Nobody had been in it for a long time. It wasn’t even heated but was still a bedroom with a brass bed made with thick quilts a homewoven red yellow and black throw and with a row of embroidered cushions on top. A handpainted rocking chair stood in a corner and the long wall was hung with neatly aligned pictures with religious themes.

I scanned the place slowly. Then my eyes focused on a small whitepainted desk with the flap down. On it stood photographs in dark frames.

The photos had been taken at different times. The oldest were wedding pictures from the turn of the last century or thereabouts. Earnest men and women in hats and dark clothes. Others were snaps of people at work on the farm. Harvesters posing in front of a wheat stook. A man standing next to his car. I sat down on the bed to scrutinise one photo. Three children sitting on a step. One could just believe it was the step of allanberg’s house at a time when housekeeping was still alive.

Two girls and a boy. The image was unusual because they were all laughing. In older photos people rarely laughed. Might not that boy be allanberg. I could spot no likeness with the man who had just died by his own hand. But I noted that the frames had been dusted. Indeed not only the frames. The whole room 247was clean and scrubbed and smelled of floorsoap. The ragrugs forming a horseshoe around the bed were all turned the right way to keep happiness inside the home.

A wedding picture stood apart from the rest. It had been coloured in by hand in gentle shades. The bride’s red lips were probably touched up later. Her hand in a white glove was resting on allanberg’s blacksleeved arm. Both looked into the camera with serious eyes.

I tried to remember if I had ever met his wife but was certain I hadn’t. Sometimes father had frogmarched us along to go visiting. I had never seen a wife only allanberg. Mostly an already drunk allanberg. He used to amuse himself by forcing bror to sit on his lap while I had to perch on father’s. They quickly got pissed. Kept talking without listening. Laughed at jokes we didn’t understand. Fetched more lemonade from the cellar to use as mixer and drank brotherly toasts.

We would run home to mother. She was always in the kitchen. Embroidering. Look here children she would say. Another text to think about, another reminder for everyone of what the good book had to say. She did not see children seeking comfort and safety. Her own sense of safety was rooted in the words of god.

Whoever sleeps does not sin. The spirit is willing but the flesh weak. He who has to him shall be given. Whoever minds his mouth shall keep his soul.