‘No,’ Bäckström said. ‘I’m afraid not, but I don’t suppose it’s the sort of thing that happens every day …’
‘It’s been over fifty years since the last time. That was up in Norrland, by the way, and took place during negotiations in court. One of the parties shot the other party’s lawyer. Lawyers must be among the rarest murder victims in the country … then there’s that business of the rabbit being taken into care … I’ve never heard of a case like that before … and then that assault with an auction catalogue as well.’
‘I’m listening,’ Bäckström said. What the holy fuck is she going on about? he thought.
‘You’ve spent your whole life investigating crime, boss,’ Jenny said. ‘How many times have you had a case in which a courtier has been assaulted with an auction catalogue? Outside the palace where the king lives too?’
‘Never,’ Bäckström said emphatically, shaking his head. ‘If you ask me, it’s probably the first time it’s ever happened in Swedish criminal history.’
‘Exactly,’ Jenny said. ‘That’s exactly what I thought.’
‘I hear what you’re saying, Jenny, but I still don’t see …’
‘It can’t be coincidence,’ Jenny interrupted, looking at him seriously.
‘Can’t be coincidence?’
‘No.’ Jenny nodded. ‘It can’t be coincidence. There has to be some sort of connection between these three events. That’s the only possibility I can see. That one leads to the second, which leads to the third. If we can identify that connection, we also find the solution to the whole thing. Who murdered Eriksson, and all the rest of it for that matter, both the rabbit and the auction catalogue.’
‘I see,’ Bäckström said. ‘I see,’ he repeated, his thoughts already having moved on. Say what you like about Rogersson, Bäckström thought, but at least he was a fully functioning police officer who’d never dream of thinking with his tits, so there’s no way he could be the father of this little private detective. Not with his looks and her brain – which is just as well, considering Rogersson’s non-existent tits, he thought.
‘I knew you’d see exactly what I was thinking, boss. That’s why I thought it best to come straight to you and not say a word to any of the others.’
‘Very wise,’ Bäckström said. ‘Very wise,’ he repeated. ‘Let me just check to see if I’ve understood correctly.’
‘Is it okay if I take notes?’ Jenny asked, leaning forward and taking back the sheet of paper she had given him.
‘Of course,’ Bäckström said. ‘If I’ve understood you correctly, you’re saying that, to start with, we’ve got an unknown perpetrator who beats up an aristocratic arse-bandit with an auction catalogue, which leads to a rabbit being taken into care two days later from an elderly woman with dementia issues – if I can put it like that – which finally leads to one or more unknown assailants murdering Eriksson the lawyer less than a fortnight later.’
‘Yes, pretty much. I know it sounds a bit weird, but I’m a hundred per cent convinced there has to be a connection. In this case, it really is all about hating coincidence.’
‘Interesting,’ Bäckström said. ‘Worth investigating more thoroughly.’ Little Jenny must be the most incredible fuckwit, he thought. Compared to little Jenny’s brain, Little Miss Friday was practically a Nobel Prize winner, as well as being a clear seven-pointer when it came to making the beast with two backs.
‘I knew you’d understand how I was thinking, boss …’
‘Of course, of course,’ Bäckström said dismissively. ‘Do you know what, Jenny?’
‘What, boss?’
‘You’re to report to me alone. Not a word about this to any of the others.’
‘Thanks, boss,’ Jenny said. ‘I promise I won’t disappoint you, boss.’
‘Splendid,’ Bäckström said, smiling warmly. That way I won’t have to watch Anchor Carlsson drag you down to reception to sort out the post, he thought.
27
Door-to-door inquiries in the neighbourhood had started at seven o’clock that morning. They had gone on all day, but the most useful results came in the morning and evening, the way they always did when you went door to door in residential areas. Mornings and evenings were best. When the people living there weren’t at work and their children weren’t at school, not that you needed to be a police officer to work that out.
The area where Thomas Eriksson the lawyer lived also offered one major advantage for every serious door-knocking police officer. The majority of the murder victim’s neighbours happened to be dog-owners, which meant that they spent considerably more time outdoors than those citizens who didn’t have dogs, and they were more likely to move in places and at times that were often of interest when it came to investigating crimes. Not least the sort of crime that had struck their neighbour Thomas Eriksson.
A neighbourhood with so many dog-owners was a goldmine when it came to door-to-door inquiries, thought Detective Inspector Jan Stigson, the 32-year-old son of a farmer in Dalarna, who still thought like that even though it was now more than ten years since he had moved to Stockholm to join the police.
He had been working for Bäckström for four years and during that time had been responsible for a number of similar operations. He and four younger officers, borrowed from the district’s beat squad, were going from house to house, from one door to the next, and when he had knocked on his second door he hit the first jackpot, even though it was no more than half past eight in the morning. He was also lucky with the weather. It was the first real summer’s day, pretty much the ideal weather for the job, he thought.
A pleasant middle-aged woman had come to the door, with a black Labrador standing behind her wagging its tail. She had lived in the house with her husband for the past twenty years. These days, the children were long gone. Her husband had travelled to Spain to play golf, and for the past few days she had been responsible for taking the dog out for his ‘evening wee’. Usually, her husband dealt with that while she took care of the morning walk.
‘We have different daily rhythms, my husband and I,’ she explained. ‘I’m best in the mornings and usually go to bed at ten o’clock or so, and my husband’s the opposite. He can sit up half the night, but he’s hardly worth talking to in the morning. But goodness, come in, so we can have a proper chat. Nalle and I have already been out for our morning walk, and I was about to have some coffee. You do drink coffee, don’t you, Detective Inspector?’
‘Thanks, I’d love a cup,’ Stigson said. Nice, he thought. She seemed alert as well, as she’d evidently noted his rank when he showed her his ID.
He ended up sitting in her kitchen for almost an hour while she told him what she’d seen the previous evening when she was out walking Nalle. She always took the same route. First up the street, past the first few sideroads, then she swung right and headed back home again. In simple terms, she had just walked round the block, as she demonstrated to Stigson on the map he had with him.
‘It can’t be more than a couple of kilometres at most, but when you’ve got the company of this little fellow, it can take the best part of an hour. There’s lots to smell and so many people to say hello to, other dogs and their owners too,’ his witness said, smiling at Stigson.
‘You wouldn’t be able to give me a few names, and preferably times as well, if you can remember? As I’m sure you can appreciate, we’re trying to locate anyone who was moving around the area yesterday evening. And, of course, anything you say will be treated confidentially.’
There had been no problem with that at all. She had met the same neighbours and dog-walkers she usually met. She had given him half a dozen names, and everything had been the same as usual. Nothing strange, and she certainly hadn’t bumped into anyone mysterious. In fact, she’d met only one person she didn’t already know by name, or at least by appearance. When she passed Eriksson’s house, a hundred metres down the street, she had seen a man standing on the other side of the road, loading a couple of big boxes i
nto the boot of a car, and at roughly the same time as she put her key in her front door she had heard the car start up and drive away.
‘It must have been the same car,’ she said. ‘I’m sure it was.’
‘Do you remember what time that was?’ Here we go, Stigson thought.
‘I know I left the house at ten minutes to nine, more or less. I’d been watching television, and the programme I was watching – one of those docusoaps, I think they’re called – finished at quarter to nine. Then I did the usual circuit, so it must have been about half past nine or so. I remember turning on the evening news on TV4, and it had just started. It starts at ten o’clock, but before that I’d wiped Nalle’s paws and filled his bowl with water, and tidied up in the kitchen.’
‘The man you saw loading boxes into the car. You couldn’t describe him?’ Getting warmer, Stigson thought.
‘No,’ she said, shaking her head, suddenly very serious. ‘Obviously, I heard what had happened on the eight o’clock news this morning, so I know why you’re here. When I went past him he was leaning into the boot, so I never saw his face. But from the little I did see, he seemed perfectly normal. He looked like most people who live out here. Middle-aged, nicely dressed – a blazer, I think, possibly just a smart jacket, blue or black, and dark trousers. Maybe there was something …’
‘What’s that?’ Stigson said, smiling encouragingly.
‘I got the impression he was big, well-built. He seemed in fairly good shape somehow. I mean, I saw the way he picked the box up when he put it in the car. Not that I know what was in it, how much it weighed, I mean, but it was one of those big removal boxes, and it didn’t seem to be a problem at all … picking it up like that, I suppose.’
‘Could you give any idea of how tall he was?’
‘Definitely taller than average. If I had to guess, I’d say he was closer to one metre ninety than one eighty. He was a big man. My husband’s fairly tall, one metre eighty-six, even if he still insists he’s one eighty-nine like he was when we first met, but he always forgets that that’s almost forty years ago now.’
‘You said middle-aged,’ Stigson said, determined to keep going. ‘Forty-five, fifty, sixty …?’
‘Definitely not sixty,’ his witness said, shaking her head firmly. ‘Fifty, or rather, fifty at the most. There was something about the way he moved. It was easy, untroubled, and age snatches that from you, no matter how often you go to the gym. Like I said, he was in good shape.’
‘Was there anything else that struck you?’
‘The car. It was a silver Mercedes, one of those big ones, that low, sporty model, not an estate. Definitely not the sort of car a burglar would drive around in.’
‘A silver Mercedes. You’re sure about that?’
‘Yes, quite sure. My husband and I each have a Mercedes. I’ve got a small one, and his is a bit bigger, to have room for all his golf clubs and so on, but this one was considerably bigger than my husband’s, and probably more expensive than both of ours combined.’
‘You didn’t notice anything else about the car? The registration number? Or if there were any stickers or labels on it?’
‘No. I didn’t even think to look at the registration number. I didn’t see any stickers or labels either. It wasn’t that sort of car, so I’d probably have noticed that. But I can see why you’re asking. It’s terrible, what’s happened. It’s the last thing you expect in an area like this. We haven’t even had that many break-ins out here. The only thing that’s happened to my husband and me was when our boat was stolen – we’ve got a berth in the marina next to Eriksson’s house – but that must be ten years ago now.’
‘I hope you got it back?’
‘Oh yes, there was a perfectly simple explanation. It turned out to be our youngest son and his friends, who’d taken it without permission and run aground, and he didn’t dare tell his mum and dad. But of course it all came out in the end.’
‘But he’s kept his nose clean since then?’ Stigson said with a smile.
‘These days he’s married with two children and works as a lawyer for the SE Bank, so we’d better hope he has,’ the lad’s mum said, returning the smile.
Ten minutes later Stigson had thanked her for her time and finished by giving her his card. If there was anything else she thought of, she only had to call. Big or small, important or not important, no matter what it was, all she had to do was call, no matter what time of day it was.
So close, so close, but a miss is as good as a mile, he thought as he stepped out into the street and set off towards the next house on his list.
28
On Monday afternoon – at about the same time as Jenny Rogersson was explaining her theories to an increasingly incredulous Evert Bäckström – Lisa Lamm and Annika Carlsson had met Thomas Eriksson’s colleagues in the offices of his law firm, Eriksson and Partners, on Karlavägen in Stockholm.
Before they set off, Lisa Lamm had checked the firm’s website so they knew what to expect. The meeting was unlikely to be entirely straightforward, and at worst might deteriorate into a legal jousting match, in which case it was important that she knew as much as possible about her opponents.
The law firm Eriksson and Partners had been established fifteen years earlier, by Thomas Eriksson. It specialized in criminal and family law cases, and until less than twenty-four hours ago there had been sixteen people working there: five equal partners, all of them lawyers, five legal associates, an accountant who looked after the finances, personnel issues and other administration, two female paralegals and three secretaries. In terms of staff and services, it was far from being a giant in the business, but at the same time it was considerably larger than Lisa Lamm had expected. On the few occasions she had encountered Thomas Eriksson in court, he had struck her as a typical lone wolf. Certainly not as someone who would establish a law firm of this size and stay on as its longest-serving partner.
Tell me who you socialize with and I’ll tell you who you are, Lisa Lamm thought, and, considering Eriksson’s reputation, four lawyers and five legal associates said all that needed saying. She shook her head anxiously and switched her computer off.
Annika Carlsson also seemed aware of the potential difficulties that awaited them, and before they had even left the garage at the police station she had asked the question:
‘Trying to get a search warrant for a law firm isn’t exactly straightforward, is it?’ she said, more as a statement than a question.
‘No, it certainly isn’t,’ Lisa Lamm agreed, with more feeling in her voice than she had intended.
‘Give me the short version. Preferably the simple one as well,’ Annika Carlsson said with a smile.
‘Okay. Firstly, the kind of business lawyers are engaged in makes it tricky. Their clients’ interests mustn’t be harmed, and the confidentiality regulations are considerably more extensive than usual. If they want to make things difficult for us, then …’ Lisa Lamm shrugged her shoulders.
‘And secondly?’
‘Well, secondly, Thomas Eriksson is the victim and isn’t suspected of any crime, and besides … thirdly … he was murdered in his home and not at work. When you put all that together, it becomes something of a hurdle.’ Lisa Lamm sighed.
‘And you haven’t even mentioned the most important factor,’ Annika Carlsson said.
‘What’s that?’ Lisa Lamm asked, although she already knew the answer.
‘Eriksson was a gangster,’ Annika Carlsson said bluntly, flexing her broad shoulders. ‘I was thinking about his colleagues. What sort of people would want to work with a gangster? Other gangsters.’
‘Yes, that thought occurred to me too. And it worries me.’
‘Not me,’ Annika Carlsson said, shaking her head. ‘If they start fucking with us, I suppose I can always twist their arms.’
‘Thanks, and I really mean that, but I think maybe I’ll take a different approach to begin with,’ Lisa Lamm replied.
‘You’re welcome,’ Annika Car
lsson said. ‘Let me know if you change your mind.’ I’m sure the pair of us are going to get on just fine, she thought.
29
Nadja Högberg was fifty-two years old. Up until twenty years ago her name had been Nadjesta Ivanova, and she was born in a little farming village a short distance outside the big city of Leningrad, now known as St Petersburg. Nadjesta was a talented girl, and the chairman of the local party, who was one of her father’s cousins, made sure she got into the right schools as early as possible so that she could best serve the great socialist republic in the future.
Nadjesta hadn’t disappointed him. At the age of twenty-six she got her PhD in applied mathematics at Leningrad University. She had the highest grades and was employed more or less at once as a risk analyst at the regional nuclear energy authority. Only three years before ‘liberation from the Communist yoke’, as her old mentor, the former party chairman, would soon describe events of the final years of the eighties.
He was also the person who advised her to take the next step. If she didn’t want to accept his offer and start work in the private agricultural business that he was now running, and preferred to carry on working with what she had been doing up until then, the logical step for a woman with her skills was to seek work outside the new Russia until her old employer realized the inevitable and adapted to the conditions that had to apply in any functioning economy, no matter what type of business you were in. In other words, that a highly qualified specialist like her, a nuclear physicist and doctor of mathematics, needed to be paid many times more than an ordinary doctor, teacher or police officer.
It quickly became apparent that this wasn’t the only thing that her employer hadn’t grasped. The first time she applied for permission to leave her homeland was in the summer of 1991, two years after ‘liberation’. At the time she was working at a nuclear power station in Lithuania, not far from the Baltic Sea. She never received a reply to her request. One week later she was summoned to see her boss and told that she was being transferred to another nuclear power station a thousand kilometres to the north, just beyond Murmansk. Several taciturn men had helped her pack her belongings. They drove her to her new workplace, not leaving her alone for a minute during the forty-eight hours of the journey.
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