She lay there motionless, curled on her side, arms crossed over her breasts. She wore the clothes I’d last seen her in—black cargo pants and white T-shirt, both now filthy, and a black pleather motocross jacket. Dirty white socks but no shoes. Her matted dreadlock was crushed beneath one shoulder. Loose sequins winked from the blankets like spiders’ eyes.
“Tindra,” I whispered, afraid to touch her. “Tindra, can you hear me?”
I couldn’t see her breathing. Her pale face looked bruised, lavender deepening to gray. I sank onto the mattress beside her, slipped my hand beneath her T-shirt. Her flesh was cool.
But I felt a flutter beneath my palm, so faint it might have been my own pulse. I moved my hand slightly, pressing until I was sure. She was alive.
I picked up one limp arm and shone my flashlight at the crook of her elbow, looking for the telltale sign of a hypodermic needle. I found none. The other arm was the same. I turned the flashlight onto her neck, and there it was: a tiny hematoma, marking where the needle had entered her neck. It might not have hit her carotid artery, just a vein, but that would be enough. I pushed up one of her eyelids. Only a pale corona of iris showed around the dilated pupil.
I shook her gently, then harder, to no avail. Whoever did this had done it before. He knew to give her enough etorphine so that she’d appear comatose, even dead, but not enough to actually kill her. I wondered if this was what had happened when she was thirteen, or if it was a pattern that developed later.
Kneeling on the futon, I dug my hands under Tindra’s shoulders and tried to lift her. I could barely get her to move. I cursed, sweat pooling between my breasts, and staggered to my feet, trying to shake off rising panic. An hour or two ago I wanted to kill myself. Now I wanted to get the hell out of here.
That grayish tinge could mean she was already gone—that she’d suffered brain damage, or was suspended somewhere between a fatal overdose and unconsciousness. I could leave her here. I could clamber up that ladder and race back outside and…what?
“Fuck,” I whispered.
I dumped my bag’s contents onto the futon, sorting through them frantically. The Nikon was useless; my wallet was useless; the scissors and cigarette lighter were useless. I had barely enough drugs to get me high, except what remained of my crank.
That left a couple of ballpoint pens, a retainer wrapped in tissue, a photo CD, a few black T-shirts and underwear, my toothbrush, and two tranquilizer darts, one empty.
I stared at the motionless form on the mattress. After a minute I swept everything back into the bag except for the empty dart, the scissors and lighter, a ballpoint pen, and the baggie containing the crank. I picked up the spent cannula and scrutinized it.
I couldn’t fuck this up. I only had one empty dart. I needed pliers to do the job right, but I might be able to make it work with scissors.
I placed the dart’s needle tip near the crux of the scissor blades, held my breath as I closed the blades as gently as I could. I needed them to grasp the needle firmly enough to pull it free, but not slice through it. I exerted as much pressure as I dared, and very slowly pulled. It took several attempts, each more difficult than the one before. My hands were sweating, and I shook from cold and nerves and the beginnings of withdrawal.
On the fourth try the needle emerged. I dropped it onto the table, wiped my palms on my jeans, and used the tip of the scissors to disassemble the dart, prying out its various parts. Plastic chamber, black plastic plunger, plastic stop, a minute wad of control felt, the red nonreturn valve. When the cannula was empty, I filled it with water from the plastic jug. I swished it around and dumped the water onto the concrete floor, repeating the process several times.
I picked up the needle again, avoiding the tip, and managed to force it back into its nearly invisible socket. I flicked the lighter and held the needle in the flame till it glowed orange, then set the dart on the table’s edge.
While the needle cooled, I cut a long strip from one of the cartoon sheets. I examined Tindra’s T-shirt until I found a spot where the fabric seemed relatively clean, and snipped off a tiny piece. Then I wrapped the long strip I’d cut from the sheet around Tindra’s biceps, just above her elbow.
I filled the cap of the water jug with water, about a quarter teaspoon. I opened the tiny ziplock bag of crank and poured the water inside it, added the bit of cotton I’d snipped from Tindra’s T-shirt. I closed the bag, made sure the seal was tight, and shook it vigorously. You don’t cook meth the way you do heroin, but you have to ensure that the crystals are fully dissolved in water before you inject it, otherwise they clog the needle.
I let it sit for a minute or two—I couldn’t wait any longer. I opened the tiny baggie and tipped the meth-soaked cotton into the hollow cannula, shaking it until the fabric settled at the bottom. Using the scissors, I poked in the nubbin of felt, no bigger than a pencil eraser, and the black plastic plunger. Last of all I slid the ballpoint pen into the chamber, point up, to serve as a charger.
I sat beside Tindra and grasped her forearm, just below the crux of her elbow. It had turned white as soap from the tourniquet’s constriction. In contrast, the veins beneath her skin looked as though they’d been drawn in azure ink. Holding the jury-rigged hypo in my right hand, I pressed the needle against a vein, the ball of my thumb on the pen charger. If the needle broke or slipped, she was done. Same if I missed the vein. I counted to three, steadying my hand, and jammed the charger as hard as I could.
The barrel of the pen shot through the chamber. The needle held, puncturing her skin. I exerted more pressure, trying to squeeze as much of the drug into her system as I could. I counted to thirty and withdrew the needle, a bloody filament dangling from its tip, undid the tourniquet, and threw it onto the floor along with the spent dart.
“Come on, baby,” I whispered, pulling her into a sitting position. I grabbed the jug and sloshed water onto her face. Her head lolled, mouth sagging open. I slapped her cheek, shook her violently. “Tindra! Goddamn it, wake up!”
She gasped. Her eyes flew open and she stared at me, her expression gormless as a doll’s. I slapped her again, dragging her to her feet. She punched me and began to scream, babbling in Swedish as she lashed out, knocking down the stepladder. I pushed her against the wall, covering her mouth with my hand.
“Shut up!” I grasped her chin and turned her head. “Look at me—can you see me? Do you remember who I am?”
Her gazed fixed on me, then the cell around us. The tawny eyes filled with tears. I took that for a yes.
“Do you remember me?” I repeated. “In London, I was at your place in Brixton. Do you remember that?”
She nodded.
“Tell me what happened.”
“Han tog mig! Han—”
“English! I don’t know Swedish.”
She drew a shuddering breath, her chest heaving. The crank had kicked in, her pupils already shrunk to pinholes. Her fingers tightened around the dreadlock as though it were a lifeline. “Where am I?”
“On Kalkö. Do you remember coming here?” Again she nodded. “Those empty cottages on the eastern side of the island, that’s where we are. This room is beneath one of them. Someone is holding you prisoner. They drugged you and brought you down here. Do you know who that is?”
Her face contorted; I thought she might throw up.
“Ville,” she croaked.
“Do you mean Gwilym? Gwilym Birdhouse?”
“Yes. Ville, that’s his name in Swedish.”
“Okay.” I backed away from her, picked up the stepladder, and placed it where it had been. “You need to listen to me. I want you to climb up that ladder. I’ll be right behind you. We need to get out of here right now.”
She grabbed me, surprisingly strong for someone who’d just had her body jump-started. “Do you have it?”
“What?”
“The book? He took it—did you find it?”
“Are you out of your fucking mind? No, I don’t have it.”
I pushed her toward the ladder. She twisted away and stared at me, wild-eyed.
“We have to get it. He has the book and my mobile. We need to go back and get them.”
“We need to get the fuck out of here before he comes back and kills us.”
She was younger than me, fired up from crank and etorphine, the speedball from hell, but I was bigger and stronger. “If I have to knock you out again and drag you up there, I swear to god I will. Or I’ll leave you here for when he comes back.”
She began to sob, then pointed at her feet.
“My shoes…”
I ripped the covers off the futon, lifted it, and found her white Vans wedged beneath. I tossed them at her. She started to pull them on, stopped abruptly, and looked at me. “There’s somebody else.”
I’d already grabbed my bag and stood beside the ladder. “What?”
“Another girl. There was another girl here. Girls.”
“What are you talking about?”
“At the farm, I heard them—Freya and Erik, they were whispering. A refugee girl, more than one. I don’t think they’re alive now.”
“Jesus Christ. What the hell are you saying?”
“I don’t know! Only that’s what I heard.”
Her eyes went in and out of focus. There was more etorphine in her system than crank. I had to keep her moving. “Okay, you can tell me while we’re walking.”
“Where are we going?”
“I don’t know. Come on.”