The Snowman Read Online Free PDF Page A

from the hall.
    Jonas was about to run to her, but his father held him by the shoulder and pointed to the unlaid table.
    ‘How good you are!’
    Jonas could hear the smile in her breathless voice as she stood in the kitchen doorway behind him while he set out glasses and cutlery as quickly as he could.
    ‘And what a big snowman you’ve made!’
    Jonas turned in surprise to his mother, who was unbuttoning her coat. She was so attractive. Dark skin, dark hair, just like him, and those gentle, gentle eyes she almost always had. Almost. She wasn’t quite as slim as in the photos from the time she and Dad got married, but he had noticed that men looked at her whenever the two of them took a stroll in town.
    ‘We haven’t made a snowman,’ Jonas said.
    ‘Haven’t you?’ His Mummy frowned as she unfurled the big pink scarf he had given her for Christmas.
    Dad went over to the window. ‘Must be the neighbours’ boys,’ he said.
    Jonas stood up on one of the kitchen chairs and peered out. And, sure enough, there on the lawn in front of the house was a snowman. It was, as his mother had said, big. Its eyes and mouth were made with pebbles and the nose was a carrot. The snowman had no hat, cap or scarf, and only one arm, a thin twig Jonas guessed had been taken from the hedge. However, there was something odd about the snowman. It was facing the wrong way. He didn’t know why, but it ought to have been looking out onto the road, towards the open space.
    ‘Why—?’ Jonas began, but was interrupted by his father.
    ‘I’ll talk to them.’
    ‘Why’s that?’ Mummy said from the hall where Jonas could hear her unzipping her high black leather boots. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
    ‘I don’t want that sort roaming around our property. I’ll do it when I’m back.’
    ‘Why isn’t it looking out?’ Jonas asked.
    In the hall, his mother sighed. ‘When will you be back, love?’
    ‘Tomorrow sometime.’
    ‘What time?’
    ‘Why? Have you got a date?’ There was a lightness of tone in his father’s voice that made him shiver.
    ‘I was thinking I would have dinner ready,’ Mummy said, coming into the kitchen, going over to the stove, checking the pans and turning up the temperature on two of the hotplates.
    ‘Just have it ready,’ his father said, turning to the pile of newspapers on the worktop. ‘And I’ll be home at some point.’
    ‘OK.’ Mummy went over to Dad’s back and put her arms around him. ‘But do you really have to go to Bergen tonight already?’
    ‘My lecture’s at eight tomorrow,’ Dad said. ‘It takes an hour to get to the university from the time the plane lands, so I wouldn’t make it if I caught the first flight tomorrow.’
    Jonas could see from the muscles in his father’s neck that he was relaxing, that once again Mummy had managed to find the right words.
    ‘Why is the snowman looking at our house?’ Jonas asked.
    ‘Go and wash your hands,’ Mummy said.
    They ate in silence, broken only by Mummy’s tiny questions about how school had been and Jonas’s brief, vague answers. Jonas knew that detailed answers could evoke unpleasant questions from Dad about what they were learning – or not learning – at the ‘excuse of a school’. Or quick-fire interrogation about someone Jonas mentioned he had been playing with, about what their parents did and where they were from. Questions which Jonas could never answer to his father’s satisfaction.
    When Jonas was in bed, on the floor below he heard his father say goodbye to his mother, a door close and the car start up outside and fade into the distance. They were alone again. His mother switched on the TV. He thought about something she had asked. Why Jonas hardly ever brought his friends home to play any more. He hadn’t known what to answer; he hadn’t wanted her to be sad. But now he became sad instead. He chewed the inside of his cheek, feeling the bitter-sweet pain extend into his ears, and stared at the metal tubes of the