Death of a Carpet Dealer

by Neil Betteridge

  As Birgitta Olsson stared into space, her gaze fell on the new flat-screen. It was off, presenting a soothing surface to gaze at while she recapped the conversation she’d had with Lotta when her daughter called from Stockholm last Monday. She’d picked up almost immediately that Lotta had something on her mind, and remembered well how the conversation went. “Mom, you know that policeman from Oskarshamn…” she began with contrived jauntiness.

  Even at that point Birgitta suspected that there was someone in the room besides Lotta. Was she calling on behalf of Magnus? Her tone was unfocused, as if her attention was being drawn in two directions. Like when you talked to someone on the phone who was reading and answering emails at the same time. The muffled clicks of the keys in the background that snuck into the microphone. She always felt inclined to just hang up.

  But she stayed on the line, despite the faint whispering in the background. “Yes, and what about him?” she’d asked dryly instead.

  “Well, when he spoke to me the other day, he asked about a rug, again.…”

  “Did he now?” she’d said, making every effort to sound completely neutral.

  “Yeah, he asked if that very special rug that he’d asked about when he interviewed us in Istanbul and that Dad had bought down there in Turkey to take back to Sweden… He… I mean the detective inspector, wondered if I knew if it was in Sweden somewhere… About where more precisely it had gotten to and… and I told him the truth, that I still hadn’t the foggiest idea… Dad had so many carpet deals happening that it was simply impossible to keep tabs on them all, I said. But then I couldn’t help checking then with Annelie to see if she knew something, but she didn’t, either.”

  “Really?”

  “The policeman said that we shouldn’t talk about it, and I haven’t, other than here at home, of course. But Mom, do you really not know where it is?”

  “No, I honestly don’t,” she’d replied. “You know very well that I’ve never had anything to do with your father’s carpet business. But it’d be a good idea to get hold of it now, don’t you think? I bet it’s worth a fortune! It would pay for the funeral and more!”

  She didn’t know what had gotten into her. Being nasty like that. Lotta had fallen silent, realizing that there was no point fishing for any more. And Magnus, who was probably hovering around Lotta, was also silent.

  Sven had been with her when Lotta called. Nettan was at work and they’d just had some coffee. He sat sill on the sofa, listening of course. Afterwards he’d reacted to how she’d sounded so stiff and artificial, and wondered, naturally, what the matter was. Was there something he could do?

  “Pah, it’s just an old rug that the kids are trying to find,” she’d said. “Or rather, Lotta.”

  “What rug?”

  “And old one… It’s pretty threadbare and bleached out, but they say it’s very valuable. A rug that Carl-Ivar had apparently invested in over in Istanbul but that has since disappeared to God knows where.”

  “Oh good Lord, might that have been why he was murdered?” Sven burst out. “Maybe someone wanted to get their hands on it!”

  She’d noted something sweat-shiny around his eyes. He’d sprung into life and she wouldn’t be able to dodge past him that easily. That powerful energy that he’d made such good use of as entrepreneur and radiated from him. He was raring to get down to things, to roll up his sleeves and take control.

  “You mustn’t tell anyone,” she begged him. “It’s a secret that the police are working on, that lead… with the missing rug, I mean. It’s a sensitive matter since it’s so valuable. It almost makes you think it’s flown off,” she said a little jokingly.

  But his curiosity had been irreversibly sparked.

  “May I be so bold as to ask what kind of price class we’re talking?”

  She held her tongue. The silence became soiled and a little hungry, like it could be when the conversation turned to money. She didn’t want to tell him. It was really nothing to do with Sven. Yet it was tempting to outdo him a little; and not just him, but his perfect Nettan, too.

  “Let’s see,” she said lightly. “A few million, I guess, but I’m not that sure.”

  He didn’t give a whistle, but just remained silent, staring wide-eyed at her.

  “Well, well, that’s not bad for a rug,” he said in an almost reverential tone.

  The door knocker banged loudly. She ran her fingers through her hair as she liked to do to freshen herself up, but mainly to steady her nerves. Then she opened the door.

  Annelie Daun was standing there. She was carrying a large shoulder bag with the strap diagonally over her chest. She looked no different than normal, thought Birgitta. Though you could never be sure given what her husband had been up to. She should be a total wreck.

  Birgitta asked her right away to step inside.

  “Would you like a little something?”

  “I’m OK, thanks,” said Annelie.

  “Shall we go into the kitchen?”

  “That’ll be fine.”

  They’d hardly sat down opposite each other, Annelie in Carl-Ivar’s place, when she lifted the bag onto her knee, opened it, and took out a thick file. It was made of warn, gray-marbled cardstock. She placed it in front of Birgitta, who stared at it.

  Annelie said nothing, just nodded. Birgitta looked her in the eye, and then lifted her hands up to the file to open it.

  A tepid wave of unease rolled through her. And at the same time, a dormant thought awoke in her, like Sleeping Beauty being awakened by the Prince’s kiss. But this was a kiss of a totally different kind.

  Because she’d had her suspicions, alright.

  CHAPTER 57

  CLAESSON LAY STARING OUT at the evening. He’d been reading Emil in Lönneberga to Klara, who’d just shut her eyes. His daughter’s warm body close to his. He’d let her lie there a little while more so that she’d really settle. It was a trap, and normally he dropped off, too, but now he had so much running through his mind that he was wide awake. The past day had been his greatest failure for a long time.

  The next step of the investigation they’d have to try to plan more carefully, any fool could see that. Some mistakes were admissible, but not too many. He’d said that to Özen in the car on the way home from Stockholm. On the other hand it was nothing to mull over either, just something to learn from and let sink below the surface while your focus was on the way ahead.

  He was trying to be the wise mentor for Özen that he was expected to be. Some people never learned to let mistakes and wrongs go. He could give many examples, but was thinking particularly of one person, which he didn’t mention to Özen. Having favorites was the worst thing a manager could do. It was Martin Lerde that got his goat. Lerde could go on and on about mistakes, especially other people’s, forever, and he wouldn’t pass up the chance that presented itself now, of that Claesson was well aware. Having a dig at his boss and his rival at the same time would be too golden an opportunity for him to pass up.

  Lerde was a coward, he thought. Gossip behind his back came with the job of being a boss, and, true, Lerde’s comments were put elegantly, in the guise of humor, you could say – he was not without talent, that young man. But it still wasn’t nice. To make fun of other people was an unacceptable master suppression technique. What was a joke and what was serious? His colleagues gave as good as they got, sure, but it whipped up too much sediment.

  He’d have to put Martin Lerde in his place at the next performance review, he thought. Claesson felt how his pulse had dropped slightly. He was done with processing it. Anyway, he knew that he’d forget the whole thing until it was time for the meeting.

  After the morning briefing, he and Özen had, rather hastily, shot up to Stockholm, a three-hour or so drive, and back. They enjoyed each other’s company, but that wasn’t enough. They got a little out of the trip, as one generally does; if nothing else, they got to see the environment in which the daughter and son-in-law lived and worked, world’s apart from carpet dealer O
lsson’s own. Louise Jasinski had promised to make sure that they scrutinized Karl-Magnus Öberg’s business affairs a little more carefully in the mean time – those that they could get their hands on, the figures that were public. This was to give the greatest yield of the day.

  What they were hoping to do was to meet the Öberg family, and see them in their posh apartment on Sibyllegatan with their own eyes. Broaden the picture, so to speak.

  But it was Magnus Öberg himself whose pulse they wanted to feel a little more closely. To squeeze more out of him than they’d managed during the brief interview in Istanbul. And he couldn’t question Patrik Lindström. Their Norrköping colleagues hadn’t gotten hold of him yet. He was in hiding and had every reason to be so, with charges of assault, possibly aggravated, hanging over him, even if the injured party, for the moment at least, was missing.

  Things were starting to pile up. Long periods of routine and petty crime, and then suddenly these two dramatic cases at the same time. It was like that sometimes, oddly enough.

  Claesson toyed with some ideas about the woman’s disappearance. He had a hunch that it was the husband who’d somehow gotten rid of her. But where? Jealousy could push people to do almost anything. It was DI Peter Berg’s brief, with Martin Lerde’s willing aid and Louise’s sharp, watchful eye on him. That would do, he reckoned, when it came down to it.

  This rug, he thought then. He was quite curious about what it looked like, but realized that it was hardly at the top of his list to get his hands on it. It was Magnus Öberg he wanted, first and foremost. He remembered him as correct, not overly garrulous, but with a professional smile on his lips, a little wider than was appropriate given that his father-in-law had just been killed. All in all not exactly Mr. Charming.

  He’d read through the printed-out notes from Istanbul. Öberg had answered his questions, no more, no less. At the time of his father-in-law’s death he’d been on business in Germany, in Munich among other places, he’d said. But his alibi hadn’t been confirmed yet. He claimed he’d driven there, which seemed a bit contrived, in Claesson’s opinion. It would’ve been more reasonable to fly and rent a car down there. Here was a weak spot.

  Claesson had called Magnus Öberg on the Monday, two days ago, that is, and reminded him amicably that it would be advisable for him to send the documents they’d requested verifying his trip to Germany, and as soon as possible.

  “Mostly for the records,” he said mildly so as not to arouse this sleeping dog.

  “Sure, sure! No problem. I’ll get onto it right away,” Öberg promised.

  Not likely, of that Claesson was fairly convinced. So he wanted to catch him napping. To witness that helplessness that struck people when they didn’t have time to prepare themselves, to raise their guard.

  So suddenly there they were on Sibyllegatan, he and Özen. Claesson had sat behind the wheel on the way up, as he enjoyed driving. Özen would be driving back, they’d agreed.

  They pushed the front door intercom code as given on the list beside it. They waited. Studied two thin, elderly women who stood a bit away, for want of anything else to look at. The women were engaged in deep conversation. Both were in their sixties, probably older, being of that spindly type that was hard to determine the age of, what with all the wrinkles. No bottoms filled out their close-fitting jeans; if anything they were concave down there. Both were identically clad in denim suits of some doubtlessly au courant label, but the uniform wasn’t blue but brown and apricot, respectively. Their jackets were waist short, and fussy in the front. Both wore their hair in a page cut – a term that Claesson had learned from Louise Jasinski – held in place by a little headband. Both were wearing large glasses with toned lenses and leopard-skin patterned loafers and each had a tiny, fluffy dog under her arm. Very interesting, he thought. This was a model of woman that was exceedingly rare where he came from. If they even existed there.

  Clearly no one was in. It was almost eleven o’clock.

  “Not a time that working people are at home,” said Claesson with the wisdom of hindsight.

  They slunk away to find Magnus Öberg’s office. The GPS told them it wasn’t that far off, on Banérgatan. They left the car; they had to consider themselves lucky to have found a parking spot. Anyway, they needed to stretch their legs, they had a long drive home in front of them.

  They followed Valhallavägen eastwards, passed a shopping center that was called Fältöversten and that looked quite dull and boring. Outside, a woman of the same mold that they’d spotted earlier but sans doggie, was packing herself and her shopping bags into a taxi with the driver’s willing assistance. She was tipsy, to say the least. He could just make out around her lips and teeth that bluish tone that excessive consumption of cheap red wine could cause.

  The office was on the ground floor of a thirties’ building on Banérgatan. The firm was called Ö&L AB. Who L was they didn’t even intend to find out. Perhaps it was the young, pretty but reserved woman who opened up for them when they knocked. She probably wouldn’t have let them in if the office interior hadn’t been clearly visible from the street. She’d realized, in other words, that they’d seen her.

  “I don’t really know where he is. I haven’t seen him today… We’ve got completely different jobs… so it’s more like we share office space,” she drawled and pulled out some of the corkscrew curls in the enormous fuzz of hair that framed her delicate face.

  The office was of the minimalistic and neosimple style that you saw in interiors magazines. It was hard to believe that someone worked here. Magnus Öberg worked with advertising or communication in one way or other, didn’t he? Weren’t they the same thing? Glossy table tops on legs of blond wood, white cube-shaped shelves along the wall, classic black desk lamps.

  Another mission unaccomplished, then. He and Özen went for some sushi at a bar around the corner. Inside, it was all go. Sushi wasn’t one of Claesson’s favorite meals, preferring hot food that was more filling, but this wasn’t at all bad. Özen ate with chopsticks, while Claesson grabbed a knife and fork for himself. It felt ridiculous to sit picking at grains of rice in that unaccustomed manner, which he’d never mastered. It was like sitting at a children’s party.

  They returned to Sibyllegatan. This time a voice answered on the intercom and let them in without too much dithering. It couldn’t be anyone other than his wife. Unless, that is, she was the cleaner.

  A soft Oriental carpet ran along the ground floor of the block. Some hypermodern strollers stood squashed up against the wall. There were probably constant neighborly spats about them being in the way, thought Claesson. The stone staircase up was broad. There were some beautiful leaded windows overlooking the courtyard representing stylized flowers: hepaticas on the first floor, coltsfoots on the next. The ascended two floors. The elevator was a fine example of some ancient design, but they preferred to use their legs. Free exercise.

  It was wife and carpet-dealer-daughter Lotta Öberg who let them in. It was almost two in the afternoon, Claesson noted on the antique pendulum clock that hung on the wall near the tall, white double doors leading into what they took to be the living room. Or drawing room, more appropriately.

  But that was as far as they got, and they had to stand there, shuffling their feet on the soft carpet. Lotta Öberg had come home to change and was stressed, she said. Was off to an event with work. So she had to get into her cocktail dress and powder her nose.

  The pictures on the narrow walls in the hallway were nothing to sniff at, Claesson could see that from where he was standing. Nor those he could glimpse on the walls of the main room, where the light shone in through tall windows.

  “So what is it you want? Is there a message you would like me to pass on?” She studied them critically.

  “We’d just like to discuss some details with your husband,” he said with as much calm as he could muster.

  “If it’s something important you can call him. He’s in Germany.”

  “Aha. In Munich, perchance?�
�� said Claesson.

  She stared at him. “How could you know that?”

  “He was there before when your father was murdered in Istanbul.”

  “Is that so?”

  She was wearing a white terry robe, like at a spa. The belt was drawn tightly around her narrow waist. Short, blonde hair. Self-assured, slightly sullen air, but she looked good. Although not, he thought with a change of mind. The people he found really attractive were always the warm types. A lithe body and a perfect profile weren’t the be-all, end-all.

  It looked like she was standing there trying to regain her balance.

  “We need to take it up with him in person,” Claesson insisted. “When is he due home from Munich, so that we can plan a meeting?”

  “Just in time to attend Father’s funeral.”

  “Well, good. Then we can take the opportunity to deal with this little matter while he’s in Oskarshamn. So that’ll be a week from Friday?”

  She nodded.

  “In nine days’ time, then.”

  She nodded again, but barely perceptibly.

  “So he’s got so much to do in Munich that he needs to be away for so long?”

  “He’s there for a major advertising campaign. It’s simply inconvenient to dash home over the weekend and then back again.”

  “I see,” said Claesson.

  They turned to go. Claesson laid a hand on the doorknob.

  “By the way, you might ask him to send tickets and other documents confirming that he was in Germany at the time of your father’s murder. He promised to do so, but he’s obviously been busy and not gotten around to it. It’s a formality, but important nonetheless.”

  She didn’t comment on that either.

  Lying now in Klara’s bed, Claesson grew all the more convinced that Magnus Öberg had been standing listening in a closet somewhere in that airy apartment.