36
“There he is!”
Julia had shouted loudly, and Lennart braked so quickly that the car skidded. But it stopped almost immediately, slewed across the road. They were just south of the turning down to Stenvik.
“Where?” said Lennart.
Julia pointed through the windshield. “I can see him. Out there... on the field. He’s lying there!”
Lennart leaned forward. Then he put his foot down and swung the wheel around. “There’s a track here... I’ll drive down.” The car spun around sharply on the wet road.
But when they pulled onto the little gravel track, Julia could see she was wrong. It wasn’t a body. It was...
Lennart slammed the car to a stop and Julia scrabbled for the door. But her crutches made her slow, and he got there first.
He bent down and picked up the object from the little ditch by the track.
“It’s just a coat,” he said, holding it up so she could see it. “A coat someone’s thrown away.”
Julia came forward and looked at it. “It’s Dad’s,” she said.
“Are you sure?” asked Lennart. “It looks like a—”
“Look in the inside pocket.”
Lennart opened the coat and burrowed in the pocket. He took out a wallet and opened it.
“Should have brought a flashlight...” he muttered, trying to hold up the wallet in the car’s headlights.
“It’s Gerlof’s,” said Julia. “I recognize it.”
Lennart pulled out a worn-looking driver’s license and nodded. “Yes. It’s his.”
Then he looked around.
“Gerlof!” he shouted. “Gerlof!”
But the wind and the sound of the car engine drowned out his cry.
“I don’t recognize this track,” he said. “I think it goes down to the shore. We’d better take the car and have a look.”
At the police car, he spoke briefly into the radio mike.
Julia followed him.
“The helicopter knows where we are now,” Lennart told her.
He put the car into first gear and began to crawl forward, peering out through the smeared windshield.
“I’ll turn the lights off,” he said, “then we’ll be able to see better.”
The track in front of them was abruptly, impenetrably dark, but when Julia’s eyes had become accustomed to it, she could see the alvar on both sides. Every new shadow that appeared out there looked like an old man swaying upright in the grass, but each shadow turned out to be only a juniper bush.
Suddenly Lennart pointed up at the sky.
“There it is!” he exclaimed. “Thank God.”
Julia stared up at a pair of rapidly flashing red-and-white lights moving across the sky. She realized it was the helicopter, just as the police radio crackled into life again.
“I think they’ve found something,” Lennart said. “Down by the water.”
He increased his speed, swung around a bend — and a second later the entire car was suddenly illuminated by a dazzling white light. It was another car.
“Shit!” yelled Lennart beside Julia.
He stamped on the brakes, but it was too late. The car racing toward them around the bend did not slow.
“Hang on!”
Julia gritted her teeth and grabbed hold of the dashboard, bracing for the inevitable crash.
The impact flung her forward, but the seat belt held her as she watched the car hood crumple like paper.
The seat belt held, but the blow to her ribs was agonizingly painful.
Silence. A few seconds of silent immobility followed the crash.
Julia could hear Lennart breathing out behind the wheel, and swearing quietly.
Then he switched on the lights again. Only one of them appeared to be working now; it illuminated the shiny car that had slammed into them.
Lennart reached over to the glove compartment. It had flown open, and now he took out his gun holster.
“Are you okay, Julia?”
She blinked. “Yes... yes. I think so.”
“You stay here. I’ll be back soon.”
Lennart opened the driver’s door, letting in the cold. Julia hesitated. Then she opened her own door. But she stayed in the car. Pain raced through her body, bringing tears to her eyes.
Almost simultaneously the door of the other car opened. A tall, broad-shouldered man stumbled out.
“Who are you?” she heard Lennart shout.
“Where the fuck did you come from?” The new voice was even louder than Lennart’s and furious. “Put the fucking headlights on! Why are you driving with no fucking lights on?”
“Calm down,” said Lennart. “Police.”
“Who’s that... is it Henriksson?” demanded the other voice.
Julia swung her legs out and fumbled for her crutches. She managed to get to her feet, although the ground was uneven and she nearly stumbled and fell.
“Have you come from the shore?” Lennart asked the stranger.
In the lights from the tangled cars she suddenly recognized the other driver. He came from Långvik, and he was a hotel owner.
Then she remembered his name too: Gunnar Ljunger.
“Who are you?” he shouted, voice thick with rage.
“Calm down, Gunnar,” Lennart said. He obviously recognized him as well. “Where have you been?”
“Down... down by the shore. I’ve been out for a drive.”
“Have you seen Gerlof Davidsson?”
“No.”
“We’re looking for him.” Lennart pointed. “The helicopter over there is looking for him too.”
“Really?”
Ljunger seemed remarkably uninterested, Julia thought. She took a step forward and called to Lennart:
“Is it far to the shore?”
“I don’t think so,” he replied. “A few hundred yards.”
“I have to get down there,” Julia insisted.
Gripping her crutches firmly, she started hopping along, past Gunnar Ljunger’s car and down the gravel track.
“Gunnar, you’ll have to reverse out of the way,” she heard Lennart say behind her. “I’m driving down to the shore.”
“Henriksson, you can’t possibly...”
“Move the car,” repeated Lennart, more crisply. “Then stay in it, we need to figure out...”
His voice was swiftly lost in the wind. Beyond both cars, Julia could see the lights of the helicopter again; it had landed a couple of hundred yards away.
She hurried along, slipping in muddy puddles on the track, but she kept going.
Getting closer, she could see two men in light gray overalls trapped in the beam of the helicopter’s searchlight; they were bending over something on the shore. A body. They lifted it up out of the sand.
“Dad!”
The men glanced over at her.
The body on the beach was lying in a blanket, unmoving. Not again, Julia thought. I can’t lose you, too. Please... Not again.
The body coughed. A dry, frail sound.
“Dad!” Julia called out.
“Julia...” He slowly turned his head toward her.
He coughed again.
“Careful, now,” warned one of the men. “We’re going to pick you up.”
They lifted Gerlof in the blanket and carried him quickly away.
“Can I come with him?” implored Julia, following clumsily. “I’m his daughter. And I’m a nurse.”
“Not possible,” said the man closest to her, without looking up. “We haven’t got room.”
“Where are you flying?”
“To the emergency department in Kalmar.”
She went with them as far as the helicopter anyway, despite the fact that her crutches kept getting stuck in the grass. She fought to stay close to the body in the blanket.
“I’ll follow you to the hospital, Dad.”
Just before they lifted him into the helicopter, Gerlof raised his head and for the first time she could see his face. It was chalk white. But his eyes were open and feverishly bright, and suddenly they focused on her. He said something, quietly and inaudibly.