WHEN THE MIDSUMMER weekend reached its end, Sandra picked up Erik from her parents’ place ahead of the last normal week before the summer holidays. Sandra wouldn’t have any holidays for a while, but Erik’s summer would initially be spent with his grandparents. They would be on holiday as of the next weekend, and when they went back to work four weeks later, it would be Sandra’s turn to take time off. There was a lot of piecing things together to make sure life worked for Sandra and her little boy, and even though she felt a little ashamed, she was grateful to her parents. Glad that their spending time with their grandchild was just as much for their own enjoyment as it was about making things easier for her by taking over some of her responsibilities.
Despite her current heavy commitments elsewhere, Sandra hadn’t taken any time off from Friends-on-call. Ellen was still calling almost every weekday, and she was the highlight now that Kerstin had pulled back. Otherwise it was just the usual calls about fears and loneliness, anxiety about the future and worries about the past. Rewarding and interesting for both parties, she hoped. For her own part, Sandra felt satisfied that she was able to offer some small assistance to people who needed someone to talk to.
The evenings passed by quickly these days. The time when she had lain on the sofa idly watching TV between the infrequent calls was gone. Now she filled her time in other ways, and jumped every time the phone vibrated next to her on the kitchen table. It was the same now, and when she glanced at the clock on the wall she realised it was just gone midnight, which meant she ought to have gone to bed if she was to deal with the challenges of the next day. In other words, it was downright lucky that the call got through.
“Kerstin! I’m so glad you’ve called! I’ve been really worried.”
“Worried?” said Kerstin. “Why?”
“Oh, you know. You’ve got your troubles, and I don’t know how well you deal with them on a day-to-day basis.”
“You mean whether I’m predisposed to suicide?” said Kerstin, getting straight to the point. “I’m not, so no need to worry on that account. On the other hand . . .”
She interrupted herself, which made Sandra curious.
“On the other hand what?”
“Oh, I’m getting there. Something has happened that I’d like to discuss with you.”
“Nothing serious, I hope?”
“In a way,” said Kerstin. “But not in the way that you think.”
Sandra didn’t know what she was supposed to think, so she was presumably going to be surprised by whatever followed. She often was during her conversations with Kerstin.
“Okay,” she said. “I’m listening.”
“I’ve met someone I hate,” Kerstin said gloomily. “That’s why I haven’t called in a while. I had to think about how to deal with it.”
The target of Kerstin’s hatred was something that Sandra was more than familiar with. The only thing was that since their last call, Sandra had discovered that the hit-and-run-driver-slash-photographer was no longer alive. Kerstin couldn’t have met him.
“Met?” Sandra said, uncomprehending.
“Or . . . Not met. That’s the wrong word,” Kerstin corrected herself.
Good. Hatred was a big thing, not to be used recklessly.
“I’ve known her for several years. Socialised with her.”
“Her?” said Sandra in confusion, thinking that Kerstin must be on the wrong track.
“It’s a pretty long story,” Kerstin said apologetically with a sigh. “I think I have to start from the beginning. If you’ve got time?”
“We’ve got all night,” said Sandra, who suddenly felt no need at all to regain her strength ahead of work the next day.
And then Kerstin told her the tale.
Of her past life of crime and her lover the bank robber who had been caught. About the departure from the destructive setting in Stockholm and the move to the countryside in Gotland, about the release and the laundered cash. Kerstin skipped the details about the crash, but described the days she spent waiting for her husband who never turned up and the time after she found out about the death: the grief, the loneliness, and how she was received when she moved to Visby. She explained how hard it had been to find a job, to find meaning in life, how she had come down in the world and eventually ended up with the social outcasts by the East Gate. Just to get out, to satisfy her need for people around her. How her name and personality had resulted in her nickname: Barbamama. She had chosen not to see it as a taunt, but thought it was meant with affection. Before long, it had been shortened to Nanna—as everyone in her surroundings now called her. A shoulder to cry on and an ear to listen.
Kerstin painted the picture of the whole thing with tenderness and unobtrusive suffering. Sandra couldn’t hold back her tears. But it wasn’t over yet, because what Sandra had heard thus far was merely the framework for a story that was far more important to Kerstin. That much Sandra grasped, but she also knew that Kerstin didn’t yet know how important the story about the fatal accident was to Sandra too.
“I’m sorry,” said Sandra, when Kerstin paused to light a cigarette. “I’m very sorry for everything you’ve had to go through. But I’m glad you’ve got friends.”
“Jeanette,” Kerstin said, resuming the conversation. “One of the girls on the bench. She tried to commit suicide on Midsummer’s Eve. They found a body down in Garde a while ago, but it was only on Friday that the papers reported who it was.”
“Peter Norling?” said Sandra, who realised they were approaching something important—something she might have missed.
“Yes,” Kerstin confirmed. “I knew that Jeanette wouldn’t take it very well. You see, Peter Norling was her lover.”
“At the time of the disappearance?”
“At the time of the disappearance.”
Sandra still wasn’t entirely clear what significance this held, but she had a strong feeling that it was important.
“His car was at the scene of the accident,” she felt compelled to say.
Now it was Kerstin’s turn to be surprised.
“How can you know that?” she asked.
“I passed the ravine just before it happened,” said Sandra. “I’ve realised that with your help. And when I read about the body being found, when I saw the picture of Norling’s car, I remembered that I happened to see that very car in the trees that afternoon. It might have been him who caused the accident. And took the photos.”
“No,” said Kerstin. “It was Jan Hallin who forced Karl-Erik off the road. And then did a runner.”
Sandra stopped breathing. Had it been the rapist who had thundered round the bend on the wrong side of the road while pissed after all? And met another car without giving an inch? Just like they had first believed, just like she had truly, truly wanted to believe. Before those photographs had messed it up for them, and got them to see a conspiracy instead of the obvious.
“It was Jeanette who took the photos and sent them to me,” Kerstin said. “Both she and Peter Norling were in that car. They didn’t cause the accident, but they left without telling anyone too. Without lifting a finger to save Karl-Erik’s life.”
“The shadow,” Sandra thought aloud. “It’s the shadow of Peter Norling that you can see in that photo. Not Hallin or anyone else.”
“Exactly,” said Kerstin.
“But why?” Sandra asked in agitation. “What drives a person—two people—to do something like that?”
“Greed,” Kerstin said with emphasis.
And then she repeated the part of the story about forbidden love and avarice, remorse, anxiety and longing, betrayal, hatred, and a death wish.
Jeanette’s story, in short. And she presented it without any subjectivity whatsoever. Honestly, plainly, and with the same feeling that she had told her own story.
“Does Jeanette know who you are?” Sandra asked carefully.
“No, she doesn’t know my real name—to her I’m just Nanna. And I haven’t revealed my identity. Not sure I’m going to, either. It depends.”
“On how you should approach this? And Jeanette?”
“Among other things,” Kerstin said thoughtfully. “I’m still thinking about it.”
“I’m not going to give you any advice,” said Sandra. “You’ll find the answer inside yourself somewhere.”
Kerstin said nothing in response to that, instead pointing out something that had already been occupying Sandra’s thoughts for some time.
“Jeanette was tormented by a guilty conscience and sent the photos to me. I sent them to Hallin with an implied threat that I would go to the police with what I knew. If he didn’t give me the money that I erroneously assumed he had stolen. Hallin didn’t have the money, but he was terrified that the police would catch wind of this—so what was he meant to do?”
“We thought he buried his head in the sand and hoped it would go away,” Sandra said contemplatively.
“Which it did,” Kerstin added. “Given that I didn’t dare remind him of the threat or put it into practice. But perhaps he interpreted it in another way.”
Sandra felt something take a deepening grip of her throat.
“If the root of the problem could be removed from the world . . .” she said, developing Kerstin’s reasoning. “Peter Norling.”
“My thoughts exactly,” said Kerstin. “It seems like too much of a coincidence that Peter Norling was murdered so soon after the hit-and-run that he witnessed. The only question is how Hallin was able to find out that Norling was there when the accident happened.”
“For the same reason that I did,” Sandra said slowly. “He passed the scene not long before the accident and noticed the car.”
Kerstin said nothing for a while, probably hoping that Sandra would finish what she had begun.
“Can you expand on that?” she eventually said.
Sandra thought the time might be right. That she and Kerstin had so much in common in this matter that they might as well tackle it together. For better or worse.
“I was in Hallin’s car when he passed the ravine the first time,” Sandra admitted resignedly. “I didn’t know him, had never met him before. But he offered me a lift home and I accepted. He was driving like a car thief, and seemed to be under the influence. And when he dropped me off, he drank more booze. And . . .”
“And . . .?” Kerstin said encouragingly.
“He raped me. Left me on the floor like a wet rag and left.”
“I’m . . . I’m truly sorry,” Kerstin said.
“It was only when you and I began talking that it dawned on me . . . what else he might have done that afternoon. Before you said that, I didn’t know who he was.”
“That was why you were so convinced he was the one who was responsible,” Kerstin said with a note of understanding. “You knew he was drunk and what he was capable of.”
“I knew that he left my house a few hundred metres from the scene of the accident at half past three with no passengers. So there’s the answer to your question. Finally.”
“I’m so sorry,” Kerstin repeated.
“You’re the only person other than Hallin who knows this, so I’d be grateful if this could remain between us.”
“Of course, don’t worry about it.”
“There’s a lot more to tell about this,” Sandra concluded. “But let’s do that another time. If you want. We’re not supposed to talk about me, after all.”
“Of course I’m interested,” Kerstin said enthusiastically. “We’re in this together now. He’d just raped a woman, was driving drunk, and caused the death of a person. It’s not all that surprising that a guy like that didn’t call an ambulance. Because that would have meant the police turning up too. He dodged a lot of years in prison that afternoon.”
“If he’s responsible for the murder of Peter Norling, then there will be a fair few more on top of that,” Sandra said, by way of reminder. She was struggling to let go of the thought.
“Somehow, we need to make sure that bastard gets put away,” Kerstin said with emphasis.
“We’re going to do it,” Sandra said. “But for now, I wonder whether you could help me out with something?”
“Help you?” Kerstin said in surprise.
“Consider it a job offer. I’ve got a couple of questions I need answers to as well.”