by Leif Persson
‘What can I help you gentlemen with?’ Löfgren asked amiably.
‘We’d like to talk to you,’ Adolfsson said, equally amiably.
‘It’ll have to be tomorrow. I’m about to go for my daily run,’ Löfgren said, and set off with a wave in completely the wrong direction for Växjö.
Von Essen set off after him out of reflex, and to his credit managed to keep Löfgren within sight for several hundred metres before the student was swallowed up by the undergrowth and his pursuer was left standing there, doubled over and gasping for breath.
‘Twenty-five degrees in the shade, and still you can’t stop yourself from trying to keep up with a black man,’ Adolfsson said, leaning back comfortably in one of the garden chairs when his partner returned to the house.
‘Have you spoken to the parents?’ von Essen asked, nodding towards the house.
‘Doesn’t look like anyone’s home.’
‘Let’s call Lewin,’ von Essen decided.
‘What do you mean, ran off ?’ Lewin said over the phone five minutes later.
‘What do you mean, ran off ?’ Olsson repeated another ten minutes later.
‘Ran off. So he just ran off ?’ the prosecutor asked on her mobile after another fifteen minutes.
‘He just ran off,’ Lewin confirmed. ‘So what do we do now?’
‘What do we do now?’ Olsson repeated when Lewin called him for the second time in half an hour.
‘The prosecutor decided that we should sleep on the matter, and if we don’t get hold of him tomorrow she’s going to issue a formal arrest warrant,’ Lewin said.
‘So why the hell didn’t you run after the fucker and beat him to death?’ Bäckström roared. He was just as red in the face as von Essen had been two hours earlier, even though Bäckström hadn’t got out of his chair all afternoon.
‘We didn’t actually have the chance, if you see what I mean, boss,’ Adolfsson said.
‘You don’t really want to jeopardize any future interview by shooting someone just like that,’ von Essen suggested in the conciliatory tone of voice that was part of his noble birthright.
Watch yourself, you fucking poof, Bäckström thought, glaring slyly at his aristocratic colleague. Personally, he wouldn’t have had a moment’s hesitation in calling out the dogs and the helicopters, and closing off the damn bridge to that island, he thought.
38
Växjö, Friday 25 July
OVER BREAKFAST THE following morning, Bäckström read the Småland Post for the first time in his life. The main local paper had devoted a good deal of coverage to the newly established association, Växjö Men Against Violence to Women, and what had particularly captured Bäckström’s attention was the photograph of the association’s committee that covered half the front page. In the centre stood the chairperson, Lo Olsson, with Moa Hjärtén to her right and Superintendent Bengt Olsson to her left. On the flanks stood little Bengt Månsson and big Bengt Karlsson, twice his size. They were all looking seriously into the camera as they held each other’s hands.
What a load of idiots, Bäckström thought happily.
But the paper didn’t appear to share Bäckström’s opinion. The association was described in glowing terms, and was even honoured by a mention in the editorial, in which the editor-in-chief, in an unusually poetic turn of phrase, described the police as ‘an inadequate and poorly maintained fence trying to hold growing levels of criminality at bay’. The editor also declared that private law-and-order initiatives like this not only were desirable, but also should be taken very seriously indeed. ‘Even those of us living in such a predominantly peaceful town as Växjö have to realize that the battle against ever increasing levels of crime is actually our shared responsibility,’ he concluded.
Where the hell do they get all this shit from? Bäckström thought, putting the paper in his pocket so that he could laugh to his heart’s content as soon as he was shut inside his office.
Lewin, as was so often the case, had spent the night in Eva Svanström’s bed, but after she had fallen asleep he had lain there for another hour, worrying about what young Löfgren was actually up to. As soon as he got to work, he pulled out various files relating to the investigation, read them carefully, and then, after further thought, decided that he had probably worked out what was really going on. But because he had occasionally been wrong before, he called in von Essen and Adolfsson and asked them to check something for him.
‘There’s an old tip-off that I’d like you to follow up for me. I did mention it at our morning meeting on Sunday 6 July, and it probably isn’t that exciting, but I’d still like you to have a word with the informant for me. His name’s Göran Bengtsson. Here are all the details,’ Lewin said, giving the note to von Essen.
‘Gurra Yellow and Blue, yes, we know him,’ von Essen said, shaking his head.
‘Sorry,’ Lewin said. ‘What did you call him?’
‘Gurra Yellow and Blue, or just Yellow and Blue. That’s what he’s known as in town,’ Adolfsson explained. ‘Partly because he’s politically tainted, as it’s so politely termed, and partly . . .’
‘. . . because of the brown colours of the political palette, if I can put it like that,’ von Essen interjected.
‘He and his friends got a serious going-over when they tried to celebrate the Swedish Flag’s Day here in Växjö a couple of years ago,’ Adolfsson went on. ‘A load of thugs from the Anti-Fascist League and similar groups showed up, and Gurra and his friends got badly beaten up. Before we got the situation under control, they’d beaten him just as yellow and blue as his beloved flag.’
‘He says he saw Linda with a fucking big ni— a fucking big man,’ Lewin corrected himself, ‘at about four o’clock on the morning of the murder.’
‘Yes, that’s not a particularly rare observation on his part, and our student Löfgren is far from being the only black man here in Happy Valley,’ von Essen said. ‘Not these days, anyway.’
‘I’d still like you to go and talk to him. And I’d like you to show him some photographs, starting with Löfgren,’ Lewin said, handing over a transparent folder containing photographs of nine young black men, one of them Löfgren. ‘Then I’d like you to move on to Linda, and it’s important that you do it in that order.’ He handed them another plastic folder holding nine photographs of young blonde women, including one of their murder victim, Linda Wallin.
As von Essen and Adolfsson were ringing on the door of Yellow and Blue’s basic one-room flat in the centre of Växjö, Erik Roland Löfgren the police student stepped up to the reception desk in the police station on Sandgärdsgatan. He had with him a lawyer from Kalmar, who happened to be an old family friend, and he appeared in the nick of time. The prosecutor had just decided to issue a formal arrest warrant as a result of his absence.
Gurra Yellow and Blue was sitting at his computer playing a game that he had downloaded from the home page of the American organization White Aryan Resistance. Some of the computer geeks at WAR had put together a more ethnically focused variant of the old classics Desert Storm I–III, and Yellow and Blue was on a roll when von Essen and Adolfsson paid him a visit.
‘New top score,’ Yellow and Blue said, his cheeks glowing with excitement. ‘I wasted three hundred and eighty-nine blunt-nosed fuckers in just half an hour.’
‘Have you got a few minutes for a chat?’ Adolfsson asked.
‘Always happy to help the cops,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘It’s the duty of every Swedish citizen. It’s war now. We’ve got to close ranks if we don’t want the blacks to win.’
Löfgren wasn’t quite as enthusiastic as he sat in the interview room with Rogersson, who was leading the session, and Lewin as the official witness. To start with, he had been just as formal as his aged legal representative, who was three times his age.
‘Why do you think we want to talk to you, Löfgren?’ Rogersson began, after the usual introductory remarks for the recording’s benefit.
‘I was hoping you could
tell me,’ Löfgren said with a polite nod.
‘You haven’t worked it out for yourself ?’ Rogersson asked.
‘No,’ Löfgren said, shaking his head.
‘In that case I’ll tell you,’ Rogersson said. ‘I can understand that you must be curious.’
Löfgren made do with another nod, suddenly seeming more watchful than curious.
‘Hell, I’ve called loads of times and asked what the hell happened about my tip-off. It’s obvious the nigger did it,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘One of your colleagues must be protecting him. The police force is crawling with blacks working as officers now. Check them out, and you’ll get the killer.’
‘What did you do when you saw them?’ von Essen asked.
‘I said hello to that Linda. I recognized her, didn’t I? I’d seen her down at the cop shop.’
‘So what did you say, more precisely, I mean?’ von Essen persisted.
‘I asked if she didn’t have anything better to do than go home and suck on a stick of liquorice,’ Gurra said, smiling gleefully at them. ‘Yes, and then I said something about the risk of HIV as well. Hell, those liquorice cowboys are walking biological bombs, when you think about all the shit they’re carrying.’
‘Then what happened?’ Adolfsson asked.
‘The nigger went mad and started running at me, and his face was really dark blue, and I thought that you wouldn’t even want to touch that one because you’d die of herpes. At best. So I ran off.’
‘And it was then about four o’clock in the morning, and the incident took place on Norra Esplanaden, some five hundred metres from the Town Hotel?’ von Essen said.
‘Affirmative,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘Circa four o’clock, by the roundabout next to the health centre.’
‘We’ve got some pictures we’d like you to take a look at,’ von Essen said. ‘Do you recognize any of these men?’ He laid out the photographs of Löfgren and the eight others.
‘In the interviews conducted by one of my colleagues, you deny categorically that you had a sexual relationship with Linda,’ Rogersson said. ‘The way you describe it, she was an ordinary classmate.’
‘We were in the same class at college. But you already know that.’
‘Yes,’ Rogersson said. ‘We know that. And we also know that you had sex with Linda. Why didn’t you mention that?’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Löfgren replied stubbornly. ‘I never had any sort of relationship with her.’
‘It’s a simple question,’ Rogersson sighed. ‘Have you ever slept with Linda. Answer yes or no.’
‘I don’t understand what that has to do with anything,’ Löfgren said. ‘Anyway, I don’t talk about things like that. I’m not that sort.’
‘According to your friends, you’re precisely that sort,’ Rogersson said. ‘We’ve spoken to a number of them, and according to them you recently spent several months boasting about all the times you fucked Linda.’
‘Rubbish,’ Löfgren said. ‘I never talk about that sort of thing, so that’s complete rubbish.’
‘Complete rubbish, you say,’ Rogersson said. ‘If you’ve never slept with her, then all you have to do is answer no.’
‘You don’t seem to understand what I’m saying,’ Löfgren said.
‘I understand exactly what you’re saying,’ Rogersson said. ‘And I know that you lied when you were being questioned by the police, and now I’m hearing with my own ears how you’re trying to avoid answering a simple, straightforward question.’
‘Which doesn’t have anything to do with anything. I didn’t kill Linda. If you think I did, you’re mad.’
‘Assuming that you’re innocent, then you won’t mind providing a DNA sample so we can discount you from the investigation,’ Rogersson said, gesturing instructively at the test-tube containing the cotton-bud that was sitting beside the tape recorder.
‘I’ve no intention of doing any such thing,’ Löfgren said. ‘Seeing as I’m innocent, and you haven’t got a shred of evidence. What this is all about, and this is exactly what it is, is you trying to get rid of a future black officer.’ Löfgren looked as upset as he sounded. ‘That’s what this is about. The rest is just bullshit.’
‘And I’m telling you that you’re lying, and the fact that you’re lying to the police in a murder investigation which just happens to concern one of your classmates is enough to make me and my colleagues suspicious of you,’ Rogersson said. ‘For us, there’s nothing more to it than that.’
‘And that’s enough for you,’ Löfgren said heatedly. ‘You’re not even listening to—’
‘Not just for us,’ Rogersson interrupted. ‘The prosecutor is just as curious as we are.’
‘Pardon me for interrupting,’ the lawyer said, ‘but it would be interesting to hear the prosecutor’s opinion of this.’
‘It’s very simple,’ Rogersson said. ‘If Löfgren continues lying and refusing to provide a DNA sample, she will consider him a formal suspect and he will be remanded in custody.’ Rogersson exchanged a glance with Lewin, who nodded.
‘In that case, I would like it noted in the records that I don’t share her opinion,’ the lawyer said.
‘Noted,’ Rogersson said. ‘And I presume you are aware that if you wish to pursue the matter further, it isn’t the police you should turn to. One final question for you, Roland, before we arrest you—’
‘I’ve got an alibi,’ Löfgren interrupted. ‘Is that something your generation ever learned about? What an alibi is, I mean?’
‘It was him,’ Gurra Yellow and Blue said, smiling triumphantly and holding up the photograph of Erik Roland Löfgren.
‘There’s no rush, Gurra,’ von Essen said. ‘Take your time.’
‘I tend to think they all look the same,’ Adolfsson said. ‘How can you be so sure?’
‘You’re talking to an expert,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘I’m as good at niggers as Eskimos are at snow, or those Lapp bastards are at reindeer. Take this one, for instance.’ He waved the picture of Löfgren. ‘Typical blue nigger. Africa, if you ask me. But not just any Africa, because we’re not talking Eritrea or Sudan or Namibia or Zimbabwe, and we’re definitely not talking Masai. We’re not even talking Kikuyu or Uhuru or Watutsi or Wambesi or Zulu or—’
‘Hang on, hang on,’ Adolfsson interrupted, holding up his hands to stop him. ‘What part of Africa are we talking about? Never mind all the niggers that we’re not talking about.’
‘If you ask me, we’re talking west Africa, Ivory Coast, maybe. Basically old French west Africa, the Frogs’ niggers,’ Yellow and Blue said, nodding like a man who knew what he was talking about.
‘Thanks for your help,’ von Essen said. ‘Just one more question. If you wouldn’t mind taking a look at our pictures of girls as well.’
‘Come off it, Count,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘Try listening to what I’m saying. I’ve spoken to her, when I was in the cop shop, I told you. It was her. I’m a hundred and ten per cent sure.’
‘Which one of these was it, then?’ Adolfsson asked, nodding towards the photographs of Linda and the other eight young women.
‘Tell me,’ Rogersson said. ‘Tell me about your alibi.’
‘I wasn’t alone when I left the hotel. I was with someone, and we went back to my place,’ Löfgren said. ‘I was with that person until approximately ten o’clock that morning.’
‘When you were questioned you said you went home alone,’ Rogersson said. ‘So that was a lie as well? Okay, give me a name. What’s the name of the person you went home with?’
‘I’ve already told you. I don’t discuss names,’ Löfgren said.
‘That’s not much of an alibi, then,’ Rogersson sighed. ‘Not from what I’ve ever learned about alibis, anyway. From the little I remember, the teachers kept going on about the fact that it was important to know who was providing the alibi.’
‘I don’t discuss names,’ Löfgren repeated. ‘Is that really so hard to understand?’
>
‘So what do you say now, lads?’ Yellow and Blue said, holding up the photograph he had picked out.
‘And you’re absolutely sure it was her?’ von Essen said, exchanging a glance with Adolfsson.
‘What do you mean, absolutely sure? I’m a hundred and ten per cent sure, I told you. I’ve spoken to her more than once down at your very own cop shop. She was a proper little bitch, if you want to know what I think.’
‘There’s something funny about what you’re saying,’ Rogersson said, looking at Löfgren sceptically.
‘What do you mean, funny?’ Löfgren said. ‘I don’t see anything funny in any of this.’
‘Your friends say you boasted to them about all the times you fucked Linda. In your own words. All the times you fucked Linda, as well as plenty more even worse phrases that I don’t intend to embarrass either you or your legal representative with by repeating.’
‘That’s up to them,’ Löfgren said. ‘I haven’t said anything.’
‘But when it comes to leaving the Town Hotel, on the other hand, you told them that you went home alone. There’s even someone who saw you going home alone. You said you were going home to get some sleep.’
‘So what? I don’t have to sit here and defend what other people have said. Besides, it looks like someone wants to talk to you,’ Löfgren said, nodding towards the door, which was slowly opening after a discreet knock.
‘Have you got a couple of minutes, Lewin?’ von Essen asked from the other side of the door.
‘This trick’s as old as the hills,’ Löfgren said to his lawyer. ‘One of the lecturers at college told us . . .’
‘Two minutes,’ Lewin said, getting up and going out, carefully shutting the door behind him.
‘I think we have a small problem,’ von Essen said.
‘I thought we might have, ever since first thing this morning,’ Lewin said with a sigh.