Irene leaned back in her chair and stretched. When this wedding took place, Richard’s son in Stockholm was already almost four months old. Did Sylvia know that he existed? This was an important question to ask at their upcoming meeting.
A clipping reported on their parental joy when Henrik was born in April 1966. He was a very sweet baby, just as they usually are. Richard looked straight into the camera and smiled broadly; Sylvia looked down at her child.
Then it was relatively calm on the gossip front for a while. Irene focused on two clippings from a couple of society parties. Richard was shown with the same woman in both, and it was not Sylvia. Her name was not given. The clippings were from September and October 1967.
Six years later, in July 1973, Richard’s mother Elisabeth von Knecht died, at the age of sixty-five. “She lost her courageous battle with cancer,” the magazine announced.
Less than a year later the sale of the family shipping company had been arranged. The price was kept confidential, but the article hinted that considerable sums were involved. After this, it was possible to track Richard’s meteoric career as one of Sweden’s biggest and most successful financiers.
Sylvia was glimpsed only now and then in an official capacity—a lunch with the king here and a Nobel Prize banquet there. Richard was seen often in photos from premieres and major sailing races. There were always women around him—but Sylvia was seldom among them. A distinct characteristic became evident with regard to Richard—a weakness for young, beautiful women. And he did nothing to hide it. This wouldn’t be easy to discuss with Sylvia, but it was important. Perhaps a motive? Now there were two for Sylvia: money and infidelity. The problem was that it would have been impossible for her to murder Richard. You can’t be standing down on the street and at the same time shove someone off the sixth-floor balcony. Henrik was eliminated for the same reason. But did he have any motive? Yes, money. Lots of money.
She started turning the pages faster. She was running out of time. Suddenly her attention was caught by the headline: WILL HENRIK MAKE IT? PARENTS CONSTANTLY AT HIS SIDE. To her surprise Irene actually remembered the news story. But it had been nine years ago. Back then she had been employed full time as well as having two four-year-olds. This item had been pushed back into the recesses of her memory, just like so many others. She spread out the faxes on the desk and quickly read about how Henrik and one of his army buddies from his commando unit had fallen ill. The progression of the disease turned serious, especially for Henrik. One complication was that he’d come down with meningitis. At the time the article was written he had been in a coma for two weeks. Suddenly Irene noticed a discrepancy between the text and the accompanying photo. The text said that “the parents were keeping vigil,” but in the photo only Sylvia was seen on her way in through the hospital entrance. Maybe they took turns keeping vigil? If she had the chance, she should try to ask Sylvia about it.
A week later the magazine reported that Henrik had come out of the coma. Both the doctors and parents were reticent about his condition. Richard had told the reporter that “Henrik will soon be his old self again!” After that there was no more news of Henrik in the gossip columns.
His father was seen, as before, at various society events. And even Sylvia began to be seen more often—not together with her husband, but in her capacity as a prominent choreographer. She staged several ballets at the Grand Theater, she worked with the Cullberg Ballet in a performance, and she was invited to be guest director of the Helsinki ballet company in the spring of 1991. But she returned home from Finland that same summer. The reason she cited was “homesickness,” but between the lines could be discerned professional differences.
The only report of Henrik and Charlotte’s wedding was a brief announcement with no photo. Irene almost missed it, under the heading HEARD AROUND TOWN. In the middle of the column it said: “Richard and Sylvia von Knecht’s only son Henrik was married to Charlotte, née Croona, in a simple ceremony at the Copenhagen Town Hall on September 10. Present were the couple’s parents and the bride’s siblings.” Irene checked the date in the top corner. A little more than three years ago. She leafed further, but could find nothing else about Henrik and Charlotte.
The last thing she had time to glance at was the report from Richard’s sixtieth birthday celebration out on his private peninsula in Bohuslän province. In all there had been three hundred guests, including various royals, diverse celebrities, and the elite of the financial world and the social register. Irene only took time to look at the pictures; she would read the articles later. He was still good looking. His hair was flecked with gray, thick, with a shock still falling over one eye. He had put on a few kilos since the wedding pictures, but there was no sign of flab. His complexion looked deeply tanned against the white tuxedo. With a champagne glass raised to the camera he smiled his sensuously disarming smile. It was unchanged, just like the glint in his intense blue eyes. Vitality, joie de vivre, sensuality were the words that flew through Irene’s mind. Not the more obvious ones: money, power, influence. Strange, because they were equally apropos when it came to Richard von Knecht.
A quick look at the clock revealed that she had fifteen minutes left until her meeting with Sylvia. It would be best to show up more or less on time. She stuffed the stack of faxes in her bottom desk drawer and slipped a notepad into her jacket pocket.
SYLVIA WAS still upset over the mess in the apartment. She grumbled at Irene, who represented the police in general and the technicians in particular. Irene let her rant, following in her wake into the magnificent living room. The curtains were still open, letting in the gray daylight. Irene went over to one of the high French doors and looked out. A narrow balcony no more than two meters wide ran along the entire room. The balustrade consisted of pink vase-shaped marble columns with lintels of black marble. The railing looked dangerously low. There were also no handles on the outside of the glass doors. This prompted Irene to dismiss her thoughts of a façade-climbing killer. It would be impossible to get in from the outside through the balcony doors. And people would have noticed him, since it would only have been a little past five o’clock. No, that theory was no good.
Her thoughts were interrupted by Sylvia’s plaintive voice.
“Pirjo isn’t answering the phone either, just one of her imbecile kids. Even when I speak Finnish to him he still can’t tell me where Pirjo is. He claims he has the flu and that a Finnish policeman is coming to talk to them this afternoon.”
“That’s true. One of our inspectors speaks Finnish. He’ll get in touch with Pirjo,” said Irene.
“What’s the point of that?”
“She and her daughter may have seen or heard something on Monday, when they were here cleaning. Does she usually bring her daughter along?”
“No, only if we’ve had a big party. And if the girl is free,” replied Sylvia brusquely.
Irene looked around the huge room. Now she saw that the columns supporting the floor of the upper level were not made of solid marble at all, as she had thought two days earlier. They were wooden columns very skillfully painted with a marble finish. Naturally, real marble would have been too heavy. The walls were lined with groupings of antique furniture and beautiful cabinets. And what paintings! Irene felt like a lone privileged visitor to an art museum. Parallel to the row of balcony doors shone a dark dining table of mahogany, the longest she had ever seen. She saw a good opening for her conversation with Sylvia.
“What a lovely table. And so long! Is this where you sat on Saturday evening?”
“Yes, of course we were here,” Sylvia said guardedly.
“How many were you?”
“Twenty. We didn’t want to invite too many, just our closest friends. They had all attended our wedding. Except for Henrik and Charlotte, naturally.”
That depends on how you look at it, in Henrik’s case, Irene thought.
Sylvia went on, “Richard’s sister and her husband couldn’t come. They live in Florida. He was having an opera
tion on his prostate or something. He’s seventy-five.”
“And how old is she?”
“Sixty-seven.”
“Could you please tell me who was at the party?”
“Of course. Besides Richard and myself, there were Henrik and Charlotte, Sven and Ann-Marie Tosse, Peder and Ulla Wahl. They had come back to Sweden to see grandchild number four. They were here a whole week before the party. Their eldest daughter Ingrid and her husband came too. Ingrid was a flower girl at our wedding. She was five years old at the time, so sweet. She wasn’t the one who has the new baby; it was the middle daughter Kerstin. She was only two when we got married, so she wasn’t at the wedding. That’s why I didn’t invite her. Or the youngest daughter either. She’s the same age as Henrik.”
She stopped, looking confused. Irene realized that she had lost her train of thought. She had managed to jot down all the names Sylvia had mentioned and was pleased at the pause; it gave her a chance to catch up.
Irene took pity on her and said, “You’ve told me that your family, the Tosses, and the Wahl clan were present. What’s Ingrid’s last name?”
“Von Hjortz.”
“Thank you. I’d like to get the phone numbers for all of them before I go.”
Sylvia nodded and took a deep breath before resuming her guest list. “My mother, Ritva Montgomery. She’s seventy-eight. My sister Arja came over with her from Helsinki. Then there was Valle Reuter—”
She broke off. A cloud of undisguised contempt passed over her face. Quickly she continued, “We were so pleased that Gustav Ceder and his wife, Lady Louise, could come. Her father is almost a hundred years old and on his deathbed. They came last Friday night and flew back to London at lunchtime on Sunday. We haven’t seen them since their silver anniversary four years ago. They couldn’t make it to Richard’s sixtieth birthday, because that’s when her father fell seriously ill, although he made a recovery . . .”
Suddenly she fell silent again, confused. Angrily she exclaimed, “God, how I’m going on! Now I’ve lost my train of thought again!”
She cast an imploring look at Irene, who humored her and said, “Valle Reuter and then Gustav Ceder with his noble wife Louise.”
“Thank you. Our good friend Ivan Viktors, the opera singer, you know, was here too.”
Irene vaguely recognized his name. Apparently he was someone she ought to know, since the superintendent had been so charmed when he heard of him. But Andersson was an opera fan, and Irene was not. The Beatles, Rod Stewart, and Tina Turner were more her taste.
“That leaves only Richard’s two cousins and their husbands. They’re the two daughters of Richard’s aunt. They’re our age and were, as I mentioned, at the wedding. Pleasant, but we don’t see them very often. Both of them live in Stockholm. My mother-in-law was from Stockholm. I’ll give you all the names and addresses you want,” Sylvia said.
She turned on her heel and began gracefully ascending the stairs to the upper floor. Irene decided to follow. The thick runner effectively muted her brisk footsteps on the stairs. At the top Irene caught a glimpse of Sylvia heading through the doorway to the room that was someone’s office. The desk and computer had led her and the superintendent to draw the erroneous conclusion that it was Richard’s. The ballet poster, however, indicated that it must be Sylvia’s. Richard had a whole apartment for his office, after all.
Irene quickly crossed the soft carpets in the hall and library. Sylvia gave a start when she realized she was no longer alone in the workroom. Irene was perplexed by this reaction, and by the expression on Sylvia’s face. She looked as if she’d been caught red-handed.
As Irene later recalled this fleeting image, Sylvia leaned her forehead lightly against the frame of the photograph that hung on the wall next to the computer table. Irene took a few cautious steps into the room and looked at the picture. The photo itself was A4 letter sized, surrounded by a broad mat within a narrow silver frame.
The smile was the same. The glint in his eyes, the expression of joie de vivre. A markedly pulsating, sensual presence. But it wasn’t Richard; it was Henrik. The short-cropped hair and the beret that sat nonchalantly—but certainly according to regulations—at an angle showed that the picture must have been taken when he was in the service. The commandos, the magazine article had reported.
Sylvia gave Irene a look brimming over with rage and hatred. Suddenly she started to cry. Her eyes wide, without blinking, she stood erect with her arms hanging loosely at her sides, without uttering a sound, but tears were streaming down her cheeks. Irene had an uncomfortable feeling of having witnessed something very personal. She felt the need to break the unpleasant scene which she had unintentionally provoked.
Contritely she said, “Forgive me, I must have misunderstood you, but I thought I was supposed to follow you up here and write down the addresses.”
Sylvia didn’t reply, but her smoldering fury subsided. Instead she began to shake violently. On impulse Irene went over, carefully put one hand on the woman’s shoulder, and led her to the desk. She pulled out the chair and Sylvia sat heavily. She was still staring straight ahead. Almost inaudibly she whispered, “I usually talk to him.”
“To Henrik?”
Sylvia nodded. Irene was slightly annoyed. It was obvious that they talked often. For one thing, they only lived a few kilometers apart, and for another, there were plenty of telephones in the apartment. But she had a vague, nagging feeling that she was on the wrong track. That wasn’t what Sylvia meant. It had something to do with the brief scene with the photograph. Adoration?
Doubtfully she asked, “Do you mean that you talk to Henrik’s picture?”
Sylvia continued staring stiffly into space as she nodded. The tears were still flowing, though not as copiously. Was Sylvia about to break down again? Maybe it had been too soon to send her home from the psych ward? Best to take it a little easy. Cautiously Irene asked, “Does he answer?”
Sylvia straightened up and said firmly, “This Henrik answers me!”
What did she mean? It felt as though they were walking on thin ice, ice that was cracking beneath them with each step. This was the widow of a murder victim, just released after a nervous breakdown. It was important to proceed carefully, since she still seemed unbalanced. Was Sylvia about to slip into psychosis? But at the same time it was important to nail down her meaning.
Tentatively Irene said, “You said this Henrik. Is there another Henrik besides your son?”
The question was phrased incorrectly. Irritated, Sylvia shrugged and snapped, “Of course it’s Henrik. But the way he used to be!”
Then the penny finally dropped.
“You mean before he got sick? Before the meningitis?”
Sylvia gave her a mute, slow nod in reply.
“Is he very different since his illness?” Irene went on.
“Yes. He was in a coma for eighteen days. When he woke up he was completely changed. He had a hard time reading, difficulty walking, and often got headaches when there was too much noise. He withdrew from his old friends. Didn’t think he could hang out with them anymore. Finally they stopped calling too. Just like Emelie.”
Sylvia fell silent and a pained look passed over her face.
Irene asked in a low voice, “Who was Emelie?”
“His girlfriend. They had found an apartment and were going to move in together when he finished his military service. Much too early, I thought. But he loved her. Although she didn’t love him. It was obvious during the time he was in the hospital. She found herself a new boyfriend, an old mutual friend from their childhood. A double betrayal. I think that’s what finally broke him.”
There was hatred in her gaze again. But she was talking—which, for Irene, was the main thing. She remembered the photo clipping, with Sylvia going into the hospital alone.
“How did you husband take it? Henrik’s illness and all?” she asked cautiously.
Hatred flamed in her eyes again. It felt physical, like a slap in the face, but I
rene understood that it wasn’t directed at her. It was for Richard.
In a stifled voice Sylvia said, “He denied it was happening! Henrik wasn’t sick! He would soon recover from his little ailment and be just the same as ever!”
“But he didn’t.”
“No.”
“What happened?”
Sylvia’s voice sounded infinitely weary. It seemed to cost her all the strength in the world to answer the question.
“Henrik worked hard at therapy and improved physically. But he was so different. He was no longer Henrik. The doctors said that there had been damage to his brain. It took almost three years before the dizziness and headaches went away. Gradually, Richard and Henrik slipped farther and farther apart. They had done so many things together before. Above all, Richard fretted that Henrik had suddenly lost interest in the stock market and business deals. He was furious when Henrik started to study art history at the university, specializing in the history of fashion. But after a while Richard changed his attitude. He was the one who suggested to Henrik that he start purchasing antiques directly for his clients. In time, Richard became one of his biggest customers. It brought them a little closer to each other again.”
“But things were never the way they were before the meningitis.”
Detective Inspector Huss: A Huss Investigation set in Sweden, Vol. 1 Page 12