The Disciple

by Michael Hjorth

  She was restless.

  A pleasant weariness normally came over her when they had completed an investigation, as if both body and brain were able to relax at last, after weeks of tension. She was usually happy to order a pizza, drink a little too much wine, and chill out on the sofa. But not this time.

  They had brought in the right man, she was sure of it. Sebastian Bergman had been completely outmanoeuvred, which was another positive. She couldn’t imagine that he would be able to worm his way in again. Torkel had made it clear that enough was enough, and even Sebastian seemed to have reached the same conclusion. Yes, it had been a job well done, taken all round. A good day. So why couldn’t she relax?

  Because things weren’t right between her and Billy. Now the case was entering a less frenetic phase, she was able to focus on their damaged relationship. Ever since she had said in the car that she was a better police officer than he was, things had been strained. Not surprisingly. Before that, too, if she was honest with herself, but since her poisonous comment in the car it had been open warfare.

  At least that was how it seemed to her. He had started whatever was going on between them, but she had escalated it all with her stupid remarks, and she would be the one who put a stop to it. But things couldn’t carry on like this; Billy was too important to her. At this rate, one of them would end up asking to leave the team, and that was the last thing she wanted. She had to get the situation back to normal. She went back into the living room and picked up her mobile.

  Maya opened the oven and took out the gratin of pork tenderloin. Billy put out the dish of couscous and sautéed vegetables. They were having an early dinner. Since he now had the evening off, they had decided to go to the theatre. It hadn’t been his idea originally, but they had made the decision together. Billy didn’t know the company at all; according to Maya they were an English theatre group called Spymonkey, who were performing on four evenings that week. Physical comedy drama, she said.

  Billy couldn’t picture it.

  ‘Like a cross between Monty Python and Samuel Beckett.’

  Okay, a reference he understood. He liked Monty Python. Some of it, anyway. Not all of it. It was a bit dated. But it was only fair that she choose what they were going to do. He had opted for the cinema last time, plus he had been working such long hours that they had hardly seen each other. He could put up with a couple of hours of British physical comedy if it meant being with her. He poured them both a glass of wine and sat down at the table. His eating habits had improved beyond recognition since he met Maya. He liked it. He liked a lot of things when it came to Maya. Everything, in fact. His phone rang and Billy checked the display. Vanja.

  ‘I have to take this.’

  ‘Okay. Don’t be long.’

  Billy went into the other room. He hadn’t told Maya about his conversation with Vanja in the car. He liked both of them, and he wanted them to like each other. The chances of that would be significantly reduced if Maya found out about the exchange which had already destroyed so much. He sat down on the sofa as he took the call.

  ‘Hi, it’s me,’ Vanja said.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Billy thought quickly. How should he handle this? Tell the truth as far as possible, he decided.

  ‘We’re just about to have dinner.’

  ‘You and Maya?’ Was there a hint of distaste in the way she said the name? Had she emphasised the y a little too much? Mayyyya. Or was he just imagining things? Looking for problems? Possibly.

  ‘Yes. Me and Maya.’ He looked over towards the kitchen where Maya was sipping her wine. She was obviously waiting until he came back before she started eating. ‘It’s on the table; was there something you wanted?’ Billy was doing his best not to sound dismissive.

  ‘How about coming for a run?’

  ‘Now?’

  He hadn’t been expecting the question. Hadn’t thought she would want his company.

  ‘In a while. After you’ve eaten. It’s not too hot outside now.’

  ‘I don’t know . . .’

  ‘I thought we could have a little chat. About us.’

  Billy didn’t answer immediately. There it was. The first step. Vanja had taken it. Billy looked over towards the kitchen again. Maya met his eyes and smiled, but at the same time her hand formed a mouth that was talking and talking. He smiled back and rolled his eyes to indicate that the person on the other end was babbling away, while he quickly went through the options in his mind. He wanted to go for a run. He definitely wanted to talk to Vanja. About their relationship. But he wouldn’t have time to do that and go to the theatre. He didn’t want to go to the theatre, but he did want to be with Maya. He wanted to drink wine and spend time with his girlfriend. He was going to have to make a choice. He and Vanja would sort out their problems, he felt sure. He knew it. But not tonight. He was going to choose Maya, and Vanja would just have to accept it.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, and meant it. ‘I can’t.’

  ‘So what are you going to do?’

  Did she sound disappointed? This time he didn’t think it was his imagination.

  ‘We’re going out. To see a play.’

  ‘A play?’

  He realised how it must sound. She knew his views on the theatre. He had chosen the worst thing he could think of, over her. That was how it sounded. But that wasn’t the case. He might have been choosing Maya over her, but he didn’t want to say that.

  ‘Yes, we arranged it ages ago.’ He had booked the tickets less than an hour ago, but it was time to abandon the truth. Save what could be saved.

  ‘Okay. Some other time.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Have fun. Say hi to Maya.’

  ‘Will do. Listen, I really do want us to . . .’ But she had ended the call. Billy wondered briefly if he should ring her back and finish the sentence. He decided to leave it for now, but he would definitely tackle the issue at work tomorrow. He would call her if she didn’t come in; sometimes she took the day off after they had made an arrest.

  Billy went back into the kitchen.

  ‘Who was that?’ Maya asked as she started to eat. She really had been waiting for him.

  ‘Vanja.’

  ‘What did she want?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  He sat down and picked up his glass of wine. It wasn’t true. That wasn’t what Vanja had wanted, that was what she had got.

  This wasn’t how he had imagined their wedding anniversary at all. Not at all.

  After Edward Hinde’s call, Haraldsson had raced out to the car and entered the GPS coordinates. The map quickly came up. Out past Surahammar and Ramnäs, left, into the forest, down towards Lake Öje. He had asked if Jenny was still alive, but hadn’t received an answer. That was the second question; he was only allowed one, Hinde had said, and ended the call.

  As he drove, Haraldsson tried to tell himself that there was no reason for Hinde to tell him where Jenny was unless he was going to be able to save her. The logical move would be to let her go; she had fulfilled her role as a means of pressurising Haraldsson. There was nothing to be gained by hurting her. But however hard he tried to convince himself, there was always, deep down, the knowledge that Hinde did not act logically, did not need reasons. That was why he had been sitting in Lövhaga for fourteen years.

  He was a psychopath.

  Haraldsson followed the GPS. The roads grew narrower and narrower, the forest more and more dense. Then he saw water between the trees, and the track came to an end. He parked next to an enormous rhododendron and got out of the car. A summer cottage. Built on the slope leading down to the lake. Many years ago, no doubt; no one would get permission to build so close to the shore these days. He walked over to the house and tried the door. Locked. He peered in through a window. The kitchen. There was obviously no water or electricity; he could see a wood-burning stove and washing-up bowls turned upside down on the small draining board. No taps, just a large metal bucket contai
ning a ladle on a stool beside it. Picturesque, but empty.

  ‘Jenny!’ he shouted.

  No reply.

  Haraldsson carried on walking around the house, looking through each window in turn. Nothing. He stopped and gazed around. The garden wasn’t very large, but it was a beautiful setting. Lawns on three sides. A badminton net on the one leading down to the lake. Garden furniture and a flagpole on another. Someone enjoyed the good life out here.

  ‘Jenny!’

  Somewhere high above the lake a bird answered him. Haraldsson could feel the panic growing. There was an outside toilet a short distance away on the edge of the forest; he went to check, but that too was empty. Apart from a cloud of buzzing flies. He closed the door and had just decided to break into the house when he noticed an unnaturally rounded hillock beyond the flagpole. A path through the blueberry bushes leading to it. Big stones sticking up between the long grass and the turf at the sides. A food cellar. Haraldsson hurried across. As he got closer he could hear the faint sound of banging. He stopped. Was it true, or just his imagination? No, someone was definitely banging. From inside the earth cellar. It wasn’t very loud, but even so. Haraldsson was there in seconds. The sound grew louder as his hopes grew.

  ‘Jenny!’

  He ran around the small hillock and ended up outside a large dark wooden door. Turned the key and flung it open. A kind of lobby approximately a metre in length, then another door. The banging was loud and strong now. She was alive, at least. The thick stone walls had done a good job of muffling the sound before, but now he could hear it clearly. A key in the lock. Haraldsson turned it and opened the door.

  Jenny was standing just inside, screwing up her eyes at the sudden brightness. He rushed in and hugged her.

  Tightly.

  She clung to him.

  For a long time.

  In the car on the way home she didn’t say anything at first. She had been scared, of course. Terrified. It wasn’t until the taxi turned down towards the cottage that she had realised something was wrong. The big man had grabbed her bag and forced her out of the car, into the earth cellar. She hadn’t been able to think straight. But now she was safe, her thoughts brought questions with them. She needed to understand. Haraldsson hated lying to her, but right now things were too uncertain to allow him to tell her even a sanitised version of the truth. Instead he explained that he had spoken to his former police colleagues when he got the call from the real taxi driver, and apparently there was a gang who specialised in picking people up from their place of work and robbing them like this. The police thought they had probably hacked into the taxi firm’s computers to find out which cabs had been pre-booked.

  Jenny seemed satisfied with his explanation.

  No doubt there would be more questions later, when it had all sunk in, but by then he would know what the result of today’s events had been, and would be able to tailor his answers accordingly. But right now they were going home.

  He was so glad she was unhurt.

  They had hardly got through the door before Victor was on the phone again. Stressed. Desperate. The ambulance transporting Hinde hadn’t arrived in Uppsala. The hospital was unable to contact the crew. Lövhaga was unable to contact the guards who had accompanied Hinde. Haraldsson had to come in.

  He tried to get out of it, but Victor made it clear that this was a situation which required the presence of the governor. He told Jenny he had to go into work for a while. He really had no choice. Should he drive her over to one of her friends, if she didn’t want to be alone? No, she wanted to stay with him. They walked back to the car together.

  Jenny was quiet most of the way to Lövhaga. Probably going over the events of the day. That suited Haraldsson. He needed to think through possible scenarios, plan how to handle the situation that had arisen.

  Time for some damage limitation.

  Under no circumstances must anyone find out that he had had anything to do with all this.

  For his sake. For Jenny’s sake. For everyone’s sake.

  He started with Jenny. No one knew she had been missing. Oh yes, the girls at the office, but nobody else. What they knew would never come to the attention of the board at Lövhaga, so Jenny didn’t constitute a risk. Even if she told anyone at the prison about her unpleasant experiences, no one would make the connection with Hinde’s escape. Check!

  Next question: should he attempt to retrieve the beetroot jar and the bottle from the chemist’s?

  It was risky. If they were found, the assumption would surely be that Ralph Svensson had smuggled them in to him. They wouldn’t take fingerprints from something like that, would they? Not when they already had a suspect who had been in contact with Hinde for a long time. Of course everyone would think it was Ralph who had helped him. The best course of action would probably be to stay well away from Hinde’s cell.

  Or should he take a different approach?

  He could demonstrate his initiative by searching the cell. ‘Finding’ those items. That would explain the presence of his fingerprints if there was an investigation at a later stage. But then Ralph’s fingerprints wouldn’t be on them anyway. Ah, but cleaners wore gloves, didn’t they . . .

  His thoughts were interrupted by his phone ringing. It was the chef, back at the house. Where were they? Haraldsson sighed; he had forgotten all about dinner. He explained that something of an emergency had arisen, and that they would have to miss the evening’s culinary treat, unfortunately. The chef was understandably put out. Haraldsson would have to pay for the lot. The food, the wine, his travel expenses, his fee. Just so Haraldsson knew. Haraldsson didn’t protest; he simply apologised and ended the call.

  ‘Who was that?’ Jenny wanted to know.

  ‘It was a chef; he was coming to the house to cook dinner for us tonight.’ Nice to be able to tell the truth for once without having to think and adapt.

  ‘So you’d arranged it all?’

  ‘Yes, but nothing’s turned out the way I planned. I’m really sorry.’

  ‘Well, it’s not your fault.’

  ‘No, but even so . . .’

  ‘You’re a star.’

  She leaned against him and kissed him on the cheek. He smiled to himself, but in his head he was already thinking through the essentials again.

  Yes, he could deal with the bottle and the jar, but what if someone searched the cell and found the photograph of Jenny? How would he explain that? He almost hoped that Hinde had taken it with him. But when they caught Hinde, if they caught Hinde, and found a photograph of the prison governor’s wife on him . . . He would simply pretend to be astonished. Wonder how the hell Hinde had managed to get hold of it. It would remain a mystery . . .

  Victor Bäckman was waiting for them in the car park when they arrived. He was surprised to see Jenny, but Haraldsson explained that it was their wedding anniversary and they wanted to be together. Victor swallowed the lie. He had more important things to worry about. They walked towards the building together.

  ‘We’ve gone through his cell. We found an empty beetroot jar and an emetic bottle – ipecac. Also empty.’

  ‘Where did he get those from?’ Haraldsson asked as naturally as he could manage.

  ‘Ralph must have given them to him.’

  ‘I expect you’re right.’ Haraldsson nodded, mightily relieved.

  ‘But that’s not the worst thing.’ Victor looked extremely troubled. ‘We found a modem.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘He’s had unlimited contact with the outside world. We’re going through the computer now, trying to see if there’s anything about the escape. But it’s password-protected, so it might take a while.’

  Haraldsson barely heard the last part. Contact with the outside world. That could definitely be used to explain a number of things if necessary. Victor’s remit. Victor’s mistake. Not his. It looked as if everything was going to be okay. He didn’t dare ask about the photograph. Presumably they hadn’t found it, or Victor would have me
ntioned it.

  He suddenly realised that the head of security had stopped, and appeared to be waiting for some kind of response.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I said the hospital still hasn’t managed to track down the ambulance. What do we do?’

  ‘We contact the police and tell them we have a possible attempted escape.’ Haraldsson was impressed by the authority in his voice, the way he had taken command of the situation. No more mistakes. Victor nodded, and together they went into the administrative block.

  It wasn’t long before vigilant journalists who were already interested in Lövhaga got wind of the fact that someone had escaped. The police force leaked like a colander sometimes. They also made the link with the missing ambulance, and the circus was underway. Haraldsson ducked and dived for a while, but realised that it would be best if he spoke to them so that he could control what was said. He issued an order that all media enquiries should be referred to him. It was like opening the floodgates.