The Voices Beyond: (Oland Quartet Series 4) (3 page)

The gravediggers had no option but to comply. Gerlof shivered in spite of the sunshine, but he set to work. His spade felt as heavy as an iron bar in his hands.

The earth began to thud against the coffin lid once more; the rhythmic beat was the only sound.

After twenty shovelfuls the lid had begun to disappear beneath a layer of earth.

There was still no other sound in the churchyard.

But, suddenly, someone sighed next to Gerlof. It was Gilbert Kloss, edging towards the grave. The sigh sounded like a long, heavy exhalation; he lifted his feet and moved slowly across the grass. He stopped by the open grave and tried to take a deep breath, but his lungs managed only a thin whistling.

‘Gilbert?’ Sigfrid said.

His brother didn’t reply; he stood there motionless, his mouth open.

Then he stopped breathing, and his eyes lost focus.

Gerlof watched as Gilbert Kloss fell sideways by the grave. He saw Bengtsson simply standing there staring, along with the doctor and the priest.

Sigfrid called out behind them; Gerlof was the only one who rushed forward, but he was still several steps away when Gilbert’s heart stopped beating.

Gilbert’s body fell head first on to the grass beside the grave, rolled slowly over the edge and landed on the lid of the coffin like a heavy sack of flour.

When the sun gives the summer its streams then the nightingale wakes the dreams we have gathered around death like midsummer myths in the valley.

Harry Martinson

Could a boat die? And, if so, when was it dead? Gerlof gazed at his old wooden gig and considered the question. She should have been in the water on this sunny June day, but she was still ashore. Cracks all over the place, tipped on her side on the grass. The name of the gig was
Swallow
; it was carved on a little wooden nameplate on the stern, but she no longer flew across the water. A fat green fly was crawling idly around the dry hull.

‘What do you think?’ asked John Hagman, who was standing on the other side of the boat.

‘She’s a wreck,’ Gerlof replied. ‘Old and useless.’

‘She’s younger than us.’

‘Indeed. So that probably means we’re wrecks as well.’

Gerlof was eighty-four years old, while John would turn eighty next year. They had sailed across the Baltic on cargo ships together for almost three decades as captain and first mate, carrying limestone and oil and general cargo to and from Stockholm, through stormy weather and calm waters. But that was a long time ago, and now the Öland gig was the only boat they had left.

Swallow
had been built in 1925, when Gerlof was just ten. His father had used her to fish for flounder for almost thirty years, then Gerlof had taken over in the fifties and had sailed her every summer for another forty years. But one spring in the early nineties, when the ice had receded out into the Sound and it was time to carry
Swallow
down to the water, Gerlof simply hadn’t had the energy.

He was too old. And so was
Swallow
.

Since then she had been lying there next to Gerlof’s boathouse as her planks dried out and split in the sunshine.

The light on Öland was intense, and on this cloudless day the sun was blazing down on the coast. A fresh, cooling breeze was coming off the sea in gentle gusts. So far, there had been no heatwave on the island; the really hot weather didn’t usually arrive until July, and sometimes it didn’t arrive at all.

Gerlof poked at the gig’s dried-out oak planks with his stick and watched as it penetrated the wood. He shook his head.

‘She’s a wreck,’ he said again. ‘She’ll sink in seconds if we put her in the water.’

‘She can be fixed,’ John said.

‘Do you think so?’

‘Absolutely. We can seal the cracks. I’m sure Anders will help out.’

‘Maybe … but the work would be down to the two of you, in that case. All I can do is sit and watch.’

Gerlof suffered from Sjögren’s Syndrome, a type of rheumatism that came and went. It was unpredictable; in the summer his legs usually felt better with the warmth, but sometimes he needed a wheelchair to get around.

‘There’s money in this,’ John said.

‘Really?’

‘Oh, yes. The Öland Wooden Boat Association usually supports projects like this.’

They heard a whining noise from the coast road behind them, and both men turned their heads. They saw a shiny black Volvo, an SUV, but it had foreign number plates and tinted side windows.

It was a Monday, the week before Midsummer’s Eve. And Stenvik, the fishing village that had turned into a holiday resort, had come back to life.

Nature had come to life in May, of course, turning the meadows and the alvar purple, yellow and white. Butterflies had emerged, the grass was green once more, the scent of herbs and flowers filled the air. But in spite of the early sunshine and the heat, the summer visitors had decided that the season didn’t really begin until now. They arrived in force at midsummer to unlock their chalets, dig out the hammocks and live the rural life, close to nature. Until the beginning of August, when they all set off back to the city.

The Volvo whizzed past, heading north. Gerlof caught a glimpse of several people in the car, but didn’t recognize them.

‘Was that the Norwegian family from Tönsberg?’ he said. ‘The ones who bought the Brown House a couple of years ago?’

‘The Brown House?’

‘Yes – well, it’s painted red now, but it was brown when the Skogmans owned it.’

‘The Skogmans?’

‘You remember – they were from Ystad.’

John nodded as he watched the Volvo.

‘No, it’s not turning in at the Skogmans’ place … I thought somebody from Holland bought their place?’

‘When?’ Gerlof asked.

‘Two years ago, I think … spring ’97. But they’ve hardly spent any time here.’

Gerlof shook his head once more.

‘I don’t remember. There are too many people around these days.’

In the winter, Stenvik was virtually empty, but at this time of year it was impossible to keep up with all the old and new faces. Gerlof had seen generations of summer visitors pass through the village, and these days he found it difficult to distinguish between fathers and sons, mothers and daughters.

No doubt the visitors didn’t know who Gerlof was either. He had lived in the residential home for senior citizens up in Marnäs for several years, and it was only recently that he had started coming down to his childhood home in the spring and summer, steadfastly battling the pain in his joints.

It seemed as if his legs were pretty tired of supporting him, and he was tired of it, too. Lately, he had tried turmeric and horseradish for the pain; it had helped to a certain extent, but he could still walk only short distances.

Take me back, he thought, to a period in my life when there was still time.

Several expensive cars were speeding along the coast road, but Gerlof turned his back on them and looked at the gig again.

‘Right,’ he said. ‘We’ll fix her up then, with your son’s help.’

‘Good,’ John said. ‘She’s a fine boat. Perfect for fishing.’

‘Indeed she is,’ Gerlof agreed, although he hadn’t been fishing for many years. ‘But can you fit it in?’

‘Definitely. The campsite more or less runs itself.’

John had leased the campsite in Stenvik every summer since he had come ashore at the beginning of the sixties. When his son, Anders, was old enough they had started to share the work between them, but John was still the one who went around the tents and caravans each morning and evening, collecting fees and emptying the bins. He hadn’t had a single free summer in thirty-five years, but he seemed to enjoy it.

‘That’s agreed, then,’ Gerlof said. ‘Perhaps in August we’ll be eating plaice that we’ve caught ourselves.’

‘Perhaps,’ John said. ‘But she can stay here for a while.’

A while.
When it came to John, that could mean anything from three days to three years, but Gerlof assumed that
Swallow
would remain by the boathouse for a few weeks before Anders and John set to work on her.

He sighed and looked around. His village, the best place in the whole world. The wide bay with its deep blue waters. The row of boathouses. The old cottages and the new houses. The lush summer greenery of Öland in the background, so different from the treeless coastal landscape when Gerlof was a little boy. He had spent his childhood here in the bay before going off to sea as a teenager, eventually returning as a grown man to build a summer cottage for his family.

The road came to an end on the southern point, and that was where the village also ended. The coast was more dramatic over there, with a steep cliff leading down to flat, wide rocks along the shoreline and a burial cairn, known as a
rör
in the local dialect, up on the ridge above the water.

The finest summer cottages were also at the southern end of the village, lining the coast road. Last of all, completely separate, were the two houses belonging to the Kloss family.

The Kloss family. The three brothers, Edvard, Sigfrid and Gilbert. Edvard and Gilbert had died at almost the same time; only Sigfrid had lived to a decent age. He had inherited his father’s land and turned it into a holiday complex, which was now run by his grandchildren.

‘Have the Kloss gang arrived yet?’ Gerlof asked.

‘Indeed they have. Their place is already packed with cars, and people are out on the golf course.’

The Kloss family’s holiday complex lay a few kilometres south of the village, and was called the Ölandic Resort, but John always referred to it as ‘the Kloss place’. He regarded it as competition, in spite of the fact that his shop in Stenvik was no more than a shoebox in comparison. The Ölandic Resort had everything – a golf course, a campsite, a range of shops, a nightclub, a swimming pool and an entire holiday village.

In Gerlof’s opinion, the Kloss family owned far too much, but what could he do?

All these rich residents bothered him. He did his best to avoid them. Them and their boats and swimming pools and chainsaws – all those new acquisitions making a racket in the countryside. Frightening the birds.

He looked out across the bay.

‘You know, John, sometimes I wonder … is there anything that’s improved on the island over the past hundred years? Anything at all?’

John gave the matter some thought.

‘Nobody goes hungry these days … And the roads aren’t full of potholes.’

‘I suppose so,’ Gerlof conceded. ‘But are we happier these days?’

‘Who knows? But we’re alive. That’s something to be happy about.’

‘Mmm.’

But was it? Was Gerlof really happy to have lived to a ripe old age? These days, he took one day at a time. After some seventy years he could still remember Gilbert Kloss collapsing with a heart attack at his brother’s grave.

Everything could come to an end at any moment, but right now the sun was shining.
Sol lucet omnibus
– the sun shines on everyone.

Gerlof decided to enjoy this summer. To look forward to the new millennium. He was due to get a hearing aid, so soon he would be able to sit in his garden listening to the birds.

And he would be more friendly towards visitors in the village. Or at least he would try. He wouldn’t just mutter when he came across a tourist, and he would answer the people from Stockholm when they spoke to him.

He nodded to himself and said, ‘Let’s hope we have nice quiet, well-behaved visitors this year.’

The fisherman’s cottage had thick walls, and small dark rooms that smelled of blood and booze. The odours didn’t bother the old man standing by the doorway; he was used to both.

The smell of booze came from Einar Wall, the owner of the cottage. Wall was in his sixties, bent and wrinkled, and he had obviously made an early start on his midsummer celebrations; a half-empty bottle stood beside the table where he was sitting working.

The stench of blood came from his most recent booty: three large birds were suspended from hooks on the low ceiling. A partridge and two woodcocks. They were peppered with buckshot but had been plucked and drawn.

‘Shot them yesterday, out on the shore,’ Wall said. ‘Woodcocks are supposed to be protected at the moment because they’re breeding, but I couldn’t give a damn about that. A man should be able to catch fish and birds whenever he wants.’

The old man was a hunter himself, and said nothing. He looked at the other two people in the cottage, a young man and a girl, both in their early twenties, who had just arrived in their own car and settled down on the shabby sofa.

‘What are your names?’

‘I’m Rita,’ said the skinny girl, who was curled up like a cat, one hand on the boy’s denim-clad knee.

‘Pecka,’ the boy said. He was tall; he leaned back with his shaven head resting against the wall, but his leg was twitching.

The old man didn’t say any more. It was Wall who had found these two, not him.

A puppy and a kitten, he thought.

But he had also been young once, and had grown more capable as time went by.

Pecka didn’t seem to like the silence. He stared at the old man, his eyes narrowed.

‘And what do we call you?’

‘Nothing.’

‘But who the hell
are
you? You sound a bit foreign.’

‘My name is Aron,’ said the man. ‘I’ve come home.’

‘Home?’

‘I’ve come home to Sweden.’

‘From where?’ Pecka wanted to know.

‘From the New World.’

Pecka continued to stare at him, but Rita nodded.

‘He means the States … don’t you?’

The old man said nothing, so Rita tried again: ‘You mean America, don’t you?’

The man didn’t respond.

‘OK, so we’ll call you Aron,’ Pecka said. ‘Or the man who’s come home. Whatever, as long as you’re in.’

The man said nothing. He went over to the table and picked up one of the guns by its slender barrel.

‘A Walther,’ he said.

Wall nodded with satisfaction, as if he were manning a market stall.

‘It’s a fine piece,’ he said. ‘The police used it as their service weapon for many years. Simple and solid … Swedish craftsmanship.’