Watching You(25)

When the key was inserted into the lock he was somewhere else.

Berger only just managed to turn the torch off before the door opened. A figure slipped in, darker than the darkness for a couple of seconds until it reached the switch and sharp light stripped away his night vision.

The woman was wearing an off-white raincoat, and she was squinting towards the kitchen, as if she could sense something she couldn’t see. And when she turned slightly her snub nose came into view.

He grabbed his pistol and roared: ‘Nathalie Fredén! Hands on your head!’

She jumped. Yet she didn’t really jump. He would never seriously be able to analyse that feeling.

When she put her hands on her head he pulled out his mobile phone and took a picture. He didn’t really know why.

‘Who are you?’ she asked in her deep voice.

‘The dentist,’ Berger said.

Then the surveillance officers crashed in with their weapons raised. The younger one forced Nathalie Fredén down onto the floor. The older one did a quick pat-down.

Berger watched the inverted form of events. He saw them reflected in the kitchen window. All sound had disappeared; he didn’t hear a word of what the surveillance officers were shouting out in the hall. There was a strange rustling sound instead. It came from the almost bare aspen tree out in the courtyard. He looked at the remaining leaves. They were trembling. The aspen leaves were trembling hard in the rainstorm, sending their rustling song into his ears.

As if someone were trying to get through from another time.

Berger turned his gaze to the flat again. Returned from the badlands. One word took hold in his head. Micrometeorology. He met Nathalie Fredén’s crystal-clear gaze from where she lay on the floor. Then he said: ‘You’re very dry.’





13




They’ve run a long way, first along the increasingly desolate road from the bus stop, then out onto the meadow with the unfeasibly tall grass that is now thinning out to the point where the sparkle of the water is coming into view. He feels almost breathless as he gets closer to the fluttering golden-yellow hair slowing down in front of him.

As his mane of hair settles back into place, the boy turns round and is touched by a light so radiant he seems to be surrounded by a huge halo. It makes his face even more striking.

He’s never stopped being astonished at that face, will never stop being astonished.

They stand eye to eye and hug each other briefly, out of breath, panting. He leans over, hands on knees, can hardly get enough air, but he’s fifteen years old and his breathing is soon back to normal. When he looks up again, when his field of vision is no longer filled by green grass, he sees the other boy disappear into the copse by the shore, where the boathouse is, green-brown and ugly and quite wonderful.

He stumbles in that direction, hears the gulls screech in the distance, feels the high sea air sweep in and merge with the smell of grass. It carries a hint of decay on it.

He reaches the copse, makes his way through the increasingly tangled undergrowth, and there it is, the big boathouse. In one direction it stretches out into the lake, and there’s a door there; that’s where he sees the fluttering golden-yellow hair disappear. He heads to the other side, climbs up the always slippery rock to peer in through the window. It’s high because the boathouse stands on pillars, a short way off the ground.

It’s hard for him to find a foothold. The moss comes loose, taking his feet with it. In the end they find purchase. He stands still at last.

It’s tricky to see in. It’s completely dark inside the boathouse, and the window is extremely dirty. He can’t see anything at all. But he doesn’t give up. His sweaty hand gradually clears a small gap in the dirt. And in the end he can actually see in.

That’s when time stops.

That’s when it really does stop.





II





14




Monday 26 October, 22.06

Berger stepped inside. The door closed behind him. The room was extremely clinical. The woven wallpaper was as bland as the empty birch-veneer table. On a side table stood an unidentifiable piece of electronic equipment. There were no windows in the room, but there were two chairs. One of them was empty.

On the other sat Nathalie Fredén.

She was wearing the same simple, vaguely sporty clothes she had been wearing in her flat on Vidargatan, minus the off-white raincoat, and her clear blue eyes followed him the whole way from the door to the other chair. He sat down and studied her. It was only a few hours since they had last seen each other. Since then a prosecutor had been brought in and had instigated a preliminary investigation into her activities.

Without a word Berger removed a number of items from his rucksack. Three thick files, a laptop and a mobile phone. He opened one of the files and said as he leafed through its various contents: ‘I know you’re something of a mystery, and ordinarily that might have roused my interest. But right now I don’t give a damn about you. This is all about one thing. This.’

And he put a photograph down in front of her. It showed fifteen-year-old Ellen Savinger with a smile that hinted at a future of unlimited possibilities.

Berger watched Nathalie Fredén. She looked at the picture without the slightest change in her expression. Her face, which had shown itself to be so expressive before, registered no reaction whatsoever.