Shadow

26

Alice was sitting on the sofa watching TV. It was a baffling programme about a rich American woman who wanted to get an operation to make herself look like a cat. Since they’d had cable TV installed in the house, she’d gained insight into so many odd things that she no longer knew what to believe about humanity. But in the absence of other companionship the TV was most often on, and occasionally something would come on that was worth looking at.

She had almost given up hope when the telephone rang. She’d been trying to reach Jan-Erik all day to ask him to give her a lift to the clinic tomorrow. This time she was sure. It wasn’t her imagination; there was something strange going on in her body. Despite her worry she was looking forward to the examination, as if she were going on an exciting adventure.

‘Jan-Erik?’

He got straight to the point.

‘I have a couple of questions about some things I found in Pappa’s cupboard.’

No greeting, no ‘How are you?’ Jan-Erik’s voice was curt, and she didn’t like it when he sounded that way. Their previous conversation still hovered in the air, despite all her efforts to drive it away. His accusing stare burned in her mind, just as strongly as if he’d put it into words.

You’re the one who bears the blame for what Annika did. It’s your fault she didn’t want to live. As her mother it was your responsibility to prevent what happened.

But what about Axel! she had wanted to scream, why didn’t any blame fall on Axel? With his inconsiderate belief in his sole right to existence, he was the one who had created her powerlessness.

He had been given everything.

Simply everything.

An invincible battleship that, unconcerned, steamed forth in the hunt for honour, while everyone else around him went under.

But she had sat there in silence. And the old feeling of guilt, long absorbed, had been drawing in nourishment.

‘What are you doing rummaging about in that cupboard? All you’ll find is misery.’

‘It’s about letters from somebody called Halina. Is that someone you know?’

The name hit her like a punch in the stomach. So many years had passed during which it had never been mentioned, an unspoken agreement to eradicate it from their consciousness. But through the silence it had remained, festering like a malignant tumour. Thirty-one years later she still didn’t know the truth about their relationship. Whether it was only that one single time or whether it went on for much longer.

Afterwards, when it all became irrelevant, she hadn’t wanted to know. As though in a haze they had tried to recreate all the routines in order to contain the truth. A forced need to map out their daily lives in order to expel the consequences. But how did you take up the threads of a life you didn’t even know you wanted?

‘No, I’ve never heard that name.’

‘The letters are from the seventies. So you’ve never heard of anyone named Halina?’

‘No.’

He kept the letters! So typical of Axel! She would have to go to the house some day and see whether the idiot had saved anything else that should never be found.

‘They were unopened, so he can’t even have read them. I just thought you might know who she was.’

‘No, I have no idea.’

Three times Halina had now been denied. With each time, she came all the more alive in Alice’s mind.

Everything had seemed so surreal. One moment of her life had suddenly become decisive. A tiny parenthesis that was lifted out and became the headline.

Until Halina rang the doorbell the whole day had been so ordinary, if one ignored the unusual episode in the library with Axel. Normal time was being counted down, although no one had realised. Soon they would eat dinner, she would watch Rich Man, Poor Man on TV; everything had been completely normal.

An instant of madness.

She had been so afraid. So terribly afraid. Not when it happened, not when Axel ran out to the hall after Halina and she remained humiliated on the sofa. Not when she heard Halina’s continued threats about what she intended to do to destroy their lives. Not when she grabbed the heavy silver candlestick and headed for the angry voices. Not even when she stood there with the candlestick in her hand, looking down at Halina’s lifeless body had she been afraid.

All she had felt was amazement. She had looked at her hands holding the candlestick and was amazed that they were hers. They had obeyed instinct, an instinct as old as humankind – the readiness to kill in order to protect what is ours.

Somewhere inside her she had unknowingly carried the ability.

She had sacrificed so much for the little she had succeeded in achieving. A life in the shadow of the man so admired.

For that little bit she had shown herself capable of killing.

Not even then was she afraid.

Gerda’s shrieks of despair. Soundlessly they hit her ears.

Axel, who sank down next to Halina.

‘What have you done? What have you done? What have you done?’

Like a mantra he kept repeating the question, and not until she heard the sound of Axel’s voice did it come slinking in: the horror of the irrevocable.

Terrified she had looked at his hands trying to shake life into Halina in an attempt to save their future. The blankness that descended when his efforts proved futile.

The realisation entered her consciousness, striking her like a club and forcing her to her knees. What he had done she could never forgive.

That man, whose children she had borne, had turned her into a murderer.

She gave a start when she heard Jan-Erik’s voice on the phone.

‘Okay, I was just wondering. I’ll come and pick you up tomorrow morning at ten past eight.’