Free Before the Frost by Henning Mankell Page A

piano by the window, which overlooked open fields and then the rolling hills leading down to the sea. Next to the piano there was a table with a tape recorder as well as a synthesizer and other electronic equipment. Henrietta turned on the tape player. A woman’s voice came on, wailing and sobbing. It was the one Linda had heard through the window. Her curiosity about this strange woman increased.
    â€œWhere did you get it?”
    â€œThis is from an American film. I often record the sound of crying from films I see, or from programs on the radio. I have a collection of forty-four crying voices so far, everything from a baby to a very old woman I recorded secretly at a rest home. Would you like to donate a sample to the archive sometime?”
    â€œNo, thanks.”
    Henrietta sat down at the piano and played a few haunting chords. Linda went and stood next to her, while Henrietta continued to play. The room was filled with a powerful surge of music which then faded into silence. Henrietta gestured for Linda to sit next to her on the piano bench.
    â€œTell me again why you came here. Seriously. I’ve never even felt you really liked me.”
    â€œWhen I was little I was afraid of you.”
    â€œOf me? No one is afraid of me!”
    That’s where you’re wrong, Linda thought. Anna was afraid of you too—sometimes she had nightmares about you.
    â€œIt was an impulse, nothing more. I wonder where Anna is, but I’m not as worried as I was last night. You’re probably right that she’s in Lund.”
    Linda broke off.
    â€œWhat is it you aren’t saying? Should I be worried about her too?”
    â€œAnna thought she saw her father on a street in Malmö a couple of days ago. I shouldn’t be telling you this. You should hear it from her.”
    â€œIs that all?”
    â€œThat’s not enough?”

    Henrietta touched the keys as if sketching out a few more bars of music.
    â€œAnna is always catching glimpses of her father. She’s told me stories like this since she was a little girl.”
    Linda raised her eyebrows. Anna had never mentioned one of these sightings before, and Linda was sure she would have. When they were younger they told each other everything. Anna was one of the few people who Linda had told about standing on the edge of the overpass in Malmö. What Henrietta said didn’t fit this picture.
    â€œAnna is never going to relinquish her hope,” Henrietta continued. “The hope that Erik will one day come back. Even that he is still alive.”
    â€œWhy did he leave?”
    â€œHe left because he was disappointed.”
    â€œBy what?”
    â€œBy life. He had such marvelous ambitions when he was younger. He seduced me with those dreams, if you must know. I had never met a man who had the kind of wonderful visions that Erik had. He was going to make a difference in the world, in our generation. He knew without a doubt that he had been put on this earth in order to do something on a grand scale. We met when he was sixteen and I was fifteen. Even as young as I was, I knew I had never met anyone like him; he radiated dreams and life force. At that time he was still looking for his niche—was it art, sports, politics, or another arena in which he was going to leave his mark? He had decided to give himself until the age of twenty to figure it out. I can’t remember any self-doubt in him until then. But when he turned twenty he started to worry. There was a restlessness in him. Until then he had had all the time in the world. When I started making demands on him to help support the family after Anna was born, he would get impatient and scream at me. He had never done that before. That was when he started making his sandals; he was good with his hands. He called them ‘sandals of indolence’ as a kind of protest, I think, for the fact that they were taking up his valuable time. It was probably then that he started