The Quarry (5 page)

The previous week his furniture had been delivered – the small number of pieces he had wanted to keep from his room at the home – and all the mementoes from his thirty years at sea: the ships in bottles, the maritime charts, the name plates from some of the ships on which he had sailed, and beautiful examples of rope work, dark brown and still smelling of tar.

Gerlof was surrounded by memories.

It was when he had opened the cupboard next to the fridge in the kitchen to put away the log books and charts that he had come across the diaries.

They had been tied up in a bundle on a shelf behind Ella’s little jewellery box and old books by Karl May and L. M. Montgomery. Each one had a number in black ink on the cover, and when he undid the string and opened them, he saw densely written pages in his wife’s ornate handwriting.

Ella’s diaries – eight altogether.

Gerlof hesitated briefly. He thought about the promise he had made Ella. Then he picked up the top book and went out to the wooden seat in the garden, with a feeling that he was doing something dishonourable. He had seen her writing in her diary on the odd occasion, but she had never shown him what she had written, and had only mentioned her diaries on that one occasion, when she was dying.

Burn them, Gerlof
.

He sat down, wrapped a blanket around his legs and placed the book on the table beside him. It was twenty-two years since Ella had died of liver cancer in the autumn of 1976, but here in the garden he often had the feeling that she wasn’t gone at all, that she was in the kitchen making coffee.

Ella had always set clear boundaries. For example, she had never allowed her husband in the kitchen, and of course Gerlof had never tried to change her mind. When their daughters Lena and Julia became teenagers at the beginning of the sixties they had made determined attempts to get him to help with the housework, but Gerlof had refused.

‘It’s too late for me,’ he’d said.

For the most part he had been afraid and unsure of himself in the kitchen. He had never learned to cook or do the washing, although he could do the dishes. These days Swedish men seemed to do just about everything; times had changed.

Gerlof turned his head. He saw a small fluttering movement in the long grass beyond the garden. It was the first butterfly of the year. It came flying towards him with the same jerky movements as every other spring butterfly he had seen over the years, flitting here and there with no apparent goal.

It was a Brimstone Yellow. A perfect sign of spring.

Gerlof smiled at the bright butterfly as it reached the lawn in front of him – but stopped smiling when he spotted another butterfly over in the long grass. This one was dark, almost black, with grey and white stripes; he didn’t know the name of it. Camberwell Beauty? Or did they call it the Mourning Cloak? This one was flying in a straighter line, and reached the lawn at almost the same time as the Brimstone Yellow. They fluttered around each other for a few seconds in a spring dance before flitting past Gerlof and disappearing behind the cottage.

A yellow butterfly and a dark-grey one, what did that mean? He had always regarded the first butterfly as a sign of what the rest of the year would be like: bright and hopeful or dark and gloomy, but now he wasn’t so sure. It was as if he had hoisted a flag that had got stuck at half-mast before continuing to the top.

When he opened the diary he heard the sound of a car engine. A big shiny car came along the road and turned off on to the gravel track leading to the quarry.

Gerlof caught a glimpse of a middle-aged man and woman in the front.

Probably some of the new neighbours who had built houses by the quarry. Summer visitors. No doubt they would be here only when it was light and warm; they were hardly likely to spend time here when it was freezing cold, chopping down the last of the trees along the coast as his own relatives had once done.

Gerlof wasn’t interested in the couple in the car. He looked down at the diary and began to read.

7
^th
May 1957

Tonight Gerlof will set off on his first voyage of the year to Nynäshamn for oil. He was in Kalmar today getting some measurements done on the ship because he has altered the cover of the hold. Lena and Julia are on board with him.

Today has been sunny. Got to the cottage at six this evening and opened the windows to air the rooms. There was a faint smell of mould, I thought; I tried to get some fresh air in, but in fact it was a pot of juniper berries in syrup that had started fermenting and had exploded into a thousand pieces. Had to start cleaning rancid, sticky purple syrup off the floor, only just managed to cook something (meatballs). The children and Gerlof will be home the day after tomorrow.

Gerlof realized these were holiday diaries. He knew that when he had been away at sea, Ella had often gone up to the summer cottage with their two daughters. Later, when they were older and wanted to go with Gerlof to Stockholm or stay at home in Borgholm, she had come here alone. That was probably why he had rarely seen her writing in them.

He read on:

15
^th
May 1957

Sunny, but a little chilly in the wind from the north-east. The girls went for a long bike ride along the coast road this afternoon.

A strange thing happened while they were away. I was standing out on the veranda watering the pelargoniums – and I saw a troll from the quarry.

What else could it be?

It was a two-legged creature at any rate, but it moved so fast I was quite taken aback. Just a shadow, a snapping twig out in the pasture, a rustling among the bushes, and it was gone. I think it laughed at me.

‘The pasture’ was Ella and Gerlof’s name for the overgrown area beyond the summer cottage where the cattle used to graze before the war.

But what did Ella mean by a troll?

Suddenly Gerlof heard the sound of another car behind the trees. The engine died away, then the gate creaked. He quickly hid the diary under the blanket. He didn’t know why – a guilty conscience, perhaps.

A short, powerfully built man in his seventies was heading up the path. It was his friend John Hagman, dressed in the worn blue dungarees and the pale-grey peaked cap he wore winter and summer. He had been Gerlof’s first mate on the Baltic cargo ships once upon a time; these days he ran the campsite at the southern end of the village.

He came over with a heavy tread and stopped on the grass; Gerlof smiled and nodded at him, but John didn’t smile back – a cheerful, happy expression was not his style.

‘So,’ he said. ‘I heard you were back.’

‘Yes. You too.’

John nodded. He had been up to visit Gerlof at the home a few times during the winter, but otherwise he had been staying in his son’s small apartment down in Borgholm. He had seemed almost shame-faced when he explained that the village had begun to feel too cold and lonely during the winter. He couldn’t cope with it any longer, and Gerlof understood completely.

‘Anyone else here?’

John shook his head. ‘There hasn’t been anybody around in the village since New Year, apart from the odd weekend visitor.’

‘What about Astrid Linder?’

‘She gave up as well in the end, and closed up the cottage. I think she went to the Riviera in January.’

‘I see,’ said Gerlof, remembering that Astrid had been a doctor before she retired. ‘I should think she’s got a fair bit of money tucked away.’

They fell silent. Gerlof couldn’t see any more butterflies. He listened to the faint soughing of the wind over in the trees and said, ‘I don’t think I’ll be here much longer, John.’

‘Here in the village?’

‘No, I mean here,’ said Gerlof, pointing to his chest, where he presumed the soul and therefore the source of life was located.

It didn’t sound quite as dramatic as he’d expected, and John merely nodded and asked, ‘Are you ill, then?’

‘No more than usual,’ said Gerlof. ‘But I’m very weary. I ought to do something useful, a bit of carpentry, paint the cottage like I used to do … but I just sit here.’

John looked away, as if the conversation was hard work. ‘Start with something small,’ he suggested. ‘Go down to the sea and clean up the gig.’

Gerlof sighed. ‘It’s full of holes.’

‘We can fix it,’ said John. ‘And there’s a new millennium in two years, a new era. You want to be around for that, don’t you?’

‘Maybe … we’ll just have to see what this new era is like.’ Gerlof wanted to change the subject, and nodded in the direction of the fence. ‘So what do you think of the neighbours, then? Across the road.’

John said nothing.

‘Don’t you know them?’

‘Well, I’ve seen them. But they’ve hardly been here up till now, I don’t really know much about them.’

‘Me neither. But I’m curious – aren’t you?’

‘They’re rich,’ said John. ‘Rich folk from the mainland.’

‘Definitely,’ said Gerlof. ‘You need to let them know you’re around.’

‘What for?’

‘So you can do some jobs for them before the campers arrive.’

‘That’s a good idea.’

Gerlof nodded, leaning forward slightly. ‘And make sure they pay you well.’

‘Good thinking,’ said John, looking almost cheerful.

‘So you’ll be staying here for a few weeks now?’ asked the young estate agent as he handed over the keys and the last of the paperwork to Vendela Larsson. ‘Enjoying the spring sunshine?’

‘That’s what we’re hoping,’ said Vendela with a laugh.

She often laughed nervously when she was talking to people she didn’t know. But she was hoping the habit would disappear now she was on the island. A lot of things were going to be different now.

‘Good, excellent,’ said the agent. ‘That means you’ll be helping to extend the tourist season, like real pioneers … Showing people on the mainland that it’s possible to enjoy the peace and quiet of Öland for more than just a few weeks in the summer.’

Vendela nodded.

Enjoy the peace and quiet? That depended on whether she would be able to relax, of course, and whether Max would settle and be able to get his cookery book finished.

Right now he was in the heated garage washing the car. Every drop of blood must go. Since they had arrived at the summer house Max hadn’t said a word about what had happened on the way, but fury surrounded him like a sour smell.

Vendela had been left to deal with the agent, and she was trying not to shiver in the cold wind. It was evening; the sun had set over the sound and taken every vestige of warmth with it. She really wanted to go back indoors.

The agent looked around in the twilight, over at the large house next door and the small cottage a few hundred metres to the north.

‘This is an excellent area,’ he said. ‘Absolutely top-notch. The neighbours are just in the right place – not too close, not too far away. And no other properties between you and the shore … All you have to do is walk around the quarry if you fancy a morning dip.’

‘Once the ice has melted, of course,’ said Vendela.

‘It won’t be long now,’ said the agent. ‘It’s quite rare for it to be here this late … but we had a hard winter this year. Minus fifteen some nights.’

A stocky man in blue dungarees was standing next to the agent. He was the local builder, and nodded to Vendela.

‘Any problems, give me a ring,’ he said.

Those were his first and last words to Vendela this evening. Both he and the agent made a move.

‘Don’t fall out with your neighbours,’ was the agent’s final piece of advice to Vendela as they shook hands. ‘That’s the golden rule for house-owners.’

‘We haven’t met the neighbours yet,’ said Vendela, laughing again.

As she walked back into the house, little Aloysius hauled himself laboriously out of his dog basket on his stiff legs and barked. He didn’t seem to be aware that it was his mistress who had come into the room – perhaps his sense of smell was failing too.

‘It’s only me, Ally,’ said Vendela, patting him.

She had felt a little exposed out in the windswept garden, but in here nobody could get to her. She loved the clean surfaces in the new house. Everything was pristine, there was no rubbish hidden in cupboards or attics. There was no cellar waiting to be cleared out and cleaned.

She remembered what the agent had said about the neighbours, and suddenly had an idea: perhaps she and Max ought to organize a party for everyone in the village, some time this week, so that they could get to know people. It would also be a way for her to practise relaxing when she was in company.

A party would definitely be a good idea.

Although it wasn’t actually the neighbours she wanted to meet, it was the elves.

Once upon a time, long, long ago, a hunter went out on to the alvar
, her father had told Vendela one evening.
The hunter was after hares and pheasants, but instead he met the great love of his life out there. And he was never the same again
.