Playing my part, I made steady progress towards my request to see the art for real – the actual paintings, too large to bring to my hotel. I presumed he wouldn’t be able to afford a studio. He’d paint at home, and if Mia had run away with him then she’d be there too, or at least some evidence of her. The trap worked. He sheepishly explained I’d need to come to his apartment, apologising that it was a long distance from the centre since he couldn’t afford the high costs of Stockholm. I said:
‘The hotel can arrange a car.’
I paid for our coffees with a hundred-krona note, noticing on the money not some famous face, an inventor or politician, but a honeybee. Anders was already moving away from the table when I said in Swedish:
‘Wait.’
I remembered the clean smooth snow outside the farm and my hope that this could be a new beginning. I wouldn’t build this discovery on the back of lies.
I began my story with the request that Anders not leave until I was finished. He agreed, confused by my change in tone. I watched his anger develop as I revealed how I’d tricked him. I could see he was tempted to leave but, a man of his word, he remained seated. His anger softened into sadness as I summarised my mum’s relationship with Mia and the events after Mia left. By the end of my account his anger had mostly dissipated. An element of disappointment remained that he had not yet been discovered as an artist. I assured him, as a layman, that my appreciation was genuine, as was that of the gallery owner whose email address I’d hijacked. Finally I asked if I could speak to Mia. He told me to wait in the foyer. He was going to make a call. Strangely, it didn’t even cross my mind that he might not return. I closed my eyes and waited, feeling lighter despite the risk I’d just taken.
We arrived at a residential block far from the centre of town. Anders muttered:
‘Artists should live in poverty.’
He was a romantic, the kind of temperament to inspire a girl to run away from home. We walked up the icy concrete stairs in single file since only the middle of the stairway had been gritted and the lift was out of order. Reaching the upper floor, he took out his keys. With a joke about owning the penthouse he showed me inside. Anders said, now speaking in Swedish:
‘Mia will be back soon.’
I waited in their living room, surrounded by his paintings. They owned very few items of furniture, no television, only a small radio plugged into the wall. To pass the time he began to paint. Thirty minutes later there was the sound of a key in the door. I walked into the corridor and saw Mia for the first time. She looked older than sixteen, heavily wrapped up against the cold. I could feel her eyes searching for my mum in my features. She shut the door, taking off her scarf. As she removed her winter coat, I saw that she was pregnant. I almost asked who the father was but caught myself in time.
The three of us took a seat in the small kitchen, the patterned linoleum floor squeaking under our chairs. We drank black tea sweetened with white sugar since honey, I guessed, was an un affordable §luxury. About to hear the truth of this summer, I was scared that maybe my mum had simply been wrong. Mia said:
‘I didn’t run away. Håkan asked me to leave. After I told him I was pregnant he arranged an appointment for an abortion. If I wanted to stay on his farm, as his daughter, I’d have to behave in a way that he found acceptable. He claimed he was concerned for my future. He was. But mostly he was concerned with his reputation. I was a disgrace, no longer the kind of daughter he wanted. I didn’t know what to do. Anders and I don’t have much money. We’re not fools. Could we be parents? I almost gave in, I almost said yes to the abortion. One night, I saw your mum walking through our fields. I didn’t know what she was doing there. But I remembered our long talks. She was so different from everyone else. She’d told me the story about how she left her farm, when she was just sixteen, she had nothing, and she’d made her way to England, and started a business, and a family. I thought – this is a woman I admire. She’s so strong. Everyone bows down to Håkan, but not her. He hated her for it. I told Håkan that if I couldn’t keep the baby then I’d leave. Part of me was sure he’d change his mind once he saw how serious I was. But he accepted. He didn’t even talk to Elise. She was my mum and she didn’t have a say in my future. She was upset. She writes to me every week. She visits regularly too, and whenever she does she fills the fridge with food. She misses me very much. And I miss her.’
Mia’s voice broke with emotion. There was real love for Elise.
‘She’s a good person. She was always kind. But she’ll never stand up to him. She’s his servant. And I didn’t want to grow up like her.’
I asked if Mia had cut up Håkan’s wooden trolls in anger. She shook her head. By deduction, it could only be one other person:
‘Then it was Elise.’
Mia smiled at the thought of her mum taking an axe to Håkan’s trolls and said:
‘Maybe, one day, she will leave him.’
I queried Mia’s drunkenness at the second midsommar party. She shook her head. If she’d seemed drunk it was because on that day she’d discovered that she was pregnant. She was in a daze. The next ten days were spent as a prisoner on the farm – the worst ten days of her life. Once she’d made her decision, Håkan came up with a plan. He wanted her to disappear. He didn’t want to explain anything to the local community. He couldn’t stomach the shame.
Mia said:
‘His idea was to stage a runaway story so that he could be a victim.’
My mum was right on both counts. To escape from a remote farm you needed a plan, but the plan hadn’t been Mia’s, it had been Håkan’s. And there had been a conspiracy. Stellan the detective had been told that Mia wasn’t a missing person. No one was looking for her. The posters had gone up only in places where they were useless. Håkan transferred money into Mia’s account at the end of every month. He paid for the apartment. He could visit any time he liked. To date, he hadn’t.
At the end of her account I asked whether there’d ever been any element of danger. My mum had been convinced Mia was in peril. On this crucial point Mia shook her head:
‘Håkan never touched me, never hit me, never laid a finger on me, he wasn’t like that. He never even raised his voice. If I wanted a new set of clothes he’d buy them the same day. He’d give me anything I wanted. He called me spoiled. He was right. I was spoiled. But he didn’t love me. I don’t think he understands love. To him, love is control. He’d go through my belongings. He found my diary inside the mirror that Anders had carved for me. He put the diary back in order that I’d keep writing in it and he could keep reading it. When I realised what he was doing, I ripped the whole thing up and put it back for him. That made him angry, as if it belonged to him.’
I asked about the suicide of Anne-Marie and the hermit in the field. Mia shrugged:
‘I didn’t know her well. She was close to Cecilia, the woman who sold your mum the farm, and Cecilia blamed Håkan for her suicide, but I don’t know why. Possibly Anne-Marie was sleeping with Håkan. It’s no secret that Håkan has affairs. To him, everyone’s wife was fair game. Elise knew it. Anne-Marie was devout, when sober. You saw all those biblical quotes, right? But no one flirted more than her if she drank, she’d do it in front of her husband, she’d torture him with it, she always thought he was a big stupid oaf of a man. She was horrible to him when drunk and guilt-ridden when sober. Underneath it all, she was just really sad.’
‘Why does Håkan want our farm so much?’
‘No reason, other than he owns the land around it. He’d look at the map and your farm was a blotch on his kingdom, a pocket of land that he didn’t control. It was a blemish. It infuriated him.’
‘He’s going to own it soon.’
Mia thought about this:
‘Like him or not, it’s hard not to respect a man who always gets what he wants.’
I imagined Håkan gloating over his map, but that was not a battle for me to fight.
Mia had been speaking for an hour. She and Anders w
ere both wondering what more I could want. I asked them to wait while I made a call. I left the apartment and, standing in the cold concrete walkway, phoned my dad. He pointed out bluntly that Mum wouldn’t believe anything he told her, or anything I said:
‘Mia needs to come to London. Tilde needs to hear it from her.’
After our conversation, I called Mark, asking if I could use the remaining money to buy Mia and Anders a flight to London. During our conversation Mark’s tone was different. I’d experienced many warm sentiments from him but never admiration. He agreed to the buying of the tickets. I told him that I loved him and that I’d see him soon.
Inside the apartment, I presented my plan:
‘I’d like you to come to London. Your flights, a hotel, they’d be paid for. Even so, I’m asking a lot of you. Mia, I need you to speak to my mum. I need my mum to see you. It’s not enough for me to repeat this information, she won’t believe a word I say, or a word my dad says, she hasn’t spoken to me since the summer, she won’t speak to me, she won’t listen to me, she needs to hear it from you.’
They discussed the matter. Though I didn’t hear the conversation, I imagined Anders was reluctant, worried about stress, since Mia was six months’ pregnant. They returned, and Mia said:
‘Tilde would have done it for me.’
On the flight to London Mia saw my mum’s Bible and her collection of Swedish troll stories in my bag. As she reached for them, I was convinced the Bible had caught her eye. Instead, she took hold of the troll storybook, examining the illustration:
‘This is Tilde’s, isn’t it?’
‘How did you know?’
‘She wanted to loan it to me. She said there was one story in particular she was keen for me to read. Your mum was wonderful to me but I never figured out why she thought I’d be interested in reading more troll stories. I’ve heard enough of those for a lifetime. I promised to pick the book up but never did.’
I was surprised by my mum’s emphasis on one particular story, curious as to which one she might have been referring to. She’d never singled one out before. I flicked through, assessing each one. In the middle of the volume I came across a story called ‘The Princess Troll’. Reading the opening lines, I realised they were new to me. I couldn’t hear my mum’s voice, despite being convinced she’d read the entire book aloud many times. Checking the rest of the collection, I established that this was the only story she’d skipped. According to the appendix, a part of the book I’d never explored or known existed, this troll legend was one of the oldest. There were numerous versions to be found in Germany, Italy and France, in volumes of fairy tales by Italo Calvino, Charles Perrault and the Brothers Grimm. The Swedish variant was of an unknown origin. I set about reading it for the first time.
• • •
THE PRINCESS TROLL
Once there was a great king who ruled his kingdom justly. By his side was a queen more beautiful than any other woman and a young daughter lovelier than any child in the kingdom. The king lived happily until his queen was struck gravely ill. On her deathbed she made him promise that he would only remarry a woman as beautiful as her. When the queen died the king went into mourning, convinced he would never remarry. His courtiers insisted that their kingdom required a queen and that he must search for a new wife. Mindful of his promise, the king could find no woman as beautiful as his wife.
One day the king was staring out of his castle window. He saw his daughter playing in the royal orchard. She’d come of age. She’d grown to be as beautiful as her mother. The king jumped to his feet and declared that she would be his next wife. The courtiers were aghast and implored him to reconsider. A wise fortuneteller predicted such a marriage would bring ruin to the kingdom. The daughter pleaded with her father to think again, but he would not. The wedding date was set. The daughter was locked in the tower so that she might not run away.
The night before the wedding one of the courtiers, fearing the kingdom was about to be cursed by such a wicked act, helped the daughter escape into the enchanted forest. On the morning of the wedding the king found his daughter missing. He executed the courtier. He then sent his army out into the forest to search for her.
The daughter was sure to be found. She begged the enchanted forest for help. A mushroom answered her cry. If the princess promised to tend the forest the mushroom would help her. There was one condition. She must never have any contact with people again, devoting herself to the natural world. The princess agreed and the mushroom blew magic spores onto her face, turning her into an ugly troll. When the king’s army found her lurking behind a boulder they recoiled and continued their search elsewhere.
The princess troll spent many years tending to the forest and became friends with the birds and the wolves and the bears. Meanwhile her father’s kingdom fell into ruin. The king was turned mad by his quest to find his missing daughter. Eventually, with his castle crumbling, his treasury empty, the mad old king had no more servants to command or citizens to rule. He set out into the forest to find his daughter for himself. He spent months crawling through the moss, chewing on bark, until finally the king collapsed. He was on the brink of death.
The princess troll heard news of her father’s condition from the birds. She visited him but dared not approach too close. Seeing the troll’s yellow eyes among the trees, the king asked the troll to bury him so that his body would not be ripped apart by ravens and that he might, in death, at last know peace again. The princess troll’s heart was pure. She remembered her love for her father and thought she must grant him this final wish. However, as soon as she gave a nod of her head her promise was broken and she was transformed, returning to the lovely shape of a princess, more beautiful than ever before.
The sight of his daughter rejuvenated the sick king. He staggered to his feet, chasing after her. The princess called out for help. The wolves and the ravens and the bears answered her cry and ripped the king apart, each taking a piece of his body to the far corners of the forest to feast upon.
Afterwards, the princess bade sad farewell to her forest friends and returned to the castle. Order was returned. The princess married a handsome prince. In attendance at the wedding were the bears and the wolves. The castle roof was covered in birds. The enchanted forest turned its leaves gold in celebration.
The kingdom was restored to greatness again and the new queen ruled justly and lived happily ever after.
• • •
I EXCUSED MYSELF FROM THE SEAT and stood in the galley at the back of the aircraft. In Sweden I’d remained composed, refusing to dwell too deeply on the emotions embedded in my discoveries, concentrating on the procedure of gathering facts and the goal of presenting them to my mum in hospital. Yet as I read this story I couldn’t help but picture my mum sitting on my bed, her fingers lingering on this story before skipping over these pages, refusing to read them, afraid she might be unable to mask her feelings, afraid I might ask a question or catch a glimpse of the sadness that she’d spent much of her life concealing, not only from us, but also from herself. I should’ve read these stories for myself a long time ago and wondered if my mum had secretly wanted me to. She could easily have discarded the book but she’d kept it close, returning to this collection time and again, communicating its great importance while also refusing to reveal why. I thought upon the way in which we’d always shared in each other’s happiness, believing it would make the moment burn brighter and longer, but sadness can be shared too, perhaps sharing makes it burn briefer and less bright. If so, I had, at last, that to offer.
Mark picked us up at the airport. I explained to him that I’d quit my job. In the new year I was going to search for another career. Had the idea been outlandish Mark would’ve expressed reservations. He accepted the announcement without protest, suggesting to me that he’d been thinking along similar lines for some time. He asked:
‘What do you want to do?’
‘I need to find out.’
My dad was waiting at the hospita
l. He greeted Mia with a hug. I saw desperation in his face. I felt it in his body, too, when he hugged me – the loss of weight, the tension. Though he wanted to go straight through, I suggested we eat some lunch together. I didn’t want anyone to feel rushed. And I had one last matter to put to Mia.
We found an old-fashioned café near the hospital. They served our meal with a plate of ready-buttered slices of soft white bread and steel pots of tea brewed so strong that Anders actually laughed when it was poured. Aside from that welcome burst of lightness, no one spoke much. Weighing on my thoughts was the way in which danger had been such a particular part of my mum’s conception of events. It wasn’t just unhappiness. She’d perceived a young girl in jeopardy. There’d been a villain. Breaking the silence, I asked Mia again, had she ever been in danger of any kind? She shook her head. However, there was something she hadn’t told me. I suspected the reason was because she hadn’t told Anders.
I decided to take a chance, handing Mia the collection of troll stories, pointing out the one my mum had wanted her to read. A little perplexed, she began to read. She must have been close to my mum, because she cried upon finishing it. I promised that I’d never ask her again, repeating my question one final time:
‘Were you ever in danger?’
Mia nodded. Anders looked at her. This was news to him too. I asked:
‘What happened?’
‘The mayor was a creep. Everyone knew that. He’d make comments about my body, about my legs, my breasts. He’d go to the toilet and leave the door open, standing there, hoping I’d pass by. I told Håkan. I told Elise. She admitted the mayor was a dirty old man. But he was a supporter of Håkan. He’d do anything Håkan asked. So Håkan told me that I should dress less provocatively around him.’