CHAPTER 6

Göran Wrath met her in the foyer of police headquarters. He smelled of tobacco, and on the way up to his office he told her that in his youth he had dreamed of searching for bones. She wasn't sure what he meant – it was only when they had sat down at his cluttered desk that she received an explanation. As a student he had been fascinated by the Leakey family who devoted their time to digging for human fossils, and if they sometimes failed to find humans, at least they discovered hominids in the deep canyons in East Africa known as the Rift Valley.

Wrath removed a mountain of documents from his desk and keyed a number into his telephone that would block incoming calls.

'I used to dream about it. Deep down I knew I would become a police officer. But, nevertheless, I used to dream about finding what was then called "the missing link". When did apes become humans? Or perhaps one ought to rephrase that and ask: when did humans stop being apes? Now and then when I get time, I try to read up on all the latest discoveries that have been made in recent years. But it becomes increasingly obvious to me that the only missing links I'm going to find are to do with my police work.'

He stopped abruptly, as if he had let slip a secret by mistake. Louise observed him with a vague feeling of sadness. She was sitting opposite a man with an unfulfilled dream. The world was full of middle-aged men like Göran Wrath. In the end, the dream became no more than a pale reflection of what had once been a burning passion.

What had her dream been? Nothing at all, really. Archaeology had been her first passion after the giantlike Emil had let her go and she had travelled a couple of hundred miles north in order to shake him off and become a normal person again. It often seemed to her that her life had taken shape when the little train stopped at Rätansbyn, halfway between Östersund and Sveg, where they were due to meet their southbound counterpart. There was a hot-dog stall at the side of the station building. Everybody seemed to be overcome by extreme pangs of hunger when the train came to a halt. Whoever was last in the queue might have to go hungry – either because the stall had run out of sausages, or because the train was about to leave.

She had not joined in the mad rush for the hot-dog stall. She had remained in her seat, and it was then she had resolved to become an archaeologist. She had considered taking the long course to become a doctor: specialising in children's illnesses was also a tempting possibility. But as darkness fell, she had made up her mind that night at Rätansbyn. It seemed an obvious choice to make, there was no longer any doubt about it. She would devote her life to hunting down the past. She pictured herself working on the front line, doing the actual digging; but she also had a vague idea that her future might just as well lie in searching for secrets in old manuscripts, reinterpreting the facts that had been established by previous generations of archaeologists.

On all sides she was surrounded by people chewing away at sausages with mustard and ketchup, and a strange feeling of peace enveloped her. She knew.

Göran Wrath had left the room and returned with a cup of coffee. She had declined his offer to bring one for her. She settled down on her chair with the feeling that she would need to put up a fight.

He spoke to her in a friendly tone of voice, as if she were a close friend of his.

'There is nothing to suggest that your son was murdered.'

'I want to know every detail.'

'We don't know every detail yet. It takes time to root out everything that has occurred when a person dies unexpectedly. Death is a complicated business. Probably the most complicated and hard to grasp process that life has to offer. We know a lot more about how a human being is created than we know about how life comes to an end.'

'I'm talking about my son! Not some foetus or other, or an old man in a care home!'

Afterwards, she wondered if Göran Wrath had expected her outburst. He must have been in this position many times before – faced with desperate parents who could not have their child back but nevertheless wanted some form of redress, no matter how pointless it might seem. Not wanting to be classified as a bad parent, not wanting to be accused of being remiss.

Wrath opened a plastic folder on the desk in front of him.

'There is no answer,' he said. 'There ought to have been. I can only apologise. Due to a series of unfortunate circumstances, the test results have been destroyed and have to be done again. Doctors and lab technicians are hard at work. They are meticulous, they need time. But the first thing we need to do, of course, is to establish that no outside party was involved. And there wasn't.'

'Henrik was not the suicidal type.'

Wrath looked at her hard and long before answering.

'My father was called Hugo Wrath. Everybody considered him to be the most cheerful person in the world. He was always laughing, he loved his family. Every morning he would set off for his job as a typographer for Dagens Nyheter in a cheerful mood. Nevertheless he unexpectedly committed suicide at the age of forty-nine. He had seen the birth of his first grandchild, and he had received a pay rise. He had just concluded a long-running dispute with his sisters and hence was the sole owner of a holiday home on Utö. I was eleven at the time, still a little boy. He always used to come in and give me a hug before I fell asleep. One Tuesday morning he got up as usual, had breakfast, read the morning paper, was in a good mood as usual, hummed a tune as he fastened his shoes, and gave my mum a kiss before leaving. Then he set off on his bike. The same route as usual. But just before he came to Torsgatan, he turned off. He didn't go to work at all. He left town altogether. Somewhere in Sollentuna he branched off into country lanes that led into the forest. There's a scrapyard there that you can see clearly as you approach Arlanda airport. He parked his bicycle and disappeared into the scrap metal. They eventually found him on the back seat of an old Dodge. He had lain down there, taken a huge overdose of sleeping tablets, and died. I can remember the funeral. Obviously, the shock over his death was immense. But the most painful aspect nevertheless was not knowing why. The whole funeral was dominated by that mysterious, painful 'why'. Nobody said a word at the gathering for coffee afterwards.'

Louise felt provoked. Her son had nothing to do with Göran Wrath's father.

Wrath understood her reaction. He leafed through the file on the desk in front of him, although he already knew what was in it.

'There is no explanation for why Henrik died. The only thing we are certain of is that there was no obvious physical violence.'

'I could see that myself.'

'There's nothing to suggest that another person caused his death.'

'What do the doctors have to say?'

'That there is no simple explanation. Which shouldn't surprise anybody. When a young, healthy person dies suddenly, there has to be something unexpected behind what happened. We'll find out eventually.'

'What?'

Wrath shook his head.

'Some little part stops working. When some minor connection or other is broken it can cause just as much damage as when a dam wall collapses or when a volcano erupts without warning. The medics are looking for clues.'

'Something odd must have happened. Something unnatural.'

'Why do you think that? Explain to me.'

Wrath's voice had changed. She could detect a trace of impatience in his question.

'I knew my son. He was a happy person.'

'What is a happy person?'

'I don't want to talk about your father. I'm talking about Henrik. He did not die willingly.'

'But nobody killed him. Either he died of natural causes, or he took his own life. Our pathologists are very thorough. We shall know the answer before long.'

'And then?'

'What do you mean?'

'When they have failed to find an explanation?'

The silence bounced back and forth between them.

'I'm sorry that I can't help you any more just now.'

'Nobody can help me.'

Louise stood up abruptly.

'There is no explanation. There is no missing link, no faulty connection. Henrik died because somebody else wanted him to die, not himself.'

Göran Wrath accompanied her to the entrance. They parted without saying a word.

* * *

Louise went to the car and drove out of Stockholm. Just before reaching Sala she stopped in a lay-by, tipped back her seat and fell asleep.

Vassilis appeared in her dreams. He insisted that he had nothing to do with Henrik's death.

Louise woke up and continued her journey northwards. That dream was a message, she thought. I dreamed about Vassilis, but in fact I was dreaming about myself. I was trying to convince myself that I hadn't abandoned Henrik. But I didn't listen to him as much as I ought to have done.

She stopped at Orsa for something to eat. A group of young men wearing football shirts – or maybe they were ice-hockey shirts – were laughing and shouting at a nearby table. She felt an urge to tell them about Henrik and ask them to be quiet. Then she started crying. A potbellied lorry driver stared at her. Louise shook her head and he looked away. She saw that he was carefully filling in some kind of betting slip or football coupon, and she hoped he would win.

It was evening by the time she came to the neverending forests. She thought she caught a glimpse of an elk in a clear-felled patch. She stopped and got out of the car. She thought hard in an attempt to find something she had overlooked.

Henrik did not die a natural death. Somebody killed him. The red soil under his shoes, the memory books, his sudden happiness. What is it that I can't see? Perhaps the shards fit together, even if I can't see how.

She stopped again in Noppikoski, when she felt so tired, she could not possibly drive any further.

She dreamed about Greece again, but this time Vassilis only appeared as a shadowy figure on the periphery. She was at the site of a dig when there was a sudden landslide. She was buried underneath the rubble, she was terrified and just as she found herself unable to breathe any more, she woke up.

She carried on driving north. This last dream had an obvious explanation.

It was late at night by the time she reached Sveg. She could see a light in the kitchen as she turned into the forecourt. Her father was still up, as usual. As she had done so many times before, she wondered how he had managed to survive all these years despite having so little sleep.

He was sitting at the kitchen table, greasing some of his carving tools. He did not seem surprised at her coming home in the middle of the night.

'Are you hungry?'

'I had a meal in Orsa.'

'That's a long way away.'

'I'm not hungry.'

'OK, I won't mention it again.'

She sat down on her usual chair, smoothed out the tablecloth and reported on what had happened. When she had finished, neither spoke for a long time.

'Perhaps Wrath is right,' he said eventually. 'Let's see if they can come up with an explanation.'

'I don't think they're doing everything they could do. They're not really interested in Henrik. One young man among thousands who's suddenly discovered dead in his bed.'

'You're being unfair.'

'I know I'm being unfair. But that's how I feel.'

'I suppose we'll have to wait and see what they say, anyway.'

Louise knew he was right. The truth about what had happened, about what had caused Henrik's death, would never be discovered if they refused to consider the postmortem examination.

Louise was tired. She was about to stand up and go to bed when Artur held her back.

'I've had another go at finding Aron.'

'Have you traced him?'

'No. But I've made an effort, at least. I've been in touch with our embassy in Canberra again, and talked to a few people at the friendship society. But nobody has ever heard of Aron Cantor. Are you sure he's living in Australia?'

'Nobody can be sure of anything as far as Aron is concerned.'

'It would be sad if he didn't find out what had happened and hence couldn't be present at the funeral.'

'Maybe he doesn't want to be there? Maybe he doesn't want us to find him at all?'

'Surely he would want to be there?'

'You don't know Aron.'

'You could be right about that. You hardly gave me a chance to meet him.'

'What do you mean by that?'

'There's no need to get het up. You know I'm right.'

'You're not right at all. I never got in the way of you and Aron.'

'It's too late at night for an argument like this.'

'It isn't an argument. It's a pointless conversation. Thank you for taking the trouble, but Aron won't be coming to the funeral.'

'Nevertheless, I think we ought to keep on looking.'

Louise made no reply. And Artur stopped talking about Aron.

Aron was not present at the funeral of his son, Henrik Cantor, in the Lutheran church in Sveg two weeks later. After the notice of Henrik's death had appeared, a lot of people contacted Nazrin, who was a big help to Louise during those difficult weeks. Many of Henrik's friends, most of whom Louise had never heard of, had said they would like to be present at the funeral. But Härjedalen was too far away. Nazrin had suggested a memorial service in Stockholm after the burial. Louise realised that she ought to meet Henrik's friends, who might be able to help her find an explanation of his death; but she did not feel up to anything more than the funeral. She asked Nazrin to keep a record of everybody who made enquiries.

The funeral took place on Wednesday, 20 October, at one o'clock. Nazrin arrived the day before, accompanied by another girl by the name of Vera who, if Louise understood the situation correctly, had also had a relationship with Henrik. There would be very few people present at the funeral. It seemed like a huge betrayal of Henrik and all the people he had known during his life. But there was no possible alternative to the arrangements they had made.

Louise and Artur had quarrelled vehemently over who should conduct the funeral. Louise had insisted that Henrik would not have wanted the ceremony to be carried out by a vicar, but Artur thought that his grandson may have been interested in spiritual matters. Who was there in Sveg who could carry off a worthy ceremony for Henrik? Nyblom, the vicar, was not an overzealous preacher of God's word and usually expressed himself in simple, everyday terms. He could be persuaded to omit God and sanctity from the funeral service.

Louise gave way. She lacked the strength to fight a battle. She felt weaker for each day that passed.

Göran Wrath phoned on Tuesday, 19 October. He informed Louise that the post-mortem had established that the cause of death had been barbiturate poisoning, a big overdose of sleeping tablets. He apologised once more for the length of time it had taken. Louise listened to what he had to say in a sort of trance. She knew that he would not dream of giving her this information unless it was a clear and incontestable outcome. He promised to send her all the documentation, expressed his sympathy once more, and told her that the investigation was now at an end. The police had nothing more to say, no prosecutor would need to be consulted as suicide had been confirmed.

When Louise told Artur what Wrath had said, he commented: 'Well, that's it confirmed.'

Louise knew that Artur did not believe this. He would worry about it endlessly. Why had Henrik decided to take his own life? Assuming that really was what had happened.

Nazrin and Vera could not believe either that what Wrath had told them was the truth. Nazrin said: 'If he was going to commit suicide he would have done it in some other way. Not in his bed, with sleeping tablets. That would have been too wimpish for Henrik.'

Louise awoke on the morning of 20 October and saw that there had been a frost during the night. She went down to the railway bridge and stood for ages leaning over the rail, staring into the black water below, just as black as the earth into which Henrik's coffin would shortly be lowered. Louise had been adamant on that point. Henrik should not be cremated, his body should be delivered into the ground. She stared down into the river and remembered standing at the very same spot when she had been young and unhappy, and perhaps even thought of taking her own life. It was as if Henrik were standing by her side. He would not have jumped either. He would have clung on to life, he would not have let go.

She stood on the bridge for a long time in the earlymorning hours.

Today I am about to bury my only child. I shall never have another child. Henrik's coffin contains a vital part of my life. A part that will never return.

The coffin was brown, decked with roses, no wreaths. The organist played Bach, and a piece by Scarlatti that he had suggested himself. The vicar spoke calmly, without fuss, and God was not present in the church. Louise sat beside Artur; on the other side of the coffin were Nazrin and Vera. Louise appeared to observe the whole funeral ceremony from a great distance. Nevertheless, she was the one that it was for. You could not feel sorry for the deceased. The dead cry no more. But Louise? She was a ruin. However, some arches inside her remained undamaged, and she was determined to preserve them.

Nazrin and Vera left early to begin their long bus ride back to Stockholm. But Nazrin promised to keep in touch, and said that when Louise felt up to emptying Henrik's flat in Stockholm, she would be pleased to help.

That evening Louise sat in the kitchen with Artur and a bottle of vodka. He drank it to accompany his coffee, Louise watered it down with lemonade. As if by silent agreement, they both drank themselves silly. By about ten o'clock they were slumped hollow-eyed over the kitchen table.

'I'm leaving tomorrow.'

'Going back?'

'Isn't everybody always going back to somewhere? I'm going to Greece. I must finish my work there. What happens after that, I have no idea.'

The next day, well before dawn, he drove her to Östersund airport. The ground had a thin covering of powdery snow. Artur took her hand and urged her to be careful. She could see he was trying to think of something else to say, but couldn't. As she sat back on the flight to Arlanda, she thought he would doubtless start work later that day on carving Henrik's face into one of his trees.

She caught the 7.55 flight from Arlanda to Frankfurt, intending to continue from there to Athens. But when she arrived in Frankfurt it seemed that all the decisions she had made collapsed. She cancelled her flight to Athens.

She knew now what she had to do. Artur had been neither right nor wrong, her concession had nothing to do with him. It was her own decision, her own insight into the reality of the situation.

Aron. He existed. He must exist.

She managed to catch the 9.50 Qantas flight to Sydney. The last thing she did before leaving was to ring one of her colleagues in Greece and say that she was not in a position to return there yet.

Another journey, another meeting would have to take place first.

Sitting next to her on the flight was an unaccompanied child, a little girl oblivious to everything around her. The only thing she had eyes for was her doll, a strange mixture of an elephant and an old lady.

Louise Cantor gazed out of the window.

Aron. He existed. He must exist.