by Wahlöö, Per
‘Do you remember what you answered when I asked you the same question the last time?’
The man seemed confused and anxious.
‘No …’
‘Do you remember that I asked you if you went to prostitutes?’
‘No, did you do that?’
Martin Beck sat quietly for a moment again. He rubbed his nose.
‘I want to help you,’ he said finally.
‘With what? Help me? How can you help me? Now, after this?’
‘I want to help you to remember.’
‘Yes.’
‘But you must try, too.’
‘Yes.’
‘Try to remember what happened after you went on board the Diana in Söderköping. You had your motor bike and fishing things with you and the boat was a lot behind schedule.’
‘Yes, I remember. The weather was beautiful.’
‘What did you do when you went on board?’
‘I think I ate breakfast. I hadn't eaten earlier because I remember that I planned to eat on board.’
‘Did you talk with the people at your table?’
‘No, I think I was alone. The others had already eaten.’
‘And then? After you had eaten?’
‘I suspect I went out on the deck. Yes, that's what I did. The weather was good.’
‘Did you talk to anyone?’
‘No, I stood by myself up in the bow. Then it was time for lunch.’
‘Did you eat alone then too?’
‘No, there were others at the table, but I didn't talk to anyone.’
‘Was Roseanna McGraw at your table?’
‘I don't remember. I didn't think much about who sat there.’
‘Do you remember how you met her?’
‘No, actually not.’
‘Last time you said that she asked you about something and that you began to have a conversation.’
‘Yes, that's right. Now I remember. She asked me what was the name of the place we were passing.’
‘What was it called?’
‘Norsholm, I think.’
‘And then she stayed there and talked to you?’
‘Yes. I don't remember much of what she said.’
‘Did you think badly of her immediately?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why did you talk with her then?’
‘She forced herself on me. She stayed there and talked and laughed. She was like all the others. Shameless.’
‘What did you do then?’
‘Then?’
‘Yes, didn't you go on land together?’
‘She followed me when I left the boat for a while.’
‘What did you talk about?’
‘I don't remember. Everything and anything. Nothing in particular. I remember thinking that it was good practice for my English.’
‘When you went back on board, what did you do then?’
‘I don't know. I really don't remember. Maybe we ate dinner later.’
‘Did you meet her later that evening?’
‘I remember that I stood in the bow for a while after it got dark. But I was alone then.’
‘Didn't you meet her that evening? Try to remember.’
‘I think so. I don't really know, but I think that we sat on a bench in the stern and talked. I really wanted to be left in peace but she forced herself on me.’
‘Didn't she invite you into her cabin?’
‘No.’
‘Later that evening you killed her, isn't that so?’
‘No, I didn't do anything like that.’
‘Do you really not remember that you killed her?’
‘Why are you plaguing me? Stop repeating that word all the time. I didn't do anything.’
‘I don't want to plague you.’
Was that the truth? Martin Beck didn't know. Anyway he suspected that the man was on the defensive again, that his barriers against the outer world were on the point of functioning again, and that it would be more difficult to breach them the more he tried to break them down.
‘Well, it's not so important.’
The look in the man's eyes once again lost its sharpness and became frightened and roaming.
‘You don't understand me,’ he said thickly.
‘I'm trying to. I understand that you don't like a number of people. That you find them repulsive.’
‘Don't you understand that? People can be disgusting.’
‘Yes, I understand. You think particularly badly of a certain category, especially the women who you call shameless. Is that right?’
The man didn't say anything.
‘Are you religious?’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
He shrugged his shoulders confusedly.
‘Do you read religious books or magazines?’
‘I've read the Bible.’
‘Do you believe in it?’
‘No, there's too much in it that can't be explained and is passed over.’
‘What, for example?’
‘All the dirtiness.’
‘Do you think that women like Roseanna McGraw and Miss Hansson are dirty?’
‘Yes. Don't you agree? Look at all the disgusting things that happen all around us. I read the newspapers for a few weeks at the end of the year and they were full of disgusting things every day. Why do you think that is?’
‘And you don't want to have anything to do with these dirty people?’
‘No, I don't.’
He held his breath for a second and added: ‘Absolutely not.’
‘Okay, so you don't like them. But don't women like Roseanna McGraw and Sonja Hansson have a great deal of attraction for you? Don't you want to look at them and touch them? Feel their bodies?’
‘You don't have the right to say such things to me.’
‘Don't you want to look at their legs and arms? To feel their skin?’
‘Why are you saying these things?’
‘Don't you want to feel them? Take off their clothes? See them naked?’
‘No, no, that's not so.’
‘Don't you want to feel their hands on your body? Don't you want them to touch you?’
‘Be quiet,’ screamed the man, and started to get out of his chair.
His sudden movement caused him to pant and he grimaced badly. Probably it had hurt his wounded arm.
‘Oh well, there's nothing unusual about that. Actually it is really very normal. I have the same thoughts when I see certain women.’
The man stared at him.
‘Are you saying that I am not normal?’
Martin Beck said nothing.
‘Are you stating that I would be abnormal just because I had a few shameful feelings in my body?’
No answer.
‘I have a right to my own life.’
‘Yes, but not to the lives of others. Last night I saw with my own eyes how you nearly killed another human being.’
‘You did not. I didn't do anything.’
‘I never say anything I'm not sure of. You tried to kill her. If we hadn't got there in time, you would have had a human life on your conscience now. You would have been a murderer.’
Strangely enough this made a strong impression on him. He moved his lips for a long time. Finally he said, almost inaudibly:
‘She deserved it. It was her fault, not mine.’
‘Sorry, I didn't hear you.’
Silence.
‘Will you please repeat what you said.’
The man looked sulkily at the floor.
Suddenly Martin Beck said: ‘You're lying to me.’
The man shook his head.
‘You say that you only buy magazines about sports and fishing. But you also buy magazines with pictures of naked women in them.’
‘That's not true.’
‘You forget that I never lie.’
Silence.
‘There are over one hundred such magazines stuffed in the back of your closet.’
His reaction was very strong.
‘How do you know that?’
‘We've had men searching your apartment. They found the magazines in the back of your closet. They found a lot of other things also, for example, a pair of sunglasses that actually belonged to Roseanna McGraw.’
‘You break into my home and violate my private life. What's the reason for that?’
After a few seconds he repeated his last sentence and added: ‘I don't want to have anything to do with you. You're detestable.’
‘Well, it isn't forbidden to look at pictures,’ said Martin Beck. ‘Not at all. There's nothing wrong with that. The women in these magazines look like any other women. There's no great difference. If the pictures had shown, for example, Roseanna McGraw or Sonja Hansson or Siv Lindberg …’
‘Be quiet,’ the man screamed. ‘You shouldn't say that. You have no right to mention that name.’
‘Why not? What would you do if I told you that Siv Lindberg has been photographed in magazines like that?’
‘You lying devil.’
‘Remember what I said before. What would you do?’
‘I would punish … I would kill you also because you had said it…’
‘You can't kill me. But what would you do with that woman, what is her name now, oh yes, Siv…’
‘Punish, I would, I would …’
‘Yes?’
The man opened and closed his hands time after time.
‘Yes, that's what I would do,’ he said.
‘Kill her?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
Silence.
‘You shouldn't say that,’ the man said.
A tear ran down his left check.
‘You destroyed many of the pictures,’ said Martin Beck quietly. ‘Cut them with a knife. Why did you do that?’
‘In my home … you have been inside my home. Searched and snooped…’
‘Why did you cut up the pictures?’ Martin Beck said very loudly.
‘That's none of your business,’ said the man hysterically. ‘You devil! You debauched swine!’
‘Why?’
‘To punish. And I'll punish you too.’
Two minutes of silence followed. Then Martin Beck said in a friendly tone: ‘You killed the woman on the boat. You don't remember it yourself but I shall help you remember. The cabin was small and narrow. It was poorly lit inside. The boat was going through a lake, isn't that right?’
‘It was at Boren,’ said the man.
‘And you were in her cabin and you took off her clothes.’
‘No. She did that herself. She began to undress. She wanted to infect me with her dirtiness. She was disgusting.’
‘Did you punish her?’ said Martin Beck calmly.
‘Yes. I punished her. Don't you understand? She had to be punished. She was debauched and shameless.’
‘How did you punish her? You killed her, didn't you?’
‘She deserved to die. She wanted to make me dirty too. She gloried in her shamelessness. Don't you understand,’ he screamed. ‘I had to kill her. I had to kill her dirty body.’
‘Weren't you afraid that someone would see you through the ventilator?’
‘There wasn't any ventilator. I wasn't afraid. I knew that I was doing the right thing, she was guilty. She deserved it.’
‘After you had killed her? What did you do then?’
The man sank into his chair and mumbled.
‘Don't plague me any more. Why do you have to talk about it all the time. I don't remember.’
‘Did you leave the cabin when she was dead?’
Martin Beck's voice was soft and calm.
‘No. Yes. I don't remember.’
‘She lay naked on the bunk, didn't she? And you had killed her. Did you remain in the cabin?’
‘No, I went out. I don't remember.’
‘Where on the boat was the cabin located?’
‘I don't remember.’
‘Was it far below decks?’
‘No, but it was quite far back … farthest back … the last one towards the stern on the deck.’
‘What did you do with her after she was dead?’
‘Don't ask me about that all the time,’ he said, whining like a little child. ‘It wasn't my fault. It was her fault.’
‘I know that you killed her and you have said that you did it. What did you do with her afterwards?’ asked Martin Beck in a friendly voice.
‘I threw her in the lake. I couldn't stand to look at her,’ the man screamed loudly.
Martin Beck looked at him calmly.
‘Where?’ he said. ‘Where was the boat then?’
‘I don't know. I only threw her in the lake.’
He collapsed in his chair and began to cry.
‘I couldn't stand to look at her. I couldn't stand looking at her,’ he said in a monotone with the tears running down his cheeks.
Martin Beck turned off the tape recorder, picked up the telephone and called for a police constable.
When the man who had killed Roseanna McGraw was taken away, Martin Beck lit a cigarette. He sat completely still and stared in front of him.
Things looked crooked in front of his eyes and he rubbed them with his thumb and index finger.
He reached for a pencil in the holder on the desk and wrote:
GOT HIM. CONFESSED, ALMOST EMMEDIATELY, IMIDI-AEMED…
He put the pencil back, crumpled up the paper and threw it in the wastepaper basket. He decided to telephone Kafka when he had got some sleep and was rested.
Martin Beck put on his hat and coat and left. It had begun to snow at two o'clock and by now the ground was covered with a blanket of snow several inches thick. The flakes were large and wet. They dipped down in long, listless swirls, tight and abundant, dampening all sound and making the surroundings remote and unattainable. The real winter had arrived.
Roseanna McGraw had come to Europe. At a place called Norsholm she had met a man who was travelling to Bohuslän to fish. She wouldn't have met him if the boat hadn't had an engine breakdown or if the waitress hadn't moved her to another table in the dining room. Later, he had happened to kill her. She could just as easily have been run over on King Street in Stockholm or fallen down her hotel stairs and broken her neck. A woman named Sonja Hansson might possibly never again feel completely calm or sleep soundly and dreamless with her hands between her knees as she did when she was a little girl. Even so, she had actually not had anything to do with all this. They had all sat in their offices in Motala and Stockholm and Lincoln, Nebraska, and solved this case by means that could never be made public. They would always remember it, but hardly with pride.
Round-shouldered and whistling Martin Beck walked through the pulsing, white mist to the subway station. People looking at him would probably have been surprised if they had known what he was thinking.
Here comes Martin Beck and it's snowing on his hat. He walks with a song; he walks with a sway! Hello, friends and brothers; it squeaks underfoot. It is a winter night. Hello to you all; just give a call and we'll go home to southern Stockholm! By subway. To my part of town.
He was on the way home.
About the Author
MAJ SJÖWALL (1935–) and PER WAHLÖÖ (1926–1975) were husband and wife. They were both committed Marxists and, between 1965 and 1975, they collaborated on ten mysteries featuring Martin Beck, including The Terrorists, The Fire Engine That Disappeared and The Locked Room. Four of the books have been made into films, most famously The Laughing Policeman, which starred Walter Matthau.
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From the reviews of the Martin Beck series:
‘First class’ Daily Telegraph
‘One of the most authentic, gripping and profound collections of police procedurals ever accomplished’ MICHAEL CONNELLY
‘Hauntingly effective storytelling’ New York Times
‘There's just no
question about it: the reigning King and Queen of mystery fiction are Maj Sjöwall and her husband Per Wahlöö’ The National Observer
‘Sjöwall/Wahlöö are the best writers of police procedural in the world’ Birmingham Post
Also by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö
The Man Who Went Up In Smoke
The Man on the Balcony
The Laughing Policeman
The Fire Engine That Disappeared
Murder at the Savoy
The Abominable Man
The Locked Room
Cop Killer
The Terrorists
Copyright
Harper Perennial
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
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Hammersmith
London W6 8JB
www.harperperennial.co.uk
This edition published by Harper Perennial 2006
1
First published in Great Britain by Victor Gollancz Ltd in 1968
Originally published in Stockholm, Sweden, by P. A. Norstedt & Soners Forlag
Copyright text © Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö 1965
Copyright introduction © Henning Mankell 2006
PS Section © Richard Shephard 2006
PS™ is a trademark of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö assert the moral right to be identified as the authors of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
Set in Minion by Palimpsest Book Production Limited,
Polmont, Stirlingshire
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