Manfred

Berit pours more tea for me, Malin and Hanne. Outside the window the sun is lowering itself over Ormberg, making space for the shadows, the darkness.

‘I am so happy for you,’ Hanne says again, laying her hand over mine.

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Although she’s only been awake for two days, so we don’t really know to what extent she will recover. What we do know is that there is a lot of hard work left. Physical therapy, speech therapy and so on.’

I think of my visit to the hospital this morning. How I looked straight into Nadja’s brown eyes and she into mine.

She opened her mouth as if she wanted to say something, but there were no words, even though the tube in her throat is gone and the little hole has been stitched up.

But she blinked.

My child can blink again. Blink and look me in the eye. And in her gaze I could clearly see that she was still in there, that she wasn’t just a shell.

The doctors say that the first examinations indicate problems with speech and with motor skills on the right side of the body.

But that hardly matters.

I don’t care if Nadja ends up deaf, mute, or disabled.

All I care about is that she is alive. That my child, who fell out of the window, onto the hard tarmac, is actually alive.

That we – who were a normal family up until that morning that separated then from now as with the cut of an axe – will have our life back.

I see Pernilla Stenberg’s distraught face in my mind’s eye.

Not everyone is as lucky as I am. Not everyone gets their child back.

Though my colleagues have searched Marholmen for almost two days by now, Samuel Stenberg has not been found. And though I haven’t said it out loud to Pernilla I am certain: Samuel is gone. He’s lying somewhere on the bottom of the ocean, wrapped in chains just like those we found in the boathouse.

It’s a strange coincidence, a sort of poetic justice maybe, that the woman who called herself Rachel also drowned, wrapped in chains. Because when the divers brought her body to the surface it was too late, far too late.

Susanne Bergdorff was gone.

By the way, the boat that Malin took, the one that was in Susanne’s boathouse, belonged to Victor Carlgren, or more accurately the Carlgren family. We don’t know why Susanne didn’t use it to escape, but likely she thought it would be easier to escape unnoticed if she swam.

With the help of Susanne’s email, messages and notes we have made ourselves a pretty clear picture of what happened. Young men were lured in by Susanne with promises of work, but instead they ended up drugged. They likely died from malnutrition and dehydration. The forensic toxicology report also showed that the victims had high levels of opioids and other drugs in their tissue.

The forensics team also found hair and traces of blood in the wheelbarrow, so we have drawn the conclusion that Susanne Bergdorff wheeled the bodies from Jonas’s room to the deck in the wheelbarrow. After that she rolled them over the edge – which resulted in severe contusions. Once down on the jetty she wrapped them in fabric and chains. Then she transported the bodies out to sea where she sank them.

She likely used Birger Jämtmark’s old boat, the same boat that she swam to before taking her own life. That Johannes Ahonen had Victor Carlgren’s DNA under his nails was likely due to Ahonen scratching him at some point when they were both at Rachel’s. We still don’t know who the boy Samuel was taking care of was, but if we’re lucky we will find the body, which will aid us in identifying him.

When it comes to Olle Berg the picture is less clear.

He was, as far as we know, Rachel’s boyfriend.

Perhaps he tried to stop her and paid with his life, perhaps he was the first victim, before Rachel realised she could target young male aides.

‘So, you want help understanding?’ Hanne says hesitantly, bringing both her hands to her head, taming the long unruly curls with nimble fingers, shaping her hair into a loose bun at her neck.

And then: ‘That’s what everyone wants. To understand. Every time an unfathomable terrible crime has happened people want to understand. But sometimes that isn’t possible. Sometimes there is no logic to explain the horrors that we humans subject each other to.’

‘But if you were to try?’ I say, because I know that Hanne loves it when I draw her hypotheses out of her.

‘Show me those diary entries,’ Hanne says.

I take out the folder of papers and find the copies from Rachel’s diary that we found in the house. Mainly it contains short notes on what medicines she gave the boys, how they were doing and trends in the numbers of followers on her blog. But in a couple of places she has written personal reflections.

‘Here,’ I say and give Hanne a copy of a page from the diary.

We read it in silence.

Last night I dreamed of Skrållan – our grey speckled cat that we got when I was eight. And it was JUST like being back that day when it all happened. It was as if it all happened again, but in my dream. I sat with Skrållan in my lap. Wanted her to stay there so that I could pet that furry little body for a while longer. But when I did, when I grabbed the thin little cat leg, something went wrong. There was a sound like pulling a cork out of a small bottle and the leg ended up at a strange angle.

I ran to get Dad. Said that Skrållan had caught her leg when she was jumping off the bookshelf.

Dad examined Skrållan and after he had determined that something really WAS wrong we took her to the vet. The nurse patted me on the head and said that I was a really good young owner to have discovered what was wrong with Skrållan. She got me ice cream and held my hand while the vet examined the cat.

The vet also nodded appreciatively when I told her what had happened. Said that she wished all owners of animals were like me. That they noticed when their animals weren’t feeling well and sought care immediately. If they did a lot of suffering could be avoided.

In school I told the story over and over again.

My schoolmates stood in a ring around me. Nobody called me ugly or fat anymore. The teacher also wanted to hear the story and in the end I drew several drawings that illustrated what had happened. The teacher put them up on the wall and they must have hung there for several years, because I recall that they were still there when I left primary school.

‘Very interesting,’ Hanne says, making some notes on her pad.

‘Would you agree that she was a sadistic psychopath?’ Malin asks.

Hanne hesitates before answering.

‘I’m not so sure about that.’

‘There is one more passage I think you should read,’ I say and dig out the other page.

A girl who follows my blog emailed me and wanted to send me a pie! Really, a PIE! It’s just like with André. Every last neighbour showed up on our doorstep with a pie or a bag of buns when he got sick. They mowed our lawn, shovelled snow, pruned our trees.

It was like standing in the sun.

But after a while that passed.

I guess people found other tragedies to take an interest in – cancer-stricken mothers of young children, children in wheelchairs. The crippled and maimed. The childless. The paralysed. The dying. All those who STOLE attention from André and me – because NOBODY was interested in someone with ‘a bit of MS’ anymore when the neighbour had liver cancer and two months left to live.

All I wanted was to stand in the sun again, for a little while. Feel that warmth and love that shone on me.

Hanne takes her reading glasses off and wipes a sweaty strand of hair from her forehead. Nods slowly and puts the paper down on the worn wooden table. Her gaze makes its way out of the window, towards the lush vegetable garden. Her expression is focused and a bit sad and at once I think she looks old.

‘André – was that her husband?’ she asks.

I nod and put the sheet back in my folder.

‘Can I have another look at the blog?’

‘Sure,’ I say, pushing the laptop over to her.

Hanne spends a long time scrolling through the posts again. Once in a while she hums and nods slowly.

‘Just like I suspected,’ she mumbles.

‘What?’ I ask.

‘Susanne Bergdorff started her blog after her son was in the accident. She quickly acquired a large number of followers. A seriously injured child against the backdrop of the archipelago was apparently an irresistible concept. This is what I find interesting.’

She points at the numbers that show how many likes and comments the various posts have.

Malin and I lean in to see better.

‘Initially she wrote that her son was recovering,’ Hanne says. ‘That he was showing clear signs of waking up. And then what happens? The number of comments and likes decrease drastically. Nobody wants to read about a regular, healthy boy. It looks like what people wanted was the grief, the disease, the misery. And then he gets worse, as if by chance, and the blog’s following explodes. And then . . .’

‘What?’ Malin asks.

‘Then Susanne is the centre of attention,’ Hanne says and smiles sadly. ‘The sun is shining on her again, just like she described in her diary entries.’

None of us say anything.

‘I think we have to consider the possibility that Susanne was driven by getting more and more followers and likes,’ Hanne says quietly. ‘And that people at home really liked what she had to offer, that her . . . misery sustained them. And in that game, the dance that emerged between her and her followers, a number of people had to pay with their lives.’

A cold chill runs down my spine and I remember Malin’s comment about that group of rubberneckers who were photographing the accident.

What the hell is wrong with people?

Then I think of Afsaneh, who photographed Nadja and posted the pictures on a forum for parents of sick children. And of Martin, Afsaneh’s old colleague, who claimed with absolute certainty that the incidence of narcissistic personality traits had increased exponentially since the 1980s. That people were prepared to do anything for digital validation.

‘What are you saying?’ I ask. ‘Do you think Susanne hurt her son on purpose?’

‘Yes,’ Hanne says calmly. ‘Her son and probably her husband too. And after that she began to seek out new victims. She was the lion and the lamb. She cared for her victims and hurt them too, just like in the poem. It all checks out. And it all began with the cat. That incident planted a seed in her. Then her parents fell ill and died. Perhaps she cared for them too. Perhaps that enhanced these tendencies. Much later her husband became sick and Susanne helped care for him. She was motivated as well as competent, by dint of her degree in pharmacy. And once again she got a lot of validation, from healthcare workers as well as friends, both online and in real life. So she hurt him so she could stay there in the sunshine. I don’t think she meant to kill him but that is what happened.’

‘And then the pattern repeated with her son,’ Malin whispers.

‘Yes,’ Hanne says. ‘With the difference that Susanne had created a blog and accounts on several social media platforms. And the sicker her son is, the more likes and followers she gets. So she takes matters into her own hands. Makes sure he gets a bit worse. We can probably assume he died eventually, as a result of her . . . treatment.’

Hanne pauses.

‘That is so fucking horrible,’ Malin murmurs, buries her head in her hands and lets out a sob.

‘When Jonas died she felt a void so great it couldn’t be contained,’ Hanne continues without taking any note of Malin’s reaction. ‘For reasons we may never know she replaced her son with his home aide. And after that she began to repeat the behaviour.’

‘Hey, look at this!’

She scrolls to a post from seven months ago.

Now the council has decided that we will only get three hours of home help a day. Due to this neither I nor my partner can work full-time anymore. Help us by sending us money via the link below. No contribution is too small! Thanks in advance to all the amazing people who will help us cope!!

‘She asked for money online and defrauded the authorities by cashing in various types of subsidies,’ Hanne murmurs. ‘I guess we will see what kinds of sums were involved, but that may have been an incentive for her to find new boys to play the role of Jonas.’

Malin lifts her head and wipes a few tears off her cheek.

‘I’m sorry,’ she whispers. ‘But what kind of a person does that?’

‘Someone who is disturbed,’ Hanne says calmly, smiles and sips her hot tea. ‘Someone deeply disturbed. She was extremely manipulative too. Lied about almost everything, as I understand it. That indicates that she had antisocial traits.’

None of us say anything. The idea of hurting people, your own child even, in order to achieve online fame is so extreme that it is almost impossible to understand.

‘If you want a diagnosis I can give you one,’ Hanne says and taps her pen lightly against the table.

I nod.

‘Münchausen by proxy,’ she continues, looking pleased. ‘Well, that’s when someone hurts a person, often one’s child, and then seeks help in order to appear as the saviour. The killer is validated by the attention he or she gets. This perpetuates and enhances the pathological behaviour. I imagine this is also true of attention one gets online. Perhaps we have just seen the first case of Münchausen by proxy online, or whatever you would like to call it. But not the last, because we are on our way into a completely new era, that much I know although I am old.’

She pauses and her gaze wanders to the ceiling.

Malin’s phone rings.

‘Sorry,’ she says, gets up and goes into the next room to answer.

‘It is too bad that she died,’ Hanne says, almost to herself. ‘It would have been very interesting to meet her.’

Malin comes back with her phone in her hand.

‘They found another body.’

‘Samuel?’ I say and feel my last hope fade.

But Malin shakes her head.

‘No, this person died many months ago.’

‘Jonas?’

Malin nods.

‘They think so. And guess where they found him?’

I shake my head.

‘Under the fucking rose garden. She buried him under her flower bed, or grew flowers on his grave. Regardless I guess she wanted to keep him close.’