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were they sleeping with the blinds up? She sneaked up to the doorway and looked carefully into the room. The big double bed was where it always was, but it was empty. There were nocovers, no pillows. There was no Mummy or little brother either.
    Hanna stood quietly for a long time, without really understanding what she saw, but then she crept up on to the empty bed and started to cry.
    * * *
    With a jerk he sat up in bed and screamed. He had never done that before. Åsa, with a hardened parent’s ability to go straight from deep sleep to being wide awake, sat up just as quickly and looked at her husband in alarm. Then she caressed his back with big, gentle movements and he put his hands over his face and rocked slowly back and forth.
    ‘What were you dreaming?’ Åsa asked carefully. ‘You’ve never done that before.’
    Sjöberg did not answer, simply shook his head in distress and sighed. They remained like that for a long time, and then he whispered, ‘There’s a woman in a window.’ He hoped she didn’t hear him. ‘She’s looking down at me and I’m standing barefoot in the grass.’
    Then he fell silent.
    ‘That’s it?’
    ‘That’s it.’
    ‘Who is she?’ asked Åsa.
    ‘I don’t know,’ Sjöberg said quietly.
    ‘You’ve only slept for a few hours,’ said Åsa. ‘It’s not time to get up yet. Lie down again and I’ll stroke your back.’
    He lay down beside her obediently, with his back turned towards her. She drew her hand through his blond hair afew times and then brought it slowly across his shoulder, arm, back and down to the lower back. He was sweaty and his entire body was still tense, despite Åsa’s gentle caresses.
    The dream had been the same as so many times before. He was standing barefoot on a lawn wet with dew, looking down at his feet. He wanted to look up, but something held him back. His head felt so terribly heavy that he was barely able to raise it. He exerted himself with all his strength and managed at last to turn his face upwards, but still he didn’t dare open his eyes. The back of his head pulled down towards his shoulders and he didn’t want to move.
    At last he opened his eyes. And there she stood again in the window, the woman with the dazzling dark-red hair like sunlight around her head. She was dancing for him up there in the window, before finally meeting his gaze. But she only seemed surprised. So strange. He raised his arms up towards her but lost his balance and fell headlong backwards.
    The dream was becoming clearer every time he had it. And although the woman had not always taken her shape, now it was Margit Olofsson standing in the window, mocking him. Since the woman in the dream had assumed Margit’s features, the dream had become that much more unpleasant. Why, he didn’t know. It had been unpleasant enough, without the woman in the window having a name. He wanted to push the dream out of his mind, but he failed. It encircled his thoughts like a fog bank.
    Careful to conceal how tense and upset he was, he turned around in bed. He took Åsa in his arms and buried his face between her cheek and shoulder. Her hair smelled of celery. When Åsa ate celery her whole body smelled of it for hours afterwards. She smelled like Åsa, and that wasthe most marvellous scent he knew. How he loved this woman. But then, as they made love in the darkness, it was still Margit Olofsson he saw before his eyes.
    * * *
    Elise was still in bed, silent and still. Maybe she was asleep; she didn’t respond and her eyes were closed. Jennifer had a feeling her little sister had thrown up a few times during the night, because she had kept running into the bathroom. She had come home fairly early, but she hadn’t said much and she’d looked terrible. Dead drunk probably. You couldn’t tolerate much at that age; she was only fourteen after all. Jennifer closed the door to their room and went out to the hall.
    The door to the living room was still closed, and Jennifer had no