The Merman (18 page)

The site was large, maybe five hundred metres long and just as broad. The closer we got, the stronger the smell got. Of furry animals, fish and fertiliser. The mink houses were five abreast. There was a sixth one some way off, but it was not currently in use.

The house was over to the side. The windows were dark. The garage door was open, and there were no cars around. Twenty metres to our right the fence was concealed by some trees. That's where we would get in.

Warning signs were fixed to the wire fence.
Beware of the dog
, it said. Next to that were laminated photos of a German shepherd with a handwritten message underneath:
If dog attacks, lie still and wait for owner
.

The barking was louder now, but the dog must have caught the scent of something else, or heard a noise from a different direction, because it was on the other side of the property over by the main road.

It wasn't difficult to climb up into the tree and clamber out on the limbs. I felt butterflies in my stomach. Hanging ten feet above the ground, I could see every single building in the area. The long mink houses with open sides and curbed roofs, the cisterns where they collected urine and droppings to dry and sell as fertiliser. The barracks where the workers got changed, and the large building where the skinning was done and the pelts were dried. In the middle of the yard stood an old VW bus. A thick hose led from the exhaust pipe over to the building. Inside was the death box as they called it, where the animals were gassed to death.

The dog had stopped barking when we landed on the ground. All we could hear were the cries of the gulls and the roar of the sea. As far as I could see there was no chance of escape from there,
at least not fast enough if the dog happened to come. But I was relieved on that score. When we turned the corner of the first barracks we discovered it chained to a post just inside the main gate. Maybe the mink farmer didn't want it to run around and terrorise the animals while they were away. Maybe the gate was the most important spot to watch because it was the only place where a burglar could get large quantities of pelts out. The dog didn't even notice us as we went over towards the farm less than a hundred metres behind it, because the wind was coming from the other direction.

The shortest way to the main building was straight through the first mink house. I got a flashback when we entered the space. I'd been there once with Dad a long time ago. Droppings on the floor. The dishes of animal feed standing next to the cages. The animals that watched us, curious, as we passed close by, pressing their noses against the mesh or standing up on their hind legs to get a better view. Normally there were five mink to a cage, but now the skinning was over and only the breeding animals were left, along with the ones with darker fur which would not be killed until later. Their little black button eyes looked urgently at us. Maybe they thought it was feeding time? Some of them were as fat as little pigs, and their colourings and patternings varied from one cage to the next.

The gulls' claws scraped across the flat roof. They usually scavenged for food at the mink farms: fish scraps, old bits of chicken, leftover mink meal that got chucked out when it went off. There were black-headed gulls out there as well; their creepy, irritating cries, as if they were mocking us. And soundless movements everywhere, sort of in the corner of your eye, as the mink scampered around to observe us as we went past.

The path ended at the door to the main building. It was locked.

‘Wait here,' said Tommy. ‘You can get in through the loading bay on the end.'

A minute later when he opened the door, the full blast of the smell hit me: the stench of blood and animal glands, of guts and flayed bodies, and something that might have been the animals' terror in the face of death.

We were in the actual killing room. Over by the loading bay was the steel box where the animals were gassed to death. Dad had told me that they would scream in there when the exhaust was pumped in. Most of the time mink don't make a peep – you might think they were mute, they're so silent. But when they were gassed, they would suddenly start squeaking like rats. It took a few minutes before they were dead, but afterwards you could see marks on the metal from their claws. In desperation they would try to claw their way out.

I suppressed an urge to be sick. The floor was covered in mink paws that had been cut off. Sawdust had soaked up the blood. In a large pile in the middle of the room lay hundreds of flayed animal corpses, stacked into a pyramid. The corpses were perfectly intact with yellowish membranes over bare flesh. The eyes were still in their sockets, teeth in the jaws; just the skin had been pulled off them like socks turned inside out. They resembled the Alien in that movie that came to the cinema when I was in Year Seven, only in miniature.

‘People are gonna start turning up here soon,' I said. ‘You can't leave animal bodies lying around like this. They'll start to rot.'

‘Not for a while yet. Can't you feel how cold it is?'

He was right: the room was like a fridge. I hadn't even noticed I was starting to get cold.

‘Come on,' said Tommy impatiently. ‘We haven't got all day.'

There was a large workroom behind a door. It was warmer in there. The fans were on. Pelts were spread out on large tables, ready for dressing. Next door was a drying room, where the mink pelts were threaded up on racks. The finest ones could fetch several thousand kronor at fur auctions. There was a strange smell in here, too. I remember once Dad told me about the fat they scraped off
the inside of the pelts which was then used in cosmetics and fine-quality shoe polish. Not just for anyone, but for really rich people. Could that be what the smell was?

A flight of stairs led up to a mezzanine level. We went down a corridor until we were standing in front of another door. We could hear the dog's barking louder from outside, as if the dog had scented us and was trying to reach the building.

‘Stay here,' said Tommy.

He disappeared into a corridor that led off to the left, opened a cupboard and returned with a red painted box – the same box I'd seen in the hut that first night when he showed me the creature, the case containing veterinary medicines.

‘You can play vet if you absolutely must. I have no intention of going near it again. No way.'

He opened the door and flicked a light switch on.

‘Where are we?' I asked.

‘In the feed preparation area.'

We were standing in a room lit by sterile fluorescent tubes. Leftover fish scraps littered the floor. Fins, tails and dried fish skins. In a coolbox there were chicken parts, heads, beaks, combs and feet. A gigantic meat grinder stood majestically atop a stand in the centre of the room. A funnel was fixed to the bottom, connected to a fat tube which in turn led to feed troughs. All around there were sacks of seed and fish meal.

‘Have you been here before?' I asked.

‘Loads of times. But not since they brought it here.'

‘Where is it?'

‘Over there, I think.'

Behind a screen was one more room, entered via swinging doors. There were glass panes in the doors so you could see in.

Tears filled my eyes when I saw the creature. It was lying on its side, chained to a pipe in the floor. Its arms were handcuffed, and just to make sure, someone had wrapped several rounds of fishing line around its claws. Its tail fin was also chained and fastened
with a large shackle. A thin trickle of water ran from a suspended garden hose, positioned so it flowed over its body. It was not moving. Its eyes were closed, and dried pus and blood was visible around them. The webbing between its fingers was split. The gash in its mouth was still open, and the edges were black, like they were starting to go septic. It had more wounds on its body – dozens of them, fresh ones.

‘What did they do?' I asked. But the question came out only as a whisper.

‘I dunno... '

‘Can't you see? It's got injuries everywhere.'

There was a Stanley knife lying on the floor. Was that what they'd used?

‘Turn off the light. It can't stand it. There must be a switch here somewhere.'

Tommy found the light switch. Now only a faint light was coming in from the feed preparation area.

‘You first,' said Tommy.

The creature lay dead still on its side when I went up to it. There was not a sound. For a moment I thought we'd come too late, that it was already dead, and I felt like I couldn't forgive myself. Then I felt the warmth of its body, and the moisture that sort of vaporised on its skin.

‘Don't worry,' I said. ‘No one's going to hurt you.'

I only realised now how big it was. If I stretched out alongside it, I'd only reach its waist. I placed my hand on its forehead, that strange dolphin-like forehead. It was hot. Maybe it had a temperature. Then there was a rattle from its throat and then a feeble movement of its tail fin that was restrained by the chain.

‘Can you hear me?' I whispered. ‘Do you remember me?'

It took a while. A sort of silence lingered within the silence. And

then, very faintly, came an answer, an inaudible but completely comprehensible answer. It could hear me, it knew who I was, and it knew I was not alone.

‘It's a friend,' I whispered. ‘Don't be afraid of him. I told you I'd come back.'

Tommy was still standing in the doorway, as pale as if he'd seen a ghost.

‘You're right,' he mumbled. ‘I can hear him, Nella. He's talking to us... '

We'd never be able to explain this to anyone else, I thought, as I let my eyes pass over its body to see if it had any more injuries. Anyone who hadn't experienced it would not be able to understand what I meant by being able to talk without using words or even a voice. It was incredible, but that's how it was. The creature was communicating its thoughts to us. I wasn't imagining things; Tommy had heard it too, so there were two of us who knew now.

‘This is an ointment for wounds,' Tommy said, taking a tube out of the medical case. ‘Farmers use this stuff on cows when their udders get inflamed.'

He had ventured a little way into the room now.

‘Good, let's start with that.'

‘Maybe you should wash him first. The wounds, I mean. There's water here. We need some soap, too.'

He was still hesitating where he stood, a couple of metres away.

‘He's not going to hurt you,' I said. ‘He understands who's a friend and who's an enemy. And look at him!'

What could he possibly do? I thought. Injured, chained up, with a fever. And as if Tommy realised the same thing, he crouched down beside me.

W
e stayed for over an hour. Together we cleaned the creature's

wounds and spread ointment over them. We found new gashes all over where somebody had cut or hacked at it with sharp instruments. There were fresh bruises on its head. From the night in the hut when Tommy's older brothers hit it with the jack, I supposed. A person would never have survived that sort of abuse, nor would most animals, but what we had in front of us was something else. It was in pain, that much we understood, but the pain didn't seem to concern it. The fever was worse; it knew it had to get over that if it was going to live.

We cleaned the wound in its mouth where the flesh had turned black, opened up the edges of the wound, rinsed them with surgical spirit and applied ointment there as well. Tommy said the gangrene would spread if we didn't put a stop to it.

It was really weird to touch its body. Its rough skin. The incredible hardness and the muscles underneath: animal and human at the same time. The fact that the creature let us touch it felt like a gift. All the time we were treating it, it was like the creature was accompanying us by means of a sort of melody, inaudible but still beautiful and calming, as if it was letting its inner being flow through us, out of gratitude for our help. It was speaking to us in its strange way, reassuring us that it recognised and trusted us. It wondered where it was, what sort of strange world it had been taken to, and if anyone could return it to where it belonged. These thoughts were interrupted only occasionally, when it lapsed into the fever and its body twitched as if it were dreaming.

When we gave it some water from the hose, it opened its mouth
and stuck out its tongue tentatively to take a drink. But when Tommy tried to give it some fish from the crates in the feed room, it turned its head away, communicating that it was too weak to eat.

In the middle of all this I went off to have a pee. I had no idea what we were going to do now. Basically I hadn't thought beyond going to the mink farm and trying to help it. At some point we'd take it away from there, I thought, set it free, but we couldn't yet because it was too weak, and we'd need tools to undo the shackles, and I didn't know how we were going to transport it... or to where, for that matter.

The curtain had come down in the shower block by the toilets; there were hundreds of cartons of cigarettes stacked against the wall. Danish brands: Cecil and Prince. Goods that were easy to load, I thought, from one boat onto another out on the open sea...

When I came back, Tommy was washing the creature's arms. The nylon lines had rubbed right through the skin. He was carefully dabbing the areas with gauze.

‘I don't get it,' he muttered. ‘How come they're keeping it alive?'

‘To mistreat it, seems like.'

‘Or else they're just waiting for it to die on its own, but it isn't. It doesn't want to die. It's refusing.'

The creature had twisted slightly to one side. Its eyes were still closed. It hadn't looked at us even once, and now its temperature seemed to be climbing. It was sort of drifting in and out of consciousness, strange dreams we didn't understand, dreams of the sea perhaps – black, filled with water and currents, and then back to a shallow wakefulness where it sent thoughts to us, repeating to itself that it was not afraid of us, that it understood and appreciated what we were doing.