he and Alice had struggled through room after room with tins of paint and wallpaper paste. He raised his eyes and searched the ceiling. He found the little hole where the newly painted plaster had given way to the champagne cork. When they had ceremonially inaugurated their library by candlelight. Just the two of them, as always. Back then, when neither could exist without the
presence of the other and the rest of the world intruded like a necessary evil.
He looked at her. Almost twenty-five years had passed.
He had been so convinced that neither of them would ever again have to feel lonely.
An impulse made him reach out his hand and place it gently on her arm. In astonishment she looked at his hand as if she didn’t know what it was. Then she put her hand on his and they sat there, two lost souls who had given up all hope of finding their way home.
At what moment does the process begin? When does the first flake fall that will form the snowball? At what stage does the movement start? Was it the day when he secretly chose the linguistic path, or when he wrote his first book? Was it signing the papers for the house, or the first night they chose to sleep without touching each other? Was it all the years of frustration, or the moment he accepted the invitation to the Book Day event in Västerås? Or was it not until the moment when he let himself be seduced?
By now everything had been in motion for a long time.
There was an hour left until what they thought was theirs would be lost for ever.