She picked up the paper and read the headline.
Will Franz Oswald reveal celebrities’ darkest secrets?
What dark secrets? But as soon as she read on, it became clear.
Is the stolen novel an exposé?
The article speculated that Oswald was going to spill all on ViaTerra’s famous guests in his new book. That it wasn’t a novel at all, but an autobiography full of remarkable details on the celebrities. There was even a list of actors and musicians who had gone through the ViaTerra program. She glanced through the text, which continued on the inside, and there was the picture of her again. Smaller than last time, but the same one. The mysterious woman who had stolen the book and vanished without a trace.
She began to tremble — only slightly, but the basket was no longer steady on her arm. Sweat broke on her forehead and palms, even though it was cool in the shop. The man at the register was unaware that anything was amiss; he was scratching his head as he worked on a crossword and waited for her. There was a shelf of summer supplies next to the register: sunblock, hats, and sunglasses. She stuck a sunhat and a pair of sunglasses in her basket as the trembling increased. Her whole body became bathed in sweat.
‘I have everything I need,’ she said, putting the basket down in front of him. She tried to look cheerful and untroubled.
‘Well, this lovely weather is supposed to last,’ said the man as he typed the sunglasses into the register. ‘Do you need any sunblock?’
‘No thanks. My skin can take the sun.’
Her legs were shaking now, and she felt vaguely dizzy. But the man just smiled kindly.
‘Well, have a lovely vacation!’
She placed the bag of food in the bike basket, slung the backpack over her shoulder, and jumped on, pedalling fast down the road until she couldn’t stand it any longer. She simply had to read the newspaper article. She stopped, fished the paper out of the basket, and read the whole thing.
Afterwards, all she wanted to do was sit down in the ditch and collect herself, but the damn bike didn’t have a kickstand. So she just stood there breathing hard in the bright rays of the sun, which had already climbed quite high in the sky.
This has really blown up.
There’s no way I’ll manage.
The article was full of details on ViaTerra, the celebrities who had taken refuge there, speculations of what had gone on . . . maybe some sort of sex therapy? And in the middle of it all was the mysterious novel that might contain the answer to all the riddles. She stuffed her hair into the sunhat, which she had bought at least three sizes too large to hide her distinctive mane — it was the first thing people noticed when they saw her. Then she perched the sunglasses on her nose and got back on the bike. She sincerely hoped that the man in the shop didn’t read Aftonbladet and wondered if anyone had noticed her on the train, but she thought she was safe on that count.
She couldn’t wait to reach the cottage; she wanted to listen to the recording on the Dictaphone. As fast as she could, she pedalled across the bridge to Seskarö, hardly taking note of how beautiful the scenery was. She was so distracted that she nearly ran off the road a few times.
One hundred metres before she reached the cottage, she got a flat tyre and had to drag the bike the last bit down the gravel path. At first she couldn’t see the building and was afraid it was no longer there, that perhaps her aunt had had it torn down. It turned out that the hedge had grown so tall it hid the house.
And there it was. A bit high on its foundation and with a large porch built to float over the garden. The white paint was flaking and moss grew enthusiastically on the roof, but otherwise it looked just the same.
She pulled the bike onto the lot, leaned it against an apple tree, and removed the grocery bag. Then she lay on the grass and let herself relax for a moment, disappearing into the endless blue sky until her energy returned.
The cottage was locked, but she went to the kitchen door in back and broke its window with a small shovel she found in a flowerbed. She cautiously stuck her arm in and opened the door from the inside. It smelled stale in there, but everything looked fine. The old stove, the rickety kitchen table, and the ugly green cabinet doors. The fridge was empty and the electricity was off. There were a few dead blowflies on the windowsill.
She cautiously tiptoed into the living room, feeling tense, because the silence and stillness were so palpable that she felt she had to fill them with something. An image of her grandmother on the couch intruded into her mind; she summoned her presence, giving herself such a fright that her heart began to race. But the living room was empty. The easy chairs and sofa were covered in sheets; the screen of the TV was covered in a thick layer of dust that the sun found through a gap in the curtains.
The beds in the two small bedrooms were made. It struck her how silly it was that no one ever came here anymore. Surely her grandmother would have wanted them to use the cottage. A person could live here — a thorough going-over with a dusting rag and a broom, and with the electricity and water on it would be truly comfortable.
She found the breaker, and turned on the water in the separate wash house. The food went in the fridge, and then she turned on the kitchen faucet, which spurted dirty yellow water that ran clear after a moment.
At first she had only planned to tidy up a little, but once she got started she couldn’t stop cleaning. She dusted and swept, scrubbed the shower and toilet. It felt like making amends for the neglect the cottage had seen. In fact, it felt almost like her grandmother were standing right there, nodding, happy to see that someone was finally taking care of the place.
She ate only cereal and milk when she got hungry, and kept cleaning until she had made her way through all the rooms. Then she decided which bedroom to sleep in and placed her extra jeans and shirts in the wardrobe.
As she dug around in her backpack, her hand brushed the box with the Dictaphone in it. Her delight over the cottage fell away immediately and she dropped everything in her hands. She went to lie down on the sofa in the living room, propping her head on a pillow. Before she even began to listen, she shuddered. She didn’t want to let Oswald into this lovely cottage. But she pressed play and there was his voice, the voice she had learned to obey, fear, and hate. It thundered against the walls of the cottage, serious and formal at first.
This is a draft of a novel I intend to write in the future. It is immaterial which parts are and are not based on my actual life.
Then the voice changed. It was almost as if he had put himself into a trance; he sounded a bit lax, as if he were drowsing.
I let the bumblebee fly around in the small aquarium for a while. It tries to get out, buzzing angrily, but all it can do is bounce off the walls. Then it gives up for a moment and lands on the cork mat at the bottom.
Her head was spinning.
What on earth is this? A novel about bumblebees?
There was a blanket on the couch and she wrapped it around her shoulders, because although it was still warm out it suddenly felt raw in the cottage. As the recording went on, she began to understand. The voice was painting a picture of a past that played out in familiar places.
That voice that just kept speaking, never stopping, never pausing, except for effect. That goddamn voice talking about killing people the way you might talk about making a cup of coffee. Yet she kept listening. She wondered where it was all going and shivered to think of how it would end.
After the recording, the words spilled out.
‘Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,’ she said to herself.
She lay still for a moment, staring at the ceiling, and found that she was scared. It was a sort of fear she had never experienced before. A feeling that the windows of the cottage would shatter and he would suddenly be standing there and staring at her with the eyes of a killer.
She rose from the sofa and locked both doors. Then she rooted around under the sink until she found a piece of cardboard to tape over the broken window. To be on the safe side, she propped a chair against the door. Then she paced back and forth through the cottage, with no idea what to do next.
Something about the recording had caught her attention. At first it had seemed completely unimportant, and yet it stuck with her. She pressed her palms to her forehead, trying to get her brain to work. And the words returned to her.
Those rocks are way too deep down. You can’t hit your head below that cliff.
The thought came to her like an icy tingle that started in her brain and spread down the back of her neck. It was absurd, idiotic, totally crazy. But even after she pushed it away, it came back. It was something that had been chafing at her subconscious. Facts that didn’t add up. And Oswald’s voice had brought them to life and made them flow together into an incredible whole. It wasn’t just the comment about Devil’s Rock; it was the manner in which Fredrik, or Oswald, or whoever he was, had fled the island.
The images grew clearer.
The body slicing through the surface so cleanly.
The waves rolling in from the sea, the head she just knew would pop up — but it never had.
The sounds of that day returned.
The roar of the sea and the wind and the silence echoing from the empty space on the cliff where he had stood.
And that voice on the phone, so completely lacking any hint of sadness.
She slowly let herself consider the idea that it might be true.
It moved in and out, like a slow inhalation you follow with your mind.
He was, after all, the type of person who could have done something like that.
In the end.
Closed off, reluctant, quick to withdraw when things didn’t go his way.
He let others take the brunt.
It was the craziest thought she’d ever had.
Yet her certainty only grew the more she thought about it.
She dashed into the kitchen, yanked out the new SIM card, and switched out the old one. Then she took out her backpack and opened the pocket with all the notes. She found the one she was looking for and tried to dial the number, but her hand seemed paralyzed; she couldn’t get her fingers to work.
Once she was able to move them, they trembled so hard that it took her three attempts to dial.
She hesitated for a moment when the warm voice answered, but she forced herself to speak.
‘I know he’s there. And I want to talk to him right now.’