The Darkest Room

WINTER 1962

Davidsson has refilled his glass with schnapps.

“Sure you don’t want some?” he asks.

When I clamp my lips together, he takes a deep draft from the glass. Then he puts it down on the table and smacks his lips.

He seems to get various inappropriate ideas when he looks at me, but before he has time to select one of them, his guts are suddenly twisted into a knot in his belly. That’s what it looks like to me, anyway-his body jerks, he bends over and presses his arms against his stomach.

“Shit,” he mumbles.

Davidsson tries to relax. But then he suddenly goes rigid again, as if he has suddenly thought of something.

“Oh shit,” he says, “I think…”

He falls silent and looks to one side, still thoughtful-then the whole of his upper body jerks in a violent attack of cramp.

I sit there motionless, staring at him; I don’t say a word. I could ask if he’s not feeling well, but I know the answer: the poison in the glass has finally begun to work.

“It wasn’t schnapps in that glass, Ragnar,” I say.

Davidsson is in a lot of pain now, he is leaning against the wall.

“I put something else in there.”

Davidsson manages to get to his feet and staggers past me toward the door. This suddenly gives me a burst of fresh energy.

“Get out of here!” I yell.

I pick up an empty metal bucket standing in a corner and hit him on the back with it.

“Out!”

He does as I say, and I follow him out into the snow and watch him aim for the fence. He manages to find the opening, and heads on down toward the sea.

The southern lighthouse is flashing blood-red through the falling snow; the northern tower is dark now.

In the darkness I can see Ragnar’s open motorboat bobbing in the sea out by the jetty. The waves are breaking along the shore with a long drawn-out roaring sound, and I ought to try and stop him, but I stay where I am, just watching as he teeters out along the jetty and loosens the ropes. Then he stops, bends over again, and vomits into the water.

He drops the rope and the waves begin to play with the boat, nudging it away from the jetty.

Ragnar seems to be feeling too ill to bother about the boat. He glances out to sea, then begins to stagger inland instead.

“Ragnar!” I yell.

If he asks me for help, he can have it, but I don’t think he can hear me. He doesn’t stop when he reaches the shore, but sets off northward. Heading for home. Soon he has disappeared in the darkness and the snow.

I go back to the outbuilding and Torun. She is still awake, sitting in her chair by the window as usual.

“Hi, Mom.”

She doesn’t turn her head, but asks, “Where is Ragnar Davidsson?”

I go and stand by the fire and sigh. “He’s gone. He was here for a while… but now he’s gone.”

“Did he throw out the paintings?”

I hold my breath and turn around. “The paintings?” I say, a lump forming in my throat. “Why do you think he would do that?”

“Ragnar said he was going to throw them out.”

“No, Mom,” I say. “Your canvases are still in the storeroom. I can fetch-”

“He should have done it,” says Torun.

“What? What do you mean?”

“I asked Ragnar to throw them in the sea.”

It takes four or five seconds for me to understand what she’s saying-then it’s as if a membrane breaks inside me and dangerous fluids begin to mingle in my brain. I see myself rushing over to Torun.

“Fucking sit here, then, you fucking old cow!” I scream. “Sit here till you die! You fucking blind old…”

I hit her over and over again with the palm of my hand, and Torun can do nothing but take the blows. She doesn’t see them coming.

I count the blows, six, seven, eight, nine, and I stop hitting her after the twelfth.

Afterward both Torun and I are breathing loudly, almost wheezing. The mournful howling of the wind can be heard through the windows.

“Why did you leave me with him?” I ask her. “You should have seen how dirty he was, Mommy, and the stench of him… You shouldn’t have let me go in there, Mommy.”

I pause for a moment.

“But you were blind even then.”

Torun stares rigidly ahead, her cheeks red. I don’t think she has any idea what I’m talking about.

And that was the end for me at Eel Point. I left and never came back. And I stopped speaking to Torun. I made sure she got a place in a care home, but we never spoke again.

The next day the news came that the evening ferry between Öland and the mainland had capsized in the waves. Several passengers had died in the icy waters. Markus Landkvist was one of them.

Another victim of the storm was Ragnar Davidsson, the eel fisherman. He was found dead on the shore a day or so later. I felt no guilt over his death-I felt nothing.

I don’t think anyone ever lived in the outbuilding again after Torun and me, and I don’t think anyone really lived in the main house again, apart from the odd month in the summer. Sorrow had permeated the walls.

Six weeks later, when I had moved to Stockholm to start at the art school, I found that I was pregnant.

Katrine Månstråle Rambe was born the following year, the first of all my children.

You had your father’s eyes.