He sighed.
What a bloody awful day.
He knew what he had to do next. He had to go, go to her, to Lena, bringing death to her home. For her, Bengt was still alive.
Hey, Grens.
He turned. Jochum Lang was still standing there, stark naked in the middle of the room, while a technician prodded under his toenails.
Yes?
Langs mouth pursed for a kiss.
So-o sad, Grens, about your old mate. I heard about the shoot-out in the mortuary. He isnt with us any more, is he? Out cold on the floor? What a shame. You two got on so well. Just like you used to with that uniformed chick of yours. Life is tough, dont you think? Eh, Grens?
More smacking noises, little kisses in the air.
Ewert Grens stood very still, controlled his breathing, then turned on his heel and left.
It took them less than twenty-five minutes to reach Eriksberg, the suburb where Ewert had been only two days earlier. They were silent for the whole journey. Sven was sitting beside him, driving. He had phoned Anita and Jonas first to say hed be even later than he had thought, so maybe they should have the birthday cake tomorrow instead. Ludwig Errfors was sitting in the back, as Ewert had asked him to bring tranquillisers and to be there, just in case. People react so differently when death knocks on their door.
Mentally, Ewert had still not left the police surgery. Lang had stood there naked and scornful, his mocking movements and all the rest taking him one step closer to a life sentence than before. Lang didnt realise that if he continued behaving like all the other bloody thugs, that as long as he remained silent, and played the predictable interrogation game denying everything or saying nothing whatsoever, lying as long as he didnt admit that he had at least roughed up Oldéus, he would be up for a murder as well. The bastard didnt know that there was a witness who dared to speak up, threats or no threats. Ewert Grens was struck by how ironic it was that, right now, when they had finally found someone who was courageous enough to stand witness against Lang in connection with his violent crimes, he was on his way to tell Bengts wife about the death of her husband; another meaningless killing in the same building where Lang had been careless enough to be seen by the wrong person.
Anything. He would give anything not to be on his way to this person, who still didnt know.
Ewert wasnt really that close to her.
He had sat in their garden and their sitting room, talked and drunk coffee in their company once a week since they moved in, ever since Lena married his best friend. She had always been warm and friendly and he had responded in his way, as best he could, but they had never become close. It could be the age difference, or that they were simply too unlike one another. But they had both cared for Bengt, and shared love was perhaps enough.
When they pulled up outside Ewert sat in the car for a while and looked at the front of the house. Lights on in the kitchen and the hall, but the upstairs rooms were dark. She was probably downstairs then, waiting for her husband. Ewert knew that they usually had a late supper.
I cant bear this.
Lena is in there and she knows nothing.
He is alive and well as far as shes concerned.
As long as she doesnt know, hes still alive. He dies only when I tell her.
He knocked on the door. There were young children in the house and they might be asleep; with any luck they would be. When did children go to sleep? He waited on the gravel path, with Sven and Ludwig close behind him. She was slow in answering. He knocked again, a little harder, more persistently, heard her quick footsteps, saw her take a look through the kitchen window before coming to unlock the front door. He had been a messenger of death many times before, but never to someone he actually cared about.
I shouldnt have to stand here.
If you were alive, I wouldnt be standing here at your door, with your death in my hands.
He didnt have to say anything. He just stood there and held her in his arms, on the steps, with the door wide open. He had no idea for how long. Until she stopped crying.
Then they all went to the kitchen and she made some coffee while he told her everything he thought she might want to know. She didnt say a word, nothing at all, until the first cup of coffee, when she asked him to repeat everything in detail. Who the woman was, how Bengts execution had been set up, what he had looked like and what the woman had really wanted.
Ewert did as she asked, describing the events blow by blow until she couldnt take any more. He knew it was the only thing he could do, talk to her, tell her again and again, until she finally started to understand.
Lena wept for a long time, now and then looking up at him, Sven and Errfors.
Later she edged close to him, grabbed his arm and asked him how he thought she should tell the children. Ewert, what do you want me to tell the children?
Ewerts cheek was burning.
They were back in the car, going along the almost empty E4 towards the city centre. The street lamps would come on soon.
She had hit him hard.
He hadnt expected it. They were just about to leave, out in the long hall, when she rushed over to him, shouting, You cant say things like that and slapped him. He was baffled at first, but had had time to think that she had the right to hit out before she raised her arm again, screaming, You cant say things like that. He stopped. What else could he do? He couldnt do any of the usual things he did when people threatened to hit him. When her voice rose to a shriek, Sven grabbed her arm and led her firmly to the kitchen.
He looked at Sven now, sitting beside him. He was driving back to town a little too slowly in the middle lane, lost in thought.
Ewert rubbed his cheek. It felt numb; her hand had hit the bone.
He didnt blame her.
He was the bringer of death.
It was past ten oclock, but a light summers night, quite beautiful now that the incessant rain had actually stopped. Sven had dropped him off at the police headquarters. They had been just as silent on the way back, as they had on the way there. Lenas despair had lingered, more powerful than words.
Ewert Grens went into his office. His desk was laden with yellow and green Post-it notes, informing him about journalists who had tried to contact him and would call again. He binned all the messages. He would arrange more press conferences as far away from here as possible and get the PR pros to field the questions he didnt want to hear. Sitting at his desk, he spun on his chair a couple of times, stopped and listened to the silence, spun round again, stopped. He couldnt really think, tried to go through the events of the last hours in his mind. Bengts death and Grajauskass death. The unharmed hostages. Bengt, unseeing, on the floor. Lena holding his arm and wanting him to tell her every detail, one at a time. It was hopeless. He couldnt do it. They werent his thoughts, so he sat there, spinning around and around, without pursuing anything.
One and a half hours alone, spinning on his chair without a single thought.
The cleaner, a smiling young man who spoke decent Swedish, knocked and Ewert let him in. His presence broke the monotony. For a few minutes there was someone who emptied the waste-paper basket and pushed a mop around. Better than the thoughts he could not think.
Anni, help me.
Sometimes he missed having people, sometimes loneliness was just ugly.
He dialled the number he knew by heart. It was late, but he knew she would be awake. When life is one long half-sleep, maybe rest matters less.
One of the young care assistants answered. He knew who she was. She had worked extra in the evenings for a few years now, to top up her student loan, to make life a little easier.
Good evening. Ewert Grens speaking.
Hello, Mr Grens.
Id like to talk to her.
A pause. She was probably looking at the clock in reception.
Its a little late.
I know. Sorry to trouble you, but t
his is important.
He heard the young care assistant get up and walk down the corridor. A few minutes later her voice came back.
Shes awake. I told her that youre waiting to talk to her on the phone and asked someone to help her with the receiver. Connecting you now.
He heard Anni breathe, between the gurgling and mumbling she usually made on the phone. He hoped someone was around to wipe away the dribbles.
Hello, Anni. Its me.
Her shrill laughter. His body grew warm, almost relaxed.
You have to help me. I dont understand whats going on.
He spoke to her for nearly quarter of an hour. She panted and laughed now and then, mostly staying silent. He missed her the moment the call ended.
Getting up from the chair his body felt heavy, but not tired. He walked along the corridor to the far too large meeting room. The door was never locked.
He fumbled about in the dark, looking for the switch on the wall and found it higher up than he remembered. It was for not only the lamps, but also the TV and the video and the whirring overhead projector. He had never got a grip on how these bloody things worked and swore a great deal before he managed to find a channel that worked with the video.
Wearing plastic gloves, he extracted the cassette from the bag he had been given at the mortuary, which he had kept hidden in the inner pocket of his jacket.
The first images were drowning in bright bluish light. Two women were sitting on a sofa in a kitchen with sunlight pouring in through a window behind them. Obviously whoever was holding the camera wasnt sure how to balance brightness and focus properly.
The women were easy to recognise all the same.
Lydia Grajauskas and Alena Sljusareva. They were in the flat with the electronic locks, where he had seen them for the first time.
They wait in silence, while the cameraman moves the lens up and down, then turns the microphone on and off, presumably to test it. They look nervous, the way people do when they are not used to staring at the single eye that preserves whatever it looks at for posterity.
Lydia Grajauskas speaks first.
Two sentences. She turns to Alena, who translates.
This is my reason. This is my story.
Grajauskas looks at her friend and says two more sentences.
She nods with a serious expression and waits, for Alena, who turns to the camera again and translates.
When you hear this, I hope that the man I am going to talk about is dead. I hope that he has felt my shame.
They speak slowly, careful to enunciate every word in both Russian and Swedish.
Ewert Grens sat in front of the TV for twenty minutes.
What he saw and heard did not exist. Lydia was transformed once more from perpetrator to victim, from whore to abused woman.
He got up and slammed his fist on the table as he usually did, hit it several times, hard enough to hurt. He shouted and hit. Sometimes there was nothing else you could do.
I was there a few hours ago.
It was me who had to talk to Lena!
Who do you think is going to tell her about this?
She doesnt deserve this.
Do you hear me?
She must never know this.
He must have shouted out loud; he thought it was only in his mind, was certain of it. But his throat felt rough, which it wouldnt if he had been silent.
Ewert looked at the empty, flickering screen and rewound the tape.
When you hear this, I hope that the man I am going to talk about is dead. I hope that he has felt my shame.
He listened to their introduction again and then rewound it again.
He could see them on the mortuary floor. She was face down, her arm twisted underneath her body. Bengt naked, his genitals ripped by the bullet, the hole through his eye.
If only you had admitted you knew her when she asked.
Bengt. Fucking hell!
She asked you!
Maybe if youd said yes . . .
Maybe if youd told her that you knew who she was.
Then you might still be alive.
That might have been enough.
That you acknowledged her, understood.
He hesitated, but only for a few seconds. Then he pressed the red button with REC on it in white letters. He was going to wipe what he had just seen. From now on it no longer existed.
Nothing happened.
He pressed the same button again, twice, but the tape didnt move. He checked the cassette and saw that the safety tab on the back was broken. It was their story and they had done everything they could to make sure that no one stole it from them, recorded over it. Ewert looked around. He knew what he had to do.
He got up, stuffed the tape into his pocket and left the room.
It was after midnight by the time Lena Nordwall stood at the sink with the four mugs that still smelt of coffee. She rinsed them in hot water, in cold, in hot and in cold again. It took her half an hour before she felt able to let go. She dried them one by one, needed them to be absolutely dry, using a clean towel to make sure. Then she lined them up on the kitchen table. They gleamed in the lamplight.
Lena picked the mugs up, one by one, and threw them against the wall.
She was still standing by the sink when one of the children came downstairs, a little boy in his pyjamas. He pointed at the shards of china and said to his mother that mugs make an awful noise when they break.
NOW
PART TWO
THURSDAY 6 JUNE
Ewerts back ached.
The office sofa was really far too small; he had to get it changed. His sleep had been troubled. Bengts lie, Grajauskas and the other girl on the video, Annis hand that he couldnt get hold of, the tears that had drained him. His clothes were wrinkled and his breath was stale. He had tried to work when the hours dragged, but he couldnt concentrate on the investigation of the Oldéus and Lang case. Grajauskas and her friend had commandeered his thoughts. They had looked pale and spent when they talked about his best friend and the shame they hoped he would feel. He had tried to get back to sleep, twisting and turning until the light forced him to get up.
He absently touched the plastic parcel in his pocket. He had tried to wipe the tape and had failed. He had made up his mind and wasnt going to change it. It had to go.
The police house was still totally empty. He bought a dry cheese sandwich and a carton of juice from the machines in the corridor, breakfasted and then went to the locker rooms and had a long shower.
I must see her again soon.
Last time I brought death.
This time must I bring shame?
The water was hammering on his skull and shoulders. That damned mortuary was being washed down the drain and the tension began to slip. He used somebodys forgotten towel, dressed and got another coffee from the machine. Black, as usual. Slowly he woke up.
Good morning, sir.
He heard her voice from one of the rooms in passing. She was sitting on a chair in the middle of the floor and surrounded by papers, on the sofa, the desk, the top of the bookshelf, and the floor.
Hermansson. Youre in early.
She was so young. Young and ambitious. That usually wore off.
Im reading the witness statements from the hospital. Theyre really interesting. I wanted to have time to go through them properly.
Found anything I should know about?
I think so. Well, I havent got them all yet. The statements from Grajauskass guard and the boys who were watching TV in the dayroom are being printed now.
And?
For one thing, the link between Grajauskas and Sljusareva looks strong.
Perhaps it was her nice dialect, or her calm manner, whatever it was, he listened to her now, just as he had listened to her yesterday in the temporary operations centre, though it was too late. He should tell her. That she was good, that he trusted her and that didnt h
appen often.
Tell me more.
Can you give me a couple of hours? Ill have a clearer picture then.
Right. See me after lunch.
He was about to go. He ought to tell her.
Hermansson.
Yes?
She looked at him and he had to go on.
You did a good job yesterday. Your analysis . . . well, what you said. Id like to work with you again.
She smiled. He hadnt expected that.
Praise! From Ewert Grens. Thats very special.
He stood there, feeling something new. Abandoned perhaps, or exposed. He almost regretted having complimented her and switched tack; anything really, as long as it was different.
You know the store where electronic stuff is kept?
Sorry?
I need a couple of things from in there, but Ive never been. Do you know where it is?
Hermansson got up. She was laughing. Ewert didnt understand why. She looked at him and laughed, making him feel uncomfortable.
Sir? Just between us?
Yes?
Tell me, have you ever praised a woman officer before?
She was still laughing when she pointed out into the corridor.
And the store is right there, next to the coffee machine.
She settled down on the chair again and started rooting around among the papers on the floor. Ewert looked at her and then walked away. She had laughed at him. He didnt understand why.
Lisa Öhrström had kept her eyes closed for a long time.
She had heard the dark man who threatened her get up and leave; she had remained seated, not daring to move until Ann-Marie left her glass booth in the corridor and came to see how she was. The older woman had taken Lisa in her arms and talked soothingly, sat with her. At one point they had started playing the childish game of slapping one hand on top of the other.
Afterwards she had gone home. She had tried to see her patients, but was too frightened and drained. She had never felt such fear.
It had been a long night.
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