The Historians
Page 28
Scared? He ushered Sven in and closed the door behind him.
“With my leanings, I’m an easy target. I always feel I have to be careful not to give people any reason to come after me.”
The knot in Jens’s chest was dissolving.
“I’m rather an easy target for blackmail.” Sven gave a false chuckle.
“I understand,” Jens said, and his voice sounded muffled to his own ears. “Thanks for telling me. I . . .”
They both bent their heads. Jens felt like he might cry. They had never talked about Sven’s homosexuality before.
“Thanks for telling me,” he repeated.
Sven cleared his throat and raised his head. “But I have reconsidered,” he said. “My best friend needs my help and that’s worth the risk. So please tell me the whole story again.”
They went into the living room and Jens told him everything, from the beginning up to what had happened last night.
“Who do you think is involved in all this?” Sven asked when he had finished.
Jens shook his head. “I don’t know. Who told you what the phone calls were about and that Britta’s killer had been caught?”
“A fellow in the Security Services. He’s Möller’s contact.”
“You see, they’re everywhere.”
“So what will you do now?”
“Recover,” Jens said. “Regroup. I don’t know,” he admitted.
“What can I do?”
“Keep your ears and eyes open? Try to see who might be in on this? I honestly don’t know, Sven. Just be careful, please. As you can tell by now, whoever they are, they’re not messing around. What you told me today . . . They wouldn’t hesitate to use that.”
“Can I do anything for you now? Do you need anything?”
“Just rest, I think. I’m not up for anything else.”
Sven nodded and rose. “Look after yourself, my friend. We’ll speak soon.”
48.
Blackåsen Mountain
Abraham’s mother. She was sitting in the kitchen with Gunnar’s mother as he opened the door. Gunnar turned on his heel to leave again.
“Son?”
His father was there even though it was a working day? This was serious.
“Yes, Dad.” Gunnar turned back to the adults in the kitchen.
Abraham’s mother’s face was white, her eyes red. She’d become skin and bone since he last saw her. When she stared at him, he found he couldn’t meet her gaze. Instead, he bent his head. His shoes were scuffed, dirty.
“Frida has come to see us,” Gunnar’s mother said. “Abraham has been missing for a week. Do you know something about it?”
“No,” he mumbled.
He lifted his head. His father narrowed his eyes at him. You didn’t want to end up on the wrong side of him. His sister and his father had never seen eye to eye. The fights they’d had . . .
“Gunnar?” his father prompted.
Gunnar sighed. “Abraham said something happened when he was out with Mr. Notholm.”
The adults exchanged gazes. He could feel their confusion.
“Why would he be out with him?” his father asked.
“Mr. Notholm asked us to do some work for him . . . Only Abraham agreed. I don’t know what happened, but Abraham said Mr. Notholm killed Director Sandler.”
Gunnar’s mother covered her mouth. Abraham’s mother wailed and Gunnar’s mother turned to her and put her hand on her shoulder.
“Abraham wanted to make sure I’d tell you that he had nothing to do with that,” Gunnar said and had to clear his throat. “With the killing.”
“But the director is alive,” his father said, forehead wrinkled.
Yes. Gunnar nodded.
“But where did he go?” Abraham’s mother cried.
“He said he was going south. He said he’d be fine.” His words sounded lame even to his own ears.
“He’ll be fine.” She laughed and shook her head. She began scratching at the raw skin of her hands. Gunnar couldn’t bear it. She drew blood as she raked, and it was spreading in long red streaks, getting under her nails. He felt queasy. He wished his mother would tell her to stop. Abraham’s mother put her face in her hands, rocking back and forth.
“I wasn’t there. I don’t know what happened,” Gunnar said.
“I saw the director,” Gunnar’s father said in a low voice to Gunnar’s mother. “It was clear he was in pain. And Mr. Notholm, too, was injured.”
“Mr. Notholm had said the director had made himself a target,” Gunnar said.
His mother gasped. “But the director is in charge of the town.” She had leaned forward and put her hand on her husband’s arm. “He could have Mr. Notholm jailed if he wanted to,” she whispered. “Doesn’t even need a reason.”
“Perhaps for some reason he can’t this time,” Gunnar’s father said.
Gunnar was shocked when he saw his face. His father looked sick.
49.
Laura
The historians and Jens Regnell were sitting in silence in Karl-Henrik’s living room. Laura and Jens had been talking at length; Jens, with his swollen, bruised face, a reminder of what they were up against.
“A Scandinavian Reich,” Karl-Henrik said, at last. He shook his head and his voice sounded full of something like admiration. “The thing that struck me when I was trying to map out the relationships the Institute has with other organizations is the breadth of it. I’ve found links to seemingly every domain: business, academia, politics, the military . . . There’s no end to it.”
He had pinned up his notes on the wall, a giant spiderweb of names. Matti was standing in front of it, reading, his fingers following the lines, mumbling as he recognized some.
“Technically, based on this chart, we don’t really know who’s at the center of the struggle for a Scandinavian Reich,” Karl-Henrik said. “These are the people and institutions with links to the Institute. Some of them won’t know. Others might be seduced by the vision of power . . .” He shrugged.
“Professor Lindahl is right in the middle,” Laura said. She was standing by the window and could feel a faint draft coming from outside. She wrapped her arms around herself. “How do we find out who else is involved?”
“I’m not sure we should try,” Erik said.
Matti turned around to look at Erik. Laura paused, uncertain she had heard correctly.
“How can you say that?” she asked.
“You heard what they told him.” Erik nodded in Jens’s direction. “It’s too big. There’s nothing we can do.”
Was Erik afraid? His body was tensed up, as if ready for them to attack him. Laura had never seen him frightened. Erik feared nothing. Feared no one.
“There’s always something you can do,” Laura said. “At least we have to try.”
“And get yourself killed in the process? Your flat has already been bombed and you’ve been shot at. What will it take for you to stop?”
The bells from the church next to Karl-Henrik’s apartment began to ring as if to accentuate his words. Laura turned to look out at the people exiting the building. A funeral. Everyone dressed in black. She could see the priest standing on the steps, shaking hands, offering consolation.
“Actually, that was one of the things that was strange,” she said and turned back to the room. “They didn’t shoot at me.”
“They didn’t?” Matti asked.
“There was only one shot—the one that killed Andreas. And yet, they could easily have killed me and Taneli, the boy I was with.”
“And the other thing?” Matti asked.
“What?”
“You said that was one of the things that was strange.”
“Oh yes. The other thing was what Andreas said before he died. ‘Why did you bring him here?’ It was as if he saw his killer in the forest and recognized him.”
“The mining director or the hotel owner?” Erik shrugged.
“Could be,” Laura said. “But it was definitely someo
ne he recognized.”
“Why didn’t they try to shoot you?” Karl-Henrik repeated.
“Perhaps that would’ve turned it into a bigger thing? Something they couldn’t keep local?” Jens shook his head.
“I don’t know,” Laura said. “But what do we do now? How do we stop this? What if they still have people imprisoned up north?”
“We have to cut off the organization’s head,” Jens said.
Matti sat down. “Don’t you think that would be just like the Hydra? For every head we cut off, two will emerge? Besides, how would we cut off a head? I am assuming you mean figuratively.”
Jens sighed. Laura understood. She, too, wanted the perpetrators punished for what they had done. She wanted them brought to justice. She looked at her friends, their suits, their groomed appearances. None of them had any real power. Not power like this. They weren’t strong enough.
“We need photographs, or something tangible,” Matti said. “And we need a newspaper willing to publish it.”
“I know a journalist,” Laura said and thought of Emil Persson. “He works for one of the big newspapers. He’d do it.”
“Despite the risk to himself?”
She nodded: he would.
“Who is he?” Erik asked.
“You don’t know him.”
“And the proof?” Jens asked.
“For that, we must go to the Hydra’s den,” Laura said.
ERIK WAS WAITING for her on the pavement when she got out of Karl-Henrik’s flat. Tomorrow night, they’d agreed. They were going to pay a visit to the Institute.
“What’s up?” he asked.
She didn’t want to tell him. She revered her father. She had never said anything negative about him. Even thinking it, felt disloyal.
She sighed. “I told my father,” she said. “I’d hoped he would help us.”
“But no?”
She shook her head. “He said it was irresponsible to continue: that if this became known, we were putting Sweden as a nation at risk.”
His face showed what he was thinking.
“You agree,” she said.
He shrugged.
She lowered her head: what if they were right? What if this put Sweden in danger?
“But people have died. Our best friend did. She thought it was worth fighting for.”
“She wouldn’t have wanted us to put ourselves at risk,” he said.
Laura didn’t say anything.
“Especially not you. She loved you.”
There was something sheepish about him: his hands deep in his pockets, not meeting her gaze. It suddenly dawned on her.
“It was you,” she said. “You were the one she was having a relationship with.”
He looked away.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It was long over.”
“Why did it end?”
He sighed. “I had wanted it for so long. And then, one day, out of the blue, she called me. I guess, when it finally happened, reality didn’t match up to the dream. We tried, but pretty soon we both agreed that there was nothing there.” His voice sounded thick. “It just wasn’t meant to be.”
“Why?” Laura had asked Britta at one point. They were sitting on a park bench by the river. “Why wouldn’t you date Erik?”
Britta’s eyes were fixed on the other side of the water. She’d seemed absent. “No.” She’d shaken her head.
“But why?” Laura had insisted.
“There’s something in him,” Britta had said. “A kind of darkness. Something in his past.”
“We all have dark things in our past,” Laura had said. “You, me, Karl-Henrik, Matti . . . All of us are messed up. It doesn’t mean there can’t be light in the future.”
“But Erik has a ruthlessness about him,” Britta had said.
“Ruthless” was too strong a word. Erik was insensitive, rash. He could be hugely irritating. But ruthless? No.
“He’s had a lot to cope with,” Britta said.
But she changed her mind, Laura thought, and gave it a try. Britta rarely changed her mind. She must have been so lonely, so desperate, that she was willing to try what she had previously thought wouldn’t work for her.
Her eyes filled, and she pushed her fingers into her eyelids to make it stop.
50.
Jens
The doorbell rang. A woman was in the hallway. She had turned to look out the window. Black hair bouncing on her shoulders, a twinset and a woollen skirt. She heard the door open and glanced over her shoulder, hip tilted. Barbro Cassel. Then her mouth and eyes widened: “My God, Jens. What happened to you?”
“Wrong place, wrong time,” he said.
She walked close to him and touched his cheek with her finger. “This is bad. Are you alright?”
“I’ve been better,” he said. “What can I do for you?”
She bit her lip. “I wasn’t certain I should come. I called your work. They said you were off sick.”
Jens waited.
“You asked me about a Mr. . . . Enander? Said Kristina had told you something about me even though she shouldn’t have?”
“Yes.”
“I have no idea what she’s talking about and I thought it might be important that you know that.”
Jens’s heart sank. He didn’t want it to be true. “Kristina told me you spy on the Germans . . . Schnurre in particular. She told me Schnurre had gotten a package from Mr. Enander in my house and so he was being watched by the Security Services.”
Barbro shook her head. She seemed sad. “It’s not true, Jens. I’m not a spy. I don’t know Mr. Enander. And, I’m so sorry, but I know quite well who Schnurre sees and doesn’t see, and the only person he is acquainted with in your building is Kristina.”
Inside the building, someone was hammering. Bang. Bang. Bang. Jens focused on the sound . . . didn’t want to hear what else was coming.
“In fact, Kristina was the one who got me the job with Schnurre. Said she was acquainted with him through her father’s business.”
Jens bent his head. It was worse than he had thought. Kristina was working for Schnurre, he felt certain now. And Jens was the secretary to the foreign minister. What might he have told her during their courtship? How could she have done this, and why?
Whether we like it or not, they might win this war and we might have to learn to get on with them. Her voice in his head.
Kristina was ambitious. And she had hedged her bets.
He found Barbro watching him.
“Alright,” he said. “Thank you.”
She nodded and started walking to the door.
“Why are you telling me this?” he asked. “She’s your friend.”
She turned back to face him. “I’m not a spy, Jens, and I won’t be accused of being one. Could you imagine what would happen to me if Schnurre were to hear that?” She shook her head. “I’d be dead within the day.”
SVEN HAD BEEN right not to trust Kristina, Jens thought, as he walked with long strides to Kristina’s apartment. And she had tried to drive a wedge between them. Somewhere deep inside, he, too, had known what she was about. How could he have been so stupid to not trust his own intuition? He had known. It occurred to him that he ought to call the Security Services to tell them about what he’d just found out, but then he didn’t exactly trust them at the moment either.
“Jens?” Kristina’s voice sounded happy as she came out to greet him. “What a lovely surprise . . . My God, what happened to you!” Just like Barbro, she reached up to touch his cheek and he took a step backward.
“How could you?” he said, in a low voice.
“What?” Kristina looked surprised. How many times had he then witnessed her interacting with people they met? Enchanted, intelligent, concerned, she could do them all. It was all flooding back now: Kristina meeting the foreign minister, at her dinners, always hard at work. Acting. People believing in her. Envying him for her and for her social skills.
“I know,�
�� Jens said. “You work for Schnurre.”
“For Schnurre . . . the German Schnurre?” Kristina paused, then burst out laughing. It was a hearty laugh. As if what he’d said was truly amusing. Her eyes glittered.
Jens remained silent.
“Jens?” Her mouth was still in a half smile. Willing him to laugh with her, willing him to tell her it had been a joke.
“Schnurre did not come to see Mr. Enander. He came to see you.”
“No!”
Jens held up his hands. Stop. “That day, when I came home and saw Schnurre leaving my building, there were two coffee cups in the sink. Two. But only you were home.”
She shook her head, serious now. “I know you’ve been under a lot of pressure lately but this . . . This is crazy talk, Jens. Me working for the Germans? Of course not!”
“Then who visited?”
“A friend,” she said.
“Who?”
“You don’t know her.”
“You have no friends.” He was being cruel now, wanting to inflict some of the hurt that he was feeling. He had trusted her. She had fooled him. Worse: she had used him.
Kristina shook her head. “I don’t know who’s been telling you stories, and perhaps you’re right: perhaps, as it proves out, I have no friends. But to accuse me of working for Germany . . . We’re engaged to be married, Jens. You need to have faith in me. Whatever I’ve done, I’ve done for you . . .” She raised a finger to stop him before he spoke. “And no, that does not go as far as jumping into bed with the Germans. I do have boundaries, you know.”
If she was telling the truth, then Barbro Cassel had been lying. Why would she have done that? He could see no reason.
Kristina seemed so honest. He wanted to trust her. But he realized he hadn’t trusted her for a long time, perhaps never. He wasn’t certain she had boundaries—that was the long and short of it. And he did.
“I don’t know what to think,” he said, truthfully.
She exhaled, a slow, long breath. “Well.” Her voice caught. “Then I think all has been said.” She stretched out her trembling left hand in front of her, pulled off the gold ring that sat there and handed it to him.
He took it.