Gudrun’s partner opened the door and he did it in nothing but a pair of shorts. A gold-mounted shark’s tooth dangled on his chest. He kept his hand on the handle and watched them with raised eyebrows. Then he stepped aside and invited them in. Gudrun was sitting at the kitchen table with her hands on a newspaper. She looked pale, unbecomingly so, and was draped in a hideous tie-dye blouse that should have been left to rest in peace long ago. No one said anything and after a while, Susso appeared in the doorway.

When Roland had turned the TV on for Kiruna and closed the door, Diana sat down at the table and told them about last night’s events. They listened without interrupting. Finally, she placed the ring in the middle of the table as proof.

‘It’s like they’re priming her or something.’

‘But did you see it?’ Gudrun said.

She shook her head.

‘I didn’t have to. I saw what it did to her. She was out of control when I carried her to my bed. It was really creepy to see. It was like when she had night terrors when she was younger; I couldn’t get through to her.’

‘And are you sure that wasn’t it?’

‘What?’

‘Night terrors?’

‘It wasn’t night terrors.’

‘What do you think, Susso?’

‘About what?’

‘About this.’

She said nothing for a while.

‘If they want her, they’re going to take her. Sooner or later. There’s nothing you can do.’

‘But you told me they wouldn’t come here,’ Diana said in a voice that was on the verge of breaking. Susso looked at her with one expressionless eye, tapping the napkin holder against the table top.

‘I was wrong.’

‘There must be something we can do,’ Gudrun said.

‘The only thing you can do,’ Susso said, ‘is hide. But that’s not such a great long-term solution.’

‘I’m just trying to get through one day at a time,’ Diana said.

‘So where are you going to go?’ Gudrun said.

‘We’re not telling you,’ Susso replied.

Lennart was sitting in the hallway…

Lennart was sitting in the hallway, holding Grete’s aluminium crutch. They had arrived. The engine had gone silent out there. Car doors were being gently shut. The old woman was asking quiet questions and getting quiet answers and the rain was coming down hard.

Now he could hear running footsteps on the gravel. Fanny stepped in through the front door with the little boy in her arms. Her eyes took in the antiques in the room; when she spotted Lennart, she stiffened. He tapped the crutch lightly against the floor and when the boy didn’t react, he tapped harder. Eventually, his big brown eyes turned to him. His hair had curled into wet knots and his tongue looked like it was on its way out of his lips like some kind of mollusc.