They went to the archive under the hill. Two crew members from the USS Key West followed. Bolt had motioned to them with his hand and they had immediately gone and grabbed an empty aluminum coffin. Bolt was carrying a small cloth bag. He walked with a straight back, his arms hanging loose.
Modin glanced toward the cottage and saw Filipson coming toward them, who had just arrived by helicopter.
It was as if Filipson didn’t see Harrison Bolt. He only addressed Modin: “I’ll take it from here, Modin. You’re safe now. The Swedish authorities are taking over. I’ve been in touch with the Minister of Defense, and he has given us free rein. My men from the Security Service are conducting arrests at your house as we speak. The Coast Guard is taking the rest to Stockholm. People are already cleaning up your place. The Swedish government will pay for any damage on your house. We’ll even foot the bill for the cat food for your sweet cat.”
Göran Filipson stopped talking and looked at Modin, still ignoring the U.S. Navy officer.
“You mean you have arrested Crack of Dawn,” Modin said. “Special Ops’ Crack of Dawn?”
“I know you are upset, Modin. I really am sorry. I just want you to know one thing. Crack of Dawn doesn’t exist anymore. It was disbanded in the mid-1990s. These guys were an underground cell, working for…” He stopped talking and spread his arms wide. “Yes, who knows? All kinds of criminal syndicates who were willing to pay. You will receive an apology from the government.”
“An official apology? Crack of Dawn is an organization funded by taxpayer money. They belong to Special Ops.”
Filipson didn’t reply.
“We are on our way to the bunker right now,” Modin said and gestured to Bolt.
Bolt and Filipson didn’t pay much attention to each other. It was clear that Bolt was not to feature in Filipson’s report and vice-versa. They walked side by side.
When they arrived at the archive in the bunker, Modin had the distinct impression that Harrison Bolt had known Julia personally. The American stood with his head bowed, honoring a Swedish woman.
“Can I bring her back with us?” Bolt said. “To Norfolk. Bring the boys and girls back home, you know.”
“I don’t know. Why?”
“She’s one of ours. Her real name was Julia Jones. She is an American citizen, employed by the NSA. I’ve been given explicit orders to bring her home. We always take care of our fallen members.”
“I thought she’d quit working for you and had moved home for good.”
“No, Mr. Modin. You never leave the NSA. She is, or rather was, still on an assignment for the U.S. Administration. She was one of us. I have to take her. Those are my orders.”
“That’s how it is, Modin,” Filipson said. “She’s one of theirs. She’s an American. They’ve been given permission by the Swedish government. You’ll have to let her go.”
Modin’s head was spinning. Julia, an American agent? He could not deny that. What he did not understand was why. She had revealed the SOSUS installation to him. Why? What had she been thinking when she suggested she was a double agent? Did she want help to leave the service? Did I let her down? No, she was right in the middle of all this and knew she would never be able to leave. I will never find out who Julia really was. I won’t ever know if our relationship was real, if she ever loved me.
“Take good care of her and give her a worthy funeral,” Modin said quietly.
He understood that revealing the existence of the SOSUS installation had been an attempt to repay her debt to Sweden, and perhaps to reveal her love for him.
“The worthiest of funerals,” Harrison Bolt said and fumbled with the cloth bag.
Then he unfolded the Stars and Stripes.
CHAPTER 97
Anton Modin watched how they prepared Julia’s coffin. Four members of the crew in white U.S. Navy uniforms lifted up the coffin draped in the Stars and Stripes and carried it down the cliff to the waiting USS Key West.
Julia is on her way home, Modin thought, but his feelings wouldn’t accept the fact. He stood nailed to the spot on the cliff as the coffin passed by him. The air was chilly. A faint breeze that seemed to come from nowhere was blowing as Julia’s coffin was loaded on board. He’d known her as a teenager, he’d loved her, and now they would never see each other again.
“Modin, we have to talk.”
Göran Filipson turned up behind him. He smelled of dusty offices and authority. His sharp tone of voice suggested an order to tie up loose ends. Behind him stood an older lady wearing a beige coat over her shoulders. Modin thought she looked familiar.
“This is Gun Hellberg, the Minister of Justice. She wants to have a word with you.”
Gun Hellberg came up as if on cue and shook Modin’s hand. He felt her cool little hand squeeze hard as her gaze fixed onto his. Modin took a step backward and shrugged his shoulders.
“I am really pissed off, you know that?” he said, trying to stare back. The Minister of Justice did not reply and he suddenly felt sheepish.
They went on a long walk along the western edge of Black Island up reddish cliffs and past some bent pine trees that hung out over the sea. They reached the water by the western shore. From there, nothing of the activities taking place on the other side of the islet could be heard. A few seabirds were gliding in the sky, silently, as if not to disturb.
“I’m sorry to say, Mr. Modin, but there are a lot of details that need to be straightened out,” Gun Hellberg began. “But we will take full responsibility, the government and I. We’re in continuous contact with the U.S. authorities.”
“Full responsibility for what? The mess out here? Julia’s death? The Palme murder?”
“Mr. Modin, please.”
Modin remained silent.
“You have a box belonging to the Department of Special Operations. I’m sure you realize that you can’t keep it. It belongs to the government.” She spoke fast and in a well-articulated manner, forward in the mouth.
Göran Filipson walked slowly behind at some fifteen yards distance.
“Should the contents of that box leak out, Sweden’s reputation will no doubt be irreparably damaged. This is a matter of our relationship to foreign powers, if I may express myself in diplomatic terms.”
“You mean the U.S.?” Modin suggested.
“Among others.”
“I’m sick and tired of that expression. Everything in this nation appears to take foreign powers into consideration, especially when it comes to intelligence matters. Do we actually have an intelligence service of our own or are we simply running errands for others?”
Modin kicked a pebble. It flew away and bounced a couple of times before disappearing behind some rocks.
“I understand your contempt for Special Ops in general and Loklinth in particular. But this is something the government supports. The Prime Minister has given me his permission to convince you. The war is over. We want to negotiate. They are prepared to strike a good deal in exchange for that box. There are funds for such things.”
The Minister of Justice stopped, facing him with her hands in her coat pockets. She was a head shorter than Modin, but radiated natural authority. She was a woman who understood men’s language and gestures of power, something that made him nervous. Modin had always had great respect for strong women, and one was standing right in front of him. He was unsure what to think, if they had done the right thing: blowing their way into the Special Ops archive and taking the metal box. He contemplated what kind of bargain he could possibly strike. Can you bargain when it comes to national security? Or a prime minister’s murder?
“I can offer money, a lot of money. I have a mandate to negotiate with you.” She looked him in the eyes. “You and I, Modin, are going to figure this out right here, before the media gets hold of the story.”
“And if I refuse?”
“During negotiations, everything is on the table. Even refusal. That’s the whole point. But you love our country just as much as I do, and therefore we
must come to an agreement. For the sake of Sweden.”
“Axman, what’s going to happen to Axman and the others who were on my side? Will we be prosecuted?”
The Minister of Justice kept silent for a short while, then pulled up some of grass out of a crack in the rocks and pointed with it. They had come around to the western most part of the islet and looked out over the sea.
“It’s really beautiful out here,” she said. “One should move here to find peace. Sometimes I grow sick of all that rushing around. Most of our activities involve finding out about what others have done wrong. It takes up a lot of the time in our ministry. We should be chasing criminals instead of an old metal box concealing sins from the past, shouldn’t we?” She was speaking gently, as if to a child.
“You could always arrest us. There you have your criminals,” Modin said. “Nail us, and you will have filled your quota. Axman’s lying on the couch in the cottage and needs morphine and a doctor. Dead easy to disarm.”
“Don’t be so sarcastic,” the Minister of Justice said, and her voice sharpened ever so slightly. “You all have immunity. We will never arrest you. No prosecutor will ever get near you for this. That’s the simple truth.”
“What do you mean?” Modin jerked his head, as if he was about to have one of his dizzy spells again. “We have killed people. Downed a helicopter.”
“Since Prime Minister Palme was assassinated, everyone involved in the case enjoys full immunity. Anyone involved cannot even be brought in for questioning. That is, by the way, one of the things mentioned in the documents in that box. And now you guys are included among them.”
“Are you kidding? Full immunity to silence us all?”
“Yes.”
“And the murderers? They go Scott-free too?”
“Those involved in the Palme murder received their assignment from Special Ops. Christer Steerback, I know you knew him, and the other members of his team are not guilty of murder. They were just doing their jobs. They didn’t even pull the trigger. They belonged to a group of guards whose task it was to protect the actual murderer. He needed protection because the masterminds feared counter-measures from the KGB. Christer understood that he was on an important and secret mission for the nation. He was a victim. Christer should have undergone crisis therapy, but never received any. You can imagine what he feels like today.”
“Christer is dead,” Modin said.
“What do you mean?”
“Christer was killed by one of us in self defense. He’s somewhere out there.” Modin pointed with his arm out over sea.
“Okay, that’s more than I needed to know. No one will be charged for his death. But this must not come out, of course. I hope you understand.”
“But all the others in the Barbro Team and Crack of Dawn. Will you charge them?”
“Not really. They cannot be traced. You will never be able to make the link between them and Special Ops, Modin. Never. That part is airtight. In 1986, when the Swedish government had all the information that revealed who was behind the murder, the investigation was declared top secret and the case was closed. For national security. According to the Prime Minister at the time, an official commission of inquiry would have shaken Sweden in its foundations.”
“So was it the Barbro Team who did the shooting?”
“No, it wasn’t, as I have already said. The person chosen to do the dirty work was a specially trained hit man. They say he’s dead now. It’s a long story.”
“And Special Ops was behind all of this?” Modin said.
“Among others. But they didn’t give the orders, those came from abroad, with support from various sections of the Swedish top brass and the anti-Palme faction in the government.”
“That can’t be the case! Olof Palme was the government!” Modin cried out, grabbing the Minister’s coat sleeve. She jumped back and pulled back her arm.
“Not really. In strictly formal terms, he was only part of the government,” she said. “Unfortunately, the other ministers and the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces had no confidence in him. Neither did the financial and business world. Not to mention NATO. Palme’s idea of Scandinavia as a nuclear weapon-free zone threatened NATO’s northern flank. All that talk about Sweden’s orthodox neutrality only worsened his case, I’m afraid. Palme was a threat to the NATO presence in Scandinavia, and a big threat to Norway and Denmark.”
“So they killed him?”
“They had no choice. You do realize Modin, how difficult it is in Sweden to fire a Prime Minister even if he is suspected of betraying his nation? You do realize what an intricate and complex procedure that is?”
“No, I don’t.”
They were now following the southwestern shoreline toward the kayak harbor. The wind was kicking in from the west.
“Relieving a head of state of his duties is a completely hypothetical possibility. It does not work in practice. At least that’s what it seemed like back then. This was the easiest way out and, for Sweden, the least damaging solution to the problem that Olof Palme posed.”
“You mean to say that, at that time, members of the government as well as the top brass were in on all of this?”
“They gave their silent approval.”
“Even the Security Service?”
“Yes, presumably, at least sections of the Service.”
“But the PKK?” Modin said with sorrow in his voice. “Why were they chasing after Kurds?”
“Diversionary tactics. The PKK were a priority target for Stay Behind in Europe, especially in Turkey, which had close contacts with both the CIA and NATO. The Kurds were enemies of the Turkish state and therefore also an enemy of NATO, or enemies of Crack of Dawn, if you wish.”
The Minister of Justice stopped and stood still on the hillside and looked toward the horizon. A gust of wind caught and ruffled her graying hair.
“Is that why Christer Pettersson turned up almost three years after the murder?” Modin said. “He wasn’t there right from the start, was he? That was diversionary tactic number two.”
“I suppose so,” she said quietly. “Christer Pettersson was not interesting at first, because they wanted to put the blame on the Kurds. When that didn’t work, they dug up a corpse, so to speak, three years later.”
“He ended up being condemned in the media and in the eyes of the Swedish people. He didn’t stand a chance.”
“Pettersson was your regular alcoholic two-bit thug.”
“But he didn’t murder Olof Palme.”
“No, he didn’t. But he was released in the end. Justice was served.”
CHAPTER 98
Minister of Justice, Gun Hellberg, and Anton Modin arrived at the kayak harbor; Göran Filipson was still following behind them like a shadow. There were two kayaks, one yellow and the other blue, and they had been pulled onto the rocky shore. There wasn’t anyone else in sight. It was an idyll with two big swans diving for food on the seabed. Their white plumage was set beautifully against the dark blue of the sea.
Beauty is the norm, Modin thought. Things eternal where nothing disturbs reality.
“Do you know whether Olof Palme’s murderer got away along Sveavägen Street?” he asked.” He did seem to go up in smoke.”
“It’s all there in that metal box,” she said. “The complete commission report is in there, down to the last detail.”
“In which case I would like to open the box,” Modin said, clearing his throat.
“You’re the one with the box, Modin. You know where it is.”
“And what happens if I break the seal and open it?”
“Nothing, as long as I’m present. But after you’re done poking around, you have to hand it over to my department. And if you do, we’ve decided to give you the seven million USD reward. As a token of our appreciation.”
“But you already know who was responsible for the murder.”
“Yes, but it was you who solved the mystery and we don’t want it to come to light. Obviously, we are
buying your silence.”
“Again?” Modin laughed.
“We’ve already made arrangements with the tax authorities. Buy a new boat, Modin. Do something nice with your life. Things never end up the way you expect.”
The Minister of Justice bit her lip. She had said too much already.
CHAPTER 99
“Prime Minister Olof Palme, before his forthcoming visit to Moscow in April, had requested a thorough report regarding our submarine defenses. How they worked and their plans for the future. He planned to go through the report on March 16, 1986 at the Muskö base, and Palme and the Minister of Defense were to participate. The meeting was to be held in secrecy.”
Supreme Commander Lennart Ljung’s secret diaries, March 3, 1986)
(Author’s note: The meeting never took place, because Palme had been murdered by then. Surprisingly, the diary entry is dated three days after the murder.)
Why don’t people want to investigate the murder?” Modin said. “Why doesn’t someone get a grip on all this?”
“Olof Palme’s own political party does not want a commission of inquiry, ever,” said the Minister of Justice and turned away from Modin. She was sitting on the edge of the pier and gazing over at the house.
“Why not?”
“The motive would have to be examined. That would damage not only Olof Palme’s posthumous reputation and his family, but also the party and, therefore, the whole country. A false interpretation of Palme’s conduct led to suspicions that he was a traitor. But no one wants to support the absurd accusation today. I mean Palme betrayed his country?” she said. “A secret can only be kept if all parties involved have something to lose should the truth leak out. That’s how it is, and so it ends up being a conspiracy, Modin. Just like the DC-3 conspiracy in 1952.” The Minister of Justice looked at Modin and smiled.
“But was he really a traitor, and if so, in which direction?”
“It doesn’t matter what he was. They thought he was. That’s what mattered. Everyone believed it. The rumors had taken root. Our Prime Minister was a Soviet spy. Special Ops had received the information from NATO, and based all further actions on reports by MI6 and the CIA. The choice they had, in their own opinion, was to either let Sweden come under Soviet influence, or get rid of a Prime Minister who was in bed with the Russians.”
Enemy of the State (Anton Modin Book 2) Page 37