‘What do you mean?’
‘Like, perhaps he volunteered to fight.’
‘You mean, join the British or something?
‘I honestly don’t know. I’ve just always thought that there was more to it somehow – there was something deeper driving his hatred towards them – it didn’t – doesn’t feel like the result of something passive, if you know what I mean?’
Ingrid frowned. Thinking back to the look in his eyes when he’d shaken her as a child. It was blind panic. ‘I do.’
It was a pigeon-coloured sky, dusted with pale stars, when Ingrid made her way to his cabin by the lake the next morning. He was sitting on the kitchen bench, his hair wild and unruly, a ceramic mug warming his hands.
He sighed when he saw her.
‘So, this is what I’m in for, Inge?’ he said, as Narfi sidled up to him, waiting patiently for the old man’s heavy-handed petting, which came soon enough. ‘You’re checking up on me every minute of the day, is that right?’
Ingrid put a knitted bag full of supplies on the kitchen table – including his favourite cake. He was more lucid this morning – and she was relieved. She looked around the kitchen, which seemed tidier too.
‘Not every minute, no, but checking in. Yes, Morfar. It would help us both if you would just stop fighting it.’
He made a tutting sound, then slurped his coffee. ‘You’re always welcome to visit, Inge, but you don’t need to worry about me.’
Ingrid tucked a strand of stray blonde hair behind her ear, then frowned. ‘Well, it’s my right, isn’t it?’
To her surprise, that made him smile. ‘I suppose.’ Then he sighed. ‘At least you’re better than Marta. She never shuts up.’
She shot him a look. ‘I don’t remember getting much of a word in yesterday.’
‘Hence why I prefer you to Marta.’
She grinned. So it was going to be like that today. That was good. There were other encouraging signs too.
She was glad to see that he’d kept the fire going. He’d also refilled the water butt, and eaten some toast. She’d wondered what it would mean if he couldn’t do those sorts of things himself anymore, and how long it would be before he couldn’t.
Still, he was in desperate need of a bath, and from the way his ribs were poking out, it didn’t look like he had been eating much besides toast. The doctor had said that when someone had early dementia like him, they often forgot, until their bodies complained. Jürgen had always been a one-track-minded person, who was always too busy to stop and make himself a meal. She’d be surprised if he was eating more than once a day now. It wasn’t good.
The truth was for this to work – for either of them – Morfar needed her to come more often. To check on things he might forget, like getting more water, going to the shops for supplies, eating, refilling the log pile.
Which meant, like it or not, that he was going to have to get used to her.
They had been close once, very close. She remembered him carving many wooden animals for her over the years. They were still precious to her, even now. Arctic creatures, foxes and birds, so many birds, and that bear. She still had them all. The bear was always on her nightstand. Keeping watch.
Her grandfather had been different back then. Quiet, kept himself to himself, but he always had time for her. He was a natural hermit, not someone who went for things like midsummer celebrations or family barbecues. He wasn’t shy, just reserved. Not good at small talk. But he visited often, and they spent a lot of time together in his garden, planting seeds in the greenhouse, tending the flowerbeds in the spring and summer months, and watching the wildlife as they went on long rambling walks along the lake and through the forest. Morfar was the one who had made her fall in love with their wild northern landscape.
They’d grown apart when her parents moved to Malmö for work. It was normal, she supposed, natural. They still spent every summer at their old cabin, though, and that’s when she saw him. The years would fall away, when they were walking in the forest together again, and she would tell him things she never dreamt of telling anyone else. When she got older, some of that ease changed. She was more interested in the boys who came down for the summer, and didn’t spare all that much time for her morfar. It was normal, she supposed, if a bit sad. He would always have a special place in her heart, however, though she regretted more than anything the distance between them. How little she really knew about his past. Despite what he said about Marta, growing up he’d always let Ingrid do most of the talking. She hoped, somehow, that she could change that now.
But first they were going to have a second try at that bath. And for that there was one thing she knew very well about him – he had the sweetest tooth in northern Sweden.
‘I made a cake,’ she said, getting the tin out of her bag.
His eyes widened. ‘The one with the cherries? The chocolate one?’
‘Yes.’
He smiled.
‘But first you are going to have a bath.’
He rubbed Narfi’s fur, then sighed as the dog looked at him sympathetically. ‘I should have known, boy. There’s always a catch with a woman.’
She was towel-drying his long grey hair when it happened – he switched to German. It was so fast, and so unexpected, that Ingrid blinked.
‘Eh, Küken, what are we going to tell Papa about Herr Baer’s dinghy? I can’t believe it sank like that. Although’ – he started to giggle – ‘you did run it aground first.’
Ingrid paused towelling his hair. Should she just go with it… try to learn more?
‘I ran it aground?’ she asked, responding in German.
He swivelled to look at her, then grinned, his voice rising in pitch. ‘Well, technically, we both did, I was the one trying to make those waves in the canal, so it was both of us. It always is, isn’t it?’
‘What?’ she asked.
‘The two of us getting into scrapes, Küken, being twins.’
‘Twins?’ breathed Ingrid.
He looked at her as if she were mad, then, still in his young voice, said, ‘Course we’re twins – how hard did you hit your head, Asta, to have forgotten about me?’
3
‘Asta?’ Ingrid repeated.
The towel was ripped from her hands. The blood had run completely from his face, making his eyes wild, and starkly blue, as he stared at her in utter shock. ‘What did you just say?’ he breathed, so softly, so laced with feeling that she actually flinched.
‘I – I—’ she began, her mouth turning dry. ‘You were talking about someone named Asta.’
The look in his eyes was full of pain, and accusation.
He stood up, fast, and put on his clean shirt. ‘I don’t know anyone by that name.’
Ingrid stared at him, concerned. The change that had come over him was astonishing.
‘You said she was your twin,’ she breathed.
He started pacing erratically, breathing heavily as he beat his hands against his head. ‘What are you doing to me? Why are you trying to get inside my head? Stop it, just stop this. I don’t want you here – prying!’