‘Thanks,’ Johansson said. He sat down at the end of the long table and took out his diary and a pen. Nodded from behind his dark, mirrored glasses.
‘It’s good that you could find the time to see us, Staffan,’ Johansson said. No headache now, no tightness in his chest. Just enough distance from his prey. Even his right index finger felt normal.
A smart, respectable prey, he thought. Evil in its most disarming guise. Blue jacket, white shirt, grey trousers, the same type of shoes as him. Friendly blue eyes, white teeth. No sign of swelling or bruising from the slap on the nose administered by Johansson’s little helper the week before.
‘Thank you,’ Staffan Nilsson said. ‘It’s a pleasure to be able to come and meet you, gentlemen. I’m looking forward to presenting our new project.’ He raised the screen of his laptop.
‘Splendid,’ Mats Eriksson said. He leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers. ‘Why don’t you begin, Staffan?’
Staffan Nilsson showed pictures of his Thai paradise. It could be completed within three years but as yet existed only in the form of financial calculations and animated 3D designs of the architects’ plans for the proposed resort. Backed up, of course, with the usual photographs of the surrounding landscape: the long white beach, the blue sea, the islands off the coast, the high mountains behind.
‘Without wishing to exaggerate, I think it’s justifiable to describe the southern coast of Thailand as one of the most beautiful places on the planet,’ Staffan Nilsson said, smiling and nodding amiably towards Johansson.
It took half an hour. Mats Eriksson asked all the expected accountancy questions about funding, liquidity, projected profit. And, of course, all the risks that might arise during the process, and how these might be dealt with. Johansson made do with grunting occasionally; he mostly sat and looked at Staffan Nilsson and his body language, his facial expressions, trying to see the thoughts in his head, remaining himself ensconced behind his dark, mirrored glasses and generally eccentric disguise. He believes what he’s saying, Johansson thought. He is the very embodiment of the man he’s making himself out to be. He doesn’t even have to pretend any more. He just switches himself on and off because he’s spent his whole life learning to dissemble.
As a result, Staffan Nilsson gave an irreproachable presentation. He had done his homework; he was quietly spoken, likeable. You could have made any amount of money, Johansson thought. If only you’d been normal. If it hadn’t been for your proclivities. And the fact that everything in your life is geared towards allowing you to have sex with little girls.
‘What do you say, Mats?’ Johansson said. ‘Time for us to do some serious thinking, wouldn’t you say? Let’s sit down and crunch some numbers. I think we should book another meeting.’
‘It’s undoubtedly a very interesting project,’ Mats Eriksson agreed. ‘But, as you say, we need a bit of time to look into the figures.’
‘Thursday afternoon. Or Friday morning,’ Johansson said, making a show of leafing through his diary. ‘I’m away after that,’ he said. ‘Elk hunting with my brother.’
‘I’m busy all day Thursday,’ Staffan Nilsson said. ‘But Friday morning would be good.’
‘Let’s say that, then,’ Johansson said. ‘Friday, nine o’clock.’ After that meeting, you’re going to be busy for the rest of your life, he thought.
As soon as he got home to Södermalm Johansson called Mats Eriksson.
‘Well, then,’ he said. ‘What sort of impression did you get of Staffan Nilsson?’
‘I was positively surprised,’ Mats Eriksson said. ‘After everything I’ve heard about him, I’d go so far as to say that I was very positively surprised. And his proposed project doesn’t seem to be entirely without merit either.’
‘So now you’re thinking of starting to build hotels in Thailand?’
‘Strangely enough, no, I’m not,’ Mats said.
‘Why not?’ Johansson teased. ‘If it was that good?’
‘Because Evert would kill me,’ Mats Eriksson said. ‘You still don’t feel like telling me why you’re so interested in Staffan Nilsson?’
‘No,’ Johansson said.
‘Why not?’
‘Because you’d probably kill him.’
As soon as he had hung up, Mattei called him.
‘Everything okay, Lars?’
‘Muddling on,’ Johansson said. ‘What can I do for you?’
‘Staffan Nilsson,’ Mattei said. ‘Our now prescribed perpetrator. Nephew of Margaretha Sagerlied’s husband. To save you the trouble of phoning me in a few days’ time.’
‘Congratulations,’ Johansson said. ‘That was quick work.’
‘Not too much of a challenge after what you told me,’ Mattei said. ‘I presume you know that there’s an old case against him for child pornography, a case that was dropped?’
‘I know. What makes me think that you and your colleagues are bugging Ulrika Stenholm’s phone? Since I mentioned her name to you?’
‘You’ll have to excuse me. I didn’t hear that.’
‘I don’t want to embarrass you, Lisa. I know as well as you do that we don’t comment on that sort of assertion but, on Monday morning, as I’m sure you’re aware, I’m going to be meeting Joseph Simon at the Grand Hotel in Stockholm. Naturally, I intend to send him away empty-handed.’
‘I wouldn’t expect anything else,’ Lisa said.
‘So you can hold back on putting Nilsson under surveillance. He’ll be okay for a bit longer. And there’s no need for you to listen to me and Simon, either. Save your money; don’t waste resources unnecessarily. I promise to behave.’
‘As I’ve said already, I wouldn’t dream of bugging you, boss,’ Mattei said.
‘Good to hear,’ Johansson said. At last, he thought. There it was. ‘Boss’.
‘What are your plans for the weekend, boss?’ Max asked. ‘I hear that Pia’s going off to some conference.’
‘Peace and quiet,’ Johansson said. I need to think, he thought.
‘Let me know if there’s anything I can help you with, boss.’
‘You can call Jarnebring and ask if he’d like to have lunch with us tomorrow,’ Johansson said. ‘Here in the house,’ he added. ‘So we can talk openly.’
92
Saturday, 21 August to Sunday, 22 August
On Saturday, Johansson had lunch at home with Jarnebring and Max. He had the food delivered from a local restaurant and, as Pia was safely out of the way, he allowed himself and his guests one or two little treats. While they were eating, Johansson told them about the latest developments and his encounter with Staffan Nilsson. But he didn’t mention his forthcoming meeting with Joseph Simon. That could wait.
‘So, what was he like?’ Jarnebring asked.
‘If I hadn’t known about Yasmine, I daresay I’d have thought him a nice, pleasant chap. He doesn’t exactly exude guilt. So he seems to have learned to deal with that.’
‘Good thing you didn’t take me with you,’ Jarnebring said. ‘I’d have killed the bastard.’
‘Quite,’ Johansson said. ‘I daresay that’s why I didn’t take you with me.’
‘At least Max has had a chance to take a swing at him,’ Jarnebring said, slapping his fellow diner on the shoulder. ‘Whoever said that life was fair, eh?’
‘That’s why Max had to stay at home, too.’
‘So what are you thinking of doing, then?’ Jarnebring asked.
‘As far as I can make out, there are four options,’ Johansson said thoughtfully, taking a bite of the splendid Italian salami that his favourite restaurateur had selected as a starter, along with an assortment of sardines, olives and miniature preserved artichoke hearts.
‘Which are?’ Jarnebring said.
‘The first option is just to forget about the whole thing. It’s a prescribed crime,’ Johansson said, and shrugged his shoulders. ‘There are no formal impediments to us simply keeping our mouths shut and getting on with our lives.’
‘For G
od’s sake, Lars,’ Jarnebring protested. ‘You’re not serious, are you?’
‘No,’ Johansson said. ‘In my book, there are some things you can’t just ignore. This is one of them. Anyway, I don’t think that would work, even if the three of us at this table are doubtless capable of keeping our mouths shut.’
‘I quite agree,’ Jarnebring said. ‘Sooner or later, one or other of our former colleagues would work everything out. As you can imagine, there’s already a certain amount of talk in the corridors. The man who can see round corners has identified Yasmine’s killer. And is refusing to say who it is. All that sort of crap.’
‘Option two is to go directly to the media and hang him out to dry. That would be pretty easy, and would at least save time, compared to letting Hermansson or another like-minded colleague figure out who did it.’ Because that would no doubt take a while, Johansson thought.
‘That wouldn’t be particularly pleasant for him,’ Jarnebring said.
‘No,’ Johansson said. ‘A number of our criminal gangs already post pictures of ordinary paedophiles on their websites, and when it comes to Nilsson there are doubtless a fair few people who could imagine compensating for the shortcomings of the judicial system.’
Johansson sighed and sipped his wine thoughtfully. Then he popped a large olive and a couple of anchovies in his mouth to help him think better.
‘With that in mind, maybe the simplest solution would be to kill the bastard straight off?’ Jarnebring said.
‘That’s the third alternative,’ Johansson said, ‘and I sincerely hope that you’re not thinking of anyone sitting at this table.’
Jarnebring said nothing, just shrugged his shoulders and exchanged a glance with Max, whose mind seemed to be elsewhere.
‘You said four options,’ Jarnebring said. ‘So what’s the fourth?’
‘Talk to him,’ Johansson said. ‘Talk to Nilsson. Explain the situation. Offer him the chance to take his punishment. The punishment for what he did to Yasmine would have been life imprisonment. I’m pretty certain of that – actually, completely certain since I met him and had the chance to study him at close quarters. Secure psychiatric treatment wouldn’t have been an option in his case.’
‘I hear what you’re saying,’ Jarnebring said with a shrug. ‘The problem these days is that he wouldn’t even get a rap on the knuckles for what he did to her.’
‘I’m getting to that,’ Johansson said. ‘How we arrange a life sentence for him.’
‘I certainly hope we can,’ Jarnebring said.
‘A life sentence,’ Johansson repeated. ‘They’d probably let him out after twenty years or so, so I could probably live with that.’
‘A life sentence for what, though?’ Jarnebring asked. ‘The problem is that we can’t find any other crap he’s done. Sitting there downloading child porn from the internet. What would he get for that? Six months and a slap on the wrist, at most.’
‘I’m pretty sure he’s been with a number of young girls the same age as Yasmine over the years. If he could just be made to confess that, we’re looking at a number of years. Or he could make something up. Take that idiot Thomas Quick, the worst serial killer in the history of Scandinavian crime. He’s in his twentieth year in jail now, isn’t he? Thanks to his vivid imagination and a number of our colleagues who are even stupider than he is. Wasn’t Bäckström involved in that whole business?’
‘Bound to have been,’ Jarnebring said. ‘I hear what you’re saying. I was thinking about Nilsson’s mother’s suicide. That hasn’t passed the statute of limitations yet. Whether it was a murder, I mean. Which I don’t think it was. She killed herself, for the simple reason that she’d worked out what her little boy had done to Yasmine. So much for his willingness to accept some sort of punishment . . .’
‘Regrettably, that does seem to be the case,’ Johansson said with a nod. ‘He appears to be able to live with a number of things on his conscience.’
‘What makes you think he’d change his attitude?’
‘I have an idea that I might be able to get him to realize what’s in his best interests. Give him the chance to crawl off into the sort of place where they put men like him. Give him a chance to survive, at the cost of the punishment he should have received.’ Johansson nodded to underline what he’d just said.
‘And if he doesn’t get it?’ Jarnebring asked.
‘That still leaves the first three options. But at least he’ll have been offered a choice, which is rather more than Yasmine had.’
‘If you want me to do anything, just say the word, boss,’ Max said. ‘In my book, there are plenty of people like him who’ve forfeited their right to life.’
‘I hear what you’re saying, Max,’ Johansson said. ‘Believe it or not, but it’s actually for your sake that I’m asking you not to do it.’
Johansson spent Sunday afternoon doing what people in his home district called ‘death tidying’, making sure that the not-yet-deceased had his or her paperwork in order when they finally shuffled off this mortal coil. That they, to take just one good example, got rid of anything that might spoil the image of a close and devoted relative.
When he failed to think of anything that he ought to look for, he sat down and wrote a private letter to his wife, Pia, instead, to be kept with his will. When it came down to it, it was all about the idea that keeping things in order was a way of prolonging life. Like all the life-insurance policies that people like him kept taking out, even though they never actually paid out anything while there was any real point in having it.
It was a way of not letting go. In spite of his constant headache and the tightness in his chest that made it hard to breathe. In spite of all the little white pills he kept taking, when flight and detachment were the only options remaining to him.
Wonder if I’ll get to heaven? Johansson suddenly thought as he lay on the sofa, where he now spent the majority of his time. I probably should, he thought. He’d never done anything too awful, not even when he worked in the Security Police. Not that he could remember, anyway. In a purely professional sense, he had devoted most of his life to trying to protect and help people who had suffered the most unimaginable horrors.
‘Max!’ Johansson called.
‘Yes, boss,’ Max said when he appeared, almost instantly, in the doorway to his study.
Quite astonishing, Johansson thought. You just had to say his name and there he was. I don’t even have to sit here rubbing an old lamp. ‘Do you believe in God, Max?’ he said.
‘I don’t think there’s a God,’ Max said, shaking his head.
‘Why not?’
‘If there was a God, he’d never have left me in that home in Grazdanka. I was only a child. I hadn’t done any harm to anyone.’
93
Monday, 23 August
At nine o’clock on Monday morning Johannson met Joseph Simon in his suite in the Grand Hotel in Stockholm. Simon himself had called him an hour earlier, when he was on his way to his hotel from Bromma Airport.
‘My name is Joseph Simon,’ Joseph Simon said. ‘I was Yasmine’s father. I’m in Stockholm now. I’d like to meet you as soon as you can manage. I’m staying at the Grand Hotel, but if you’d rather meet somewhere else that would obviously be fine.’
‘See you at the Grand in an hour,’ Johansson said. ‘Nine o’clock.’
‘Perfect,’ Simon said. ‘Do you want me to send a car to pick you up?’
‘No,’ Johansson said. ‘I’ve got my own chauffeur.’
Perfect Swedish, he thought. Only a trace of an accent, in spite of the many years that had passed. That saved Johansson practical worry, seeing as his English left a great deal to be desired these days.
‘Max,’ Johansson said.
‘Boss,’ Max said, a moment later.
‘We’re going out. You’re coming with me to meet Yasmine’s father.’ Just in case, he thought. Taking Jarnebring was out of the question, for historical reasons.
He was physically similar
to Jarnebring, Johansson thought when he and Joseph Simon shook hands, but otherwise completely different to his best friend. He looks like the Shah of Iran, he thought, even though he had only ever seen pictures of him.
He was surrounded by the usual entourage that people like him presumably took with them, even on private trips. Four men and a woman. His lawyer, his secretary, three personal assistants, of whom two were bodyguards, to judge by their appearance and the look they exchanged when they caught sight of Max.
‘I’m glad you could see me,’ Joseph Simon said with a polite gesture to the armchair next to his.
‘Well,’ Johansson said, ‘I felt we should meet. But I’d rather speak to you in private.’
‘Of course,’ Simon said, and all he had to do to get the others to leave the room was nod towards his secretary. Even Max picked up the message and went out with them.
‘Well, then,’ Simon went on. ‘An acquaintance of mine believes that you have identified the man who murdered my daughter, Yasmine.’
‘Yes,’ Johansson said. ‘That’s why I asked her to arrange this meeting.’
‘Please don’t be offended, but over the years a number of people have contacted me, claiming to know who he is. The man who murdered my daughter. People wanting money from me – the usual lunatics. Sadly, it has never been true, but they have caused me personal suffering as well as practical problems.’
‘I know,’ Johansson said. ‘I know the sort of people you’re talking about, but on that point you can rest assured. I have really found him.’
‘Of course, I know who you are,’ Joseph Simon said with a slight smile. ‘But how can you be sure? After all, twenty-five years have passed since it happened.’
‘I got hold of a sample of his DNA and compared it to the perpetrator’s,’ Johansson said. ‘The chance of it being someone else is less than one in a billion. That was mostly to confirm to myself that it really was him. To rule out any possibility of a mistake.’
‘You’d already worked out that it was him? Without DNA?’
‘Yes,’ Johansson said. ‘If I’d been part of the investigation when it happened, I’m fairly certain that I’d have got him convicted even without any DNA. Of course, we didn’t have access to that technology when your daughter was murdered.’
The Dying Detective Page 37