Back then the drawer had been stuffed full, and all he’d seen before his guilty conscience made him close it again was a planner beside a pencil box. Now there were two more planners. He picked one up and opened it at random.
It was from 2011, and he opened it to week fifteen. All seven days were marked with different times and the letters I and M. The next page showed the same, except that the times were slightly different. The same went for the next two as well. Just about every day had been marked with I.M. The rest of the days had question marks, and there were symbols here and there; Fabian had no idea what they meant.
On September 5 there was an entry that finally made more sense.
New number: 072-8534672
So someone had gotten a new phone number. Fabian took out his phone, typed in the number, and found, to his surprise, that it belonged to Ingvar Molander. So that was what I.M. stood for.
Fabian had to sit down; the realization, even though he had no idea where it might lead, made it harder to breathe. Every page of Elvin’s planner had something to do with Ingvar Molander. The times appeared to be when he arrived at the police station in the morning and when he left in the evening.
Fabian had a hard time processing the information. Why had Elvin been keeping tabs on Molander?
He wiped his sweaty hand on his pant leg, then picked up the top folder and opened it. The first page was a map of Øresund. A cross marked at the northernmost coast on the island of Ven formed one end of an arc that extended all the way up to a point in Råån. The next page showed crime-scene photos of an Inga Dahlberg, who was naked and fixed to a pallet with ten-inch screws. It was an older case, from 2008, and still unsolved.
The contents of the next folder were more familiar to him. This information was about Ingela Ploghed, who had been subjected to an involuntary vaginal hysterectomy. Someone had drugged her, removed her uterus, and left her to bleed out in Ramlösa Brunnspark.
Fabian recalled that they’d had varying opinions about whether Torgny Sölmedal, the subject of their ongoing investigation, was behind this crime as well, or whether someone else was involved. There had been quite a few striking similarities, but there had also been some discrepancies.
Molander in particular had been absolutely convinced that Sölmedal was the culprit. He had become almost aggressive when Fabian argued that the attack didn’t match the other classmate killings.
That wasn’t all. There were more folders full of old, unsolved investigations that suddenly had an explanation. It was an explanation so tremendous that the very thought of it seemed forbidden. But the more Fabian considered it, the more sense it made.
Tuvesson had sent Molander out alone to examine the little building where they suspected Ingela Ploghed had been attacked. He had also been in charge of the crime scene investigation in Råån, where Inga Dahlberg had been screwed to the pallet. That location wasn’t very far from Molander’s own house. Molander had also led the investigation of Hugo Elvin’s house, and who knew better than Molander how to stage a suicide such that no suspicions would arise?
Everything suddenly fell into place. Could it be that Elvin hadn’t taken his own life at all? Had he had found the piece of the puzzle that would bring all the other, unsolved puzzles to a conclusion? And for that, had he given his life?
Fabian had no idea how many investigations were involved. All he knew was that the responsibility to find out now rested with him.
X
Way up in the left corner lay Mölle, a picturesque old fishing village with a view of the northern end of the Øresund Sound. Directly to the right lay Bjärnum, a perfectly ordinary Swedish community with a population of 2,674. In the lower right-hand corner was Sjöbo, known for its xenophobia and links to various brown-shirt political dissatisfaction parties. Out to the left, in the final corner, lay Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark and the hub of the entire Øresund region.
The cut-out section of the map formed a perfect square, his favourite of all the two-dimensional geometric shapes. Add a third dimension, and the obvious choice was a cube. Or, if you will, the shape of a die. Like a game board, the enlarged map was divided into 144 squares of equal size. Twelve up and twelve across.
He weighed the two dice in his hand and felt the pleasure spread throughout his body. Two perfectly balanced precision dice made of anodized aluminum, purchased for this very task. He closed his eyes, shook them for a long time, and finally let them fall on the felt tabletop.
A five and a one.
He counted six squares in from the left, and rolled again.
A one and a two.
Three squares down, his index finger landed on Klippan, with its 8,000 citizens and 500 hectares. There were 360 streets, most of which began with the letter B. The only representative for C was Centralgatan, and there were none beginning with Q, W, or X.
He shook one of the two dice and let it fall.
A five.
He took out three more precision dice, weighed all five in his hand, then shook and let them scatter across the felt.
Three sixes and two fives.
Twenty-eight, which meant the letter Ä.
There were four streets that started with Ä. He rolled one die.
A four.
Ängelholmsgatan was one of the longer streets in Klippan, extending through three post codes and thirty-nine street numbers. The dice told him that he needed to use six this time.
A one, a five, a three, two fours, and a six.
Ängelholmsgatan 23. He entered the address on Google Maps and discovered right away that the dice had performed brilliantly once more.
The property was nearly perfect. A red-brick building, three storeys high and with fifteen windows on each level. He threw the first die.
A three.
That would have to mean the third floor. The next roll told him to use only one die. He picked it up, shook it, and let it fall.
A six.
He printed out the picture of the building and circled the sixth window on the top floor, with no idea who lived there. But it didn’t matter, because whoever was behind that window would be his first victim.
The game could begin at last.
Acknowledgements
Mi, Kasper, Filippa, Sander, and Noomi
For reading and sharing your opinions, straightening the stacks of books in stores, and above all for putting up with me even when I’ve just realized that the last week’s worth of work has to be thrown out.
Jonas Axelsson
For your time and energy, thoughts and ideas. I said it last time, but it bears repeating.
Adam Dahlin and Andreas Lundberg
For outdoing yourselves this time when it came to good input and comments. I think I agreed with pretty much everything.
Helena Biel
For all your knowledge of the Ouija board and its powers.
Lars Forsberg
For your rigorous police eyes.
And last of all I’d like to send an extra big thanks to all my foreign editors and translators, who see to it that my stories reach so far beyond the borders of Sweden that there’s always someone somewhere reading them.
Stefan Ahnhem is the bestselling author of the Fabian Risk series. He is an established screenwriter for both TV and film and has worked on a variety of projects, including adaptations of Henning Mankell’s Kurt Wallander series. He also serves on the board of the Swedish Writers Guild. He lives in Stockholm.
Rachel Willson-Broyles is an American translator specializing in literature. She has a Ph.D. in Scandinavian Studies from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and recently translated Quicksand by Malin Persson Giolito, Everything I Don’t Remember by Jonas Hassen Khemiri, and Victim Without a Face by Stefan Ahnhem. She lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota.
House of Anansi Press was founded in 1967 with a mandate to publish Canad
ian-authored books, a mandate that continues to this day even as the list has branched out to include internationally acclaimed thinkers and writers. The press immediately gained attention for significant titles by notable writers such as Margaret Atwood, Michael Ondaatje, George Grant, and Northrop Frye. Since then, Anansi's commitment to finding, publishing and promoting challenging, excellent writing has won it tremendous acclaim and solid staying power. Today Anansi is Canada's pre-eminent independent press, and home to nationally and internationally bestselling and acclaimed authors such as Gil Adamson, Margaret Atwood, Ken Babstock, Peter Behrens, Rawi Hage, Misha Glenny, Jim Harrison, A. L. Kennedy, Pasha Malla, Lisa Moore, A. F. Moritz, Eric Siblin, Karen Solie, and Ronald Wright. Anansi is also proud to publish the award-winning nonfiction series The CBC Massey Lectures. In 2007, 2009, 2010, and 2011 Anansi was honoured by the Canadian Booksellers Association as "Publisher of the Year."
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