Buried Lies

by Kristina Ohlsson

  ‘Did she say why?’

  ‘She said some friends of hers had lived here before and loved it. And she’d always wanted to go to a famous riding school just outside Houston. That was where she was planning on spending her wages.’

  I tried rather half-heartedly to kill a fly that was buzzing against the window.

  ‘A riding school?’ I repeated.

  ‘Didn’t I mention that when we met? It was one of the things that attracted her to Houston. Preston’s Riding School, that’s the name. It’s just off the road to Galveston.’

  I started looking around for signs beside the freeway.

  ‘Are you sure Sara spent her time at the riding school?’ I said.

  ‘I don’t know how sure I am really. The way things developed, I’m not actually sure of anything at all. But she used to say that was where she was going when she was gone for a while.’

  Victor Brown broke off to talk to someone else again.

  ‘I’m really sorry,’ he said to me. ‘But I’m afraid I’m going to have to go.’

  And with that he was gone. Slowly I lowered the phone and let it rest in my lap.

  ‘What was that all about?’ Lucy said.

  My mobile buzzed. A new text from Boris.

  Everything fine. Getting another report from the guys in a few hours.

  I felt relief spread through my chest. Never mind the fact that Belle’s grandparents didn’t have their mobiles on. Boris was the one who really mattered.

  At that moment I caught sight of a modest sign by the side of the road.

  Preston’s Riding School.

  ‘Turn off here,’ I said. ‘Follow the signs to the riding school.’

  Lucy did as I said.

  ‘Do you want to tell me what exciting things you’ve figured out?’

  ‘I don’t think Sara first came into contact with Lucifer when she arrived in Houston,’ I said. ‘I think she was part of his network before she left Sweden. And that was why she decided to come to Texas.’

  39

  If Belle ever comes home and announces that she wants to start horse-riding, I shall say no at once. Horses are big, clumsy, and smelly. A small part of me also thinks they’re lethal. But there were no horses visible at Preston’s Riding School. I may have detected a faint whiff of them, but that was all. Presumably that was what posh riding schools were like. Too clean for real animals.

  Lucy didn’t share my views on horses. To my surprise she exclaimed: ‘What a wonderful place! I’d have loved to go riding here.’

  ‘No way, you were a horsey girl?’ I said.

  ‘God, yes. I practically lived in a stable until I turned fifteen.’

  I didn’t like to be reminded that I didn’t know all there was to know about Lucy. In my world we had always known each other, and that was the way things were going to stay. Which was obviously incredibly naïve. We don’t even know our own children as well as we’d like.

  As far as Preston’s Riding School was concerned, even I could see that it was high class. I found myself thinking of the Spanish Riding School in Vienna, where horse-riding shows were performed in a huge, castle-like facility. How the hell could Sara’s au pair parents have thought she could afford to ride here?

  The same thought occurred to Lucy.

  ‘They’re hardly going to offer impoverished au pairs subsidised riding lessons,’ she said.

  The spacious school was surprisingly calm and quiet. I realised we must have come in the wrong way. There was no one in sight. It felt like we were in some sort of large practice hall.

  ‘There must be a reception area or information desk,’ I said.

  We went out into the heat again. The three-metre tall door swung shut behind us. The sunlight hurt my eyes and I fumbled for my shades.

  ‘Over there,’ Lucy said, pointing to a much smaller door in a much smaller building.

  ‘Administration,’ a discreet sign said.

  ‘Good job we didn’t go straight there,’ I said. ‘Then we wouldn’t have seen the lovely school.’

  We hurried over to the other door. The heat was oppressive, and in combination with the high humidity was soon unbearable.

  Indoors an Alaskan chill reigned. The Yanks love their air-conditioning, but don’t seem to have the faintest idea of how to use it. It’s either too hot or too cold, and if the difference between them is too great you end up catching a cold.

  ‘Can I help you?’ said an elderly woman with grey hair, round glasses and a blouse so tightly buttoned at the neck that I wondered how she could breathe.

  By this point we had become practised liars. This time we gave a minimalist background explanation for our visit.

  ‘What we’d like to know is if you’ve ever had a Sara Tell registered with you,’ I said.

  ‘Or a Jenny Woods,’ Lucy said.

  ‘Woods is her husband’s name,’ I said quietly in Swedish. ‘What was she called before she got married?’

  Lucy thought.

  ‘Eriksson,’ she said. ‘Jenny Eriksson.’

  The old lady hesitated.

  ‘We take care to protect our members’ confidentiality and we don’t hand out their details to anyone,’ she said.

  I was trying to make as reassuring an impression as possible. It wasn’t easy when beads of sweat kept appearing on my forehead. My shirt was sticking to my back and I kept shuffling to avoid contact with the damp fabric. Lucy looked like she was about to start laughing but managed to stop herself. I had no idea how she was able to stand there looking so cool and unperturbed by the heat.

  ‘I had hoped you might be able to make an exception,’ I said. ‘For Sara Tell’s brother’s sake. You see, Sara is dead.’

  To keep the woman on side I neglected to mention that the woman I wanted information about was a suspected serial killer. It worked. Somewhat reluctantly she tapped at the keyboard in front of her. After a while she looked up.

  ‘Both of the women you mentioned are in our register,’ she said.

  I started with surprise.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Absolutely. They joined at the same time, early in 2007. They left in May and August respectively the following year.’

  I glanced at Lucy. She was as surprised as me.

  ‘Can you see how often they came riding?’ I said.

  The woman raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Sorry, how often they were here riding?’ she said brusquely.

  I looked around, bewildered.

  ‘Yes, what else would they be doing here? This is a riding school, isn’t it?’

  The woman laughed, and it wasn’t a friendly laugh.

  ‘I could see at once that you and your friend weren’t aware of what sort of establishment this is. This isn’t a riding school for girls who dream of horses. Our riders are among the best in the country, and all our training is aimed at dressage competitions at national or international level.’

  She pointed a bony finger at a series of diplomas and trophies lined up in a locked glass cabinet behind her.

  ‘One of our riders won gold in the World Championship just two years ago.’

  ‘Really,’ I said. ‘So if Sara and Jenny weren’t here to ride, would you mind telling us what they were doing here?’

  ‘Hard work,’ the woman said, stretching her already straight back. ‘They were among the many volunteers who come to our school to participate in an extraordinary equestrian environment.’

  ‘So they worked for free?’ Lucy said.

  ‘Yes, but from what I can see, not terribly often,’ the woman said. ‘They worked here on a total of three occasions. Now that I come to look at it, I can’t honestly understand how they were allowed to remain on the register for so long. We’re usually very quick to get rid of girls and boys who aren’t prepared to give their all.’

  I kept my opinion of the woman’s attitude to unpaid labour and the exploitation of young people to myself. I had one further question.

  ‘Would you mind loo
king to see if any other young women registered at the same time as Jenny and Sara?’ I said.

  The woman looked hesitant again.

  ‘You’re on rather thin ice now,’ she said.

  ‘You don’t have to say what their names are,’ Lucy said. ‘A yes or no would be fine.’

  Further hesitation, then finally an answer to the question.

  ‘Another two girls were registered at the same time,’ the woman said. ‘One of them was Swedish, just like your girls, and one was American. They seem to have followed the same pattern. They don’t come and work very often at all.’

  ‘Come and work?’ I repeated. ‘So they’re still registered?’

  ‘Yes. But it’s been six months since the last time either of them was here.’

  I leaned heavily against the reception desk. I was prepared to go to great lengths to learn the names of those two girls.

  ‘I can see what you’re thinking, and the answer’s no,’ the woman said firmly. ‘And that’s not negotiable.’

  ‘We understand,’ Lucy said quickly. ‘We’re very grateful for the information you’ve given us.’

  ‘Yes, truly,’ I said, nodding in agreement. ‘I won’t press you for further details. You don’t by any chance have any printed material about the school that we could have? It would be interesting to learn about the background to the school, who’s on the committee, that sort of thing.’

  A moment later I had a heavy brochure in my hands.

  ‘I hope this will be of some use,’ the woman said, evidently eager to be rid of us.

  ‘I’m sure it will be,’ I said.

  We thanked her for her help and prepared to leave. At least Lucy did. I couldn’t move from the spot. Because I knew I hadn’t done all I could to get the names of the other girls. And like hell was some miserable old cow in the middle of a baking hot Texas going to get in my way.

  I looked her right in the eyes.

  ‘Just answer this one question,’ I said. ‘Was one of the girls who was registered at the same time as Jenny and Sara called Denise?’

  Time stood still while I waited for the woman to make her mind up.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘One of them was called Denise Barton. According to our records, you’ll find her in Galveston.’

  40

  In a lot of ways cities are like people. When one is fashionable, it’s really fucking fashionable. And for one that used to be cool and fashionable but no longer is, there’s no way back. Barcelona is the clearest example of this. People who go there today can never get the magical first impression as those who went for the first time in the eighties and nineties. Time can be merciless. I’ve no idea how that can be prevented.

  Galveston is far more tragic than Barcelona. Galveston’s age of greatness is so far back in time that there’s no one left alive who can remember it. Lucy was steering the car through areas where colourful wooden houses stood side by side with abandoned hovels.

  ‘Exciting,’ she said. ‘They’ve done a great job of integrating the disadvantaged into society. Every second house looks like it’s about to fall down, while the others look like something designed by Alice in Wonderland.’

  I saw a chance to occupy my mind with something new, and gave a brief explanation of why the city looked the way it did. I told her about the hurricanes which sweep in to torment Galveston each year, tearing apart any buildings that aren’t strong enough. With my eyes half-closed behind my shades I talked about American society’s lack of solidarity and how much I actually like that, because it makes reasonable demands of individuals, as long as it doesn’t go too far. When a hurricane blows down the homes of hardworking people, I think it would be acceptable for society as a whole to help repair them.

  ‘Do most people have home insurance here?’ Lucy said.

  ‘Yes, but that doesn’t cover extreme weather conditions. They get defined as force majeure.’

  ‘So people don’t get financial compensation?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  Force majeure. I tried out the expression, and decided it was magnificent. Force majeure was why I couldn’t take Lucy to Nice as we had planned. Exceptional circumstances had forced me to take drastic decisions. Force majeure was also the reason I had left Sweden even though the police had told me to stay in Stockholm. If I had felt confident that they were doing their job I would have acted differently. I would have felt secure in the knowledge that they had reached the only reasonable and acceptable conclusion: that I was innocent. But things didn’t seem to be moving in that direction, which was why I had, as the stupid phrase goes, taken the law into my own hands.

  We checked into the Carlton Hotel. I paid for two nights but hoped we would be able to leave after just one. In spite of strenuous efforts to attract Lucifer’s attention we still hadn’t heard from him. All that remained of our plan was to meet Denise. We had come to the end of the road in Texas. It was almost time to go home.

  While we were waiting for the key to our room I pulled my mobile out of my pocket again. Still no messages or calls from Belle’s grandparents. Irritated, I tried calling again. Still no answer. Hopeless people. I’d been through this before. They would disappear on an outing all day, and I would break out in nerve-induced eczema when I couldn’t get hold of them. I had reluctantly learned to appreciate that, because it taught me how much Belle meant to me.

  I wondered what my sister would have thought if she could see me now. All sweaty palms and eyes red with tiredness. She’d have said she was disappointed. She would have wondered how I could leave Belle alone when I was in such a dangerous situation.

  But that’s not what I had done, I thought. I hid her away in the archipelago with Boris to watch over her. She wouldn’t have been any safer if I’d hidden her in the Pope’s wardrobe in the Vatican.

  The thought of Boris made me feel calmer for a while. He had promised to give me an update in a few hours. If Belle’s grandparents didn’t bother to get in touch in the meantime, at least Boris would let me know that everything was okay.

  At last the receptionist was ready.

  ‘You’re on the top floor,’ she said. ‘The elevator’s over there.’

  I thanked her and then asked the question that contained the entire purpose of our trip to Galveston.

  ‘Denise Barton,’ I said. ‘Does she work here?’

  The receptionist’s smile faded.

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘But she used to work here, didn’t she?’

  ‘Yes, but that was several years ago.’

  ‘You don’t know where she’s working now?’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  I smiled my most ingratiating smile.

  ‘It would be a huge help if you could ask around,’ I said. ‘Lucy and I would really like to get in touch with her. It’s urgent, really very important.’

  The receptionist was more malleable than the old woman at the riding school.

  ‘I’ll see what I can do,’ she said. ‘I’ll get back to you.’

  We left it at that and squeezed into the lift.

  Lucy let out a whistle when we walked into our room. I had booked a mini-suite with a view of the Gulf of Mexico. Perhaps the magnificent view would help Lucy relax.

  ‘Have we got anything planned here, apart from seeing Denise?’ Lucy said.

  ‘Not that I know of,’ I said.

  ‘Good,’ Lucy said. ‘Then I’m going to take a long bath.’

  She shut herself in the bathroom and I sat down on the bed with my eyes fixed on the big picture window. The view was magnificent. The water was clear blue, the beach endless. Unfortunately it was also packed to bursting with people. Presumably that was why Lucy would rather lie in a bath indoors than on a sun-lounger outside. Best to stay inside until the sun went down or the receptionist got in touch to say where we could find Denise Barton.

  Exhausted, I gave in to tiredness and lay back on the bed. The whitewashed ceiling with its little spotlights had an almost hypn
otic effect on me. I pretended the lights were tiny stars and that I was drifting weightless in space, out of reach of anyone trying to catch me.

  I believed I had solved a large part of the mystery that had made Sara Tell so hard to understand at first. The whole story was more logical if there was a link between her involvement in Lucifer’s network and her decision to come specifically to Houston. As far as we were aware, Sara had never even sat on a horse before she left Sweden. Something else must have enticed her to Texas. I thought about what her sister, Marion, had said. That Sara had belonged to a gang who wreaked havoc on the streets of Stockholm. Could that have been where she got her contacts?

  To say I had doubts about my own theory was putting it mildly. If Lucifer’s network extended all the way to Sweden, then I wouldn’t have been the only one who knew about it. The police in Texas and Stockholm would have known. But perhaps Sheriff Stiller had been right: if Sara had been part of Lucifer’s network, she was so far from the centre that she hadn’t shown up on the police’s radar.

  All that linked Sara to Lucifer were some sporadic mentions in a diary that turned out to belong to someone else. How much significance could I place on something like that? When we weren’t even sure that the Lucifer mentioned in the diary was actually the mafia boss and not someone completely different?

  ‘Baby?’ I said in a loud voice.

  ‘Mmm,’ Lucy said from the bathroom.

  ‘Why did Jenny send Bobby her diary?’

  ‘To get Sara exonerated.’

  ‘But what specifically in the diary would do that? There was nothing in there that could help Sara. The entries weren’t dated, and there was nothing that gave her an alibi for either of the murders.’

  Silence from the bathroom. The only sound was the lapping of the water, as if Lucy were splashing it with her fingers.

  I got up from the bed abruptly and ran over to the bathroom.

  ‘Are you okay?’ I said, pushing at the half-open door.