Shadows of Sören

Chapter 7

Clarice was having a bit of a bad morning.

First she had worked on her M-theory, which was an extension of String theory, till late in to the night, but without making any progress or getting anywhere close to a solution. And then when she had just decided to call it a night she had heard Sören´s Volvo speed up the alley and watched him disembark with a blond woman, dressed to kill and obviously enamored with him.

The two of them had disappeared in to the house together and a couple of minutes later she had seen the lights come on in his bedroom. Actually she only assumed it was his bedroom, since she had never set foot in it herself and wasn’t really planning on it in the near future. She was upset and she didn’t know why.

He was her landlord, not even a friend or anything and that was the way she wanted it. She didn’t want to become involved with anyone, even if he had been interested.

Which he obviously wasn’t.

For a short while she thought she had detected a slight romantic interest in her on his part and had quickly withdrawn to her shell, but he had never acted on it and had obviously moved on. Good, perfect. He could be happy with Blondie, that was fine with her. Then she had woken in the middle of the night due to a recurring nightmare which always left her feeling shaky and vulnerable. As usual she hadn´t been able to get back to sleep.

Of course her thoughts had gone to Sören and his blond femme fatale, who were probably snuggled up tight in the arms of Morpheus. That image did absolutely nothing to improve her mood. Especially not at four o’clock in the morning. But then she grudgingly decided that it really was best for Sören if he pursued other amorous interests, since she was a troubled woman with multiple traumas that she yet had to resolve. Sören didn’t deserve to be burdened with her troubles and as Aimee Mann sang very aptly,”Noone´s got that much ego to spare.” Then again Aimee Mann also sang “It’s not going to stop till you wise up.”

And Clarice was making a lot of progress in the wising up department, especially since she had been living in Vickleby. She felt secure and sheltered on the island and at Rettinge. Her nightmares had receded in the past few months and when she did have them, they were less daunting and powerful.

Still, it was all for the best if she and Sören didn´t get involved just then or ever.

Except that in the morning the water in her shower was cold again and she really, really hated cold showers. The temperature had dropped a little outside and the supermodern, energy saving heatpump always took its time adjusting to the outside temperature. She hadn´t actually managed to study the instruction manual yet, so she didn´t know how to get extra hot water.

And to top of her morning, she discovered Per Nielson peering through her bedroom window. This was not the first time she had caught him peeping through one of her windows or Tilda´s windows. He did it all the time and she had taken to keeping the blinds drawn until she was properly attired. Clarice had not spoken to Sören about this, because she knew he was getting enough trouble from Anna, Magnus and Tilda about Per´s constant and annoying presence on the gård.

She was a little surprised though, that he hadn´t acted more vehemently towards having him removed somehow and she couldn´t really fathom why. Two nights ago she had even seen him come out of the main house when Sören had obviously been at home. It was all a little strange.

There was a knock on her door. She peeped outside. It was Tilda. As usual Tilda looked a little uncomfortable and apprehensive when encountering Clarice. Clarice gave her a broad smile to make her feel more secure.

“Hey.”

“Hey. I was just wondering, I don´t want to bother you, but is your heat pump not working, either? I mean do you have only cold water too?”

“No, it isn´t. It´s a real bummer, isn´t it?”

“Yeah, I had to wash Oscar with cold water this morning and he really didn´t like it.”

“I´m not surprised. Listen, I´m going over to tell Sören. Maybe he knows how to work these things, he had them installed after all.”

“Oh, good. Could you, I mean do you mind asking him if he can fix mine, too?”

“Sure, no problem.”

“Oh thanks, thanks a lot.”

Clarice quickly threw on a pair of jeans and a sweater and purposefully marched over to the main house. She entered the house via the kitchen entrance at the side, as she always did. Nanna, Sören´s housekeeper was busy making more coffee for the happy couple.

“He has company this morning, Clarice,” she whispered, even though there was no way Sören could have heard her from the wide and spacious dining room.

“A dreadfully thin woman who drinks a lot of coffee.”

“Well good for him,” Clarice said.

Clarice had actually taken to visiting the big house and chatting to Nanna while she prepared Sören´s meals on a regular basis. Nanna had been Sören´s nanny when he was small and had stayed on as the cook when Sören got too big for a nanny. She was a cheerful, slightly overweight woman of about sixty withlively blue eyes. She and Sören were very close. Nanna was an excellent cook and Sören had several times invited Clarice to join him for dinner, because Nanna always cooked far too much. But this morning was obviously not one of those times when her presence was required. Well he would have to deal with her anyway.

“My shower is broken, I only have cold water, I need to talk to him”, she said and swiftly slipped past Nanna and in to the adjoining dining room.

Sören was in his usual place at the head of the table, reading the paper for heaven´s sake, like they were some old married couple. He was in what she thought of as his blue ensemble. Dark-blue pin striped jacket, dark-blue slacks and blue shirt open at the neck, no tie. He never wore ties. All his clothes looked like they were tailor made, which they probably were. He was really tall and she doubted he could wear anything of the rack. He also had his hair slicked back in a style reminiscent of Michael Douglas in Wall Street. She hated that look on him. She much preferred it when he just let his hair hang loose around his face.

But Sören´s hair was not really the issue right now, was it? The two of them hadn´t noticed her come in, but they would now. Hand on hips she declared, “Good morning. I´m sorry to disturb you in the middle of breakfast but my heat pump is not working. I realize the two of you are still basking in the afterglow of what was undoubtedly an energetic fulfillment of your biological urges, but would you mind sending someone over to adjust the heat pump?”

Sören almost dropped his piece of toast and Blondie turned a very ugly crimson red.

He fixated Clarice with a very cool stare and with obviously barely contained anger and very controlled movements he rose from his chair and coming towards her spat out “Anna, this is one of my tenants, Clarice Carter. Clarice let me introduce Anna, a client and personal friend.”

After which he more or less dragged her out of the room with a very firm grip on one of her arms.

“Ouch, you´re hurting me. Let go of my arm“, she sqeaked.

He turned so he was facing her, “What the hell do you think you´re doing? Coming over here, marching in to my house, into my dining room and insulting one of my guests during breakfast? A guest who just happens to be a very important client too.”

“Do you sleep with all your clients? I´m surprised you still find time to run your business.”

“Who I do or do not sleep with is none of your business, Clarice. You are my tenant, not the lady of the manor and have no business speaking to me the way you do.”

“What way? Alright, alright, calm down. I only want warm water. That damn heat pump isn´t working again.”

“That´s a matter which you very well know you should be taking up with Magnus, not with me. He manages the estate and the houses. That is what I pay him for, that is his job. I have other things to attend to, like the little matter of running a busy company. Which is by the way Rettinge´s main source of income or do you think Rettinge survives on your and Tilda´s rent or the herb boutique or the ostrich farm? Those just barely cover the running costs, the consulting firm is what keeps this place going and you have probably just lost me a very lucrative client.”

“I didn´t just come here because of the shower, I also came here to tell you that I have caught Per Nielson peering through my bedroom window and not the first time, either. And what are you going to do about that? Because you haven´t been exactly forceful on that matter have you? No, you even let him into your house, what is that about?”

“Excuse me?” Sören asked tensely.

“Yes, I saw him leave your house two nights ago. How can you let that disgusting old man into your house? What do the two of you talk about while he´s here? Do you have an idle chat about each other´s days?”

She attempted to imitate Sören and put on a poncy voice, “So Per, old sport, how was your day? Oh, nothing special Sören, just the usual really. Tried to catch a glimpse of Clarice getting dressed in the morning, then I harassed my daughter a bit, then I annoyed the hell out of Alma at the örtagård, then I drank two bottles of vodka and went to bed. How about you Sören, old chap?”

Do I really sound like that, Sören wondered, that´s terrible. “I don´t sound like that and I would never use the words “old sport”, he answered feebly.

Clarice glared at him, “That´s hardly the point is it?”

“Well what is the point, I´ve lost track?”

“The point is that you really need to do something to get that man to stay away from Rettinge. This is your land, for God´s sake. And yes, I know about the allemansrätten, but he´s disturbing the peace so the freedom to roam hardly applies in his case, does it?”

“Did it occur to you, Clarice, that he was here because I was trying to reason with him peacefully? I tried to talk some sense into that thick head of his because believe it or not, I don´t actually like him hanging around Rettinge all the time, either.” I am such a good liar, Sören thought.

“Well your methods of diplomacy haven´t worked, because he´s here, right now, out there,” Clarice said accusingly.

“I shall have to use more drastic methods then, but basically all of this is just distracting from the fact that your behavior this morning was equally unacceptable and rude.”

She gave him a haughty look, “Right, but in contrast to Per Nielson I will comply to your wishes and won´t come round unannounced anymore in the future. You´re right and I´m wrong, I apologize. Don´t worry, stick insect in there will stay with the firm, she has that desperate look about her. Maybe you should shag her again before lunch, just to be on the safe side. And make her eat something before relief agencies start dropping survival packages on to your house.”

And she left not banging the door as he had expected but closing it very gently and quietly.

Chapter 8

Fuck, Sören thought. Per Nielson really was becoming something of a major problem and he would deal with him, there was no way around it. The man was disturbing every area of his life.

He hoped he hadn´t completely alienated Clarice now.

That little speech she had given when she had marched in to his dining room? The woman really did have a mouth like a razor blade. She was a rhetorical monster.

Next time he had to give a speech somewhere he´d have her write it for him. But really he had been angry with himself, because it had been stupid to bring Anna home and he had just come to that conclusion himself again, when Clarice had burst in.

Anna was attractive and fairly entertaining, but he would soon get bored with her and then things would become akward, especially since she was a client.

Christ, couldn´t Clarice have sounded just a bit upset that he had had a woman here over night? But no, she had calmly and indifferently delivered her little speech and asked him to repair her shower. He actually liked her moving around the place like she owned it, coming and going at her pleasure. And now she wouldn´t any longer, if she stayed at all. Maybe she was already over there packing up, about to disappear completely from his life. Now that he thought about it, she had also looked a little pale and sort of tired. Then again he would be more than happy to take care of her when she was ailing, if she would only let him. And that thing about Per Nilsson, that really was the tip of the iceberg. He hadn´t known the old man had now turned into a peeping Tom too. The image of Per Nielson watching Clarice do something private like getting dressed in the morning made his blood boil. Per had to go, somehow.

So Clarice had seen him leave the big house that night? That was bad. He could not tell her or anyone for that matter what Per had been doing here. He could never tell anyone.

It was his burden to bear and his alone.

He returned to the dining room where Anna was still seated drinking yet another cup of coffee. She had hardly eaten anything and he suspected that she was one of those women who survived solely on water, coffee and diet coke all day, since she had that starved, skin and bones look about her.

Sleeping with her had been like fucking a freaking skeleton. He was sure he had heard hear bones crack once or twice. No soft curves or fleshy spots anywhere. Were there really men who liked that kind of thing or did women just imagine there were men who liked that kind of thing?

Or did woman just like to compete with each other as in: Let´s see who can slip herself between the wall and the radiator and she who can´t is a fat cow.

Clarice was no skeleton, she was nice and curvy in all the right places. Nice and slim and curvy. Not that it showed so much in those jeans and university sweatshirts she insisted on wearing all the time when she was at home. She did dress up for work though. She favoured dark coloured snug fitting trouser suits. And high heels. Maybe she wanted to set herself apart from the students. She was still so young to be a professor. He wondered how she kept that figure of hers, because she didn´t seem to engage in any athletic activities he had noticed. She rode her bike everywhere in and around Vickleby, but did bicycle riding really do that much for you? She wasn´t exactly putting in Tour de France miles, was she?

He dragged his thoughts away from Clarice and her curves and back to the present. He cleared his throat and started to say something when there was a knock on the door.

Sören gave Anna an apologetic look, “Sorry Anna, it´s a bit of a hectic morning today.”

He left her again and hopefully opened the door only to find that dreadful woman from the local heritage club on his doorstep. What was her name again?

“Lord Hellström, I wish you a very good morning.”

Sören sighed. She was the only person he knew who insisted on calling him by his title, even though he had repeatedly told her not to and had offered his first name to her several times. But to no avail. She was one of those people who felt elated from her own mediocre position in life by coming into contact with someone higher up on the social ladder than herself, no matter how perfunctory that contact was. She was also the least attractice woman he knew and those dreary clothes and wire rimmed glasses she wore all the time didn´t help.

“Good morning Miss Sjöquist” Thankfully he had remembered her name at the last minute.

“I must talk to you about our annual guided tour of Rettinge and we have new members in the svenska-tyska sällskåpet, who are also interested in joining the tour. It is as you very well know in two weeks.”

He knew nothing of the kind, but he did know what she was talking about. Miss Sjöquist was not only the chairman of the local national heritage society but also chairman of the Swedish-German club, whose membership boasted a whole pack of Germans and one Swedish person: Annet Sjöquist herself.

He never really did fathom the point of such clubs. Why would anyone move to another country, only to herd themselves together in a club consisting of fellow citizens from the country they had left? If they were so eager on being with their own kind, so to speak, why on earth didn´t they stay in their home country in the first place?

Nevertheless Miss Sjöquist regularly offered guided tours of Vickleby and any places of interest in its nearest vicinity which included Rettinge. Mostly it was tourists and the odd new person in town who took part in these tours and of course new members of the Swedish-German club.

She continued, “Of course I am particularly interested in not having a repetition of that most embarrassing scene in January, where that awful Mr. Nielson hurled a load of most insulting abuse at my guests. We really must see to it that he is not present during the tour this year. You do know what I´m talking about, Lord Hellström?”

Yes, he knew. How could he forget. Last year Per Nielson had invaded Miss Sjöquist´s little guided tour of Rettinge and shouted “Heil Hitler” greetings accompanied by the appropriate hand gesture at the appalled members of the Swedish-German club. Actually that little scene had been one of the funnier moments in Per Nielson´s illustrious career as Vickleby´s most hated citizen. Sören had found the expressions on the faces of the tour members quite hilarious. A sentiment that was apparently shared by Clarice, who had joined the tour because she was genuinely interested in Rettinge and its history. Sören had felt her shaking with silent laughter beside him. But of course Per Nielson had had to be forcefully removed from the premises and apologies had been made all around. Miss Sjöquist had been beside herself with anger and grief.

The island was teeming with German pensioners who had lived all their life in big cities like Hamburg and Berlin. Tired of city life they had bought huge properties here. They lived a very comfortable life with a little gardening, walking, excursions with the Swedish-German club and swimming in the summer. Most of them kept a small apartment in Germany which they used during the winter. The winters on Öland could be rather nasty, with temperatures sometimes below minus fifteen degrees and cold winds blowing in from the sea. Many islanders did not look too favourably on what they called the “German invasion”, but Sören thought every person willing to move here and spend money was a blessing for Öland. Which was why he put up with the annual guided tour of his premises for the Swedish-German club and even sometimes accompanied and led a part of that tour himself. As he had last year, when Per Nielson had made his little entrance. His house was off-limits though. The day he became so desperate that he let troops of strangers trample through his house in exchange for a minor fee, he would give the whole thing, house and land to the government and let them take care of it. That day was long off though as he was not hurting for money.

Miss Sjöquist had made a very tentative enquiry about his wine cellar last year and its possible inclusion in the tour, but had quickly withdrawn the question after Sören had given her such a sharp riposte, that the poor woman had almost jumped out of her skin.

“What do you suggest we do about him, Miss Sjöquist?” Sören asked. “I assure you we have tried every approach possible to keep him away from this place, but he insists on coming over here again and again. I am open to any ideas you might have on the matter.”

Annet shook her head and said “Well, I really don´t know. He really is the most unpleasant man, isn´t he? Have you tried speaking to the police about him?”

“I have. They can do nothing.”

“Nothing? But that cannot be, he is most vicious and probably dangerous and not to be trusted.”

He is indeed not to be trusted, Sören thought, but you don´t know how little he is to be trusted.

He said, “The thing is, Miss Sjöquist, he has never actually physically harmed anyone here or done any real damage to my property, so the police have nothing they can use against him. Now if he had actually physically attacked one of the members of the club, that would have been a completely different matter and we would be well rid of him by now.” Rettinge might be rid of him, but he Sören would only be rid of Per Nielson when he was dead in the ground, that much he knew.

“Dear God, Lord Hellström, perish the thought that one of my club members would come to harm by this horrid man.” “Well, I was speaking hypothetically of course Miss Sjöquist, I do not wish any harm to come to anyone visiting Rettinge. Especially not your dear old pensioners.”

“Yes well, what are we to do?”

Sören sighed, “Don´t worry, I shall have a serious talk with him and if all fails I shall have to bribe him into keeping the peace.” Shouldn´t be too hard Sören thought. He had enough practice there, didn´t he.

“Leave it to me and now you must excuse me, I have important matters to see to.“

Sören turned to go back into the house but Annet Sjöquist held him back, “Lord Hellström, you are aware that the tour coincides with the Skördefest in two weeks, are you not?” Sören groaned“Oh hell, so it does. The place will be packed.”

“Yes indeed and I had an idea. Why don’t we open the tour to the general public, too? It would be an additional activity at the Skördefest.”

“Sure, go ahead, why not? Now if you have any more questions about the tour or the Skördefest, please feel free to contact my estate manager or Alma. Goodbye Miss Sjöquist.”

“Well yes goodbye Lord Hellström and we will see you during the tour next week, will we not?”

“I can´t promise anything, but I will try to make it happen.”

“Oh, please do”.

“Right, goodbye.”

It was necessary to end a conversation with her that abruptly otherwise one never got rid of the damn woman.

And he had forgotten about the Skördefest the following week. The Skördefest was the annual harvest festival which was spread out all over the island and attracted thousands of visitors. Pumpkins were placed upon the top of bales of hay to signal that harvest goods were available for sale at the location. Every entrepreneurial establishment opened its doors all weekend late into the night and in addition to its normal range of products or gastronomical choices there were also special activities like concerts, art exhibitions, games for the children and special menues to choose from. At the örtagård for example Alma would be offering homemade pumpkin soup and smoked ostrich meat with homebaked bread. And of course Miss Sjöquist would be offering tours of the premises now. They would also have an additional snack van selling doughnuts and candy floss for the kids, since there were always plenty of children around who were probably not too keen on pumpkin soup and ostrich meat. Sören loved doughnuts himself, but rarely indulged himself. But he made an exception at the Skördefest. Even though he had seemed dismissive and vague with Annet Sjöquist, he knew exactly what was going to take place where and when on Rettinge. Anna, Magnus and Sören had meetings about everything concerning the estate on a regular basis, including the Skördefest.

He returned to the dining room a second time that morning to find Anna still there with an expectant look on her face. “Well, well, you are a busy man, aren´t you? You can´t even have breakfast in peace without people bothering you left, right and centre.”

He didn´t tell her that he usually liked to be bothered by one of those people.

But Anna had not finished yet, “And who was that bad tempered little redhead? Is she a close acquaintance of yours? She must be, otherwise she wouldn´t have had the nerve to barge in here like that.”

Oh yes she would, Sören thought. “She´s my tenant, she rents one of the houses on the estate.”

“A tenant?? You let people who rent from you speak to like that? I must say, I´m beginning to become a little disillusioned in you. Are you really that soft? These people will walk all over you, if you let them.”

“Right, thanks for the advice. Listen I think we should get going soon, We need to go over the details of your business plan again.”

They drove to Kalmar and Sören was spared any further private conversation with Anna, as she was constantly busy talking into her mobile phone and checking messages.

Why had he even taken her to Rettinge, he wondered. He had a perfectly nice place in Kalmar too which he usually used when he had long meetings or had to take customers out for a night on the town and knew he was going to be drinking. Or when he just felt like staying in Kalmar, which hadn´t been often since Clarice had moved in.