Red Wolf_ A Novel - Liza Marklund [143]
The woman shook her head, and at that moment the candle went out.
‘Light it again,’ Annika said, hearing the fear in her voice.
‘It’s burned out,’ Karina said. ‘There’s no wick left.’
And with the darkness came silence, as the cold grew sharper and drier.
Annika opened her eyes wide but could see absolutely nothing. She was hovering in an empty, ice-cold space, and was struck with a sense of utter and immense loneliness. Surely nothing in the world could feel worse than this. Anything but isolation.
‘We have to keep moving,’ Annika said. ‘Karina, don’t stand still.’
But Annika heard the minister sink to the floor, and a muffled and uncontrollable attack of sobbing rose from the corner.
The woman was crying, wailing, drooling, and Annika and Yngve were moving ever slower in the ice-cold freezer. She held the shivering man in her arms, feeling his limbs getting heavier and heavier, his breathing more and more strained, and she tightened her grip, her arms rigid.
Responsibility for others, she thought, staring into the darkness. Nothing without each other. And Ellen’s and Kalle’s soft faces appeared in front of her, she could feel their silky-smooth warmth and sweet smell.
Soon, she thought. I’ll soon be with you again.
The Minister of Culture gradually calmed down, her sobbing dying away. The silence that followed was even deeper than before. It took a few seconds before Annika realized why.
Göran Nilsson had stopped breathing.
The thought sent sparks through her mind. Her fingers itched like mad, a sound emerged. Panic.
A moment later Yngve slumped in her arms, his legs gave way beneath him and his head fell on her shoulder.
‘Shit!’ she screamed in the man’s ear. ‘Don’t die. Help, someone, help!’
She didn’t have the strength to hold the man upright, he slid into a heap at her feet and she was hit by a complete blackout.
‘Help!’ she screamed at the top of her voice. ‘Help us, someone!’
‘There isn’t any help,’ Karina Björnlund said.
‘Help!’ Annika shrieked, fumbling forward to where she thought the door was, and walked right into the compressor, her knee striking the metal. ‘Help!’
Somewhere behind her she heard muffled voices and for a moment feared she was about to suffer a new onslaught from the angels. Talking, cries, the voices were definitely human, and a moment later came a sharp knocking sound.
‘Hello?’ a male voice called from the other side of the wall. ‘Is there someone in there?’
She spun round and stared into the darkness in the direction the voice had come from.
‘Yes!’ she screamed, falling over Yngve. ‘Yes! We’re in here. We’re locked in. Help us!’
‘We’ll have to cut the padlock off,’ the man said. ‘It may take a while. How many of you are there?’
‘Four,’ Annika said, ‘but I think one man is dead. Another is on the point of falling asleep; I can’t keep him awake. Hurry!’
‘I’ll get the tools,’ the voice said, then Karina Björnlund came back to life.
‘No!’ the minister shouted. ‘Don’t leave me! I have to get out, now!’
Annika found her way over to Yngve where he lay on the floor, breathing shallowly. She stroked his rough hair, clenching her jaw, then lay down on the floor and pulled the man on top of her, wrapping the polar jacket around them both.
‘Don’t die,’ she whispered, rocking him as though he were a child.
And she lay like that until she heard the cutting torch break the lock and the door was pulled open, and a torch was shining right in her eyes.
‘Take him first,’ Annika said. ‘I think he’s about to give up.’
A moment later the man was lifted off her, put on a stretcher, and floated out of her line of vision in just a couple of seconds.
‘What about you? Can you stand?’
She peered up at the light, could see nothing but the silhouette of a policeman.
‘I’m okay,’ she said, and stood up.
Inspector Forsberg looked at her anxiously.
‘You’ll have to go to hospital and get checked out,’ he said. ‘When you feel like talking I want to speak to you down at the station.’
Annika nodded, suddenly mute. Instead