The Savage Altar - By Asa Larsson Page 0,56

“They don’t take any notice of what I say. They own me. And they own my child. Just like they used to own my dogs. There was Laika—Daddy just took her away from me. They’re so frightened of being alone with each other, they just—”

She breaks off and the rage and the tears turn into a long, drawn-out wail from her throat. Her hands fall helplessly to the floor.

“They just took her,” she whimpers. “We were going to make a gingerbread house, you and me and Sara.”

“Ssh,” says Rebecka, stroking the hair from Sanna’s face. “It’ll be all right. I promise.”

She dries the tears from Sanna’s cheeks with the back of her hands.

“What kind of mother am I?” whispers Sanna. “I can’t even defend my own child.”

“You’re a good mother,” Rebecka reassures her. “Listen to me, it’s your parents who’ve done something wrong. Not you.”

“I don’t want to live like this. He just comes in with his spare key and takes what he wants. What could I do? I didn’t want to start screaming and pulling at Sara. She’d have been terrified. My little girl.”

A picture of Olof Strandgård forms in Rebecka’s head. His deep, reassuring voice. Not used to being contradicted. His permanent smile above the starched shirt collar. His cardboard cutout wife.

I’ll kill him, she thinks. I’ll kill him with my bare hands.

“Come along,” she says to Sanna, in a voice that brooks no disagreement.

And Sanna gets ready and goes with her like an obedient child. She drives the car to where Rebecka wants to go.

Kristina Strandgård opens the door.

“We’ve come to collect Sara,” says Rebecka. “We’re going to a party and we’re already forty minutes late.”

Fear flashes through Kristina’s eyes. She glances over her shoulder into the house, but doesn’t move to let them in. Rebecka can hear that they have guests.

“But we agreed that Sara was coming to us this weekend,” says Kristina, trying to catch Sanna’s eye.

Sanna looks obstinately at the ground.

“As I understand it, you didn’t agree anything of the sort,” says Rebecka tersely.

“Just a minute,” says Kristina, biting her lip nervously.

She disappears into the lounge, and after a while Olof Strandgård appears in the doorway. He is not smiling. His eyes bore into Rebecka first. Then he turns to his daughter.

“What’s this nonsense?” he growls. “I thought we had an agreement, Sanna. It doesn’t do Sara any good being dragged from pillar to post. I find it very disappointing that you keep making her pay the price for your whims and fancies.”

Sanna hunches her shoulders, but still stares stubbornly at the ground. Snow is falling onto her hair, forming a helmet of ice around her head.

“Are you going to answer when you’re spoken to, or can’t you even manage to show me that much respect?” says Olof in a tightly controlled voice.

He’s afraid of causing a scene when they’ve got guests, thinks Rebecka.

Her heart is pounding, but still she takes a step forward. Her voice is shaking as she stands up to Olof.

“We’re not here for a discussion,” she says. “Now, either you fetch Sara, or I will go straight to the police with your daughter and report you for abduction. I swear on the Bible, I’ll do it. And before I do it, I’ll force my way into your living room and play hell. Sara is Sanna’s daughter, and she wants her. Your choice. You can fetch her, or the police will.”

Kristina Strandgård peers anxiously over her husband’s shoulder.

Olof Strandgård smiles scornfully at Rebecka.

“Sanna,” he says to his daughter in a commanding voice, without taking his eyes off Rebecka. “Sanna.”

Sanna looks down at the ground. Almost imperceptibly she shakes her head.

And then it happens. Olof’s mood changes abruptly. His expression becomes concerned and hurt.

“Come in,” he says, backing into the hall.

“If it was so important to you, you only had to say,” says Olof to Sanna, who is dressing Sara in her snowsuit and boots. “I can’t read your mind. We thought it might be nice for you to have a weekend to yourself.”

Sanna puts on Sara’s hat and gloves in silence. Olof is talking quietly, afraid the guests will hear.

“You didn’t need to come here threatening and carrying on,” he insists.

“This really isn’t like you, Sanna,” whispers Kristina, but she is looking daggers at Rebecka, who is leaning against the front door.

“Tomorrow we’re getting the locks changed,” says Rebecka as they walk to the car.

Sanna is holding Sara in her arms and says nothing. Holding her as if she’ll never let

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