Chapter 27
In the kitchen, she ran into Linn who proclaimed that there was fresh bread for breakfast and that Oskar was soon going to come and pick her up.
They were going to drive the last things over to the venue and fill up the counter with cream rings, Lucia buns, cinnamon rolls, currant cookies and vanilla hearts.
The smell of the bread made Emelie’s belly rumble.
“Can you go down into the cellar and fetch the IKEA-bag with paper plates, coffee mugs and plastic spoons? We can’t fit them right now, but perhaps you can bring them when you come over?” Linn said on the way out, and Emelie nodded and waved goodbye to her energetic daughter.
Nowadays, when Birgitta wasn’t lurking down in the cellar and Andreas had installed a new light, it wasn’t at all spooky anymore, and after breakfast and a quick shower, Emelie opened the door and went downstairs.
When she had turned on the light and had time to adjust, she spotted the blue bag in one of the corners of the room.
As she bent down to pick it up, she noticed something sticking out behind a shelf.
It was brown and rectangular, and when she leaned in closer, she saw that it was an envelope.
It was stuck between the back part of the wooden shelf and the baseboard.
Emelie carefully pulled one of the corners and dust and a disgusting old, dead fly came out with it.
Emelie swept away the worst part of it and pulled out the envelope.
There had been a stamp on the back of it, but it was faded, and she couldn’t make out what it had said in the dim light in the cellar.
She grabbed the envelope and the bag, turned off the light and went back upstairs.
She put away the bag and leaned against the kitchen counter while opened the envelope that wasn’t sealed.
A smile slowly spread across her face as she read what was inside the envelope.
Thirty minutes later, she had made it to the community centre with the IKEA-bag which she handed over to Linn and the envelope under her arm.
Oskar was standing behind the counter arranging the cookies and he smiled shyly at Emelie.
She felt all warm and fuzzy looking at him, and a bit guilty about her thoughts yesterday when she thought that they had miscarried.
He was her son in law, after all, and would make a lovely father for her grandchild.
“Hello Oskar” she said and walked over to give him a hug. “How’s it going?”
“Great. Lots to do, but it will be fine once we got the hang of everything,” he said.
“Hey, have you seen Birgitta? And have you made the coffee yet? I can see that there are salespeople on their way in.”
“Yes, the coffee is ready, but I haven’t seen Birgitta yet.”
Linn called him from inside the kitchen and he rushed off.
Emelie met Christer on the stairs and they were standing next to each other watching boxes of Santas, Christmas-themed oven mitts, stockings, cheeses, painted bricks, jewellery and crocheted tablecloths find their place onto each of the tables. They nodded to each other.
“Let’s do this,” Christer said. “If you take care of the people on the inside, I’ll handle the ones outside.”
“I’ll start arranging my table too,” Emelie said. “We have about one hundred boxes of Christmas things that I plan on selling. I hope we get rid of a lot of things, preferably everything!”
Inside the great hall, Emelie had booked a six-metre-long table for herself and the girls.
It was placed right across from the café, the best spot in the whole house, but shouldn’t one have some advantages for being the market general?
Behind the table were boxes filled with Astrid’s Christmas decorations.
Emelie put a red tablecloth on the table and opened box number one.
Santas, bowls with Santas, carved Santas, crocheted Santas.
She sighed. Every time she saw all these Christmas things, she was amazed by the sheer amount of them.
Box number two; an abundance of Christmas tapestries.
She started arranging them on the wall behind the table and it soon was completely covered.
When most things were in their right place, the salespeople gathered into little groups and the buzzing and the laughter mixed with the smell of coffee.
Emelie had introduced herself to everyone and told them about Linn and Oskar overseeing the café.
A couple of times she had helped Christer with the electricity outside but now it seemed to run smoothly out there too.
She was walking along the tables, exchanging a couple of words here and there and praising the lovely items. Imagine, that they were finally here and that they had succeeded.
Now she was hoping that Sussi’s website and their ads in the local newspaper would work their magic and get lots of visitors to the market.
The next event on the program was the Lucia procession and then Stig was going to be Santa for a couple of hours in the afternoon, assisted by Mrs. Claus, Birgitta.
Emelie saw a woman in her sixties come walking towards her.
She knew that it was Christer’s ex-wife, Carina, and smiled at her.
They had just exchanged quick hellos when she arrived, but now she had a cup of coffee in her hand and looked more relaxed.
“Hello”, Carina said, looking around. “It looks lovely in here with all the flowers and wreaths.”
Emelie also looked around.
“Yes, we have a very talented gardener here on the island,” she said, smiling.
The thought of Andreas gave her butterflies and she felt that her smile stayed on longer than necessary. The woman nodded and shifted her weight from one foot to another. She grabbed Emelie’s arm, pulling her in behind a table that was filled with aromatic spices.
“Well, yes…You might know that I was married to Christer?”
“Yes, I’ve come to that conclusion,” Emelie said in a slightly amused voice.
Was Carina planning on courting her own ex-husband? A man who hated almost everything and was pretty grumpy but still had a very good heart.
“I saw him outside, but I didn’t dare to say hello. I’m afraid he is still terribly angry with me,” she said, scanning the room.
“Okay…”
“So, I thought you could introduce us?”
Emelie chuckled.
“Introduce you? Don’t you know each other already?”
“Yes, but I thought that if you do, it might stop him from making a scene.”
“Ah, I see what you mean,” Emelie said. “Yes, I suppose I could, if I have the time, but I can see Christer is waiting for me now, so I have to run.”
Christer showed Emelie the way up to small stage in one end of the room where he already standing prepared with a microphone in his hand.
“I thought we could say welcome to everyone, tell them why we are here and say something about the rules and regulations.”
Emelie nodded.
“Good idea, do you want to start?”
Instead of answering, he looked out over the room where the volume had gone down a bit and most people were quiet. Christer turned on the microphone and tapped it a couple of times to check that it worked properly, then he loudly cleared his throat.
“Okay, well hello, everyone.”
It got completely quiet in the room as all eyes were drawn to them.
“If you have been around for a while, you know that the Christmas market is an old and appreciated tradition, that has been on hold for a couple of years for various reasons. But this year, Emelie came to our island and decided to revive the old market, in Astrid’s honour.
Astrid was a remarkable person and a big Christmas enthusiast; she would have loved it.
And I can see that you have already found the lovely cookies that Linn has baked, they are all made from Astrid’s recipes.
The last thing that Astrid did, was to make sure that Emelie and her lovely family came to the island, and we are all so thankful for that. ”
Christer put his arm around Emelie who wiped away a tear from her cheek. She wasn’t going to stand on this stage bawling, but these were some pretty big words coming from Christer and she smiled warmly towards him as he started speaking again.
“Yes, and many of you might wonder why the island is called Sardinon, Sardine Island, since everyone knows that sardines live in the Mediterranean and in the Atlantic, but not here in Kattegat.”
There was a buzzing in the crowd and Emelie stared at Christer in surprise. It hadn’t even crossed her mind.
“The original name of the island was Lilla Carlstenson, but then in 1971 it was decided that Marstrand was to be included in Kung?lv municipality. The politicians decided that there could only be one Carlsten and that Lilla Carlstenson had to change names. And then the inhabitants of the island were invited to send in suggestions. That’s why the island council gathered right here in the community centre one chilly Saturday afternoon in November and Anders, who has our shop here on the island, and is selling chocolate and nuts here today… ”
Everyone’s eyes were turned to Oskar’s father who got up and took a bow, grinning.
“Yes, Anders’ father, who was also called Anders, had promised to bring the food if the others brought beer and schnapps.
It just so happened, that Anders had gotten a shipment of sardines in tomato sauce in that day, and he brought ten cans and some Swedish crisp bread and butter.
When the city council split up a couple of hours later, the beer and the schnapps had been drunk and the sardines eaten, and everyone agreed it was one of the best meals they had ever had and that the island should be called Sardinon from that day on. ”
The laughter echoed over the great hall and the buzzing grew even louder than before when everyone tried to make their comments about Christer’s story heard. Christer raised one hand to ask for silence.