‘Both have wives and small children,’ he says, as he reloads. ‘I suggest we leave them here, so they’ll be found.’ I nod. ‘And even though it’s a hell of a day I reckon you should get rid of your boots.’
I nod again. He reaches across Ploman’s bloke and we shake hands. He looks as if he’s about to leave, when suddenly he stops.
‘Damn, that’s right, I was going to ask you: can you breathe through that nose of yours?’
‘Just about. You?’
‘Hello, no. I can’t even smell my own shit any more.’
He grunts at his own joke, nods and gets into the motor. It splutters a few times before it starts. The driver backs into the grass, turns, and drives off. The bound men lie not far from the walls of the fort. I smoke, and I watch them for a while. The rain washes them clean of blood, pieces of bone and brain matter. Soon, only two small black holes can be seen in their skulls, no bigger than two-öre coins. They stare back at me. I think a bit about death and my almost-new boots. The corpse closest to me has a wedding ring on his finger. It gleams through the water running over it.
By the time the nausea catches up with me I’ve made my way to the bottom of the park. It comes over me like in the dressing room after a match, when your stomach suddenly becomes aware of just how much sweat and blood you’ve swallowed. I put my hand against the black metal railing of the stone stairs leading down to Ingemarsgatan and bend over it. My jaw is buzzing.
I hold back from vomiting. I hiss and spit and dry my mouth with the back of my hand. I’m trembling. I straighten up again. On the façade of the old whorehouse to my right, a single word has been set in yellow brick above the door: SALVE.
Tottering down the steps, I think again about Zetterberg. I was wrong about the bloke’s mob connections and two families lost their providers because of it.
‘So where the hell was he getting the dough from?’
The questions keep buzzing in my head while I stumble down to Ingemarsgatan.
Lundin almost gives me a heart attack when he opens the front door of the undertaker’s. He’s wearing a faded dressing gown with red embroidery along the collar. His grey locks of hair stand out around his head. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen him wearing anything but a black suit. He’s half a second away from getting his nose slammed, just on impulse.
‘Where the hell have you been, brother?’
The nausea almost overwhelms me again. ‘Damn, you scared me!’ I lean forwards with my hands on my knees.
‘I spent half the night banging the ceiling with the broom for you!’
‘I just went out for a bit of air. Couldn’t sleep.’
‘You can’t have people calling you in the middle of the night!’
I straighten up again. ‘Who was it?’
‘It doesn’t matter if it’s a Saturday. Decent people are abed, sleeping!’
‘Who called?’
‘You have to make sure it doesn’t happen again!’
‘Damn it! What was it about?’
‘It was from the Toad. They’d seen her there. The one-legged one.’
‘The bowlegged?’
‘That’s what I bloody mean, the bowlegged one.’
I’m the only customer the following morning when I walk into the betting shop known as the Toad. It’s situated among the stables on Karduansmakaregatan, in a quarter known very decorously as the Tortoise. Behind the counter sits an elderly man with black armbands and spectacles on the tip of his nose. He’s counting betting stubs. Standing on a stool, a youth is writing playable matches and odds on a blackboard that covers almost the length of the room. He’s wearing plus fours with Argyle socks. His hair is copper coloured.
‘Someone called about a bowlegged prostitute?’
The boy turns around. He’s freckly. I feel I recognise him. He looks first at the old man and then he nods at me to come outside. With the boy in tow, I walk out into the slippery-as-glass yard. Even though it’s late on a Sunday afternoon, the whole area smells of printer’s ink. The boy wraps his arms around himself and pulls up his shoulders.
‘Kvisten?’
‘Yes?’
‘I used to work as the soap boy at Nyström’s.’
The barber’s at home on Roslagsgatan. I vaguely remember a freckled whippersnapper always strutting about with the soap cup when I was there. He’s grown. A lot. There’s an itch in my crotch. It’s been itching since last night. Ever since I enlisted under an Irish flag running coal to Stettin, I’ve had a soft spot for ginger lads. Last time I thought a boy was pretty I went with him to Bellevueparken. Apparently I got crabs at the same time. I have to remember to pass by a pharmacy and buy grey salve.
The boy looks around, assuring himself that no one’s listening.
‘Was it you who called?’
‘Maybe.’ He smiles mischievously.
I sigh. ‘What have you got?’
‘She was here last night to use the telephone.’
‘Yesterday isn’t a great deal of good to me.’
‘She was babbling on. Talking about how she needs help to move. And then she said a number… I mean a telephone number.’
‘Yes?’
‘And I was standing there with the chalk in my hand and so I wrote it down. The number.’
‘How much?’
‘Twenty.’
He’s pretty but not that pretty. I don’t even have twenty kronor on me.
‘A five-kronor note.’
‘What do you say, double or nothing?’
Before I’ve had time to agree to the wager, a one-krona coin is flipped into the cold December air. I snatch at it. It probably wouldn’t be noticed in a hurry, but one edge has been filed down – I can feel it quite clearly although I’m wearing gloves. I’m unsure how the trick works in detail, but it’s irrelevant. I grab his mop of hair with my free hand. An almost silent yell forms a cone of steam out of his mouth when I take the sharp side of the coin and rake it across his cheek, from his eye to the corner of his mouth. The red graze matches his hair. The boy throws in the towel without fuss.
‘Twenty-three twelve.’
He’s panting. I nod and go back into the warmth. For some reason he doesn’t follow me. I walk up to the wall-mounted telephone, pick up the receiver and ask for the number.
‘The Hostel Prince,’ croaks a woman at the other end.
I spin the lever to cut off the call. According to rumours, the proprietors of the whorehouse in Old Town strew a fine narcotic powder over Yxsmedsgränd at night to seduce unsuspecting country girls, who are then kept prisoner in the cellars. What is undeniably true, however, is that they rent out rooms to girls who, for a sizeable percentage of their takings, can receive their clients there. I feel my heart beating quicker. This is right. No doubt about it. Most likely Sonja moved to another part of town after she’d burned her bridges in Klara. A futile tactic when I’m on the hunt. When it comes to street girls, I’m a regular bloodhound.
I button up my coat and am just about to leave when the old man behind the desk rises to his feet. He opens a hatch and comes limping into the room with a smile on his damp lips. He folds up his glasses and puts them in his pocket.
‘What did you do with my assistant?’
‘He suddenly felt unwell and had to get some air.’
‘Heads or tails?’
‘He lost.’
‘You have to forgive him, he’s young and doesn’t have the sense to choose his victims.’
‘We’ve all been young.’
The old man nods gravely, as oldsters do when just for a change they remember something.
‘When I found him he was running the job exchange up in Maria with a companion.’
‘Is it still going?’
‘Better than ever. People are desperate for jobs. Don’t you read the classifieds? Every other person is paying a commission just to get an interview.’
I chuckle. ‘Hope.’
‘It’s the last thing the human being gives u
p on, they say. A lack of jobs, but plenty of hope. In actual fact it makes people act beyond the pale of reason.’
I chuckle again and start coughing.
‘I saw you, you know,’ the old bloke goes on. ‘Against “The Mallet” Sundström. Early twenties, I’d say.’
‘That’s right. Sture Sundström. Twenty-two.’ I take half a step towards the door.
‘The best fight I’ve seen to date. That spectacular recovery. The knockout in the last round.’
‘Thanks. I was four kilos overweight a week before.’
‘I heard it was six.’
‘I don’t remember so well.’
‘How’s your form now?’ He taps his forefinger lightly under one of his eyes and peers at my fading shiner.
‘Dwindling.’
‘It can only get so low, I think. Come by if you want another fight. I mean the conditions are a bit different now. Well, you know how it works.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Well, let’s leave it at that, then.’ He hauls out a cigar and puts it in my breast pocket, then pats me on the shoulder. ‘Whatever people say about you, you were a damned fine boxer, one of the best we ever had. Don’t let anyone take that away from you.’
‘For the conversation,’ I say, and toss over the rigged one-krona coin.
The old man catches it, slaps it down on the back of his hand and mutters something I can’t hear.
‘If you see him, throw him back inside for me,’ he calls as I head for the door.
I wave with the back of my hand over my shoulder. The cold hits me. I think the temperature has gone up a few degrees. I shove my fists in my coat pockets, walk past the parliament and into the Old Town. Svensk Filmindustri’s talkie film bus is parked by the castle. A couple of kids with Sunday time on their hands are hanging about the bus, shivering in the cold wind from Strömmen.
At the corner of Stora Nygatan and Yxsmedsgränd I see piled up in the street two landscape paintings, an old mirrored chest and a rag-stuffed mattress. A couple of removal blokes have already loaded a lot of tatty furniture on a truck. A group of people have gathered around them, calling out loudly. Oaths and curses fly through the air. A porky goon is there to keep them all in order. On the pavement sits a woman under a blanket of patched horse cloth, weeping into her apron. A parish district visitor is ushering a bunch of children in front of her down the cobbled street. Most likely they’ll be taken to the children’s home.
‘Aren’t you going to hock the clothes off her back as well, you swine?’ A red-nosed bloke in a rock-blaster’s vest aims a blow at the constable, who ducks, but slips. His peaked cap with the gleaming metal emblem hits the ground. People laugh. I light a Meteor. The goon draws his sabre and chases his assailant. His sabre glitters in the dying light. He gives up after only ten metres or so.
‘Now the sod’s coming back as well.’ A boy in the crowd picks up the goon’s cap. Before he runs off he spins it as far as he can down the street. The goon comes running after him.
The boy loses his footing on the slippery cobblestones right in front of me and ends up on his back-end. The goon’s apple-red face splits wide open in a smile. I step into the street and brace myself. The goon hurtles into me. He struggles to keep his balance, then loses it and hacks his sabre into the cobbles. The kid darts in behind my back, grabbing my coat arm.
‘What the hell’s the matter with you?’ The goon spits saliva in all directions.
‘Excuse me, I didn’t see you.’
For a few seconds his grey eyes stare into mine. I drill my gaze into him. Soon enough, the anger dissipates from that mound of pork. He looks around hurriedly and shambles back to the truck. The boy darts off through the lanes.
I take a last puff on my Meteor. One of the removals blokes drops his end of a double bed, which slams into the street. I step on my cigar butt and turn off down Yxsmedsgränd as the truck ploughs its way through the crowd. An old man, in a gesture of futile despair, cracks his stick against the paintwork. There’s permanent shadow in the alley, which is scarcely two metres wide. The ice is like translucent mortar between the paving stones. The ochre-coloured façades are streaked with soot.
At the corner of Lilla Nygatan I stand watching the men making circuits around the Pensionat Prinsen. A seaman wearing a shipmaster’s winter coat walks up and down the lane three times before summoning his courage and disappearing into the foyer. He comes out soon enough. Maybe the cost was a little steeper than he’d had in mind, or his requirements were too specific. The establishment’s sign sways slowly on its hinges above the black door. The agitations on Stora Nygatan have abated. My hopes of finding Sonja in there set my heart aglow.
A tall, lanky bloke in a bowler hat and unusual heeled military boots remains outside for a long time before he disappears in the direction of Stora Nygatan. I have a sense of having seen him before quite recently, but I can’t remember where.
A rat scurries across the lane and follows the gutter around the corner. There, a man and a school-age boy pass by. The man is dressed in a black three-piece suit. He’s holding his cap in his hand. The boy is wearing a sailor’s hat.
I stroll up to the door.
The foyer, with its worn red carpet, smells of coffee and cheap mulled wine. The little crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling is turned off, and the foliage of the large pot plant on the floor looks as if it’s been burned through by cigarettes. A large-busted elderly woman in a black velvet dress sits under a key cabinet. She’s knitting. In the gloom, one can make out a few grey whiskers on her chin. A cigarette smoulders in an ashtray beside her. I assume she’s had the occasional odd request before.
‘I’m looking for a girl with a Dales accent.’
She raises a finger and finishes counting her stitches before she replies. I feel my heart beating.
‘Oh, but then you’re a bit late, sir. We had a girl here from the Dales but she moved out last night. We do have a blonde jewel from Östersund, though. A bit short but very popular. Kept company for a while with the motorcycle ace Vicke Gustavsson.’
Disappointment falls heavy as a plumbing weight into my chest. No bowlegged Sonja, no witness, no alibi for this damned murder and no comeuppance for the goons.
‘Where did she move to?’
The woman scratches herself between her eyebrows – pulled into a deep furrow of concern – with the tip of one of her knitting needles. ‘She was in a hurry and didn’t say anything about it. Rushed out like a shot. But she was off anyway, she didn’t even put on all that colourful stuff they usually wear.’ The woman laughs so hard that her breasts look about to jump out of her dress. ‘We have a girl from Medelpad. Slightly lame but not even twenty.’
I shake my head and write down Lundin’s number on a page of my notebook, tear it out and hand it over with a five-kronor note.
‘Call me if she turns up.’
The woman nods, snatches up the five-kronor note and quickly tucks it into her sleeve, although she leaves the telephone number where it is.
‘Of course.’
‘Have you cleaned her room?’
‘No, haven’t had time yet. There’s been a blasted high turnover.’
‘Clearly. Can I have a look at the room?’
Unconcerned, she keeps knitting. ‘We don’t usually do that. A question of discretion, you see.’
‘Can I pay for an hour?’
‘We only rent out rooms at a daily rate.’ She nods down at the table.
I mutter and get out another five-kronor note.
‘One floor up. Number three.’ Without looking, she reaches for a key behind her in the key cabinet, and puts it on the table.
The key catches a little, but after some fiddling the door opens. From the room next door comes the sound of a bed thumping against the wall. On the shelf in the hall lies a lady’s hat in black plush. The door of the wardrobe has been left open. It’s empty, and three of the clothes hangers are on the floor.
I step inside. The room
has green wallpaper. Maybe I can still pick up the scent of her fragrance. The furnishings consist of an unmade bed, a low table and two sunken armchairs with tassels. On a table covered in a lace tablecloth is a full ashtray, an empty vase and two glasses, still with a red residue inside. I move one of the glasses to my nose. Port wine.
The room gives me bad memories, and suddenly the itching starts again. I straighten my back and put my hand inside my waistband, to give myself a bit of a scratch. ‘Damned creepy-crawlies.’
Next to the ashtray lies a promotional card for a boutique on Kungsgatan offering fancy goods, and a couple of hat pins with big glass marbles at one end. A man bellows in the room next door. I pull the elastic off my wallet and tuck the card into it.
On the windowsill are a couple of women’s magazines, Allers and Allt för Alla. I pick them up and give them a shake but nothing falls out from between their pages.
In the wastepaper bin lies a piece of discarded chewing gum and a couple of packs of cigarettes of various brands, Bridge and Negresco. My knees click as I go down on all fours. There’s an open condom packet under the bed. I stand up, holding it in my hand. Royal. To this extent at least the lovesick porter from Boden was right. In the middle of the dirty sheet is a small, rusty-red bloodstain.
The bathroom is hardly more than a square metre in size. There’s a zinc tub on the floor. The hand basin is of porcelain. A few long hairs cling to the edge. I’ve seen enough.
‘She had a visitor,’ I say to the velvet-wearing woman in the foyer. The note with Lundin’s telephone number is still on the table.
‘At night. In that case, I never saw anyone.’
‘Any other friends?’
‘Not as far as I’ve seen.’
‘Ring me if she comes back.’
The alley still lies steeped in shadow. I’m hungry but don’t have much money left in my wallet. I go and stand in the doorway next to the hostel. As the girls come out I’ll grab each one for a chat. I’m calmer now. I’ve picked up her scent. Sonja is up and moving. I’m looking forward to seeing Berglund’s face when I stroll in with Sonja on my arm. I smile.
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