Read The Shapeshifters for Free Online

She felt paralysed by sudden doubt brought on by the silence.
    On the kitchen windowsill, seven glowing lights of an Advent candleholder, shining in a pointed arch. A ladder of flimsy metal leaning against the roof, on every rung a lip of snow.
    To announce her arrival she slammed the car door shut. With her eyes on her mobile she walked towards the house up the narrow pathway cleared of snow. A wreath decorated with bows hung on the door, which opened before she had time to knock. Raising her eyebrows in surprise she took a step backwards, grabbing hold of the handrail.
    In the hall stood a thin woman. Her light-grey hair was abruptly cut just below her ears. Underneath her long knitted waistcoat she wore a blouse with meandering embroidery around the neck. She was pressing her left hand to her chest. It looked as if she was in pain.
    â€˜Are you Edit?’
    The old woman nodded.
    â€˜Susso Myrén,’ said Susso, reaching out her hand.
    After they had greeted each other Edit backed into the hall. Susso took off her boots but kept her jacket on. She might be leaving very soon. That usually became obvious pretty quickly. The only lighting in the kitchen came from the electric Advent candles, so it was quite dark, and chilly as well. The refrigerator hummed loudly, on its last legs by the sound of it. Stuck on the door were vouchers, a handwritten receipt and a lottery scratch card. On the wall a collection of trays hung in a wide embroidered band. There were crocheted Christmas decorations, small paintings in various shapes and sizes, a calendar with notes written in neat lettering. Standing in the sink was a fuchsia in its plasticflowerpot and on the table was a newspaper,
Norrbottens-Kuriren
.
    â€˜Do you live here alone?’ asked Susso, pulling up her belt and straightening her jeans.
    Edit had clamped her mouth together so tightly that her pink lips had disappeared.
    â€˜It’s lovely here,’ said Susso, pulling aside the cotton curtain and looking up the road. ‘In the village.’
    A sharp, vertical line appeared between Edit’s eyes, as if someone had struck her with a chisel. She was troubled and had no time for small talk. That was perfectly obvious.
    â€˜How . . .’ she said in a thin voice that faded away. She placed her hand on one of the copper discs covering the hotplates on the stove. It slipped sideways and she moved it back into place.
    Susso drew out a chair and sat down at the table. She pushed aside the newspaper and took her notepad and a ballpoint pen from her jacket pocket, not because she wanted to write anything in particular but mainly to get straight to the point. There was a click when she pressed the pen but it would not work. It had probably frozen solid. Looking around she found a pencil lying on the table and picked it up.
    She looked encouragingly at Edit, who was fiddling with a button on the sleeve of her blouse. The lines on each side of the old woman’s mouth were deeply etched, as if it required deep concentration to fiddle with that button.
    â€˜Shall I show you where it was? Where I saw him?’
    Â 
    Â 
    It had been snowing all morning. It fell and fell in thick masses, and Seved sat at the kitchen table seeing nothing else. The slopes of the stubbly pine-covered mountain had faded into white and the wire netting of the dog enclosure was so clogged up that it was impossible to see what was going on in there. The dogs usually sat staring silently ahead when the nights had been long.
    He leaned across and widened the opening in the curtains so that he could see the upturned Volvo 240 out in the yard. The snow had covered the undercarriage in such a thick layer that it was hard to see any of the components apart from the hump of the silencer.
    As soon as he had drunk his coffee he would go out and try to turn the car upright. Make an attempt, at least. Most of the damage had already been done so there was no immediate hurry, but he