When the Snow Fell (18 page)

This time they came running towards him. Joel sat stroking them for a while before looking for the hens. They were all in the truck today. Joel crumbled up some dry bread and put it inside the truck for them.

Then he couldn’t wait any longer. He would have to visit Simon. He had a stroke of luck when he got to the hospital, and bumped straight into the doctor he and Samuel had spoken to the day before.

No change. Simon was still unconscious.

Nobody could say if he was going to live or die.

Joel had tears in his eyes. Not because he wanted to. Why should Simon die now that he was in hospital instead of lying in a snowdrift?

Joel left the hospital.

He noticed her immediately.

The Greyhound. She was standing outside the hospital gate.

And she looked nothing like a gigantic bird with flapping, threatening wings.

Joel tried to be angry. But he didn’t succeed.

They walked down the hill from the hospital. The Greyhound didn’t say a word. Nor did she run round and round him like she usually did.

Instead of being angry Joel tried to demonstrate that he couldn’t care less about her company. To act as if she weren’t there. But that didn’t really work either. He would never be an actor.

In the end he decided to be himself and do exactly what he wanted to do. They had come as far as the railway station now.

There were several large snowdrifts just behind the long, red wooden building that housed the freight office. Anybody walking past would think they were only playing.

As they passed the biggest of the snowdrifts Joel tripped the Greyhound up so that she fell backwards into the snow. Then he jumped on top of her and started rubbing snow into her face. She struggled as hard as she could, but Joel was stronger. Then he started to poke snow down inside her clothes. She kicked and scratched and fought back. Joel still wasn’t angry, but even so, he had to do what he was doing.

“Stop it!” she shouted.

“Purse your lips,” said Joel.

Then he pushed her head into the snow again.

He didn’t stop until she had started crying.

“So, now I’ve gotten you back,” he said, standing up.

Her jacket was torn. She was crying as she walked away. Joel thought it was odd that she didn’t run. Now, if ever, was the time when she ought to be running.

He set off for home. But suddenly he stopped dead and started following the Greyhound. Now he was the one running, not her.

He caught up with her at the tumbledown old building used as a warehouse by Thulin the ironmonger’s. She was still crying, but Joel could tell that it was ebbing out. He walked beside her for quite a while without speaking.

In the end he couldn’t keep quiet any longer.

“It served you right,” he said. “But I won’t do it again.”

“Nor will I,” she said. “But it wasn’t my idea.”

Joel stopped dead. What she said couldn’t be true.

“I thought you and I were the only ones who knew about it.”

“Nearly,” she said. “But it wasn’t me who wanted to do it even so.”

“Who was it, then?”

“The others.”

“But you could have told me.”

“I wish I had done.”

Joel gazed down at the ground. Should he believe her or not?

There was only one way of finding out.

“Show me,” he said. “Here and now. How to kiss. Then I’ll believe what you say.”

“Not out here in the street,” she said.

“We can go behind this building. Nobody lives here. There’s only saws and axes and such stuff inside.”

“Another time.”

“In that case, I don’t believe you.”

She looked at him angrily.

“But I’ve been crying! I can’t stand here kissing some body when I’ve been crying! Don’t you understand anything?”

Joel felt unsure.

“I’ll wait, then,” he said.

“I have to go home now,” said the Greyhound. “I’ll be in trouble if I don’t.”

“When shall we do it, then? If I’m going to believe you?”

“Later,” she said. “I promise.”

And now she started running. Joel felt relieved that they hadn’t stopped being friends despite everything. He still felt he couldn’t trust her completely, but he felt better even so. And he’d gotten her back.

Joel went to the railway station. Checked to see if anybody had dropped any small change behind the wooden benches. An old man was sitting with his back resting against the wall, fast asleep. Stationmaster Knif was shouting inside the ticket office, telling somebody off. Joel paused in front of the big timetable pinned to the wall. Somebody had crossed out the name of the little town and written in pencil:

No trains stop here. Only idiots stop in this dump
.

Joel giggled. He wondered if Knif had seen that. How would he have reacted, in that case? He must have been raving mad.

The old man asleep by the wall was snoring. It seemed to Joel that he must be a hundred years old. Which would mean he’d been born in 1858. At about the same time as Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday had walked down that deserted street for the showdown with Ike Clanton and his gang.

Joel sat down on a bench and dangled his feet. That was another problem when it came to having parents, he thought. You can’t choose yourself what time you want to live in.

Joel knew of course that this was a silly way of thinking. Childish. But good fun even so.

If he could have chosen, he’d have been one of Fletcher’s right-hand men. The one who would take over from Fletcher eventually. And then he wouldn’t have needed to sit around in a boring railway station with an old man fast asleep.

He’d have been in a totally different world.

In that world the leaves of palm trees rustled in the wind and women walked around in transparent veils.

Now he was back on that subject again! He stood up in annoyance. Stamped his feet hard to see if he could wake up the old man. Not a chance.

He checked his watch. Too late. Ehnström’s had closed. And he couldn’t very well just march up and ring her doorbell. Not when he didn’t have any Christmas magazines to sell, nor any mittens to look for. Besides, that unknown man might be there. The one who’d been holding hands with her at the cinema. It could be risky if he was. He might throw Joel out. Even out of the window. The man might be wild with jealousy. You could never tell in advance.

He started pedaling with his feet. Lumps of slush and dirt dripped off his boots and onto the floor. They looked as if they’d formed a map. An archipelago of islands. He started giving names to the various stains. “Snake Island,” “Doc Holliday’s Skerry,” “Windstorm Rocks.”

But all the time what he was really thinking about was Sonja Mattsson.

He wondered if he would ever see her wearing transparent veils.

Joel looked at the old man. And decided to get some help from fate. If he succeeded in waking the old man up before anybody else came into the waiting room, he would see Sonja Mattsson in transparent veils. He wasn’t allowed to shake the old man. Nor to shout. But everything else was permitted.

If the old man was still asleep the next time the waiting-room door opened, he could forget all about that business of the transparent veils. Fate would have made its decision.

Joel started kicking one of the bench legs, which were made of steel. All the time he was keeping an eye on the ticket office window. It could open at any moment. Knif had ears that could pick up the sound of a train fifty miles away. But the old man didn’t wake up. Joel kicked even harder. The old man snored. Joel was really furious with him by now. Maybe he was dead? Joel stood up and took hold of the backrest of the bench the old man was sitting on. He started shaking it. The old man grunted and rubbed at his nose. But he didn’t wake up. Joel shook so hard that the whole bench started jumping up and down. No effect. He was sure the waiting-room door would open at any moment now. He thought desperately about what he could do. Then he hit on the only possible solution. He ran to the ticket office window, which
was closed, and hammered on it as hard as he could. It opened immediately. Stationmaster Knif was staring Joel in the face.

“What do you want, belting on the window like that?” he roared. “Do you want a ticket?”

“I was just checking if you were awake,” said Joel with a grin.

Knif turned red in the face.

“Get out!” he bellowed. “Get out of here!’

It echoed all round the waiting room.

And the old man woke up.

Joel ran off before Knif could come storming into the room—but the old man had woken up! That was the important thing. Knif’s voice could awaken the dead.

So fate had decided. Joel would get to see Sonja Mattsson wearing nothing but transparent veils.

He hurried home as fast as he could. No doubt Samuel would have made dinner and be wondering why Joel hadn’t come home.

Joel could imagine how astonished Samuel would be, if he heard what fate had decided.

One evening very soon I, Joel Gustafson, will visit the flat of Sonja Mattsson, also known as Salome, and see her naked behind transparent veils
.

Samuel would doubtless fall down in a faint on the cork floor tiles.

Joel also wondered if Samuel had seen Sara wearing
transparent veils. Now that would have been a sight for sore eyes.

But needless to say, when Joel got home he didn’t say anything about what fate had ordained.

And Samuel hadn’t finished making dinner. Typical! He was always messing about and never finished any thing in time.

He had been a sailor. And he was a lumberjack. But Joel didn’t think his father was up to much as a cook.

The next day the Greyhound and Joel wrote a never-ending stream of notes to each other. By the end of the school day Joel’s pocket was full of them. They were friends again, it seemed. None of the others who had been present when Joel sat on that chair and pursed his lips said a word. They didn’t even smirk. Even Otto evidently felt obliged to be nice to Joel. It wasn’t just any old boy who was capable of dragging Simon Windstorm goodness knows how many miles through the snow.

During one of the breaks Otto wanted to show Joel one of the secret magazines he’d acquired.

“It’s a new one,” he said. “Nobody else has seen the pictures yet.”

“I think I’ll give it a miss,” Joel said. “The real thing is more exciting.”

Otto stared at him. Joel stared back. Otto daren’t say that Joel was just making it up.

It was a good day. One of the best for a very long time.

After school Joel fed the dogs and the chickens at Simon’s place. The Greyhound went with him. Joel let her feed the chickens while he dealt with the dogs. Then they heard from the hospital that there was no change in Simon’s condition. He was still seriously ill.

Joel felt sad. The Greyhound tried to console him.

“At least he’s no worse,” she said. “That has to be good news.”

Joel could see that she was right. It was good not to have to do all the thinking yourself. The Greyhound was good company. Even if she was a girl.

They said goodbye outside her front door. She hadn’t said anything about kissing. Nor had Joel asked.

Once the Greyhound had vanished into the block of flats, it occurred to Joel that he ought to tell Kringström that he would soon be calling round again for a lesson. But then he saw that the black van used by the orchestra wasn’t there. So Kringström wasn’t at home.

Joel went straight to Ehnström’s grocery store. He needed to buy a lot of things today. The bell rang as he opened the door, and he saw that it was Sonja behind the counter. Joel took off his hat and gave his hair a quick stroke. He’d forgotten to do that before entering the shop. There were lots of old ladies to be served before
him. She still hadn’t noticed that he was there. He was able to watch her surreptitiously. Once again he imagined her in transparent veils. But that wasn’t easy, not with all the other women jostling one another in the shop. He would have to think them away. He tried to imagine that he was alone in the shop. But he couldn’t. It just wasn’t right, her moving back and forth behind the counter and weighing flour. And then she noticed him. Joel gave a jump, as if she had been able to read his thoughts.

“I think it’s your turn now,” she said.

All the old ladies started muttering and moaning, but Joel took the opportunity of marching up to the counter. It was about time he had the upper hand. Those ladies had so often elbowed their way in front of him in line.

“How’s your brother?” she asked. “How’s Digby?”

Joel wished the floor would swallow him up.

Needless to say, one of the old ladies couldn’t resist putting her oar in.

“He doesn’t have a brother,” she said.

Joel didn’t know where he got the courage from, but he just turned round and looked the woman in the eye.

“It’s funny how some people just can’t resist butting in on other people’s conversation,” he said.

Then he turned to look at Sonja.

“Digby’s fine,” he said. “His knee and his shoulder are both OK. I’d like some eggs and some butter, please.”

The old lady said nothing. Sonja collected what he’d asked for.

“I heard that you rescued somebody who was in danger of freezing to death in the forest,” she said.

She spoke loudly so that everybody could hear. Joel was impressed.

“He was heavy,” Joel said. “But anything’s possible if you put your mind to it.”

She worked out what he owed and wrote it down in a book. Samuel called in and paid once a month. Joel initialed the amount.

“Why not come round to my place and tell me all about it?” she said.

Joel couldn’t believe his ears. Neither could all the old ladies. This new shop assistant from Stockholm was actually inviting Joel to pop round and visit her?

“When?” Joel asked.

“Why not this evening?” she said.

Joel collected his carrier bags and left. Nobody jostled him.

When he emerged into the street he found it necessary to put down his bags. Had he heard right?

Then he realized he was short of time. If he was going to call round and visit her tonight, he needed time to get himself ready.