The Fire Witness

by Lars Kepler

  “Oh God!” she whispers.

  Vicky is hanging from the whitewashed beam by a bed sheet made into a noose. Her mouth is open and her face has lost color, but she’s kicking her feet. She’s still alive. She’s holding on to the noose, trying to relieve the pressure on her throat.

  Elin doesn’t stop to think. She runs to Vicky and lifts her as high as she can.

  “Try to get loose!” she exclaims, crying, as she holds her up by her thin legs.

  The girl fights with the cloth. Her body is cramping and she has to get oxygen. She’s panicking and tearing at the cloth to get the noose off.

  Elin hears Vicky draw in a lungful of air. She coughs and takes another deep breath. She starts to pant and her body goes tense.

  “I can’t get it off.” Vicky coughs.

  Elin stands on her toes and struggles to lift Vicky higher.

  “Try to climb!”

  “I can’t!”

  The noose tightens again and Vicky can’t get enough air. She’s jerking in panic-induced convulsions. Elin’s arms are shaking from the effort of holding her.

  She won’t give up.

  She tries to reach the fallen chair with her foot so she can climb on it. She can’t reach it. Vicky is covered in sweat and her body spasms. Elin tries to change her grip, but it’s too hard. Still, she lowers one of her hands just a bit so she can lift higher. Vicky uses the last of her strength to fight the noose and manages to slip it over her chin and then off her head. Coughing, she falls to the floor in a tangled heap with Elin.

  Vicky’s neck has a red bruise and she’s taking quick, shallow breaths, but she is breathing. She’s alive. Elin kisses her cheek and wipes her damp hair from her face. She whispers to Vicky to keep quiet.

  “It was Daniel.”

  “I know,” Elin says. “The police are on the way. Stay here. I’m going to lock the door, and you must keep completely quiet.”

  167

  Elin locks the door with Vicky inside. She’s shaking and her arms and legs are numb from the effort she’s just made. Her cell phone rings and she sees that she’s gotten a text message from Vicky’s cell phone.

  Sorry. I can’t tell more lies. Don’t be sad. Hugs, V

  Elin feels nauseated and her heart is hammering. Her thoughts are tumbling too quickly in her head. It takes her a moment to understand what’s going on. Daniel must have just sent her this message from Vicky’s cell phone. She heads downstairs to the large living room. The metal shutters are still closed throughout the house.

  She catches sight of someone: Daniel. He’s at the head of the basement stairs and must have just come up from the garage. She knows that she’ll have to keep him occupied until the police arrive.

  “She went through with it,” Elin says. “Vicky locked the door. I couldn’t get it open in time. I don’t understand.”

  “What are you saying?” Daniel says slowly, looking at her with shining eyes.

  “She’s dead. I’ve got to call someone about this.”

  “That’s right,” he says.

  “Daniel, I don’t get it.”

  “You don’t?”

  “No, I’m—”

  “After killing you, Vicky went to her room and hung herself.”

  “What?”

  “You shouldn’t have come back so soon,” Daniel says.

  Elin catches a glimpse of the ax Daniel is holding behind his back. She makes a run for the front door, but he’s right behind her. She twists to the right and pulls a chair over behind her. He trips over the chair so now she has a slight head start. She runs through the kitchen and into the hall. He’s right behind her. There is nowhere to hide. She runs into Jack’s old bedroom and locks the door behind her. She hits the button to open the metal shutters.

  I’m not going to get out, she thinks. It takes too long for the shutters to open.

  The motor whirs and then there’s the creaking sound as the aluminum panels start to part. Light starts to stream through the tiny holes.

  Elin screams when the first ax blow hits the door. The blade goes through the wood by the lock, is turned to the side and drawn back out.

  The shutters slowly rattle upward. She can see a few inches of window when the ax falls a second time.

  She can’t wait in Jack’s bedroom. She stumbles into the bathroom as she hears Daniel break open the door. She can hear the wood splinter and the door being pushed aside.

  She catches a glimpse of herself in the large mirror as she runs through the bathroom past the tub, the shower, the sauna, out the other door, and into Jack’s office. It’s so dark, she runs into Jack’s pedestal desk. Folders and files crash to the floor. She opens a desk drawer, dumps out pens and pencils, and gropes through them. She grabs the letter opener.

  She can tell by the silence that the shutters have finished opening in the bedroom. She hears something fall into the large bathtub. Daniel is still coming after her. Elin kicks off her shoes and sneaks out the door to the hall, closing it silently behind her.

  She thinks perhaps she could follow Daniel and get in the bedroom through the broken door and try to open the window.

  She takes a few steps and then changes her mind and runs down the hall.

  “Elin!” Daniel calls behind her.

  The door to the large guest room is locked. She turns the key, but the lock sticks. She looks back and sees Daniel striding down the hall. She pulls at the door handle but it won’t budge. A shadow crosses the door and she leaps to the side.

  The ax misses her head. The blade clangs into the concrete wall behind her and changes direction so fast that Daniel loses his grip on it. The ax slams to the floor.

  168

  The lock clicks and Elin shoves the door open with her shoulder. She stumbles into the room. Daniel is right behind her and tries to grab her. She whirls around and stabs him with the letter opener. It goes into his chest, but not very far. He catches her hair and pulls her to the side and then pushes her onto the floor. She tumbles into the TV stand and a lamp crashes to the floor.

  Daniel pushes his glasses up his nose and walks back to where the ax has fallen. Elin crawls beneath the large bed.

  Elin is hoping that Vicky is all right. She’s beginning to hope she’ll have enough time until the police arrive.

  She can see Daniel’s feet and lower legs. She wriggles to the center under the bed and curls up. She can hear him walk around the bed and then crawl on top of it. The slats beneath the mattress creak. Elin doesn’t move.

  He reaches in and grabs her foot. She screams, but now he’s on his knees next to the bed and hauling her out. She tries to grab a slat to hold on to, but she can’t. He’s holding her foot with one hand and raising the ax with the other. She kicks him in the face as hard as she can with her free foot. He loses his grip on her ankle and his glasses fall off. He tips over backward and hits the bookshelf. He holds his hand over one eye and stares at her with the other.

  She gets to her feet and rushes toward the door. From the corner of her eye, she can see him pick up his glasses. She runs past Jack’s bedroom and into the kitchen. Daniel’s footsteps are behind her.

  All kinds of thoughts are scrambled in her mind. The police should be here at any moment. Joona said they were on the way.

  Elin grabs a frying pan as she darts through the kitchen. She runs across the living room and opens the door to the garage. She throws the frying pan down the stairs to the basement and hears it clang as she rushes up the stairs to the upper floors.

  Daniel has reached the basement stairs, but he hasn’t been fooled. He’s heard her running up the stairs. She’s almost out of ideas. She races past the floor where Vicky is hiding and then deliberately slows down to lure Daniel toward her and away from the girl. She’s now in the big open room on the top floor. It is almost completely dark.

  Elin knows she must hold on until the police arrive. She has to keep Daniel following her and ignoring Vicky’s room.

  She hears his footsteps on the st
airs and knows that he is coming after her.

  She runs to the tile stove in the corner and grabs the poker from the rack of implements, then crosses to the middle of the room and smashes the ceiling lamp with one blow. The large dish of frosted glass crashes to the floor and slivers fly everywhere. Then the room is silent.

  There is only the sound of heavy steps on the stairs.

  Elin hides in the darkness next to a bookcase beside the door.

  Daniel is panting when he reaches the top. He’s not in a hurry. He knows there’s only one staircase down from the top floor of the house.

  Elin tries to stifle the sound of her breathing.

  Daniel stands in the doorway holding the ax. He stares into the room and then hits the light switch.

  There’s a click, but nothing happens. The room stays dark.

  169

  Elin hides in the darkness with a poker in both hands. She is shaking with the adrenaline coursing through her, but she feels remarkably strong.

  Daniel slowly steps into the room. Elin can’t see him, but she hears the glass crackling beneath his shoes.

  Then there’s a loud buzz and the metal shutters start to open. Light begins to seep into the room. Daniel is standing right inside the doorway and he is waiting until he can see where Elin is. Bit by bit, light pours into the room.

  There is nowhere to hide.

  He spots her. He stares at her and she backs away, aiming the poker at him.

  Daniel has the ax in his right hand. He glances at it and then approaches her.

  She hits at him, but misses. He moves away. She’s panting from the strain as she aims at him again. Her foot burns. She’s stepped on a shard of glass. She keeps staring at Daniel.

  The ax sways in his hand.

  She hits, he dodges the blow.

  His eyes are boring into hers.

  He slashes the ax down with all his strength. But he hasn’t aimed it at her. Instead, the blade hits the poker. The clang of metal against metal. The poker is knocked out of her hand and thuds to the floor.

  She can’t defend herself. She just keeps stepping backward. She realizes with a kind of astonishment that things aren’t going well for her. Fear floods her body but clears her mind. She feels uninvolved, as if she’s merely observing what is happening.

  Daniel keeps approaching.

  She looks him in the eyes and he looks back. He seems calm, as if none of this has touched his emotions.

  Finally she has her back to the large window. Behind her, it is three and a half stories to a stone patio.

  Her feet are bleeding and red footprints mark her path over the blond wood floor.

  She can’t do anything more. She thinks that she should try to negotiate, promise him anything, just get him to talk.

  Daniel is breathing heavily and watches her for a while. Then he swiftly crosses the last few feet while lifting the ax. He strikes as hard as he can. Instinctively, Elin jerks her head to the side. The ax smashes into the window. She feels the thick glass vibrate behind her back and crack. Daniel lifts the ax again but before he can land a blow, Elin leans back. She’s throwing all her weight at the broken window and she can feel it give way. Her stomach churns. Then she’s falling through the air with glass showering down all around her. Elin Frank closes her eyes and does not feel the ground when she hits it.

  Daniel steadies himself on the windowsill and looks down. Splinters of glass are still falling from the window as Elin lies on her back down below, a steady stream of blood flowing from her head onto the stones of the patio.

  Daniel begins to breathe more calmly. His shirt is stuck to his back from sweat.

  He has a spectacular view from this uppermost window. He can see Tyskhuvud close-by but Åreskutan is lost in the clouds. On the road from Åre, the bright blue lights of emergency vehicles are heading this way. The road to Tegefors, however, is completely empty.

  170

  Joona had put the puzzle together the moment Flora said her brother’s name. Daniel Grim was the boy who had been adopted by the Rånne couple in Delsbo. He was the same Daniel whom Flora saw kill a little girl at Delsbo Church thirty-five years ago.

  Now Joona understood why Elisabet had wounds on the backs of her hands, not her palms. She hadn’t been trying to defend herself, she’d been holding them over her face. Daniel wasn’t leaving any witnesses. No one could see what he had done.

  Once he’d phoned Elin and warned her of the danger she was in, Joona radioed the national communications center asking them to send a helicopter, an ambulance, and police cars to Elin’s house near Duved. He was told that the helicopters were already in use in Kiruna, so it would take at least half an hour for the police to get to the house by road.

  Joona couldn’t get there himself—it was more than 150 kilometers from Delsbo to Duved.

  He was starting the car engine when Carlos Eliasson called, wanting to know why Joona thought Daniel Grim was the murderer.

  “Thirty-five years ago he killed another girl in the same way as the girl at Birgittagården,” Joona said as he started driving down the gravel road.

  “Anja showed me the photo from the accident at Delsbo Church.” Carlos sighed.

  “It wasn’t an accident,” Joona said.

  “What makes you believe they are connected?”

  “Both victims had their hands over their faces when they were killed,” Joona said.

  “I know Miranda did, but this victim is lying on a sheet and her hands are at her sides.”

  “The body was moved before the police arrived,” Joona said.

  “How do you know?”

  “I just do.”

  “Is this your usual stubbornness or did that psychic woman tell you about it?”

  “She is an eyewitness to the Delsbo murder.”

  “That’s well past the statute of limitations,” Carlos said with a slight laugh, and then he continued in a more serious tone. “We have a prosecutor who is leading the investigation for the case against Vicky Bennet. You are still under internal investigation.”

  Now Joona is turning east onto Highway 84 toward Sundsvall. He contacts the Västernorrland police and requests a patrol car and a technician to Daniel Grim’s home. Over the radio, he can hear the Jämtland police estimate the time of arrival at ten minutes.

  171

  The first patrol car stops right outside Elin Frank’s house on the side of Tegefjäll. One of the police officers runs over to the Jeep and turns off the engine. The other one pulls out his gun on his way to the front door. A second patrol car is turning into the driveway, followed by an ambulance. The light from a second ambulance behind it is flashing on the gravel road.

  There is no noise coming from the house. The windows are shuttered.

  Everything is frighteningly quiet.

  Now both officers from the first patrol car are entering the house with their guns drawn. A third officer stays in place, while a fourth starts to walk around the house. He walks up a wide white concrete staircase.

  The house appears abandoned. It is as dark as a locked treasure chest.

  The fourth police officer walks onto the terrace and past a cluster of outdoor furniture. He sees blood, glass splinters, and two human beings.

  He stops.

  A girl with a pale face and dry, cracked lips looks up at him. Through her messy hair, her eyes look almost black. She’s on her knees beside a woman who appears lifeless. A pool of blood has surrounded them both. The girl is holding the woman’s hand in hers. She’s moving her mouth, but the police officer can’t hear what she’s saying until he comes closer.

  “She’s still warm,” Vicky is whispering. “She’s still warm.”

  The officer lowers his weapon and picks up his radio to call the paramedics.

  Vicky can’t stop weeping. She keeps a tight hold on Elin’s hand.

  The paramedics roll two stretchers to the wounded people. They determine immediately that the woman is still alive. She has a skull fracture and
possible damage to her spine. They secure her breathing, then brace her head and neck and lift her onto a backboard before lifting it carefully onto the stretcher. The girl does not once let go of the woman’s hand.

  The girl is also seriously wounded. She’s bleeding from kneeling on the glass. Her neck is swollen and badly bruised, and her neck vertebrae might be injured. She refuses to lie down on a stretcher. She won’t leave the woman’s side.

  The paramedics are in a hurry now, so they don’t argue with the girl. They let her sit beside Elin Frank and hold her hand while they drive to Östersund, where they’ll both be examined. An ambulance helicopter can take Elin on to Karolinska Hospital in Stockholm.

  172

  Joona is bumping over rusty train tracks when the coordinator for the operation at Duved answers the phone. His voice is jumpy and he’s speaking to Joona at the same time that someone else in the operation bus is talking.

  “Things are a bit jumbled right now—but we’re on the scene,” he says, coughing.

  “I have to know if—”

  “Damn it, no! Before Trångsviken and Strömsund!” the coordinator shouts.

  “Are they alive?” Joona asks.

  “Sorry, I’m trying to get some roadblocks set up.”

  “I’ll wait,” Joona says. He starts to pass a long-haul truck.

  He hears the coordinator put down the phone and talk to the operational leader, confirming the positions of the roadblocks and telling Alarm Communication Central to use patrol cars to block the roads.

  “I’m back,” he says, when he picks up his phone again.

  “Are they alive?” Joona asks again.

  “The girl is fine. She’s not in danger. The woman is in critical condition. They’re going to do emergency surgery in Östersund and then fly her by helicopter to Karolinska in Stockholm.”

  “What about Daniel Grim?”

  “There were no other people in the house. We’re putting up the roadblocks right now. Still, if he knows the side roads … We don’t have the resources to cover everything.”