Between Summer's Longing and Winter's End: The Story of a Crime

by Leif G. W. Persson

  Now, on the other hand, she didn’t look funny. Her dear father had clearly stuck the barrel of his moose rifle in through the slats of her little bed, set the muzzle against the base of her skull, and pulled the trigger. The bullet had gone diagonally down through the body and out through her belly. On its way it had taken with it the entire package of the small intestine, which was lying like a neat, pale pink ball outside her pajamas, covering at least one and a half Mickey Mouses. It was not a bad photo, as stated, and the gook only needed to cast one brown goat eye on it in order to reconnect sufficiently for the damn doctor to be up on charges for his crazy diagnosis.

  His mouth started going like a sewing-machine needle while the tears and sweat sprayed off him. Broken Swedish, of course. For long intervals he’d been completely incomprehensible, and for awhile he of course tried to put the blame on his wife, but Bäckström nonetheless got it done, although he had to toil like a galley slave with the tape recorder when not being forced to keep his interrogation object in bed where he should be if he was ever going to get healthy. It only took an hour to put all the pieces in place. Then the nurse was allowed to come in and stick a sturdy injection into the poor bastard as a reward, and before Bäckström left he took the opportunity to give him a few parting words.

  “I’m certain that you’re going to feel much better now that you’ve spoken up,” said Bäckström kindly, patting him on the arm and smiling mournfully toward the nurse. “Tsk, tsk, tsk, it’s too bad about some people.”

  It was clearly strong stuff she’d poked into him, for when Bäckström left he was just lying there staring at the ceiling again. Just like he’d done an hour earlier.

  . . .

  But ingratitude is the world’s reward. The following day Jack Daniels came into Bäckström’s office and raged and was not the least bit grateful. The gook had evidently taken his own life during the night after Bäckström’s visit, despite the fact that he’d been given all the chances in the world to relieve his inner pressure. So it turned out to be the after-hours unit anyway, and considering how his finances looked after the most recent partying he didn’t have any choice other than to slave over both Christmas and New Year’s. What a fucking world, thought Bäckström gloomily. What fucking people there are and what fucking lives they live.

  Wiijnbladh had a lot to do, chairman of the party committee that he was, and when he was finally starting to put all the details in order, that fat loudmouth Bäckström in homicide called and nagged that he needed help with a double murder. Nice as he was he naturally joined in, despite the fact that he had more important things on the program. This was a tragic family affair. Two spouses had quarreled, the man had clearly met a new woman and wanted to separate, and in her agitated and deranged condition the wife had taken his moose rifle and gone upstairs where she first shot their little daughter and then herself. Normally it was the other way around, i.e., it was the husband who shot the wife and children, but Wiijnbladh thought that the trace evidence spoke clearly, even if Bäckström refused to listen to that version. And as he neither had the time nor the inclination he settled for finishing his own business, and then he returned to his real assignment, organizing the celebration of the boss’s sixtieth birthday.

  The boss, whose name was Holger Blenke, was something of a legend within criminal investigation. To start with he’d been a cadre commander in the cavalry—that was at the end of the Second World War—but as soon as the war was over he’d applied to the police department. Had to patrol his way up like everyone else to eventually end up in the tech squad, because he was a handy fellow who not only had a good way with horses but generally liked to fiddle around with things.

  Blenke had already been around during the old boss’s time, when the technical squad was established; it was with him that Blenke had earned his spurs. You might well say that it was the old boss who’d broken ground and after that it was Blenke who had administered the forensic fields that the old boss had plowed up, thought Wiijnbladh, hurrying to put this well-thought-out formulation down on paper. In the midst of everything else, of course, he was to make the speech in honor of the boss. Unfortunately it hadn’t gone so well for the old boss in the autumn of his years. Instead most indications were that in a drunken delusion he had beaten his oldest son to death in connection with a garden-variety apartment break-in, but because Blenke had been in charge of the crime-scene investigation, it had nonetheless finally been resolved for the best. The case had been written off as an accident, and if nothing else the efforts Blenke had made then indicated his qualifications to be the old boss’s obvious successor. But to bring up such unpleasant details in a birthday speech was of course completely out of the question, and Wiijnbladh had decided early on to stick to the more general and all-embracing features of the history of the squad when the time came. That was still the most interesting, while the other things were just the usual police-station gossip, thought Wiijnbladh.

  The work of planning his big day had unfortunately not proceeded without friction. Differing ideas and conflicting desires had demanded their tribute of compromises in matters both high and low, and at times Wiijnbladh had to mobilize all the diplomatic ability he was capable of in order for anything to get done. First they’d argued about the present for which they were going to collect money. Olsson, who never missed a chance to make himself seem important, had suggested that a travel stipend should be established in the boss’s honor, but considering the relevant amounts the whole idea was ridiculous to start with. Including a short stay, the money would hardly be enough to take you round trip to Växjö or Hudiksvall, quite apart from the question of what exactly you might be able to pick up in terms of knowledge of criminal investigation in such places.

  Instead Wiijnbladh had underscored that in a context like this it must obviously be a personal gift, and the only natural thing was to proceed from the boss’s personal interests and hobbies. That was why they had finally decided to buy a chain saw, for the boss had a little summer place out on Muskö south of the city, and his major free-time interest was felling trees on his property.

  After this they’d gone over to planning the party itself, and that was when things had gone seriously wrong within the committee. First Olsson, who was always the same, had developed an extremely peculiar idea that amounted to devoting the whole day to lectures and seminars where various problems and methods of criminal investigation were elucidated, but an otherwise united party committee had fortunately voted him down at once, even if one or two—considering the context—had perhaps not expressed themselves so well.

  “The Chimney Sweep doesn’t give a damn about such novelties” was how one of the really old foxes on the squad summed it up.

  Chimney Sweep was the boss’s nickname, even if it wasn’t what you called him when he was listening, and the reason he’d gotten this nickname was that he had always been a warm adherent of the classic old technique of searching for fingerprints with the help of brush and coal powder. Fingerprints in particular were Blenke’s great professional passion. The one time he could get really engaged and worked up was when he got onto the subject of what he called the Great Betrayal. As early as the beginning of the century, and throughout the Western world, apparently, the technique of using coal powder had been abandoned in favor of various other mysterious powders, liquids, light rays, or even gases that reacted chemically with the prints you were seeking, and which were completely incomprehensible to regular, normally constituted people.

  “Gas me here, gas me there, the only gas we policemen need is tear gas,” as Blenke himself had so pointedly concluded the discussion when the question had been on the agenda during a morning meeting at the squad.

  And as always, of course, it was that loser Olsson—Doctor Olsson, as his colleagues called him, even though he’d probably only gone to elementary school like all the others—who recommended that perhaps one ought to take a closer look at these new methods. Who was going to do that, since all the books were
in foreign languages? Olsson seemed to have good contacts, in any case, as was shown most recently, when the ombudsman’s office had courted him despite his miserable efforts in connection with the murders of those three Turkish narcotics dealers.

  But clearly it had been that careerist Johansson, who was head of the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation, who had chosen to write an amazingly lax statement that the ombudsman’s office had obviously accepted.

  The whole thing was inexplicable, thought Wiijnbladh. What interest could a bigwig like Johansson, known for stepping over colleagues’ bodies if needed, have in supporting a lightweight like Olsson? Probably it was just an expression of the general arrogance and laziness that characterized people like Johansson, the Butcher from Ådalen, as certain members of the uniformed police called him. Personally Wiijnbladh had only met one leader within the corps who possessed the moral stature, the knowledge, and the capacity for practical action that one ought to have the right to demand of every person at that level. Police Superintendent Claes Waltin with SePo, thought Wiijnbladh with warmth. A man who had also personally sought him out to ask for advice on various technical questions of interest to the closed operation.

  If he’d only had the opportunity he would have sent him a personal invitation to Blenke’s dinner, but for cost reasons the number of invitations to persons outside the squad had been kept to an absolute minimum. And considering the locale and the remaining arrangements that the party committee’s majority had voted through against his express wishes, it was surely just as well. Waltin on a Finland boat, thought Wiijnbladh with a shudder.

  For all too many of his colleagues it was unfortunately the case that the boundary between a normal party and a conference was fluid. A work conference was a party that your employer was paying for, and the most popular locale for the Stockholm Police Department’s conferences was the boat to Finland, which regrettably—in the midst of the drunkenness, spending, and common immorality that were its essence—provided conference rooms. As a sort of alibi, thought Wiijnbladh, and the sorrow that was always with him could sometimes turn into pure impotence and despair.

  Obviously his colleagues had also gone behind his back and made contact with the travel agent in advance. Because the technical squad had already been one of the shipping company’s steady customers for many years, there hadn’t been any problems in negotiating various benefits when it was finally time to celebrate the squad’s boss. Wives, fiancées, live-ins, and regular girlfriends would thus be allowed to come along for free, Blenke himself would have the shipowner’s cabin, the price of both liquid and dry goods had been heavily discounted, and the matter was already decided. A trip with the wife on a Finland boat, thought Wiijnbladh, and the hopelessness he suddenly felt was without limit.

  They sailed the week before Christmas. The entire squad, including partners both formal and informal, as well as the birthday boy himself, bringing along his wife and a half dozen close friends; in total a good sixty people, and to start with everything had gone according to the program. First a reception with champagne, which the shipping company had paid for, a few short speeches along with the presentation of gifts. Blenke was very happy with his chain saw, and so far all was well and good.

  But then everything reverted to the norm again. First there were free activities until the evening’s celebration dinner, and all too many of the participants, exactly as he’d feared, used that time in the usual unfortunate way and for the usual unfortunate reasons. And when it finally came time for Wiijnbladh’s celebration speech—minutely prepared for several months—the atmosphere was at such high volume that only those sitting closest to him were able to make out what he was saying. After dinner his wife disappeared, as usual and for the usual reasons, as usual unclear where and with whom. And when she returned to their little cabin late that night he—as usual—pretended to be asleep.

  I’m going to murder her, thought Wiijnbladh while she, giggling and intoxicated, reeking of alcohol, sweat, and sex, undressed, lay down in her bunk, fell asleep immediately, and started snoring loudly. But then he must have fallen asleep himself, for when he woke up their boat was already at the dock. This he understood from the sounds and voices and the water that had stopped moving against the wall of the cabin where they were lying.

  I must see how the weather is, he thought, and as silently as he could he pulled his clothes on and sneaked out on deck. It was overcast and gray and very cold, despite the fact that there was snow in the air. He didn’t feel sorrow any more, just hopelessness and despair. Impotence naturally, because he was the type who couldn’t even manage to kill his own wife. He couldn’t even kill her.

  The closer it got to Christmas, the tighter the clouds had massed over Berg’s head. At the final weekly meeting of the year—they usually took a break over Christmas and New Year’s, since everyone was off anyway and nothing in particular was usually going on—he was once again compelled to take up the question of the prime minister’s personal security and his awareness of the issue. Nonexistent awareness of security, thought Berg, but naturally he didn’t say that, and fortunately he’d forgotten how many times he’d kept it to himself.

  The old threats against the prime minister remained. The only thing that had happened was that new threats had emerged. The Harvard affair, with attention from the media, seemed to have released a pure spirit of readiness among the country’s ideologues, and a day did not pass without new reports coming in of fresh lunatic recruits to the ranks.

  “I’m not going to make things worse than they are,” said Berg with unexpected frankness, “and I’m not trying to maintain that these characters can be compared with the Jackal or other professional terrorists and hired killers”—Berg paused before he continued—“but at the same time let us not forget that the most common attacks against highly placed politicians and other similar persons are actually carried out by the so-called solitary madman. A simple man who works with simple means and unfortunately can attain gruesome results.”

  “I have understood that my esteemed boss has declined all security over the holidays,” said the special adviser behind half-closed eyelids and with the usual irritating smile.

  “Yes,” said Berg curtly. “He wants to be in peace and celebrate Christmas and New Year’s with his family and a few close friends.”

  “The blessed Christmas season,” nodded the special adviser under cover of his half-closed eyelids and his wry grin.

  “What worries me most,” continued Berg, who didn’t intend to let himself be sidetracked, “is that he clearly intends to spend almost a week at Harpsund.”

  “I know, I know, for grace has even befallen me in the form of a small invitation,” sighed the special adviser.

  “Harpsund is a security nightmare,” said Berg, nodding with emphasis at everyone at the table.

  “You’re thinking of that cook they have,” said the special adviser. “Yes, she’s really a nightmare. If I actually accept, I’m thinking seriously about bringing my own food.”

  “I’m not thinking of the cook,” said Berg, who was not inclined to witticisms. “I’m thinking about one or several assailants, and considering the way things are down there, none of them needs to be particularly well qualified.”

  “I actually brought that matter up with my dear boss,” said the special adviser. “That head of personal security you have can be extremely tedious and finally I gave up. So I talked with him, but he simply wants to be left in peace. It’s been a little much lately, if I may say so, and if I should be so indiscreet now as to quote him he doesn’t think that the crime rate in municipal Flen during the approaching holidays constitutes a major problem in his existence, not right now anyway. He just wants to have a few days off, wife and children, peace and quiet, presents and tree, pleasure and enjoyment, no bodyguards, no police whatsoever, not even a little guard in a red Santa suit lurking down by the gate.” The special adviser chuckled with delight.

  “I too am hoping for a peacef
ul holiday,” said Berg seriously.

  “Yes, we all are, I guess,” said the minister of justice, sounding unusually engaged. “Personally I’m going to celebrate Christmas with my old mother, and considering that she’s almost a hundred I’ll really have to decline …”

  “Can you arrange it so that he avoids having them in the house?” interrupted the special adviser.

  “Yes,” said Berg. “I can do that. I can arrange it so that he doesn’t even need to see them.” Even if that requires more than twice as many resources, he thought.

  “Then that’s what we’ll do,” decided the special adviser. “I’ll warn the boss so he doesn’t take out his moose rifle and shoot them by mistake if they’re sneaking around in the park.”

  “That would certainly be practical,” Berg agreed.

  “Although I can’t guarantee that he won’t try to invite them in for mulled wine and ginger snaps,” said the special adviser. “My dear boss easily turns sentimental this time of year, and we shouldn’t underestimate his ability to adapt himself to … what is it you policemen say? … his ability to like the situation.”

  “Ginger snaps and mulled wine, that would certainly be fine,” said Berg, smiling.

  “Not a lot, of course,” said the special adviser, raising his hand in a slightly dismissive gesture.

  After the meeting they had lunch at Rosenbad, which had been a tradition for many years. During the bourgeois administration it had often been really nice, with ample refreshments and conversation that had been both frank and agreeable. And you didn’t need to sit and wonder the whole time what they really meant when they said something, thought Berg. Although this wasn’t a bad lunch either. Everyone except Berg, who was going back to work afterward, had schnapps with the little Christmas plate that had been served as an appetizer. The minister had two, the special adviser probably three by filling up his glass on the sly when he didn’t think anyone was looking, while the chief legal officer was content with a half to indicate solidarity.