She was surely irritated about all the running around, he could understand that, even if rescue and safety had to go first. The ambulance personnel, the nurse, and the doctor had been in the hall, besides two colleagues from the uniformed police to secure the rest of the house. That was seven people, including Karlén herself.
“What do you think about the weapon?” said Gustav.
“Some kind of tool. An ordinary carpenter’s hammer is a qualified guess.”
Eva had taken out a camera and started photographing the bodies, but also the room. She covered floors and walls bit by bit so that in principle she could re-create the hall by means of the pictures.
“Both of them got ten or twenty blows. It’s hard to count with all the blood.”
Fredrik and Gustav looked at each other, silent. Fredrik knew exactly what thoughts were going through Gustav’s head. Ten or twenty blows. A little boy, five years old. Who does something like that?
Fredrik turned toward the hall and the bodies again. Bodies. Dead. Victims. It was a little easier to think about them like that. But this time they were more. Once before he had stood in front of a murder victim that he knew. But in all other cases they had started as just bodies. Blank pieces of paper that would get a name and personality in pace with the progress of the investigation.
It was harder to defend yourself when they already had all that. When he had talked with them, heard their worried questions, seen them smile and laugh.
Axel Andersson Kjellander was lying in the kitchen with his head in front of the stove and his legs pointed toward the hall. Everything around him was bloody. He was bloody. His head, arms, likewise the light green T-shirt and black soccer shorts that ended mid-thigh. His eyes were open, but his gaze was hidden under all the blood.
Where did the fury come from, the glowing hatred that burst all barriers? Could it even be explained in words like hate and fury, which after all belonged to a description of a normal, if extremely pressured psyche? Fredrik tried to picture it, or rather imagine himself in it. One blow he could understand, perhaps even two, at a grown person, but the rest?
The room reeked heavily of blood. A few flies were buzzing in there, settling down on the bodies and walking around in jerky hops.
“I have a pretty clear picture of what happened,” said Eva while she was working her way in toward the room with the camera. “The doorbell rings. The woman goes and opens it.”
Malin, thought Fredrik. Malin Andersson goes and opens the door.
“Considering the background it must have been someone she recognized, or in any case did not perceive as dangerous.”
Don’t you perceive almost everyone as not dangerous? thought Fredrik. Not dangerous in the sense that you don’t expect them to pull out a hammer and strike you twenty times on the head with it.
“The person who rang the doorbell must have taken out the tool more or less immediately, we can call it the hammer for the time being, and gone on the attack,” Eva continued. “The woman tried to defend herself, but the bones in her wrists and one forearm were crushed and then she basically had no chance. I can’t decide in what order the injuries occurred, but presumably the first blow against the head already made her too groggy to flee. If you look at the blood splashes around the head you can see that several of the blows, perhaps even the majority of them, must have hit when she was already lying down.”
Fredrik could only note that Eva’s description seemed to tally. Blood had splashed across the floor in several directions from Malin’s head, even up on the wall.
“The boy either followed the woman when she went to open the door, or else was lured out into the hall by the commotion.” Eva picked up the thread again. “When the perpetrator felt done with the woman, or however you want to put it, she went after the boy. He received roughly as many blows as his mother, but has no defensive injuries.”
Eva lowered the camera and walked slowly back to the front door. She was moving in a narrow area in the middle of the room that she had marked.
“Everything must have happened extremely fast,” she said. “I can imagine that the perpetrator was not inside the house more than thirty seconds, a minute max.”
“So you think that she, or he, was only in the hall?” asked Gustav.
“It’s too soon to say for sure,” said Eva. “But reasonably there ought to have been blood tracks on the floor if the perpetrator had gone in, considering how it looks here in the hall.”
Certainly the floor surface was covered with spattered blood or blood from bleeding. There were several bloody shoe impressions on the clean surfaces, hopefully some of them would turn out to belong to the perpetrator when impressions from the ambulance personnel and others who had been in the hall had been sifted out.
When Fredrik let his gaze glide across the hall floor, he suddenly sensed something between the fingers in Malin’s clenched hand.
“She has something in her hand,” he said.
Eva crouched down next to Malin Andersson’s dead body and carefully loosened the four fingers.
“Hair,” she said.
In the palm of the dead woman’s hand was a large wad of blond hair.
46.
The steel plate rumbled under the wheels of the police van as it rolled on board. Henrik looked out over the sound for a moment. The glow from the ferry landing’s streetlights were reflected in the surface of the water, and to the north and south the beacons of the ship channel were blinking.
Boarding the ferry knowing that Malin and Axel were still in the bloody hall in Kalbjerga, that was … a boundary, he thought sluggishly. He passed a line that made it definitive. The nightmare finally became reality.
Thoughts were moving slowly and the panic he ought to feel wandered back and forth impatiently, locked into a dark little room in an unknown place inside him. It must be the pill he got from the doctor. A light sedative, she said as she handed over the little white capsule, still enclosed in its packaging. Henrik had pressed it out in his hand and they both realized at the same time that there was no water to wash it down with. After briefly asking around, one of the emergency medical technicians had come with a mug of water. Henrik put the tablet on his tongue and swallowed it. Maria has also been offered a pill but declined.
They were sitting in the backseat of the police van with Ellen between them, Henrik with his arm around Ellen. Maria stared out the windshield, Ellen looked down at her lap. None of them said anything. They had not said a word since one of the police officers closed the door on them and the van started moving.
He wondered what Ellen was thinking, what she understood. She had been full of questions that got inadequate answers and had finally fallen silent. That something dramatic had happened must be obvious, but what did she think? What fantasies were flying around in her head?
The questions had to get better answers, but how would that happen? How could he tell Ellen what he barely allowed himself to think?
The bodies in the hall. Axel’s little boy’s body. Like a doll. Like a discarded, bloody doll. Henrik had been alone with them so long. So alone with the dead. He closed his eyes and squeezed the padding of the backseat with his right hand. Ellen let out a plaintive sound and he realized that he had squeezed her shoulder just as hard with his left hand. He stroked her shoulder and mumbled an apology.
Henrik had fought against death. First alone, then pinning his hopes on the nurse from Fårö who had come equipped solely with her goodwill. Then, when she had given up, his hope had been awakened again by the sound of the helicopter. Now it was for real, he had thought. Now the ones who could fix everything had arrived. Emergency response, acute care, transport to the country’s best specialists. Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh through the air. There came the rescue. Finally it would be right. An end to his own fumbling over bloody bodies. An end to local nurses and powerless ambulance personnel. Here came the real pros, the rescue from the air with adrenaline syringes and drip and …
Then hope died. Eve
n before the helicopter hit the ground. It was just a reflex, a feeling without any anchoring whatsoever in reality.
He did not remember how he got out of the house, but suddenly he found himself out in the garden with Ellen and Maria. There were several others there. Police officers. An ambulance. Two policemen took him heavy-handedly aside, demanded that he show identification, asked questions. He was a confused man in bloodstained clothes at a crime scene. For a few dizzying seconds he was a suspected murderer.
His calling for Ellen echoed in his memory. She was all he had left now. Was that really so?
The police van drove slowly ahead and stopped in front of the gate at what was the forward end of the ferry at the moment. Immediately behind them followed the ambulance with the paramedics who had not been able to do anything. They had to get back to Visby of course, couldn’t stand and wait in Kalbjerga for nothing. Had to be available for others. For those who could still be saved.
Their bodies rocked sideways in a common movement as the ferry put out from Broa and started its journey across the dark sound.
47.
Sara Oskarsson had been waiting in the Harbor Hotel reception area for almost twenty minutes. She was starting to get tired of staring at the ceiling fixture above her and the blue linoleum floor between her feet and wondered whether it really was the best way to use her time. Then finally Henrik Kjellander came through the door accompanied by his daughter, his sister-in-law, and the officer who was assigned to protect them.
Sara stood up, nodded to the officer, and then extended her hand to Henrik Kjellander.
“Hi.”
“Hi,” said Henrik in a subdued voice.
He was holding Ellen by the hand.
Sara reached out her hand to Maria Andersson.
“My name is Sara Oskarsson and I’m a detective inspector with the police in Visby.”
Maria took her hand and gave it a brief squeeze.
“Maria Andersson.”
“I’m truly sorry,” Sara continued. “I understand that this must be difficult, but I have to ask a few questions. If that’s okay?”
“Yes,” said Maria, sneaking a glance at Ellen. “Yes, that will be fine.”
“Do you want to go to the room for now?” the officer asked Henrik.
Henrik looked questioningly at Maria. She raised her eyes. She looked tired, the whites of her eyes were more gray than white.
“You two go ahead.”
“You can bring her to the room later,” the officer said to Sara.
“Of course.”
The receptionist took out two key cards and handed them to Sara’s colleague. He took them and went with Henrik and Ellen. He had not said what room they were going to.
“Shall we sit down over there?” Sara suggested.
She pointed to four tubular armchairs covered in blue cotton fabric that were in an out-of-the-way corner of reception.
Maria went there without saying anything, flopping down on the closest chair. Sara sat down across from her.
“I want you to tell me what happened from the time you left your sister’s house earlier this evening until you came back.”
Maria looked down briefly, sucked on her lips, and looked up again.
“I asked Ellen if she wanted to go down and have an evening dip after dinner, and she wanted to. I asked…”
Maria fell silent, sat a little while with her mouth wide open, but then started up again.
“I asked Malin if it was too late, but she thought it was okay, for Ellen anyway. She and Axel would stay home. Well … we left, that is, we rode our bikes.”
“What time was it then?”
Maria wrinkled her nose a couple of times, as if she could smell her way to the time.
“Six thirty I would think. About that. It was a little late as I said, but Ellen really wanted to.”
Sara nodded and made a note.
“About six thirty.”
“Yes.”
“And then? You took off on your bikes?”
“Yes, we biked down to the shore. We stayed a little longer than we intended. The water was so warm.”
“So how were you dressed? That is, when you took off on your bikes?” asked Sara.
“Bathrobes. Both of us had bathrobes and swimsuits underneath.”
“Did you see anyone on the road, or did you see anyone at the shore?”
“No,” said Maria, hooking two fingers in the neckline of her avocado-green T-shirt.
“You didn’t notice anything else?”
“No.”
“No car that was parked anywhere?”
“No,” said Maria as she inhaled.
She crossed her arms.
“What was it like later, when you came back?”
Maria coughed.
“Well, Henrik came rushing out, screaming that we had to wait. I didn’t understand a thing, he—”
She interrupted herself and lowered her voice.
“He was completely covered in blood and…”
The gray eyes suddenly became even darker. Sara could see how something seemed to close off inside her and Maria sighed deeply.
“Is that enough? I don’t think I can take any more.”
“Just one more question: Do you know what time it was when you came back?”
Maria sighed again.
“I would guess right after eight. Ten past maybe.”
“Did you take your cell phone with you to the shore?” asked Sara, well aware that this was yet another question and that she was pressuring Maria.
“No,” said Maria. She stood up. “Now…”
“Of course, forgive me,” said Sara. “That will do. We’ll have to continue later.”
Sara showed her police badge to the receptionist, a young, dark-haired woman in a burgundy-red jacket, and asked for the room number.
“Room number fourteen. It’s at the far end to the left.”
She pointed in the direction that the officer had just gone with Henrik and Ellen.
When they came to the corridor, the policeman was already sitting outside the hotel room door. He raised a hand to show that he saw them. Sara didn’t actually need to accompany her any farther, but went to the room with Maria anyway. Before they parted she turned to Sara.
“If Ellen and I hadn’t gone swimming, what would have happened then, do you think? Would Malin and Axel still be alive, or would we be dead, too?”
48.
It was late before Fredrik could drive back to Visby and from there farther south. It was only a few hours before dawn when he entered the house. Everyone was asleep. No one heard him.
He locked the door and turned in toward the hall, remained standing, and looked at the jackets on the hooks to the right, shoes in a row below. No blood here, no dead bodies, just an ordinary hall.
He took a few steps forward and looked into the kitchen. No dead boy in front of the stove. Only their ordinary kitchen with a carelessly cleaned counter and kitchen table cluttered with magazines, papers, and boring mail that no one bothered to open.
Henrik Kjellander’s kitchen had also been an ordinary kitchen until a few hours ago.
Fredrik went slowly up the stairs. The evening’s events were hard to shake off. What he had seen in Kalbjerga combined two cases that he had a hard time coming to terms with. Violence against children and unprovoked violence that affected regular people. However unusual it was, it had a capacity to make everyday life fragile and unreliable.
He stopped by Simon’s door. It was closed. He hesitated a moment, but then pushed down the handle and opened the door enough to be able to stick his head in. One of the hinges creaked. Simon mumbled something and moved in his sleep. He was tall, hardly seemed to fit in the bed where he was outstretched, would soon be taller than Fredrik.
The years with small children had seemed endless when they were going on. Now they were over. Many times he had longed for that, thought it would be a liberation. Be spared the endless minding and driving ar
ound, be spared slushy overalls, spilled-on clothes, sudden angry outbursts, and relentless refusal to perform the simplest little chores. Now he was no longer so certain.
He slowly closed the door and slipped in to Ninni.
“Hi, is that you?” she mumbled barely audibly in the darkness.
“Hi, how’s it going?” he whispered.
He waited for an answer, but realized that she had already fallen back asleep. A little disappointed, he undressed. As soon as he crawled down into the bed beside her, he felt that he did not need to lie there sleepless after all.
49.
It was six thirty in the morning. Henrik looked out over the harbor terminal. The Destination Gotland ferry was docked at the pier. The upper half of the side of the white vessel was lit up by the morning sun, the lower half in shadow from the cliff. The first cars had already started lining up in the many rows. Several rolled up to the gray-and-apricot check-in booths where three sleepy young people had just sat down in front of their computers.
Henrik saw police officers stopping the cars and looking in through the windows, searching for a blond woman in a white car who yesterday evening had killed …
He stopped the thought, tried to send it off in a different direction, tried to just see what was in front of his nose. But it was hard considering what was going on outside the hotel windows. They must not have thought about that when they decided to put them right there.
He turned his back toward the windows. Looked at Ellen, who was still lying in bed under the light blue cover. She was sleeping. Miraculously enough. Looking at Ellen both helped and made everything worse. She was still there, Ellen was still there, he thought. That was life, everything was not over. That was big, actually. Then he thought about her pain, her loss.
Henrik closed his eyes and sat down on one of the chairs that belonged to the gray-brown sofa group. The room was large. A white-stained door led to another room where Maria was sleeping. Or lying awake and staring. It was quiet anyway in there. A kind of suite in all its simplicity. Something that suggested that they would be there awhile. Family room, it said in the folder on the desk. A family room for half a family. A police officer standing guard outside the door.
The Intruder Page 20