by Mikaela Bley
He moved closer to her and whispered: ‘So was it that good? How many times was it?’
‘Ellen has been out all night searching for a missing girl,’ Jimmy said, now done with his call.
‘You did what?’ Philip sounded serious now, and shook his head. ‘Tell me he’s joking,’ he went on, opening a cupboard in front of him.
‘No one else was looking for her …’ The words stuck in her throat.
‘Listen, I know exactly what you’re trying to do.’ He fixed his round eyes on her freshly shaven ‘pussies’. ‘It’s not your responsibility. It’s not your fault. Do you hear me?’ He took hold of her chin. ‘You can’t change what happened, whether you find this girl or not. Nothing is going to change.’
He turned and opened another cupboard. ‘Are you kidding me? There are four dishwashers here and not a single clean cup?’ He pulled down one of the many paper signs that peppered the shiny white kitchen. ‘Can’t any of you read?’ he said, holding up the paper so the people sitting at the round tables could see. ‘Your mother doesn’t work here. What is it you don’t understand about that? It makes me so angry.’ He wadded up the paper in his hand, and then turned his attention back to her. ‘But mostly I’m worried. Fucking worried. Do you hear me? Look at me. This isn’t good for you.’
Philip knew her better than anyone else. They had been best friends since they were in high school together, at the Lundsberg boarding school. They’d found each other immediately. Both of them had been sent to the school against their will: Ellen because her parents could finally get rid of her, and Philip because he was gay, and that didn’t fit in well with his aristocratic family.
He picked up a dirty cup from the counter. ‘Couldn’t you try thinking about yourself for once?’ he said, washing the cup by hand.
‘Ellen, we need to talk,’ Jimmy interrupted.
‘By all means then,’ Philip said. ‘Don’t let me disturb you. I can’t stomach the coffee here anyway.’ He set the cup down in the sink and dried his hands. ‘Take care of your business. I’ll go and do Lotta Engberg’s make-up. Just as important. She’s going to sing children’s songs with some cute little kids’ choir.’ He winked, and then gave Ellen a stern look before heading off in the direction of make-up.
‘We’ll have the meeting with the rest of the team in an hour, when everyone is here,’ said Jimmy. ‘I want you to continue on with this, if that’s okay with you.’
Ellen nodded.
‘Ann can do research.’ Jimmy took a roll from the breakfast buffet on the counter. ‘And Andreas will be your photographer.’
‘Is he back?’
‘He starts today. His first day back from parental leave. He hasn’t done any filming for several months, but he has a reputation for being the best. But you already knew that,’ he said, looking meaningfully at her.
Andreas and Ellen had gone out a few times when she started at TV4, but now they were just co-workers.
Jimmy cut the bread roll open and spread butter over it. ‘This case is probably far from over, if my gut instinct is right. And it usually is.’ He sliced some cheese, added a piece of ham, three slices of cucumber, and a piece of red pepper, and then brought the two sides together, forming it into a roll. ‘Nice, huh?’
Ellen felt completely worn out, her legs barely able to support her. She hadn’t slept in over twenty-four hours.
‘Are you okay?’ he asked, taking her hand.
She jerked it away. ‘Yes.’
‘Okay, sorry. I’m sorry.’
‘I’m just tired.’
‘Can you still work then?’
‘Yes. We have to find her,’ she said, taking a sip of coffee.
‘Okay, but we have to create news, and most important of all right now …’ Jimmy took a big bite of his sandwich and finished chewing before continuing. ‘You can arrange for the girl’s mother to be on the morning show tomorrow.’
‘What? On Tilde’s show?’
‘It’s Mother’s Day tomorrow,’ he said, taking another bite of the sandwich. ‘Perfect.’
HELENA
7.30 A.M.
She threw off the covers and sat up in bed. It took a few seconds to remember what had happened.
She sat on the edge of the bed for a while, her face buried in her hands and her damp hair hanging over her eyes. Her head ached and her mouth was dry.
Evidently, she had fallen asleep after her shower. She recalled lying down on the bed, with the damp towel around her, to rest her eyes. Now it was 7.30 in the morning. She had slept for almost three hours.
She got up slowly, took a few steps. Her feet were sore after yesterday’s search.
She heard a buzzing sound coming from under the covers. She searched frantically, eventually finding the phone under a pillow.
‘Helena.’ Her voice was barely more than a croak after all the shouting yesterday, and it hurt when she swallowed.
‘Hello, this is Jonas Vatt at Aftonbladet. I’m sorry if I’m calling at a bad time —’
‘Aftonbladet?’ Her voice failed her. She cleared her throat to bring it back. ‘You mean the newspaper?’
‘Yes, exactly. Sweden’s biggest evening paper. I’m sorry that I’m calling so early,’ he continued. ‘First I want to express my sympathy for what’s happened.’
Her heart was pounding. ‘Sympathy? What do you mean? Have the police found her? Is she —’
‘Uh, no. At least not as far as I know. Sorry if I’m expressing myself clumsily — what I mean is that we’re sorry to hear that your daughter is missing. We want to do everything we can to help find her, and we’ve noticed that there is great interest from our readers. For that reason, I want to ask if you would be willing to blog for us so our readers can follow the search?’
‘Excuse me?’
‘Now, don’t be alarmed by the word “blog”, it doesn’t need to take up too much of your time. You can just tell me and I’ll write it down. We just call it a blog for our readers. Do you understand what I mean?’
‘A blog?’
‘Yes, exactly,’ he said.
‘Is this some kind of joke, or what?’
‘No, not at all. Let me explain —’
She hung up before he could say another word.
Her arms started to itch. The itching spread up toward her shoulders. As she scratched, she browsed through her missed calls but didn’t recognise a single number.
She listened to the messages on her voice mail. Six different newspapers and websites had called, wanting to interview her.
Now her whole back was itching, but she couldn’t reach far enough around to scratch it.
Helena pulled on her bathrobe and went into the kitchen, pulling open the topmost drawer under the kitchen bench. Even though she’d lived in the apartment almost four years, she still hadn’t put knobs on the white cupboard doors. She’d tried several times, but then gave up, and it had just been that way ever since. By now, she was used to it.
The drawer was filled to the brim. She ran her fingers over the various packets and bottles until she found the Alvedon tablets. Finally, she also found the Nicotinell and quickly put two sticks of the gum in her mouth. She opened the pantry and took out flour, sugar, oatmeal, and a packet of cupcake mix with a best-by date that had passed several months ago. She’d thought that she and Lycke could one day do some baking together, but had never found the time. Helena felt with her hand at the back of the cupboard — maybe she still had a pack of cigarettes. She dug deeper, but it was empty.
Instead, she shook out two Alvedon, leaned her head back, and swallowed them dry.
She went over to the window and looked out toward Nybrogatan. The pedestrian-only street was empty. It was Saturday morning, and people were still asleep. As if nothing had happened. Storm water rushed down the gently sloping street.
She
still felt itchy, her arms covered in angry red scratch marks.
She had to call the police, but she was afraid to. Maybe she should call Harald instead.
They had searched for Lycke the whole night, finally giving up at four in the morning. Harald had gone home to his family, and Helena had to come home to this. She looked around and suddenly remembered the email.
She had to delete it.
She ran out into the hall and sat down at the small desk, which was just big enough to fit her laptop.
They lived in a little three-room apartment. Lycke’s bedroom, her own bedroom, and a small living room. That was all she could afford.
She’d gotten four million kronor from Harald when they divorced. That was how much she was worth. Her price tag. It was a lot of money, but it was nothing for Harald. It didn’t even make a dent in his wallet, yet apparently he couldn’t give her, or Lycke for that matter, anything more.
She could have bought something bigger in another part of town, of course, but she’d wanted to live in Östermalm. It wasn’t the nicest building on the street either, but it was functional. It had parking in the basement, and the space was well planned. A good investment. If the housing market ever turned around. The past year had been tough. It had been hard to sell even a few apartments, no matter whether they were in a prime location or had been completely renovated. People were keeping a tight grip on their money these days.
As usual, it took the computer some time to start up, and her pulse rose as she waited, drumming her fingers on the desk. Why hadn’t she deleted that email before she went to bed? What if someone found it? Was it possible to see that she’d read it? She didn’t know how these things worked.
When the computer was going, she logged onto her email and scrolled down. She couldn’t think of the tennis coach’s name. She searched for ‘tennis’ and finally found the message informing her that tennis had been cancelled. She clicked on the ‘delete’ button.
At the same moment, her phone rang. She gave a start, feeling somehow exposed. Before answering, she deleted everything from the trash folder.
When she answered, it was the police. They wanted her to come to the police station.
***
Thirty-five minutes later, she and Harald entered one of the interview rooms at the Stockholm police station together.
The room was small and looked like a pared-down office, with laminate flooring and standard government-issue furniture. The walls were probably supposed to look white, but appeared more like yellow. The curtains should have been washed years ago.
It was the first time she’d been inside the big building on Kungsholmen. Except for when she’d stood in line to renew her passport. But that had been in another part of the building.
She kept her jacket on, even though it was damp after the short walk from the car. Clenching her hands to avoid touching anything in the room, she approached one of the chairs and sat down.
Across from them sat two plainclothes police officers they hadn’t met before. Both were men in their late middle age. One of them introduced himself as the on-duty-something and the other as the preliminary investigation leader.
The mere titles made the hair on her arms stand up.
The on-duty officer, whose name was Mikael, was reading some papers, and the other, Lars, was typing something on a computer.
Both wore checked shirts, tucked into their trousers. Lars had his mobile in a waterproof holster attached to the leather belt on his blue jeans. Both men had bad posture, their necks hunched forward.
Probably from all the heavy things they’ve experienced, she thought, stretching her shoulders back.
Hanging above them were some banal posters from IKEA, skylines of big cities. One was of New York before September 11. The other city, she couldn’t place.
She had so many questions she wanted to ask the police officers. She also wanted to ask for a glass of water, but sat quietly and waited.
Harald looked worn out, sitting there beside her.
‘Do you recognise this?’ the investigation leader, Lars, asked abruptly, turning the screen around so that they could see.
Helena gave a start, raising her hand to her mouth. ‘Where did you find it?’
It was a picture of Lycke’s backpack.
‘What does this mean?’ She didn’t understand. Sweat broke out across her back and first one shoulder blade started itching and then the other, the sensation creeping farther down her spine.
‘In Rålambshovsparken,’ the officer replied.
‘Rålambshovsparken?’ Harald’s voice was shaking. ‘Why there? Can you tell us more?’
‘Yes. I understand that a lot of questions are going to come up, and we will answer all that we can,’ the on-duty policeman said in a drawling tone. ‘At the present time, it’s hard to say what this discovery means.’
‘But we want you to know that we view this very seriously. The fact that we’ve found the backpack indicates the high probability that Lycke has been taken somewhere against her will.’
Harald leaned back in the chair and made a gesture of resignation with his arms. As if it was all over. Done.
‘We suspect that she’s been kidnapped.’
Kidnapped … The word gnawed at her insides.
‘Yes. We hope we’re wrong, but we’ve prepared a report of it as a kidnapping, and begun a preliminary investigation.’
Helena sought Harald’s gaze, but he was staring blankly ahead.
‘We’ve sent the backpack to the lab for examination, but we would need to know what was in it to establish whether anything is missing.’ He picked up a pen and looked poised to write.
Helena and Harald sat in silence.
‘Please excuse me,’ Mikael said, trying to jolt them out of it. ‘I understand that this is a lot to take in, but you must try to help us by answering our questions.’
‘Absolutely.’ Harald cleared his throat. ‘But to be honest, I really don’t know what’s in the bag. It was our nanny who packed it.’
‘Her name is Mona —’ Helena added, but her mind suddenly went blank; she couldn’t recall Mona’s last name, even though the woman had worked for them for several years. ‘Do you remember her last name?’ she turned to Harald, who just shook his head apologetically.
‘Okay. We’ll need to ask more questions of you, and the people close to you who might conceivably know where Lycke is. Simply routine. We would also like to take a saliva sample so we can rule out your DNA, which will probably be on the backpack. Even if you weren’t the ones who packed it, you certainly would’ve been in contact with it. We will also need Lycke’s toothbrush, or the like, to get a sample of her DNA.’
‘We’ll get the results back no later than Wednesday,’ Lars added. ‘But hopefully we’ll have found her before then.’
It didn’t sound convincing, but Helena held on to it to keep from completely losing control.
The investigation leader cast a look at his colleague, who then immediately got up and left the room.
Helena’s phone buzzed in her bag, but she let it ring.
‘We would like to look at Lycke’s computer, if she has one? And anything else that might give us a lead.’
Lars looked first at Harald and then at Helena, regarding her for a long time.
‘She doesn’t have her own computer, but we allow her to use my old one sometimes,’ said Harald.
‘Okay. Now, I’m sure many people are trying to get hold of you right now. Some family, but also the media. There’s been a lot of pressure from the media this morning, so we’ve called a press conference at eleven-hundred hours,’ he said, glancing at the clock. ‘That’s in just two hours, and I think it would be good if the two of you could say a few words then. To avoid them going after you.’
‘What?’ Helena blurted out before she could stop herself. Wha
t had she gotten herself into? Blogs? Press conferences?
‘Take it easy.’ Harald looked at her reassuringly. ‘I agree, we have to do all we can.’
Images of the parents of Madeleine McCann, the British girl who’d gone missing, flittered through her mind — the girl had vanished without a trace during a family vacation in Portugal several years ago. The parents had appeared in numerous interviews, but they still hadn’t found their daughter.
‘We need all the help we can get right now — and it might sound strange, but the media reaches out to people in a way that we don’t. And believe me, it’s better to talk with journalists during a press conference than on the side. They are real vultures, those people.’
Once again, Helena thought about the McCann family and how the parents had been made into suspects.
‘What do you think we should say?’ Harald asked.
‘Well, that’s up to you, but if I were in your shoes I would ask the general public for help. Someone must have seen something. You have a few hours to prepare yourselves. We’ll go through it together beforehand.’
Helena hoped that Harald would remember what the officer had been saying; she was having a hard time concentrating.
‘I have a few more questions I need to ask you,’ Lars continued, as he started to poke at the little black tape recorder on the table.
‘The time is 8.40, interview room three …’
Helena looked nervously at Harald as the officer continued reeling off the details.
‘We are going to interview you separately later. Pure formality. Nothing to worry about. But, here and now, we have to ask a few questions, simply to supplement the information we have so far,’ he explained, looking up from under his bushy eyebrows. ‘Where exactly were you yesterday, when … excuse me —’ he looked down at his papers ‘— when Lycke disappeared?’
‘I was at work,’ Harald quickly answered.
A little too quickly, the policeman seemed to think, as he continued: ‘You shouldn’t feel offended by the question; this is just pure routine. Is there anyone who can confirm that?’