The air conditioning hummed quietly, bringing a welcome coolness. Alex had gathered the team for a quick run-through before he and Fredrika met their colleague from London. He wasn’t sure whether that conversation would be of any use at this stage, but it was worth a try. He glanced at his watch, the second hand racing along. Time was passing, and they were getting nowhere fast.
‘I’m assuming we’ve had the list of calls from Benke’s mobile by now,’ he began. ‘Who’s looked at them?’
A female investigator sitting next to Fredrika raised her hand. At that moment Alex’s phone rang. Diana. For the second time that day he rejected her call.
‘As far as we can see, Benke had only one mobile, and the phone company has been very helpful,’ the investigator said. ‘He might have had other phones, of course, but in that case they were pay-as-you-go, which means we can’t follow them up. Unless we find them.’
‘Nothing turned up when the house was searched?’ Fredrika asked.
‘No, and we’ve also checked his cars and his summer cottage this morning.’
‘Okay, so we work on the theory that this was Benke’s only phone,’ Alex said impatiently.
His colleague nodded. ‘The strange thing is that there seems to have been very little traffic. People often make and receive dozens of calls a day, but in Benke’s case we’re looking at no more than a handful.’
Alex shrugged. Disregarding work calls, how much did he use his phone? He spoke to the kids maybe once a week, Diana rang him now and again, but only when he was at the station or out on a job. If he was a pensioner and at home all day, there would be very few calls. The thought made him go cold. As far as he was concerned, retiring was something in the distant future. So distant it didn’t seem real, even though in fact it wasn’t that many years away.
Fredrika interrupted his train of thought. ‘Okay, so who’s Benke been in touch with?’
‘Mainly business acquaintances. He was an active member of his company’s board, and he spoke to his son in Vienna. He also contacted Sten Aber occasionally.’
‘Isn’t that a bit odd?’ Ivan said eagerly. As always he was keen to find some interesting diversion. ‘I’d have expected him to talk to his best friend more often.’
Alex couldn’t suppress a smile. He had two best friends, and they rarely spoke. The idea of chatting on the phone to maintain relationships made his flesh crawl.
‘No,’ he said. He could see that most of his colleagues agreed with him. ‘It’s not at all odd.’
‘Who was the last person he spoke to?’ Fredrika wanted to know.
The investigator consulted her notes. ‘His son in Vienna – at eight o’clock on the evening Benke died.’
Alex’s phone rang again. Diana. He felt a stab of unease. Had something happened? He rejected the call and switched his phone to silent. He would ring her after the meeting.
‘Sorry,’ he said to the others.
‘We need to interview the son,’ Fredrika said. ‘For several reasons.’
‘Do we know where he is right now?’ Alex asked.
‘He’s still in Vienna,’ Ivan informed him. ‘I talked to him earlier today – he contacted us. His mother told him what had happened, and he’s flying to Stockholm tonight.’
‘Good – we can question him tomorrow.’ Fredrika made a note in her diary.
Under different circumstances her pallor would have worried Alex, but right now there wasn’t time for concerns of that kind. For the same reason he had pushed aside the thought of her red-rimmed eyes when she turned up late for the interview with Sten Aber.
He straightened his back. The chairs were uncomfortable, and the air con now seemed to have achieved some sort of turbo-charged level and was dispensing ice-cold air.
‘What else have we got? Anyone checked Benke’s emails?’
They hadn’t. The technicians had discovered two accounts, both password protected. Alex sighed. If people only knew how much time it took to gain permission to access their email, even when they’d been murdered.
‘There might be a short cut,’ Ivan said.
‘Not one I want to hear about,’ Alex said firmly, before adding: ‘Although of course I’d be interested in anything you find out.’
Ivan’s cheeks flushed and he looked down. At that moment Alex couldn’t believe he’d ever been so young and unspoilt, the kind of person who took short cuts, who blushed, who wanted so much.
That’s the problem, he thought. I don’t want anything any more. Because I’ve already done everything.
*
Fredrika reported back on the conversation with Sten Aber.
‘We found out far too little,’ she concluded. Then she moved on to other sources, and for the first time Mikael Lundell’s name was brought into the frame. This quickly aroused everyone’s interest.
‘Are we sure he’s in Israel?’ a colleague asked. ‘He couldn’t have been in Sweden at the time of the murder?’
The question made Alex unreasonably angry. Mikael Lundell was the last person he wanted to suspect. Thank God Fredrika stepped in before Alex could explode.
‘I’ve already checked. He and his family have been living in Israel for several years, and Mikael hasn’t visited Sweden in recent months.’
Her statement made Alex feel better; she was much better at being objective than he was. She had made it a priority to exclude Mikael as a suspect.
He swallowed. Of course they couldn’t be absolutely certain. Just because Mikael hadn’t been in Sweden, it didn’t mean he couldn’t be involved. He and Fredrika exchanged a glance of mutual understanding.
They both knew the hell that Eden and Mikael had gone through.
They both hoped with all their hearts that Mikael had nothing to do with the murder of Malcolm Benke.
But they had both seen him in the mysterious photograph taken in London. If Mikael chose to follow the same path as Sten Aber, to keep quiet about a truth that must be revealed at all costs, then they had a problem. A problem that would cast a shadow so dark and vast that it would reach all the way to Israel. That was why they had called and found out when he was available.
They ended the meeting and left the Lions’ Den, which now resembled a fridge.
‘We need to get that fixed,’ Alex said to Fredrika, gesturing towards the air conditioning. ‘Otherwise some tosser will go to the union and demand a change of venue.’
Fredrika smiled, highlighting the network of fine lines around her eyes.
‘It’s true,’ Alex went on. ‘The union—’
His mobile vibrated in his inside pocket. Diana.
‘Hi.’
‘Alex, you have to come home.’
He stopped dead. Diana wasn’t the kind of person to worry unnecessarily. On the contrary, her calmness was one of the qualities he valued most. Something had happened – her voice was tense and shrill. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Torbjorn Ross. Twice in two days, for fuck’s sake. Was it Alex’s imagination, or was Ross deliberately ensuring that they bumped into each other? It was a ridiculous idea, and yet . . .
He went back to the Lions’ Den for some peace and quiet.
‘What’s going on?’
‘You’ve had a letter,’ Diana said.
‘A letter?’
‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have read it, but I was in a hurry, I was opening the rest of the post and I accidentally—’
Alex interrupted her.
‘It’s fine, Diana. Tell me about the letter.’
She was breathing hard. ‘I don’t know . . . there was something about the way it looked, what I thought it was. And what it wasn’t.’
Fredrika came in looking concerned.
‘Diana, you’re babbling. I’m sorry, but you are. Read me the letter, please.’
His firm tone made Diana pull herself together, and she read out the words on the piece of paper.
Alex listened, his mobile pressed to his ear. The colour drained from his face. When Diana had
finished reading the few short lines, it was the last one that reverberated in his head.
And I am putting everything right.
Before Fredrika Bergman started working for the police, she’d had only the vaguest idea of what the work involved. Above all, she’d found it difficult to imagine the kind of things that might come her way. She remembered the box of hair, which had been sent by courier to a mother after her daughter had been abducted. For Fredrika, it had been a watershed moment. It was after that event that Alex had acquired the scars on his hands, and Fredrika had seen for the first time what certain people were capable of doing to their fellow human beings. It had made her doubt herself; maybe this job was meant for someone else? Slowly she had come to believe that not only was she capable of making a difference, but she could learn to find the work interesting. Two children and a temporary post with the justice department had made the decision easier. Fredrika knew where she belonged: in the police, together with Alex.
Together with Alex.
She was on shifting sands here, just as she was elsewhere in her life. Alex was bound to stop working soon. He had a maximum of five years left until retirement, however hard he tried to pretend that wasn’t the case. Many officers of his age had already chosen to leave.
Five years, Fredrika thought. Who will I be in five years?
The question burned a hole in her soul.
She didn’t even know who she would be in the autumn, when Spencer was gone.
She gripped the pen in her hand. The message that had been sent to Alex. That was what she must focus on. Was there a link to the murder of Malcolm Benke, or was it referring to something else?
‘Are you coming?’ Alex suddenly appeared in the doorway of her office. ‘The letter’s here, in the Lions’ Den.’
*
Everything was icy. The air conditioning was still playing up, and relations between those gathered in the room were frosty. Alex, Fredrika and Margareta Berlin bent over the unprepossessing sheet of paper that had been collected and driven to HQ in a patrol car, blue lights flashing. They read the short lines until they knew them by heart.
I am doing what you cannot do and have never been able to do.
I am making a difference.
And I am putting everything right.
The message had been in an envelope with Alex’s name on the front, and nothing else. No address, no stamp. The sender had personally placed it in Alex’s mailbox, or used a messenger to do so.
‘Have you received anything like this before?’ Berlin asked.
‘Oh yes. I get so many fucking letters like this that it’s hard to keep track of them all.’
Berlin sighed. ‘Enough, Alex.’
‘Of course I haven’t had anything else like this.’
Berlin pushed her glasses up into her hair.
Fredrika knew Alex hated that gesture, along with everything else about his boss. It was because she’d been head of HR, and was far too pedantic for his taste. Fredrika had to agree. The woman had no leadership qualities. The day they found out she was taking over, Alex and Fredrika had gone out and got drunk after work – the first time in ten years, as far as Fredrika was concerned. It had been much needed, and extremely liberating.
‘Time to go home,’ Alex had said when midnight had come and gone. ‘And tomorrow we’ll find that we’ve drunk Berlin into oblivion, just like we wanted.’
How wrong he’d been. Neither Berlin nor the bad dreams had gone away. The memory of how the night had ended still made her cry. She’d been so happy, so tipsy, so high on life. She had done her best not to wake the children when she got home, but had still managed to knock over Spencer’s beloved umbrella stand, scratching the parquet. She had collapsed on the floor, trying in vain to stop giggling. And suddenly there he was beside her.
‘Sorry,’ she’d said, attempting to adopt a serious expression. ‘I’ll buy you a new umbrella.’
As if she thought she’d broken them all.
She hadn’t been able to stop laughing, or to pick up the stand. And there in the hallway she had experienced her last moment of pure happiness.
‘Fredrika, there’s something we need to talk about.’
She remembered the words with absolute clarity. Something we need to talk about. The laughter disappeared and never came back. Something we need to talk about. They went and sat in the kitchen, then came the next sentence, which had branded itself on her long-term memory.
‘I have a brain tumour, and it’s inoperable.’
And then yet more searing, inescapable pain:
‘This is not the death I want.’
She had begun to cry, and the man who had been her professor before becoming her husband stroked her hair and whispered:
‘I’m sorry.’
Brain tumour. Inoperable.
Not the death I want.
Sorry.
That had been back in February. Fredrika didn’t want to think about how the intervening months had affected her, eaten away at her. She had seen Alex watching her, concerned but too preoccupied by Margareta Berlin to reach out.
Thank God.
‘Did you hear what I said, Fredrika?’ There was no mistaking Berlin’s irritation.
I wish we’d managed to drink her into oblivion, Alex.
‘Yes.’
‘So have you? Had any messages like this?’
‘Don’t you think I’d have reported it if I had?’
Alex grinned and Berlin inhaled sharply. ‘I want to know if there’s a connection to the ongoing investigation,’ she snapped.
‘So do we,’ Fredrika said calmly. She glanced through the letter again. Those words – I am putting everything right – she recognised them. She’d seen them somewhere, read them.
But where?
Where had she been over the past few days?
‘We need to send the CSIs back to Benke’s house,’ she said slowly, speaking and thinking at the same time.
‘I think one or two of them might still be there,’ Alex said. ‘What do you want them to do?’
Fredrika hesitated, wondering how far she dared push something she wasn’t sure about.
‘I think I saw a similar message at the house.’
Alex frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t know, I just feel I’ve come across parts of the letter in a different context. And I think it was at Benke’s house.’
Her brain was full of slush, refused to cooperate.
Where had she seen those words?
Berlin sniffed. ‘I’m not buying this. We don’t even know if the message has anything to do with the murder.’
But it might have, Fredrika thought.
‘I want to go back there,’ she said.
Alex looked from the letter to Fredrika.
‘In that case I’ll come with you.’
Berlin tapped her pen on the table.
‘And what about your colleague from London? Who’s standing waiting in reception? Are you taking her with you? Forget it.’
Neither Fredrika nor Alex replied. They left the Lions’ Den in silence.
‘You agree with her – you think I’m imagining things,’ Fredrika said.
Alex shrugged. ‘I don’t know what I think.’
The letter and its brief message were unpleasant to say the least.
And I am putting everything right.
Everything?
Everything?
At first Vendela thought it must be her imagination. Then she thought it must be down to the ventilation system. The apartment block was old, and it was no secret that they’d had problems for some time. Vendela had contacted the housing committee more than once; poor ventilation could cause damp, or air that was too dry. And very unpleasant smells.
The stench was coming from the kitchen. There was often a greasy haze in Vendela’s apartment when her neighbours down below were frying food, but this was something different.
‘Try leaving the window
open in the afternoons,’ the chair of the committee had suggested when she called to complain.
A ridiculous idea – how was that going to improve the situation? However, in spite of her scepticism, Vendela gave it a go. She left the window open for several hours, and when she closed it the odour was just as bad as before.
She went downstairs and rang the bell of the apartment on the far left; the occupants were a very nice family with small children. They even invited her to dinner occasionally. Elvira looked stressed when she opened the door. She was holding the latest addition, a two-month-old baby who was screaming so loudly that Vendela was quite taken aback.
‘I’m a bit busy at the moment,’ Elvira said. ‘Is it urgent, or can I pop up and see you when things have calmed down?’
She smiled, as she always did, but the smile didn’t reach her eyes. Vendela wished she hadn’t come.
‘I was just wondering if you’d noticed a strange smell over the past few days,’ she said.
Stupid question – the whole stairwell stank. Elvira shushed the baby.
‘Yes – Paul thinks there might be a dead rat somewhere.’
The same thought had occurred to Vendela. After all, Stockholm was practically heaving with the creatures. They must get into buildings and die there all the time. She shuddered and drew her cardigan around her body. It always upset her when something in the block went wrong. As a self-employed person with a home office, she was dependent on things functioning properly. Otherwise she couldn’t get on and started missing deadlines, which didn’t impress those who supplied her with work.
‘I’ll take a walk around, see if I can suss out where it’s coming from,’ she said.
She decided to start in the basement, see if she could locate the source of the problem. If it was a dead rat it ought to be down there where the laundry room and storage facilities were, or maybe on the ground floor. It seemed unlikely that it would have got into one of the apartments.
However, the further down she went, the less noticeable the smell became. By the time she reached the laundry room, it had disappeared completely. She scratched her head. Weird. She quickly turned and headed back upstairs. The smell made its presence felt on the second floor. On the third floor, where Elvira lived, it was worse. When she got to her own floor, the smell had become a stench. Slightly out of breath, she continued up to the top floor. It was unbearable up there. Vendela moved from door to door, sniffing. She glanced up at the attic and decided to check it out. It was damp and rather too warm during the summer, but the smell had noticeably diminished. It was like a little world of its own; the unpleasantness hadn’t managed to get as far as the attic.
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