With determined steps Lilian ascended the last steps to the top floor, taking the tray to the guest room. That was where she installed Stig when he was sick. It wouldn’t do to have him moaning and groaning in the bedroom. If she was to take care of him properly, she had to get a good night’s sleep.
‘Dear?’ She cautiously pushed open the door. ‘Wake up now, I’m bringing you a little something. It’s your favourite: chicken soup.’
Stig wanly returned her smile. ‘I’m not hungry, maybe later,’ he said weakly.
‘Nonsense, you’ll never get well if you don’t eat properly. Come on, sit up a little and I’ll feed you.’
She helped him up to a half-sitting position and then sank down on the edge of the bed. As if he were a child, she fed him soup, wiping off any dribbles at the corners of his mouth.
‘See, that wasn’t so bad, was it? I know exactly what my darling needs, and if you just eat properly you’ll be back on your feet in no time, you’ll see.’
Once again the same weak smile in reply. Lilian helped him lie back down and pulled the blanket over his legs.
‘The doctor?’
‘But, sweetie, have you entirely forgotten? It’s Niclas who’s the doctor now, so we have our very own doctor right here in the house. I’m sure he’ll look in on you this evening. He just had to go over his diagnosis again, he said, and consult with a colleague in Uddevalla. It will all work out very soon, you’ll see.’
Lilian fussily tucked in her patient one last time and took the tray with the empty soup bowl. She headed for the stairs, shaking her head. Now she had to be a nurse as well, on top of everything else that needed her attention.
She heard a knock at the front door and hurried downstairs.
Patrik’s hand struck the door with a sharp rap. Around them the wind had come up quickly to gale force. Droplets of rain were landing on them, not from above but from behind, as the stormy gusts whipped up a fine mist from the ground. The sky had turned dark, its light-grey hue streaked with darker grey clouds, and the dirty brown of the sea was far from its summery blue sparkle, with whitecaps now scudding along. There were white geese on the sea, as Patrik’s mother used to say.
The door opened and both Patrik and Martin took deep breaths in order to summon extra reserves of strength. The woman standing before them was a head shorter than Patrik and very, very thin. She had short hair curled in a permanent wave and tinted to an indeterminate brown shade. Her eyebrows were a bit too severely plucked and had been replaced by a couple of lines drawn with a kohl pencil, which gave her a slightly comical look. But there was nothing funny about the situation they were now facing.
‘Hello, we’re from the police. We’re looking for Charlotte Klinga.’
‘She’s my daughter. What is this regarding?’
Her voice was a bit too shrill to be pleasant. Patrik had heard enough about Charlotte’s mother from Erica to know how trying it must be to listen to her all day long. But such trivial matters were about to lose any importance.
‘We’d appreciate it if you could tell her that we’d like to talk to her.’
‘Of course, but what’s this all about?’
Patrik insisted. ‘We would like to speak with your daughter first. If you wouldn’t mind —’ He was interrupted by footsteps on the stairs, and a second later he saw Charlotte’s familiar face appear in the doorway.
‘Well, hi, Patrik! How nice to see you! What are you doing here?’
All at once an expression of concern settled on her face. ‘Has something happened to Erica? I spoke to her recently and she sounded all right, I thought …’
Patrik held up his hand. Martin stood silently at his side with his eyes fixed on a knothole on the floor. He usually loved his job, but at the moment he was cursing the day he’d decided to become a cop.
‘May we come in?’
‘Now you’re making me nervous, Patrik. What’s happened?’ A thought struck her. ‘Is it Niclas, did he have an accident in the car, or something?’
‘Let’s go inside first.’
Since neither Charlotte nor her mother seemed capable of budging from the spot, Patrik took charge and led them into the kitchen with Martin bringing up the rear. He noted absently that they hadn’t taken off their shoes and were surely leaving wet footprints behind. But a little mud wouldn’t make much difference now.
He motioned to Charlotte and Lilian to take a seat across from them at the kitchen table, and they silently obeyed. Patrik and Martin sat down across from them.
‘I’m sorry, Charlotte, but I have …’ he hesitated, ‘terrible news for you.’ The words lurched stiffly out of his mouth. His choice of words already felt wrong, but was there any right way to say what he had to say?
‘An hour ago a lobsterman found a little girl drowned. I’m so, so sorry, Charlotte …’ Then he found himself incapable of going on. Even though the words were in his mind, they were so horrific that they refused to come out. But he didn’t need to say any more.
Charlotte gasped for breath with a wheezing, guttural sound. She grabbed the tabletop with both hands, as if to hold herself upright, and stared with empty eyes at Patrik. In the silence of the kitchen that single wheezing gasp seemed louder than a scream. Patrik swallowed to hold back the tears and keep his voice steady.
‘It must be a mistake. It couldn’t be Sara!’ Lilian looked wildly back and forth between Patrik and Martin, but Patrik only shook his head.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said again, ‘but I just saw the girl and there’s no doubt that it’s Sara.’
‘But she said she was just going over to Frida’s to play. I saw her heading that way. There must be some mistake. I’m sure she’s over there playing.’ As if in a trance Lilian got up and went over to the telephone on the wall. She checked the address book hanging next to it and briskly punched in the numbers.
‘Hello, Veronika, it’s Lilian. Listen, is Sara over there?’ She listened for a second and then dropped the receiver so it hung from the cord, swaying back and forth.
‘She hasn’t been there.’ She sat down heavily at the table and stared helplessly at the police officers facing her.
The shriek came out of nowhere, and both Patrik and Martin jumped. Charlotte was screaming, motionless, with eyes that didn’t seem to see. It was a loud, primitive, piercing sound. The raw pain that pitilessly forced out the scream gave both officers gooseflesh.
Lilian threw herself at her daughter, trying to put her arms round her, but Charlotte brusquely batted her away.
Patrik tried to talk over the