The Farm by Tom Rob Smith Read Free Book Online Page A

mum unclipped three photographs from the journal and laid them side by side on the table in front of me. They matched up, forming a single panorama of their farm.
     
    It is a pity that you never had a chance to visit. My task today would have been easier if you’d experienced the farm first-hand. Maybe with these photos you consider a description of the landscape unnecessary. That’s exactly what my enemies hope you’ll think, because they portray the countryside as being no different from the tourist-brochure stereotype of rural Sweden. They want you to conclude that anything other than an enthusiastic reaction is so bizarre that it could only be the product of sickness and paranoia. Be warned: they have a vested interest in presenting it as picturesque since beauty is easily mistaken for innocence.
    Standing at the point where these photographs were taken, you’re immersed in the most unbelievable quiet. It’s like being at the bottom of the sea except instead of a rusted shipwreck there’s an ancient farmhouse. Even the thoughts in my head sounded loud, and sometimes I found my heart beating hard for no reason except as a reaction against the silence.
    You can’t appreciate it from the photographs, but the thatched roof was alive, a living entity spotted with moss and small flowers, home to insects and birds – a fairytale roof in a fairytale setting – I use the word carefully, for fairy tales are full of danger and darkness as well as wonder and light.
    The exterior of this ancient property hadn’t been altered since its construction two hundred years ago. The only evidence of the modern world was the collection of red dots in the distance, beady rat eyes atop wind turbines, barely visible in the gloom, churning a morbid April sky.
    Here’s the crucial point. As the fact of isolation sinks into our consciousness we change, not at first but slowly, gradually, until we accept it as the norm, living day to day without the presence of the state, without the outside world chafing against our side, reminding us of our duty to each other, no passing strangers or nearby neighbours, no one peering over our shoulder – a permanent state of unwatched. It alters our notions of how we should behave, of what is acceptable, and, most important of all, what we can get away with.
    • • •

T HE MELANCHOLY IN MY MUM’S description didn’t surprise me. There was always going to be more than straightforward happiness bound up in her return to Sweden. Aged sixteen she’d run away from her family home and carried on running, through Germany, Switzerland and Holland, working as a nanny and a waitress, sleeping on floors, until she’d reached England where she met my dad. Of course, this wasn’t her first time back, we’d often holidayed in Sweden, renting remote cottages on islands or near lakes, never spending more than a day in the cities, partly due to expense but mostly because my mum wanted to be among the forests and wilderness. Within days of our arriving, empty jam jars would be filled with wildflowers. Bowls would be brimming with berries. Yet we’d never made an attempt to meet any relatives. Though I was content to spend the time with just my mum and dad, occasionally even I – naïve as I was – sensed sadness in the absence of other people.
     
    My mum returned to the diary and seemed frustrated as she searched the pages.
     
    I can’t be sure of the exact day. It was roughly a week after we’d arrived. At that point I wasn’t in the habit of taking many notes. The idea hadn’t occurred to me that my word would be doubted as if I were a fanciful child making up stories for attention. Of the many humiliations I’ve experienced in these past few months, including having my hands and feet bound, by far the worst has been the disbelief in people’s eyes as I make a statement. To speak, be heard, and not believed.
     
    During our first week on the farm Chris’s state of mind was cause for concern, not