The Key (46 page)

‘Good morning.’

‘Am I disturbing you?’

‘Not at all. Come right in.’

In the hall, Anna-Karin takes her shoes off, puts her rucksack down and opens it to produce the envelope she has brought with her. She hands it to Nicolaus.

‘This is what’s left of the money you gave us. I thought you might need it. In your letter you wrote that you had paid a year’s rent for the flat and, well … that was about a year ago now.’

‘Thank you, Anna-Karin.’

Nicolaus walks ahead of her into the sitting room. The skull is still on the table by the sofa but the black sand is gone. Anna-Karin wonders where it went. Has he managed to put it back inside those tiny cylinders?

‘What would you like? A cup of tea?’

‘Yes, please.’

Anna-Karin follows him into the kitchen. He pours two mugs of tea and they sit down at the kitchen table.

‘I want you to know how sorry I was to learn what happened to your mother,’ he says.

Anna-Karin stares into her mug. She sits quite still but, inside, she has withdrawn to a far-away place.

‘Thank you,’ she replies mechanically.

‘Is it all right living in Minoo’s home?’

Anna-Karin isn’t sure what to say. She is grateful, of course. Minoo and her parents have been very generous – it’s more than she can ever repay. She likes them, but she doesn’t feel at home there. She doesn’t feel at home anywhere.

‘Absolutely,’ she says.

‘I have thought about you often,’ Nicolaus tells her. ‘Of all of you, naturally. But I was especially upset about leaving you at a time when you had to endure so much. Your grandfather was ill, your home up for sale. Had I known that the Council came here to take you to court, I don’t know that I—’

‘You had no choice,’ she interrupts. ‘Whether you knew or didn’t, you had to go. So it doesn’t matter, right?’

Her voice sounds so odd and strained. She smiles to make him understand that she didn’t mean to sound angry. She isn’t angry. Not in the slightest.

‘That is indeed true. But, hearing the whole story yesterday grieved me deeply. I understand that it must have been—’

She interrupts again.

‘No, I don’t think you’ll ever understand that.’

Nicolaus’s eyes meet hers. In the weak sunlight, his eyes are icy blue.

‘How do you feel? Truly?’ he asks.

‘Do you care?’

It sounds harsh and hurtful, and she is surprised at how pleasing that is.

‘Of course I do, Anna-Karin. I do care.’

‘I ask, because it hasn’t seemed so to me. I accept that you had to leave, but you might have phoned. Or sent an email. Or sent a message by effing pigeon post or whatever you used back in your days.’

This isn’t like her at all. More like Linnéa. Or Ida.

‘Matilda did not allow me to get in touch,’ Nicolaus says. ‘Or I would have, I promise. You were in my thoughts so very often.’

His voice reveals how hurt he is. She feels terrible about it but, at the same time, it’s liberating not to have to be the kind, grateful Anna-Karin.

‘You know what, my mum used to talk non-stop about how often
she
thought about me. And told me how she fought to protect me from suffering when Dad left us. But it was all talk. She never showed it. Never did anything. You are just the same. If you’d cared, you would have contacted me, whatever Matilda had said. And you would have returned much sooner.’

She is talking very quickly now so that she gets to say all the forbidden things before she has time to pull herself together and stop the flow.

‘Everything is going straight to hell. What happened earlier was so bad I … thought it couldn’t be worse. The trial and Ida’s death and Linnéa almost killed … and Adriana … and just about the entire town going crazy. But at least we had each other. We were the Chosen Ones and we trusted each other. But … but now …’

She gasps for breath and stumbles on.

‘Minoo is no longer with us, or she is still there but, as you can see yourself, she’s slipping further and further away and I’m not at all sure that she is right to collaborate with the Council – it was only that she was told Matilda and the guardians wanted it … and now you, too, feel that they are not to be trusted. And Minoo fought with Linnéa yesterday; well, you know that, but it wasn’t just the two of them, something strange was happening between Linnéa and Vanessa as well and I can’t stand it if what they have is ruined. I don’t want it to be another thing that seemed so good only to …’

She falls silent.

‘I understand your frustration.’ He looks serious. ‘And I am very sorry that I have caused you pain. You’re right. I should have questioned what Matilda demanded of me. But we should all have asked more questions before we acted. Asked where precisely our orders came from. Who we were actually obeying.’

Anna-Karin feels her anger draining away. She can’t rage against him any longer. Instead, sadness fills her, and hopelessness.

‘I wish I could help you more, Anna-Karin,’ Nicolaus says. ‘But I don’t know how.’

She looks at him and remembers how she had thought that if he would only return, it would make things easier. He would help them stay together.

Now, she realises that she is the only one who can take on that heavy responsibility. And, strangely enough, knowing that makes it a little easier.

The sky is grey and rain hangs in the air. Minoo has been walking through town for hours, avoiding areas where she might meet people she knows. Now, she is simply walking up and down along the canal.

When she went to sleep last night she was only thinking of Gustaf, but she woke angry after stressful dreams about Linnéa. It’s as if she had been floating on rosy clouds and then been pulled into the muck below.

It is drizzling now and Minoo walks faster towards the manor house. She doesn’t want to arrive covered in runny mascara and with all her concealer washed away. She is cross with herself for not bringing an umbrella.

Yes, she understands that Linnéa must feel horribly stressed about the magistrates’ court and all that. But does that mean she should be forgiven for everything? Minoo was almost murdered by Max – not just once, but twice – and still she hasn’t used that as an excuse for being horrid to Linnéa.

But Linnéa has had a hard life from the beginning, a small still voice says inside Minoo. You should know – you’ve even been inside her body and shared her life for a while.

She dismisses the voice. This need to understand Linnéa irritates her. Why should she be so sympathetic, when Linnéa doesn’t seem able or willing to understand Minoo’s situation for one single moment?

It’s all so bloody easy for her, Minoo thinks as she walks up the manor house front steps. So bloody easy to see life in black and white. Linnéa isn’t the one being pressured into being a double agent. She doesn’t have to run all sorts of risks to snoop around for a magic box. Quite unnecessarily as well, because they’ll have to hand over the skull and the cross to the Council’s circle in any case.

Minoo unlocks the front door and steps inside.

At first she thinks it’s a dog that’s staring straight at her. She has never seen a real lynx before. The big cat looks sternly at her. Minoo realises that it must be somebody’s familiar. And that somebody wants her to follow the lynx.

So she does. To see such a wild animal indoors is strange. Anna-Karin has never taken her fox inside, and not just because foxes mark their territory with turds. It simply wouldn’t feel right.

The lynx pads on soundless paws along corridors and through rooms. Minoo thinks that it is the same route that Clara followed yesterday. Finally it stops in front of a closed door and its ears point straight up. It turns to Minoo and waits until she has pushed the door handle down. Then it leaves her.

She enters the ballroom. Rain is beating against the tall windows. The garden looks like a watercolour that has started to run.

Seven chairs have been placed to form a circle. Felix is sitting on one of them with a thick, well-worn paperback open on his lap. He is wearing black trousers, a white shirt with rolled-up sleeves and a loosely tied black tie. His eyebrows are the same deep black as his hair. When he looks at her, daylight falls on his brown eyes.

‘Hi, Felix,’ Minoo says.

Felix just looks at her. One second passes. Then another.

‘Hi,’ he says in the end.

‘Whose lynx is that?’ she asks. She tries to smile.

‘She is the
spiritus familiaris
belonging to Chairman Hjorth,’ Felix informs her without returning her smile.

The parquet floor creaks loudly as Minoo walks to a chair. She feels large and clumsy. Her sense of awkwardness isn’t helped by the way Felix stares, as if her every step irritates him. She pulls her rucksack off and sits down on a chair, leaving an empty seat between herself and Felix.

‘What’s that you’re reading?’ she asks.

Her voice sounds tinny in the huge room. It’s as if she hears herself through Felix’s ears. She sounds annoying.

Felix doesn’t answer, only holds up the book so she can see the front cover.

‘Right,’ she says. It’s all that comes to mind.

She has never heard of the title
Atlas Shrugged
, or of the author Ayn Rand, but she isn’t going to tell him that. Felix returns his attention to the book. Minoo puts her hands under her thighs and looks out through the window. Minutes pass. She can’t even breathe normally – every breath she takes is so loud.

The only other sounds are the rain and the rustling of paper when Felix turns a page. She wishes she too had brought a book. She always used to bring one to school, in case there was no one to talk to. Perhaps she should take up her old habit again.

She looks around. The room has several doors. The double doors to the garden are matched by a double door just opposite. The way Minoo came in was through a single door, which also has an opposite number at the other end of the room. The walls are painted pale yellow and the ceiling is decorated in lovely white stucco. There is no other decoration, no pictures or curtains. Only a dry potted plant in one of the windows.

The door that Minoo came in through opens. Sigrid enters. She is wearing a white blouse with blue dots and a grey pencil skirt. Low-heeled, red shoes. No glasses today. She carries a small animal in her arms. Its fur is dark. It could be some kind of mink. Or a weasel, or a stoat.

‘Hi, everyone!’ Sigrid smiles warmly. The parquet barely squeaks under her feet.

‘Hello, Sigrid,’ Minoo responds.

Felix says nothing. Sigrid sits down on the empty seat between them and crosses her legs. Her every movement is elegant and precise. Minoo guesses at a lifetime of ballet lessons.

Minoo takes a look at Sigrid’s animal. It has a small area of white fur under its chin. It is asleep but its little pink nose is twitching.

‘This is Henry,’ Sigrid tells her.

‘He is very cute,’ Minoo says, though she isn’t sure she thinks so. ‘What is he?’

‘He’s a mink.’

Minoo starts trying to calculate the number of Henrys that would go into making one mink coat.

‘There, Henry, did you hear that?’ Sigrid coos. ‘Minoo thinks you’re cute.’

‘Cutest little murderer in the world,’ Felix says, without looking up from his book. ‘For your information, minks eat birds’ eggs and kill baby birds – often way more than they need to survive.’

Sigrid reaches out a hand for Felix’s book, turns it over and rolls her eyes when she sees the cover.

‘Not
again
?’ she says. ‘Seems you can’t get enough of that load of fascist crap.’

Felix quickly pulls the book back. Unfazed, Sigrid glances at his wristwatch.

‘Gosh, is that the time? Where is everyone?’

‘Clara and Viktor are with the chairman.’ Felix looks down and starts to read again. ‘That other girl …’

‘Nejla,’ Sigrid reminds him.

‘
Nejla
. I’d be surprised if she’s left her room.’

‘Maybe she would leave it more often if you were just a fraction nicer to her. Try to remember her name for a start.’

Minoo smiles and Sigrid smiles back at her.

‘Felix, Viktor and I were in the same class at school,’ she says. ‘I think Nejla feels a little bit like an outsider. And she’s only sixteen.’

Minoo notes gratefully that at least one of them is younger than her. Viktor is twenty, so presumably Sigrid and Felix are as well.

‘I’ve tried to talk to her,’ Sigrid continues. ‘She says she wants to be left in peace but I think she’s just shy. We should all try harder to make her feel at home.’

She turns to Felix. ‘Did you know that she’s going out with Sanke’s kid brother?’

‘Such thrilling news,’ Felix responds, turning a page.

‘Sanke is a rather odd guy who went to our school,’ Sigrid tells Minoo. ‘You must let us know if you’ve had enough with our private jokes and jargon and things. We didn’t just go to the same school, we boarded together, and I’m sure you know how cliquey it can get.’

Minoo nods wisely, as if she shared their experiences. In fact, her ideas about boarding schools are based on Harry Potter and scandalous reports in the tabloids about bullying and worse.

‘I simply can’t get over this development with Clara.’ Sigrid lowers her voice and has a quick look around the room. ‘We knew Viktor had a sister, but always thought she went to another school. She’s incredibly like him, don’t you think?’

‘Yes, she is.’

‘It’s utterly fantastic that you saved her,’ Sigrid says earnestly.

Minoo tries not to look too flattered, but also not too dismissive.

‘All this, you know, with the circle, it’s so overwhelming,’ Sigrid says. ‘When Chairman Hjorth told me about it … I truly couldn’t believe my ears at first. I thought the story about the Chosen Ones was just that. A myth. And I can’t even imagine how it’s been for you to live here in Engelsfors.’

‘Couldn’t agree more.’ Felix’s eyes are still glued to the book. ‘After a close look at this town, one begins to think the apocalypse isn’t such a bad idea after all.’

Sigrid ignores him.

‘You must have had such a strange impression of the Council.’ She is speaking so quietly that Minoo has to make an effort to hear her. ‘They can be so stiff and narrow-minded. But Chairman Hjorth isn’t like that at all, I think. He seems a good guy and really fair. Has he been fair to you?’