Annika sat down, closed her eyes, and tried to stop herself hyperventilating.
‘Who?’ she said, momentarily confused.
‘Lisbeth, the counsellor.’
The voice sounded reproachful.
Annika sighed inaudibly. ‘Oh, of course,’ she said. ‘The youth centre in Täby. What can I do for you?’
‘The youngsters are holding their protest against violence today,’ she said. ‘They’re setting off from here in three coaches at two p.m. They should get to the scene of the murder at about two thirty.’
Annika swallowed and rubbed her forehead.
‘Two thirty,’ she repeated.
‘Yes, I thought you’d want to know,’ Lisbeth said.
‘Thanks, that’s great,’ Annika said, and hung up.
She went out to the toilet and splashed her face and wrists with cold water. Gradually her panic subsided.
It’s hardly that big a deal, she thought. I really must try to keep things in proportion. So what if everyone thinks I got it wrong?
She tidied her hair, then went to the cafeteria and got a sandwich. Anyway, maybe she got it right, at least as far as press ethics were concerned.
It was worth looking into.
She took the sandwich and a bottle of Fanta Light back to Berit’s desk.
The press ombudsman on duty was a woman.
‘I’d like to register a complaint,’ Annika said.
‘I see, of course. Something concerning you yourself?’ the ombudsman said.
‘No, it’s on behalf of a girl who’s dead.’
The ombudsman was friendly and patient.
‘In that case her relatives would have to register the complaint, unless you’re acting on their behalf.’
Annika reflected for a moment.
‘This concerns a newspaper and a radio programme – would that be something you would handle?’
‘We can look at the newspaper article, but not the radio programme. That’s the remit of the Broadcasting Commission.’
Annika groaned. ‘But aren’t they mostly concerned with political impartiality and factual accuracy?’
‘Yes, they do handle matters of that sort, but they also look into questions of ethics and privacy as well. The rules are more or less the same as for the press. What form of complaint is it?’
‘Thanks very much for your help,’ Annika said quickly, and hung up.
She called the Broadcasting Commission out in Haninge.
‘Yes, that’s the sort of issue we could look into,’ said the section head who took her call.
‘Even if I’m the one making the complaint?’ Annika said.
‘No, we only deal with complaints from members of the public in matters of factual accuracy and impartiality. As far as intrusions into personal privacy are concerned, the complaint has to be made by the individuals whose privacy has been infringed.’
Annika closed her eyes and leaned her head on her hand.
‘If that were to happen, what sort of conclusion would you come to?’
The woman considered this.
‘Well, the outcome isn’t certain,’ she said eventually. ‘We’ve had a few cases where the surviving relatives have had their complaints upheld. Could you be more specific?’
Annika took a deep breath.
‘It’s about a dead woman. She’s been called a stripper in a radio programme. Those closest to her hadn’t given permission for that information to be made public.’
That wasn’t strictly true. Annika hadn’t actually spoken to Josefin’s parents. But it was true as far as Patricia was concerned, and, in the purely physical sense, they had been living together.
‘Ah, yes,’ the woman said. It sounded like she was a Studio Six listener. She paused.
‘This isn’t a black-and-white case,’ she said eventually. ‘The Commission has to receive an official complaint, which would lead to an investigation. But there’s also the matter of public interest – that would also have to be considered.’
Annika gave up. She had a feeling she wasn’t going to get much further. She thanked the woman and hung up.
Well, at least I’m not barking up the wrong tree entirely, she thought.
37
Annika put her feet up on the desk and settled back to listen to the lunchtime news on Berit’s radio. They had five main items: the Middle East, the Prime Minister’s comments on the Christer Lundgren affair, and three other stories that Annika forgot the moment she heard them. Her thoughts started to wander as they ran through the situation in the Middle East. When the Prime Minister came on she turned up the volume. The familiar voice sounded a bit rattled.
‘Do I look like a man facing a crisis?’
The reporter’s voice explained that the Prime Minister looked relaxed and in a good mood when he arrived at Rosenbad that morning. He hadn’t seemed at all concerned about the allegations concerning the Minister for Foreign Trade, Christer Lundgren, and was cautiously optimistic about the ongoing election campaign. He had, however, expressed his sympathy for what his colleague was going through.
The Prime Minister’s voice again: ‘Of course I have every sympathy for what Christer is going through right now. This sort of media witch-hunt is always a severe trial. But I can assure you that for the government, and for the party, these exaggerated allegations have absolutely no significance at all.’
That was the end of the item. A report from the Association of Local Authorities came on instead and Annika turned off the radio. If there was one thing she found utterly boring, it was reports about local councils.
‘So have you been shooting your mouth off, then?’
Only just awake, Patricia blinked at the light coming through the gap in the curtains, moved the phone to her other ear and tried to sit up on the mattress.
‘Hello,’ she said. ‘Who—’
‘Don’t pretend it wasn’t you. Tell me the truth!’ The shrill voice was on the point of breaking.
Patricia coughed and rubbed her eyes, wishing that the pollen season was over.
‘Is that Barbro?’ she said tentatively.
‘Of course it’s Barbro! Who else would it be? One of your sex club friends, perhaps?’
Josefin’s mother started yelling down the line, inarticulate and incoherent. Patricia took a deep breath and tried to gather her thoughts. Her words got tangled up, falling over each other, making no sense. Spanish took over, the way it always did when she was stressed.
‘No entiendo—’
‘Do you have any idea what you’ve done?’ Josefin’s mother shrieked. ‘You’ve tarnished her memory for ever! How could you?’
Patricia’s thoughts cleared: something was wrong.
‘What’s happened? There must be some misunderstanding …’
The voice on the phone sank to a whisper.
‘We know what you are. A foreign whore, do you hear? And as if that wasn’t bad enough, you had to drag Josefin down into your shit as well!’
Patricia stood up and screamed back into the phone: ‘That’s not true! None of it! I didn’t drag Josefin into anything!’
‘Well, one thing’s certain,’ Barbro Liljeberg Hed snarled. ‘You’re getting out of my flat, today. Pack up your squalid little life and get back to Africa or wherever the hell you come from.’
‘But—’
‘I want you out by six o’clock.’
Click. The line went dead. Patricia listened to the silence for a moment. She put the phone down gently and sank back onto the mattress. She pulled her knees up under her chin, wrapped her arms round her legs and rocked slowly back and forth, back and forth.
Where was she going to go?
The phone rang again. She jumped as if she’d been slapped. Without thinking she picked up the phone, tore it from the wall and threw it out into the hall.
‘Bloody bitch!’ she screamed, and started to cry.
Annika listened to the ringing tone for several minutes. Patricia ought to be at home now,
maybe she was asleep, but surely she’d hear the phone ringing?
What if something had happened to her?
Anxiety merged with the shame she had felt the day before: first about Patricia herself, and then at her own betrayal of her.
She took a walk round the newsroom, got a cup of coffee and watched CNN for a while. As she passed the newsdesk she remembered that she hadn’t mentioned the demonstration at the scene of the murder.
‘You’ll have to do it yourself,’ Ingvar Johansson said curtly. ‘All the other reporters are busy.’
She went over to Picture-Pelle and asked for a photographer at 2.15 p.m.
‘It’ll be Pettersson,’ Pelle said. ‘He’s on his way in.’
She smiled sweetly, groaning to herself. That clapped-out Golf again.
‘I’ll be waiting outside,’ she said, and went to get her bag.
She took the lift down, left the building and sat on one of the concrete blocks near the garage. The air was stifling, heavy and electric, crackling in her lungs when she breathed. She shut her eyes and listened to the sounds of the city. Maybe they wouldn’t be hers for much longer.
When she opened her eyes it took her a second to realize what she was looking at. The young woman who was on her way into the Evening Post building looked familiar, but it took her a few moments to place her.
‘Patricia!’ Annika cried, jogging towards her. ‘What on earth are you doing here?’
The woman looked round, startled, and caught sight of Annika. She walked out of the building again, and came close to getting caught in the automatic doors. Tore Brand was shouting something inside, and Patricia started to cry.
‘What on earth’s happened?’
Annika went up to her and put her arm round the young woman, steering her towards the car park.
‘I’ve got the push,’ Patricia said.
Annika breathed out. ‘Maybe that’s just as well,’ she said. ‘You’ll soon find another job.’
Patricia looked up at her uncomprehendingly.
‘Not from the club. From the flat.’
‘Josefin’s parents?’
Patricia nodded, drying her tears.
‘Josie’s mother’s a bitch,’ she said. ‘A racist bitch. I ought to do a bit of black magic on her.’
‘Where are you going to go?’
The young woman tossed her hair back and shrugged. ‘Dunno. Move in with some bloke, probably. There’s always a load of sugar-daddies around.’
Maybe it was the residual sense of shame and betrayal, but Annika had made up her mind before she had even formulated the thought. She hunted around at the bottom of her bag.
‘Here,’ she said, holding out the keys to her flat. ‘Thirty-two Hantverkargatan; the top floor of the building in the courtyard. Have you got any money? Go and get the keys copied, Sven’s got my spare set.’
‘What?’ Patricia said.
Annika looked seriously at her.
‘It’s quite likely that I’m going to get chucked off the paper,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what I’ll do then. Have you got your own mattress?’
Patricia nodded.
‘I’ve got a spare bedroom, the housemaid’s room just off the kitchen. Put it in there. What about the rest of the furniture in the flat?’
‘The bed belongs to Joachim, and Josie bought the table from the free ads.’
‘Are you working tonight?’
The young woman nodded again.
‘Do you work every day?’
‘Almost,’ she said quietly.
‘Okay, well that’s your business. Just don’t make a mess, or I’ll get annoyed.’
Patricia was looking at her, wide-eyed.
‘Why would you trust me? You hardly know me.’
Annika smiled wryly. ‘There’s nothing worth stealing,’ she said.
At that moment Pettersson appeared along Gjörwellsgatan. Annika could tell it was him because the car stalled at the entrance.
‘Take the number sixty-two from Rålambsvägen – it goes down Hantverkargatan.’
Patricia smiled with relief. ‘I know.’
Annika got up and started to walk towards the photographer’s car.
‘We’re going to get a storm tonight,’ Pettersson said through the window.
Patricia waved and glided away. Annika forced herself to smile at Pettersson. So he thought he was some sort of miracle weatherman now, did he?
‘Let’s not leave the car right next to the park,’ she said, settling into the passenger seat.
‘Why not?’ the photographer asked.
‘I’m not sure they’re going to be very happy to see us there,’ Annika said.
They sat in silence the whole way to the cemetery. The car only stalled a couple of times, and they parked in the Vivo garage on Fleminggatan.
Annika walked slowly up Kronobergsgatan towards the park. They were there in good time: the coaches would only just have left Täby. She sat down in a doorway overlooking the cemetery, while the photographer walked up and down on the other side of the road.
When winter comes I’ll look back fondly on these summer days, she thought. When the wind’s blowing a storm and the snow is falling, and I have to scrape the windscreen every morning, I’ll wish I was back here again. And when I drive into Katrineholm to cover yet another council meeting, and talk to angry old women about the closure of a post office in some godforsaken little village, I’ll remember all this. Here and now. Chaos and murder. Heat and blood.
She looked up at the sky. It was bluer than blue. As it faded behind the park it slipped into the colour of steel, sharp and cool.
Maybe Pettersson’s right, she thought. Maybe there will be a storm.
38
The first coach pulled into Kronobergsgatan at twenty past two. Annika stayed where she was, watching as the photographer pulled out a long lens and started taking pictures of the youngsters as they got off the coach. The other two buses appeared a couple of minutes later. Annika stood up and brushed off her skirt. She tried to swallow: her mouth was dry. Damn, she’d forgotten to bring anything to drink yet again. She slowly walked over to the crowd, looking out for Martin Larsson-Berg, Lisbeth or Charlotta. She couldn’t see any of them.
The youngsters were noisy and were acting up. Several of them were screaming and crying loudly, and some seemed quite aggressive. She stopped on Sankt Göransgatan. This didn’t feel right. Even from a distance she could see that some of them looked very tired. Their faces were grey with emotional exhaustion and lack of sleep. She crossed the street towards Pettersson.
‘You know what,’ she said, ‘I think we should give this a miss.’
The photographer lowered his camera and looked at her in surprise.
‘What the hell would we do that for?’
Annika nodded towards the coaches. ‘Look at them. They’re completely hysterical. God knows if it’s healthy to encourage this sort of psychosis like they’re doing out in Täby. These kids probably haven’t been home or had a decent meal since Wednesday.’
‘Yeah, but they did call us.’
Annika nodded. ‘Yes, they did. Because they obviously think this is important. But we have to take some of the responsibility, and consider whether it’s right, if these kids aren’t in a position to work it out for themselves.’
The photographer lost patience with her. ‘For fuck’s sake!’ he said. ‘I want a permanent contract! I’m not about to bail out of a job just because you’ve suddenly developed a conscience.’
The group of youngsters had grown into a sea of people. They spread round the cemetery like water round an island. Annika still wasn’t sure.
At that moment she saw the other paper’s car pull up and park on Sankt Göransgatan, and Arne Påhlson got out.
That decided it.
‘Okay, let’s go over, then,’ she said to Pettersson.
She walked up to the cemetery, the photographer following behind her as she headed towards the ornate railings. Her mou
th was bone-dry, and she gulped, her pulse racing. When she was just a couple of metres from the youngsters, they started screaming and shouting.
‘There they are. They’re here! Vultures, vultures!’
Annika stopped. Pettersson started taking pictures. The attention of the whole crowd was focused on the two journalists now.
‘Is Lisbeth here?’ Annika asked, but she couldn’t make herself heard.
‘Fuck off, scum!’ shouted a boy who couldn’t have been more than thirteen or fourteen.
He walked aggressively towards Annika, and she backed away instinctively. The boy’s face was swollen with crying and exhaustion, and his whole body was trembling with adrenalin and rage. Annika stared at him, lost for words.
‘We don’t want to disturb you at all,’ she said. ‘We’re not trying to intrude—’
A heavily built girl stepped up and shoved Annika on the shoulder. ‘Fucking hyenas!’ she shrieked in a spray of saliva.
Annika stumbled back, unable to comprehend what was happening. She tried to disarm the girl’s fury by being calm and sensible.
‘Please,’ she said, ‘can’t we talk to each other like—’
‘Hyena!’ the girl screamed. ‘Scum! Scum!’
The circle of young people tightened around Annika, and she suddenly felt scared. Someone jabbed her in the back, and she lurched forward into the heavily built girl.
‘What the fuck are you doing, you cunt?’ the girl screamed. ‘You having a go at me?’
Annika tried to see where Pettersson was. Where the hell had he gone?
‘Pettersson?’ she shouted. ‘Pettersson, where the fuck are you?’
She heard his voice from over towards the entrance to the car park.
‘Bengtzon,’ he shouted, panic-stricken. ‘They’re trying to rip my clothes off!’
Suddenly one voice, threatening and hysterical, could be heard above all the others, cutting through the noise.
‘Where are they? Where are they?’
The girl who had grabbed hold of Annika’s bag let go of it at once and turned towards the source of the voice. Annika saw a copy of the Evening Post heading towards her, held up above the sea of heads.
The crowd parted, and she saw several more youngsters pulling out copies of the paper.
As the path opened up she caught sight of Charlotta, Josefin’s classmate, heading towards her. Annika took another step back at the sight of her.
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