Midnight Sun

Chapter 12

The hymn rolled like slow thunder around the walls of the little prayer hall. It sounded as though the whole congregation, all twenty-something of them, were joining in.

I tried to follow the words in the little black book Lea had handed me. Landstad’s hymnbook. ‘Authorised by royal resolution, 1869,’ it said on the title page. I’d already leafed through it. Didn’t look as though a single syllable had been altered since then.

When the hymn was over, a man walked with heavy steps across the creaking wooden floor to a simple lectern. He turned towards us.

It was Lea’s father. Grandpa. Jakob Sara.

‘I believe in God the Father, the Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth,’ he began. All the others remained silent, and let him read out the whole declaration of faith alone. Afterwards he remained motionless, silently staring down at the lectern. For a long time. Just as I was convinced something was wrong, that he was suffering some kind of mental block, he raised his voice:

‘Dear Christians. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Yes, we wanted to start this meeting in the name of the Holy Trinity. Yes.’ Another pause. He was still standing with his head bowed, huddled in a suit that was slightly too big for him, like a nervous beginner, and certainly not the hardened, well-travelled preacher Knut had talked about. ‘For if one is to look at oneself, one’s own being, it is not good to step up to this pulpit as a wretched sinner.’ Stop. I glanced around. Oddly enough, no one else seemed to feel at all uncomfortable with the man’s obvious struggle. I managed to count to ten before he went on: ‘And this valuable thing we are gathered here for, the holy, pure Word of God — one must ask, how can this word be upheld? That is, why it is so difficult to step up to this lectern, because what is one to do?’ He finally raised his head. Looked straight at us. There was no trace of uncertainty in his firm, direct gaze. No sign of the humility he claimed to be afflicted by. ‘For we are naught but dust. And to dust we shall return. But we shall have eternal life if we remain true to the faith. This world in which we live is a world in decay, governed by the Ruler of the World, the Devil, Satan, he who seduces the flock.’ I couldn’t swear to it, but wasn’t he looking straight at me? ‘In this world we poor wretches must live. If we can forsake the Devil, and can spend the brief time that remains walking in hope.’

Another hymn. Lea and I were sitting closest to the exit, and I signalled to her that I was going outside for a cigarette.

Outside the meeting house I leaned against the wall and listened to the singing inside.

‘Forgive me asking, but could I have one of your coffin nails?’

The meeting house lay at the end of the road. Mattis must have been waiting round the corner. I offered him the packet.

‘Have they managed to save you?’ he asked.

‘Not yet,’ I said. ‘Their singing’s a bit too out of tune.’

He laughed. ‘Oh, you have to learn how to hear the hymns the right way. Singing carefully in tune, that’s the sort of thing worldly people think is important. But for true believers, emotion is everything. Why else do you think we Sámi became Læstadians? Believe me, Ulf, it’s only a stone’s throw from the drumming of a shaman and witchcraft to the Læstadians’ speaking in tongues, healing and emotionalism.’ I gave him a light. ‘And this infernal, ponderous hymn-singing...’ he muttered.

We took a synchronised drag on our cigarettes and listened. When they had finished Lea’s father began to speak again.

‘Is the preacher supposed to sound like he’s suffering up there?’ I asked.

‘What, Jakob Sara? Yes. His job is to make out that he’s just a foolish Christian who hasn’t actually chosen to stand in the pulpit but has been chosen by the church.’ Mattis bowed his head and made his voice as deep as the preacher’s: ‘My desire since I was chosen to lead this congregation has always been for God to bend me to obedience. But one is burdened by one’s own corrupt flesh.’ He took a drag on his cigarette. ‘That’s how it’s been for a hundred years. The ideal is humility and simplicity.’

‘Your cousin told me you were one of them.’

‘But then I saw the light,’ Mattis said, and looked at the cigarette with displeasure. ‘Tell me, is there actually any tobacco in this?’

‘You stopped believing when you were studying theology?’

‘Yes, but up here they counted me as lost the moment I set off for Oslo. A true Læstadian doesn’t study to become a priest among worldly folk. Here the preacher’s only task is to impart the old, true creed, not new-fangled rubbish from Oslo.’

The latest hymn had come to an end inside, and Jakob Sara’s voice rang out again:

‘The Lord is long-suffering, but have no doubt, he will come like a thief in the night, and the elements and the earth shall fall apart when that lack of faith is revealed.’

‘Speaking of which,’ Mattis said, ‘those of us living under a death sentence don’t want him to come any sooner than he has to, do we?’

‘Sorry?’

‘I daresay some people would be very happy if they never saw him in Kåsund again.’

I stopped mid-drag.

‘Okay,’ Mattis said. ‘I don’t know if that Johnny went further north or headed home, but the fact that he didn’t find what he was looking for is no guarantee that he won’t come back.’

I coughed out some smoke.

‘He won’t come back straight away, of course. No, you’re probably safe there, Ulf. But someone might decide to dial a number and say a few words over those.’ He pointed at the telephone wires above our heads. ‘They could have been promised money for it.’

I threw my cigarette on the ground. ‘Are you going to tell me why you came here, Mattis?’

‘He said you’d taken money, Ulf. So perhaps it wasn’t anything to do with women after all?’

I didn’t answer.

‘And Pirjo in the shop said she saw you had a load of it. Money, I mean. So it’s got to be worth sacrificing some of that to make sure he doesn’t come back, eh, Ulf?’

‘And how much would it cost?’

‘No more than he offered for the opposite result. A bit less, in fact.’

‘Why less?’

‘Because sometimes I still wake up at night with a feeling of nagging doubt. What if He does actually exist and — just like Johnny — could come back to judge the living and dead alike? Wouldn’t it be better to have more good than bad deeds, so that you might get a more lenient punishment? Burn for a slightly shorter eternity at a slightly lower heat?’

‘You want to blackmail me for a smaller amount than you could get for giving me up because you think that’s a good deed?’

Mattis sucked on his cigarette. ‘I said a slightly smaller amount. I don’t want to be canonised. Five thousand.’

‘You’re a bandit, Mattis.’

‘Come and see me in the morning. I’ll let you have another bottle into the bargain. Drink and silence, Ulf. Proper drink, and proper silence. Things like that cost money.’

He looked like a fucking goose as he waddled off down the road.

I went back in and sat down. Lea gave me a curious look.

‘We have a visitor at our meeting today,’ Jakob Sara said, and I heard clothes rustle as the others turned round. They smiled and nodded at me. Pure warmth and friendliness. ‘We ask the Lord to protect him, so that he has a safe journey and soon gets back safely to where he belongs.’

He bowed his head, and the congregation did the same. His prayer was muttered and indistinct, and consisted of old-fashioned words and phrases that might have meant something to the initiated. One particular word resonated with me. Soon.

The meeting closed with a hymn. Lea helped me to find it. I joined in. I didn’t know the tune, but it was so slow that you just had to be a little late and follow the notes up and down. It was good to sing, to feel my vocal cords vibrate. Lea might have mistaken that as enthusiasm for the words, because she was smiling.

On the way out someone standing outside took me gently by the arm and directed me back into the chapel. It was Jakob Sara. He led me over to the window. I watched Lea disappear through the door. Her father waited until the last person had left before speaking.

‘Did you find it beautiful?’

‘In a way,’ I said.

‘In a way,’ he repeated with a nod. He looked at me. ‘Are you thinking of taking her away from here with you?’ The slow, gentle humility in his voice was gone, and the look that shot out from beneath those bushy eyebrows nailed me to the wall.

I didn’t know what to say. Was he being facetious when he asked if I was thinking of running off with his daughter? Or was he not being facetious when he asked if I was thinking of running off with his daughter?

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘Yes?’ One eyebrow rose.

‘Yes. I’m taking her to Alta. Then back again. That’s to say, she’s the one taking me. She’d rather drive the car herself.’

I swallowed. Hoped I hadn’t caused any trouble. That it was a sin for women to drive cars with men in. Something like that.

‘I know you’re going to Alta,’ he said. ‘Lea sent Knut to see us. The Devil has a firm foothold in Alta. I know, I’ve been there.’

‘We’d better take some holy water and garlic.’ I let out a quick laugh, and immediately regretted it. His face didn’t change at all, except for a spark in his eyes that vanished as quickly as it appeared, as if a sledgehammer had hit a rock somewhere in there.

‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I’m just a man passing through, you’ll be rid of me soon, so everything can go back to the way it usually is again. The way you evidently like it.’

‘Are you so sure of that?’

I didn’t know if he was asking if I was sure everything would return to normal, or that that was how they liked it. All I knew was that I had no great desire to continue the conversation.

‘I love this country,’ he said, turning towards the window. ‘Not because it’s generous or easy. As you can see, it’s sparse and hard. I don’t love it because it’s beautiful, or admirable — it’s a country like every other country. And I don’t love it because it loves me. I’m a Sámi, and our rulers have treated us like disobedient children, declaring us incompetent and stripping many of us of our self-respect. I love it because it’s my country. So I do what I have to to defend it. The way a father defends even his ugliest, stupidest child. Do you understand?’

I nodded to let him know that I did.

‘I was twenty-two years old when I joined the resistance to fight against the Germans. They’d come here and raped my country, so what else could I do? In the middle of winter I lay out on the plateau and almost starved and froze to death. I never got to shoot any Germans — I had to stifle my bloodlust because there would have been reprisals against the local population if we’d taken action. But I felt hatred. I felt hatred, I starved, froze, and waited. And when the day finally came and the Germans disappeared, I believed that this country was mine again. But then I realised that the Russians who had arrived in the area weren’t necessarily thinking of leaving again. That they could well imagine taking over my country after the Germans. We came down from the plateau to the burned-out ruins, and I found my family in a lavvo together with four other families. My sister told me that every night Russian soldiers would come and rape the women. So I loaded my pistol, waited, and when the first one arrived and was standing there in the opening of the lavvo where I had hung up a paraffin lamp, I aimed at his heart and shot. He fell like a sack. Then I cut off his head, left his military cap on, and hung the head outside the lavvo. None of this meant anything to me — it was like killing a cod, cutting its head off and hanging it on the racks. The next day two Russian officers came and collected the headless body of their soldier. They didn’t ask any questions, and they didn’t touch the head. After that no one got raped.’ He buttoned up his worn suit jacket. He brushed the lapel with one hand. ‘That was what I did, and that’s what I’d do again. You protect what’s yours.’ He looked up at me.

‘It sounds like you could just have told the officers about him,’ I said. ‘And achieved the same result.’

‘Possibly. But I preferred to do it myself.’

Jakob Sara put his hand on my shoulder.

‘I can feel it’s better,’ he said.

‘Sorry?’

‘Your shoulder.’

Then he smiled that wilfully meek smile, raised his bushy eyebrows as if he had just thought of something that needed doing, turned round and left.

Lea was already sitting in the car when I reached the house.

I got in the passenger seat. She was wearing a simple grey coat and a red silk scarf.

‘You’ve dressed up,’ I said.

‘Nonsense,’ she said, turning the key in the ignition.

‘You look nice.’

‘I haven’t dressed up. They’re only clothes. Was he being mean?’

‘Your father? He was just sharing some of his wisdom with me.’

Lea sighed, put the car in gear and released the clutch. We set off.

‘And the talk you had with Mattis outside the prayer hall, was that about wisdom as well?’

‘Oh, that,’ I said. ‘He wanted me to pay for some of his services.’

‘And you don’t want to?’

‘I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.’

Down by the church a figure was walking along the side of the road. As we passed I looked in the wing mirror and saw her standing in the cloud of dust watching us.

‘That’s Anita,’ Lea said. She must have seen me looking in the mirror.

‘Oh,’ I said, as neutrally as I could.

‘Speaking of wisdom,’ she said, ‘Knut told me about the conversation you had with him.’

‘Which one?’

‘He says he’s going to get a girlfriend after the summer. Even if Ristiinna says no.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes. He told me that even Futabayama the sumo legend kept on losing and losing before he started winning.’

We laughed. I listened to her laughter. Bobby’s had been light and bubbly, like a lively stream. Lea’s was a well. No, a slowly flowing river.

In places the road curved and passed through gentle slopes, but mostly ran straight across the plateau, kilometre after kilometre. I held the strap above the door. I don’t know why — you don’t exactly have to hold on when you’re going at sixty kilometres an hour along a flat, straight road. I’ve always done it, that’s all. Holding the strap until my arm goes numb. I’ve seen other people do the same. Maybe people do have something in common after all, a desire to hold onto something solid.

Sometimes we could see the sea, at other times the road ran between hills and low, rocky knolls. The landscape lacked the striking drama of Lofoten or the beauty of Vestmark, but it had something else. A silent emptiness, a reticent relentlessness. Even the greenery of summer held a promise of harder, colder times that would try to pull you down, and which would win in the end. We encountered very few other vehicles, and saw no people or animals. Every so often there was a house or cabin, which raised the question: why? Why here, of all places?

After two and a half hours the houses began to appear more regularly, and suddenly we passed a sign at the side of the road that said ‘Alta’.

We were — to judge by the sign — in a city.

When we came to some crossroads — the shops, schools and public buildings that surrounded it all adorned with the town’s coat of arms, a white arrowhead — it turned out that the city didn’t just have one centre, but three. Each of them was like a very small community of its own, but all the same: who would have guessed that Alta was a miniature Los Angeles?

‘When I was little, I was convinced that the world ended here in Alta,’ Lea said.

I wasn’t sure that it didn’t. According to my estimation, we were now even further north.

We parked — not a huge problem — and I managed to buy the things I wanted before the shops shut. Underwear, boots, a raincoat, cigarettes, soap and shaving equipment. Afterwards we went to a branch of Kaffistova for dinner. With the taste of fresh cod still in my mind, I searched in vain for fish on the menu. Lea shook her head with a smile.

‘Up here we don’t eat fish when we go out,’ she said. ‘When you’re out, you want something fancy.’

We ordered meatballs.

‘When I was growing up, this was the time of day I liked least,’ I said, looking out at the deserted street. Even the urban landscape had something oddly desolate and relentless about it: here too you had a nagging sense that nature was in control, that human beings were tiny and impotent. ‘Saturday after closing time, before evening fell. It was like the no man’s land of the week. Sitting there with the feeling that everyone else had been invited to a party or something that was about to start. Something everyone else knew about. While you yourself didn’t even have any other loser friends you could pester. It got better after the news at seven o’clock, then there was something on television and you had stuff to take your mind off it.’

‘We didn’t have parties or television,’ Lea said. ‘But there were always people around. As a rule they wouldn’t even knock, they just came in and sat in the living room and started talking. Or they just sat there quietly and listened. Father did most of the talking, of course. But Mother made the decisions. When we were at home, she was the one who decided when Father needed to calm down and give other people a chance, and when they had to go home. And we were allowed to stay up and listen to the grown-ups. It was so safe, so good. Once I remember Father crying because Alfred, a poor drunk, had finally found Jesus. When he discovered a year later that Alfred had died of an overdose down in Oslo, he drove four thousand kilometres to pick up the coffin and bring it back here so he could have a decent burial. You asked me what I believe in...’

‘Yes?’

‘That’s what I believe in. People’s capacity for goodness.’

After dinner we went outside. It had clouded over, creating a dusk of sorts. Music was streaming from the open door of one of the kiosks advertising hotdogs, French fries and soft ice cream. Cliff Richard. ‘Congratulations.’

We went in. There was a couple sitting at one of the four tables. They were both smoking, and looked at us with visible disinterest. I ordered two large ice creams with chocolate sprinkles on. For some reason, the white ice cream that oozed out of the machine and curled neatly into the cones made me think of a bridal veil. I took the cones over to Lea, who was standing by the jukebox.

‘Look,’ she said. ‘Isn’t that...?’

I read the label behind the glass. Inserted a fifty-øre coin and pressed the button.

Monica Zetterlund’s cool but sensual voice crept out. As did the smoking couple. Lea leaned against the jukebox; it looked as though she was soaking up every word, every note. Eyes half closed. Hips swaying almost imperceptibly from side to side, making the hem of her skirt move. When the song was over, she put another fifty øre in and played it again. And then again. Then we went out into the summer’s evening.

Music was coming from behind the trees in the park. We automatically walked towards the sound. There was a queue of young people in front of a ticket booth. Happy, noisy, dressed in light, bright summer clothes. I recognised the poster on the ticket booth from the telephone pole in Kåsund.

‘Shall we...?’

‘I can’t,’ she smiled. ‘We don’t dance.’

‘We don’t have to dance.’

‘A Christian doesn’t go to places like that either.’

We sat down on one of the benches under the trees.

‘When you say Christian...’ I began.

‘I mean Læstadian, yes. I know it can all seem a bit odd to an outsider, but we stick to the old Bible translations. We don’t believe that the contents of the faith can be changed.’

‘But the idea of burning in hell was only read into the Bible in the Middle Ages, so that’s a fairly modern invention too. Shouldn’t you reject that as well?’

She sighed. ‘Reason lives in the head, and faith in the heart. They’re not always good neighbours.’

‘But dancing lives in the heart too. When you were swaying in time to the music on the jukebox, did that mean you were on the verge of sinning?’

‘Maybe,’ she smiled. ‘But there are probably worse things.’

‘Such as?’

‘Well. Such as socialising with Pentecostalists, for instance.’

‘Is that worse?’

‘I’ve got a cousin in Tromsø who sneaked out to go to a meeting of the local Pentecostalist group. When her father realised that she’d been out, she lied and said she’d been to a disco.’

We both laughed.

It had got slightly darker. It was time to drive back. Even so, we remained seated.

‘What do they feel when they’re walking through Stockholm?’ she asked.

‘Everything,’ I replied, lighting a cigarette. ‘They’re in love. That’s why they see, hear, smell everything.’

‘Is that what people do when they’re in love?’

‘You’ve never experienced it?’

‘I’ve never been in love,’ she said.

‘Really? Why not?’

‘I don’t know. Obsessed, yes. But if being in love is like they say it is, then never.’

‘So you used to be an ice princess, then? The girl all the boys wanted, but never dared talk to.’

‘Me?’ She laughed. ‘I hardly think so.’

She put her hand in front of her mouth, but removed it just as quickly. It’s possible that it was unconscious, because I had trouble believing that such a beautiful woman could have a complex about a tiny scar on her top lip.

‘What about you, Ulf?’ She used my false name without a trace of irony.

‘Loads of times.’

‘Good for you.’

‘Oh, I don’t know about that.’

‘Why not?’

I shrugged. ‘It takes its toll. But I’ve got very good at handling rejection.’

‘Rubbish,’ she said.

I grinned and inhaled. ‘I would have been one of those boys, you know.’

‘Which boys?’

I knew there was no need for me to answer: her blushes revealed that she knew what I meant. I was actually a bit surprised: she didn’t seem the blushing type.

I was just about to reply anyway when I was interrupted by a sharp voice:

‘What the hell are you doing here?’

I turned round. They were standing behind the bench, ten metres away. Three of them. They each had a bottle in their hands. Mattis’s bottles. It wasn’t easy to know which of us the question was aimed at, but even in the murky light I could see and hear who had asked it: Ove. The brother-in-law with inheritance rights.

‘With that... that... southerner.’

The slurring in his voice made clear that he had sampled the contents of the bottle, but I suspected that wasn’t wholly responsible for his failure to find a more cutting insult.

Lea sprang up and hurried towards him, putting a hand on his arm. ‘Ove, don’t—’

‘Hey, you! Southerner! Look at me! You thought you were going to get to fuck her now, did you? Now that my brother’s in his grave and she’s a widow. But they’re not allowed to, did you know that? They’re not allowed to fuck, not even then! Not until they’re married again! Ha ha!’ He brushed her aside before raising the bottle in a wide arc and setting it to his lips.

‘Mind you, it might work with this one...’ Alcohol and saliva sprayed from his mouth. ‘Because this one’s a whore!’ He stared at me, wild-eyed. ‘A whore!’ he repeated when I didn’t react. Not that I didn’t know that calling a woman a whore is an internationally recognised signal to stand up and plant a fist in the speaker’s face. But I remained seated.

‘What is it, southerner? Are you a coward, as well as a cunt-thief?’ He laughed, evidently pleased with himself for finally finding the right words.

‘Ove...’ Lea tried, but he shoved her away with his drinking hand. It might not have been intentional, but the bottle caught her on the forehead. Might not. I stood up.

He grinned. Held the bottle out to the friends standing in the semi-darkness under a tree, came towards me with his fists raised in front of him. Legs apart, with quick, nimble steps, until he got himself into position, head slightly tilted behind his fists, with a look in his eyes that was suddenly clear and focused. As for me, I hadn’t done much fighting since I left primary school. Correction. I hadn’t done any fighting since primary school.

The first punch hit me on the nose, and I was blinded by the tears that instantly filled my eyes. The second one hit my jaw. I felt something come loose, and then the metallic taste of blood. I spat out a tooth and threw a wild punch at the air. His third blow hit me on the nose again. I don’t know what it sounded like to them, but to me the crunch sounded like a car being crushed.

I punched another hole in the summer night. His next blow hit me in the chest as I tumbled forward and wrapped my arms round him. I tried to pin his arms down so they couldn’t do any more damage, but he got his left hand free and hit me repeatedly on the ear and temple. There was a banging, squeaking sound, and it felt as if something cracked. I gnashed my teeth like a dog, got hold of something, an ear, and bit as hard as I could.

‘Fuck!’ he yelled, and yanked both arms free and locked my head under his right arm. I was struck by a pungent smell of sweat and adrenalin. I’d smelled it before. On men who had suddenly been confronted with the fact that they owed the Fisherman money, and didn’t know what was going to happen.

‘If you touch her—’ I whispered into the remnants of his ear, hearing the words gurgle with my own blood — ‘I’ll kill you.’

He laughed. ‘And what about you, southerner? What if I knock out the rest of your lovely white teeth?’

‘Go ahead,’ I panted. ‘But if you touch her...’

‘With this?’

The only positive thing I can say about the knife he was holding in his free hand is that it was smaller than Knut’s.

‘You haven’t got the nerve,’ I groaned.

He put the point of the knife to my cheek. ‘No?’

‘Come on them, you fucking—’ I couldn’t work out where my sudden lisp had come from until I felt the cold steel against my tongue and realised that he’d stuck the knife right through my cheek — ‘inbreed,’ I managed to say, with some effort, seeing as it’s a word that requires a certain amount of tongue gymnastics.

‘What did you say, dickhead?’

I felt the knife being twisted.

‘Your brother’s your father,’ I lisped. ‘That’s why you’re so thick and ugly.’

The knife was suddenly pulled out.

I knew what was coming. I knew it was going to end here. And that I’d pretty much demanded it, as good as begged for it. A man with the violent genes he had inherited didn’t have any choice but to stick the knife into me.

So why did I do it? Fucked if I know. Fucked if I know what calculations go on inside our heads, the way we add and subtract in the hope of getting a positive result. I just know that fragments of that sort of calculation must have fluttered through my sleep-deprived, sun- and alcohol-addled brain, where the positive result was that a man has to spend a hell of a long time in prison for first-degree murder, and in that time a woman like Lea could get a long way away, or at least could if she had the sense to keep hold of some of the money she knew where to find. Another plus: by the time Ove was released, Knut Haguroyama would have grown up enough to protect them both. On the negative side was my own life. Which, considering the probable extent and quality of the time remaining to me, wasn’t worth much. Yep, even I could do the maths.

I closed my eyes. Felt the warmth of the blood running down my cheek and under my collar.

Waited.

Nothing happened.

‘You know I’ll do it,’ a voice said.

The grip round my head loosened.

I took two steps back. Opened my eyes again.

Ove had raised his hands and dropped the knife. Right in front of him stood Lea. I recognised the pistol she was holding, aimed at his forehead.

‘Get lost,’ she said.

Ove Eliassen’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. ‘Lea...’

‘Now!’

He leaned over to pick up the knife.

‘I think you’ve lost that,’ she snarled.

He held his palms up towards her and backed away into the darkness, empty-handed. We heard angry cursing, bottles being swigged from and branches rustling as they disappeared between the trees.

‘Here you are,’ Lea said, handing me the pistol. ‘It was on the bench.’

‘Must have slipped out,’ I said, and tucked it back under my waistband. I swallowed the blood from my cheek, felt my pulse hammer frantically in my temples, and noticed that I couldn’t hear much from one ear.

‘I saw you take it out before you stood up, Ulf.’ She closed one eye. The family habit. ‘That hole in your cheek needs sewing up. Come on, I’ve got a needle and thread in the car.’

I don’t remember much of the journey back. Well, I remember us driving down to the Alta river, where we sat on the bank while she washed my wounds and I listened to the sound of the water and gazed at the scree, which looked like sugar piled up against the steep, pale cliff faces on either side. And I remember thinking that I had seen more sky in these days and nights than I had done in my whole life before coming here.

She felt my nose gently and concluded that it wasn’t broken. Then she sewed my cheek while she talked to me in Sámi and sang something that was supposed to be a joik about getting better. Joik and the sound of the river. And I remember that I felt a bit sick, but that she waved the midges away and stroked my brow more than was strictly necessary to keep my hair away from the wound. When I asked why she had needle, thread and antiseptic in the car, and if her family was particularly prone to accidents when they were out, she shook her head.

‘Not when we’re out, no. A domestic accident.’

‘A domestic accident?’

‘Yes. Called Hugo. Used to fight and was full of drink. The only thing to do was flee the house and patch up any injuries.’

‘You used to sew yourself?’

‘And Knut.’

‘He hit Knut?’

‘Where do you think he got those stitches on his forehead?’

‘You sewed him back together? Here in the car?’

‘It was earlier in the summer. Hugo was drunk, and it was the usual thing. He said I was looking at him with that reproachful look in my eyes, and that he wouldn’t have touched me that night if only I’d had the sense to show him a bit of respect and not just ignored him. After all, I was only a girl at the time, and he was an Eliassen who had just come home from sea with a huge catch. I didn’t reply, but even so he got even angrier and eventually stood up to fight. I knew how to defend myself, but at that moment Knut came in. So Hugo picked up the bottle and struck out. Hit Knut on the forehead and he collapsed in a heap, so I carried him out to the car. When I got back home Hugo had calmed down. But Knut was in bed for a week, all dizzy and nauseous. A doctor came all the way from Alta to look at him. Hugo told the doctor and everyone else that Knut had fallen down the stairs. And I... I didn’t say anything to anyone, and I kept telling Knut that it was sure to be a one-off.’

I had misunderstood. Misunderstood when Knut said his mum had told him he didn’t have to worry about his dad.

‘No one knew anything,’ she said. ‘Until one evening when the usual gang of drinkers was round at Ove’s and someone asked what really happened, and Hugo told them all about his disrespectful wife and brat, and how he’d put them in their place. So the whole village knew. And then Hugo went off to sea.’

‘So that was what the preacher meant when he said Hugo had tried to run away from deeds he hadn’t atoned for?’

‘That, and everything else,’ she said. ‘Your temple’s bleeding.’

She took off her red silk scarf and tied it round my head.

I don’t remember anything after that for quite some time. When I came to, I was curled up on the back seat of the car, and she was telling me we’d arrived. I’d probably got a bit of concussion, she said, that was why I was so sleepy. She said it would be best if she accompanied me back to the cabin.

I walked off ahead of her and sat down on a rock when I was out of sight of the village. The light and stillness. Like the moment just before a storm. Or after a storm, a storm that had wiped out all life. Patches of mist were creeping down the green sides of the hills, like spirits in white sheets, swallowing up the small, stunted mountain birches, and as they reappeared from the mist they looked bewitched.

Then she came. Swaying, sort of, also bewitched.

‘Out for a walk?’ she asked with a smile. ‘Perhaps we’re going the same way?’

Secret hiding.

My ear had started to whistle and peep, and I felt giddy, so Lea held onto me just to be on the safe side. The walk went remarkably quickly, possibly because I seemed to be drifting in and out of consciousness. Once I was finally back in the cabin I had a strange feeling of having come home, an inbuilt security and peace that I’d never felt in any of the far too many places I had lived in Oslo.

‘You can sleep now,’ she said, feeling my forehead. ‘Take things easy tomorrow. And don’t drink anything except water. Promise?’

‘Where are you going?’ I asked when she moved from the edge of the bed.

‘Home, of course.’

‘Are you in a hurry? Knut’s with his grandpa.’

‘Well, not too much of a hurry. I just think you ought to lie completely quiet and not talk or worry.’

‘I agree. But can’t you lie here quietly with me? Just for a little while.’

I shut my eyes. Heard her calm breathing. Imagined I could hear her weighing things up.

‘I’m not dangerous,’ I said. ‘I’m not a Pentecostalist.’

She laughed softly. ‘Just a little while, then.’

I moved closer to the wall, and she squeezed in beside me on the narrow bunk.

‘I’ll go when you fall asleep,’ she said. ‘Knut will be home early.’

I lay there, feeling myself half out of it and yet absolutely present, as my senses took in everything: the heat and pulse of her body, the scent filtering out of the neckline of her blouse, the smell of soap from her hair, the hand and arm she had placed between us so our bodies weren’t in direct contact.

When I woke up I had a feeling that it was night. Something to do with the stillness. Even when the midnight sun was at its zenith, it was as if nature was resting, as if its heartbeat had slowed down. Lea’s face had slipped into the crook of my neck; I could feel her nose and her even breathing against my skin. I ought to wake her, tell her it was time to go if she wanted to make sure she was home when Knut got back. Of course I wanted her to be there, so he didn’t get worried. But I also wanted her to stay, at least for a few more seconds. So I didn’t move, just lay there and reflected. Feeling that I was alive. As if her body was giving mine life. There was a distant rumble. And I felt her eyelashes flutter against my skin and realised she was awake.

‘What was that?’ she whispered.

‘Thunder,’ I said. ‘Nothing to worry about, it’s a long way away.’

‘There’s never any thunder here,’ she said. ‘It’s too cold.’

‘Maybe there’s warmer weather from the south.’

‘Maybe. I had such bad dreams.’

‘What about?’

‘That he’s on his way. That he’s coming to kill us.’

‘The man from Oslo? Or Ove?’

‘I don’t know. It slipped away from me.’

We lay there listening for more thunder. None came.

‘Ulf?’

‘Yes?’

‘Have you ever been to Stockholm?’

‘Yes.’

‘Is it nice?’

‘It’s very nice in summer.’

She raised herself up on one arm and looked down at me. ‘Jon,’ she said. ‘Leo.’

I nodded. ‘Did the man from Oslo say that too?’

She shook her head. ‘I saw the tag on your necklace while you were sleeping. “Jon Hansen, born 24 July”. I’m Libra. You’re fire and I’m air.’

‘I’m going to burn and you’re going to heaven.’

She smiled. ‘Is that the first thing you think of?’

‘No.’

‘What’s the first thing, then?’

Her face was so close, her eyes so dark and intense.

I didn’t know I was going to kiss her until I did. I’m not even sure if I was the one who did, or if it was her. But afterwards I wrapped my arms round her, pulled her to me and held her tight, feeling her body, like a pair of bellows as the air hissed out between her teeth.

‘No!’ she groaned. ‘You mustn’t!’

‘Lea...’

‘No! We... I can’t. Let me go!’

I let go of her.

She struggled out of bed. Stood there breathless in the middle of the floor, staring at me fiercely.

‘I thought...’ I said. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean...’

‘Shhh,’ she said quietly. ‘That didn’t happen. And it won’t happen again. Never. Do you understand?’

‘No.’

She let out her breath in a long, trembling groan.

‘I’m married, Ulf.’

‘Married? You’re a widow.’

‘You don’t get it. I’m not just married to him. I’m married to... to everything. Everything up here. You and I belong to two different worlds. You make a living from drugs, I’m a sexton, a believer. I don’t know what you live for, but that’s what I live for, that and my son. Nothing else matters, and I’m not going to let a... a stupid, irresponsible dream ruin it. I can’t afford to, Ulf. Do you understand?’

‘But I’ve already said I’ve got money. Look behind the plank next to the cupboard there, there’s—’

‘No, no, no!’ She clapped her hands to her ears. ‘I don’t want to hear, and I don’t want any money! I want what I’ve got, nothing else. We can’t see each other again, I don’t want to see you again, it’s ended up... ended up all silly and mad and... and now I’m going. Don’t come and see me. And I won’t come and see you. Goodbye, Ulf. Have a good life.’

A moment later she was out of the cabin and I had already started to doubt if any of it had actually happened. Yes, she had kissed me, the pain in my cheek wasn’t lying. But then the rest of it must be true as well, the part of it when she said she never wanted to see me again. I stood up and went outside, and saw her running towards the village in the moonlight.

Of course she was running away. Who wouldn’t? I would have done. A long time ago. But then I was the type who ran away. She couldn’t afford to run away, whereas as a rule I ran because I couldn’t afford to stay. What had I been thinking? That two people like us could be together? No, that isn’t what I’d been thinking. Dreaming of, maybe, the way our minds conjure up images and fantasies. Time to wake up now.

There was another rumble of thunder, a bit closer this time. I looked off to the west. Off in the distance banks of lead-grey clouds towered up.

That he’s on his way. That he’s coming to kill us.

I went back inside the cabin and leaned my forehead against the wall. I believed in dreams about as much as I believed in gods. I was more inclined to believe in a junkie’s love of drugs than in people’s love for one another. But I did believe in death. That was a promise I knew would be kept. I believed in a nine-millimetre bullet at a thousand kilometres an hour. And that life was the time between the moment when it left the barrel of the pistol and when it tore through your brain.

I pulled the rope out from beneath the bed and tied it round the door handle. Knotted the other end to the heavy bed-frame that was nailed to the wall so the door couldn’t open outwards. I pulled it tighter. There. Then I lay down and stared at the planks of the bunk above me.