The Fire Witness

175

Flora is walking up the narrow tree-lined driveway to the Rånnes’ manor house. She’s carrying the heavy moose rifle in both arms. Blackbirds observe her from their perches in the yellowing trees.

She feels as if Ylva is walking beside her. She is remembering playing here with her and Daniel.

Flora thought it had all been a dream: the fine house they’d come to, her own bedroom with its floral wallpaper. Images she’d buried and forgotten keep swelling up from the depths of her memory.

The old cobbled courtyard hasn’t changed a bit. A few shiny cars are standing at the entrance to the garage. She walks up the wide, shallow steps to the house, opens the door, and goes inside. She remembers this hall, with its dark paneling and huge oil paintings.

She feels odd being inside a familiar place while carrying a loaded weapon.

Massive chandeliers light her way as she walks silently across dark Persian rugs.

She hears voices coming from the dining room, but no one has seen her yet.

She walks through the four salons one by one until she can see into the dining room. There are fresh-cut flowers in the vases standing in the window niches. Her former family is seated at the table, eating and conversing. None of them is looking in her direction.

She shifts the moose rifle so that it is resting in the crook of her arm, holds it under the barrel, and puts her finger on the trigger.

She sees a movement from the corner of her eye and whirls around with her weapon raised. It’s just her own reflection in a mirror that goes from floor to ceiling. She’s aiming at herself. Her face is gray and her expression wild.

Still aiming the moose rifle, she walks into the dining room.

The table is decorated with tokens of the harvest: small sheaves of wheat, bunches of grapes, and clusters of plums and apples.

Flora remembers it is the day of thanksgiving.

The woman who was once her mother looks thin, fragile. She’s eating slowly with trembling hands. A napkin is spread over her lap.

A man is sitting between her parents. He’s just a bit older than she is. She does not recognize him, but she knows who he is.

Flora stops and the floor creaks beneath her feet.

Her father sees her first.

When the old man looks at her, he lowers his knife and fork and straightens his back. He says nothing. He just stares at her.

Her mother follows her father’s gaze and blinks several times as she sees the middle-aged woman with the rifle.

“Flora?” the old woman says, dropping her knife. “Flora, is that you?”

Flora stands in front of their well-set table. She can’t speak. She swallows and gives her mother a quick glance. Then she turns to her father.

“Why are you carrying a gun into this house?” he asks.

“You made me out to be a liar,” she says, finding her voice.

Her father smiles shortly, but without joy. The wrinkles on his face show him to be a bitter and lonely man.

He says tiredly, “The liars are cast into the lake of fire.”

She nods and has a moment of doubt before she asks her question.

“You knew that Daniel killed Ylva, didn’t you?”

Her father dries his mouth on a white linen napkin.

“We had to send you away because of all your terrible lies,” he says. “And here you are, coming back and telling those lies again.”

“I was not lying.”

“You told me you were, Flora. You confessed that you’d made it all up,” he says.

“I was just five years old. You were telling me that my hair would catch on fire and that I would burn right up if I didn’t say that I was lying. You were yelling at me that my face would melt and my blood would boil. And so I said I’d lied and then you sent me away.”