Gabriella interrupted him periodically, asking him for specific details and to repeat things, names, the exact time of his call to 112. Like a legitimate, hard-ass lawyer.
When they’d finished, he felt strangely calm. For the first time since this all started, he wasn’t alone. They sat in silence for a moment, listening to the engine and the sea. The snow beating against their cheeks.
George swallowed hard, hesitating.
‘What happened on the island,’ he began. ‘Reiper and Josh and the whole gang. Are they dead?’
‘We didn’t stop to check,’ said Klara. ‘But I sincerely hope so.’
After a few minutes, the old man slowed the boat down and leaned over the steering console.
‘Klara,’ he shouted. ‘Almost there. Are you ready?’
Klara nodded and turned to George.
‘Gabriella is changing boats here,’ she said. ‘You’ll stay with me, okay?’
George nodded.
‘Sure,’ he said. ‘It’s not like I have any other plans. Where are we going?’
Klara glanced toward Gabriella, who shook her head.
‘Wait until I leave,’ she said. ‘It’s better if I don’t know where you’re going.’
The old man steered the boat into the protection of a pair of dark islands. The sea was strangely quiet here, in drastic contrast to earlier in the evening. Somewhere farther in, a lonely, bright light blinked suddenly. He felt his mouth go dry.
‘There!’ he hissed and knelt down to point. The blanket fell from his shoulders without his noticing it.
‘There’s someone there. A light!’
Klara took him by the hand and pulled him down on the floor again.
‘It’s okay,’ she said. ‘That’s our signal.’
She lifted up a square and battered signal lamp and sent a couple of blinks in response. The old man had already put them on course toward the flashing light.
When Klara had finished her exchange, she crawled aft and dug out the bow line. After another minute they were side by side with an old workboat that had undoubtedly seen better days. A huge man with terrible hair, dressed in full rain gear, stood on the foredeck.
‘Klara!’ he shouted. ‘What the devil! How’re you doin’?’
‘We’re okay,’ replied Klara. ‘But right now it’s probably best if we don’t talk about it. Gabriella is coming over to you, okay?’
‘’A course,’ said the giant. ‘But where’re you headed?’
He spoke a dialect that was so thick, George had trouble understanding him. The dialect of Östergötland. George had never heard anyone speaking it with such dedication before.
‘Bosse, it’s better if we talk about all that later. Gabriella needs to get to Stockholm as quickly and as under the radar as possible. Can you take care of that?’
The giant chuckled, leaned over the railing, and grabbed Gabriella around the waist. With a quick lift, he swung her over onto his own boat.
‘Under the radar?’ he said. ‘That’s my style, and you know it, Klara. Hello there, Gabriella, by the way.’
‘Hello,’ said Gabriella.
Klara picked up a small computer bag from the floor and handed it over to Gabriella.
‘Well then,’ said Gabriella. ‘I’ll get a hold of you as soon as I can.’
She began to push off from their boat.
‘Not so fast,’ said the giant. ‘I got somebody to hand over to ya here. She’s as stubborn as sin.’
An elderly woman with long, almost white hair in a ponytail stepped out of the aft cabin. She patted Gabriella on the cheek.
‘How are you, Gabriella?’ she said.
Gabriella nodded and hugged the woman.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Everything’s going to be okay.’
‘That’s good,’ said the older woman. ‘Just be careful now, honey.’
The woman was holding a basket, which she handed over to Klara before climbing into their boat with surprising agility.
‘Klara, my little darling,’ she said. ‘You didn’t think I’d let you celebrate Christmas without me? I’ve brought Christmas dinner with me. A little herring salad, ham, and rye bread. And Grandpa’s Christmas schnapps, of course.’
‘Thank goodness you didn’t forget that!’ said the old man.
George watched as Klara gently put down the basket on the deck before falling into the older woman’s arms.
‘Grandma,’ she sobbed. ‘Dearest, dearest grandma.’
Northern Rimnö, Sweden
Klara pulled the soft wool blanket up to her chin and rested her head in her grandmother’s lap. The white couch was so soft she wondered how it held her up at all. Her cheeks were glowing from the heat of the fire.
Grandma’s dry hands stroked her forehead and hair. George had stumbled into one of the three small bedrooms and fallen asleep as soon as they arrived at the boathouse on the eastern shore of Norra Rimnö. Grandma had covered him with another one of those new blankets and gently closed the door behind him.
The large boathouse actually belonged to a family from Stockholm who’d bought it a couple of years ago and worked very hard, obviously spending a lot of money, to turn the upper floor into an apartment in tacky, faux ‘New England’ style. White walls, navy blue pillows, and blankets from the Swedish brand Lexington. A pair of crossed oars hung on one wall. The only thing missing was a framed photo of the Kennedy family.
If Klara hadn’t been in a state of low-intensity shock, it would have made her laugh.
Some friend of her grandpa’s had been given the keys to the boathouse to keep an eye on it during the fifty weeks in the year that the family wasn’t in the archipelago. Now it was, despite its decor, a perfect hideaway until… Yes, until what? Klara didn’t have the energy to think. No energy to look back on what had happened or to imagine how it would end. She just wanted to keep lying here on this wonderful couch, in this wonderful warmth, with Grandma’s hands gently caressing her forehead. If life consisted of nothing more than this moment, she’d be more than content.
Still she couldn’t fall asleep, couldn’t relax, couldn’t stop worrying and questioning things for even a moment. The past week had been too much. Everything had changed forever. The secrets so extensive she couldn’t comprehend them. Mahmoud was dead. She hadn’t allowed that fact to sink in. And the American. Her heart started racing again. It was too much.
Cautiously she opened her eyes and pulled away from her grandmother’s embrace. The blanket slid down on the floor as she sat up on the couch.
‘Grandma?’ she said.
Her grandmother turned toward her. The room was dim, but the glow from the fire made her fair skin look like it was lit from within.
‘Yes, Klara?’ she said.
‘The American?’ said Klara. ‘How could Grandpa be so sure he knew my mother? Was it because he had the locket? I mean anyone could have got hold of that.’
Grandmother didn’t answer, just rose as silently as a cat and walked across the white, painted floorboards to the little basket of Christmas food she’d brought with her. She bent down and pulled out what appeared to be an old, yellowed envelope.
She returned to the couch, sat down next to Klara again, and took one of her hands in her own. Carefully she put the envelope in Klara’s other hand.
‘Klara,’ she said. ‘My sweet Klara.’
Her grandmother took a deep breath. Those eyes, thought Klara, they hide nothing at all.
Slowly she released her grandmother’s hand and opened the envelope. Inside was a single color photograph. It was stiff and shiny, as if it had just been developed or had been developed a long time ago and stored in a vacuum. Klara swallowed.
The image was overexposed, bathed in light. A man was sitting in the shade on a large balcony. In his arms he held a tiny baby wrapped in a light blue knitted blanket. He squinted into what might have been blinding sunlight and seemed about to put his hand up to cover his face. But the photographer had been too quick.
Dark, thick hair. Olive-colored skin. A curved upper lip and high, well-defined cheekbones that made him look both sensitive and authoritative. On the table in front of him stood a half-f ashtray and a red packet of cigarettes with Russian letters on it. In the background there were blocks of gray, sand-colored apartment buildings, almost translucent in the intense sun.
There was no doubt that the person in the picture was a younger version of the man whose hand Klara held as he died on the island. Klara looked up at her grandmother.
‘Turn over the picture,’ said her grandmother.
Klara hesitated, suddenly unsure if she wanted to know more, if her heart could handle any more. Finally, she flipped the picture over. One sentence, written in clear, precise handwriting: ‘Klara and her dad, Damascus, June 25, 1980.’
Stockholm, Sweden
Gabriella got off the subway at Östermalmstorg. Bosse had found her a ride to Stockholm with some friends of his.
‘Under the radar,’ he said.
Somewhere a church bell was ringing. Advent candles burned in every window. It was like another world, with garlands and Christmas decorations and a thin layer of snow. A world where everything was quiet, tranquil, tastefully lit, and completely free from conflict and death. The streets were empty except for a lone taxi.
‘Merry Christmas,’ said the taxi driver as she jumped into the backseat.
My God, it actually was Christmas eve. Gabriella just nodded and gave him the address.
It didn’t even take the taxi ten minutes to get to Djursholm. They passed seven cars and an occasional bus on their way. Was this the most deserted time of the year? Just before seven on the morning of Christmas eve.
Gabriella paid the driver, muttering ‘Merry Christmas,’ because it seemed as though he wouldn’t let her out of the car if she didn’t at least give him that. The streets weren’t plowed, and the taxi left solitary tracks across the newly fallen snow as it rolled away almost silently along Strandvägen.
If Wiman’s house had seemed spooky the first time she visited, now it looked almost comically cozy. A thick layer of fluffy, inviting new snow covered the manicured hedges, the lawn, and the path leading up to the door. As she carefully opened the gate, snow spilled from its top onto her hands. It was light and as pure as air. Exterior lights were lit, but the windows were dark except for the symmetrically placed Advent candelabra in the window.
Gabriella felt calm. Focused. She registered her surroundings but was absorbed by her task. This was a do-or-die moment. There was no turning back now. No alternatives. This was it.
Light shone warmly from the windows on the shorter side of the house. The kitchen and one of the living rooms, Gabriella suspected. The snow crunched under her feet as she ascended the few steps and rang the doorbell. It took just a few seconds for it to be thrown wide open. A little girl of about five, with long blond hair and wearing a pink nightgown, stood in the softly lit hallway.
‘Who are you?’ said the girl.
‘My name is Gabriella,’ said Gabriella. ‘Is your… grandfather here?’
‘Grandpa isn’t dressed yet,’ said the girl.
She made no move to either call for an adult or let Gabriella in.
‘Do you know it’s Christmas?’ she continued.
‘Well,’ said Gabriella. ‘I know. But I really need to talk to your grandfather.’
‘I’ve been up since five o’clock. You know how I know that? Because I got a watch in my stocking. Wanna see it?’
She held out her wrist, where a small red plastic watch was fastened.
‘Maria?’ said a familiar voice from inside the warm, cozy house. ‘Maria? Did you ring the doorbell?’
‘A girl with red hair is here,’ replied Maria.
In the hall behind the girl Gabriella saw an older man approaching. Though he had to be Wiman, he was almost unrecognizable. His hair was not slicked back tightly, but messy and unexpectedly gray. Instead of his rigid, steel-rimmed glasses he wore a tortoiseshell pair that was thicker and rounder. And instead of being dressed in one of his customary Zegna suits, he was wearing a fraying, dark red robe with a
W
embroidered in gold on the breast pocket. His bare, pale legs protruded awkwardly from the bottom of the bathrobe.
‘Gabriella?’ said Wiman.
He brought his hands through his unkempt hair in a vain attempt to give it some kind of order.
‘It’s Christmas, for goodness sake. What are you doing here?’
His intonation was as restrained as ever. Just as authoritarian and accustomed to being obeyed. But his eyes avoided Gabriella’s, and his hands seemed to have a life of their own, alternating between flattening his hair and pulling on the knot that held the robe together.
‘We have to talk,’ she said. ‘Now.’
When Wiman entered the library, he was carrying a small tray of steaming coffee cups and saffron buns. The sky had brightened almost imperceptibly above the water beyond the windows. Gabriella sat in one of the chairs by the fire, immobile in the warm glow. From another part of the house she heard the faint sound of a children’s show on television.
‘So, Gabriella,’ said Wiman. ‘If I were to be completely honest, I’d say visiting me at home on Christmas eve isn’t the best way for an associate to show me she’s partner material.’
The same voice. The same paternalistic irony. But it had no effect on Gabriella now. She could no longer remember how it had felt to simultaneously fear him and long for his respect. It was as if her whole world had shifted. As if a spell had been broken.
‘Why did you do it?’ she said. ‘Or I don’t give a fuck why. I honestly can’t understand how you could do it. You of all people.’
Wiman calmly set down the tray on the small table in front of the blazing fire. The same table they had sat at just a few days ago, in what seemed like another time, another world.
‘Do what?’ Wiman said, sitting down opposite Gabriella in the same chair he had sat in last time.
He studied her with quiet interest.
‘What heinous crime have I committed this time?’
Gabriella balked. That gaze. It wasn’t the look of a Judas.
‘You were the only one who knew Klara was coming back to Sweden,’ she said. ‘Just you and me. You were the only one who knew she wanted to return to the islands.’