So that’s an interview you can just forget, Holt, thought Lars Martin Johansson, and then he finally fell asleep.
70
“I have to talk with you, boss,” said Mattei as she stood in the doorway to Johansson’s office.
“It can’t wait until Monday?” said Johansson. “I have a lot of things to do. Have to pick up my wife. We’re going away this weekend.”
“I’m afraid it’s important,” said Mattei.
“What’s more important than my wife?” said Johansson.
“Nothing, I’m sure,” said Mattei. “It’s just that I think I’ve found the bastard who did it.” The one the boss is harping about all the time, she thought.
“Close the door,” said Johansson. “Sit down.”
“4711,” said Johansson five minutes later when Mattei was through talking. “Wasn’t that some kind of mysterious German perfume?”
“That was why I happened to think of it,” said Mattei. “That was when I remembered the service code on the so-called receipt that Waltin gave to Wiijnbladh.”
“Although you don’t know what his name is,” said Johansson.
“Someone must have known. Someone at SePo must have known. Considering the answer from their personnel department that was in the file. I asked Linda, my mother that is, but she didn’t want to talk about it. She thought it could be hard to produce. So long afterward, that is.”
“Do you have any description of that mysterious perfume man?” said Johansson.
“The anonymous informant provided a description. The informant, who I think was Orjala, Jorma Kalevi Orjala. A known thug at that time who was run over in a hit-and-run accident involving an unknown perpetrator, and found drowned in the Karlberg Canal only a few months after the Palme murder. Doesn’t seem as though Orjala liked our colleague from SePo, but maybe we shouldn’t worry about that.”
“What should we worry about then?” interrupted Johansson.
“He says that the person he saw at that Chinese restaurant on Drottninggatan the same evening that Palme was murdered had worked at the bureau in Solna, but that he had quit a number of years before and started at SePo instead. He is supposed to have left there in 1982 according to what SePo itself says in its response to the officer who had the question about the anonymous tip.”
“Hell,” said Johansson, sitting straight up in his chair. “Hell’s bells. Why didn’t I think of that? How could I have forgotten that bastard?”
“Excuse me,” said Mattei.
“Hell,” Johansson repeated. “It’s Kjell Göran Hedberg you’re talking about, of course.”
North Mallorca, fall of 1992
First he intended to clean up after himself. As soon as he got rid of the body he intended to clean up after himself. Starting with his hotel room. Get his keys. Take the plane to Stockholm. Clean up his apartment on Norr Mälarstrand and his big house in the country. In the best case he could get back anything that rightfully belonged to him.
There was never time for any cleanup. As so often before when he planned things, the unexpected upset his calculations.
When he showed up at the hotel the next morning the police had already been there. A regular marked car was parked by the hotel entrance. Two uniformed Spanish officers standing in reception, talking with the staff. The main key that was in his pocket, that he’d had to pay so dearly for, could no longer be used. He got rid of it. Threw it in the water when he turned in the boat he had rented. Traveling to Sweden was out of the question.
What remained was the hope that there wasn’t anything to clean up. He laid low. Changed residence, waited, hid for months like a rabbit in its new hole. It was also then that he decided to have Esperanza built. As an extra insurance policy he could use to protect himself against the unexpected.
But nothing had happened. There hadn’t been anything he needed to clean up. If there had been he would have noticed it. Then things would have happened. All that had happened was that year was added to year, and soon it would be over for good, and worldly justice could no longer reach him. He had never had any reason to trouble himself about divine justice. On the contrary, it seemed to have been on his side all along, if you wanted to believe in such things.
Esperanza was no longer simply a boat, an insurance policy, and a reminder. It had also become a contribution to his livelihood, and it was Ignacio Ballester who had suggested it. Why not earn some extra money from all the charter tourists? Everyone who wanted to swim, fish, and dive. He knew the area, he knew the waters. He was an experienced sailor too, good diver, and capable fisherman. What would be simpler than putting out his card among all the others on the bulletin board down by the charter pier in Puerto Pollensa? Day tours, swimming, fishing, diving. Easy money and no tax authorities to torment anyone smart enough to give out only a cell phone number on the printed card.
Think of all the good-looking women he could meet, said Ignacio, winking at him. A man like him. In his prime and with a beautiful boat like Esperanza. All the beautiful women, practically naked, dressed for swimming and diving. And then the sun, the warm sea. Security, freedom, perhaps love too. Love. There was never anything wrong with a little love, was there?
71
Wednesday, September 26 and exactly two weeks left until October 10.
Headquarters of the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation on Kungsholmen in Stockholm
Half an hour before the usual Wednesday meeting would begin, Lisa Mattei’s mother stepped into Johansson’s office. She closed the door behind her, sat down in the visitor’s chair, and fixed her eyes on Lars Martin Johansson.
“No time for frills,” said Johansson. “You’re more beautiful than ever, Linda. Although that’s probably not something any of your sallow colleagues have dared say to you.”
“No time for bullshit either, Lars,” said Linda Mattei. “Quick question. What are you up to with my daughter?”
“Nothing,” said Johansson, shaking his head. “True, she’s just as gorgeous as her mother, but as I’m sure you know, I’ve been a happily married man for many years.”
“She’s asking a lot of strange questions,” said Linda Mattei. “I’m getting worried about her.”
“I don’t think you need to be,” said Johansson. “If you ask me I’m convinced things will go very well for her. Things are already going well for her, and she can go as far as she wants. I’m sure she will too.”
“Last week she wanted me to reveal the identity of one of my former colleagues. Is that something you’ve asked her to do?”
“Actually, no,” said Johansson. “She came up with that all on her own, and I’m very grateful that she did.”
“So it’s not something that you’re behind,” said Linda Mattei.
“I helped her of course when she asked.”
“You helped her?”
“Kjell Göran Hedberg,” said Johansson. “How could I have ever forgotten someone like him?”
“So you knew,” said Linda Mattei.
“It struck me suddenly when your gorgeous daughter was kind enough to describe him to me. The bureau in Solna in the seventies. Then bodyguard at SePo. Quit in 1982. Kjell Göran Hedberg. Same Hedberg who never should have become a policeman.”
“Did you know he was called the Perfume Man? After that horrid German eau de cologne Kölnisch Wasser 4711 that my husband used to give me as a present,” said Linda Mattei.
“Not a clue,” said Johansson. “Must have been before my time. That wasn’t what you were wearing those far too few times when I had the pleasure,” said Johansson.
“Come, come now,” said Linda Mattei. “You’ve never heard the story about the Perfume Man?”
“No,” said Johansson. “Tell me.”
Hedberg had started with SePo in the summer of 1976. He had been recruited from the detective division at the Solna police and was one of three who had been brought over from Solna and placed in SePo’s bodyguard squad. First training, then service as a bodyguard.
In addition, a service code to protect his identity from the outside world.
“He got the code 4711,” said Linda Mattei. “There were no ulterior motives in that. At least not as far as I know. It was simply the code that was available, I guess. After a while he discovered that his colleagues were calling him the Perfume Man. After that German eau de cologne. He came to me and complained. I was office manager at the squad back then.”
“I can barely contain myself,” said Johansson.
“I told him not to be so damned childish,” said Linda Mattei. “If any of his little classmates were being mean to him, he could always tattle on them to the teacher who would take them by the ear. Because he was evidently not man enough to rise above such childishness.”
“So what did he say?” said Johansson.
“He slunk off,” said Linda Mattei. “Didn’t come back the whole time I was sitting at the counter, and that was at least a couple of years.”
“He must have been occupied with other things,” said Johansson. “First running off to rob the post office on Dalagatan and then killing two witnesses who happened to recognize him.”
“I’ve heard that story before,” said Linda Mattei. “Show me an indictment or even a preliminary investigation, then I promise to listen to you.”
“Forget about that now,” said Johansson. “Continue.”
“My successor was evidently more sensitive than I was. It was Björn Söderström, whom you no doubt know. The one who later became head of the whole squad. In any event he liberated Perfume Man from his suffering. Gave him a new service code and saw to it that 4711 became inactive. For the same reasons you avoid having DIK on the license plate on your car.”
“What would a real man do with a license plate like that?” said Johansson, shrugging his shoulders.
“No, maybe not you. But certainly one or two of your brethren,” said Linda Mattei.
“That particular code I’m talking about, 4711 that is, has actually never been used since then. Not since the autumn of 1977 as far as I know. Although the story was well known, and that was certainly why our personnel department sent the reply they did.”
“Although Hedberg was still there. Even after having robbed the post office and eliminated two witnesses,” said Johansson.
“He was allowed to stay. Though he had left the bodyguards by 1978. For one thing, there was a lot of talk about what you just mentioned. For another, the boss at the time, it was Berg as I’m sure you remember, transferred him. Internal service for almost four years before he resigned.”
“I’ve thought a good deal about that,” said Johansson. “Why did Berg let him stay?”
“Well, it certainly wasn’t out of consideration for Hedberg,” said Linda Mattei.
“I understand exactly,” said Johansson. “If it was concern for your daughter that got you to look me up, then you don’t need to worry yourself in the slightest.”
“Good,” said Linda Mattei, getting up. “And if you were to get tired of your young wife you know who you can call.”
All these women who love you, thought Lars Martin Johansson. In his conference room there were probably two more who were longing to meet him.
Not both however, as it appeared. When he showed up Anna Holt looked pointedly at the clock, even though he was only fifteen minutes late. Lisa on the other hand was energetic and happy as always, while Jan Lewin seemed almost absent. Although he was a guy of course. Not much of a guy, to be sure, thought Johansson, but who cared about such things?
“Read this,” he said, giving them copies of the summary he had devoted the entire evening to while his wife sulked and finally disappeared to go to the movies with a girlfriend. Not with her husband, even though he had promised her.
“Kjell Göran Hedberg,” said Holt. “Where have I heard that name?”
“Read,” said Johansson.
72
Kjell Göran Hedberg was born on the fifteenth of August 1944, in Vaxholm parish due north of Stockholm. His father worked as a harbor pilot. He was stationed in Sandhamn and lived in Vaxholm, when he wasn’t out piloting vessels through the Stockholm archipelago. He and his family lived in a single-family house. Hedberg’s mother was a housewife. Besides Kjell, the Hedbergs had a daughter three years younger named Birgitta.
If Kjell Hedberg was still alive, and there was nothing to indicate that he wasn’t, he would have turned sixty-three just over a month ago. If he was the one who shot the country’s prime minister, he would have been forty-one when he did it. Tall enough besides. When he applied to the police academy almost forty years before he had been six foot one. According to the information in his passport, now seven years old, these days he was slightly shorter.
“Age takes its toll even on someone like that,” Johansson observed.
After finishing nine years of comprehensive school, Hedberg worked for a few years as a carpenter’s apprentice at a small shipyard in Vaxholm while he studied at evening school and earned a high school diploma. When he turned eighteen he did his military service with the coast commandos in Vaxholm. He trained as an attack diver and mustered out with the highest grades in all subjects. As soon as he was a legal adult he applied to the police academy and was admitted the following year. He was then twenty years old and the year was 1965.
Once he was through with his year of police training, he ended up with the police in Stockholm as a trainee. He was promoted to assistant one year later, and after a total of ten years he applied for a position as a detective inspector with the police in Solna.
Hedberg got the position. Not only did he have good recommendations. He was also the kind of colleague everyone spoke well of. Someone who could be relied on when things suddenly heated up. Someone who always volunteered. Despite his youth, Hedberg was a real constable. The year was 1975 and he had just turned thirty-one.
After only a year at the bureau in Solna the secret police had been in touch. Spoke with Hedberg’s boss. Spoke with Hedberg himself. Sent their usual recruiters there. Interviewed Hedberg, brought him to the mandatory test week at their training camp, somewhere in Sweden. Asked if he wanted to start with them. Got an affirmative reply. Took care of all the papers and got the go-ahead from his police chief and Hedberg himself.
Hedberg was placed with SePo’s bodyguard squad. He was the Solna police department’s best marksman. He was in perfect physical shape. Single, no children. There was nothing that would prevent him from living life as a policeman to the fullest. He looked good. Was careful about his appearance. Dressed well. Was courteous and well-mannered. Had everything required of someone who would be watching over the potentates of the realm, and in the worst case would take the bullet meant for the person he was protecting.
So far all was well known and well substantiated. What happened next was at best mere slander in the big police building on Kungsholmen. At worst it was true, even though Hedberg during his entire active time as a police officer had never been named as a suspect for the crimes he was supposed to have been guilty of.
Johansson’s memo was about Hedberg’s life up to the point when the wicked rumors had taken over. The boss pointed out that he had done it himself, that it was concise and a model of brevity, and that despite his advanced age he still managed to hit the right keys on his computer.
“So read and enjoy, because the rest I intend to do verbally,” said Johansson. “You’ll understand why immediately, and I don’t need to even explain why this has to stay in this room. For the time being, at least. If it’s as I think, there’ll be some changes coming soon. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” said Johansson.
“On Friday, May 13, 1977, Hedberg robbed the post office at Dalagatan 13,” said Johansson. “His assignment was to guard the then minister of justice during the day. The minister of justice wanted to take the opportunity to visit his favorite hooker a few blocks from there. Hedberg got leave for a couple of hours and passed the time by robbing the post office. Got away with almost thre
e hundred thousand in cash. A lot of money at that time, when a detective inspector like myself earned five thousand a month, before taxes and including all the overtime you accumulated.”
“I’m sure I’ve heard that story a hundred times,” said Holt. “Is it really true?”
“Yes,” said Johansson. “How do I know? Well, I know. I was the one who found him, you see.”
Then it got even worse. During the ensuing months Hedberg did away with two witnesses to the robbery by murdering them. The first was a young man whom he ran over with his car when the man was crossing the street outside the subway station at the Skogskyrkogården cemetery just south of Stockholm. That case had been written off as a tragic traffic accident—the victim had been high and more or less threw himself in front of Hedberg’s car. The second was a completely ordinary murder. An elderly man and social outcast had his neck broken and was dumped in the same cemetery on December 24, 1977.
“On Christmas Eve,” said Lisa Mattei, her eyes widening.
The suspicions against Hedberg could never be proved. What decided the whole thing was that the minister of justice gave him an alibi for the time when he was supposed to have robbed the post office on Dalagatan, and with that all the evidence collapsed like a house of cards.
“The whole thing ended with him being taken out of outside service,” said Johansson. “He got to sit at SePo and shuffle papers. He sat there for four years before he resigned. Where he went then is unclear. According to the little there is, he’s supposed to have moved to Spain a year later. That was in the fall of 1983. At the same time I have reason to believe he continued working for SePo during the following years. As a so-called external operator.”
According to Johansson there was more to it than that. The only one who seemed to have made use of this particular external operator was then police chief superintendent Claes Waltin. It is probable that he had employed Hedberg in a mission that went wrong. A secret house search of a student apartment on Körsbärsvägen in Stockholm, Friday the twenty-second of November 1985.
Free Falling, As If in a Dream Page 44