As the train pulls out of the station and rockets along the bridge linking Denmark and Sweden, I stare out the window. At first all I can see is water. Then, gradually, shapes start to form, emerging from the ocean like sea monsters. I squint, trying to work out what they are. I’m amazed to discover they’re windmills. It’s as if the Vikings woke up one morning and decided to hurl the windmills like javelins into the water, where they landed perfectly in a line, silhouetted against the horizon of the world.

I could have stayed on that train for hours. It’s almost a disappointment when the words, ‘Next stop: Lund’, echo through the carriage.

More mundane sights greet me as the train slows. Factories, fields, houses.

When the train shudders to a halt and the doors open, I’m greeted by torrential rain. It’s the start of June and meant to be the European summer but Sweden hasn’t got the memo and it’s freezing. The lift is broken, so I drag my suitcase up what feels like three hundred stairs. After asking a woman in the ticket office for directions to my hotel—there is no need to take a taxi, she assures me; it is only a five-minute walk away—I step out of the station into a cobblestone square lined by rows and rows of pushbikes.

Despite the seemingly straightforward directions, and even with the attempted use of Google Maps, I manage to get lost trying to find the hotel. By the time I reach the Grand Hotel I’m feeling anything but grand. My clothes and hair are so wet I feel like I’ve been on some kind of military exercise. The staff kindly ignore my bedraggled state and check me in with admirable Scandinavian efficiency. I finally make it to my room, and collapse onto the bed.

Then, reminding myself that I should text my parents to let them know I’ve arrived safely, I lift my head off the bed to rummage in my bag for my phone. I hear the rumble of thunder, and a flash of lightning illuminates the scene outside my window. There’s a church standing in the rain, light shining from its stained-glass windows. The walls sparkle, even in the storm. I step back in time and see the stonemasons carving each brick, one by one, to build that fantastic cathedral. ‘Wow!’ I whisper involuntarily.

I had planned to review my research before the meeting I have scheduled with Wolfgang Dietrich at the hospital tomorrow morning, but it stays untouched in my suitcase. Instead, I lie on the bed and stare at the magnificent edifice in front of me. Only a divine hand could have created such exquisite beauty. There must be a God, I think drowsily, as my eyes start to close, to have inspired humans to build a place like that.

TWENTY-SEVEN

twenty-seven