The Golden Calf

by Helene Tursten

  At the last second, Irene hit the brakes to avoid plowing into the trunk of the car in front of her. A small boy had come running across the street a few cars ahead. It was a miracle that nobody crashed into each other and that the boy made it across safely. They’d all barely escaped injury. Irene felt her pulse race, and she forced herself to pay attention to traffic. It was no good to let her thoughts wander while driving. The problem was that she seldom had any other time to think things through.

  IRENE WAS THRILLED to find Marianne Bonetti alone at home. She was clearly still crying a great deal, since her eyes were red-rimmed. Irene realized that she was truly mourning her son even though she hadn’t heard from him for three years—for obvious reasons. It was just as she’d said during their last visit: their worst fears had been confirmed. At least now they could truly begin to process their grief, although the knowledge of how he died was probably not much help. So far, the parents did not know about the four missing fingers. Irene felt it was high time they were informed. Such a macabre detail would certainly leak out to the press soon. The tipster would get some cash, and the newspaper would make some money from the sensational headline. Irene had no illusions that this piece of information would stay hidden. The parents were due some advance warning, but Irene really did not want to bring it up when the mother was alone. It would have to wait until she had a chance to talk to both of them together.

  Marianne had changed her dark blue dress to one of nougat brown, but otherwise looked exactly the same.

  Irene was escorted to the living room, just as before. On the coffee table, tea for two was set out. The cups were made of thin Chinese porcelain, while the teapot and the sugar bowl were silver. The dark chocolate cake on the crystal tray had been cut in thick slices and smelled as if it had just come out of the oven.

  “I’ve forgotten the milk!” Marianne Bonetti exclaimed and clapped her hands, which caused her diamonds to glitter in all the room’s reflective surfaces.

  “Don’t worry on my account,” Irene said.

  “That’s good. I don’t drink milk myself, because I’m lactose intolerant.”

  She placed slices of cake on plates and leaned forward, breathing heavily, to pour tea into Irene’s cup. They chatted for a few minutes about this and that, and Irene let herself enjoy her cake. Irene realized that Marianne needed to feel as if this were a normal conversation around a couple cups of tea. Irene had run into this before in her work as an investigator, often with older women. The police were treated as an invited guest. Marianne, lawyer’s wife with sorrowful eyes, was a very lonely person.

  Once Irene had washed down the second slice of cake with her second cup of tea, she decided it was time to get to the matter at hand. Choosing her words carefully, she began, “As I mentioned on the phone, there are still a few things we need to talk about.”

  Marianne nodded seriously, and it was clear she understood.

  “We are trying to confirm the timeline of events and make sure we know as much as possible about the last day of Thomas’s life. I’ve read through all the witness reports written three years ago. There are some things that are still not clear and others that aren’t in any of the reports. Try to think back to the day Thomas disappeared. He was going to Styrsö. Did you meet him yourself that day?”

  “Yes. He came home around five thirty and picked up some food and a few bottles of wine. He also wanted to borrow my boots. Antonio’s were too small.”

  “Did he tell you then that he was going to Styrsö?”

  “Yes. I asked him why, and he said he needed to think about things in peace and quiet. I could understand that. Those awful people, Sanna Kaegler and Philip Bergman, were trying to put all the blame on Thomas. The truth is that he tried to warn them, over and over, that the company was going bankrupt. They didn’t want to listen. He’d already told Antonio and me about this the previous fall. He was truly worried about it.”

  Irene spoke to keep the conversation moving in the right direction. “Did he say anything else that day as far as you can recall?”

  Mrs. Bonetti began to shake her head, then stopped. “He said he was going to the state liquor store on Jaegerdorffsplatsen because he didn’t have any whiskey at home. I remember that clearly,” she said, eagerly, clearly just remembering.

  “How did Thomas act that last day?”

  Mrs. Bonetti’s eyes welled up. She removed her glasses and dried them with her handkerchief. “He … he was stressed. He was always stressed. He always had business plans in the works. He was in demand. People were always calling him on his cell phone.”

  “Did anyone call while he was packing to leave?”

  “Yes … I believe so. People were always calling, as I said. Yes! Now I remember something. A man called our home telephone asking for Thomas.”

  “While he was still packing?”

  “No, after he left. About fifteen minutes to a half an hour later.”

  “Do you remember who it was?”

  “Not really. It was so long ago … but it was someone from a bank in England. I remember that!” Marianne was clearly glad her memory was still working after such a long time.

  “Do you remember which bank?”

  “No, just that it was English.”

  “I realize it wouldn’t be easy to remember the name of a bank, especially if you had to concentrate on speaking English.”

  “I didn’t have to speak English. He spoke Swedish.”

  “I see. But then he must have had a Swedish name?”

  “No, I don’t think he introduced himself. In fact, I’m sure he didn’t. He just said he was calling on behalf of the bank and he needed to talk to Thomas. He was wondering where he could find him.”

  “What did you say to him?”

  “I said that Thomas needed a few days’ vacation and that he’d gone to the summer cabin. I gave the bank man Thomas’s cell phone number.”

  “Did you tell him where the cabin was?”

  “Of course not. Thomas had told me not to tell anyone where he was.”

  Irene felt a shiver run down the back of her neck. Her instincts told her that something was wrong here.

  “Did you ever wonder how the bank man found your telephone number here?”

  Marianne looked aghast. “I never thought of that. But Thomas must have given it to him.”

  Why would he have given an important bank person his parents’ number but not the number of his cell phone? Something is definitely not adding up.

  Irene decided not to press Marianne Bonetti further. She was a friendly person who really was doing her best to help them solve the case, which was more than Irene could say for other people involved in this investigation.

  Irene changed the subject.

  “Why weren’t you and your husband more concerned when Thomas disappeared? It took you almost two months to file a missing person report.”

  Marianne started sobbing. Irene handed her napkin since her handkerchief was soaked.

  “We thought … we thought … he was still alive,” she managed to say between sobs. She blew her nose and took a few deep breaths to calm down. Her hands shook as she replaced her glasses on her nose. She looked directly at Irene through the thick lenses, which made her eyes look huge.

  “A package … we received a package,” she said.

  She stood up with difficulty and went out into the hallway. The floor creaked under her heavy footsteps as she moved from room to room. After a while, she returned to the living room with a small brown box. She handed it to Irene.

  “Go ahead and open it,” she said.

  Irene lifted the lid. There was a sheet of crumpled paper. Irene placed the box on the coffee table, carefully lifted the paper by one corner, and shook the box so the contents would come out. It was a simple piece of paper ripped from a notebook. In blue ink, a note had been written.

  All is well. Will be in touch.

  Thomas

  The note was in capital letters right on the cent
er of the sheet. At the bottom of the box was a pair of round glasses. Irene didn’t touch them.

  “Are those Thomas’s glasses?” she asked.

  Marianne Bonetti nodded. She seemed much calmer now that she’d shown the box to Irene.

  “When did this come?”

  “A week after he left. We were starting to become nervous that we hadn’t heard from him. Then these came.… Antonio speculated that Thomas needed to … disappear for a while. In order to put things right. He needed to find proof that he wasn’t guilty.”

  As she said the last words, she glanced away. Irene realized that Marianne Bonetti had just lied to her for the first time, and intentionally. Of course Thomas’s parents feared he might be guilty and have good reason to lie low for a while. They knew it wasn’t the first time he’d been involved in financial crimes. In London, Thomas had known which way the wind was blowing for Poundfix, and he’d managed to get out in time. Perhaps they thought he’d managed to escape the ph.com fallout just as easily.

  “Did this box come in the regular mail?” asked Irene.

  “Yes. It was in a padded envelope.”

  “Do you still have the envelope?”

  “No, I’m sorry, I don’t.”

  “Do you remember where it was sent from?”

  “Yes. Göteborg.”

  Perhaps that meant the murderer was from Göteborg, but Irene couldn’t be sure yet. “Could Thomas get along without his glasses?”

  “No. He had bad eyesight.”

  “He sends you the glasses he needs to see. Didn’t you think that was strange?”

  Marianne’s gaze wavered. It was clear she was debating what to say and how to say it. After a few seconds, she pressed her lips together until they formed a narrow line. She said with finality, “Antonio said it was a sign. A secret signal. Thomas was trying to tell us he’d changed his appearance. It was not something he could say directly, but we were supposed to figure it out.”

  “Of course we would! We’re his parents!” roared a voice.

  Both Irene and Marianne jumped. Neither of them had heard Antonio Bonetti come in.

  “I—I was trying to explain why we thought—Thomas was still alive,” Marianne said in a tiny voice.

  Her husband strode angrily into the living room in his extra-high shoes. He ignored his wife completely and aimed his glare at Irene. If he’d hoped to intimidate her by his stare, it didn’t work. Irene stood up calmly and looked straight back at him. In order to keep eye contact, he had to crane his neck. “How nice that you’ve come,” Irene said. “I have something which I have to tell both of you together. We have received the final autopsy report. I’m afraid that there is a strange and rather unpleasant detail I must tell you.”

  Chapter 17

  THE FIRST OF October dawned beautiful and clear. When the sun appeared over the horizon, the temperature was just above freezing, but it was supposed to rise with the sun’s journey across the sky. If luck held, there would be a few days of Indian summer. Or is an Indian summer when it falls in October? Which one is Saint Birgitta’s summer and which one is an Indian summer? Irene decided it wasn’t important. She would just enjoy the day as it came.

  She parked her car in the lot next to the police station and got her backpack with the plastic bag holding the brown box of Thomas Bonetti’s eyeglasses and his short letter. Both parents were convinced that Thomas had written the letter, but they’d had trouble finding another sample of handwriting to compare it with. Thomas was not much of a letter writer, according to his parents; he’d mostly sent emails and called on the phone. After a thorough search, they finally found a post card, a birthday greeting to Marianne. The card showed the Statue of Liberty and was dated NY 1999-03-04. Thomas had used capital letters on this as well. Irene thought they appeared similar to the writing on the letter that had come with the glasses, but she wasn’t much of an expert. On the back, written in black ink from a ballpoint pen, were the words:

  Happy birthday, Mamma!

  Hope this card arrives in time for your birthday. Things are just fine here. Many meetings but business is going in the right direction for us. Hugs, Thomas

  Irene had found room for this postcard in the plastic bag, too. There was no room for it in the box, but there was enough for one of Antonio Bonetti’s business cards. Both parents had put their fingerprints on that to help the technicians, who could then eliminate them right away. In her own mind, Irene wondered what the lawyer would say if he knew that his fingerprints had already been lifted, a few days earlier, from another one of his business cards.

  Antonio Bonetti’s rage had deflated as soon as Irene had told them about the missing fingers. The parents were deeply shaken. They also had asked why anyone would do such a thing. Irene had had a vague hope that they might know something more about the reasons why, or suggest a theory, but they didn’t. The mystery remained.

  Irene swung by the lab and gave the plastic bag with its contents to Svante Malm. She decided to leap up the stairs two at a time as a way to get her blood moving; she was feeling energetic and happy because of the sunny day. As she leaped over the top stair, she almost crashed into Fredrik Stridh, who was striding down the hallway at top speed.

  “Whoops!” cried Irene.

  “Whoops, yourself. I’m in a hurry. Rothstaahl’s dad just called, absolutely hysterical. They had been defrosting a freezer in the basement in preparation for that girl and her boyfriend to rent the place, in spite of what had happened. They were going to move in today. Yesterday evening, as they checked the freezer, they saw that there was something left behind—a tube of vitamin C tablets—at the very bottom. Rothstaahl’s mother picked it up and thought it was empty, but it rattled, so she opened it. Guess what she found?”

  “No idea. Cocaine?”

  “Nope. A finger.”

  THE SUPERINTENDENT HAD changed the normal time of their morning prayer from eight A.M. to eleven A.M. Fredrik Stridh had returned from fetching the vitamin C tube and its macabre contents from the Rothstaahl’s summer house. The tube had been forwarded to the pathology lab. Even Professor Stridner had raised an eyebrow when it came in, he reported. That was small comfort for Andersson. He glared grimly at his team.

  “Some devil is having fun at our expense,” he growled.

  No one contradicted him.

  “We can be reasonably certain that this is Thomas Bonetti’s finger. Or one of them,” Birgitta said.

  “So where are the other three?” Jonny wanted to know.

  “It shouldn’t be impossible to guess. Perhaps Rothstaahl had all four in his possession, but that is doubtful. The other three would have turned up,” Birgitta thought out loud.

  “What if it was planted?” asked Jonny.

  “That’s a possibility. After shooting Joachim and Philip, the killer could well have gone to the basement and put the tube with the finger into the freezer,” Birgitta agreed.

  “According to Rothstaahl’s parents, the tube had been embedded in a thick layer of snow. It looked like Joachim hadn’t defrosted the freezer in years. This explains why they didn’t see the tube when they first started to remove things. They only found the tube once the snow was gone,” Fredrik said.

  “It’s not called snow when it’s in a freezer,” Jonny said.

  “I don’t care what it’s called,” Andersson said. “Keep going.”

  Even Jonny thought it best not to cross their boss in his present state of mind. Jonny folded his arms and muttered something to himself. Andersson looked at Birgitta and commanded, “Go on.”

  “If we surmise that Joachim had only one of the fingers, we could assume that three other people had the others. If the finger was a warning, we ought to suspect that Kjell B:son Ceder and Philip Bergman had also received one finger before they were killed. The question is, who got the fourth one, and who is likely to be the next victim?”

  The investigators sat quietly and digested this information. Finally, Jonny asked to speak. “It could b
e that the killer kept the other three fingers for himself. As trophies. Or to keep for the future.”

  Obviously, Jonny hadn’t let go of the serial killer theory, but there could be some truth to what he said.

  “We have to look for the remaining fingers. We should start with the houses of the other victims,” Tommy suggested.

  “If that Rothstaahl guy kept Bonetti’s finger in the freezer, maybe he was Bonetti’s killer. Or at least one of his killers,” Jonny said.

  Silence fell again as everyone thought this through. This was a new idea, and it wasn’t all that far-fetched. Irene agreed Jonny had a good point.

  “We should keep that in mind,” she said. “It could give us a clearer picture of how Thomas Bonetti was killed. But it would have been hard for one person to carry out this complicated murder. Two or more killers might’ve been needed, one to maneuver the boat and handle the flashlight while the other kept Thomas under control. Two people could have forced him to the stone heap by holding a gun on him, and then he was shot when they got there.”

  “What the—?” Andersson exclaimed. “Two killers? So we’re supposed to be looking for two killers now? And who would the other one be?”

  “Why not Philip Bergman?” suggested Irene.

  “Philip Bergman! Why would he be involved?”

  “We don’t know if Rothstaahl had an axe to grind with Bonetti—it’s possible. Yet we don’t even know if they knew each other. On the other hand, we do know that there was animosity between Bonetti and Philip Bergman when ph.com was going under.”

  “And the motive?” asked Andersson. He didn’t look as grim and was listening carefully to Irene.

  “Money. Of course it has to be money. We know that Thomas Bonetti got out of Poundfix by the skin of his teeth but with a lot of money. We also know that he was being blamed for swindling between five and twenty-five million kroner from ph.com. Joachim and Philip would certainly believe that this was their money, too. Perhaps they wanted revenge.”