The Darkest Room

WINTER 1962

With the wind at my back, I race into the outbuilding’s porch and on into the middle room, despite the fact that I know what I will see there.

Empty white walls.

Almost all of Torun’s blizzard paintings have gone from the storeroom-there are just a few rolled up on the floor, but there are several piles of fishing nets.

The door to our end of the house is closed, but I know that Torun is sitting in there. I can’t go in to her, can’t tell her what has happened, so I sink down onto the floor.

Over on the table are a half-full glass and a bottle. They weren’t there before.

I quickly go over to them, stick my nose in the glass, and sniff at the clear liquid. It’s schnapps-presumably Davidsson’s ration to keep him warm.

Here and there around the house are similar bottles with different contents, and when I think about them I know what I am going to do.

There is no sign of Davidsson as I hurry across the inner

courtyard, open the barn door, and slip into the darkness. I can find my way around in there among the shadows without a light, and go further inside to the garbage and the hidden treasures. In a corner stands a special metal container-a container on which someone has drawn a black cross. I take it back to the outbuilding with me.

In the storeroom I empty out most of Davidsson’s schnapps onto one of his piles of nets that stinks of tar, then top it up with the same amount of the equally clear and almost odor-free liquid from the can.

There is a wooden cupboard in the corner; I hide the can in there.

Then I sit down on the floor again and wait.

Five or ten minutes later there is a rattling at the door. The howling of the wind increases in volume, before the noise is cut off with a bang.

A pair of heavy boots step into the porch and stamp up and down to shake off the snow; I recognize the smell of sweat and tar.

Ragnar Davidsson comes into the room and looks at me.

“So where have you been?” he asks. “You just took off this morning.”

I don’t reply. The only thing I can think of is what I’m going to say to Torun about the paintings. She can’t find out what has happened.

“With some guy, of course,” says Davidsson, answering his own question.

He walks slowly around me on the cement floor, and I give him one last chance. I raise my hand and point toward the shore.

“We have to go and fetch the paintings.”

“That’s not possible.”

“It is. You have to help me.”

He shakes his head and walks over to the table. “They’re

already gone… they’re on their way to Gotland. The wind and the waves took them.”

He fills up the glass and raises it to his lips.

I could warn him, but I say nothing. I simply watch as he drinks-three good gulps that almost empty the glass.

Then he puts it down on the table, smacks his lips and says, “Right, little Mirja… so what do you fancy doing now?”