with a click.
“Fantastic,” she murmured as the taxi swung out onto the cobblestones.
“What did you say?” Karl asked, looking out the window.
“The concert was fantastic. The best I’ve heard in a long time. Makes me happy.”
“Yes, it is one of the most played pieces in the entire piano repertoire.”
“I understand why.”
“Rachmaninoff, hard to beat.”
“Yes.”
He looked at the snowdrifts. As the car turned to the right, he turned his gaze up to the garlands that hung over the street, watching the thousands of lights swaying back and forth.
“It’s the second Sunday of Advent this week,” Margaretha murmured. “And Christmas soon...”
She said it quietly, but he heard her.
“Yes? And what about it?”
She didn’t answer at first, as if she were biding her time. Then came the question he had expected. “Maybe it’s time to invite her over?”
He looked at his wife, saw how she was hugging her purse and knew that she was waiting for his reaction.
“For Christmas, yes,” he replied.
“Or earlier, maybe even this Saturday so that we could...”
He held his hand up, signaling that he’d heard enough.
“Please, Karl.”
“No.”
“But I don’t want to wait until Christmas, and I think it’s a good idea if we...”
“She hasn’t called.”
“But I’ve called her.”
He glared at her, making Margaretha hug her purse even more tightly.
“Have you spoken with her?” he asked.
“Yes, and you should, too. It’s been a long time since you did,” she said, adding his name. “Karl.”
He cleared his throat.
“I don’t want to hear any more,” he said.
“So we should just leave her alone?”
“Yes.”
“But I don’t want to.”
“That’s enough! If you want to see her, do it. Invite her over. Do what you want! But leave me out of it!”
There it was again. The anger, irritation. He surprised himself with it. He heard her sigh but didn’t care.
He turned his gaze back to the window.
Back to the swaying lights.
* * *
Jana Berzelius opened her inbox and glanced through new emails that she had received during the late afternoon. The first was from Torsten Granath, an invitation to the regional prosecutorial chamber’s traditional Christmas dinner at the Göta Hotel in Borensberg. The next two were regarding a hearing about an assault at a pub, to be held at Norrköping’s district court within a week. The last one contained a two-page document that had to do with an amendment decision in the Swedish Prosecution Authority statute book.
Twenty minutes later, she turned off her computer and walked slowly into her bedroom, taking off her clothes, folding them and putting them on a chair. She turned on the light in her walk-in closet and stood before the mirror that stretched from the floor to the ceiling. She pushed her long, dark hair to the side, letting it fall over her right breast.
She stood and examined herself for a moment, studying her arms, hips and thighs. She let her hand caress her shoulder, down to the curve of her back, her buttocks. Her whole body shuddered as she surveyed her bruises. They had darkened, and would gradually disappear—along with her thoughts of Danilo.
She pulled a drawer out, forcefully grabbed a silk bra and matching panties, flung them onto the bed and went into the bathroom. She showered quickly, put on the underwear and swept a thin bathrobe around herself.
In the kitchen, she poured a glass of wine, stood by the window and looked at the dense clouds. After taking a big sip, she held the cool glass to her temple. Leaving the window, she went into her office and unlocked the door to the secured inner room.
Standing on the threshold, she turned on the light and looked into the small secret space. Her gaze traveled across the bulletin boards, whiteboard, pictures, photographs, books and notes. Every detail of her childhood that she could find, she had recorded here. She carefully stroked her neck with her fingertips. She felt the uneven skin, the three letters that would never disappear, that were immortalized in her pale skin. K. E. R. Ker—the goddess of death.
Her eyes focused on the drawing in the middle of the bulletin board, attached with staples in every corner. It was a sketch she had drawn of Danilo after their encounter last spring. After all these years, she had searched for him then in his home in Södertälje.
Tell me instead what you as a prosecutor are doing in my place, he had said to her. He hadn’t any idea who she was when she had suddenly appeared in his home.
I need your help.
He had laughed.
Oh, really? You don’t say. How interesting. And what can I help you with?
You can help me to find out something.
Something? And what is this something about?
My background.
Your background? How could I help you with that when I don’t even know who you are?
But I know who you are.
Really? Who am I, then?
You are Danilo.
Brilliant. Did you work that out all by yourself, or did you perhaps read my name on the door?
You are someone else, too?
You mean I’m schizoid?
Show me your neck?
He had fallen completely silent.
You’ve got another name written there, she had said. I know what it says. If I guess right then you must tell me how you got it. If I guess wrong then you can let me go.
We’ll change the agreement a little. If you guess right then I’ll tell you. Sure, that’s no problem. If you guess wrong, or if I don’t have a name on my neck, then I’ll shoot you.
She had guessed correctly.
She took another sip
