The Treacherous Net

by Helene Tursten

  Tommy paused and took a sip of his coffee as he leafed through his papers.

  “I feel sorry for people,” Åsa said quietly to Irene.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Jonny snapped.

  “That’s what Indra’s daughter says in Strindberg’s play . . .” Åsa began, but she fell silent when she realized that Tommy was ready to carry on.

  “The mother insisted that Mattias didn’t own a car. He’d borrowed one from a friend occasionally, but he didn’t need a car; after all, he always traveled by train. The only interesting thing we got out of her was that Mattias stays over in Göteborg now and again, if the time between shifts is too short to make it worthwhile traveling back to Malmö. She didn’t know where he stayed, but assumed it was with a friend. We haven’t managed to find an address for Mattias here in Göteborg.”

  “Biskopsgården,” Hannu said.

  He was a man of few words, but when he did say something, it was usually well thought out.

  “You think that’s where he stays?” Tommy asked.

  “Yes. That’s where he lived when he was registered in Göteborg. That’s where he was accused of molesting young girls last fall.”

  “And it’s not far from Rya Forest,” Åsa commented.

  “In that case I suggest we start by concentrating on Biskopsgården and the surrounding area. We’re looking for a small apartment or a rented room,” Tommy said.

  “With a garage,” Hannu added.

  “Exactly. The van can’t have been left outside in a general parking lot over such a long period. He must have had a place where he could fix it up, both before and after the murders. It would have taken him a hell of a long time to cover that whole area with the nylon carpet, and he also kept things in there that he didn’t want to lose—the video camera, for example,” Tommy said.

  “I wonder what that business with the carpet is all about?” Jonny chipped in.

  “You can see it in the filming he did . . . he arranged the girls in different positions. This guy is definitely not right in the head,” Tommy said seriously.

  “So you’ve seen these films?” Jonny asked.

  “Yes, and I wouldn’t recommend them to anyone of a sensitive nature. He filmed the girls after they were dead, and thank God they were! He’s one sick puppy.”

  “So he doesn’t torture them to death; he gets off on the rituals involving the dead body,” Fredrik concluded.

  “Yes, and it’s a good thing we picked him up before he managed to lure any more girls into his trap,” Tommy said.

  Irene’s thoughts turned to Lina Lindskog. If her older sister hadn’t suspected something, there would have been three mutilated bodies on film. The fact that he had failed on that occasion had given them a few months’ respite and the chance to step up their investigation. And it was Åsa who was responsible for the eventual breakthrough.

  Irene decided to speak up. “Let’s give credit where credit is due; it was Åsa who managed to make contact with Mattias Eriksson online, which enabled us to start closing in on him. Åsa has been a key player in this investigation.”

  To Irene’s satisfaction, Efva Thylqvist looked less than happy. Praising other women wasn’t her strong point. She was saved by the internal telephone. A deep male voice came through the speaker:

  “Håkan Matsson from the custody suite here. We’ve got a problem. The suspect has hanged himself in his cell. We’re trying to revive him; the ambulance is on its way.”

  Everyone in the room leapt to their feet and rushed toward the door.

  “Stop!” Efva Thylqvist yelled. She hadn’t moved; her face was deathly white.

  “Tommy and I will go. The rest of you stay here.”

  Without waiting for a response she left the room, with Tommy right behind her. The rest of them returned to their seats.

  “It can’t be true! How the hell could that happen? The guards down there are so damned careful about taking everything away after last year’s record suicide figures. And now . . . fuck!”

  Jonny slammed his fist down on the table, expressing exactly how they were all feeling.

  “I need more coffee. Anyone else?” Irene said, getting to her feet. She couldn’t stay in that room. The coffee was just an excuse to escape and move around.

  As soon as they appeared in the doorway, the expression on their faces said it all.

  “He’s dead,” Efva Thylqvist informed them tersely.

  “Oh my God!” Åsa exclaimed.

  “Calm down. The shot you fired didn’t kill him,” Jonny said; it almost sounded as if he was trying to reassure her. Åsa glanced at him in surprise, but didn’t say anything.

  “He used the bandage around his thigh to hang himself. Apparently some bright spark at the hospital had used a wide dressing that wound around his leg. No one in the custody suite saw it when they booked him. Mattias Eriksson was a smart guy; he had covered it with an elasticized support stocking that looked completely smooth, according to the custody officers. And of course none of them looked underneath. The hospital notes said he would need a clean dressing in a week’s time,” Efva Thylqvist said icily. Something told her colleagues that there had been hell to pay down in the custody suite. Superintendent Thylqvist had no intention of letting a shadow fall over the Violent Crimes Unit due to negligence elsewhere.

  The gloomy atmosphere in the meeting room had nothing to do with any sense of grief over the death of Mattias Eriksson. Everyone present realized what the media would do with the story of the murder suspect who had been shot by the police, then died in custody. Things were going to get uncomfortable.

  Efva Thylqvist seemed to be thinking hard. She looked down at her hands, pressing down on the surface of the table. The pink mother-of-pearl nails were the perfect length, the slim fingers unadorned by rings. Suddenly she looked up and her gaze swept around the table.

  “We have to find Eriksson’s hideout in Göteborg.”

  Without another word she got up and walked out.

  “We’ll meet back here at three o’clock,” Tommy said, hurrying after her.

  “Some people have a poodle. Others have a DCI,” Jonny murmured.

  Irene managed to get an appointment with the funeral director the following day. To her surprise it turned out they were open in the evenings, so she arranged to go over there at six o’clock. The kindly woman on the phone suggested that Irene take a look at their website beforehand, so that she could take her time to consider the options that would be discussed at the meeting.

  “You can even bury people online these days,” Irene said to herself with a sigh.

  For pity’s sake, I’ve started talking to myself! Yet another sign of aging, she thought. Her father had done the same thing.

  They heard from their colleagues in Malmö, who had searched Mattias Eriksson’s mother’s house on the outskirts of Tullstorp. Mattias had lived in the basement; the former hobby room had become his combined study and bedroom. His impressive IT equipment had been confiscated and taken to police HQ in Malmö. One of their experts had managed to get into Mattias’s computer and had found thousands of images of child pornography, mostly very young teenage girls. Several of the pictures showed serious abuse, stopping just short of outright sadism. Apart from that there was nothing in the basement to suggest Mattias’s more morbid tendencies. No sadistic porn films, no magazines or books with similar content. Nothing.

  “Something tells me that his mom went looking, but couldn’t get into his computer. It would have been password protected,” Jens said.

  Fredrik gave a wry smile. “He keeps all his kinky stuff here in Göteborg.”

  The evening papers had the whole story of how Mattias Eriksson had found his victims on the Internet. Of course, the details weren’t quite right; according to the articles a young teenage girl had felt something was wrong and had gotte
n in touch with the police. They had taken over all online contact with the man because they immediately suspected he was the perpetrator they were looking for in connection with the murders of Alexandra Hallwiin and Moa Olsson. When the police were sure he was the right man, they had set a trap at Göteborg’s central station, and Mattias Eriksson had walked straight in. Unfortunately, he had grabbed hold of an innocent bystander when he realized that he was about to be arrested, and had taken the young teenage girl along with him as a hostage. When he was surrounded he had threatened her with a baseball bat, at which point a police officer had been forced to stop him with a well-aimed bullet to the leg. The police had decided that there was a definite risk to the girl’s life, bearing in mind the abuse to which the homicide victims had been subjected. She was left traumatized by the terrible experience, and had received emergency counseling from a child psychologist. At her parents’ request, her identity was being kept secret. The suspect had initially been treated in a hospital for a minor bullet wound; he had managed to smuggle out a strong bandage when he was transferred to the custody suite, and had hanged himself in his cell.

  “Someone has very carefully leaked this story,” Irene said; she couldn’t help smiling.

  “Madam Thylqvist,” Jonny said.

  No one had any other suggestions.

  The morning paper had also published Mattias Eriksson’s picture. The article stated that he was definitely guilty; video film found in Eriksson’s van showed the murders of Alexandra and Moa.

  The story prompted Margot Asplund to contact the police.

  “We’ve had a tip-off about what could be Eriksson’s hideout,” Tommy said as he walked into Irene and Åsa’s office. He looked tired but pleased. He had gotten to bed late after Friday’s operation, and had been on the go all weekend. Irene realized that he had put a lot of stock in the success of plan B. Even if he hadn’t been totally convinced to start with, he had given one hundred percent when they decided to go for it. The sign of a good boss, Irene thought warmly.

  “An elderly woman has been renting out a room and a garage to a guy she’s sure is Mattias Eriksson, although he’s been using a different first name—Östen. Östen Eriksson.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Åsa said.

  “Östen is the last name in the phonetic alphabet,” Irene pointed out with a shudder. “That’s where he was intending to get to.”

  “Go and take a look at his little lair,” Tommy said, dropping a piece of paper on Irene’s desk before he left the room. Irene checked the address and looked it up on the map in the telephone directory.

  “Halfway between Biskopsgården and Bräcke. Just as we suspected; he knew the area.”

  The house was small and nondescript, with a separate double garage. The steps leading up to the front entrance had been replaced with a ramp, and when Irene rang the bell she heard a faint humming noise approaching the door.

  “Who’s there?” asked a woman’s voice.

  “DI Irene Huss and DI Åsa Nyström. We’ve come about your phone call.”

  There was a click and the door swung open. The owner of the house was in a wheelchair that she maneuvered using a small lever on the armrest. She was small and white-haired, and somewhere between seventy and eighty years old. Her back was bent, making it difficult for her to look up at their faces.

  “Come in,” she said, leading the way indoors.

  Irene could see that all the doors had been widened. There were no rugs, and all the floors were tiled. The tiny kitchen had also been adapted for a wheelchair user.

  “Please take a seat,” Margot Asplund said.

  With an elegant spin she parked herself next to a high coffee table, where a tray with cups, cookies, milk, sugar and a large red plastic thermos was already laid out. Irene and Åsa sat down in brown leather armchairs.

  “The girls from the home-care service are so kind. They went and bought the cookies and made the coffee. I’d never have been able to stay here without them. Please help yourselves,” Margot said.

  “Do you live alone?” Irene asked.

  “Yes. My husband died almost twenty years ago. We never had children; I developed rheumatism the year we got married.”

  “So you’ve been renting out your garage for some time?”

  “That’s right; my husband ran a cab firm, which was why he had such a big garage built. He used to have three cars, but toward the end he just had the one. Employing other drivers got too difficult. Then he retired, and the following year he had a heart attack. The garage stood empty for a year or so after his death, but it actually has a small bedroom with a shower and toilet. One of my husband’s drivers was from Vänersborg, and sometimes when the weather was bad he stayed there. And since I became a widow I’ve been renting the room out too.”

  “And when did Mattias Eriksson become your tenant?”

  “It’s on those papers over there. I still think of him as Östen; it’s a very unusual name for such a young man.”

  With a crooked finger Margot pointed to a large brown envelope on a small desk by the window. Åsa went to fetch it.

  “He showed me his ID card from the railroad company. He said he needed to be able to stay overnight in Göteborg occasionally. The card looked genuine, although I didn’t think the photograph was a very good likeness. When I mentioned it to Östen . . . Mattias . . . he just said that anyone who looked like the photo on their ID card needed to see a doctor. I didn’t pursue the matter, because I wanted to rent out the room to bring in a little more money.”

  Åsa passed the envelope to Irene. She took out the papers and began to read. The lease was made out in the name of Östen Eriksson, date of birth July 2, 1975. He gave his home address as Annetorpsvägen in Malmö.

  Mattias had added four years to his real age. The address was false. The ID card was obviously fake or stolen. Even if her body no longer obeyed her, Margot Asplund’s mind was razor-sharp. And yet she had accepted the proof of identity, in spite of the fact that she suspected there was something wrong with it. The only explanation was that she really needed the money from the rental.

  The lease dated from November 1 the previous year. Mattias Eriksson had rented the room and the garage for almost a year.

  “Did he say why he wanted the garage?”

  “Yes, he said he was fixing up some kind of camper van so that he could go traveling around Europe.”

  “Did you ever get a close look at the vehicle?”

  “No, I only caught a glimpse of it when he drove in and out of the garage. I can’t get down there in my wheelchair; there’s only gravel outside, not tarmac. When my cats disappeared I went out to look for them, and my wheels almost got stuck.”

  Which must have been perfect for Mattias. No chance of his landlady snooping around when he wasn’t there. Irene was keen to get out there and take a look at the room and the garage, but she realized it was important to find out as much as possible from the old lady.

  “What was your impression of Mattias Eriksson?”

  Margot Asplund straightened up as best she could, and gave Irene a long, appraising look before she replied. “He made it very clear that he preferred to keep himself to himself; he didn’t want any kind of social interaction. That was fine by me, as long as he paid the rent every month, which he did.”

  “Do you know if he was away at any point over the summer?”

  “He was—both he and the van were gone during the second half of July and part of August.”

  Nothing connected to Mr. Groomer had happened during that period; had he been operating elsewhere? Overseas?

  Irene got up and thanked Margot Asplund for the coffee.

  “The keys are in the cupboard in the hallway,” Margot said.

  The garage was poorly maintained. The paint was flaking, and there were patches of rust all over the metal roof. Years of accumulated dirt made
it virtually impossible to see through the windows. Irene unlocked one of the doors.

  The smell was the same as in the van. It wasn’t overwhelming; it was more of a faint perception that gradually made itself felt, until it was impossible to ignore.

  “There’s stuff here. Maybe trophies. Be careful,” Irene said.

  Åsa gave her a weary look. She was already putting on plastic gloves, shoe protectors and a paper cap. I have to stop sounding like her mother, Irene cursed herself.

  She found the light switch by the door, and the old fluorescent tubes flickered reluctantly to life. They were festooned with cobwebs, but still provided a surprisingly good light.

  Shelves and worktops lined one wall, with tall closets on the other side. They began to go through them, starting on opposite ends. Most were empty, but in some they found traces of Mattias: a piece of the red nylon carpet, along with a Stanley knife and some carpet glue. Everything had been dumped in paper bags, along with empty Coca-Cola bottles and chips wrappers. When Irene opened the door of the last closet, she inhaled sharply. She had found the source of the smell.

  Clothes were neatly displayed on a series of hangers. Presumably they were the clothes Alexandra and Moa had been wearing when they went missing, although it was hard to tell because they were ripped to shreds and covered in blood. There was also blood on the inside of the closet. On the floor Irene saw a laptop and two pairs of shoes, with a cell phone pushed inside each pair. Everything was spattered with blood.

  “There’s a hell of a lot of blood. Strange. And I assume that’s Moa’s laptop and cell, and Alexandra’s cell.”

  She closed the door to escape the smell, and called CSI. As she ended the call Åsa was already heading toward a rickety wooden staircase at the far end of the garage.

  “The room is up here,” Åsa said.

  At the top of the stairs they found an attic with a sloping roof, divided by a wall. One half was an open, empty space. Irene unlocked the door leading into the other half.