Harbor by John Lindqvist (classic novels for teens txt) 📕

and smooth after Johan had cleaned it. ‘It called to him. He caught something he shouldn’t have caught.’

‘Called to him? What called to him?’

‘He said it was an island over towards Gåvasten. But that it wasn’t Gåvasten. That it kept moving. One night it was just off the Shack, he said. And it was calling to him. Don’t you remember how frightened he was, Simon? How frightened he was all the time?’

‘Yes,’ said Simon. He remembered both the enthusiastic boy who had dug up the spear, and the increasingly confused and distant man the boy had become. ‘But this sounds crazy. An island? Hunting a person?’

Anna-Greta leaned towards him and lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘Haven’t you heard the sea? Heard it calling?’

Only a week ago Simon would have been concerned about Anna-Greta’s mental health if she had asked him a question like that with such quivering earnestness. A week ago he hadn’t seen thedepths, hadn’t sunk a body into those same depths.

‘I don’t know,’ he replied. ‘Maybe. Have you heard it?’

Anna-Greta looked out of the window and her gaze reached far into the distance, to the outermost shipping lanes. ‘Have I told you about Gustav Jansson?’ she asked. ‘The lighthouse keeper? On Stora Korset?’

‘Yes. You knew him, didn’t you?’

Anna-Greta nodded. ‘It all started with him. For me.’

The keeper

Stora Korset is the last outpost facing the Åland Sea. The island is so remote that the lighthouse keeper there receives what is known as an isolation supplement in addition to his normal pay. A little bonus for enduring the loneliness.

From the end of the 1930s to the beginning of the 1950s, it was Gustav Jansson who ran the whole show out there. He originally came from Domarö, but found it difficult to get on with people, and when the post of lighthouse keeper became available he took it as an opportunity to be left in peace at last. Then he spent thirteen years there with four hens as his only company.

He did not like the war. The din of practice firing and drift mines that had to be rendered harmless was one thing, but the worst thing was that visitors came to the island. Military personnel knocking on his door and asking questions about this and that, boats mooring at his jetty on reconnaissance missions. For a while there was talk of some kind of fortification on Stora Korset, but fortunately the plan came to nothing.

How terrible would that have looked! A tower with a gun emplacement down on the rocks below, soldiers stomping around smoking and frightening the hens. No, if that had happened he would have demanded to leave forthwith.

However, the war did bring one good thing.

Gustav Jansson had never been married. Not because he had anything in particular against women, no, he disliked men just as much. He was a solitary soul by nature and not suited to the companionship of marriage.

However, the war brought a woman he was able to tolerate. Not that he would have married her even if the possibility had existed, but he could tolerate her company and gradually found himself looking forward to the days she came to the island with snuff and newspapers.

He was enough of a man to appreciate female beauty in spite of everything, but what he liked most about Anna-Greta was that she didn’t talk unnecessarily. Gustav’s taciturnity made other people nervous, and they would chat away even more as if there were some kind of quota that had to be filled.

Not Anna-Greta. It was only after they had been acquainted for a year or so that they said any more than was absolutely necessary to carry out their transactions. At that time Gustav had bought a jigsaw puzzle from Anna-Greta. When he had done that one he wanted to buy a new one, which led to a certain amount of discussion. What kind of picture, how many pieces?

He ended up being a subscriber, and was particularly fond of puzzles with a sea motif. Since he had neither the space nor the inclination to keep the puzzles once he had completed them, he would place the pieces carefully, then when he had finished he would take the puzzle apart and put the pieces back in the box. Once a month Anna-Greta would come and replace the completed puzzle with a new one. At half price, because she could sell the old one again.

Over the years they had the odd conversation that was unrelated to their business dealings. A certain level of intimacy grew between them.

A couple of years after the end of the war, the general view was that Gustav Jansson had lost his mind. He did his job as lighthouse keeper extremely well, there were no complaints on that score, butyou just couldn’t talk to the man. He had spent too much time reading the Bible.

Anna-Greta knew better. It was true that reading the Bible was Gustav’s only diversion apart from jigsaw puzzles out on his little island. He knew it inside out, and would even conduct conversations with himself, where one party was an austere prophet and the other a free-thinker.

But he wasn’t mad. Gustav had simply realised that the surest way of frightening away unwelcome visitors was to preach at them. People became strangely uncomfortable when they heard the word of the Lord being intoned as they were tying up their boats at Gustav’s jetty, and visits were kept short. Gustav was left in peace with his lighthouse and his God.

One afternoon at the beginning of the 1950s, Anna-Greta arrived later than usual for her monthly visit. With the north wind blowing at twelve metres per second, Gustav was surprised to see her at all. As Anna-Greta unpacked Gustav’s purchases in the lighthouse keeper’s cottage, the wind picked up even more. Some gusts made the wind gauge shoot up to twenty.

It looked as if Anna-Greta was going to have to stay on Stora Korset overnight. Gustav managed to get in touch with Nåten via