she left, Blanca came to her with a letter in her hand.
'I forgot to give you this. It arrived a couple of days ago.'
There was no sender's address. The postmark showed that it had been posted in Spain. It was addressed to her at the hotel she had stayed in previously.
'How did you get hold of this?'
'Somebody from the hotel brought it. You must have given them Henrik's address.'
'Perhaps I did. I can't remember.'
Louise put it into her pocket.
'Are you sure there aren't any more letters that you've forgotten about?'
'I haven't got any more, no.'
'No more letters that Henrik asked you to send? In a year's time? Ten years'?'
Blanca understood what Louise meant. She shook her head. There were no more letters like the one she had sent to Nazrin.
It had stopped raining. Louise decided to go for a long walk, tire herself out, and then have dinner at her hotel. Before going to sleep she would phone Artur and wish him a Merry Christmas. Perhaps she would go back home in time for Boxing Day? At the very least she would assure him that she would be home for New Year.
It was late in the evening that she remembered the letter. She read it in her room. With a sense of increasing horror, she realised that nothing was over, the pain that was afflicting her had not yet reached its culmination.
The text was in English. All references to names, countries, towns were crossed out in black Indian ink.
Personal particulars correspond to the data on the identification tag attached to the corpse. The overall skin colour is pale, livor mortis bluish-red on the back of the corpse. Rigor mortis is still present. There are petechiae in the conjunctivae and around the eyes. No foreign bodies are present in the auditory meatus, the nasal cavities, the oral cavity or the rectal orifice. Visible mucous membranes are pale with no sign of haemorrhage. There are no signs of injury on the body, apart from an old scar on the back. The external sexual organs are uninjured and free from extraneous content.
Louise still had no idea what the letter was about. But she had a vague feeling of anxiety. She read on:
The internal examination shows that the scalp displays no sign of haemorrhage. The skull is uninjured, the cranium pale on the inside. No haemorrhage is visible outside or underneath the hard membrane of the brain. The surface of the brain appears to be normal. The tentorium and occipital cavity have not been exposed to pressure. The medial line has not been distorted. The soft membranes are glossy and smooth. There is no trace of haemorrhage or pathological change between the membranes. The brain cells are normal in size. The border between grey and white fluid is clearly marked. The grey cells are normal in colour. The brain tissue is normal in consistency. There is no trace of deposits in the arteries at the base of the brain.
She continued reading about circulatory organs, breathing organs, digestive organs, urinary organs. The list was long, and concluded with an examination of the skeleton. The conclusions came at the end.
The deceased was found dead lying face down on the tarmac. No specific objects have been found at the site. The occurrence of petechiae indicates that the cause of death was strangulation. The conclusion is that the cause of death was probably intentional action by another party.
What she had in her hand was a forensic report of a post-mortem examination, conducted at an unknown hospital by an unknown pathologist. It was only when she read the details of height and weight that she realised to her horror that the corpse being subjected to the autopsy was that of Aron.
Intentional action by another party. When Aron left the church, somebody had attacked him, strangled him and left him lying in the street. But who had found him? Why had the Spanish police not contacted her? Who were the doctors who had conducted the post-mortem examination?
She felt a desperate need to speak to Artur. She phoned him but made no mention of Lucinda or the postmortem report, merely said that Aron was dead and she was unable to say any more at this moment. He was too sensible to ask any questions. Apart from wondering when she was coming home.
'Soon,' she said.
She emptied the minibar and wondered how she would be able to cope with all the grief she was being forced to bear. She felt that the last of the columns propping up her inner resistance was about to give way. That night in her hotel room in Barcelona, with the post-mortem report lying on the floor beside her bed, she had the feeling that she no longer had the strength to keep going.
The next day she returned to Henrik's flat. While she was trying to make up her mind about what to do with his belongings, it suddenly dawned on her what she had to do in order to continue living.
There was only one way, and it started here, in Henrik's flat. Her mission would be to finish the story he had been unable to tell. She would dig down, and piece together the fragments she found.
What was it that Lucinda had said? It's never good to die before you've finished saying what you have to say. Her own story. And Henrik's. And Aron's.
Three stories that had now combined to form one.
She had to take over, now that nobody else could.
She felt that it was urgent. Time was shrinking wherever she looked. But first of all she would go home, to Artur. They would go together to Henrik's grave, and also light a candle for Aron.
On 27 December Louise left her hotel and took a taxi to the airport. It was foggy. She paid the taxi driver and made her way to the Iberia check-in desk before boarding the flight that would take her to Stockholm.
For the first time for ages she felt strong. Her compass had ceased to spin wildly.
When she had checked in her bag she paused to buy a newspaper before proceeding to the security barrier.
She never noticed the man observing her from a distance.
It was only when she had passed through security that he left the departure lounge and headed for the city.
EPILOGUE
Twenty years ago, close to Zambia's western border with Angola, I watched a young African man die of Aids.
It was the first time I had witnessed such a thing, but not the last.
The memory of that man's face has been in my mind's eye all the time I spent planning and writing this book.
It is a novel, it is fiction. But the borderline between what has really happened and what might well have happened is often almost non-existent. Naturally, I dig down in a different way from a journalist; but we both illuminate the darkest corners of people, society and the world around us. The result is not infrequently identical.
I have taken the liberties that fiction allows me. To give just one example: as far as I am aware, no member of the past or present embassy staff or Sida delegation in Maputo, or anywhere else come to that, is called Lars H氓kansson. In the unlikely event of my assumption being wrong, I hereby declare once and for all that he is not the person portrayed in this book!
One seldom comes across the values I have attributed to him. I wish I could write 'never', but alas, I cannot.
I have received help from many people in what can be described as this descent into an abyss. I would like to mention two of them by name. First and foremost Robert Johnsson, in Gothenburg, who dug out everything I asked him for, and in addition added extra spice by way of his own discoveries. Also Dr Anastazia Lazaridou at the Byzantine Museum in Athens, who piloted me through the complicated world of archaeology.
Many thanks to them, and to all the others.
In conclusion, a novel can end on page 185 or page 452, but reality continues apace. What is written in this book is exclusively the result of my own choices and decisions, of course. Just as the anger is also mine, the anger that was my driving force.
Henning Mankell
F氓r枚, May 2005