Page 184 of The Sleepwalker

‘It was crazy .?.?. and incredibly interesting, too.’ Agneta smiles and turns her glass.

‘Anything we can use?’

‘I wrote it all down as soon as I came out.’

‘That’s great. We really need it,’ he says, topping up their glasses. ‘I’m getting excited now. Tell me everything.’

‘OK.’ She laughs.

‘You were there, with Hugo, Lars, the hypnotist and the detective.’

‘Joona Linna. He’s very attractive, you know .?.?. objectively speaking.’

‘Ha ha. What about the hypnotist? Is he as creepy as you’d expect?’

‘I’m going to sound insane now, but he was actually reallycharming.’

‘And handsome?’ Bernard suggests, pushing his plate away.

‘No comment,’ she replies with a smile.

A gust of wind blows a flurry of snowflakes against the kitchen window with a soft crackling sound.

‘Go on,’ he says, hiding his shaking hand beneath the table.

‘I don’t really understand how hypnosis works – we’ll have to look into that – but the whole process took much longer than I was expecting,’ she begins. ‘At first, I felt like laughing at how serious it all was. The ceremonial aspect of it. He started by counting down, but it all got very suggestive after a while.’

‘And that’s when you found yourself getting hypnotised too?’ he teases.

‘I know.’ Agneta laughs again. ‘It almost felt that way.’

‘Sorry, go on,’ says Bernard, producing a mechanical pencil from his chest pocket. ‘He was counting down .?.?.’

‘He started counting down from one hundred, and he kept telling Hugo to focus on his voice. Somehow, he managed to take Hugo back to that night, when he was sleepwalking at the campsite, over to the caravan where he saw the woman with the blonde hair.’

As Agneta takes him through the sequence of events at the back of the caravan, Bernard asks a few follow-up questions and takes notes directly on the table.

‘Even though he was under hypnosis, it was like Hugo kept turning away from whatever he saw through the window,’ she tells him. ‘Erik Maria Bark tried a few times to guide him back over there, but as soon as he realised it wasn’t going to work he changed tack .?.?.’

‘OK,’ Bernard mumbles as he scribbles, circling and underlining certain words.

‘This part was really interesting, so we’ll have to make sure it’s included in the book,’ she says. ‘Rather than trying to forceHugo to turn back to the window, he told him to watch a video of the murder on his phone instead, and it actually worked. I wrote everything down. You can read it once I’ve typed it up.’

Agneta takes a sip of wine, and Bernard leans back in his chair and studies her with a smile.

‘Did he manage to give the detective any sort of description?’

‘No, but I don’t think it’ll be long.’

‘We’re getting closer, aren’t we?’

‘One more session. That’s my guess.’

Bernard picks up his glass, gets to his feet and moves around the table to toast with her.

‘I really do believe in this. We’re helping the police stop a killer, and we’ll be done with the book before the court case is even over. This is going to be great.’

‘I hope so,’ Agneta replies, getting up.