Dark Angel полностью

She made the coffee and switched on the TV. The programme Ask the Doctor was on channel 2, while channel 1 was rerunning a drama series that she’d already seen. A show for kids was on channel 4. She sighed and went back to channel 2 and a discussion about prostate cancer. At least it was reassuring to have some background noise, voices to keep her company and hold bad thoughts at bay. She went into the kitchen to pour herself some coffee. Then stopped abruptly. She had glimpsed something moving outside in the dark. Like a shadow slipping past the window. All of a sudden she was uncomfortably aware of how visible she must be from outside as she stood in the brightly lit kitchen. She fumbled for the light switch.

When the room went dark, she had a better view of the outdoors. She crept over to the small window to scan her surroundings, looking from one side of the property to the other. She saw the lawn, which was covered with withered leaves, pine needles and branches that had come down during the winter storms. She saw the toolshed, the playhouse and the privy. Nothing. She went back to the living room, turned off all the lamps and blew out the candle. If someone was out there, she didn’t want that person to be able to see every move she made. She also turned off the light in the hall. The house had no curtains or blinds. She had decided that window blinds were unnecessary since she usually came here only in the summertime. She loved it when sunlight flooded the small cabin, both day and night. Curtains merely gathered mildew, and besides, they blocked the view. But right now she would have given anything for some sort of window covering.

Her heart was pounding hard. Who in the world could be after her? She’d never done anyone any harm. But she was starting to wonder if she might be wrong about that. She turned off the TV and listened intently, straining all of her senses. All she heard was the wind. She sat down on the sofa in the dark living room and waited. Half an hour passed. Then another. Nothing happened. She was growing more and more annoyed. Should she keep sitting here like a rat in a cage? To make matters worse, she badly needed to pee, but unfortunately she had no chamber pot. She refused to consider peeing into a bowl that was used for food. After yet another half-hour passed, she gave up. She couldn’t hold it any longer. And by now anger had taken over. She wasn’t about to let fear keep her trapped inside her own house. Well, it wasn’t really hers, but the cabin had always been available to her because her friends who owned it lived abroad. They wanted to keep the summer place in the family, so they had let her use it ever since her children were small. She’d made it her own, and she loved the cabin more than anything.

She put on her jacket and pulled on her boots, hesitating a moment with her hand resting on the door handle.

Then she turned the key and opened the door.

THE REST OF the world faded away and then vanished entirely as Knutas watched the Regional News programme on TV in the police break room that evening. The top story wasn’t about Viktor Algård but about the death that had resulted from the assault outside the Solo Club. He was deeply moved by the interview with the father of one of the witnesses, and the statements made by Alexander’s sister, the school principal and a few students. When he suddenly saw his own son appear on the screen, his breathing faltered.

In a voice-over Johan Berg proclaimed: ‘Several young people were witnesses to the drama. One of them was Nils Knutas. Out of fear of reprisals, he previously hasn’t wanted to say anything about what he saw. But today he has decided to come forward.’

Nils was shown standing at the scene of the assault, pointing to show where he and his friends had been, only a few metres away. They had watched as Alexander was severely beaten. None of them had dared intervene. He talked about his sense of guilt and about how scared he’d been, how powerless he’d felt. When the assault was over and the perpetrators had fled, he’d gone over to Alexander. He’d felt how faint the boy’s pulse was, and he’d seen all the blood. While his friends had phoned the police and the medics, he had simply walked away, leaving the scene without doing anything to help.

‘Why have you decided to talk about this today?’ asked Johan.

His expression sombre, Nils looked straight at the camera as he replied: ‘Because of what Alexander’s sister, Olivia, said in the auditorium. If she has the guts to stand up there in front of hundreds of people and say what she knows, then how could I remain silent?’

With that, the story was over. It was followed by a studio discussion with several participants. Knutas saw them through a fog, not taking in who they were or what they were saying. He sat on the sofa as if frozen, incapable of moving. Jacobsson, who was sitting next to him, patted him on the shoulder and got up without saying a word.