David gave Sara a look.
‘Harassment?’
‘No, just show him that we have an eye on him. Check his ID, hint that his wife might find out. They think they can carry on without any consequences.’
‘Either we catch them red-handed or we leave them alone.’
‘Look at us now,’ Sara said. ‘We can take down a bloke, but this girl has ten other clients today. And around the rest of town, hundreds of other girls have thousands of clients. Just today. And we’re taking down a handful. Who get fined. And then carry on as before. It’s just crazy.’
‘That’s how it is.’
‘And it’s shit!’
‘What’s up with you?’ David asked. ‘Why are you so angry?’
‘Is it so strange? Isn’t it stranger that you’re not angry?’
‘I don’t think you can do a good job if you’re angry.’
‘It’s bloody brilliant being angry,’ she said. ‘Gives you energy to carry on. What am I supposed to be otherwise? Happy? “Hurrah! What awful people there are in this world!”’
‘I think it’s stupid. You work less efficiently and you burn out. You can’t deal with this job if you get angry at everything you see.’
‘It’s about bloody time someone got angry at this shit. Instead of just trying to understand and reason, they should get totally raging. Fucking furious.’
‘We need to work with a long-term view.’
‘I don’t want to work for the long term, I want to work for the short term. Like this – “Stop it! Now!”’
David shook his head.
‘We need to get them to understand what they’re doing is wrong. Anger isn’t a good way to communicate. It creates distance, conflict. They won’t listen if you shout at them – they’ll just become defensive.’
‘But do you think what we do actually matters? Everything just keeps going on anyway.’
‘What is it you want most?’ said David. ‘To rescue the girls or take down the punters?’
‘Both.’
‘But which is most important?’
Sara shrugged.
‘If you had to pick one.’
She thought about it. But she already knew the answer.
‘Take down the punters,’ she said. ‘Without villains there are no victims.’
‘I want to rescue the girls.’
‘But they don’t want help. They refuse to testify. Refuse to move to safe houses. Refuse to bloody speak to us.’
‘We need to gain their trust,’ David objected. ‘It takes time.’
‘“Trust?” Shouldn’t it be pretty bloody easy to choose between us and a bunch of violent pimps? Between us and being raped ten times a day by disgusting johns? With the possibility of being killed at any moment?’
‘This doesn’t sound like you, Sara. Has something happened?’
‘No, not a fucking thing. That’s the problem. No matter how many buyers of sex we arrest, there are thousands more standing in line with their dicks in their hands. All ages, all sorts, all of them. Nothing helps. What’s the point? And the girls don’t even want to testify – not against the pimps or the punters.’
‘They’re scared of what happens next,’ David said, ‘once the perpetrators are in jail and we’re otherwise occupied. Scared of revenge – that something might happen to their families.’
‘I know that. And that’s why we can’t help them. Can’t put away the guilty. Why not jack it all in, if we don’t stand a chance? Maybe we just shouldn’t bother anymore?’
‘If we don’t, who will?’
‘Why doesn’t God do something?’
David sighed.
‘Not again—’
‘Yes, again. I get really worked up when you talk about God the same day as you take care of some teenage girl who’s been gang-banged to pieces. How the hell do you do it?’
David didn’t reply. This wasn’t the first time Sara had challenged his faith. More like the seventieth time. By a factor of seven. She didn’t even seem to want to understand what his faith was about. He understood it wasn’t part of their line of work, but without his faith he wouldn’t have been able to cope.
‘Faith in a God that means you don’t even dare come out to your family!’ said Sara. ‘What kind of God is that, really?’
‘It’s not about my family. I’ve told you that! I can tell them anything. It’s everyone else.’
‘That’s what I mean. Free Church congregations in some backwards hole that force families out if they have a homosexual son. In Sweden, today! Not to mention other countries. The American Deep South, Saudi Arabia, Poland, Russia. It’s not about religion, it’s about legitimising hate, controlling fellow human beings. Freely attacking gays and women and . . .’
Sara fell silent. David looked up and saw her staring at the door.
‘Check on the girl!’ she shouted, leaping out of the car.
David saw Sara run down Artillerigatan towards Karlavägen. Then he hurried in through the door they’d been watching. He knew the flat was up one storey, facing the inner courtyard. It wasn’t their first visit.
He tried the door. Locked.
‘Open up! Police!’
He could only hope there was someone inside who was capable of opening the door. He thumped hard on the door and called out again, and after a minute or so he heard steps on the other side and a click from the lock.
The door slowly swung open.
David knew that the girl who lived and worked here called herself Becky, so he assumed that it was her opening the door. But it wasn’t all that easy to tell, because she was holding her hand in front of her face. And what little of Becky’s face he could see was completely bloodied.
‘Are you injured?’ said David. ‘Seriously, I mean,’ he added, as he saw the woman’s eyes flash. It was pretty obvious she was injured. ‘Are you OK? Can I look?’
David carefully took Becky’s hand and she let him move it aside. Her nose appeared to be broken. One eyebrow was split. And two teeth had been knocked out. Others might be loose.
‘I’ll call an ambulance.’
But Becky waved her hand dismissively.
‘Haxi,’ she mumbled as she took her handbag from the coat rack. She pulled out her mobile, entered the PIN and handed it to David.
‘What? Oh, right – you want me to call?’
‘Mmm.’
‘Taxi to pick up from Artillerigatan 65. Becky. Going to Danderyd Hospital.’ David looked at Becky quizzically to check whether the choice of hospital suited her. The woman nodded in response. ‘The emergency room.’
Then he ran back down to the street.
How had Sara known?
*
The punter had already realised at Tyskbagargatan that he was being chased by Sara, so he dashed towards Karlavägen. Pushing aside all the families carrying their graduation placards. Stopping cars, which couldn’t actually do more than a couple of kilometres an hour in the throng.
Sara ran after him along the footpath running up the centre of the lush avenue on Karlavägen. Several student trucks were heading for Östra Real: families and friends en masse.
The man zigzagged between the revellers, shoving them aside so he was practically pulling himself through the crowd.
Sara ran, jumping and dodging.
‘Move! Idiots!’
Some protested loudly, others pulled unhappy faces. People weren’t accustomed to being run into in these parts.
On Sibyllegatan in front of the kiosk there was a Chevrolet Bel Air ’56 decked out for graduation, its driver impatiently waiting to turn on to Karlavägen. He took his chances when a gap that was barely big enough appeared. The young man floored it, but was stopped by Sara landing on the bonnet.
‘Idiot!’ Sara cried out, but carried on without stopping.
She registered pain in her ankle and shoulder as she ran on past the ICA Esplanad.
The punter was pulling away.
Jesus – she wasn’t goin
g to make it.
Sara plucked a champagne bottle out of the hands of a dumpy middle-aged gentleman with a pointed beard, and threw it with all her might at the fugitive.
And she hit her target.
A bullseye on his back.
Sufficiently hard to make him stumble, which resulted in him running into a gaggle of young lads and tripping over.
As he struggled to get up, Sara caught up with him.
She threw herself down, wrapping her legs around his stomach and squeezing – a scissors move she’d used a lot when training in the Russian martial art of Sambo. She’d learned that her strong legs were particularly useful in that position. Numerous burly blokes had been forced to tap out when they’d been caught in her iron grip during training.
‘I surrender!’ the punter cried out, and Sara loosened her grip slightly. There was a stinging feeling in her leg, and she saw that the punter had something shiny in his hand. A flick knife. He’d stabbed her with it. Fortunately not deeply, just a scratch. But still . . .
Sara bent forward, grabbed the little finger on his empty hand and bent it backwards. He screamed with pain, and then she struck his knife hand from behind, making the weapon fly out of it.
Then she squeezed even harder with her legs.
‘Let go!’ the punter shouted. ‘Let go! You’re suffocating me!’
‘And you stabbed me with a knife,’ said Sara, pulling out her handcuffs. ‘Give me your hands!’
‘Fucking whore!’
Sara squeezed even tighter.
‘Let go!’ the idiot cried out. ‘Police brutality!’
Then he turned to the people standing nearby and exhorted them:
‘Video this! Video this!’
At the same time, he carefully concealed his own face.
‘Give me your hand,’ said Sara.
Finally he obeyed.
‘And the other.’
When Sara had locked the handcuffs, she released him from her scissor hold and the punter gasped for air, as if he’d been underwater and needed to catch his breath.
‘Did you think you could run away from me? Huh?’
But he was too exhausted to answer, and she leaned forward and bellowed into his ear.
‘Idiot!’
Then she found his wallet, pulled out the driving licence and took a photo of it.
Pål Vestlund.
The name of a bloody john. Ring on his finger and everything.
‘You never give up.’
The words came from David, who’d come running through the sea of student graduation revellers.
And it was true, Sara thought to herself. She never gave up.
‘How is she?’ she asked, her eyes on the captive punter.
‘Two teeth, nose, eyebrow.’
‘Bloody swine,’ said Sara, grabbing Vestlund by the hair and pulling his head back.
‘I’ll report you,’ he managed to say.
‘For what?’ said Sara. ‘For this?’
And then she kicked him in the ribs.
‘Or this?’
Then she kicked him right in the crotch. Vestlund screamed and curled up into the foetal position.
‘Sara!’ said David, stepping between them.
He looked around to check whether anyone was filming. But everyone seemed to have their sights set on the front doors of Carl Bildt’s old school, that were about to open.
‘I slipped,’ said Sara. And then she added: ‘Why should he get off more lightly than Becky?’
‘Stop it.’
‘He stabbed me,’ said Sara, showing the bloody wound on her thigh.
‘OK, but we shouldn’t be like them,’ said David. ‘How did you know he’d hit her?’
‘Blood on his knuckles.’
‘Just that?’
‘“Just that?”’
‘No, I mean that was enough, was it? For you to realise. And you saw it from that distance.’
‘See for yourself.’
‘Yes, I can see it now. But I wouldn’t have seen it from across the street.’
‘OK, let’s get this swine on his feet and bring him in. Buying sex, grievous bodily harm, violently resisting arrest. I struck the knife out of his hand – it should be over there somewhere.’
David found it and then they pulled Pål Vestlund to his feet.
Sara could still feel the adrenaline pumping through her body. She didn’t have a lot of time for the theory of catharsis – the idea that implementing violence was an outlet that made one calmer, used by many martial arts trainers as an argument in favour of letting young criminals train at their clubs. Instead, Sara was convinced that it just built it up. The more she trained, the more she let the anger emerge, the more aggressive she became. Even Martin and the kids had begun to notice her increasingly short fuse. And you only had to look at football hooligans – no bloody way did they become less violent by fighting each other. No, sometimes she regretted accepting violence into her life – but on the other hand, it was good to be able to channel it at times like this. There were two sides to it.
They headed back towards the car, with Vestlund ducking his head in order to hide his face from any passing acquaintance.
As they walked past Café Foam, Sara’s mobile rang. The ringtone told her it was Anna, her old study buddy at the police academy, who now worked in homicide in Västerort to the west of the city. Anna had been assigned ‘Somebody That I Used to Know’ by Gotye as her personal ringtone – although it was mostly a joke. Truth be told, Sara knew her pretty well. Anna wasn’t her only friend, but she was one of just a few.
‘Nothing bad,’ said Sara into her mobile.
‘Yes, I’m afraid it is,’ said Anna.
‘I wanted a proposal that we grab a beer or something.’
‘And you’re getting a murder in Bromma.’
‘OK. Of a prostitute?’
‘Only for very kinky customers in that case,’ said Anna. ‘An eighty-five-year-old man with a bullet in his skull.’
‘OK . . . A john?’
‘It actually has nothing to do with your job – this is purely private. I think you know the old man. Or knew him.’
Family, neighbours, friends, old colleagues – names and faces rushed through her head. An old man murdered. Someone she knew.
‘Who . . .?’ was all she managed.
‘Uncle Stellan.’
‘Uncle Stellan?’ said Sara, trying to take it in. Struggling to fit it into the right place in her brain. But Uncle Stellan didn’t seem to sit right. There wasn’t a spot for him anywhere, actually.
‘The old television presenter,’ said Anna. ‘You knew him, right?’
‘Yes. Well, his daughters. Yes – him, too. I was there constantly when I was a kid.’
‘Well, then. Perhaps you can help.’
‘But hang on – has Uncle Stellan been murdered?’
‘Shot in the head.’
‘You’re kidding.’
‘No.’
‘By who?’
‘No idea. Some dissatisfied ex-viewer? I thought you might know something. An old threat. Row in the family. Crazy neighbour. Bonkers admirer. I don’t know.’
‘I’m on my way.’
By the time Anna said ‘No’, Sara had already hung up.
5
The driveway to the grand white villa was besieged by police cars, the street was cordoned off with blue and white tape, and police officers were coming and going. Neighbours and curious onlookers were standing at their garden fences and on the pavement, staring. They were trying to pump passing officers for information without seeming nosy. There weren’t any journalists yet, but it was only a matter of time.
Sara parked a short distance away and walked up to the house. Even from a distance, she could feel herself being transported back in time and she had to stifle the impulse to check she hadn’t turned back into her childhood self.
She flashed her police ID and stepped over the cordon.
‘Sar
a!’ someone called out behind her and she turned around. A white-haired man in dungarees and gardening gloves was looking at her.
‘It’s me. Jocke.’
Jesus Christ. Jocke. The gardener.
‘What’s happened?’ he said, the worry audible in his voice.
Sara could see how those around him pricked up their ears with curiosity. All in vain.
‘I can’t say anything,’ she said.
‘But I’m part of the family.’
‘I know. But still. I’m sorry.’
Sara continued towards the house. Jocke had seemed like a ghost from the past. So much older, but still the same as ever. It was remarkable that he still worked for the Bromans.
On the way to the front door, she glanced towards the garden and directed her steps that way instead. Perhaps it was the close encounter with the past that influenced her.
She could also feel how she was still buzzing with adrenaline following the arrest. She thought she probably needed to calm down before speaking to her childhood friends Malin and Lotta about their father’s death. But it was mostly a pretext.
The Bromans’ garden would always live on in her memory as the emblem of a paradise lost, a symbol of the innocent games of childhood. Perhaps she should take a look at it first, try and find a little respite from the crap she had to put up with in her job. Perhaps this was exactly what she needed just now. Well, if she ignored the awful reason for her visit, anyway.
The waterside garden was just as wonderful as she remembered. She walked past the small cabin for guests and onto the jetty. She hadn’t stood here since she was a child. In her mind’s eye she saw three little girls sitting and laughing and chucking cheese sandwiches into the water. Happy and carefree. Dark-haired Lotta, blonde Malin and red-haired Sara.
They had complemented each other. Formed a team.
She supposed it was here that they’d first heard the Swedish expression for skimming stones: ‘sandwich throwing’. And they’d thought it sounded fun – especially if you used real sandwiches instead of stones. It had been a sunny day, just like this one. But it was an eternity ago. In another world.
What happened to all that? Sara thought to herself. Why couldn’t it carry on?
They’d spent their days hanging out here, on this jetty, all through the warm summer months.
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