Room 55, page 22
Anna had been on a run here once and knew the bridge Nils Karlsmäter was referring to. The energy was powerful down here in the valley, with its dramatic landscape, tall trees and high humidity from the waterways, which were now partially covered with ice. She breathed in the fresh air deeply and felt light and free.
In the distance, she saw a man leaning against the bridge railing. He was remarkably tall for his advanced age, with silver grey hair. His arms were folded over his chest. It had to be Nils.
Chapter 129
Nils
The developments of the past few weeks had exceeded Nils’ wildest expectations. The decades of waiting were over. He’d tried so hard for so long to uncover the truth.
He’d never thought she’d suddenly died or left Dalarna. He’d always known it was something else. His gut feeling had been that she wasn’t far. Cecilia had never been mentally ill in any way. She was the healthiest person he’d ever met. He knew that the truth lay somewhere within the walls of that hospital, but every attempt to find out more had been thwarted.
There were people in there who knew what happened. That much he’d known. Every time he’d tried talking to anyone, their lips were sealed. The story had come to a standstill and since then, a cover up. The years had slipped past. He’d dreamt of this day.
It was all thanks to Gunnar and his outspoken daughter that he’d learned about the new psychologist. And since she wasn’t from these parts, she’d brought a fresh approach, unburdened by any code of secrecy. Nils had watched her as she made her way to work in the mornings. Here was an earnest and genuine young person, he’d thought to himself, just like his Cecilia.
It hurt him deeply that they hadn’t spent their lives together. Particularly bittersweet was the fact that she’d lived so close for almost ten years. If only he’d known. If only he could have planned a great escape, broken her out and carried her into the night. Why did they take her there? He shuddered to think what she’d been subjected to in those years. They’d taken her life from her, and his. How could anyone do that? The injustice defied words.
He’d arrived early and walked the gravelled paths by the water to clear his head. He stood on the bridge and saw someone coming towards him. Two large bags swung from her shoulders, and she moved with small deliberate steps as her brown hair fluttered behind her.
She reached him and held out her hand.
Chapter 130
Anna
‘Hello, Nils.’
‘Hello, Anna.’ A smile tugged the corners of his mouth.
Anna looked around. ‘Shall we find somewhere to sit? Just so I can put my bags down.’
‘Are you going away?’
‘Just for a while, but I’ll be back soon.’
They found a bench by the river.
Nils’ face was strangely familiar to Anna even though they had never met. In front of them the water winked at them in the sunlight between patches of ice. It rolled away from them, disappearing behind centuries-old trees, whose skeletal branches reached proudly into the sky.
Anna thought she heard a rustling sound in the bushes behind them. She looked over her shoulder, but all was still.
Nils noticed as she did this.
‘I hear them too, sometimes.’
‘Hear what?’
‘Hear them moving. Those who haven’t come to rest.’
They sat quietly for a few seconds.
‘They seek rest and reconciliation,’ Nils said. There was a twinkle in his eye.
‘It could have been a bird.’
‘Yes, perhaps. Or perhaps it was Cecilia.’
She noticed how strong and healthy Nils looked as they sat there. She turned to face him.
‘Why me?’
‘I knew that you came from the outside to replace the missing psychologist.’
The news about Mona hadn’t reached the media and Anna chose her words very carefully. It was a huge shock to the hospital. The press conference was scheduled for later that day. She wouldn’t be there, of course, but Miro had informed her. Bjurberg and Stark had been arrested. Mona had identified them as her captors. Anna’s stomach lurched when she thought about it. It was too awful. It could have been her who had ended up there.
Nils tilted his head back and looked into the pale blue sky which carried the scent of winter. ‘I’m sorry for what I got you into, but I needed the truth.’
‘You really shouldn’t be. You’ve saved a life through this.’
Nils looked surprised.
‘You’ll either see it in the paper tomorrow or on the news tonight. That’s all I’ll say for now.’
Anna had really been no more than a puppet in this scenario, instrumental though she’d been. Nils had fed her the information. All she’d done was connect the branches of the family tree severed by the hospital. She still didn’t fully comprehend the reasons for this severing.
As a psychologist, however, she knew the importance of knowing one’s own story and how integral it was to the healing process. She quieted her own unanswered questions. At least she’d done this part of her job well. Nils and Villy had their closure now, the best possible outcome for them both; the town newspaper had received a much-needed boost, and Sven Järring could finish his career on a high.
‘But Nils, why the anonymous notes? Why all the secrecy? Couldn’t you have talked to me, or explained it all in one letter?’
‘I had to tread a fine line. You’d have been too frightened to do anything if I’d revealed all immediately. Worse, you’d have lost your job if you’d gone in guns blazing. Just like the former psychologist. I wanted to do things differently this time. Leave a breadcrumb trail that gave you an out if needed. It was a process. It had to take its time, I think.’
By now, this seemed to Anna typical of the way things worked in Säter. Nothing here was linear or logical; everything was diffused, elusive, cryptic even, like a delicately woven spiderweb. Maybe he’d been right. It had needed to take its time.
‘But, tell me. Not everything was in the paper, was it?’
‘I can’t tell you everything, Nils, because of my duty of confidentiality. I couldn’t even tell the journalists everything I wanted to. But I know you’ll receive more information on Cecilia. I also know you’ll come into contact with someone important.’
He straightened a little and nodded alertly.
‘Some questions remain for me too. For instance, how did you come to know Cecilia?’
Nils gathered himself and began to explain how he’d grown up on a large estate with his mother, father and brother. The farm employed a lot of staff. Cecilia was the daughter of a woman who’d worked in the kitchen. She had no father. Her mother had always taken care of Nils and his brother.
‘Cecilia and I played every day. But the older we got, the less they wanted us to play. My parents thought that we boys shouldn’t fraternise with the servants. We were just childhood friends at first, Cecilia and I, best friends. In our teen years, we fell in love. They were the best days of my life. She was the loveliest creature. So cheerful, so full of natural charm.’
‘Did she have any mental health problems?’
‘Cecilia? No, good grief, none whatsoever,’ he continued. ‘When Cecilia turned fifteen, they made her leave Vansbro and the farm. They said there was no work for her there, but I think they were onto us. Cecilia went south, to Säter, to look for a job.’
‘Did you see much of her after that?’
‘Well, she’d come back to Vansbro in the summertime. We met in secret. She lived in a small cabin in the woods on my parents’ land. We owned many acres. I went there at every opportunity.’
‘Did you ever think of eloping?’
‘I was the eldest son, the heir. The family’s past and future rested on my shoulders. I couldn’t have left everything. Too many people depended on me. My parents made that clear early on. They already had a match in mind, to ensure the property remained in the family.’
‘That’s awful.’
‘By today’s standards, yes. It wasn’t uncommon then. I never married in the end.’
‘But what about you and Cecilia?’
‘We lived to meet in the summers.’ Nils’ eyes glazed over, his expression becoming dreamy. ‘That final summer we could no longer hold on. We made love every night in that simple shelter. It was wonderful. She was so soft and beautiful. My perfect Cecilia.’
‘What happened after that?’
‘After that summer, I never saw her again.’
A tear ran quietly down Anna’s cheek.
‘I stayed on the farm and managed it for some years with my brother. Later on, I moved down to Säter in the hopes of finding out what happened to her.’
‘What did you think happened to her?’
‘I didn’t know what to think. I was very worried but lived for a long time hoping she’d get in touch. I heard rumours in Säter that it was something to do with the hospital. That there were people there who knew what had happened. But I never came close to finding out.’
Anna thought of the drawings and journal entries. ‘I think she was committed the year you saw her.’
‘I think you’re right. But why? She wasn’t ill, was she?’
‘Yes, that question remains. But I must ask you. Did you know she was pregnant, Nils? And do you think it could have been yours?’
A flush came into Nils’ smooth cheeks. He stared at the ground.
‘I almost certainly think it was mine. I don’t think she’d been with anyone else. What happened to the child?’
‘Nils…’ There was so much Anna wanted to tell the man who stood before her. He looked a lot like Villy. Vital, healthy, but somehow wounded, incomplete, and crying out for Cecilia. Her absence had left a lifelong scar on both of them.
‘All I can say is that you have a son. I promise that you’ll find each other.’
Nils took a deep breath and leant back.
Anna took out a folder from one of her bags. She got up from the bench and told him she had a train to catch. In the folder was a copy of one of Cecilia’s drawings. She handed it to Nils.
‘What is this?’
‘It’s Cecilia’s.’
Nils’ eyes swam with tears as he held the picture up to the light. It showed Cecilia, her hands grasping her partner’s shoulders as they danced, his face hidden from view. Her eyes were closed, her hair tossed back. She was laughing.
A strange breeze rose from the river, warm and humid and sweet, like the breath of the woods. They felt as it passed over their cheeks and condensed on their clothes. They smiled at one another.
‘That’s her all right. That’s my Cecilia.’ Nils blinked away the tears. ‘Anna. Thank you.’
Anna squeezed his hand. It felt right to leave him now, whilst the truth still hung in the air around them.
‘Goodbye, now, Nils. Take good care of yourself,’ she said, feeling the chill as she gathered her things. She trod carefully on the wooden bridge that gleamed with a thin membrane of frost and headed for the steps that climbed the hillside.
Chapter 131
Villy
No one in the department made the connection between the news in the morning paper and Villy immediately asking for anti-anxiety meds.
He’d just read of the disappearance of his mother and realised his father was only down the road. He decided he must meet him at all costs. There wasn’t a second to lose. His father would be very old by now.
As soon as he saw Tony, the nurse, standing alone sorting through the medicine folders, he crept up behind him. They had had several confidential conversations, so Villy and Tony had developed a special relationship that none of the others in the ward knew about. Tony was a man who liked to take shortcuts to big muscles and was happy to take steroids when he was off duty.
Villy had helped him make contacts so he could get what he needed.
So, he owed him a favour.
Chapter 132
Anna
Late that afternoon, a great siren was heard at Säter’s forensic psychiatric clinic.
Anna had been waiting for the train and heard it from the station platform. Miro had been preparing to speak at the press conference, notes in hand, glass of water at the ready.
The alarm’s centre of origin was Villy’s department, where for some reason there was only one staff member on site. Tony.
Other personnel had arrived for their shift to find Tony locked in the staff toilet, hands bound behind his back and duct tape across his mouth. They’d conducted a patient headcount, declared Villy missing and activated the main alarm, alerting the police.
The helicopters would soon be circling the town and surrounding forests. They’d turn on their thermal imaging cameras if the search extended past sundown. Anna’s train was to be stopped and searched, and patrols were dispatched to question Säter residents.
Chapter 133
Nils
Nils had just sat down with a cup of coffee to look at Cecilia’s drawing. There came a screech of tyres from outside. He sprang to the kitchen window to see a small red car, engine still purring. He squinted as someone switched off the ignition and got out.
Nils’ heart skipped a beat when he heard the doorbell. Through the stained glass of the front door, he could make out the face of a man who peered intently in.
He opened the door a quarter of the way. ‘Who are you looking for?’
‘I’m here for Nils. Is that you?’
‘Maybe. And you are?’ Nils tried to hold his voice steady as he trembled with emotion.
The man before him seemed tongue-tied. ‘I’m…’
‘Are you…’
Villy nodded. ‘I’m your son. Could I come in for a minute? I don’t think I’ll have much time.’
Nils threw open the door. ‘Of course! Welcome home, and not a moment too soon!’
Chapter 134
Anna
Anna was moved by her encounter with Nils. She was overjoyed at the thought of this beautiful, lonely soul meeting the son he’d never known. She thought of Cecilia’s life, snatched away from her for falling in love with the wrong man. She thought how Nils’ parents had presumably arranged for her disappearance to secure the farm but at the cost of their son’s unhappiness. She thought of Room 55. A death chamber, built with the sole purpose to erase and extinguish.
She had trouble processing what she’d witnessed in the past few days. She hoped that she’d be able to sit down and talk with her predecessor one day. But now Mona needed time to rest and recover the life that had been taken from her.
The hospital had once housed hundreds of people. Anna felt at once distant and remarkably close to these hundreds of souls. Someone could be locked away on fallacious grounds and left to die of heartbreak. The hospital had helped some people. Others had deteriorated within its walls, sealed away from the world by dense forests and the strange vacuum of time. She thought of the Others, puppeteering everything from the wings.
Her phone rang. She saw that it was Sven and felt immediately safe when she heard his voice.
‘I’m on my way to Stockholm. Bjurberg gave me a sabbatical.’
‘Oh, but you don’t need to leave. Bjurberg’s under arrest. You can jump straight off the train.’
‘Yes, I considered that, but I actually really need some time away. The past few days have been… a lot.’
‘I’m calling to thank you for what you did.’
Anna told him there was no need to thank her, and she meant it. She’d done nothing more than follow the instructions given.
‘There’s just one more thing before we wrap this up. We have received a call from a woman who didn’t dare say anything about Cecilia for many years. She’s ninety now and dying.’
Anna noticed how quiet the carriage was around her. She pressed the phone closer to her ear and leant against the window.
‘We must remember, here, that Nils Karlsmäter’s father was a titan of rural commerce in the Fifties. Around the time of Cecilia’s disappearance, the hospital manager suddenly saw a radical improvement in his finances. So did the hospital, new pavilions were added and a luxurious villa was built for the director, which was passed down through succeeding generations of directors in exchange for keeping Cecilia’s secret. Säter’s generous research fund was also established at this time.’
Anna hoped no one heard her gasp. ‘So, you mean to say…’
‘Yes, Bjurberg and all of his predecessors have been party to this. All of the clinic managers have had their research funded by this secret.’
‘But that’s insane. All of this because of a problematic relationship?’
‘Well, full disclosure here. We’ve been on this trail for a very long time. We had to tread very carefully. We didn’t want to reveal Cecilia’s name.’
Anna wasn’t processing this information properly. She didn’t understand how these things were connected but knew that she trusted Sven. She marvelled at how Cecilia and Nils’ relationship had so significantly changed the hospital’s history.
‘You must realise that this makes up part of a larger truth. We’ve only just scratched the surface.’
Anna pressed her forehead against the window and saw a blur of trees as they whistled past. The other passengers’ voices faded into the background.
‘The Others are a cryptic network that has existed since the early 20th century, when the first high-security psychiatric clinics sprung up around the country. This network handled difficult decisions, dealt with the people that no one wanted and controlled the flow of information to the outside world. Bjurberg survived the earlier scandal thanks to them. There is plenty to suggest their involvement at the highest levels of government.’
