The Stonecutter. Camilla Lackberg

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      She was spinning through space. Free-falling among the planets and other heavenly bodies that spread a soft glow all around as she sped past them. Dream scenes were mixed with small glimpses of reality. In her dreams she saw Sara. She was smiling. Her little baby body had been so perfect. Alabaster white with long, sensitive fingers on the tiny hands. Already in the first minutes of life she had grabbed hold of Charlotte’s index finger and held on as if it were her only anchor in this frightening new world. And maybe it was. For her daughter’s firm grip on her index finger would become an even harder grip around her heart in the days to come. A grip that even then she had known would last a lifetime.

      Now she passed the sun on her path across the heavens, and its dazzling light reminded her of the colour of Sara’s hair. Red like fire. Red like the Devil himself, someone had said in jest, and she remembered in her dream that she hadn’t appreciated that joke. There was nothing devilish about the child lying in her arms. Nothing devilish about the red hair that had at first stood straight up like a punk-rocker’s, but with the years had grown long and thick till it tumbled down her shoulders.

      But now the nightmare pushed away both the feeling of the child’s fingers round her heart and the sight of the red hair that bounced on Sara’s narrow shoulders when she hopped about, full of life. Instead she saw her hair dark with water, the strands floating round Sara’s head like a misshapen halo. It was waving to and fro, and below she saw long green arms of seaweed reaching out for it. Even the sea had found pleasure in her daughter’s red hair, claiming it for its own. In her nightmare she saw the alabaster white darken to blue and purple, and Sara’s eyes were closed and dead. Ever so slowly the girl began to turn in the water, with her toes pointed to the sky and her hands clasped over her stomach. Then the speed increased, and when she was spinning so fast that a small backwash was formed on the grey water, the green arms withdrew. The girl opened her eyes. They were completely, utterly white.

      The shriek that woke her seemed to come from a deep abyss. Not until she felt Niclas’s hands on her shoulders, shaking her hard, did she realize that it was her own voice. For an instant relief washed over her. All that evil had been a dream. Sara was alive and well; it was only a nightmare playing a nasty trick on her. But then she looked into Niclas’s eyes, and what she saw made a new scream build up in her breast. He forestalled this by pulling her close to him, so that the scream metamorphosed into deep sobs. His shirt was wet in front and she tasted the unfamiliar salt of his tears.

      ‘Sara, Sara,’ she moaned. Even though she was now awake she was still in freefall through space. The only thing holding her back was the pressure of Niclas’s arms round her body.

      ‘I know, I know.’ He rocked her, his voice thick.

      ‘Where have you been?’ she sobbed quietly, but he just kept rocking her and stroking her hair with a trembling hand.

      ‘Shh, I’m here now. Go back to sleep …’

      ‘I can’t!’

      ‘Yes you can. Shh …’ And he rocked her rhythmically until the darkness and the dreams again descended upon her.

      The news had spread through the police station while they were out. Dead children were a rarity, the victims of the occasional, rare car accident, perhaps. Nothing else could cast such a pall of sadness over the whole building.

      Annika gave Patrik a questioning look when he and Martin passed the reception desk, but he didn’t feel like talking to anyone. He just wanted to go to his office and close the door. They ran into Ernst Lundgren in the corridor but he didn’t say anything either, so Patrik quickly slipped into the silence of his little den and Martin did the same. There was nothing in their professional training that prepared any of them for situations like this. Informing someone of a death was one of the most odious tasks of their profession. Informing parents of the death of a child was worse than anything else. It defied all sense and all decency. No one should have to be forced to deliver such news.

      Patrik sat down at his desk, rested his head in his hands, and closed his eyes. Soon he opened his eyes again, because all he could see in the dark behind his eyelids was Sara’s bluish, pale skin and the eyes that stared unseeing at the sky. Instead he picked up the picture frame that stood before him and brought the glass as close to his face as possible. The first picture of Maja. Exhausted and bruised, resting in Erica’s arms in the maternity ward. Ugly yet beautiful, in that unique way that only those who have seen their child for the first time can understand. And Erica, worn out and smiling feebly, but with a new sense of resolve and pride over having accomplished something that could only be described as a miracle.

      Patrik knew that he was being sentimental and maudlin. But it was only now, this morning, that he had understood the scope of the responsibility that had been placed in his hands with his daughter’s birth. Only now did he realize the extent of both his love and his fear. When he saw the drowned girl lying like a statue on the deck of the boat, for a moment he wished that Maja had never been born. Because how could he live with the risk of losing her?

      He carefully put the photograph back on his desk and leaned back in his chair with his hands clasped behind his head. It suddenly felt utterly meaningless to continue with the tasks he’d been working on before they got the call from Fjällbacka. Most of all he wanted to drive home, crawl into bed and pull the covers over his head for the rest of the day. A knock on the door interrupted his dismal ruminations. ‘Come in,’ he assented and Annika cautiously pushed open the door.

      ‘Hi, Patrik, excuse me for disturbing you. But I just wanted to tell you that Forensic Medicine rang and said they’d received the body. We’ll have the autopsy report the day after tomorrow.’

      Patrik gave a weary nod. ‘Thanks, Annika.’

      She hesitated. ‘Did you know her?’

      ‘Yes, I’ve met the girl, Sara, and her mother quite a few times lately. Charlotte and Erica have been spending a good deal of time together since Maja was born.’

      ‘How do you think it happened?’

      He sighed and fidgeted absently with the papers before him without looking up. ‘She drowned, as I’m sure you heard. Apparently she went down to the wharf to play, fell in the water, and then couldn’t get out. The water is so cold that she probably got hypothermia very quickly. But driving out to tell Charlotte, that was the most terrible …’ His voice broke and he turned away so that Annika wouldn’t see how the tears threatened to spill out of his eyes.

      She tactfully closed the door to his office and left him in peace. She wasn’t going to get much done on a day like this, either.

      Erica looked at the clock again. Charlotte should have been here half an hour ago. She carefully shifted Maja, who was snoozing at her breast, and reached for the telephone. It rang many СКАЧАТЬ