“I don’t want anything bad to happen to her,” he said. “It’s just as much my fault.”
I resolutely stood up and assured Roger that I would take care of it right away.
He didn’t even need to say her name. It was obvious whom we were discussing.
* * *
I told Monika, the deacon, that I had a migraine, then went home and banged on the door to Stella’s room until she let me in.
“What the hell have you done?”
And I never curse. Seldom had Stella looked so flattened. She made no excuses, just confessed and swore up and down that she would return the money immediately and apologize. It was just a stupid idea that had gone off the rails. Nothing like it would happen ever again.
I didn’t mention any of it to Ulrika. On one hand this felt like a deception—you’re expected to share this sort of thing with your spouse. On the other hand, I was sparing her; what she didn’t know couldn’t hurt her. In hindsight, I have to admit that much of my reasoning here revolved around shame. I couldn’t come to terms with what Stella had done, and I didn’t want anyone else, not even my wife, to know about it.
When I saw Roger in church the next Sunday, I took him aside after the service. Once again I had to drag the words out of him.
“Did you get your money back?”
“Oh, yes.”
“All of it?”
“Yes.”
“And Stella apologized? Did she seem genuinely sorry?” I asked.
“Yes.” Roger nodded again and shifted back and forth. “But it wasn’t her.”
“What?”
He lowered his head.
“It wasn’t Stella who did it,” he said. “It was the other one, the little dark one.”
32
Amina and I walked side by side through City Park. We had nearly reached Svanegatan and could hear the hum of traffic.
“I was there the first time Stella met Chris,” Amina said. “It was at Tegnérs. He seemed like a perfectly ordinary guy. Nothing sketchy about him. Except he was pretty old, but we didn’t know that at first.”
“When was this?”
She shrugged.
“A few months ago.”
“But what was Stella doing at his place? The police found evidence that she was there.”
“She probably just went home with him.”
I regretted asking. I didn’t want to know any more.
“An after-party, maybe?” Amina said. “I don’t really know. I haven’t seen Stella for over a week, since the weekend before last.”
Her bike tipped and I readied myself to catch it in case she lost her grip.
“Did you see Christopher Olsen that time too?”
Amina straightened the handlebars.
“Yeah, that Friday.”
“That was Stella’s birthday.”
“We were only with him for a little while, then Stella and I took off for Stortorget and had a glass of wine. I had a match on Saturday, so nothing too crazy.”
“And you haven’t seen each other since? But you’ve talked, haven’t you? Texted each other?”
“Not exactly. But she did message me on Friday. We were supposed to meet up that night, but I had practice and I wasn’t feeling all that well. Then on Saturday I ended up with a fever.”
“So you don’t have any idea what happened on Friday?”
She was quick to shake her head. I felt doubtful.
“Then what did you tell the police? When they questioned you?”
“The truth, obviously. I couldn’t lie, could I?”
I didn’t respond.
Over the years I’ve learned that lying is an art form, a skill some people have mastered while others never will. Like other talents, I’m sure you can improve with practice and hone this skill, but essentially it seems to come down to a certain innate disposition. Stella has always been a good liar. Even in elementary school I had a hard time pinpointing her lies. They were sometimes about the most banal things.
“Have you cleaned your room yet, Stella?”
“Yes, Dad.”
One time it would be true; the next she would lie to my face. It was impossible to determine when she was telling the truth.
I presume Amina isn’t a skilled liar at all. After the incident with Roger Arvidsen she begged me for forgiveness, sobbing, and got me to promise never to tell Dino and Alexandra. A promise I kept, naturally.
She wasn’t succeeding in her lie this time either. I had no doubt that she was hiding something. Who was she trying to protect? Herself or Stella?
Or me? Did she believe I couldn’t handle the truth?
We took a left onto Svanegatan. A car sped by, going much too fast.
“Amina, do you think that Stella…? Do you think Stella did it?”
She stopped short.
“No! Stella didn’t do anything! You aren’t thinking…?”
I didn’t know. How could Amina be so certain?
“Please,” I begged again as she mounted the bike for the last fifty meters home. “I have to know.”
“Know what?”
“Everything.”
“I don’t know everything either.” Amina put her feet on the pedals and pedaled one revolution. “I don’t know any more than you do. And neither does Stella, presumably.”
She waved over her shoulder as she biked home.
I knew she was lying.
33
When I came home that evening, Ulrika was standing in the bedroom and gazing out the window. My mind was sluggish. Every muscle in my body ached as if I had just climbed a mountain.
“What are you looking at?” I asked.
She didn’t respond. As I put my arms around her waist, I discovered that her face was full of shadows; her tears seemed to have hollowed out her cheeks and dried her lips.
“Honey,” I whispered.
“Where have you been?”
Her voice was a tremor.
I explained that I had been sent home from work, off sick at least another week. Ulrika didn’t react. Her eyes seemed devoid of life. Everything outside the window was darkness. Black, impenetrable murkiness.
“You’ve heard of Job, right?” I said.
“I’m familiar with the name.”
I rested my chin on her shoulder, but she jerked away without warning and turned around.
“You don’t seriously think this is a trial from God?”
I no longer knew what to think.
“Job was the most honest man on earth,” I explained. “But the prosecutor pointed out that it’s easy to believe in God when your life is as great as Job’s was.”
“The prosecutor?”
“Some translations use that word. It’s a euphemism for Satan.”
In the midst of all this misery, I glimpsed a smile on my wife’s face.
“As a defense attorney, I have no argument there.”
As I related the story of Job—how God allowed Satan to take away everything he owned, to take the lives of his livestock and his ten children, to make him very sick—Ulrika nodded in recognition.
“So you’re Job?”
It was hard to tell whether she was trying to be funny or just scornful.
“Certainly not. Anyway, Job’s wife thought he should turn his back on God after everything that happened to him. Do you know what Job said in response?”
“No, what did Job say?”
“He said that if we accept all the good things from God, we must also be prepared to accept the bad.”
Ulrika replied with a snort. I wasn’t quite sure what it meant.
Then she sighed.
“We can’t keep living here.”
“What?”
Ulrika gazed past me and out the window again.
“Did you see the news online today?”
“Yes, Mom called.”
“Lund isn’t exactly a big city. What’s more, you and I have relatively public lives here.”
We kept staring int
o the darkness.
“Aren’t you being a little overdramatic?” I said.
“You have no idea. I’ve seen it happen so many times. People forced to flee, to give up their lives and start over somewhere else.”
“So you think Stella’s going to be convicted?”
She looked at me as if I were a child she was about to disappoint.
“Maybe not by the justice system. It’s too early to predict that right now. But it doesn’t really matter. It’s the court of public opinion that really counts. In general, people don’t care about the court’s decision.”
I couldn’t accept this.
“You’re exaggerating.”
“Not at all. One week in jail and you’re as good as guilty in people’s eyes. Even if Stella is freed of all suspicion, a seed of doubt will always remain in those who know who she is. At least as long as no one else is convicted of the crime.”
It sounded so cynical. Maybe it was bitter wisdom learned from almost twenty years in the criminal justice system—and there certainly was some truth in her reasoning. I only had to look at myself. How many times had I taken for granted that a suspect was guilty even though the courts came to the opposite conclusion? If Stella was freed but no one else was convicted of the murder, surely many people would doubt her innocence.
“You’re serious? You want us to move away from Lund?”
Ulrika nodded.
“Michael offered me something up in Stockholm.”
“Michael?”
“Blomberg.”
I blinked a few times. The darkness outside the window lingered in my vision like a shadow.
“What kind of thing?”
“He’s got a job for me, a big case that’ll take a long time, several months. The firm has an apartment downtown, for overnights; we can stay there till we find a place of our own.”
“We’re moving?”
She put her arms around my neck.
“It’s not going to be good for us to stay in this city.”
The warmth of her body softened me.
“What about Stella?”
“Stella will come with us, of course. Until she takes off for her Asia trip.”
“But she’s locked up.”
“After the trial,” Ulrika said, nuzzling my neck.
“After…?”
“There’s nothing we can do about it right now. In all likelihood it will go to trial.”
“You think so?”
I twisted my torso away, but Ulrika held me tight and pressed my cheek to her chest.
“But we know she’s innocent,” I said.
“We don’t know anything, honey.”
“What do you mean?”
I extracted myself from her arms. She looked so desperately tired. This was sapping us more than I ever could have imagined.
“She has an alibi!” I said. “Stella has an alibi.”
Ulrika reached out her hand.
“Honey, I was awake too when Stella came home last Friday. I know exactly what time it was.”
Something shattered inside me. Why hadn’t she said anything? She had known I was lying to the police.
What else did she know? I thought of the stained blouse and Stella’s phone.
“What really happened to Stella’s cell phone?”
“What do you mean?”
“I thought the police seized it, but that’s not what happened. What did you do with it?”
“I … I…”
Although she was looking at me, it was as if her gaze floated off. I felt lonely and abandoned, and I had to bite my tongue to keep from saying something I would come to regret.
“What did you do with her phone?” I asked once more.
She stroked my cheek.
“The phone is gone,” she said.
I gasped. What had she done? Had she dumped Stella’s phone somewhere? If this got out, her career would be ruined.
“How did things end up for this Job?” she asked softly.
“It was a happy ending. God gave him ten new children.”
I forced a smile and Ulrika kissed me.
“We have to stick together now, honey,” she said. “You and Stella and me. We have to stick together.”
I had the strong sensation that she too was hiding something from me. Even my wife.
34
Blomberg called on Monday. Could we come in to his office that afternoon? He had news for us.
“I suppose there’s no such thing as good news in this situation,” I said to Ulrika.
I held her hand tight on the short walk from the parking lot to Klostergatan.
Maybe Ulrika was right. We should leave Lund. I’ve always liked Stockholm; it could be our sanctuary.
But of course we couldn’t just leave Stella in Lund. As long as she was jailed, we would stay here. I would not compromise on that.
We turned the corner onto Klostergatan and stopped outside the front door. I caught a faint whiff of alcohol as I kissed Ulrika. In the elevator on the way up to Blomberg’s office, she took a compact and lip gloss from her purse and spiffed herself up in the mirror.
“Have a seat,” Blomberg said; for once he was wearing an ordinary T-shirt. It was unusual to see him so dressed down. It was almost embarrassing. As if he were naked.
“I told him about your job offer,” Ulrika said.
Blomberg smiled at me. I found it unpleasant that he and Ulrika had discussions when I wasn’t around.
“You said you found something new,” I said.
“So I did,” said Blomberg, sitting down across from us with his legs spread. “As I mentioned, Chris Olsen has quite the lengthy résumé. But I also found some things that a person would tend not to include in a résumé.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“This dude was involved with some fairly shady deals—we’re talking real monkey business here.” Blomberg nodded and looked pleased with himself. “I told you about the Poles with the pizzeria, right? Turns out Olsen also had a big outfit that depended on cheap labor from Romania. People he housed in some goddamn barn in the countryside while they worked like dogs to fix up properties for Olsen’s firm.”
“That sounds terrible.”
“People like Olsen buy up ramshackle buildings and flip them for ridiculous sums.”
“But what does this have to do with the murder?” I asked.
Blomberg gave a huge smile.
“Well, it seems some of the Romanians were grumpy about the conditions and claimed that Olsen was trying to cheat them out of dough. Some of their compatriots we chatted with were convinced that they were the ones who killed Olsen.”
“What? Do the police know?”
“I’ve informed Agnes Thelin, but Jansdotter is the one leading the preliminary investigation.”
“Agnes Thelin.” I snorted.
Ulrika looked at me in surprise.
“We’re still checking up on the Poles as well,” said Blomberg. “We’ve got two names to have a closer look at.”
It seemed so anticlimactic. Was that all? I didn’t put much stock in Blomberg’s private investigations. It’s the job of the police to investigate homicides.
“When can we see Stella?” I asked.
Blomberg’s neck turned red.
“I want you to know that I tried. I truly have done everything in my power, but that fucking Jansdotter refuses to let you see Stella.”
“This is a complete miscarriage of justice. Should we contact the evening papers? Or maybe that investigation show would do an episode?”
Blomberg shook his head.
“It’s way too early for anything like that. Until there’s been a conviction, they won’t be interested.”
“You have to talk to Amina Bešić,” I said. “I’m sure she’s hiding something.”
Blomberg fingered his necklace.
“Hmm, I don’t know…,” said Ulrika.
I assumed she was afraid that this would upset Dino and Alexandra.
>
“I’ve tried,” said Blomberg. “The police questioned her as well, but it doesn’t seem she knows anything of importance.”
“She does,” I said.
Ulrika elbowed me in the side.
“This is Amina we’re talking about. Why would she lie?”
“I know she’s lying!”
But I couldn’t say more, since Ulrika must not find out that I had spoken with Amina. She would never understand—she would only be furious, sure that I had crossed a line.
“It’s still the case that Olsen’s ex-partner, Linda Lokind, is the most interesting for our purposes,” said Blomberg. “It turns out that Lokind has a history of anxiety and depression. She first sought psychiatric treatment as a teenager and since then she’s been bouncing from clinic to clinic more or less continuously.”
This didn’t exactly surprise me. Linda Lokind was a young woman with a damaged self-image. She reminded me in many ways of other women I’d met who were victims of domestic abuse. I knew Linda had lied to me, but I was uncertain of the extent. Could her entire story of Chris Olsen’s violence really have been fabricated? A terrible way of getting revenge on her cheating former boyfriend? I doubted that Linda Lokind was capable of doing something like that. But that meant she had to be hiding something else.
“It’s completely absurd that the police aren’t properly investigating Lokind,” I said. “You have to push them!”
“It’s becoming more and more common for this sort of thing to land on attorneys’ desks,” said Blomberg. “I want you to know my people are capable. But we need to get something concrete on Linda Lokind to move forward.”
Something concrete?
“Her shoes,” I said.
Ulrika and Blomberg stared.
It just slipped out of me. We needed something concrete, and I knew what it was.
“What shoes?” Blomberg asked, leaning forward.
I sighed and felt Ulrika stiffen beside me. There was no way out but to reveal the truth.
“Linda Lokind has the same shoes as Stella. The same kind of shoes that left that print at the scene of the crime.”
Blomberg raised his eyebrows.
“How do you know that?”
I looked at Ulrika. Her face was impassive.
“I went to her house.”
Both of them seemed to hold their breath as I told them about my visit to Linda Lokind’s place on Tullgatan. I had seen those shoes close up and was one hundred percent sure of myself.
A Nearly Normal Family Page 11