Only the smell changed. And every time for the worse.
The two women who took turns being behind the till started arguing over who would serve him when they saw the pickup truck pull up outside. And customers in the queue started letting him walk straight to the front so that he would leave as quickly as possible. Anyone who didn’t know him would scrunch up their nose and wonder who this oddball was. And those who did know Jens Horder would exchange sad, knowing looks. Some tried to greet him amicably as he walked past, but they never got more than a fleeting smile in return, and in time the silent smile was reduced to a stare at the post-office floor.
The postman who served the Head also noticed the change. He had been used to delivering the sparse post to the house and would occasionally depart with a few letters from Jens or Maria to post, but now he had to settle for the impersonal post box down where the road bent. If there were parcels, a rare occurrence, he was to put them in the wooden box next to it. And if he had any messages for the couple, they should also be left in the box. A pen and paper had been left there for that very purpose.
The postman was especially intrigued by the barrier that had been put up, but as he himself was from a rather eccentric family on the main island, he didn’t regard the device as wholly out of the ordinary. He was convinced that he was the illegitimate son of the renowned and very handsome postmaster Nielsen from Korsted and not the ugly cross-eyed farmer who had raised him. That is to say, the postman had a certain appreciation for rumours as well as for family secrets.
He hoped that one day he would deliver a parcel that needed a signature to the Head so that he would have a reason to cross the barrier. As a postman, he was not only dutiful by nature – come rain, come shine, and so on – but also incurably nosy. Besides, he was desperate to bring news of the Horders to his friends at the pub. Not that he was a gossip, heaven forbid, but being able to imply that he knew something the others didn’t would make him very happy. It was a source of great anguish that he had not yet succeeded in convincing his friends, discreetly of course, of his real ancestry. He couldn’t say anything outright; it wasn’t the done thing. But he could hint, and he kept dropping hints, as if his life depended on it, without anyone so much as raising an eyebrow.
Liv knew that not being seen was a matter of life and death, so whenever she had the slightest suspicion that someone was coming, she would disappear, quick as lightning and without a sound, into the furthest corner of the container. Here, with her father’s help, she had made a wonderful little den for herself behind tyres and cardboard boxes. Two big duvets and a whole pile of blankets kept her warm, but should she get cold in spite of that, there was a sack of extra-warm clothing which she could help herself to. She also had books and torches and plenty of batteries and sweets, crackers and bread and bottles of water, so she wanted for nothing.
To begin with, while everyone was searching for her, she hadn’t dared to switch on the torches. Instead she had lain quietly under her duvet in pitch darkness, listening out for the faintest sound. In the constant darkness she had lost track of time, and it wasn’t long before she couldn’t tell whether it was day or night. Soon the darkness also started to feel heavy in her eyes and lungs.
She was missing Carl, who wouldn’t join her.
Finally, after far too much time, he came. She didn’t see him, but she knew that he was there with her in the silence. She didn’t dare talk to him, due to the risk of being overheard, but he whispered to her that he was there – and that he was scared of the strangers, of the darkness, of time, of uncertainty, of the air. And the smell, which enveloped them like a thick blanket of old rubber and dust and mould and dried-out paint and turpentine rags.
His fears made her calm down. She comforted Carl without a word, and felt stronger than she was. As long as she focused her attention on reassuring her twin brother, fear would not take hold of her.
They lay like this for a long time, she and Carl, surrounded by the darkness, which was surrounded by things, which were surrounded by a sealed metal container. They thought about the air outside, the scent of the forest, and tried to pull it deep into their den, through the thick blanket and right into their lungs.
Eventually they heard sounds, they heard the padlock on one of the hatches being unlocked, and through a gap between two tyres Liv caught a glimpse of a starry sky, and she heard her father’s voice speaking to her. At last she dared turn on the torch, which she had been clutching in her hand the whole time.
He brought her tea and tinned food, which he had heated on the camping stove outside his workshop. Reaching the stove in the kitchen had become difficult, so now that it was just him doing the cooking he preferred to use his own kitchen, as he called it. He had stretched a canvas sheet over it as an awning, so that it was reasonably protected against the rain. Sometimes he would light one of his home-made torches and stick it in the umbrella stand next to the camping stove. On such occasions, the smell of food and resin would fill the air and Liv imagined that her father was happy.
Right now it was the tea and the food that made Liv happy. The air from the open hatch felt like happiness too. The light was warm and good. Dad was with her.
Liv told him about the darkness and the heavy air. And he left, came back and drilled three holes in the side of the container and metal shavings snowed on the newspaper below. Afterwards he folded the newspaper and placed it and the shavings in between the other newspapers. Then he placed a piece of black fabric over the three holes and fixed it at the top with gaffer tape.
‘Now you can have fresh air whenever you want,’ he said. ‘You’ll need to lift up the cloth if you want more air and you can also look out at the road. But be careful with the light. You must never switch on the torch, unless the cloth is in place. The light can be seen from the outside. Do you understand?’
Liv nodded. Then she switched off her torch like a good girl, lifted up the cloth and pressed her face against the three holes arranged as an inverted triangle. Through the bottom hole she took a long, deep breath; she could smell spruces and coarse grass and salty sea air. And through the two top holes she could see the night sky and the moon lighting up the gravel road. Somewhere, an owl was hooting. She imitated it quietly, and smiled when she felt her father’s hands on her shoulders.
‘You’re very good at this,’ he whispered. Then he told her that it was best that she stayed in the container until people had finished looking for her. ‘The police must be absolutely sure that you’re dead, Liv. But then we’ll be left in peace.’
She understood. Being left in peace was a good thing.
And one day she was allowed out. Her father lifted her up over the dark blue metal edge and out through the opening with the slanted hatch, even though she insisted she didn’t need any help. He had placed a couple of crates and a tractor tyre outside, so she could easily climb back into the container, if necessary. She obviously couldn’t lock the hatch from the outside once she was inside, but he had made a device so that she could secure it with a metal bracket from the inside. Just to be on the safe side.