Depths: A Novel, page 26
‘Stay until the baby’s been born. Then you should take her away. The youngster won’t survive out there. So many young children have died on that barren skerry over the years, too many to keep count of.’
He started rowing.
‘Tell her I’ll come,’ she shouted. ‘We’ll get the baby born and it will survive all right, as long as you all get away from there.’
He kept on rowing until he found some wind. Then he raised the sail and headed for the open sea.
He felt ashamed when he thought about how close he had come to running away. He would have stolen her boat like a pirate, and abandoned her. Now he was sailing as fast as possible so that she would not start to think that he had headed out to sea after all.
He was in a hurry. And the sea was still carrying him to his destiny.
CHAPTER 175
August was drawing to a close, it was unusually windy, persistent westerly winds. An autumnal thunderstorm passed over them, and a stroke of lightning felled a tree on Armnö.
He speculated that memory and forgetting shared the same key. Perhaps anger shared the same door? Kristina Tacker and the baby drifted away. But where was he himself?
The longest distance I have had to relate to is the distance to myself. No matter where I stand, the compass inside me pulls me in different directions. All my life I have crept around trying to avoid bumping into myself. I have no idea who I am, and I do not want to know either.
CHAPTER 176
Sara Fredrika could feel that her body was calm. She talked all the time about the journey they would make once the baby was delivered.
Sometimes the conversations became unbearable. The skerry began to be a heavy weight, a ballast in his pockets that made it more and more difficult for him to move. He thought about what Angel had said, about the inhospitable skerry scraping her to the bone.
CHAPTER 177
Every three or four days he would sit down to write a letter to Kristina Tacker. He had found a rock formation on the south side of the skerry that gave him both a bench to sit on and a rough desk to write on.
He described a voyage in a convoy of ships heading for Bornholm and the Polish coast. It had been a dangerous but necessary expedition. Now he was back in Swedish waters again, and by coincidence he had ended up in Östergötland, among the islands where he had already spent such a long time. He would soon be returning to Stockholm. His mission had been long and drawn out, but there was an end in sight, he wrote, an end, and then he would return home. He asked about Laura, how Kristina Tacker herself was, and not least her father. Had he recovered? Had they arrested whoever had carried out the attack?
But he also wrote about himself, tried to capture something of his own desperation without revealing the true facts. When I’m alone I sometimes get so close to myself that I understand who I am. But then you are not there, nobody else can see what I see, only me, and that is not enough.
He hesitated for a long time, wondering whether to leave out the last few lines. But in the end he left them in, felt that he dared do so.
He buried the letters under a piece of turf, wrapped inside a waterproof pouch. Towards the end of August he decided he would have to send at least one of the many letters. He had intended to give the letters to some fisherman or hunter who passed by the skerry, but none of them landed. He could see sailing dinghies in among the skerries sometimes, but none of them came close. One day he decided that it could not wait any longer. He told Sara Fredrika that he was going to go to church in Gryt on the last Sunday in August.
‘I’m not much of a believer,’ he said, ‘but after a while I feel very empty inside.’
‘If you’re lucky you’ll be able to sail there. If there’s no wind you’ll have a long way to row.’
They got up at dawn and she went with him to the inlet. He had his uniform wrapped inside his oilskin.
‘You’ll have a good wind,’ she said. ‘Easterly veering towards north, a church wind in both directions. Sing a hymn for me, listen to the gossip outside the church. I’ve no idea who’s dead and who’s still alive. Bring me some news, even if it’s old news.’
He stopped once on the way, landing on one of the islands in Bussund. He changed into his uniform and scrubbed away a stain on one of the shoulders. As he sailed into Gryt accompanied by other boats with passengers on their way to church, he was wearing his naval cap. He could see that his companions were bemused, but some of them must know about him, he could not be completely unknown.
There was a man on Sara Fredrika’s island, the father of the baby that was about to be born.
Remarkably enough, he felt something approaching pride when everybody looked at him.
CHAPTER 178
There had been a time when you could sail right up to the church from both the north and the south.
But the sound had silted up, and now you had to walk. There were a lot of people gathered outside the church. People seldom came from the outlying islands in winter.
Suddenly he came face to face with the farm labourers from Kättilö. They were not entirely sober.
‘We haven’t said a word,’ Gösta said. ‘Nothing has slipped out.’
‘Let’s keep it that way,’ Tobiasson-Svartman said. ‘And we mustn’t make it too obvious that we know each other.’
He turned on his heel and walked away. The sexton told him that the man who looked after the post in Gryt was smoking his pipe by the church wall.
Tobiasson-Svartman gave him two letters. He asked for one to be posted right away, the other ten days later.
During the service he half listened to the Reverend Gustafsson’s sermon about the devil who takes possession of our flesh, and the mercy of the Son of God.
Afterwards he wandered around, listening to the conversations. He had always been an eavesdropper, skilled at sucking in what other people were talking about. Most of the congregation were talking about who was ill and how bad the fishing had been.
When he started walking towards his boat a man in uniform came alongside him. He shook hands and introduced himself as the parish constable, Karl Albert Lund.
‘There aren’t many people round here wearing uniform,’ said the constable. ‘That’s why I thought I’d say hello.’
‘Hans Jakobsson, Commander. I just happen to be passing by,’ Tobiasson-Svartman said.
‘Might I ask what it is that brings you here?’
‘I can’t tell you that. It has to do with the war.’
‘I understand. I won’t press you.’
Tobiasson-Svartman clicked his heels and saluted. He went back to the boat and sailed home. Why had he chosen the name Hans Jakobsson? he wondered.
Was it a greeting to the man who had died on the deck of the Blenda? Why had he not said what he had really wanted to say, that he was Sara Fredrika’s new husband?
He changed out of his uniform. The wind was enabling him to maintain steady progress. On the way he invented news and rumours about unknown people that he passed on to Sara Fredrika that evening when he got back home.
CHAPTER 179
Sara Fredrika gave birth on Halsskär on 9 September 1915.
He’d had time to fetch Angel from Kråkmarö. The wind had been capricious on the way back, the sail had not been much use, and he had rowed so hard that the palms of his hands were covered in burst blisters. There were three of them in the boat, Angel had taken with her another woman to help, a maid to one of the cargo boat skippers. Once they arrived on the island Angel told Tobiasson-Svartman to keep out of the way, and to find somewhere among the rocks where there was a wind to carry the screams in a different direction if Sara Fredrika got into difficulties.
It was a chilly day. He found a crevice on the south side where he could half lie, well protected. He tried to imagine Sara Fredrika, her struggle to force the baby out. But he saw nothing, only the sea.
My innermost longing is a dream about horizons, he thought, horizons and depths. That’s what I am searching for.
It was as if he had some kind of invisible seal that made him inaccessible to everybody apart from himself. The surface was calm, like a sea when there is no wind blowing, but underneath it lurked all the duplicitous forces he was forced to fight against. Ambition, insecurity, the memory of his furious father and the silent weeping of his mother. He lived through a constant battle between control, calculation and outrageous risk-taking. He did not do what other people do and adapt to different situations, but he changed his personality, became somebody else, often without being aware of the fact.
Without warning, he started crying, forlornly, uncontrollably. Then he stopped, just as suddenly as he had started.
Late in the afternoon he heard them shouting for him. He went back to the cottage, convinced that he had a son. But Angel Wester held out a daughter to him. This time he did not think the baby looked like a shrivelled mushroom, more like heather in the spring before it acquires its full colour.
‘She’s healthy and strong. She will survive if God wishes her to and you look after her properly. I reckon she weighs three kilos, and a bit more.’
‘How is Sara Fredrika?’
‘Like all women are after they’ve given birth. Relief, happiness at the fact that all has gone well, a great desire to sleep. But first she should greet her husband.’
He went inside. Angel and the maid left them alone. Her face was pale and sweaty.
‘What shall we call her?’
Without hesitation, he replied ‘Laura. That’s a pretty name. Laura.’
‘She’s born now. And now we can leave this hellish island and never return.’
‘We shall leave as soon as I’ve finished my last reports.’
‘Are you happy about your child?’
‘I’m indescribably happy about my child,’ he said.
‘You got a new daughter to replace the one that fell over the cliff.’
He did not say anything, just nodded. Then he went outside and invited Angel and the maid to a celebratory drink. As it was already late, they stayed overnight.
He spent the night in a hollow covered by his oilskin coat.
He thought about his two daughters, both called Laura.
Laura Tobiasson-Svartman.
The younger sister of Laura Tobiasson-Svartman.
They’ll live their lives in ignorance of each other. Just as their mothers will never meet.
CHAPTER 180
A few days after Sara Fredrika had given birth, Tobiasson-Svartman found something extraordinary next to the rocks on a headland at the extreme eastern edge of Halsskär.
He could see something bobbing up and down close to the edge of the rocks. When he clambered down to the water he saw that it was a collection of military-issue boots, tied together to form a chain. He tried to find some marking or other that would reveal if they were German or Russian boots, but there was nothing.
There were nine boots in all, four left ones and five right. They had been in the water for a long time. Somebody had tied them together and sent them drifting over the sea.
He threw them up on to the rocks.
He had the feeling that once again he had been surprised and challenged by the dead.
CHAPTER 181
Their daughter cried a lot and kept them awake at night.
For Tobiasson-Svartman it was like being exposed to an agonising pain. He cut pieces of cork and stuck them in his ears when Laura was crying at her loudest, but nothing seemed to help. Sara Fredrika was immune to all noise, and he observed her love with envy. As for him, he had difficulty in feeling any connection with the child.
But with Sara Fredrika, it was as if he had finally understood what love was. For the first time in his life he felt terrified of being abandoned. He was scared by the thought of what would happen if one of these days it dawned on Sara Fredrika that there was no plan to leave the skerry. That the only things in existence were the barren island and all the new reports that had to be written for a secret committee.
CHAPTER 182
Sara Fredrika took every opportunity to talk about leaving.
Her questions now made him feel profoundly desperate. He wanted to be left in peace, he did not want to talk about the future.
‘I’m scared,’ she said. ‘I dream about water, about the depths that you measure. But I don’t want to see that. I want to see Laura growing up, I want to get away from this hellish skerry.’
‘We shall. Soon. Not just yet.’
It was early one morning. Their daughter was asleep. It was raining. She looked long and hard at him.
‘I never see you touching your child,’ she said. ‘Not even with your fingertips.’
‘I daren’t,’ he said simply. ‘I’m afraid that my fingers will leave a mark.’
She said no more. He continued to balance on the invisible borderline between her worry and her trust.
CHAPTER 183
At the beginning of October Tobiasson-Svartman could see that Sara Fredrika’s patience was close to breaking point. She did not believe him when he said that soon, not just yet, but soon he would have finished writing his reports.
One night she started hitting him while he was asleep. He defended himself, but she kept on hitting.
‘Why can’t we go away? Why do you never finish?’
‘I’m nearly finished. There’s not much left. Then we can go.’
He got out of bed and went outside.
CHAPTER 184
A few days later. Drizzle, no wind.
He walked round the skerry. He suddenly had a flash of insight. All these rocks formed a sort of archive. Like books in a library with infinite holdings. Or faces that will eventually be picked out and examined by future generations.
An archive or a museum, he could not be quite specific about his insight. But autumn was creeping in. Soon this archive or museum would close down for the winter.
CHAPTER 185
Nights now brought frost with them. As day broke on 9 October, the baby started to cry.
That same day Angel Wester sailed out to the skerry to check up on Sara Fredrika and the baby. She was satisfied, the baby was growing and developing as it should.
He accompanied her down to the inlet when her visit was over.
‘Sara Fredrika is a good mother,’ she said. ‘She is strong, and she has plenty of milk. And she seems to be happy as well. I can see that you are looking after her properly. I think she has forgotten her husband, the one that drowned.’
‘She will never forget him.’
‘There comes a day when the dead turn their backs on us,’ she said. ‘It happens when a new being enters our lives. Make the most of the opportunity. Don’t let there be a distance between you and the baby.’
He pushed the boat out as she raised the sail.
‘Will you be staying here over the winter?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Maybe not.’
‘What kind of an answer is that? Yes and no, and maybe something in between?’
‘We haven’t decided yet.’
‘Autumn has hit us early this year, as the old men say when they see the clouds and feel the winds. Early autumn, long winter, rainy spring. Don’t wait too long before leaving.’
He watched the dinghy disappearing round the headland. He could hear his daughter crying in the distance.
Angel’s words had hit him with full force. All his life he had been keeping things at a distance. But distance did not matter, it was closeness that was significant.
He realised that he would have to tell Sara Fredrika the truth, that he had belonged to somebody else, that he had been kicked out of the Swedish Navy and one of these days would be penniless. Only then could they start again from the beginning, only then could they really make plans to leave.
With great effort he had built walls around Halsskär. Now he would have to demolish them, in order to get out.
He was overcome by a strong sensation. Surprised and confused, he said to himself: I think my sounding lead has reached the bottom.
He was in the habit of rounding off the day by taking his telescope and climbing up to the highest point on the skerry. There was a north-easterly wind, fresh and squally. He pulled his jacket more tightly round him and gazed out towards the mainland.
A sailing dinghy was approaching. The sail was straining hard, but the boat was sitting well in the water. He did not recognise it, he did not need the telescope to tell him that. It was longer than the boats used by the fishermen in the archipelago.
He aimed his telescope and focused it.
There was a woman at the helm and she was steering straight for Halsskär.
The woman was Kristina Tacker, his wife.
PART X
Angel’s Message
CHAPTER 186
He thought it was an optical illusion.
But the boat was real. Kristina Tacker was sailing resolutely, the sail straining in the wind. She was heading for Halsskär because she knew that was where he was hiding.
He searched for a way of escape. But there was none. He had nowhere to escape to.
He set off in a hurry for the inlet when he saw her turning the boat into the wind. All the time he was trying to find an explanation. Could he have left a trail by way of his sea charts? He had never imagined that she would start to interpret them. Or had somebody given him away, somebody who knew where he was?
He could not find an answer. There wasn’t one.
By the time he reached the shore the boat was inside the inlet. Kristina Tacker had already dropped anchor when she noticed him, stood up and started yelling. In order to shut her up he waded out into the cold water until it was chest-deep.
