HE HAD SLEPT for a while on the ferry from the mainland, so he felt fairly rested as he sat in the car heading home. It was freezing on Gotland—it hadn’t been yesterday morning when he had left the island. Temperatures were in free fall and it was already at the freezing point. He had to be careful, because a hazardous layer of frozen slush was forming a crust on the road.

But there wasn’t far to go. Soon he would be home in the warmth, where Kerstin would hopefully be waiting with some little surprise for him. He assumed she would after all these years of waiting. At this very moment, he felt that it might still have been worth it. He wouldn’t repeat it—definitely not—and if he got to relive the last thirty years of his life he would make different choices. But as of now they had a future ahead of them that wouldn’t have been possible if the last thirty years hadn’t happened, and he had to see that as being worth something. The fact that he, they—Kerstin too, of course—were worth it. Otherwise everything was a waste, and he didn’t want to look back on his life like that.

He realised he had forgotten to call her. He had promised to give her a ring when he came ashore so that she could prepare whatever it was she was going to prepare. He smiled at the thought of it—Kerstin was a rock. In the kitchen and in every other way. She put up with him—that in itself was noteworthy. And she had been patient and waited for him all these years instead of finding a new man. Which he, against his better judgment—although he was a good-natured soul—had suggested to her at an early stage. But it had never been in the picture. For some completely incomprehensible reason she apparently loved him.

“My dove!” he bellowed when she answered.

She laughed, used to his theatrical expressions of affection.

“I forgot to call—sorry.”

“I realised,” said Kerstin. “But I knew when the ferry was due. Has it gone well?”

“I’m on Gotland. I’ve got enough petrol. There’s air in the tires. I’m wearing my seat belt. I can’t see any cars in my rearview mirror and the road is devoid of any hazardous objects. What can possibly go wrong?”

“Knock on wood. Where are you?”

“I just passed that crossroads where it says ‘Sarve’ something to the left and ‘Lilla’ something else to the right.”

“You sound like a mainlander,” Kerstin said with a laugh. “Havdsarve and Lilla Lärs. How hard can it be?”

“I’ve lived here for two years! You’ve been here for ten. They use such strange names everywhere on this island. What are we having?”