Free The Double Silence by Mari Jungstedt Page A

actual shooting of the film were shown on a large movie screen. It was easy to imagine Bergman clambering among the limestone rocks and along the shore, pointing andgesturing as he conversed with the actors. Moving back and forth to get just the right shot with the right light; working with Sven Nykvist, who was always the cinematographer for his films.
    They ambled over the rocks, enjoying the view. They noticed that a short distance away, Jörn Donner and the TV newsreader were walking on ahead. They seemed to have a specific destination in mind. They stopped in front of a fence that ran across the middle of the rocks. The field on the other side was nothing more than a wide expanse of stone-covered ground before the lowlying woods began. It seemed completely desolate.
    Jörn Donner raised his hand and pointed, but they couldn’t hear what he was saying. They could only guess.

THE TOUR ENDED with a luncheon, and by the time the group returned to the inn, it was already two in the afternoon. She declined to accompany the others to the beach and instead set off on a bicycle ride. She had already decided where to go, but she didn’t tell anyone what her plans were. She was going to try to find Bergman’s house. She glanced at her watch. She had four hours until she had to be back for the evening film showing. It was at least worth a try. She suspected that they had been very close to his house during the bus tour. She didn’t actually remember which way they had gone to get there, but she did know that he had lived somewhere in Hammars.
    She decided to take a detour via the ferry dock at Broa in order to get some real exercise. She would bike around the promontory at Ryssudden and then go to the little village of Dämba. From there she would head to Hammars. She set off pedalling towards Fårö church, passed the turnoff for the
rauk
area called Langhammars, and continued down to the ferry dock. Just before reaching the strait between Fårö and Gotland, she turned on to a narrow, asphalt road and went past several limestone farmhouses that sold Fårö potatoes, strawberries and vegetables. What an idyllic country scene, she thought. On one side was the beautiful view of the sea and the houses situated on the shore of Fårösund. On the other side of her were the farms, windmills and small feed barns with high, thatched roofs typical of Fårö. She also saw flocks of sheep and windswept heaths where the trees were bent crooked by the wind, never growing taller than a metre high.
    As the road meandered upwards, the landscape opened up: flat plains with stone walls in the middle of the barren landscape, juniper bushes, the skeletons of dead trees with white branches, and even more sheep, grazing undisturbed in the poor soil. She kept up a good pace, and it wasn’t long before she was drenched with sweat. She enjoyed the exertion and breathed air deep into her lungs. She passed a man standing at the edge of a ditch, staring at her. Without changing expression, he raised his hand in greeting. Otherwise the road was deserted. Most people had probably gone to the beach on such a beautiful day. Fårö had plenty of long sandy beaches.
    She passed a big lake. The light-coloured gravel road, dusty with limestone, wound its way onwards, and she saw a cluster of houses up ahead. The secluded village of Dämba consisted of a dozen or so houses, surrounded by low walls. There were also small farms. An old windmill with broken sails stood on a hill a short distance away. Somewhere she’d heard that it belonged to Bergman, and that he’d used it as a guesthouse for people who worked on his films.
    After a kilometre a sign appeared. Hammars. Her pulse quickened. She was now truly in Bergman country. A road, straight as an arrow, led east. On either side were meadows filled with flowers and hectares of oats billowing in the faint breeze. The sun was high overhead, and it had to be over 25 degrees centigrade. She passed pastures where