The Flood

by Kristina Ohlsson

  She carried Max into the living room and put him down on the sofa next to Hedvig. She had to go on searching, because this was ridiculous. Dan couldn’t leave the house, so where the hell had he hidden the knives?

  Hedvig made a move to get to her feet, but Malin stopped her.

  ‘No, you stay here and keep Max company.’

  Max curled up beside his sister and they both sat there, equally afraid.

  Tears sprang to Malin’s eyes and she turned away.

  The knives.

  She had to find the knives.

  Many people thought of death as a state, as the polar opposite of everything they regarded as living. Noah didn’t think that way. For him death was a function, a mechanism. Death was what made life finite, which was a very good thing. No sane person would want to live forever. The only problem was when death came calling too early, too early in relation to what people had come to expect, too early in relation to what they had managed to experience so far.

  Noah had imagined that he, like his paternal grandfather, would one day be a very old man. Old but as bright as a button. There was nothing he could do about the physical ageing process, but it was definitely possible to control one’s mental faculties, if one had the strength and determination.

  Dan and his children were an important part of Noah’s vision of the future. He had nothing against Malin, but he didn’t miss her when she wasn’t around. They hadn’t really managed to form a relationship; they had settled for mutual respect. That was often enough; it wasn’t necessary to love and be loved by everyone.

  Time was hanging heavy on his hands. He hadn’t had an answer to his email, and he hadn’t heard anything from Alex Recht, which was bitterly disappointing.

  What would become of Noah if Dan was dead?

  It was such a painful thought that his eyes filled with tears. He couldn’t bear it if Dan had been dead all these weeks, and Noah hadn’t known. Anxiety drove him back to the computer to check his email yet again. No new messages. He checked his phone; nothing from Alex either.

  I’m going crazy. I have to get out of here.

  He had no appointments booked, and the chances of a new client simply turning up were very limited. He shut down the computer and slipped his phone into his pocket. His shirt was sticking to his back; stress made him sweat.

  The bell pinged as the door opened then closed.

  Noah hurried out of the office, keys in his hand. His brain was working overtime; whoever this was would just have to go away and come back later.

  ‘Unfortunately we’re closed,’ he said. ‘But if you’d like to make an appointment and—’

  He broke off when he saw who it was. He opened his mouth and closed it. For a second he couldn’t place the man, but then his mind cleared. His heart skipped a beat.

  ‘Hi!’ He hoped he didn’t sound too cheerful, too relieved.

  The man who had just walked in had once helped Dan a great deal. Was that why he’d come to see Noah? To help Dan again?

  The man moved slowly towards Noah. He was wearing a leather jacket even though it was the middle of summer, and he kept one hand in his pocket.

  If only Noah hadn’t been so exhausted, if only he’d been able to rely on his normal ability to think clearly, then he might have perceived the danger before it was too late. But that wasn’t the case.

  ‘How can I help you?’ he said. ‘Is it about Dan?’

  The man took his hand out of his pocket.

  He was holding a revolver.

  A revolver?

  Noah blinked. He’d seen guns in films, but had never expected to be confronted with one in real life.

  ‘What do you want?’ he whispered.

  The gun was shaking slightly in the man’s hand, but his voice was steady.

  ‘I want to put everything right,’ he said. ‘And you’re going to help me. Do you understand? You’re going to help me. By keeping your mouth shut.’

  Then he forced Noah back into the office. Once again Noah thought that death was no more than a function designed to bring life to an end, and that he would be utterly devastated if his time was already up.

  They met in the Lions’ Den – partly because it was the closest available space, but mainly to annoy Margareta Berlin by ignoring the note she’d stuck on the door, stating that the room was not to be used as long as the air conditioning wasn’t working properly. The first thing Fredrika did was to switch it off, and the temperature immediately began to rise. Outside the sun was pouring down, caressing Kronoberg, doing its best to beautify the irredeemably ugly police HQ. Lovely weather didn’t necessarily make the world a lovely place. Fredrika had known that ever since she was a child.

  Torbjörn Ross had insisted on calling them to a meeting. Fredrika was trying not to show how unpleasant she found the situation.

  ‘I thought it would be a good idea to get together and compare notes,’ Ross said. He was wearing Wellingtons as usual; no doubt he was going fishing after work. Or maybe he’d spent his lunch hour fishing. You never could tell with Ross.

  ‘Most of the information is already on the computer,’ Alex pointed out, sounding more dismissive than he’d intended. And it was typical of him to say that the material was ‘on the computer’. Since Fredrika’s arrival the IT system had steadily improved, but they were still lagging behind, and in fact very little was ‘on the computer’.

  ‘I prefer to meet face to face,’ Ross said.

  That was generally how the team operated, but on this particular day Fredrika would have liked to get home a little earlier than usual. Spencer had called and promised barbecued steak for dinner.

  ‘You’re not going to barbecue on the balcony, are you?’ Fredrika had said, only too well aware of what the neighbours on the floor above would think.

  ‘I’m going to barbecue wherever the hell I like,’ Spencer had replied.

  She wanted to laugh out loud at the memory, wanted to scream because there wasn’t enough time to make lots more memories. Because there would be too little to tell the children one day.

  Do you know how much your daddy loved barbecuing on the balcony?

  ‘The mask that was buried with Lovisa Wahlberg,’ Ross began. ‘I showed her parents a picture of it. We’d originally intended to keep that detail to ourselves, but they recognised it right away. Apparently she brought it back from the West Indies.’

  ‘When she was accused of being a drug courier?’ Alex asked.

  ‘Yes. She said her boyfriend had given it to her. He stayed behind, which was why she kept it.’

  A boyfriend who gave his partner a carnival mask. Which she kept. After being dragged into a narcotics investigation.

  What did I do when I was young? Fredrika thought. She knew the answer before a ghostly voice whispered in her ear:

  You were never like others. You were with Spencer, no one else. And you studied way too much.

  ‘Why did he stay in the West Indies?’

  ‘He was convicted of drugs offences. He’s rotting in jail – if he’s still alive. Apparently there’s been no contact between him and Lovisa for years. I’m not interested in him; the question is how Lovisa’s murderer got hold of the mask. And why he killed her.’

  ‘And how her death is linked to Malcolm Benke’s,’ Alex said.

  ‘Which is the main reason why we’re all sitting here,’ Ross agreed. ‘If I’ve understood Berlin correctly, you’re working on the hypothesis that Benke was killed by someone who was close to his daughter?’

  Alex pulled a face.

  ‘It’s too early to start formulating any hypotheses,’ he said. ‘But obviously he was executed in the same way as Beata, and he was wearing her wedding ring when he was found.’

  ‘And you don’t think that’s enough for a hypothesis?’ Ross sounded weary.

  ‘No. Not when we also have Lovisa’s murder to take into account.’

  Fredrika tried to redirect the conversation.

  ‘I believe Beata and Lovisa we
re the same age?’

  ‘Beata was two years older than Lovisa,’ Ross informed her.

  ‘Did they ever attend the same school, belong to the same riding club, anything?’ Alex wondered.

  ‘Not as far as we’ve been able to establish. From a social point of view the girls were very similar – they both had wealthy parents – but geographically they didn’t grow up anywhere near each other. Of course that doesn’t necessarily mean they couldn’t have met somewhere, but so far we haven’t been able to find any connections. Lovisa’s parents didn’t recognise Beata’s name.’

  Fredrika consulted her notes. Notes that would never end up ‘on the computer’. She shouldn’t accuse the police admin system of being old-fashioned; she wasn’t particularly modern herself.

  ‘So Beata moved to London as soon as she left school, and stayed there until she died,’ she said. ‘While Lovisa went to the West Indies and got involved in drug dealing.’

  She glanced up at Ross for confirmation.

  ‘There wasn’t enough evidence to secure a conviction, but I’d say she certainly wasn’t innocent. I do know the whole experience scared her; she was terrified by the thought of ending up in jail, so she got out as soon as she could.’

  ‘Do you know this for sure, or are you just guessing?’ Alex asked.

  ‘We kept an eye on her for several years after she came home. If she’d put a foot wrong, we’d have known about it. She wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer, and she found it difficult to lie low. I can always tell, though I say it myself.’

  Though I say it myself. Jesus, what a boring, arrogant fucker.

  ‘We need to find the point where our investigations intersect,’ Ross went on, clearly unwilling to engage in any further discussion of the life Lovisa had lived.

  Fredrika thought about what Alex had told her when they were on their way to meet Bernhard Benke: that Ross had expressed an opinion on how Malcolm Benke had died, who had murdered him. An opinion that had no basis in evidence.

  Is that something we ought to ask him about? she wondered.

  At that moment they were interrupted by a discreet knock on the door, and an admin assistant came in.

  ‘Sorry to disturb you, but I have a Linda Sullivan in London on the line, wanting to speak to either Alex or Fredrika.’

  ‘I’ll take it,’ Fredrika said.

  *

  She left the meeting room, realised she’d let out a long breath when she was away from Ross. The sun had disappeared behind the clouds; with a bit of luck it would start raining before Spencer managed to light the barbecue.

  She sat down at her desk.

  ‘Fredrika Bergman.’

  ‘Linda Sullivan. I have news about Beata Benke’s husband.’

  Fredrika held her breath.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘He’s dead.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘He’s dead. He died several weeks ago. He’d been living in Manchester for a few years, which I didn’t know. I contacted colleagues up there and found out that he died in an aggravated burglary. It happened in the middle of the night – no witnesses.’

  Fredrika’s mouth went dry.

  ‘What was stolen?’

  ‘I thought you’d never ask.’ There was a hint of excitement in Linda’s voice. ‘His girlfriend identified the body, and was able to tell the police what she thought was missing – a necklace and a wallet. Guess what the necklace was like?’

  ‘I’ve no idea.’

  ‘According to the girlfriend, who’d been with him for over a year, he always wore a fine gold chain with a gold ring on it.’

  ‘A gold ring . . .’

  ‘Exactly. A gold ring with a diamond set in it. Way too small to fit on his fingers. He claimed it was his mother’s, and that he’d kept it to remember her by. But I’m assuming that’s not true.’

  ‘Definitely not.’

  When they ended the call, Fredrika hurried back to the meeting room, but there was no sign of Ross or Alex. Then she heard Alex’s voice behind her.

  ‘The meeting’s over. Ross had a call too.’

  ‘Anything important? Because I have very interesting news from London.’

  However, Alex didn’t appear to register what she’d said.

  ‘I’ve just spoken to Renata Rashid,’ he said. ‘The tattoo on Lovisa Wahlberg’s wrist – her parents practically screamed when they saw it. They insisted she would never have done something like that of her own free will.’

  Fredrika remembered Renata saying it was fairly recent.

  How recent?

  ‘Renata now thinks it was done only hours before she died,’ Alex said in answer to her unspoken question.

  ‘By the killer.’

  ‘Exactly. And do you know who else had that same tattoo? Lovisa’s ex, the one who dragged her into all that business with the drugs. Her parents recognised it right away, and insisted their daughter would never have wanted it.’

  ‘But she got it anyway,’ Fredrika said slowly. ‘Just as Malcolm Benke got his daughter’s wedding ring.’

  Alex shook his head. ‘What the hell are we missing?’

  ‘I don’t think we’re missing anything. What we should be asking is what does the murderer want us to see? What is he or she trying to say?’

  At that moment Berlin came storming in.

  ‘Alex, have you been in touch with a Noah Johansson over the past few days? A funeral director?’

  Fredrika saw Alex go pale, then his cheeks flushed red. At the same time she went weak at the knees and her heart contracted. Noah Johansson was supposed to take care of all the practical details when Spencer was gone.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’m asking the questions – answer me!’ Berlin snapped.

  ‘Please, you need to tell us – has something happened to him?’ Fredrika asked.

  Both Berlin and Alex stared at her, taken aback by her reaction.

  ‘He’s dead. He was murdered less than an hour ago,’ Berlin informed them.

  The apartment stank of excrement and the early stages of decomposition. When the initial shock had passed, all Vendela could think about was that she never wanted to be found in the same humiliating way.

  ‘Oh, Henry,’ his ex-wife whispered, dropping to her knees beside his body.

  Vera had unlocked the door and let out a stench so powerful that it made them retch. Henry was less than a metre inside; they couldn’t miss him. They both covered their mouths and noses with their hands as they entered the apartment. In fact they ran in, because hope springs eternal, and even though it was obvious that Henry was no longer alive, neither of them was prepared to accept that. Not until they were close enough to see the empty eyes, the grey pallor.

  Vendela backed away; death had made Henry unrecognisable.

  ‘I’ll call the police,’ she whispered. As if something might break if she spoke in her normal voice.

  She went out onto the landing. She could hear Vera sobbing and talking to Henry behind her. ‘I told you to look after your heart, Henry. I told you.’

  Vendela also started crying. The operator who took her call listened patiently and promised to send a patrol car and an ambulance, just to be on the safe side.

  ‘Try to make sure that no one else enters the apartment,’ she said. ‘The police will need to preserve the scene of the crime.’

  ‘The scene of the crime?’

  Vendela hadn’t considered the idea that Henry might have been the victim of a crime. He was in his own apartment, behind a locked door.

  ‘When someone dies at home, the police always have to exclude the possibility of a crime,’ the operator reassured her. Of course. It was standard practice. Vendela sat down on the stairs to wait.

  No one attempted to go into the apartment, no one came to find out why the stench had suddenly exploded. Vendela was ashamed to admit that she just wanted someone to come and take Henry away, get rid of the smell so that everything could get back to normal.


  Slowly she turned her head and looked at Henry, lying on his back with his feet towards the door. His shoes had thick soles, and a dried leaf was stuck to one of them.

  Death had taken him when he’d just arrived home. Or maybe he was on his way out.

  He must have been so surprised, Vendela thought.

  The mobile phone had been in the dead man’s hand. The first police officers on the scene had assumed that was how he’d died – with the phone in his hand and terror in his eyes. A woman passing by on the street had heard someone shouting for help – only once, but it was enough. She had kept walking, hailed a taxi and called the police from the back seat as the vehicle sped away.

  Thanks to the phone, Alex Recht’s name had come up immediately. The investigating officer had established that Alex was one of the last people Noah Johansson had contacted. Alex informed Berlin briefly – very briefly – about his dealings with the deceased. At a later stage, when he knew what was going on, he would tell her a hell of a lot more. Above all he would tell her about Ross.

  ‘Stay away,’ Berlin ordered. ‘It’s nothing to do with you.’

  Fifteen minutes later he was on his way to the scene. He left HQ without speaking to Fredrika or anyone else. She rang his mobile, but he rejected the call. He knew she was wondering what had happened, and that she wanted to tell him what she’d found out from Linda Sullivan, but that would have to wait.

  Because there’s something else I have to do right now.

  His chest hurt when he parked outside Noah’s funeral business. The brain could tidy things away, but the heart remembered.

  His mind cleared as soon as he saw the police tape and officers moving in and out. Alex had no right to be there, but no one else knew that. He walked purposefully to the door, showed his ID and went inside.

  Nothing had changed. He recognised the wallpaper, the pale oak parquet flooring, the armchairs in one corner. There was no sign of a struggle.

  ‘In here,’ said a uniformed colleague who appeared from nowhere. She pointed to a doorway on the right.