He knew he should go inside and wake Stava; he’d promised her he would if Ransu turned up again. But there was no time. What if he withdrew and disappeared again? She wouldn’t want that. He ran along the water’s edge until he reached the trees. At that point, he immediately began to proceed with more caution. The path winding around the lake was little more than an animal run, difficult enough to follow even in daylight; now it kept branching off, making him uncertain. It was as though the nocturnal light made trails appear where there were none during the day.

He thought the woods looked familiar. He scissor-jumped over a branchless log and skidded down a small slope and ducked under a spruce branch.

There was something on the ground.

A greyish-brown, moving mass.

Good God, what was it!

He crept a few steps closer to have a look.

A swarm of tiny rodents crawling over one another, faintly and elatedly squeaking. Mice, shrews, a lemming, two lemmings. He stared at it. Then he made a coughing noise and doubled over.

A shoe was sticking out of the heaving heap. A tiny trainer with flapping Velcro ties.

Anders’ mouth started moving.

‘No,’ he moaned. ‘No, no, no.’

His words triggered an irritated agitation among the little ones; when they shifted, the plastic bag that had been put over the child’s face became visible and a lemming slipped from the swarm, got up on its hind legs and hissed at him with a clown mouth of coagulated blood.

Horrified, he leapt aside. He staggered backward and fell into a spruce tree. He didn’t get back up.

*

When he finally crawled out from under the tree, he had cried himself empty and didn’t quite know where he was. He had been somewhere else. Far, far away, in a place where only he existed and no one could reach him.

Now he walked slowly through the trees, carrying his hope like water in a cupped hand.

He stopped and stared at the abomination on the ground. Then he lunged forward, braying furiously, grabbed the plastic bag and started to pull it off; when the head appeared, he let go of the bag and ran away.

Diana sat with her phone…

Diana sat with her phone in her hand, talking to her father. He was telling her the police had gone out to Rumajärvi but had found no sign of Lennart Brösth and when Diana put in that if that was true, they had done a poor job looking, he grumbled at her that the best thing would be for her to take some sick leave and leave the search for Susso to the authorities.