She got to her feet like a stranger to herself, pulled off the eiderdown and stood gazing at him, covered him again, lit the stove and dressed to go out and look for the boat they must have arrived in and found it where she knew it would be, on a low-lying spit of land at Karvika, an oval, dirty white craft made of planks and metal cylinders, more a raft than a boat, probably visible through binoculars from the main island, in daylight and clear weather at any rate. Now it was dark, but the stars were out, so she couldn’t burn it, nor would she be able to drag it over the crag and out of sight either.

She sat down.

It was quiet. No birds. She got up and spotted some drain plugs in the tanks, managed to loosen them and push the boat back into the sea and loaded it with rocks, launched it with her feet and watched it fill with water and sink like a white shadow. Now only the lustreless stars were reflected on the surface, she had forgotten her mittens and couldn’t move her fingers.

Back at the house she took off all her clothes again and inspected every inch of her body, as if looking for lice, then scrubbed herself until her skin was red and sore, until she was both hot and cold; she went into the sitting room and stared in the mirror, her face was dry and her body wet.

She dried her body and put on some potatoes and fish, overcooked them and mashed everything together, mixed in some liver and began to feed him.

He fell asleep.

She laid a hand on his wound.

He opened his skinless eyelids and peered at her with pupils like jellyfish in a black sea. She showed him the spoon, he nodded and opened his mouth, she fed him and he sucked and managed to swallow. She gave him another spoonful, and another, and warm redcurrant jelly, he coughed and drank, was given more and passed out in mid-mouthful. She wiped his chin, put a hand first on his forehead, then on his neck, to feel for a temperature and a pulse, and kept it there for so long that it seemed like a caress, then withdrew it and stared at it and stroked his chin twice more because it was impossible not to. Then she ate the rest of the food and went upstairs and fell asleep, fully dressed.

7

Ingrid had a feeling of water. It ran into her ears and filled her thoughts – with words. She felt the weight of eider down and her own body heat; her hands no longer ached, they weren’t even red, her throat was dry, she said nothing and the foreign words continued to stream upwards from down below through the hatch in the floor.