“Putte!” she shouts. “Putte!”

She searches for hours, but he’s nowhere to be found. Once she thinks she hears him barking behind some juniper bushes, but when she’s forced her way through the brambles, he isn’t there.

In the end she gives up and collapses onto a rock. She’s exhausted from all the running. Her bare legs are covered with scratches.

What is she to do? Putte’s lost and it’s her fault. Not to mention that she’s been in a fight, with a summer guest, of all people, and split his lip. And Putte ruined the guest’s trousers, trying to defend her.

Putte’s a city dog, not accustomed to fending for himself in the countryside. Maybe he’s stuck between rocks, or has broken a leg. It may be ages before someone finds him. He may starve to death. Or be caught by a fox. He may already be dead.

Aunt Märta will be beside herself. She’ll make Stephie apologize to all of them-the doctor’s wife, Karin, the freckle-faced boy. And Jesus.

No, she’ll never apologize to that boy. Not after what he said. She hadn’t done anything bad to him. But if she tells them what happened, no one will believe her. It will be four against one, and she knows that both Sylvia and Barbro tell lies.

Anyway, she doesn’t want to tell them what the boy said. She doesn’t want to tell anyone. She’s ashamed. Although nothing that happened was her fault, she’s ashamed just the same.

She can’t go home.

It’s hot enough to spend the night outside. But she’ll have to get some food. If she waits until evening, she can sneak into the root cellar at home unseen.

And she still has that package of cookies in her pocket. She can get through the day on cookies. They’re all broken and crumbly now. She must have fallen on them when the boy pushed her to the ground. She opens the package and takes out a cookie. She’ll save the rest until she’s famished.

thirty-eight

How can a day be so long? Hour by hour, the sun shifts from the east of the island to the very top of the sky. Then it continues west, so slowly you can hardly tell.

Now and then Stephie thinks she hears Putte barking, but it’s probably just her imagination; at least she never catches sight of him. Her stomach’s growling. Occasionally she allows herself a cookie, to stave off the hunger.

It’s a hot day. The sun is glaring down and there is hardly so much as a cool breeze. Stephie’s thirsty.

She tries to pretend she’s shipwrecked on a desert island-a game she played with herself when she first arrived. But a desert island ought to have trees with delicious fruit that fills you up and quenches your thirst. Stephie suddenly remembers the blackberry bramble Vera showed her last summer. But it’s only June, and the bushes are just full of white blossoms.

Behind the blackberry bushes there’s a crevice in the rocks, dark and deep. The sun can’t penetrate there.

Stephie takes a couple of cautious steps down into the crevice. The air is cool and damp. Under her feet there’s soft, sandy soil.

She continues farther in and hears the murmur of running water. There’s a little rivulet springing up out of the stone, running down the side of the rock. Stephie cups her hands, holding them under the trickle. Then she takes a little sip. The water smells of earth and iron, but it doesn’t taste bad.

Just before the other end of the crevice, she discovers a little cave. Inside, the sandy soil is covered with thin green grass. A cool, shady spot.

Stephie lies down. The grass tickles her bare arms and legs. It’s very quiet. She can’t even hear the ocean in here. The only sound is the persistent chirruping of a grasshopper.

She stays in the cave for a long time. Sleeps for a while, lies awake thinking. Nibbles on cookies, one at a time.

In the end she gets cold. Stiffly, she rises and walks back through the crevice. She splashes her face with water and has another drink. Strangely, she no longer feels hungry, just weak and dizzy.

The sun has begun to sink in the west, down toward the surface of the water. Then it sets so fast, Stephie thinks she can almost see it slip into the water. The sky is cloudless, the pastel colors shifting rapidly from pink to purple to pale blue to green. Just before the sun disappears it is shrouded in a grayish pink haze.

The warmth in the air vanishes in a hurry. Stephie shivers. She’s got to get something warm. Perhaps there’s an old blanket or sweater in the boathouse.

It’s getting dark. The sky is deep blue, except in the west, where there is still a band of light. Aunt Märta must be asleep by now. She goes to bed at ten every night, summer and winter. The summer guests might still be up, but she’ll have to take that risk. She’s too cold and hungry to wait any longer.

Stephie walks along the beach, approaching the house from below. The white paint looks almost iridescent in the twilight. The windows are all dark except the one in her room upstairs. Sven must be up; he’s probably reading in bed. He’ll surely never lend her any more books.

The door of the root cellar creaks when she opens it. Quickly she gathers some tins, a jar of jam, and a couple of carrots, putting everything in a paper bag.

Now I’m a real thief, she thinks.

She needs a bottle to fill with water from the pump.

They keep empty bottles and jars on the top shelf. Stephie has to stand on a step stool, and even there she has to stand on tiptoe to reach. Just as she’s extending her arm to take a bottle, she loses her balance and grabs the edge of the shelf. It totters and, for a moment, Stephie is sure all the bottles and jars are going to crash to the floor.

But she’s lucky. The shelf holds. She takes a bottle and gets down off the stool. Setting the paper bag of provisions outside the root cellar door, she heads for the pump.

As she turns the corner of the yard, Stephie sees to her horror that there’s a light on in the basement.

She’ll have to pass by the lighted window to reach the pump, and she decides that the best thing to do is to sidle along the wall of the house and crawl under the window, which is only about a yard above the ground.

One step at a time, Stephie creeps to the window and crouches down. But her curiosity gets the better of her and she raises her head just high enough to peek in over the sill.

The light comes from the basement bedroom. Aunt Märta’s sitting on the edge of the bed in her nightgown, a long braid hanging down her back. Stephie’s never seen her hair in anything but a bun before.

Aunt Märta’s head is bowed. It can’t be true, but she actually appears to be crying.

Stephie cranes her neck to see better. At that very moment Aunt Märta raises her eyes, and looks right through the window. Stephie ducks as fast as she can, but it’s too late.

“Hello?” Aunt Märta cries. “Is anybody there?”

It would still be possible for Stephie to run, grab the bag of provisions, and be out of sight before Aunt Märta got outside.

“It’s me,” says Stephie, standing up.

Aunt Märta isn’t angry. She takes Stephie by the hand, leads her into the basement kitchen, and makes her some sandwiches and cocoa.

“Eat now,” she says. “You must be starving.”

“I took some food from the root cellar,” Stephie whispers. “It’s in a bag outside.”

“Were you going to run away?” Aunt Märta asks.

Stephie doesn’t know how to answer. So much has happened, and she’s very tired.

“There were these boys,” she begins. “Outside the shop.”

“You don’t need to tell me,” Aunt Märta interrupts. “I know all about it.”

A bite of bread catches in Stephie’s throat. Somebody’s already told Aunt Märta what she did. Was it the shopkeeper? Or the parents of the boys? Of course the doctor’s wife must have come down to find out where Putte was. As soon as she has eaten her sandwiches, Aunt Märta will scold her, and tomorrow she’ll have to make her apologies.