Sail of Stone

10

Angela came with Elsa, who immediately ordered a drink with bubbles. Angela ordered a dry martini. Winter ordered a Longmorn. Angela had a dark circle under one eye, which was a sign that she was tired. Never more than one circle, and it was never there for more than a few short hours, before a new day. Soon it would be a new day.

“Cheers, and hi,” said Elsa.

Winter raised his glass. He looked into Angela’s eyes. What kind of habits are we teaching our daughter? How will it be when we’re not there keeping an eye on her? What will happen with the bubbles?

“Is it good, Elsa?” asked Angela.

“It tickles my nooose,” said Elsa.

Just then, Winter felt a sting in his nose and in the next second he sneezed.

“Bless you!” shrieked Elsa.

“Thanks, sweetie.”

“Does your nose tickle too, Papa?”

“Yes. Just like yours.”

“But I didn’t sneeze!”

“I did it for both of us.”

“Ha ha!”

“If you two keep this up, I’ll sneeze too,” said Angela.

“How can this be explained from a purely medical perspective?” said Winter.

“What?”

“Well, you’re a doctor. How do you explain why you have a sneezing reflex when other people talk about sneezing?”

“I don’t think the research has come very far in that area,” said Angela. “And I really don’t know which branch it would be done in.”

“Medicine,” said Winter. “Ear nose throat.”

“No.”

“Physiology.”

“No.”

“Sneeziology.”

“No.”

“Nosiness,” said Elsa.

Her parents looked at her.

I am the father of a genius, thought Winter.

“Where did you get that from, Elsa?” asked Angela.

“You had to say something with ‘nose,’ right? My day-care teacher told us the story of the nosy boy.”

“So you didn’t mean that Papa and I were talking about knowing about noses?”

Winter saw that Elsa didn’t understand the question, and he relaxed.

“Did your teacher tell you what nosiness means?” he asked.

“I forget.”

“What does it actually mean?” asked Angela, looking at him.

“That you take too many liberties,” said Winter.

“You’re taking too many liberties here,” said the man who said that his name was Sigge Lindsten and that he was Anette Lindsten’s father. “Even for the police.”

Aneta Djanali didn’t answer. She still felt dizzy. If there had been anything to take hold of, she would have grabbed it.

“Are you okay?” asked the man.

“Could I have a glass of water?”

The man seemed to make a decision. He no longer looked unsympathetic. Maybe he never had.

“Come in,” he said.

She took off her shoes in the hall. She could smell some plant, a scent she recognized but couldn’t place.

When she followed the man to the kitchen she remembered that she had smelled the same scent in the apartment that two men were in the process of emptying in front of her. Crazy. Just crazy.

She felt the dizziness again.

“Please sit down,” said the man. He filled a glass with water. “Here,” he said.

She drank. She saw the wind move in a tree outside, maybe a maple. The wind had increased the last few days, like a growling promise of autumn. She didn’t look forward to it.

She suddenly spun again. Am I becoming seriously ill? she thought.

“Now, what’s this about Anette?” said Sigge Lindsten.

That’s my question, she thought.

“Is Anette home?” she asked.

“Not at the moment,” said the man.

She looked around.

“Is your wife home?”

“She’s not home at the moment either,” he said.

“Could I see some identification?” asked Aneta.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Identification. I’m sorry, but this is all a bit confusing, and I will explain soon. But first I have to be certain that you’re the-”

“Good Lord,” interrupted the man, “I’ll get my wallet. This should be interesting to hear.”

He went out into the hall and came back with his wallet and held it out, and she saw his driver’s license in a plastic sleeve. It was in the name of a Sigvard Lindsten, and the relatively recent photograph showed the man who stood before her.

“Thanks,” she said.

He closed his wallet.

“Have you heard of Hans Forsblad?” she asked.

“Isn’t it my turn to ask some questions?” said Lindsten.

“Just answer this one.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“That piece of shit wouldn’t dare come here. If he did, it would be the last thing he did.”

“When did Anette move out of the apartment in Kortedala?”

“That’s another question.”

“I’ll explain soon,” said Aneta.

Lindsten suddenly seemed to lose interest in the conversation. He turned toward the counter and turned on the faucet and turned it off again.

“When?” repeated Aneta.

“What?”

“When did she move?”

“She hasn’t moved,” said Lindsten. “Not officially. She has left the apartment but she hasn’t given notice yet.”

Good God, thought Aneta.

Time to explain.

Lindsten had made himself a cup of coffee. Aneta had declined. She had called dispatch and reported a break-in. She had called the local police.

She had felt like an idiot the whole time.

Would Fredrik have asked for identification first off if he had been her and had come up to Anette’s apartment and met a nice but worried dad and a sulky brother? She wasn’t sure. She would ask him.

It was an interesting psychological situation. She had wandered right into it. The man who had claimed he was Sigge Lindsten had shown exceptional presence of mind in this situation. Exceptional. She had been under his command. The younger man had been under his command. When she thought back to the hour or so she had spent in the apartment, she realized how skillfully he had handled everything. Almost an hour! They were in the process of emptying an entire apartment and the cops knock on the door and they offer coffee and wave good-bye in the end!

It was comical, but it was also something else.

She had exposed herself.

To the two men.

And to Hans Forsblad. If it had in fact been him.

Was that man also someone else?

“Do you have a picture of Forsblad in the house?”

Lindsten went and got a photograph without a frame. A young woman and a young man, trying to outdo each other’s smiles. It was possible that several years had gone by since, but she recognized Forsblad from the meeting in that damn apartment.

It struck her that this was the first time she’d seen Anette, really seen her. She had come here without having a face in mind. That was unusual for her. The first time. But she had also come here. Something had brought her here, and there was also something frightening in that thought.

Suddenly she thought of death. She thought of her own death. She felt the sharp but fleeting sense of dizziness again, as though she had been dragged down into an abyss, a darkness.

Something told her that she ought to run away from these people, these events. Run away from everything, immediately, hurry away from this case, this investigation, before everything got bigger, even more incomprehensible, worse. More dangerous.

Anette Lindsten had regular features that tried to make her beautiful but didn’t really succeed. Aneta held the picture in her hand. Anette’s face was long, and the impression was intensified by her hair, which hung free. She was wearing a dress that was bigger than it needed to be. Anette and Hans were sitting on a bench, and it wasn’t possible to determine how tall Anette was. The man was of an average build, well over six feet.

Anette held a Popsicle that was in the process of melting.

The picture was taken on a street with cars parked on it. A store was visible behind the couple, but she couldn’t see the name. A child was on the way into the store, maybe on the way to the ice cream counter. There were sharp shadows in the photograph. Somewhere outside the picture was a sharp sun.

“It was taken a few summers ago,” said Sigge Lindsten.

Aneta nodded.

“And now it’s probably time to go to Kortedala and see the damage,” said Lindsten.

“I’ll drive you,” said Aneta.

In the car, she thought of Anette.

Had he already beaten her then? The man sitting next to her in the photograph, with his big smile?

Was she still hoping?

I’ll have to ask her. If I ever meet her.

The Winter-Hoffman family was on the way home over one of the bridges when Winter’s phone rang.

“Yes?”

“Hi, Erik, Möllerström here.”

“Yes?”

Winter heard Möllerström give a cough. Janne Möllerström was a detective and the department records clerk. Everything went through Möllerström just like it went through Winter. But Möllerström kept everything in his advanced data files. Winter had his thoughts, his theories and hypotheses, in his PowerBook. Möllerström had several computers. And telephones.

“A woman has tried to reach you a few times. Sounded a little desperate.”

“What’s her name?”

“Osvald. Johanna Osvald.”

“Did she leave a phone number?”

Möllerström recited the number. Winter recognized it. She had given it to him.

“What else did she say?”

“Just that you should call when you can.”

“Tonight?”

He watched Angela and Elsa, who were five yards ahead of him. Elsa’s hand stuck out from the stroller. Angela was walking briskly.

He quickly dialed the number he’d gotten from Janne. He released his breath when he heard the busy signal. The phone rang as soon as he hung up. He recognized the number on the screen.

“She called here again,” said Möllerström. “Just now.”

“It’s after working hours,” said Winter.

“That’s something new to be coming from you,” said Möllerström.

“What is it that’s so urgent?” said Winter.

“She just said that she wanted to talk to you.”

“Mmhmm.”

“I assume the best way to find out is to call.”

“Thanks for the advice, Janne, and have a good rest of the night at the department.”

“Thank you,” Möllerström snickered, and hung up.

Angela was waiting at a red light at Allén.

“The mobile office,” she said.

“Well…”

“There is an off button.”

He didn’t answer. He thought she was being unfair. She didn’t know that he was trying to avoid a conversation. There was still a first time for everything.

“For everyone but you,” she said.

“What?”

“A button for everyone but you.”

“Please, Angela…”

Red turned to green. They walked across the street. He saw that Elsa’s head was hanging. He would have had trouble staying awake himself if he was being pushed around in a stroller just after twilight.

“They can send a car for you if it’s really important, can’t they?”

“As long as I haven’t left town,” he said.

“Left town! Surely you don’t have permission to leave town!”

“By written request three months ahead of time.”

“In which case you can be wanted if you’re away from the house,” she said.

“Like now,” he said.

“You know what I mean.”

He looked at his watch.

“Officially, I’m still on duty,” he said.

“Did that also apply to the hour at the new bar?”

“It’s my new office.”

His phone rang again.

“You have to answer,” said Angela. “You’re still on duty.”

It was Möllerström again.

“For God’s sake, Janne!”

“Sorry, sorry, boss, but she called again and said it’s about her father.”

“I know that it’s about her father.”

He hung up and looked at Angela. They were standing outside their own door.

“I really did try,” he said.

“What is it about?” she said, and opened the door with one hand. Winter was steering the stroller. Elsa was sleeping and snoring quietly. The polyps. She would have to have an operation later, Angela had said. Are you serious? he had said. Unfortunately, she said. It happened to me too, she had said.

“Johanna Osvald’s father,” he said now. “She’s tried to reach me several times; apparently she’s shaken up.”

“Well, call her, darn it,” said Angela, and her face was open, and there was no sarcasm in her voice.

He called from the hall. Angela was fixing supper for Elsa, who had woken up in the elevator. It was impossible to sleep in that elevator. It was antique and dragged itself up with tortured protests, loud sighs.

He heard the rings, two, three, four, five, six. He called again. He didn’t get an answer.

In the kitchen, Angela was making a porridge out of yesterday’s rice pudding.

“No answer,” he said.

“Well, that’s strange.”

“Very strange,” Elsa said, and giggled.

He smiled.

“Do you want porridge, Papa?”

“Not right now, sweetie.”

“Soon it will be gone,” she said.

“You’ll just have to try again,” said Angela, scooping porridge into Elsa’s deep dish.

He went into the living room and called from there. Three-four-five-six. He hung up and turned on the CD player, which continued where it had left off late last night, with Miles Davis’s and Freddie Hubbard’s trumpets in “The Court.” The court of law. Or a courtyard, if you looked at it that way. Miles’s solo, which was like a sharp shadow from a sharp sun. Of course. A long shadow across a courtyard.

He kept time with his foot, not something for a beginner. He had tried to show Angela once quite a while ago, teach her, but she had given up, laughing. Give me rock ’n’ roll! she had cried. Okay, he had said. Something simple and easy to digest for mademoiselle. You don’t even know what it is! she had said. Yes I do, he had answered. Say something, then! she had said. Say what? he had said. Say a band! A rock band! He had thought and answered.

Elvis Presley.

She had laughed again, a lot. You are truly up to date, she had hiccuped.

He smiled at the memory. But he was up to date. Tonight he would listen to Pharoah Sanders, Save Our Children. Good God, he had just bought The Complete “In a Silent Way” Sessions.

He tried to call again an hour later. It would have to be the last time. Angela was in the bath, but that wasn’t why; it wasn’t why he was taking the opportunity right then. He didn’t get an answer this time either.

She came back to the living room as Bill Frisell’s guitar was running amok as it had so many times before.

“Heavens,” she said. It was one of her expressions, like “darn.” She sometimes spoke a sort of lively 1950s Swedish that had become the Hoffman family’s language when they came to their new country. The language had encapsulated itself in the Hoffmans, and some of it remained with Angela. He had pointed it out to her. You bet, daddy-o, she had answered.

“Is it supposed to sound like that?” she said, nodding at the CD player with a towel around her head. He could feel her warmth.

“I don’t actually know how it’s supposed to sound,” he answered.

“Whoever played like that should get it checked out,” she said.

“I didn’t know you were so prejudiced.”

“Prejudiced? It’s called considerate.”

Bill Frisell ladled it on, and it was worse than ever, better than ever. Viktor Krauss on bass, Jim Keltner on drums like two tiptoeing caretakers while the crazy person ran into walls with his guitar in overdrive, attack after attack. Winter turned up the volume. “Lookout for Hope.”

“Good God,” yelled Angela. “Elsa is sleeping, you know.”

Winter lowered the volume.

Angela grabbed the album sleeve and read:

Gone, Just Like a Train.

“Good title.”

“If the train leaves on time,” she said.

He lowered the volume until almost nothing was left.

“Are you naked under that robe?” he said.

She put down the album sleeve and looked at him.

“Come here and sit in my lap,” he said.