‘And did she?’ Birck asks. ‘Did she record it?’
Without thinking, he gets out the list and studies it in front of Grimberg. On the fifteenth of June, Marika Alderin had only one visit.
Grimberg leans forward.
‘Interesting,’ he says, reading the page. ‘I recognise that name.’
‘I’m pretty damn sure it’s him.’
Davidsson is red in the face with excitement.
‘I was right, anyway,’ Tove says, standing behind him. ‘Eva Levin and Daniel Bredström were getting it on behind Levin’s back.’
I look at the man sitting there, think about the pain it must have caused Levin, the rage he must have felt. Pain and rage are not good for a man.
‘It’s just a matter of time before he cracks,’ Davidsson goes on.
‘Yes,’ says Tove. ‘But he won’t necessarily be cracking because he did it.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘That,’ she says, nodding towards Bredström, who’s sitting and staring at his hands without blinking, ‘is a profoundly confused individual. Could he really have done it? I don’t think so.’
Davidsson looks at Tove, then me, then back to Tove again, stunned.
‘Everything stacks up.’
‘Everything could stack up,’ I say.
‘So you’re …’ Davidsson begins, but then goes quiet and grimaces. Then he sneezes, loudly and angrily. ‘You agree with her?’
‘Yes. And I’m not convinced about the motive.’
‘The motive,’ Davidsson spits. ‘The motive is something people and the media speculate about to kill time. What matters are the facts.’
‘All we’ve got is circumstantial evidence.’
‘A confession is all we need for it to stand up.’
‘A confession that you haven’t yet managed to get,’ says Tove.
‘I’m telling you, it’s just a matter of time. I mean look at him.’
‘That’s what I’m doing,’ I say. ‘And I agree with Tove. He’s …’ I don’t know what to say. ‘Charles Levin’s assailant acted calmly and collectedly, focused on the task in hand. He didn’t touch his coffee, shot Levin from point-blank range, and seemed to be aware that he had plenty of time. Not only that, he took Levin’s computer, mobile phone, and printer. Or scanner. What the hell would Bredström want with them?’
‘Sell them,’ says Davidsson. ‘Why not? He’s probably already done it. I’ll ask him, but I’d say he saw a chance to get something in his empty coffers once he’d done away with Levin.’
‘I really doubt that,’ Tove says. ‘But yeah, it’s a thought.’
An unlikely one, verging on the stupid considering it’s coming from someone who’s supposed to be a policeman. When men of Bredström’s ilk bump people off, they are not generally sufficiently composed to process that kind of arithmetic.
‘One thing I don’t believe,’ Tove adds. ‘I don’t believe that that’s Bredström sitting in that car either.’
‘I …’ Davidsson says, but he’s cut short again, this time by a ringing mobile phone in his pocket. ‘Yes, Davidsson … That’s correct … Okay, already? … Well, I never. Yes, we’re glad to have you here, of course … Good. Ring when you get here … No problem, I’ll make sure your colleague stays here and waits for you … Eh? Yes, him, what’s …’ He turns to me. ‘What’s your name again?’
Tove looks at me, and it’s impossible to know what she’s thinking.
‘Leo Junker,’ I say slowly.
‘Leo Junker,’ Davidsson repeats.
I open the door and walk out into the corridor with hasty, jerky steps. The pain in my ribs and my head comes in jolts, and while Davidsson’s voice tails off behind me I pull one of the morphine tablets out of my pocket.
I put it in my mouth and stop outside the meeting room. The pain is getting worse, makes me groan.
‘What the fuck?’ I hear Davidsson scream.
About time I got out of here.
SEPTEMBER–OCTOBER 1980
‘All I ask of you, Charles, is that you actually consider the advantages and don’t just see the drawbacks. You may, of course, bring your family.’
Charles clamped his office phone between his shoulder and his ear while he looked for a new ream of typing paper.
‘I am flattered. But this isn’t the best time to call.’
‘What’s a poor civil servant to do to get you to reconsider?’ said Paul.
Charles laughed.
‘Nothing.’
‘Real police work is all about doing favours and calling them in, even between colleagues. I am grateful to you for balancing the various delicate elements of the Lichter case so well.’
‘That was what we agreed on,’ said Charles, lowering his voice despite being distracted.
‘That’s right.’ Paul cleared his throat. ‘Let me know if there’s anything I can do to make your daily grind easier.’
It was the fourth time Paul had made Charles the offer by phone. At first, Charles had been embarrassed, then flattered, and by the third time he felt a bit perplexed. Now the circle was complete and he felt embarrassed again, but for another reason this time. Charles took a deep breath.
‘I’ve stumbled across something a bit odd in Bruket. I think the guy who owns the mechanic’s there, a man named Daniel Bredström, is a fence.’
‘And what makes you think that?’ says Paul.
‘I have a few photos of the activities that go on round his workshop. In some of them, a lorry arrives and delivers goods to Bredström, who takes them into his premises. I have good reason to believe that those goods are stolen. I also have photographs of him with the goods, when they are leaving his workshop in the hands of a new buyer.’
‘Well, there you go,’ said Paul. ‘Awful. What do you need me for?’
‘I work over in the city, not at the station out there. The local talent need a tip-off that doesn’t come from here. Bruket is a small place, and this station isn’t much bigger. Everyone knows everyone. If someone put their mind to it, then it could be traced back to me.’
‘I understand,’ Paul said, and something, perhaps his tone of voice, indicated that he actually did. ‘Just send me the pictures. But,’ he added, ‘one day you have to tell me what it’s really all about.’
‘Maybe.’
Paul laughed.
‘Speak soon, Charles.’
His heart was beating dangerously fast as he hung up.
Only now was he beginning to realise just how much it hurt. Over a month had passed. On one occasion, she’d tried to touch him, but he’d backed away. He slept on the living-room sofa. They never said it, not in so many words. It was easier not to.
Somehow, Charles knew that he would be staying.
He didn’t even know whether or not he wanted to, just that the family had to be held together. It felt so old-fashioned — so stale and so full of the maxims that his parents lived by — yet it was everything he clung on to.
How many people in Bruket knew? Eva could be discreet, but Bredström? He wasn’t a quiet kind of guy. Quite the opposite, in fact: he was the type of guy who loved to boast. Charles avoided going down to the square, but, on those occasions when he had to, he convinced himself that people’s looks contained silent messages, that they were whispering behind his back, that they were laughing at him.
The rage grew inside him, but he did nothing with it.
Eva did everything at Charles’ pace. He felt grateful for that at times, because nothing was expected of him. Other times, he hated it, and he wanted to scream at her to stop. It made him feel like a child.
He didn’t say anything to his parents, not a word to his brother, nor his colleagues. He carried that shame — and it was shame — alone, hoping that it wouldn’t always feel as heavy as it did now.
One chilly day in
October, Daniel Bredström was remanded into custody, charged with receiving stolen goods.
In the mirror: Charles, paler than before.
NOVEMBER 1984
‘Wasn’t there supposed to be three of them?’ says Paul.
‘Yes.’
‘Have we missed one of them?’
‘No. Calm down.’
They have a good view of the bar — Öhrns Hörn — in the rear-view mirror. The women have arrived in Gräns’ white Renault. They look chirpy: Gräns’ gait self-assured and agile, Falck’s comfortable and relaxed. They choose a table near the window and share a bottle of wine. Talking, laughing. Gräns has a necklace that flashes occasionally as it catches the warm lighting.
‘What was the third one’s name?’ Paul asks.
‘Ulla Jones. She might have had to cancel.’
‘Yes. Shit.’
The vehicle: an old Ford, waiting to be scrapped and de-registered. It belongs somewhere near Sätra, and was missing for six months before it turned up in one of Södermalm’s underground car parks a month ago. No one knows how it got there, and no one seems to want anything to do with it.
It was the best they could find. Paul’s Citroën was out — Falck might recognise it. The news comes on the radio: the murder of Indira Gandhi has led to rioting among Hindus, which is thought to have left thousands of Sikhs dead. Palme makes a statement, expressing his consternation at the events. Sweden now, and Bofors: The controversy surrounding the complaint made to police by the Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society in May continues. Leading executives are now demanding that those responsible for leaking the details of Bofors’ arms deals with Dubai and Bahrain step forward and explain their actions.
Charles turns the radio off.
There’s nothing to do but wait.
They’ve been in hot water before, essentially ever since 1980 when he sent the photos of Daniel Bredström’s misdemeanours to Paul, who did as Charles asked him. A favour. That was all. Things were never the same again.
How much can a person take before they fall apart? He has never felt like he knew the answer to that question, but he’d never thought it could ever be this much.
That might be why this feels like entering the lion’s den with blood on his hands.
‘What’s on your mind?’ Paul asks.
‘Why do you ask?’
‘Just wondered.’ He puts his hands in his overcoat pockets. ‘Jesus it’s cold.’
In the backseat behind them is the gadget that Paul dragged out of his wardrobe after the conversation with Kraus. It is small, dark grey in colour, and made of metal. It looks a bit like an air compressor, but with an extra tank for water. In one corner is a stamp revealing that it belongs to MFS HAUPTABTEILUNG IX.
‘That thing scares me,’ says Charles.
‘It was given to me as a present by Kraus’ predecessor.’
The road in front of them, Folkungagatan, glistens with frost. The damp cold finds its way into the car and down their collars; it settles around their necks and backs.
‘Wind the window down a bit,’ says Charles.
‘Are you mental?’
‘The windows are steaming up. We have to be able to see them.’
Paul winds down the driver’s side window just enough that you would be able to stick a finger out through the gap.
‘You do know,’ Charles says without looking at him, ‘that after this … there can be no more. This is heavier than anything else. This is … The risks … This is the last thing we do.’
‘I know.’
‘I’m going to ask for a transfer.’
‘Where to?’
‘I don’t know. Violent Crime Unit, maybe. Or the Surveillance Unit. I liked it there back in the early Seventies.’
‘Just don’t forget, Charles, that there are certain things that have happened in our world, but not in theirs.’
‘I’m not a child.’
Paul opens his mouth and takes a breath as if he was about to say something, but then seems to think better of it and breathes out again, heavily.
‘She remembers,’ Charles says instead.
‘Who remembers what?’
‘Marika. She remembers that night.’
‘How much?’
‘Quite a lot. She wrote about it in her diary at the end of September.’
‘Have you read it?’
‘Just that entry.’
Paul nods, says nothing.
There are no more words.
The stream of people along the Folkungagatan’s pavements never ends; it just increases or decreases in intensity. The clock ticks, first half-past seven, half-past eight, slowly passes nine o’clock, crawls up to quarter-past.
‘They’ve just asked for the bill.’ Paul checks his firearm is in place, under his left armpit. ‘Wish me luck.’
‘No.’
He laughs, a joyless laugh.
Paul goes and stands outside Öhrns Hörn. Inside the restaurant, Cats Falck and Lena Gräns are putting their coats and scarves on. Gräns says something to Falck, who concurs and laughs. They emerge onto the pavement. Paul approaches them. Falck freezes, and a bewildered Gräns looks at Paul, then her friend, then back to Paul again.
Paul unbuttons his coat as he talks. The exact moment — there — when they realise he’s armed is plain to see.
Charles watches Cats’ mouth: What do you want?
Paul: To talk.
She shakes her head, then looks at her watch. Paul smiles. Gräns looks over her shoulder.
I wonder how he chooses his words, if he’s choosing them at all.
Paul gestures gently towards Gräns’ white Renault. Gräns shakes her head: I’ve been drinking wine.
Falck’s stare is fixed on the gun under Paul’s armpit. She puts a hand on Gräns’ arm, to get her to be quiet.
Paul and the women walk towards Gräns’ car. Charles slides over to the driver’s seat in the Ford and watches Gräns’ car back out of the tight parking space. Then he follows them through the darkness of the November evening.
Hammarby’s docks are deserted; the shadows are almost close enough to touch. Across the water lies Lugnet, with its faltering industries and dark dank sheds.
The white Renault turns left by the quay marked 301, drives past the neighbouring wharves, slows down by 309, and then stops far too abruptly by 310.
Charles can’t brake in time, and has to swerve out behind them — the right-hand side of the Ford scrapes against the Renault’s left flank. Chips of paint fly into the air.
Fuck.
Falck and Gräns climb out of the car, with Paul behind them.
‘So,’ Paul says, looking around.
‘My car,’ Gräns says as she bends down to run her fingers over the paintwork.
Charles shuts the driver’s door of the Ford behind him.
‘I didn’t have time to avoid you. You stopped so suddenly.’
‘You!’
Falck takes one, two, three steps forward, and her heels make them sound more determined than they actually are. She’s so close that he could reach out and touch her now.
‘I knew it,’ she says. ‘This is completely absurd.’
‘What’s this about?’ Gräns asks.
‘You wanted to talk,’ says Falck. ‘Talk away, Charles. That is your name isn’t it?’
He can smell the scent of her perfume. She’s standing with her back to the water, its dark depths waiting beyond the edge of the quay.
Water.
Good.
Charles takes a deep breath.
It’s called a tiger claw, a strike with the heel of the hand. Charles aims for Falck’s nose. She has time to open her mouth as if to say something, and one of her teeth scratches his glove.
The blow connects, and, wh
en Falck’s nose cracks, the noise mixes with a muffled thud behind Charles: Paul has neutralised Gräns.
Falck screams, staggers backwards, reeling. Charles catches her when she faints, and lays her gently on the ground. Behind him, Paul is standing over Gräns, who is now lying on her side, still and silent. Charles pulls out the little cloth from his overcoat pocket.
‘The bottle,’ he says.
‘Wait.’
Paul gets out his own cloth and opens the bottle, pours chloroform over it, and presses it to Gräns’ face.
The effects of the chloroform are much slower than the impression you’d get from seeing it used on film. The long seconds tick away slowly, and when Paul throws the bottle over to Charles, Falck has started moaning and moving around in front of him, as though she was dreaming.
He screws the cap off the bottle and puts the cloth down on the ground by his feet, then soaks it in chloroform before holding it to Falcks’ nose and mouth. Her breathing is rasping and hoarse, her body is twitching, and Charles has to put his knee on her chest.
He closes his eyes, counts the seconds, thinks about everything that Cats Falck will never get to experience, thinks I am not really here.
Time — this is taking such an incredibly long time. Charles gets the hoses, attaches them to the compressor-like contraption. He turns the key, and somewhere inside the machine the battery comes to life: the light under STANDBY flashes red one, two, three times before becoming a solid green. Paul wrenches Falck’s jaw open, and in the darkness his eyes are glossy black puddles.
‘Give me the first one.’
Charles complies, and Paul forces the tube down Falcks’ throat, down into her lungs. She gurgles, and Paul grimaces. Charles stares at her face, expecting her to come to at any second, to start coughing and retching.
‘Give me the other one.’
Paul carefully pushes the second tube down alongside the first.
‘Now.’
Paul puts his hand on her chest, and Charles turns one of the machine’s two dials. It hums briefly, like the sound of a vacuum cleaner being turned on and then immediately off again.
Falcks’ chest collapses as her lungs are slowly emptied of air.
Master, Liar, Traitor, Friend: a Leo Junker case Page 26