There was no cat in the house, so she went to the trash barrel. Back in the hall she noticed the smell again. A mouse, she decided. After finding droppings in the kitchen a week earlier she had set out rat poison, which now had evidently produced an effect.
Nine
Ann had extremely diffuse memories of the man who became her son’s father. It was a one-night stand. She remembered his first name, and that he was an accountant, or claimed to be. Was he good in bed? No, not particularly. Was he handsome? She didn’t remember, thin-haired maybe, fairly tall, light trousers that he had problems getting down and off. They were drunk. She was horny, or something like that. That was all.
She hated him. Maybe a bit unjustified, but she couldn’t escape that feeling. She didn’t want to hate, not even loathe, simply forget. She was convinced that he didn’t know that he was a father.
Now she was waiting at the bus stop for their offspring. Erik. He was strong, that was the word that came to her when friends asked. Because they knew, but thank God not all of it, about what he had to experience when she was down on her knees, burdened by guilt, work, and out-of-control alcohol intake. It was a miracle that he still wanted to have contact with her, but he’d always been loyal. On the other hand, what alternative was there? He had obviously wondered about his father, but it had never been particularly dramatic. “Everyone has a dad,” he’d say, “even if they don’t show up.” Ann waited for him to confront her in earnest. She was convinced that moment would come.
When he was fifteen she had presented the proposal about moving. He put his foot down at once, quite vocally too, and explained that he never wanted to move to “the sticks.” She understood that very well, but he couldn’t live alone in Uppsala. “I’ll drive you,” she said. He was in ninth grade, he had lots of friends, and played junior hockey in Sirius with some success.
“Every day?”
“Every day. So you won’t have to change schools. And you can keep playing hockey. Then, when you start high school, we’ll figure something out.”
“There are practices too, not just matches,” he said.
“As if I didn’t know that, I drive you quite a bit already.”
“Okay,” said Erik.
So that’s how it was. It was tough, but it worked. A win on points. She drank less too, when she had to get there on time or pick him up in the evening. She was often completely beat, the new job was also physical in a way that she wasn’t used to, but she gained his confidence that year, it felt that way. They were doing well together, and Ann could feel a bit of happiness and peace for the first time in a very long while. The fact was that Erik’s grades improved considerably. The “sticks” were so boring that for lack of anything else he studied a bit more.
She thought that he liked the arrangement. That slightly meditative feature that he’d always had was reinforced. On the other hand he was happier, he dared to trust his mother, avoided anxiously watching and adapting to her moods.
Now he was living in the city, and came out when he wanted to and stayed in his own cabin. Sometimes he showed up unannounced, and then he walked from the bus stop. It struck her that he did that solely to please her, as if to say: I like you after all.
All young people should have that independence, she thought, when she saw the bus appear on the highway. She understood that it was also a kind of freedom from her, but she told herself that it didn’t hurt anymore. Sometimes she felt that she gave him too much freedom, but she dismissed that thought.
He was the one who had called unexpectedly and said he was coming out. “Is there anything in particular?” she had asked, but he simply said that he wanted to get a little fresh air. Then he’d laughed, as if to play down his statement, which could be interpreted as that he wanted to see her.
* * *
“What’s that smell?” was the first thing he asked. The stench in the house had increased.
“Maybe a mouse that died,” said Ann.
“A mouse? More like a dead hippo that’s rotting,” Erik said. He walked around in the house, simply to decide that it was worst in the hall.
“Have you checked upstairs?”
Ann shook her head. It didn’t feel good. Something was wrong. She realized that it couldn’t possibly be a mouse.
“Mice that eat poison dry up,” said Erik.
Ann peeked up the stairs to the top floor, where her bedroom was.
“Yuck,” she said. “Stow away your things now, and I’ll make something to eat.” That was a signal that made him respond. He was always hungry. He took down the key to the cabin.
She unwrapped the veal entrecôte, which she had taken out earlier, and set it on the cutting board. A neat little 450-gram piece. Erik stood outside his cabin with his hand on the doorknob. It struck her that he was a handsome boy. She pulled open the kitchen drawer and saw immediately that the knife was missing. The best one, which she’d bought in a specialty shop in Lisbon, the one she always used for meat. Now it wasn’t in its place. She looked up and out the window. Erik had gone in and shut the door. Now he was no doubt sitting in front of the computer. She searched through the drawer again, took out the few kitchen utensils, eyeballed the counter and the sink. The knife was gone. She was always careful with that knife, she washed it by hand, dried it off, and stored it in a cork case, advised by the salesperson not to let it bump against other utensils unprotected. “This knife is the most important tool in your home,” he’d said. It had been priced accordingly, 105 euros.
She turned around. Someone had moved the knife, maybe stolen it. The front door had been unlocked while she went around doling out herring. An hour’s absence and that was more than enough for an intrusion. Someone had seen her leave the house and taken the opportunity, was that it?
A freezing cold spread in her body, as if a contrast fluid was being pumped into her veins. Her muscles tensed. The anger would come, she knew that, but now it was only a budding terror that was growing ever stronger. A knife, why would you steal a knife? The computer was on the table, the thief hadn’t bothered about that. A knife.
Was the intruder still in the house? She took the vegetable knife down from the knife holder on the wall. It was far from as imposing as the Portuguese meat knife, but the blade was about ten centimeters long in any event and well sharpened. She had been a lone wolf in her work with the police, going her own way many times, and she had nearly paid with her life. Now she was in her own home, surrounded by an increasing odor of decomposition and obliteration, because of course it was death that stank. I’m calm, she told herself. I’m calm, nothing can make me paralyzed.
The stairs creaked as usual. The smell increased with every step she took. The bedroom door was wide open. The door to the other room, which was mainly used for storage, was closed. Centuries ago she had taken part in an exercise at school, how you go in and search a house. Twenty-five years later none of this actually had any significance. Now it was just her, alone with a vegetable knife. She breathed deeply, tested the blade against her left index finger, squeezed the handle, feeling the sweat beading on her hairline.
It was on its back, and strangely enough gave a human impression. The four legs stuck straight up, as if it were participating in an exercise session. The belly was cut open and in the middle the knife was thrust in. This was perhaps what made her the most upset; how would she ever be able to use it again? How would she be able to cut up a piece of meat without thinking about the dead badger in her bed, without associating it with the stench? The hell she could!