Part 81 (1/2)

Madeleine is standing perfectly still, with her hand on the wound to her neck. Blood is running between her fingers, but she's alive.

Nelly's high-pitched voice has been a foreboding of death every time.

Joona rushes over to the girl, kicks the knife from Nelly's hand even though he knows she's dead, picks Madeleine up and backs away through the smoke.

Nelly is lying on her back among the fragments of broken mirror, her mouth open. She's lost one of her boots and her foot is twitching in her filthy nylon stocking.

A plastic bottle topples over and paraffin splashes out across the floorboards, there's a hiss and then the fire leaps up through the floor.

They're hit by a wave of heat. Joona stumbles backwards with the girl, just making it through the doorway as the floor of the bedroom gives way under Nelly's weight.

She's sucked down and vanishes into a shaft of raging flame.

Joona's trouser leg catches fire as he shuffles backwards with the girl in his arms.

The flames are reaching up with a howl all the way from the cellar, striking the bedroom ceiling. Burning pieces of the lamp fall in a cloud of swirling sparks. The windowsill is ablaze and the gla.s.s shatters with a bang.

Joona pulls Madeleine with him further into the girl's bedroom. The walls covered with pictures of Erik are on fire.

'I'm going to take this off,' Joona says, and pulls the tape from her mouth. 'Did that hurt?'

'No,' she whispers.

A tall cupboard collapses through the floor of the bedroom and disappears into the shrieking inferno.

'Let's try to get out,' he says, wrapping his leather jacket around her. 'The smoke's dangerous, so I want you to breathe through the lining. Can you do that?'

She nods, and he picks her up and starts to carry her down the stairs. The glow from the fire is flickering across the walls. Sparks are drifting up between the steps. From somewhere deep in the bas.e.m.e.nt there's a screech of twisting metal.

The fire is climbing the wall then pulling back, leaving sooty traces across the wallpaper.

Joona breathes hot air into his lungs and begins to cough.

There's a crash in the room beneath them as the heat blows out all the windows at the same time. Gla.s.s rains down onto the floor and air streams in, making the flames leap up towards the ceiling with a roar.

The burning lampshade spins on its cable.

The girl coughs and Joona shouts to her to keep breathing through the lining of his jacket.

In the living room below the bedroom the walls are burning from floor to ceiling. The heat forces him towards the television room. Parts of the ceiling are collapsing and the girl screams as burning dust rains down on them.

Joona coughs again and puts his hand down on the hot floor to steady himself. His lungs are burning, and smoke-poisoning is making him dizzy and tired. He knows he doesn't have many seconds left, so holds his breath and gets to his feet again. With the girl in his arms he takes a few faltering steps forward, then carries on through the thick smoke in the next room.

His eyes are streaming and he's having trouble seeing. The sofa catches alight and sparks swirl up into his face on the hot wind.

There's a thunderous roar behind their backs, like a las.h.i.+ng sail, and the fire throws itself at them.

He steps over a smoking bundle of carpets and shoves the door open.

The kitchen is ablaze, and burning sections of the ceiling are cras.h.i.+ng down. An explosion sends splinters of gla.s.s and fire across the room.

Joona's lungs are straining and burning, he'll have to breathe soon, his heart is pounding desperately.

The end of one of the roof beams comes loose and falls like a heavy pendulum, crus.h.i.+ng the kitchen table and embedding itself deep in the floor.

The linoleum floor is bubbling and the walls are rippling with fire.

A bucket of water is boiling.

The powerful spring mechanism has contorted out of shape, bending the door back on one hinge.

Joona steps over the dead police officer's body. The hall is full of flames. The heat and howling roar wrap themselves around him and the child. He knows he needs oxygen desperately, but forces himself to fight the urge to take a breath.

Surrounded by fire, he fights his way forward and kicks the burning front door open. It comes loose from its hinges and crashes down the front steps.

Joona emerges on to the veranda with the girl in his arms. His face is black with soot and his clothes are burning. Police and paramedics rush towards them with fire-extinguishers and blankets.

Margot Silverman is forced to take a step back from the heat and lets out a gasp as a powerful contraction hits her, then feels her waters break and run down between her thighs.

The clattering downdraught from the helicopter's rotor-blades sends rubbish and dust flying in a wide circle.

Erik is holding Maddy's hand as the helicopter takes off. She's lying strapped to a stretcher next to Jackie, and smiles up at him before closing her eyes.

They rise unsteadily into the air, and Erik sees Joona lying on all fours on the ground, coughing. He's surrounded by police officers and paramedics. Margot is trying to resist as she is led away to a waiting ambulance.

The yellow glow of the burning house and the pulsating blue lights of the emergency vehicles fill the yard.

Joona slowly gets up, takes his pistol from its holster and throws it on the ground, then holds out both hands so he can be cuffed.

The helicopter turns, tilts forward and picks up speed.

Erik watches as the whole house collapses into the flames, and the smoke curls up into the sky like a black umbilical cord. The shadow of the tall chimney stretches jerkily across the ruins and neglected fields.

epilogue.

Erik Maria Bark is sitting in his sheepskin armchair, looking out at the white October sky through the tall windows. Detective Superintendent Margot Silverman is walking up and down across the polished oak floor, holding her baby daughter at her breast.

Erik and Rocky Kyrklund have both been cleared of suspicion of any involvement in the murders. Without apologising for anything, Margot is outlining the key points of the long reconstruction of events she has been working on since September.

Nelly probably began stalking Erik at the time of Rocky Kyrklund's trial. She transferred her fixation to him, just as she had transferred her fixation to Rocky at her father's funeral.