Page 20 of The Sleepwalker

After a main course of crispy kale, roast venison with celeriac cream and a quick glass of grappa to finish off, they went back up to their room.

Agneta pours herself more coffee, grabs a Danish pastry and gets back into bed.

The tip of her tongue has just touched the vanilla cream when Bernard calls.

‘Good morning,’ she says.

‘Did I wake you?’

‘No, I’m just eating breakfast. What’s happening with Hugo?’

‘The whole thing seems so bloody bureaucratic. I spoke to his lawyer, or whatever he’s called. He has a meeting with the prosecutor this afternoon,’ Bernard tells her. ‘I understand that they have to take this seriously, but throwing a teenager in a cell? That’s just not right .?.?. not unless there’s a very good reason.’

‘Are you going to be there for the meeting?’ she asks.

‘We’ll see. I said I’d like to be, but I honestly don’t know. I just want to get Hugo home, run him a nice hot bath and cook him a juicy Salisbury steak.’

‘How are they getting on with the search?’

‘They’ve just this minute finished .?.?. They were mostly focused on his room, took all of his gadgets and seemed pretty interested in your underwear drawer, but they didn’t touch my little jar.’

‘God, that never even crossed my mind .?.?. Lucky you’re a white man.’

‘Pale, stale and male.’

On his desk, Bernard has a glass jar labelledDAGENS NYHETER CULTUREthat is jam-packed with cannabis. Every now and again, after a long day at work, he likes to roll a joint and smoke it with Agneta on the veranda overlooking the lake.

7

It has already been dark for hours when Agneta turns off onto the steep driveway and parks in the snow-dusted space outside the house, gets out of the car and plugs in the charging cable.

She can sense that something is wrong the minute she opens the front door. Bernard’s briefcase is lying on the tiled floor, and the hallway is full of loose sheets of paper covered in footprints. His winter coat is in a heap beside the sideboard, his brown shoes kicked off just outside the kitchen.

Agneta hangs up his coat and puts his shoes on the doormat, gathers up the sheets of paper and grabs his briefcase.

She finds Bernard drinking water by the kitchen sink. The tap is running, and he keeps refilling his glass and gulping it down.

‘Bernard?’

He flinches and turns around, staring at her with a strange expression on his face, as though he can’t quite remember who she is.

‘Are you OK?’ she asks, setting his briefcase down on the counter.

‘They’re remanding him in custody, under full restrictions,’ he mumbles.

‘But you said—’

‘I know. I’m trying to find out what rights I have, how it all works .?.?.’

‘You need to talk to the solicitor.’

‘I have. He’s the one who called.’

Bernard trails off and lifts the glass to his mouth again. His hand is shaking so much that the water spills down his chin.

‘I know you must be upset,’ Agneta says, rubbing his back. ‘But we need to find out what this means .?.?. what we can do to get Hugo home and what we need to do if it goes to trial.’

‘I know, I know, it’s just .?.?. This is all just so damn wrong, that’s how I feel .?.?. I don’t know how he is, whether he’s OK, whether they’ve been good to him.’