Free A Bridge to the Stars by Henning Mankell Page B

longer than that, Joel thinks.
Tonight it happened far too quickly. As if he were
hoping that I'd be asleep.
    There ought to be rules for fathers, thinks Joel angrily.
They shouldn't be allowed to come bursting into a
dream. They should only be allowed to listen so long at
the door to see if you're asleep. They shouldn't be
allowed to invite certain people home for coffee.
    All fathers ought to be made to sign such rules. And
every time they break one, they should be punished.
    The radio falls silent, Samuel has a good gargle, and
his bed creaks.
    What actually happened? Joel wonders.
    Why was Jenny so unhappy? What happened?
    When the alarm starts buzzing under his pillow, he's
not sure at first what it is. It goes off when he's in the
middle of a dream. Joel is surrounded by strangers, but
he knows that his mother is among them somewhere.
The only person he recognises is The Old Bricklayer.
Then the barriers at the level crossing start ringing. It's
the alarm clock under his pillow.
    He lies still in the darkness, listening.
    What had he been dreaming about? Was it a nasty
dream? Or just an odd one?
    He keeps on listening. Silence always has many sounds.
    A beam creaks. He hears his own breathing. There's a
rushing sound in his ears, like the wind.
    Joel is afraid of the dark. Not being able to see the walls
and ceiling, not being able to see his own hands. Waking
up in the dark is a kind of loneliness he's scared of.
    It's the nearest he can imagine to death.
    A black room where the ceiling could be just above
his face, but he can't see it.
    When you wake up in the middle of the night there's
no way of knowing if you're the only person left in the
whole wide world.
    He switches on the lamp standing on the blue stool.
Then he switches it off again. The darkness isn't
frightening any more. Not now that he knows nothing
has changed while he's been asleep.
    He tiptoes into the kitchen, puts on his boots then
creeps silently down the stairs. Old Mrs Westman is
having a coughing fit.
    The stars are twinkling in a clear sky when he gets
outside, and he starts running so as not to be late. Ture
is waiting for him by the goods wagons, in the shadows.
Once again he creeps up on Joel from behind and grabs
him by the shoulder, making him jump.
    I ought to have known, thinks Joel. Ture will keep on
doing that for as long as he sees it makes me jump.
    First they go looking for the dog. Joel shows Ture the
streetlight where he last saw the dog. He'd like to tell the
story of the night when he carried The Flying Horse out
of the bicycle shop – but would Ture believe him? Joel
has no idea what Ture thinks. And when he runs away
next week it will be too late. After that he'll never get to
know anything.
    It strikes Joel that this is the first time he's met
anybody who he knows he's soon going to be separated
from, and will never see again. Never ever, as long as he
lives . . .
    'A dog,' says Ture without warning. 'Why are we
looking for a dog?'
    Joel doesn't know what to say. All he knows is that
the dog is important. The dog heading for a star.
    He can't explain it, he just knows . . .
    Ture suddenly pokes him in the back.
    'There's somebody coming,' he whispers.
    He points down the street, and Joel sees a figure in
dark clothes approaching along the opposite pavement.
Somebody lit up by a streetlamp before being swallowed
up by the darkness again.
    They stand next to the wall where they are sure of not
being seen. The darkly clad figure has its head bowed,
looking like a body that stops at the shoulders. But Joel
sees who it is.
    It's No-Nose. The woman with a handkerchief instead
of a nose in her face.
    'It's Gertrud,' he whispers into Ture's ear. 'I know
who she is.'
    'Why is she out in the middle of the night, walking
with her head bowed?' wonders Ture.
    Ture indicates that they should follow her. They sneak
along in the shadow of the house walls, keeping the
hunched figure in front of them.
    It's not hard to follow her because she