‘Henry, I just can’t take her with me. You know what it was like last time!’

Beatrice Forsenström was preparing for her annual visit to her mother and two aunts. Henry Forsenström didn’t have much time for these ladies and the feeling was mutual. Beatrice went to see them on her own.

Sibylla had speculated about the possibility that once upon a time her mother really must have married her father for love because Beatrice’s parents had been so opposed to the marriage. Beatrice’s family was upper-class. Her parents, Mr and Mrs Hall, surveying the world from inside their huge apartment in Stockholm’s prestigious Östermalm district, had dismissed the son of Forsenström’s Foundry as ‘not really one of us’. When anyone wanted to marry into the Hall family ‘a good family background’ was what really counted. ‘New money’ was automatically suspect.

Besides, what would a Hall girl do, buried in Hultaryd? No one had ever heard of this one-horse place somewhere in the Småland uplands. Still, it’s your funeral, my dear, just don’t come complaining to us afterwards.

Sibylla had picked this up gradually, listening to her mother’s conversations with Granny at mealtimes. Apparently, Granny was also displeased at how long it had taken Beatrice and her husband to produce children. Displeased, though not at all surprised. What can you expect? Beatrice had been all of thirty-six when Sibylla was born.

Sibylla’s grandmother had a finely honed ability to make herself understood, a skill relying entirely on insinuations and covert accusations. Her daughter had inherited it in full. As a grown-up, Sibylla had sometimes wondered if she too carried the same dissembling gene.

At that time, she had been a teenager and hiding halfway up the stairs to listen to what her parents were saying about going to see Granny.

‘Her cousins simply can’t understand what she’s talking about half the time. They make fun of her. I shouldn’t expose her to that.’

Henry Forsenström said nothing. Perhaps he was just looking through some of his documents. ‘Her accent is even coarser than some of the working-class children here, you know.’

Her father sighed audibly, but must have felt he should comment.

‘What’s wrong wi’ that. She’s born ’n’ bred in these parts after all.’

Henry Forsenström’s version of the local dialect showed no regard for proper speech. Beatrice didn’t answer at once. Although Sibylla couldn’t see her, she felt she knew exactly what her mother’s face looked like.

‘Anyway, I think she’d better stay here this time … Besides, I’d have a chance to get out on my own for a change. Mummy mentioned a premiere at the opera on Friday – they’re doing La Traviata.’

‘You do as you think best, of course.’

Sibylla had never again been allowed to travel with her mother to Stockholm. The next time she arrived in the capital, it was under quite different circumstances.