Buster Hansson has always been surprised that people couldn’t count. He had made this discovery at an early stage in his career. Immigrants were indisputably over-represented in the crime statistics. There was in fact a clear correlation between being part of a less privileged stratum of society, and being over-represented in the crime statistics. Immigrants who lived in the Östermalm district of Stockholm featured no more heavily than people who had not been born overseas, or whose parents fell into that category. Therefore, the problem was not that immigrants were immigrants, but that regardless of an immigrant’s background, as soon as they arrived in Sweden, they were banished to the periphery of society. And once they ended up there, it was easier to go astray in life.
During his time as Secretary of State, Buster had given countless lectures on the subject. Those on the periphery of society were more likely to turn to crime than those who lived a more comfortable life. And since immigrants were more over-represented than Swedes in the lowest stratum of society, then . . . Buster didn’t have the strength to follow the chain of thought through to its conclusion; he had been there far too often, without ever coming up with anything new. There could be only one conclusion – immigration itself was not harmful. What was harmful was failing to give people any hope for the future.
However, he was by no means as certain that the international terrorism that had now reached Scandinavia could be explained in the same way. The men who had recently been convicted were young and driven, and had made a living running their own businesses. They earned good money, and had lived in Sweden all their lives. Their parents had been part of the group of Swedes born overseas who had made a great success of their life in Sweden. So the frustration must come from a different source other than the usual criminality.
Eden Lundell had often asked where all this anger came from, and Buster thought it was a good question. How come those with their origins in the Levant, for example, wanted to commit acts of terrorism in Europe because European soldiers were fighting in Afghanistan? And even if you accepted that as an explanation, how could anyone convince themselves that it was okay to carry out a suicide bombing on a street full of civilians who have never set foot in Afghanistan, and who probably didn’t even have an opinion on the subject?
To Buster it was important not to mix up understanding an incident and justifying it. If he didn’t have the courage to comprehend what might explain a particular action, then he was doomed to fail in his task.
Ensuring the safety of Sweden was not the same as keeping Sweden Swedish. Whatever the hell ‘Swedish’ was supposed to mean.
His musings were interrupted by the arrival of Henrik Theander, head of counter-espionage.
‘You said it was urgent,’ Henrik said as he sat down.
Buster hesitated briefly, then decided he had no choice – he couldn’t just ignore what he had been told about Eden by MI5. He quickly summarised the information he had received from his British colleague.
‘Bloody hell,’ Henrik said when Buster had finished.
Buster could see that Henrik was badly shaken. It was obvious that something had to be done. But what?
‘What do we really think about all this?’ Henrik Theander asked. ‘Do we believe Eden is an Israeli spy?’
Buster spread his arms wide.
‘She was always a bit too good to be true, wasn’t she?’
‘What’s the situation with this Mossad agent who has entered the country?’
‘I’d like you to put him under surveillance right away,’ Buster said. ‘He’s staying at the Diplomat Hotel. If he approaches Eden, we need to know about it.’
‘No problem.’
‘And I want you to take over this case with immediate effect,’ Buster said.
It was hard to think of a worse time to expose the head of the counter-terrorism unit as a spy for a foreign power. On the other hand, it was a good thing that Eden had been working for Säpo for only a few months.
Henrik gave a humourless laugh.
‘That must be some kind of record,’ he said. ‘I mean, Eden has only just started.’
‘I don’t understand what the Brits were thinking,’ Buster said. ‘Letting us recruit a potentially lethal woman to one of the most sensitive posts in the country. That’s seriously poor judgement.’
‘True, but we don’t know if their assumptions are correct.’
‘No, and we have to cling onto that, and hope she isn’t a spy. Hope the Brits got rid of their strongest card for no reason.’
‘But didn’t you say that she was actually fired for some other reason, some mistake she made?’
‘Exactly,’ Buster said. ‘But he refused to tell me anything whatsoever about that.’
He had decided to inform no one except the head of counter-espionage. One or two investigators within the unit would probably have to be brought in, but Buster was happy to leave that up to Henrik.
‘Should we pull her out right away? As a preventative measure?’
‘I’ve thought about that, but Eden would get suspicious if we did something like that. When it comes down to it she prefers working in the field, close to the action. She actually made that a condition when we recruited her; she wasn’t prepared to sit in meetings and deal with admin all the time.’
‘Which is also worth noting,’ Henrik said. ‘In the light of what we’ve just been told, I’m not at all happy that she wants to be “close to the action”.’
Buster was supposed to be able to handle this kind of problem with a high degree of professionalism. But to be honest, he wasn’t at all sure what to do. He almost wished the Brits hadn’t told him anything about it.
‘By the way, how’s it going with the hijacking?’ Henrik asked. ‘Are you getting anywhere?’
Buster suppressed a sigh.
‘Eden’s running the whole thing. She and Sebastian are due to report back to me as soon as they know more.’
Henrik crossed his legs.
‘In that case, let’s hope Eden can sort this out.’
‘Absolutely,’ Buster replied.‘Anything other than total success is unthinkable.’
Deep down, he was wondering whether in this particular respect it was an advantage or a disadvantage if the head of counter-terrorism was a Mossad agent.
34
16:20
Not so very long ago, Fredrika Bergman’s civilian background had made it difficult for her to fit in with the police. Her colleagues had questioned the fact that she lacked police training, and suggested that she didn’t have the necessary qualities to bring to the table. She had called their bluff and won the game. The idea that an investigator had to look a certain way was no more than a myth. The assignment itself was the important thing. The assignment had to come first. If only people would follow that basic principle, then everything would be so much easier.
Sitting in the car with Alex on the way to see Karim Sassi’s mother, Fredrika thought that Eden Lundell and her colleagues were facing an undertaking which was unimaginably more difficult.
Protecting national security.
Every failure led to an outcry. The Swedish people demanded zero tolerance; no crime that seriously threatened the country’s safety should be committed under any circumstances. The thought of what it would mean if the same demands were made of the section of the police authority where she had worked made her head spin.
No bank robberies.
No rapes.
No murders.
A Technicolor dream. Completely unattainable. A total absence of criminality would require such an oppressive police force that no one would want to go on living.
After the terrorist attack in Stockholm in 2010, nothing had frightened Fredrika more than the immediate calls for Säpo and the government to take decisive action against terrorism.
Decisive action.
With his back to the wall, the General Director of Säpo had tried to get people to understand what they were asking for. A controlled society where every
thing that was written on Facebook was scrutinised, and where the private sphere virtually ceased to exist. A society in which Säpo would need to increase by several thousand per cent in order to have the capacity to deal with all the information coming in. Fredrika thought he had won that debate; he had done a good job. People agreed with him – no thank you, they didn’t want a controlled society.
Someone had mentioned the miasma of intelligence. After only a few hours working with Säpo, Fredrika thought she was beginning to understand what that meant. All those little snippets of information flying around, just waiting to be picked up by a security or intelligence service, which in turn wanted to know whether that particular piece of information could be the one that made the difference, the one that turned a defeat into a success.
‘What do we know about Karim Sassi’s mother?’ Alex said, making Fredrika jump. ‘Apart from the fact that she worked at an Ericsson factory.’
Fredrika opened her bag and took out a sheet of paper that she had been given by a Säpo agent before they left.
‘Born and raised in Kalmar, moved to Stockholm at the age of twenty. Married young, to Karim’s father who then disappeared from the picture. She worked at the Ericsson factory in Kista until 2005, when she remarried and became a housewife in Östermalm.’
‘A social climber,’ Alex said.
‘Looks that way.’
A housewife – who would want to be a housewife? Fredrika couldn’t understand it at all. She had been brought up by a hardworking career woman, and had never even considered the idea of not working. The very idea of putting herself in a situation where she would be dependent on someone else made Fredrika feel ill. Love didn’t mean owning another person, or being owned. Not even the arch-conservative Spencer would come up with such a bizarre notion.
Alex glanced at Fredrika. ‘Don’t look so bloody judgemental,’ he said. ‘You never know why people make the choices they do.’
Kudos to Alex for saying people rather than women. It strengthened his argument, and made Fredrika think along different lines.
‘Karim has no brothers or sisters,’ she said.
‘No step-siblings either?’
‘No.’
‘Grandparents?’
‘His maternal grandparents are dead. I don’t know anything about his paternal grandparents; they don’t live in Sweden.’
Alex parked outside the building where Karim’s mother lived, not far from the Royal Mews. Fredrika got out of the car and inhaled the thin autumn air. She and Spencer used to see each other in secret in Östermalm, over all those years when their relationship had to remain clandestine. Sometimes she missed those days so much that it actually hurt. Their impossible love affair had been like a parallel reality into which Fredrika could disappear when life was difficult or boring. A fun interlude in an everyday existence which often seemed ridiculously dreary and grey. Everything had been so taboo, so forbidden. Not only was Spencer married, he was the same age as her parents, and had been her tutor at the university. Nothing was more attractive than something that went against all the rules.
Fredrika loved to think back to their initial flirting. It had been so innocent; she could never have imagined that anything would come of it. Who would be brave enough to take the first step, dare to be the person who had perhaps misjudged the whole situation? Fredrika thought it was her, but Spencer always said it was him. It didn’t really matter; it was fifteen years ago, and now they were married and had two children together.
Who is going to be my little adventure now? Fredrika wondered.
Alex led the way inside. The lift took them up to Karim Sassi’s mother’s apartment on the fifth floor, and they rang the doorbell.
‘Shouldn’t we wait for Säpo?’ Fredrika said, remembering that that was what she had agreed with them when she was given the brief summary about Karim’s mother.
‘They’re on their way,’ Alex replied, just as the door opened.
Karim’s mother, Marina Fager, was quite different from the way Fredrika had pictured her. She was small and thin, unlike her tall, broad-shouldered son. They had called to tell her they were coming, but hadn’t wanted to say why over the phone.
‘We’ll wait until we get there,’ Alex had decided.
But Fredrika could see that Marina Fager already knew why they were there.
‘I spoke to Karim’s wife,’ she said, leading the way into the kitchen where she had coffee waiting for them.
She spread her hands wide; the despair etched on her face was painful to see.
‘I don’t know what to say,’ she whispered. ‘I really don’t know what to say.’
‘Let’s sit down,’ Alex said.
The kitchen was rustic in style, nothing like all those modern kitchens with shiny worktops and cupboard doors that could be found all over Stockholm. This was a homely kitchen, a kitchen in which to gather friends and family, not a kitchen in which to offer the police a cup of coffee when your son had hijacked a jumbo jet.
‘Säpo called as well,’ Marina said. ‘They wouldn’t tell me anything either; they just said they wanted me to stay at home because they wanted to talk to me.’
Fredrika opened her mouth to speak, but at that moment the doorbell rang. Karim’s mother leapt up from her chair and hurried into the hallway.
‘We should have come together,’ Fredrika said. ‘This looks so disorganised.’
‘I’m not so sure about that,’ Alex said. ‘It’s important that she realises we belong to different organisations with different assignments to complete.’
There it was again. The assignment.
Karim’s mother returned with two Säpo officers. Fredrika recognised one of them; it was the same man who had been there when they made their first visit to Karim’s house. She still didn’t know his name, but presumed he had introduced himself to Marina when she opened the door. The other was a woman Fredrika hadn’t seen before. They said a brief hello, then sat down at the oval kitchen table.
‘How could my Karim end up in a hostage situation?’ Marina said. ‘It just doesn’t make any sense. I don’t know what I’ll do if anything happens to him.’
‘We understand that,’ the Säpo officer said. His voice was so calm. Fredrika watched as he almost imperceptibly leaned forward across the table, thus getting closer to Karim’s mother.
‘Have you seen your son lately?’ he asked.
Marina nodded. ‘Of course. We see each other all the time – we’re family, after all.’
‘Have you noticed anything particular recently? For example, would you say that Karim has been stressed, anything like that?’
‘No, I can’t say I have.’
‘He hasn’t withdrawn? Kept himself to himself?’
‘No.’ Marina frowned.‘Why are you asking all these question about Karim? He’s the captain of the plane, not the hijacker.’
As she finished speaking, she caught Alex’s eye across the table. Her hand flew to her mouth in horror.
‘You’re crazy! Karim would never . . .’
Alex held up his hand to calm her.
‘We’re following up on several leads, but at the moment it does look as if Karim could be involved. We don’t know exactly how or why, and that’s what we’re trying to find out.’
The Säpo officer joined in.
‘Exactly. We’re not certain, but we think that Karim may be mixed up in all this. And if he isn’t, then of course it’s vital that we find out as quickly as possible.’
Karim’s mother nodded; she had settled down a little.
‘Of course.’
‘Zakaria Khelifi,’ Alex said. ‘Do you recognise the name?’
‘Of course I do,’ Marina said sadly. ‘He spent some time with Karim one summer many years ago – 2001 or 2002, I think.’
‘How did they become friends?’
‘I was working at the Ericsson factory in Kista back then, and so was Zakaria’s uncle. He knew I had a son roughly the same age as his nep
hew, so when Zakaria came over to Sweden that summer, I asked Karim to take him out a few times. I don’t know if I’d call them friends; as far as I know they haven’t been in touch since then.’
‘Do you know what Zakaria is doing these days?’ Alex said.
Maria turned and reached for a newspaper that was lying on the window ledge.
‘Isn’t he the same Zakaria who’s going to be deported?’ she said, pointing to an article on the front page.
‘Indeed he is,’ Fredrika said. ‘What did you think when you read about Zakaria in the press?’
Maria put the paper down.
‘The same as I thought when you turned up and started telling me you think my Karim is a terrorist. It doesn’t make sense. I don’t know what has happened in Zakaria’s life since he was here in 2002, but back then he was a really nice boy. Hard working and conscientious – a good boy.’
‘Whoever has hijacked the plane is demanding the release of Zakaria Khelifi,’ Fredrika said.
‘And that’s why you think Karim is behind this? Because they hung out together one summer ten years ago?’
It was impossible to answer that question without giving away more information than necessary, so Marina got no reply.
However, Fredrika silently ran through everything that pointed to Karim’s involvement.
His fingerprints on the phone that had been used to make a bomb threat the previous afternoon.
The fact that he knew Zakaria Khelifi.
The book by Tennyson in which the photograph of Karim and Zakaria had been hidden.
The note found in the toilet on the plane after take-off.
The doubts came from nowhere, hitting Fredrika like a blow to the solar plexus.
We’re missing something here. Something really important.
It was all too simple. Everything was being served up to them on a silver platter.
‘Tennyson,’ Fredrika said in a tone so brusque that the Säpo officer turned to look at her.
Marina Fager looked blank.
‘Alfred Lord Tennyson, the poet. Do you know if he had a special significance for Karim?’
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