The Ice Cage — A Scandinavian Crime Thriller set in the Nordic Winter (The Baltic Trilogy)

by Nilsson-Julien, Olivier

  After the initial fear-induced panic, I opened up and started to see. I needed to take control, because the longer I waited to act, the unlikelier I was to escape. The net was tightening and I had to do something. I did. Using the two men as leverage, I swung my leg up to kick a fire alarm button. I only had one chance and of course I blew it. One of the guards held down my leg and stood in front of the button. In a last desperate attempt, I threw myself into him, banging him into the button and unleashing the ear-splitting alarm.

  44

  There was only one police officer waiting outside the museum. No SWAT team, just the female police officer who’d saved my life – agent Eva Mikaelsson. I couldn’t help seeing it as a Kafkaesque loop. Whatever I did in this godforsaken place, I bumped into the same police officer. The guilt of shooting the man in the woods hit me again when I saw her. I’d managed to repress it while in the museum, but it wouldn’t go away.

  I’d feared the worst from Boeck when the steel shutters went down, especially after what I’d been through in the church bay, but when the guards took me to him, he was very understanding. He said that it must be very hard for me to come back to Mariehamn, coping with my father’s death. The museum wouldn’t even press charges. I seriously started to doubt about what I’d seen at the church. The footage and stills taken by my father pointed to the utmost integrity. I wasn’t an expert, but these were images I could relate to. Although they weren’t of humans, they suggested exceptional humanity. Could the man commissioning these images really be involved in abduction and molestation? Maybe Eva had been right. Maybe being away from London and having to process so many new impressions put me in a state of emotional overload. Why hadn’t I listened to her when she’d said it was just a film shoot?

  She needed to establish what I was doing at the museum and we could have gone back to the police station, but she had to make a stop and suggested I accompany her. It would save her time. The contrast between the men dragging me down the corridor and this friendly police officer didn’t make sense. It all seemed too easy. If I’d been found in a London museum, I would have been treated less informally. Here, being picked up by the police felt like a relief, almost a reward. Once again I was thrown by the informality of a culture I thought I knew.

  The headlights opened a tunnel onto the winding winter lane.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘To the end of the road.’

  I liked to think that her answer had some deeper signification, but my experience of Scandinavians told me she meant what she said, nothing more nothing less. I still held on to the first option though – the idea of going to the end of the road appealed to me. If only I’d known then that we would be doing exactly that.

  ‘Coffee?’

  Surely, everything was closed at this time of night.

  ‘The thermos is on the backseat.’

  I reached for what turned out to be an enormous pump thermos.

  ‘You must drink a lot of coffee.’

  ‘What were you doing in the museum?’

  She obviously didn’t do small talk – another local trait.

  ‘I lost track of time.’

  ‘The truth please.’

  She’d spoken without looking at me as she kept her eyes locked on the road, handling the car like a rally driver. Her driving was fast but firm. She slid and counter-steered through the bends, barely touching the brakes, obviously enjoying the control. I would have spun out at the first turn and couldn’t help admiring her skill. Her touch was so light that it felt like the car was dancing.

  She wanted the truth. All I had was a hunch.

  ‘There’s something wrong with my father’s death.’

  ‘You have to stop making allegations.’

  ‘The burglary, the absence of an ice drill, Anna... and I haven’t even told you about her passport.’

  I showed it.

  ‘I found it in Thor’s desk. She wouldn’t have left without it.’

  Eva glimpsed at it, suddenly interested.

  ‘Did you ask him?’

  ‘He didn’t put it there. I believe him. It makes no sense.’

  ‘Don’t jump to conclusions too quickly.’

  ‘Are you saying he’s lying?’

  ‘All I’m saying is that you never know what’s going on in people’s minds.

  Can I keep it?’

  She pocketed it.

  ‘Do you believe me now?’

  ‘I’ll look into it.’

  ‘Good, because something’s wrong.’

  ‘Of course – your father is dead.’

  She wasn’t listening, but I wasn’t giving up.

  ‘Who do you think drilled the hole?’

  ‘A fisherman?’

  ‘It looked staged, as if someone had laid him there.’

  ‘It was a combination of hypothermia and heart failure. He just happened to fall like that.’

  ‘It still doesn’t add up. Why would he go to an isolated bay for a cold dip when he was searching for Anna?’

  ‘What’s this got to do with the museum?’

  ‘I think it’s linked to Boeck. My father must have discovered something.’

  She went silent and I saw it as an invitation to continue. My eyes lingered a few seconds too long on her. There was something intriguing about her.

  ‘I’ve never seen anything so real. Acted fear and real fear are totally different.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I watch a lot of bad movies.’

  She almost smiled, or so I liked to think.

  ‘What do you think happened to your father?’

  ‘He returned to the church bay at night.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I don’t know, but it doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Death rarely does. He died a natural death, a stupid death. The same would have happened to you if I hadn’t found you.’

  It wasn’t the same because I’d had a clear motivation. I’d gone to the bay to follow in my father’s footsteps, to look for communion, and I certainly hadn’t been found sunbathing next to the hole. That wasn’t the point though. I sensed there was something dodgy about Boeck and I had to convince her.

  ‘Then why did Boeck say he didn’t know Anna?’

  ‘He’s a busy man. Maybe he didn’t recognise her on the photo, or maybe he had other reasons for not telling you. There could be lots of explanations.’

  ‘He knew I was desperate to find her.’

  ‘He’s a respected citizen. He may be a nationalist, but that doesn’t make him a rapist.’

  ‘It’s not the kind of thing people tend to boast about…’

  She obviously didn’t like Boeck being criticised. I’d forgotten that everyone knew each other in Mariehamn.

  ‘Look, I did call Boeck after your call last night to check what he was filming and he confirmed they were working on a period re-enactment. He said there were some hints of sexual violence, but nothing graphic.’

  I wasn’t surprised – he wasn’t going to tell a policewoman that he was filming a woman being abused by his men.

  ‘Did you ask him about Anna?’

  ‘He’s never heard of any Anna.’

  ‘He’s lying, she was there. I saw her.’

  ’You’ve never met her.’

  ‘Who was it then?’

  ‘Make sure you keep away from the museum.’

  ‘I’m just trying to understand my father’s death.’

  ‘Doesn’t justify breaking in. Don’t do it again.’

  She stopped the car by a remote farm house to check on an old lady while I waited in the car. One of the lady’s dogs had a tumour the size of a tennis ball hanging from its hindquarters and needed to be put down. Eva had been trying to convince the woman for months, but she wouldn’t listen. Her three dogs were everything, only they understood her and – most importantly – didn’t contradict her. Her children lived in Stockholm and always stayed in a bed and breakfast when they visited, in spite of their mo
ther having a huge house. She simply couldn’t handle people, only her dogs. The old lady considered Eva almost on a par with the dogs. She was an honorary Labrador.

  When we passed the funeral home on the way back, I finally remembered where I’d seen Sven. He was the man who’d slammed the door in my face as I was leaving. He must have gone to see my father’s body. Did this mean he was off the hook? Not necessarily, he could have gone to see my father out of guilt, but guilt for what? I didn’t even know what – if anything – had happened and whether Sven had anything to do with it. I still didn’t know why my father had taken a photo of his shop.

  I tried picking up the conversation about Boeck.

  ‘Maybe he let me go because he doesn’t want my suspicions to become public.’

  ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘He’s hiding something.’

  It was snowing when she dropped me off outside my father’s house. I didn’t look back, but I felt her sharp eyes on my back as I walked into the house.

  45

  He sat in Henrik’s empty tub with his clothes on, remembering why he liked the man, or why he didn’t dislike him – he didn’t really like anyone. It was because Henrik was one of the few people who’d never shown him any contempt. Henrik had been an observer. They’d connected, partly thanks to Henrik’s capacity to see through him, to see the hidden frailty of his youth. He saw the open wounds but never judged. His photography had been like him – full of integrity, empathy and an ability to see beyond appearances. They revealed a truth and he’d ended up focusing on nature because his portraits had become too overwhelming. Henrik hadn’t been able to carry other people’s suffering any longer.

  In the end it was the empathy that killed Henrik. When he’d helped a few Eastern refugees to Mariehamn on his ice yacht, all he asked from the cockroaches was to let him take their portrait. Henrik used an old-fashioned 35mm Olympus OM-1 camera and developed the photos in his basement. He would make one large print of each person and throw away the film. It made each photo unique, like the person it represented. He’d glued them into a scrap book and spent his evenings looking at the faces, reading the lines in their faces, the depth in their eyes, recalling their voices and their shivering in the Baltic wind. They became his friends, his people, his family.

  Sitting in the kitchen one evening, Henrik had pulled out the scrap book, told the refugees’ stories and shared their hopes and fears over a bottle of aquavit. It was too good an opportunity and he’d offered Henrik his help – maybe he could give them work. This was his chance to combine cultural cleansing and training for the cause. He knew that it would inevitably lead to a clash and that Henrik would try to stop him if he ever found out, but he’d had no choice. It was fate. When Henrik eventually discovered how he ‘helped’ the cockroaches, there had been no choice. He had to sacrifice the photographer even if it meant losing the closest thing he had to a friend. He was prepared to lose everything and more to complete his mission. This wasn’t about him. He was only a facilitator. Sweden’s future was at stake.

  46

  Although I was convinced I’d locked up, the front door was open when I returned. After calling out to check there was no one there, I walked through the house scanning the rooms for any signs of a repeat burglary. Maybe I’d simply left the door open after all. I found it hard to believe, but nobody’s perfect. I’d been in a rush after what I’d witnessed in the church, upset after killing a man and wanting to get to the museum as quickly as possible. There was no visible change in the house. The Mexican film star was still staring at me from the living room wall. What had she seen? Her face looked scratched, but I couldn’t recall if the scratches had been there before. Was she trying to tell me something? I wasn’t sure, because my fear put everything in a different light.

  I took a glass of water from the tap. As I was glugging it down, there was a sound from the living room and I went in to check. The television had turned itself on. The first images were abstract and I couldn’t distinguish any body parts yet. I couldn’t understand what it was. I noticed that the DVD player was on, so it wasn’t a television programme. Once the images became clearer, they hit me like an iceberg. Of course, I should have known. I should have learnt from my Åland nightmare so far. None of it had been comical or light-hearted. It wasn’t meant to be.

  The first images were of a dart hitting a moose.

  Cut to the moose running and lying down, sedated, having lost its ability to fight.

  Cut to my father in his bath tub. This is a handheld shot and he speaks to the camera. The film is silent but he is clearly protesting about something, until his attitude changes and the camera becomes static, accentuating the fear in his eyes.

  Cut to a dart pistol being loaded and pointed.

  Cut to my father, agitated, screaming in silence.

  Cut to the moose slashed open.

  Cut to a close-up of my father lying in a metal cage. At first he appears to be dead, but then he slowly comes to and raises his hand.

  The camera pulls back to reveal that the cage is hanging mid-air. It looks like a shark cage – the cage I’d seen in the museum.

  Cut to the cage being lowered.

  Cut to my father’s panicking eyes.

  Cut to the cage being submerged.

  Cut to my father caged underwater.

  He climbs the cage to stay out of the water, but it continues to sink, until the only part of my father above water is his face squeezed against the top of the bars. His body is trapped in the freezing water, the suffering is endless and the silent screams louder than ever. There isn’t a single cut in the footage until his death.

  A 20-minute static shot of a man dying of hypothermia – my father. I watched it with the chilling thought that all that time – every unbearable second – someone had held the camera and chosen not to stop filming; someone had edited this. I’d been right all along. My father didn’t commit suicide. He’d been tortured to death and a twisted mind had recorded him dying without intervening – a murderer, a monster.

  It was a shock, the first time in 20 years that I saw my father alive, and not being able to hear his voice made the horror of watching his death even more painful. His voice, his warmth, his life, his spark, they’d all been taken away, stolen. I picked up the DVD player and threw it against the wall. I was destroyed, unable to understand why anyone would do this. What could be so important it demanded an innocent man’s execution?

  ‘Happy now?’

  I jumped and looked round to face Boeck sitting in the armchair in the corner holding the remote. He must have been sitting there since I came in, a peeping Boeck delighting in my reaction. I was speechless. Only a sick man could do this, show it and flaunt it. Boeck was more insane than I’d ever imagined.

  ‘WHY?’

  He didn’t reply. I stood up, shot over and went for a punch in the face, but he blocked me with his longer arms before standing up, calmly.

  ‘I thought you wanted to know.’

  Briefly, I was paralysed by his detachment, but then I went ballistic, kneeing him in the crotch and adding a punch to the head when he leaned over to hold his groin. Controlling the pain, he took a deep breath and looked me in the eye.

  ‘Sit down.’

  ‘Where’s Anna?’

  I threw another punch and another kick. Boeck was furious.

  ‘SIT DOWN!’

  When I didn’t, Boeck picked me up like a doll and dumped me on a chair that immediately crashed under my weight. Sitting on the floor amidst chair debris, I scrabbled to my feet. I had to do something. My father had been murdered and Anna was in danger – if she was still alive. I picked up a chair leg and threw it at him but missed and smashed the window instead. When Boeck pushed me back down again, I exploded.

  ‘DON’T TOUCH ME!!’

  I tried to push him but landed on the broken chair again.

  ‘WHAT DO YOU WANT??!!’

  I got up but he pushed me over again,
more violently this time, making me bang my nose against the floor. It started bleeding.

  ‘Who have you talked to?’

  I couldn’t speak.

  ‘Who have you told about the film?’

  I wiped the blood with my sleeve. In my mind, images of my father clinging to the cage mixed with visions of me murdering a man in the snow. Everything was fucked up. As Boeck pulled me up by the hair, I looked up, re-emerging from my visions.

  ‘ANSWER THE QUESTION!’

  I was apathetic, numb, but Boeck kept going.

  ‘Who have you talked to?’

  This had gone too far and there was no safe way out. He was mad, capable of anything. What did he want? Was Anna still alive? I had to find out.

  ‘What have you done to Anna?’

  ‘Who is Carrie?’

  I froze and Boeck grinned at my reaction.

  ‘When you use a phone, you leave a trace.’

  How could he track my phone calls? I’d used the landline. Was he really that resourceful? Or was he bluffing? Had he simply found Carrie’s name? I regretted not telling her about my suspicions. I’d thought about asking her to go and stay with her mother. I hadn’t because she would have told me to go to the police. She would have been right of course, but at that stage, it had only been speculation. I was a fantasist and usually, my fantasies remained figments of the imagination. For once, they turned out to be life-threatening, not just to me, but also to the woman I loved. And to Anna. Whatever I said, Boeck wouldn’t believe me. Carrie was far away, but considering his ruthlessness and resourcefulness, geographical distance wasn’t much of a reassurance. How could I protect her?

  ‘I didn’t tell her.’

  ‘You’re lying. You rang her after coming to the film set the second time.’

  He was dangerous and prepared to kill in the name of his project. The only way to protect Carrie was to tell the truth.