The Dinosaur Feather

room and pushed the armchair in front of the open doors of the stove.
    Why are you so angry, Søren had asked? For a moment, his eyes had been tender and curious. As if he truly didn’t understand. Perhaps she didn’t understand it, either. That was just the way she was. Anger was her most powerful emotion. Much stronger than love. The thought paralysed her. She was angry with Thomas, but her anger was ultimatelyfutile. They hadn’t seen him for over two years and all she knew was that he worked in Stockholm and she had his number somewhere, but apart from that she knew nothing and he never contacted them.
    But she was also angry with Cecilie and feelings ran high every time they saw each other. And Jens annoyed her. When he picked his nose, when he was late, when he couldn’t quit smoking or generally failed to pull himself together. She was incapable of tempering her irritation with concern and tolerance, she simply blew a fuse. At the slightest thing. And then there was Lily. Anna obviously wasn’t angry with her three-year-old daughter, but neither did she possess the patience she so desperately longed to have. Lily was demanding and impossible to negotiate with, she was stubborn, she acted as if she had no common sense, and she clearly hadn’t because she was only three years old!
    She had been angry with Helland, Tybjerg and Johannes. Johannes, who massaged her shoulders when she had slept badly. Johannes, who listened gently and attentively and made her laugh. Her rage triumphed every time. It made no sense. Why was she so angry? She put her mug on the floor and pressed her knees into her eyes. The fire was roaring now and warmed her thighs.
    She got up, feeling livid. No way did she want to be angry with her child! Children couldn’t handle that! A child loves because it feels loved.
    Anna studied the photo of Cecilie, Jens and her younger self, a girl with sparkling eyes. Noted the contrast between her parents’ smiling mouths and their sad eyes; stared at her own, oblivious innocence. Something had happened backthen. She would visit Ulla Bodelsen tomorrow. A child loves because it feels loved.
    Her interview at the police station on Friday morning lasted just under two hours. Søren was clean-shaven, and his treatment of her was equally smooth. Nothing in his behaviour revealed that he had tucked her daughter up in bed and held her hard by the shoulders last night. Another officer was present during the interview; perhaps that explained why. She left just after twelve and had an hour and a half before her train to Odense. She was in need of fresh air and decided to walk down Frederikssundvej. It was cold and a couple of birds on the pavement couldn’t even be bothered to take off when Anna walked past them.
    Further down the street she noticed a man who reminded her of Troels. Karen hadn’t mentioned him and Anna had avoided the subject completely. But perhaps she had to face it at last? Maybe it was time to get in touch with him and apologise for what she had said? Even though she didn’t feel genuinely sorry? Handsome Troels. Anna stared – surely she was seeing things? How could anyone look so much like him? It couldn’t possibly be him. Troels wouldn’t just turn up out of nowhere, after ten years, on Frederikssundvej; there was no way he could know that Anna would be there or that she had got back in touch with Karen the day before. That simply couldn’t happen.
    But there he was. He was standing outside a greengrocer, casually, as though he was waiting for a cab on the corner of 2 nd Avenue and 58 th Street. Troels stared into the distance, across the road, across the cars and Anna tried to follow hisgaze. She just had time to think that he was posing, that he must have seen her and was now trying too hard to pretend he hadn’t, when he turned his head and looked straight at her.
    ‘Hi, Anna!’ he exclaimed, astonished. ‘Wow, Anna, hi!’ he said again. His voice sounded delighted and genuine, and Anna couldn’t help laughing when she embraced him.
    ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ she said into his oilskin jacket. It smelled of nicotine.
    ‘I was just wondering,’ Troels laughed, squeezing her, ‘if Anna Bella Nor had learned to speak like a lady or whether she still swears like a sailor! How are you? I hear you’ve become a dinosaur expert, or an archaeologist or something?’
    ‘That’s about it,’ Anna smiled. ‘But who told you that?’
    Troels looked