‘Maybe she has the record already,’ he said.
‘What record?’
‘The one we were going to give her.’
This conversation’s getting very odd, Joel thought.
‘Perhaps we could give her a gift voucher,’ he suggested. ‘Then she could choose for herself what she wanted to buy.’
Samuel shook his head.
‘No, it has to be something real. Something you can put in a parcel. If we had an elk steak we could have given her that.’
Joel looked at Samuel in astonishment.
‘Are you saying we should take her an elk steak? What if blood were to start dripping out of the suitcase? The police would think we’d murdered somebody.’
‘It’s not the elk-hunting season now anyway. We’ll have to think of something else.’
It was afternoon. The sun’s rays were streaming in through the kitchen window. Moving steadily across the wall. Until they reached the showcase containing the Celestine.
‘Maybe she’d like to have Celestine,’ said Joel. ‘That would be something that we like as well.’
Samuel spent a long time gazing at the model ship in its case before answering.
‘I suppose it was on display there when she went away,’ he said. ‘You might be right. Perhaps we ought to give her Celestine.’
They didn’t make a decision. But now they had an idea, at least.
One more week before they were due to set off. They would take the night train on Saturday evening. They’d arrive in Stockholm on Sunday. Joel had asked Samuel about all the details. Not least where they were going to stay. Samuel had said that there were cheap hotels near the railway station. Joel was also worried that Samuel wouldn’t take enough money with him. But that wasn’t something he could very well ask about. Instead, he made a point of going through Samuel’s wallet when his dad wasn’t looking. Samuel had three hundred kronor. That was a lot of money as far as Joel was concerned. But would it be enough? He didn’t know.
The days passed slowly. Joel tried to go back to sleep in the mornings after Samuel had left for work in the forest, but he was far too excited to stay in bed. He got up again, ate his sandwiches and went out. No more snow had fallen, and it had become warmer as well. He didn’t just cycle around town, but went for quite long rides, exploring the logging tracks. Whenever he came to a clearing where the sun’s rays managed to penetrate as far as the ground, he would find a biggish rock and sit down to think. Most of all about what it would be like to meet Mummy Jenny. But also about whether he would manage to persuade Samuel to make up his mind about moving at last. And what he would do if he didn’t succeed. If they came back here and Samuel carried on going into the forest to cut down trees.
One day Joel had sat down at the kitchen table and made a long list of all the jobs he knew about. Then he tried to work his way through them all, and imagine what it would be like, doing each one.
Airline Pilot Captain Joel Gustafson
That sounded tempting, of course. Visualising yourself in uniform. With nerves of steel. Making a skilful emergency landing in the middle of some desert or other. But there again, he knew that a pilot had to be able to do sums. No doubt his mark for maths wouldn’t be good enough.
Surveyor Joel Gustafson
What exactly did a surveyor do? Look at things? Measure distances? Wander around by the side of ditches and logging tracks? Noting down how far it was between fences? That would bore him stiff.
He worked his way through his long list as he sat in those sunny glades, wondering what life would be like as a motor mechanic or a gamekeeper, a watchmaker or an actor. He also thought about what he had dreamt of only a year ago: becoming a rock idol. But he had accepted the fact that he couldn’t sing well enough, and probably wouldn’t be able to learn to play the guitar as well as was necessary.
Some of the jobs on his list he could cross out straight away. What he wanted to be least of all was a lumberjack like Samuel. Anything at all but that.
In the end he concluded that there was only one thing he really wanted to do. To become a sailor. What Samuel had been when he met Mummy Jenny. He could become a deckhand or an ordinary seaman. Start at the bottom of the ladder. Sailors worked with ropes and did lookout duty. They didn’t need to be good at sums. He would never wake up in the same place as he’d gone to sleep in. The ship was always on the move. He would get to see everything that lay beyond the never-ending conifer forests. He wouldn’t need to stay in this little town where there was even snow on the ground when school broke up for the summer holidays. He would only sign on for ships that were heading for warmer climes. Somewhere out there was also Pitcairn Island, and the women waiting for him in transparent veils.
Almost every day he thought about what had happened the previous year. When he discovered that Ehnström’s grocery store, where he always bought food for himself and Samuel, had acquired a new shop assistant. Her name was Sonja Mattsson, and she wasn’t going to stay in the town for very long. She was somehow related to the Ehnströms. Joel had made a hopeless New Year’s resolution, that within the coming year he would see a naked woman. And one day he had caught a glimpse of Sonja Mattsson wearing nothing but a transparent veil.
Then it dawned on Joel that Sonja Mattsson had gone back to Stockholm: maybe he would be able to meet her there? She had said she’d like him to visit her if he ever went to the capital. But he didn’t have her address.
That thought struck him while he was sitting in a woodland clearing, crossing out jobs on his long list of possibilities. He immediately jumped into action. Cycled back to town. He knew that if he went to the telegraph office he would be able to find out details of any addresses and telephone numbers he needed. He was a bit worried as he walked up the stairs to the office. A few years ago he had connected lots of lines at the switchboard one night when the operator had fallen asleep. Nobody had realised that he was the one who did it. But you never knew. There were some people who seemed to be able to see straight into his mind.
He went to the hatch and rang the bell. He saw to his relief that it wasn’t the same operator as had fallen asleep that night when he had made his secret visit to the exchange.
‘I’d like an address and telephone number in Stockholm, please,’ he said.
‘Do you want to phone them or send a telegram?’ asked the woman behind the hatch. She looked stern, and Joel immediately felt nervous.
‘Neither just now,’ he said. ‘I’m going to make a call later.’
‘What’s the name of the subscriber?’
‘Sonja Mattsson.’
‘And her address?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘But you are sure she lives in Stockholm?’
‘Yes.’
‘Just a moment.’
She closed the hatch. Joel waited. He read a notice on the wall that explained how much it would cost to send a telegram.
But what would he put in it?
I’m coming on Sunday by train from Norrland. Please meet me. Joel. P.S. Samuel will be there as well. My father.
That was too many words. Twenty-three of them. He tried to cut it down.
Meet the train Sunday afternoon. Joel.
That was only six words. But then she wouldn’t know which train to meet. And she probably wouldn’t remember him anyway.
The hatch shot open again.
‘There are seven persons called Sonja Mattsson in Stockholm.’
The woman handed him a telephone directory through the hatch.
‘You’ll have to work out which one it is you want to contact.’