The Root of Evil

by Håkan Nesser

  Taken by: Henrik Malmgren?

  Comments: Typical holiday photo. All have their eyes closed against the bright sun. They are sitting on straw mats, and towels and bags are visible at the bottom of the picture. The sea and horizon are in the background on the left-hand side. Erik Bergman and Anna Eriksson are wearing sunglasses, Katarina Malmgren has an open paperback in her hand.

  Picture 7

  Setting: The same as picture 6 but taken from further back.

  Time: Day.

  People: Erik Bergman, Anna Eriksson, Gunnar Öhrnberg, Katarina Malmgren. A few people are bathing in the sea. A sailing boat further out.

  Taken by: Henrik Malmgren?

  Comments: Another typical holiday photo. There is sand at the foot of the rocks. The four are eating, and Anna Eriksson is looking at the camera, waving – her hand is blurred. Both women are in bikinis, different shades of red.

  And that was it. Gunnar Barbarotti put down his pen and ran his eyes over all seven photographs. He waved away a mosquito, who was late to the feast. What am I doing? he thought. Is it possible to glean anything from this? What happened to these people?

  Justifiable questions, without a doubt. Especially the last one. He leant back and shut his eyes. He ruminated.

  Behind every crime there was a story, and the trick was to lay it bare. That was the basic aim of virtually all detective work: exposing the preconditions. And backwards, always a backward movement, searching, feeling one’s way towards the crucial period of time.

  So in this case, unless all indications were mistaken: five people on a holiday trip to Brittany. In the summer of 2002 . . . it must be that summer, mustn’t it? He had forgotten to ask Backman if the date had been confirmed. Two couples, it seemed: Henrik and Katarina Malmgren from Gothenburg, Anna Eriksson from Kymlinge and Gunnar Öhrnberg from Borås. And a fifth person: Erik Bergman from Kymlinge.

  Plus a sixth? Who was that man? Gunnar Barbarotti opened his eyes. He leant over the photos and scrutinized them again. Number six was at the restaurant and at the boules park. But he wasn’t in the photos on the cliffs. What did that signify?

  Drivel, thought Gunnar Barbarotti, it doesn’t signify anything in particular. Perhaps he’d just gone for swim at that point; pictures 6 and 7 could well have been taken only a few minutes apart.

  It was hard, he thought as he ran his eyes over the photos on the table and then raised them to the dark lake and the strip of forest outlined against the slightly lighter sky on the far shore, it was hard to ask any kind of sensible question at all. That was just a fact. He had been away from the investigation for three days, and there must be lots of factors of which he was unaware.

  Where? for example. Where in Brittany were these pictures taken? If friends and acquaintances of the Malmgrens knew they had gone on that holiday – isn’t that what Backman had told him? – well then, surely the investigators had also been able to get more details? Loads of details. How had they travelled? By car or on some kind of package? What were the dates of their stay? Was there conceivably any link between the Malmgrens and Gunnar Öhrnberg? That question must surely have been pursued as far as was possible by now.

  And as the link between the murders should presumably have been established by now, hopefully they would also have started on a fresh round of interviews with the friends and acquaintances of the first two victims.

  And – again hopefully – they would have found out a useful thing or two.

  This is daft, thought Gunnar Barbarotti. It’s pointless indulging in this armchair speculation. I’m too many steps behind. Better to draw a line under it for tonight and get a proper update on the way to Hallsberg tomorrow.

  He collected up the photographs and his notes, stuffing the lot of them into his briefcase as he glanced at the time. Five past eleven – high time indeed.

  He set the alarm on his mobile for half past six. Why not allow himself an early swim, as for once he happened to have a lake only twenty metres away?

  And especially in view of the state of the guest bedding at Paradise Scrapheap. He found it hard to imagine Axel Wallman had bothered to change it since his last visit.

  So that was how it would have to be: late to bed, early to rise.

  And as for that murderer, wasn’t it about time they brought him in?

  FIVE

  NOTES FROM MOUSTERLIN

  8–9 July 2002

  I fell asleep there in my lounger on the terrace, and was woken by Erik when he got home a couple of hours later.

  ‘How’s things?’ he wanted to know.

  I didn’t really get what he was driving at. Was he just asking how I felt, or was he wondering if I intended to leave soon? Or perhaps he was alluding to how I had got on the previous night. I assumed the last of these, but chose to answer the first.

  ‘Fine,’ I said. ‘A bit tired but OK otherwise.’

  He stood there regarding me with a look on his face I hadn’t seen from him before. As if he was only now realizing I was a more complex person than he had taken me to be. But then he’s not used to trying to get inside other people’s skins. Erik’s very self-contained, and as he looked at me now, grinding his jaw as his eyes darted around, he gave the impression of being about to lose control of something – something he didn’t normally feel a need to control, but had now found in his hands.

  ‘They’re standing us dinner tonight,’ he said finally. ‘Over at Thalamot in Beg-Meil. So we can discuss everything. So it all went to plan last night then?’

  ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘It went to plan.’

  He sat down at the table. I got up from the lounger and looked at my watch. It was half past four. ‘I’ll go and have a shower,’ I said. ‘What time are we supposed to be there?’

  ‘Eight o’clock,’ said Erik. ‘So we ought to leave here around half seven, I suppose.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ I said. ‘And what exactly are we going to discuss?’

  He looked at me in some confusion. ‘Well isn’t it obvious?’ he said. ‘We can’t put all this behind us, just like that.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ I said.

  He said nothing for a while, and then lit a cigarette.

  ‘What kind of person are you?’ he said.

  ‘I’m like everybody else, I think,’ I replied. ‘I don’t understand what you mean.’

  He took a few drags. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Well, I guess you’d know that best yourself. We’ll say half past seven then, shall we?’

  ‘Fine by me,’ I said.

  Le Thalamot was empty apart from a table of Germans having langoustines and mussels. The tourist season still hasn’t really got going, even though we’re into July; I assume it will look rather different here in a couple of weeks’ time. On the beach, along the paths through the polders, in the restaurants and crêperies.

  And at the campsites. But by then I shall be far away. I don’t know exactly where – but south of here, at any event, I shall head south. I’ve had a feeling for a while now that I’d like to die by the Mediterranean, perhaps the Middle East, or why not Cairo or Alexandria? There’s something about those latitudes that strikes a chord with me, though I’m not sure quite how it resonates or what it expresses, but then there’s no need for us to understand everything. The important things are the route and our feelings, not the destination and the purpose.

  The quartet had already arrived and was waiting for us at a long table at the back of the restaurant, by an open window that looked out over a garden, at a safe distance from the German party. I noted that all four of them had dressed up a bit for the occasion; the two ladies were wearing dresses I hadn’t seen before, Anna’s pale green and Katarina’s red, and the gents were in freshly pressed short-sleeved cotton shirts. They had ordered a drink each and were taking cautious sips as Erik and I came in, and Gunnar and Henrik got to their feet when they saw us.

  ‘Nice to see you both,’ said Gunnar. ‘Have a seat. Do you want a drink?’

  Considering it was less tha
n twenty-four hours since we had been cursing each other over the dead body of a girl, this all sounded excessively formal, and I realized different choreography applied tonight. Choreography that had been worked out and noted down in the course of the day’s consultations, wherever they had taken place. I felt an ironic smile start to twitch inside me.

  ‘Sure,’ said Erik. ‘Gin and tonic for me.’

  I said a glass of white wine would do for me and we sat down. Erik between Anna and Henrik, and me between the two women. This, too, seemed to have been calculated in advance, though I couldn’t quite see what was intended by it.

  Once Erik and I had our drinks, we raised our glasses to each other. I couldn’t see a smile on any of the others’ faces, it was more a passing moment of solemn solidarity and community. Then we devoted a long time to ordering from the menu, with Katarina transmitting our words to the waiter as usual, and as we waited for the food to arrive we chatted about French wines, French cheeses, the days and months to avoid when eating seafood; the whole thing, I thought, was a replay – though duller, less slick and hopeful – of the conversation that had taken place at that first lunch in the old port in Bénodet. Ten days ago, if I was not much mistaken.

  We also drank a good deal less wine, and ordered fish and meat instead of seafood, and it was only when we reached the dessert that Gunnar finally came to the point.

  ‘We want to thank you,’ he said, turning to me. ‘Thank you for taking on such a very unpleasant task and completing it.’

  He paused. I had no comment.

  ‘That is, I assume you completed it in a satisfactory manner?’

  I waited a few seconds. I could feel all their eyes on me. ‘You want to know if I buried the girl properly?’ I asked.

  Gunnar and Henrik both looked round uneasily and it struck me that it was pretty unwise of them to have this discussion in a public place if they were so worried about outsiders hearing it.

  ‘It’s OK,’ said Erik. ‘Nobody here understands Swedish.’

  ‘Do you want to know where?’ I asked.

  ‘No, no,’ Gunnar hastened to say. ‘Of course you needn’t tell us that. But it feels important to us to know that everything went as planned.’

  Planned? I thought.

  ‘And that there’s nothing we ought to know about,’ Katarina chimed in.

  I wondered what it was they really wanted. Were they just after some kind of general reassurance to make them feel safe, or was there more to it than that? But if so, I really had no conception of what it might be.

  ‘It all went the way I’d imagined it,’ I said. ‘You can carry on drinking your wine in peace.’

  ‘That’s not what I mean,’ said Gunnar. ‘I just mean it’s important for us to know this is over and done with now.’

  ‘It is,’ I said. ‘All over and done with.’

  ‘We’ve also got to be sure we’re all singing from the same hymn sheet if the police turn up after all,’ said Henrik. ‘I mean to say, we’re going to be down here for a couple more weeks, and . . .’

  ‘How long are you staying?’ Katarina asked me, attempting a smile.

  ‘I’m leaving the day after tomorrow,’ I said.

  ‘On Wednesday,’ said Gunnar. ‘Excellent. But anyway, it’s vital that we all deny categorically taking the girl out to the islands with us. Or seeing her that day at all, in fact. She spent a few hours with us one afternoon the previous week, but that was it. And that’s all we need to remember.’

  ‘How did you get on with the boat?’ I asked.

  ‘There were no problems about the boat,’ said Henrik.

  ‘Glad to hear it,’ I said. ‘Well, one girl more or less doesn’t make much difference, I guess.’

  I felt Anna give a start, sitting close beside me as she was, and I expected her to say something. But Gunnar raised a warning finger and gave her a look. It was enough, and she held her tongue. Anna had said very little all evening, in fact. The same went for Erik. It was Gunnar, Henrik and Katarina who did the talking, and presumably that was no coincidence.

  It was only quarter to ten when we finished at the restaurant. Gunnar and Henrik shared the bill and we walked home along the bridleway between the polder and the steep bank down to the beach. Erik and I turned off to our place without any further ado and had a glass of Calvados on the terrace before we turned in, but we didn’t seem to have much to talk about.

  ‘Wednesday, then?’ he said.

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I’ll be heading off in the morning.’

  ‘Probably just as well,’ he said.

  ‘Right,’ I said.

  He gave a brief laugh. ‘The girl’s name,’ he said.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Henrik came up with what it meant.’

  ‘What it meant?’

  ‘Well, what it stood for, at any rate. If you spell it out and take each letter. T-R-O-A-Ë . . . in English, can you work it out?’

  I thought about it for a bit, then shook my head.

  ‘The Root of all Evil,’ said Erik. ‘Good, eh?’

  ‘The root of all evil?’ I said. ‘It sounds like something that might have a sequel after all. This whole saga, that is.’

  I don’t really know what I meant when I said it, and Erik didn’t respond. He just stubbed out his cigarette and gave me another of those appraising looks.

  Then we wished each other good night and went to bed.

  On Tuesday morning I went to the boulangerie and bought a copy of Ouest France. I glanced through the paper from the first page to the last. Despite my poor French, I could plainly see there wasn’t a word in it about any missing girl.

  It was lovely weather and I was sure Erik had already set off for the beach. Heading for Bénodet I assumed, now that he knew nude sunbathing was allowed there, something which clearly appeals to him. I decided to stay at the house, do my packing and write a few more pages.

  Sum up my impressions. The first thing that strikes me is that how much is ruled by chance – or by mechanisms beyond our control, at least. When Erik picked me up from that petrol station on the edge of Lille, I’d been trying to hitch a lift for exactly fifty-five minutes; I remember that very clearly, because I’d set myself a limit of an hour before I went back into the cafe. If he’d turned up two minutes later, we would never have met at all. I would have been picked up by some other vehicle and deposited in some other place entirely.

  Would Troaë still have been alive, in that case? It would be easy to answer yes to that question, but I think that would be a simplification of the truth. There is no human means of determining this, of course; she could have turned up that morning anyway, and she could have gone out to des Glénan with the Swedes. The same sequence of events could have unfolded, and one thing is for certain: the weather would have been the same, the rain would have blown in, the engine would probably have broken down – but would the girl have started feeling sick on the way home, would the boat have crested the same treacherous wave, and would someone have let go of her hand? I have no way of solving this riddle but the thoughts and questions will not leave me alone. What is the extent of my participation in the events and processes of this world? Are there a variety of alternatives – and other conceivable actors – on the way to a given goal?

  Maybe Henrik Malmgren would be able to guide me through all this, I can see these are problems that properly belong within philosophy. The archetypal mother of all scientific disciplines, but I have no intention of asking Henrik Malmgren’s advice. I assume I won’t ever see any of them again apart from the various superficial exchanges I shall have with Erik before I leave tomorrow. Amongst other things, I must make sure I’m not in debt; I reckon we’re all square on what we’ve spent on food, and I also paid my share of the trip to des Glénan. I don’t think I owe him any money. In other respects, I think it best for me to view this stay in Finistère as a parenthesis, something that, in a sense, never happened. Everybody has to be allowed periods like that in their lives, the intenti
on simply can’t be for us to be held to account for every last thing, for every unfortunate circumstance and every second that happens to veer off course.

  If I can just get away from here, I will do my best to forget these two weeks. I will erase that walk with the girl in my arms from my mind, the intensity of her presence, her remarkable lightness; I have heard so much about the weight of dead bodies, but this was not at all the case with Troaë. I will repress those ghastly minutes in the water and I will never try to recall the way the ground and the earth enclosed her in their embrace. I will keep these notes of course, but that does not mean I will come back to them and reread them; it is enough for me to be aware that they exist, and if anyone happens to need them in the future, they are still here.

  Perhaps I should devote a few lines to the individuals who have peopled my existence this past fortnight, but I have no urge to. I cannot overcome my reluctance and if they had the slightest idea – any of them – how much I despise them, it would undoubtedly come as a major surprise. My inside is not written on my outside, for better or worse, and that has always been the case. I remember Dr L and I discussed this state of affairs in some detail, and he felt initially that it was an element of, and a factor in, the pathology of my illness, but I think in the end we agreed it was a question of a legitimate characteristic. Revealing one’s soul in one’s face is not necessarily a sign of a good state of health, and it certainly isn’t anything to aspire to if it doesn’t happen naturally.

  I spent the morning cleaning my room and getting all my packing done. I took a walk inland for about an hour and a half, and as I passed the boulangerie I picked up an evening paper. No word of a missing girl in there, either. When I got back to the house, Erik still wasn’t back, and I presumed he had joined up with the other Swedes, perhaps not wanting to spend any more time in my company. In fact, on reflection, I guess that is the case, and probably applies to all five of them. They are biding their time until I leave, so they can calmly go back to their trivial beach life and forget what happened. I briefly toy with the idea of doing as they want and going on my way this evening. But there’s no bus to Quimper until first thing tomorrow, and hitchhiking on the road from Mousterlin and Fouesnant is not a tempting prospect. I could draw undue attention to myself, too, which is the last thing we need at the moment.