by Arne Dahl
It was hard to tell whether Norlander was relieved or disappointed. Hultin ensured his goodwill by saying, “Viggo’s role is the most important of all. He’s your closest immediate covering fire. Now, who’s best at picking a lock quietly and quickly?”
The members of the A-Unit looked at one another. “I can do it,” said Chavez.
“Okay,” said Hultin. “You’ll be the first man up there. Hjelm will follow you. When we reach the rendezvous point at the bottom of the hill, you’ll head straight up the slope. It’ll be a bit like mountain climbing at first; then it levels out. The first cottage you’ll reach is visible from the rendezvous point. This one here.” Hultin pointed at the map and drew orange lines that glowed faintly in the night. “Go past that cottage and three more; you can see them here. The path turns right, above position one; you should be able to see it after you’ve passed the fourth cottage. When you see the path, the position-one cottage will be right in front of you. All this applies to you too, Paul.”
“Question,” said Hjelm. “Do we know that the three positions are all unoccupied?”
Hultin looked at him. “No, but in all probability they are. Most people come out here only in the daytime to work in their gardens. But there is a chance that the positions could be occupied. If so, we’ll have to make other plans.”
“Plus your route will take us across a whole bunch of allotment gardens. What if someone is home in one of the cottages and starts yelling because we’re trampling their prize-winning tulips?”
“Cautious and silent pattern of movement applies, of course,” said Hultin, still looking at him. Could Hultin have overlooked all this? Hjelm wondered. “Stay as far away from the cottages as possible. There’s no question of launching an evacuation. Andersson would be sure to notice.
“All right, position two-Kerstin. Position three-Arto. You’ll take off at the same time as Hjelm, after Jorge gives the all-clear from up at the first position, but you’ll head left from the rendezvous point before making your way up the slope. You’ll run into a small road, here, and follow it around. When the road intersects with the path, here, start counting: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine cottages. At the ninth, Kerstin will go straight ahead for three more cottages. The third one is position two. The door faces the top of the hill and should be completely hidden from the target cottage.
“Arto will continue along the road, past four more cottages, until the road starts climbing steeply. At the fourth cottage, after Kerstin has turned off, you’ll head in too. Again it’s the third cottage straight ahead. The location of the door is a little trickier and might be visible from the target cottage. Caution will be needed to force the lock in the dark without being heard or seen.”
Hultin paused, then nodded, and they all rushed down the grassy slope and into Tantolunden, which was remarkably pitch-black, an area of silent darkness in the middle of the noisy city’s shimmer of lights.
“This will be the rendezvous point,” whispered Hultin, as he folded up the map and handed out small flashlights and walkie-talkies that he fished out of a shoulder bag. “Use the earpieces. And keep your cells turned on, as backup, but for God’s sake don’t call each other unless it’s a real emergency. The ringtone will be heard. And the flashlights are also only for emergencies. Do Jorge, Kerstin, and Arto have adequate tools for picking the locks? If not, I’ve got some in our little emergency kit here.”
Each of them accepted their lock-pick tools.
“Okay, get going,” said Hultin.
Jorge began making his way up the slope and soon disappeared from sight. They waited five long minutes.
Then they all heard Chavez’s voice in their earpieces: “Okay,” he whispered, out of breath. “Position one has been taken. It’s empty, thank God. Paul, the second cottage that you’ll pass is occupied. A man is sitting on the terrace and looking out toward Årstaviken. You can pass him by going around behind. The other places are empty. As for the target cottage, here’s what I can see: dark shades pulled down in the windows. But there’s definitely movement inside. It looks as if a light is on. Göran Andersson is here. I repeat, our man is here. Let’s get going.”
“I’m sending in the rest of the troops now,” said Hultin. “Don’t do anything before everybody’s in place. Over and out, for now.” Hultin’s sign-off was surprisingly unorthodox.
Holm and Söderstedt headed off to the left, while Hjelm followed in Chavez’s footsteps. The man in the second cottage was no longer sitting on the terrace. He was poking about among his rosebushes in the middle of the night. Hjelm crouched down behind a shrub and waited for three minutes that seemed like hours. The man was a black silhouette against the darkness. He moved slowly, as if slightly drunk, among his precious roses. In his earpiece Hjelm heard Kerstin reach her position, then Arto. Their cottages were also empty. He heard them waiting tensely, but there was nothing he could do. Finally the man seemed to have had enough of his nightly wandering and went back to the terrace. He belched loudly as Hjelm slipped past behind him and joined Chavez, who peered at him, wide-eyed, through the dark.
“What the hell happened?” he said.
“Your guy decided to fuss with his roses for a while. I was crouched down a couple of yards away. Is anything going on?” he asked, and then reported on his walkie-talkie that he was in position.
“No,” said Chavez.
Hultin’s voice came over on the walkie-talkie: “Good. Can anyone see an opening anywhere in the blinds?”
“Position one,” said Chavez. “No opening from here.”
“Position two,” said Holm. “None here either. View of the target not as good as I’d hoped. Can only make out the top half of one window with a shade pulled down.”
“Position three,” said Söderstedt. “I can see a slight gap with some light showing through on one side of the shade, but that’s all. No movement visible in the gap. I’ll let you know if I see anything.”
Hjelm turned to Chavez, who was nothing but a silhouette. “How the hell can you tell that he’s here?” he whispered.
“I could swear that I saw some sort of movement inside,” Chavez whispered in reply. “And Arto can see a light. Oh yes, goddamn it. He’s here all right.”
Seen from their angle, the little cottage on the other side of the path was dark. There was nothing to indicate anyone’s presence.
The night was black and raw, the moon only a thin sliver that gave off almost no light. A few stars glimmered faintly in the background. It was like being way out in the country. Göran Andersson’s home territory, thought Hjelm.
They were shivering in their darkened cottages.
They waited. Hultin was thinking on his feet down at the base of the hill. There was no real plan; that much was clear. The plan was taking shape as it went along.
“Should we make contact?” ventured Hjelm.
There was silence for a moment.
“It’s most likely a hostage situation,” Hultin said pensively. “He’s probably sitting inside, holding Alf Ruben Winge and Anja Parikka. Making contact too abruptly could spell their death.”
“Why would he suddenly take hostages?”
“Because of what you mentioned in your conversation with him. Presumably Winge arrived with Anja. Andersson let Helena Brandberg live, even though it cost him the cassette tape. He doesn’t want to kill Anja. He has his list, and he’s going to follow it to the letter. Right now he’s sitting in there with one person who’s on the list and one person who’s definitely not, and he’s not really sure what to do about it.”
Silence again. A cold wind swept past the little cottage, blowing a few clumps of grass into the air, which tumbled about as if in slow motion.
“There’s another option,” Hjelm said into the walkie-talkie.
“What’s that?” said Hultin.
“He could be waiting.”
“For what?”
“For me,” said Paul Hjelm.
Absolute silence no
w. The small bursts of noise from the nighttime traffic off in the distance slipped into the silence, becoming part of it. An owl hooted quietly. That too was part of the silence.
Chavez stirred. He’d pulled out his gun.
Time stood still.
Then a crackling in their earpieces.
“I saw it,” said Arto Söderstedt. “I saw a gun in the gap next to the window shade. It moved past for a second. He’s walking around inside.”
Time contracted. Long, muffled waves for each second that ticked by in their brains.
Hultin’s silence.
The decision.
Still no sound from the little target cottage. But something had changed inside, not visible but palpable.
Moving through the cottage was a presence, possibly several.
Then Hjelm’s cell phone rang.
A ringtone that was normally quite faint magnified itself in the silence to a mad peal of bells.
He answered as fast as he could.
“There, I heard the ringtone,” Göran Andersson said on the line. “Very clearly. So you’re in the cottage across the way. I’ve been waiting for you.”
For a good long moment Hjelm couldn’t utter a sound. Then he merely said, in an unrecognizable voice, “Are they alive?”
“In the case of one of them, it’s a matter of definition,” said Göran Andersson. “The girl is scared but alive. The other one already looked dead by the time he got here.”
Again silence. Chavez held his walkie-talkie close to the cell phone. The conversation was being transmitted to the other cottages.
“What are you going to do?” said Hjelm.
“What am I going to do?” Andersson said sarcastically. “What are you going to do?”
Hjelm took a deep breath. “I’m coming in.”
Now it was Andersson’s turn to be silent.
“All right,” he said then. “But no gun stuck in the back of your waistband this time. And no walkie-talkie.” Andersson hung up.
“Jan-Olov?” Hjelm said into Chavez’s walkie-talkie.
“You don’t have to do this,” said Hultin.
“I know.” Hjelm handed his service revolver to Chavez, then put his jacket, walkie-talkie, and cell phone on the floor.
Jorge looked at him through the darkness, placed his hand on Hjelm’s arm, and whispered, “Make some sort of noise for a few seconds when you go in, so I can get over to the left window. I’ll keep watch outside.”
Hjelm nodded, and they stepped out into the night. Jorge stopped behind the cottage, while he continued on around the corner.
Wearing only a T-shirt and trousers, with his hands raised, he crossed the little path between the cottages. Those few yards seemed endless. He thought he would freeze in the cold.
For a moment he thought he was running up the stairs to the immigration office in Hallunda.
The door opened slightly. No one was visible. Only the glare of a light.
He stepped onto the small terrace and slipped through the doorway. Seeing a little metal wind chime hanging from the doorpost, he purposely bumped his head against it. While it jangled, out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw Chavez crossing the path.
The light from the small ceiling lamp was actually quite weak, but it blinded him because his eyes had become accustomed to the dark. It took a moment before he could distinguish anything else.
On the floor in the far right corner were two figures, tied up, with tape over their mouths. Anja Parikka’s pale blue eyes were staring at him above the tape; Alf Ruben Winge’s eyes were closed. She was sitting up; he was lying down, curled in a fetal position. Their bodies were not touching.
Along the wall on the left stood a small, unmade bed.
The love nest, thought Hjelm without thinking.
On a chair just to the left of the door sat Göran Andersson. He looked exactly like the photographs and was smiling a bit shyly at Hjelm. In his hand he held Valery Treplyov’s gun with the silencer attached. It was aimed straight at Hjelm’s chest, six feet away.
“Close the door,” said Göran Andersson. “And go over there and sit down on the bed.” Hjelm did as he was told.
“All right then,” said Andersson, keeping the gun aimed at him. “And the sharpshooters are swarming all over the Tanto cottages, am I right?”
Hjelm didn’t answer. He didn’t know what to say.
“Do you remember what I said I’d do if you kept pestering Lena?” Andersson said with a crooked smile. “I just talked to her. From here. She’s not doing very well.”
“That’s hardly our fault, is it?” Hjelm said tentatively.
“My question was whether you remember what I said I’d do,” said Andersson, his tone a bit harsher.
“I remember.”
“And yet you still came in here?”
“You’re not a murderer.”
Göran Andersson laughed loudly, but it sounded strained. “A rather strange thing for a man to say with a gun pointed at him that’s already killed five people.”
“Come on,” said Hjelm. “I know you want to put a stop to this whole thing.”
“Is that right?” Andersson said calmly.
“I’m not really sure when that change happened. It’s possible to pinpoint it to several different moments. Do you know?”
“No.”
“The first two murders were perfect crimes. You left not a single scrap of evidence. Carried them out with real thoroughness. Then all of a sudden, in Carlberger’s living room, as you stood there wrapped in that marvelous music and pulling the slugs out of the wall with your tweezers, something happened. You left a bullet behind. Was that when you started to think about things?”
“Go on.” Göran Andersson’s face was impassive.
“Then you took a long break, which made us draw a lot of erroneous conclusions. You could have stopped there and returned home to your pregnant wife.”
“Is that actually what you think?”
“Not really,” said Hjelm. “No one who shoots another human being will ever be the same. Believe me, I know. But it’s still possible to go on living. Put down your gun, and you’ll get to see your child grow up.”
“Cut that out, and go on.”
“Okay. It took some time for you to plan the first three murders in such an elegant fashion. The victims had to come home late and alone, and within a reasonably tight time frame. It took two days in both cases. Then you had to plan the rest. Although I wonder whether you really needed a month and a half for the planning, from the early morning hours of April the third until the early morning hours of May the eighteenth. What were you doing all that time? Hesitating? Pondering?”
“Mostly I was listening. As I told you on the phone. I traveled around on public transportation back and forth, taking subways and buses and commuter trains. Everywhere people were talking, I sat and listened; listened to their theories and ideas and thoughts and feelings. Maybe you’re right that I hesitated. But everyone’s reactions made me go on.”
“One little question,” said Hjelm. “Why the two shots to the head? Why such… symmetry?”
“You’ve been to Fittja,” Andersson said wearily. “Didn’t you count the bullets? Seventeen board members, thirty-four bullets. Everything fit together. Can you even understand how well everything fit? That ox in the bank gave me my weapon, the tape that was playing while I was getting beat up, and two bullets per board member. It was all so precise. And two shots to the head are the surest way to kill a victim if you only have two bullets at your disposal. It was as simple as that.”
“But then there was the cassette you left behind. Surely you could have grabbed it and taken it along, even without killing the daughter. But you left it. Why? It was your great source of inspiration. And then what happened? Was it unbearable without the music? Did it force you to look deep into your heart?
“And then the conversation with me, which you very deliberately sprinkled with the clues. And finally this. You knew
all about Winge’s habits, you knew that he’d be coming out here with Anja. And you knew that you wouldn’t be able to kill Anja. You sat here as usual, waiting for your victim to arrive. Maybe they’d gone out for a walk, left their love nest and gone to a restaurant, and then you slipped inside. But this isn’t the usual living room. You knew very well that Winge wouldn’t be coming here alone. You set yourself up for this situation. It’s your own, possibly subconscious, but very intentional creation. You wanted to bring me in here. Why me? And why did you want this particular situation?”
Göran Andersson stared at him. Only now did Hjelm notice how tremendously tired the man looked. Tired of everything.
“There are so many reasons,” Andersson said. “All the strange connections that have landed me here. Coincidences piling up that I thought were fate. Maybe that’s what I still think. But without the music, the mystery disappeared. And you, you in particular, Paul Hjelm, were the final nail in the coffin. The empty apartment that I heard about turned out to be right next door to the police station in Fittja. Okay, that was to be expected; it was part of the overriding pattern. The fact that the hostage drama took place out there, at the very same time as my first murder, and that it stole all the media attention from me… that was also only natural. Everything was conspiring.
“But later, when it turned out that you had been out to my house in Algotsmåla and talked to Lena, that you were the one who was hunting me, then I realized that our fates were interlinked, yours and mine. I know that you were about to lose your job because of that hostage drama. I know that you, just like me a few months earlier, stood in your row house in Norsborg and looked at yourself in the mirror but saw no reflection. I know that you felt the ground being ripped out from under your feet. I know that you were dangling in midair and wishing death on the police top brass because they didn’t back you up but just hovered somewhere high over your head. Maybe you even thought about killing the whole lot of them.
“Don’t you understand how alike we are? We’re just two ordinary Swedes that time has left behind. Nothing we believed in exists anymore. Everything has changed, and we haven’t been able to keep up, Paul. We signed up for a static world, the most Swedish of all characteristics. With our mother’s milk we imbibed the idea that everything would always remain the same. We’re the paper that people reuse because they think it’s blank. And maybe it is. Completely blank.”