Dead of Winter

29 Winter 1987

Hedda made them a late lunch, then persuaded Laura to come out for a walk. She would have preferred to stay in her room. Crawl into bed and pull the covers over her head. But Hedda was having none of it.

‘Come on, let’s go!’

They headed west along the shore, in the direction of the village rather than Alkärret. The wind was blowing off the lake, and out in the centre that wide-open, dark eye looked back at them.

‘Jack cares about you,’ Hedda said after a while. ‘More than you think.’

‘In that case he’s got a funny way of showing it.’ Laura could feel the anger bubbling up in her chest. ‘Why didn’t you say something? Iben’s father has spoken to you about them, said he didn’t want them seeing each other.’

‘To be honest, I didn’t really listen. Ulf Jensen has some strange ideas, particularly when it comes to Iben. After you left she carried on coming here for dinner some evenings. At first I think it was because she missed you – and probably because she wanted to get away from Källegården. Find some peace and quiet.’

Hedda tucked her arm through Laura’s.

‘I liked having her here, mainly because it reminded me of you. As time went on, she and Jack started ending the evening up in the boathouse. I could hear them singing and playing. And then . . .’

She stopped, chewed her lower lip.

‘And then what?’

Laura tried not to sound too aggressive, but she couldn’t help herself.

‘Something happened. Just a couple of weeks before you were due back.’

‘What?’

Hedda looked worried.

‘I don’t actually know, but I noticed that Jack was . . . troubled.’

Laura turned her head away. It wasn’t difficult to work out what had happened, or why Jack had been plagued by a guilty conscience. She was determined not to cry.

They continued past the closed-up dance hall. In the summer it was the liveliest place in the holiday village, but in the winter it looked pretty rundown. The domed roof was covered in snow, and all the windows were boarded up with big sheets of plywood.

‘The first time you fall in love can be agonising,’ Hedda said. ‘All those feelings you’ve never experienced before – love, longing, anger, sometimes even hatred.’

She stopped again, turned to face Laura and gently put a hand under her chin.

‘It’s easy to go too far. To say and do things you later regret – do you know what I mean?’

Laura nodded reluctantly.

‘You and Jack and Iben have been friends for a long time,’ Hedda went on. ‘Regardless of what’s gone on, you care about one another, and none of you would hurt the others deliberately. Try to remember that, even when things are at their worst, OK?’

‘OK.’

Hedda put her arm around Laura’s shoulders and drew her close, then pointed out across the ice.

‘I’ve always loved this lake, ever since the summer when your grandfather brought me and your father here for the first time. I was about your age.’ She squeezed Laura a little tighter. ‘We stayed at Gärdsnäset for a week. We went sailing and fishing. It was one of the best weeks of my life.’

Hedda smiled to herself.

‘You see, my first love was also painful.’ Her voice had taken on a melancholy tone. ‘I was twenty-one when your grandfather died. Old enough to be able to make my own decisions. Your father and I inherited quite a bit of money. Jacob used his share to start a business. As you know, he was a lot more sensible than me. I had other plans . . .’

‘Like what?’

Hedda had never really talked about her life before Gärdsnäset.

‘Travelling, partying – all kinds of fun. I lived in Berlin for a while, Australia, the south of France. I was young, attractive, and I had money. Life was fantastic.’

‘So what happened?’

Hedda shrugged. ‘I fell in love.’

‘Who with?’

‘A guy with a guitar. Talk about a cliché.’ She laughed. ‘He was a few years older than me, and so good-looking. For a few enchanted months I thought he was the one.’

‘But he wasn’t?’

‘No. Prince Charming turned out to be married – a detail he’d forgotten to mention. I was furious, and I did something really stupid.’

She looked down at the snow, kicked a lump of ice out of the way.

‘What did you do?’

‘We had a fight. He’d . . . We’d both been drinking and taking God knows what. I was high, drunk, jealous and angry. Not a good combination. In the end I hit him over the head with a bottle. Walked away and left him lying there in a pool of blood.’

‘Did he die?’ Laura gasped.

‘Fortunately not. The neighbours had already called the police. They broke the door down and found him. I was arrested on suspicion of serious assault.’

Hedda was still kicking at the snow, her expression showing how difficult she was finding this conversation.

‘Your father came to my rescue. He flew to France the very next day, organised a good lawyer, sorted me out and made sure I was more or less drug-free for the trial. I got away with four months in jail.’

‘What happened after that?’ Laura said eventually. Hedda’s face softened.

‘When I got out, your father helped me to buy Gärdsnäset. You could say it became my salvation. Without Jacob I wouldn’t be here today.’

A gust of wind from the lake sent a little cloud of loose snow whirling up around them.

‘Why did you never get married?’ Laura asked.

Hedda shrugged, gazed out across the lake.

‘I guess you could say I’d been burned. By life, and love.’

They walked slowly back to the house, arm in arm. Laura glanced at her aunt from time to time. She’d never really known Hedda’s story, and now she did, she saw her through different eyes.

‘What do you do if someone you care about is doing something dangerous?’ she asked after a while.

Hedda looked at her. ‘What do you mean by dangerous?’

‘Something that might be illegal. And if I tell on them, it will just make things so much worse.’

‘Is it someone I know?’

Laura swallowed. Shook her head. ‘One of the girls in school.’

Hedda frowned. ‘The best approach is to try and talk to the person concerned.’

‘But what if they don’t want you to get involved?’

‘Then you just have to try to explain that you’re getting involved because you care about them, not because you wish them any harm. Tell them that’s what friends do.’

Laura nodded slowly. It would have been such a relief to unburden herself, to tell Hedda what Tomas and Peter were up to before the situation got worse. But Milla had shared a confidence with her. They’d exchanged secrets. Plus, she’d made a promise to Peter.

‘Are you absolutely certain it isn’t someone I know?’ Hedda asked.

Laura shook her head again, looked away.

‘Like I said – it’s a girl in school.’