It was summer. One of the warmest. We could even go swimming in the sea. Maria kept working for as long as she could but she had to stop eventually. She came to see me in the middle of august. We hadn’t met for a long time. We sat on the veranda with our mugs of coffee. Chatted about this and that. Joked about some of the villagers. It felt so familiar.

Then our talk became serious. She told me she had stolen syringes and morphine. But she needed help to stick the syringe into her arm.

Why I asked. Surely she could do that sort of thing herself.

I honestly don’t know he said. With her you never did. Maybe she wanted to avoid dying alone or else she felt I deserved becoming a murderer.

But why did you agree I asked.

I responded to her just like everyone else. We all did what she wanted. It was a gift she had.

Was that also the reason why you had sex with her one last time I asked. He looked up and his surprise seemed genuine. 307

Fuck bror. We walked silently arm in arm. By now the snowfall was so heavy we could barely make out the road in front of us.

Did she die in that clearing or somewhere else I asked. She died that evening in my house. During the night I carried her to the mill. And you think nobody saw you.

No I don’t think anyone did. You are the only one who knows what happened.

What about the police. They must have found traces of you. Like fingerprints or marks left by your feet.

I wasn’t so stupid not to have thought about that he said. I wore gloves and overshoes from the homeservice storeroom. I don’t know what people have told you but the police didn’t make a great performance about her death. For a little while they went housetohouse asking questions because everyone knew who she was and what she had been doing. Bror with his backstory was clearly of interest to them at one point but they eventually ditched any suspicion of murder. The syringe was left in her vein. Her body had all the signs of longterm morphine dependence. And the postmortem showed that the cancer had spread extensively. She was dying.

But still I said. But what he asked.

It makes me uneasy to think I’m the only one who knows.

Don’t you trust me he asked. No I said. I suppose I don’t.

He stopped abruptly made a left aboutturn and took hold of my upper arms like a parent about to tell a child something that really mattered. I was getting fed up with the way people gripped my upper arms. Especially john. As if I were the one with poor hearing not him.