The smile disappeared from Tommy’s face and his voice had no more laughter in it as he said, “That’s a tough case. Why’d you get it?”
“Well…for one, she refuses to talk to Andersson or Borg. And two, I’ve met her once before, right after it happened. An additional reason seems to be that I have children.”
“But the twins are only four! Sophie is eleven,” Tommy objected.
“Right. But kids are kids, according to the boss.”
“Of course. Kids are not his thing,” Tommy said, his smile returning.
Irene spent the rest of the workday going through the thick folder from Superintendent Andersson and stayed a few hours after her shift had ended. She had no reason to hurry home, as her mother had picked up the twins from preschool already. They’d enjoy themselves with their grandmother until Krister came home at five. He had just gotten a part-time job as a cook at a new gourmet restaurant on Avenyn. He was thrilled to death that he’d gotten the job despite the fact that he could only work thirty hours a week. The owner had been surprised and had tried to convince him to go full-time, but Krister told him that his wife was a policewoman in the criminal unit.
“There are no part-time jobs there, so I’m the one who has to take part-time work for the sake of my girls.”
When the owner realized that Krister was not about to change his position, he reconsidered and hired his first-ever part-time cook.
On Monday afternoon on the sixth of November, 1989, Sophie Malmborg had taken the school bus home as usual. She was in a rush, as she had a ballet lesson at 5:15 p.m. , and a classmate’s mother was going to drive them to The House of Dance.
The friend’s name was Terese Olsén, and the mother’s name was Maria Olsén. The school bus had stopped by the convenience store at around 3:35 p.m. The bus driver had seen Sophie go to the bike rack and unlock her bike. She had to ride about one kilometer down a narrow, gravel road to get home, which would have taken, at most, ten minutes. Probably less.
According to her mother, Angelika Malmborg-Eriksson, Sophie would gobble down a few sandwiches and a glass of milk and grab her ballet bag, which would have already been packed the night before. She’d then bike back to the convenience store, where Maria Olsén would pick her up. She had been driving her every Monday for the past year.
According to Maria Olsén, Sophie Malmborg had come biking up at top speed a little after the predetermined time, which was unusual, as she was always prompt and often early.
If the time given by the bus driver were accurate, Sophie would have arrived home at 3:35 p.m. at the latest. In order to make it back to the convenience store, she would have had to have left her home at about 4:20, or 4:25 at the latest, especially since she’d been running late.
What had happened while Sophie was at home? No one knew except Sophie herself.
After ballet class ended at 8:00 p.m., Sophie’s mother, Angelika Malmborg-Eriksson, had taken her turn to drive the two girls. They shared the same classical ballet class. First they dropped off Terese Olsén, then they drove toward their own home but stopped by the convenience store so Sophie could get her bike. It was too large to fit in the Golf. Angelika Malmborg-Eriksson had been alone when she drove up to the house—or what was left of it.
Irene took a break from reading and leaned back in her chair. She remembered how the beat-up Golf had slammed to a halt right next to the patrol car and Angelika Malmborg-Eriksson had leapt out almost before the car stopped.
“Frey! Where’s Frey?” she’d screamed, her voice filled with fear.
An old Saab Kombi had driven up just then, and a young boy got out, holding the hand of the large woman who had driven the Saab. It seemed as if he were unsteady on his feet and needed the woman’s support. It was likely that he’d been scared by the commotion and the devastation of the fire and wanted to be anywhere but there. The heavy, pungent smell was suffocating enough to make anyone want to get away.
The boy and the woman had walked toward Angelika, who had become quite hysterical. When Angelika caught sight of the boy, she ran to him, laughing and crying in turns, holding the boy to her tightly as tears streamed down her cheeks. The woman who had come with the boy went to the fire chief and asked him a question. The Chief shook his head and, judging by his gestures, delivered some bad news.
With a grim expression on her face, the woman walked back to the mother and son. Irene Huss and Håkan Lund were standing close by.
The woman said, “They weren’t able to enter the house. It was completely engulfed when the fire trucks arrived. So they don’t know if he…” She stopped and cast a glance at the boy.
Håkan took her by the arm and gently but firmly pulled her away from the other two. “Can someone have been in the house?” he’d asked.
She’d bitten her lower lip hard before she replied, “My brother, Magnus Eriksson. Frey’s father.”
Irene had heard the woman’s statement and turned back to the glowing inferno. If a person had been in that building, there would not be much left of him.
Two days later, the fire investigators found some remains of a skeleton, including the lower jaw, which the forensic dentist had used to determine that the remains had indeed belonged to Magnus Eriksson.
* * *
Angelika Malmborg-Eriksson was a dance instructor at The House of Dance who also taught at the College of Dance in Högsbo. The school, built in the fifties and later abandoned, had been renovated for the College.
The trip between the House of Dance and the Malmborg-Eriksson home in Björkil was more than ten miles. Since public transportation in Göteborg left something to be desired, Sophie and her friend Tessan had to be driven to their ballet class. This was also part of the paperwork from the initial investigation.
Sophie had danced her whole life. According to her mother, she’d been dancing before she could walk.
Angelika had provided all the information about her daughter for the paperwork. Sophie hadn’t been helpful to the officials. Angelika insisted that Sophie had said nothing to her about the fire, either. The girl had kept to herself, though her deep, dark eyes took in everything she saw. It also appeared that she’d talked to her father, Ernst Malmborg, the composer. Angelika Malmborg-Eriksson was still upset when she told Superintendent Andersson (who had given up on hearing a word out of the girl) that Sophie had refused to move back in with Frey and herself after her latest visit with her father. Apparently, Social Services had located an apartment for Angelika and her two children since there was nothing left of their house to return to. Everything they owned had been lost in the fire except a few pieces of outdoor furniture that would be useless in a fourth floor apartment in the Biskopsgården District. Angelika had protested her daughter’s decision mightily, but finally had to give in, at least “until the worst was over”.
Irene checked the date for that statement and found it was given the day before Christmas Eve.
Is the worst over now? Why couldn’t Angelika and her children live with Magnus Eriksson’s sister after the fire? It appeared that she had a good relationship with the little boy.
Irene flipped through the various papers left in the folder.
She didn’t find any interviews with the sister. Irene vaguely remembered that the woman had introduced herself, but she couldn’t remember her name. She’d check on that tomorrow, after she had her meeting with Sophie at ten.
At the back of the folder, there were three short reports as appendices. The first one touched on a fire in a haystack during April of 1985. The owner of a riding field had mucked out bad hay into an area behind the stable. The plan was to burn it at a later date. At nine the same evening, a neighbor had called to say that the hay was on fire. The neighbor’s house looked out over the owner’s field, so he’d spotted it, and by the time the fire trucks arrived, the fire was already under control and could be put out quickly.
The fire investigators determined that it had been arson. The technicians had found two bottles of ignite
r fluid nearby. They were so close to the fire, unfortunately, that they’d actually started to melt, so no fingerprints could be lifted from them.
There was a report from a witness who said that someone on a bicycle had been seen in the vicinity shortly before the fire broke out. The witness was the same neighbor who’d called the owner. He was an elderly man and his eyesight was no longer the best, but he was absolutely sure that there was a person outside the stall. He wasn’t sure whether it had been a man or a woman; he could only say that the bicyclist had black pants and a dark, long-sleeved shirt or coat.
The second report concerned a more serious fire that had broken out at a summer cottage early in September 1989. The cottage was somewhat isolated and it took a while before the fire was discovered by a couple walking their dog. The cottage had burned to the ground. The technicians were able to determine fairly quickly that it had been arson. Someone had piled rugs, bedcovers and other textiles to the center of the floor and set them on fire. Chemical analysis determined that the suspect had used igniter fluid as well.
The newspapers had picked up on this one. Pyromaniac in Björlanda. People began to fear another arson would be committed again by the alleged pyromaniac. Still, all remained quiet on the arson front until the beginning of November, when Magnus Eriksson had died in the Björkil cottage fire.
The last report concerned a case of smoking in bed. It dated back to Christmas, 1988, at 7:47 p.m. The fire department had been called to the Malmborg-Eriksson cottage.
According to the report, there was a hysterical woman screaming into the phone: “It’s on fire! He’s on fire!”
By the time the ambulance and the fire trucks arrived, the fire had already been put out. Magnus Eriksson had an ugly burn on his right hand and lower arm, but was otherwise not injured. According to the report, he’d been heavily intoxicated, and his wife wasn’t sober, either. Their seven-year-old son had also been in the house.
Magnus Eriksson had been taken to the hospital for treatment of his arm. His wife said that her husband had felt tired and decided to go upstairs to rest. When she’d gone upstairs an hour later to tell him that the movie he wanted to see on television was about to start, she saw that the room was on fire. She yelled and was able to wake up her husband, then showed great presence of mind and rushed to get a plastic bucket in the bathroom where a pair of dirty shoes had been soaking. She threw the water on the fire. The bed itself had not started to burn, just the shag rug beneath it. The investigation determined that Magnus Eriksson had fallen asleep after he’d lit a cigarette. His arm had been dangling from the bed and the cigarette had fallen down onto the rug.
Irene noted that Sophie Malmborg was not mentioned in the report—probably because she had been spending Christmas with her father, Ernst Malmborg.
The first two fires had been arson and had been set within a one-kilometer radius of the Malmborg-Eriksson home in Björkil.
It could be a coincidence, however statistically improbable it might seem. Or, as Superintendent Andersson had written in his barely legible handwriting: One fire—perhaps. Two fires—hardly. Three—absolutely not.
Irene had to agree with her boss. Three fires within a half year and within such a small area was hardly a coincidence.
* * *
“I can honestly say I’m nervous. We hardly ever question children, and when we do, it’s usually in cases where we suspect that the child is the victim of a crime. This case is different.”
Irene and Tommy were drinking coffee together in their shared office.
“Do they seriously think that she set the fire?” asked Tommy.
“The home started to burn shortly after she left on her bike. Perhaps it really is a coincidence. Magnus Eriksson could have fallen asleep with a burning cigarette and set fire to the rug or the bed. It happened before, less than a year ago. But that it would happen twice…” Irene sighed and shook her head.
“It doesn’t appear all that believable,” Tommy agreed.
“Have the technicians found the cause of the fire yet?”
“No, and they were not able to determine where the fire started. The house burned to the ground. There are two reports concerning arson in the vicinity of the house during the past six months. In those cases, plastic bottles containing igniter fluid were found. That would not have been needed here. The technicians found a huge number of bottles with high proof alcohol. They were all over the place. All the arsonist would have had to do was pour some alcohol onto the floor and throw a match in it.”
“Was he a drunk?”
“Don’t know. In the report concerning the bed fire, they state that he was heavily intoxicated. Still, it was Christmas and it’s not unusual for people to overindulge—add some more vodka to the glögg and the like.”
“Maybe he was celebrating Gustav Adolf’s Day on the sixth of November and bought a cake and a bottle in honor of the King who founded our city of Göteborg,” Tommy joked as he imitated drinking straight out of the bottle.
Irene grimaced to show what she thought of the combination of cake and strong spirits. “A terrible way to celebrate. But still, we don’t know for sure that he was an alcoholic. There’s nothing else about it in the material, but that could be something to check up on.”
“Maybe so. I’ll go ahead and take this on—dig up something on that Eriksson guy. Something tells me you’re going to have a tough time with Sophie and her mother.”
“You’re right about that.”
“Are you going to use the large interrogation room?”
“I think so. We can use the video camera then. I can always start by talking to the mother…Angelika.”
“Is someone going to be in the adjoining room?”
“Yes. Probably someone from Child Protection or Social Services. They’ve been observing all the interrogations so far. So has her mother. Sophie has been determined to have psychological damage of some kind. After all, she’s only eleven—twelve next month.”
Tommy looked at Irene thoughtfully. Finally, he sighed and said, “It’s not like we’ve been trained to question children.”
“No, and it’s not like we have experience with it, either. Social Services usually handles it whenever the suspect is underage.”
“The suspect…so you think she’s a suspect?”
“I have no idea. I should meet her first. It would be best if I didn’t jump to conclusions beforehand.”
“What are you going to do if she refuses to speak?”
Irene raised her palms. “No idea!”
She got up to head to the bathroom before she had her meeting with Sophie and her mother. As she walked, she realized that she should have worn a different set of clothes. She had on jeans and a hoodie. It made her look a little childish. It didn’t help that her hoodie had the emblem of the Swedish Police Sport League on it. Should she put her hair up to make her appear older and more proper?
She studied her appearance in the mirror over the sink and decided just to use barrettes to pin back her hair behind her ears. She tried smiling at her mirror image. Perhaps the girl would prefer to talk to a young woman instead of two middle-aged men, she told herself encouragingly. She certainly hoped so.
* * *
Sophie, especially pale and thin in her all-black outfit. Her large boots, her tights and her cotton sweatshirt, emblazoned with a college logo, were all washed-out shades of black. She was unusually tall for her age. In fact, she was just as tall as her mother. They both wore the same dark eye shadow and had dark hair, but that’s where the similarities ended. Angelika Malmborg-Eriksson was tiny and thin-boned. She rattled on quickly and nervously, gesturing a great deal.
According to the reports, Angelika was thirty-one years old, but she appeared much younger. Her bright red angora turtleneck sweater was burled, and its wide shoulder pads revealed it had been around for a few years. Still, the color suited her. She’d managed to find glossy lipstick to match. >Beneath her sweater, she wore tights that disappeared
into her black high-heeled boots.
Sophie sat and watched them. Her stillness so penetrated the air around her, that it felt like the molecules had stopped swirling and started to vibrate in place. Irene became intensely aware of the temperature shift around the girl. It was hard to tell if it was warmer or colder, but something was there that Irene would later describe as an “energy field”. The phenomenon was so unusual that Irene started to wonder if it was due to her own nervousness about the interrogation.
Irene introduced herself and offered her hand. Angelika’s small, thin hand felt hot and tense but otherwise lifeless. Sophie gave no indication that she wanted to greet Irene.
Irene picked up the girl’s right hand gently. It was fragile and cold, like a thin pane of glass, and it lay in Irene’s hand passively. Irene shuddered. She felt uncomfortable in the girl’s presence. Sophie’s unusual gaze revealed neither fear nor nervousness, neither sorrow nor joy—in fact her eyes showed nothing at all.
How could a mere girl be so disengaged? She did not appear to be totally withdrawn, as from time to time she would look at the person speaking. But for the most part, she looked straight ahead or at her hands, loosely clasped on her lap. Irene noticed that her nails were bitten all the way to the quick, but there was no other sign of nervousness. Was this disengagement Sophie’s way of channeling her inner tension? Perhaps, but Irene had never seen it before, nor heard anyone mention experiencing anything like this.
Angelika perched herself graciously on the edge of the chair, and began chattering before Irene could even formulate her first question.
“Sophie and I have been talking. The truth is that Sophie did not know whether Magnus was home or not that day. He must have gone to sleep before she came home from school, because the whole house was dark. Nothing was on fire when Sophie left the house. She didn’t smell any burning odor. There must have been an electrical issue.”
“Is this true, Sophie?” asked Irene. She peered directly at the girl.
The Fire Dance Page 2