by Maj Sjowall
She called to Mona, who came running—her new playmate at her heels.
“I thought we’d take a little walk,” Monita said. “Just up to Rozeta’s house and back. Want to come?”
“Do I have to?” Mona said.
“No, of course not. Stay here and play if you like. I’ll soon be back.” Monita began walking up the hill behind the hotel.
Rozeta’s house stood on the mountainside, a quarter of an hour’s walk from the hotel. It was still called that, though Rozeta herself had died five years ago, and the house was now owned by her three sons—all of whom had houses of their own down in the town.
Monita had already made the oldest son’s acquaintance during her first week here. He kept a bodega down by the harbor and it was his daughter whom Mona most liked playing with. By now Monita had gotten to know his whole family but could only converse with the husband, who had been at sea and spoke good English. It cheered her to have made friends in town so quickly; but best of all, she had arranged to rent Rozeta’s house in the fall, when the American who was living there during the summer had gone home. Since the house had not been promised to anyone else until next summer, she and Mona would be able to live there during the winter.
Rozeta’s house—whitewashed, spacious, and comfortable—was situated in a big garden with a fantastic view out over the mountains, the harbor, and the bay.
Sometimes Monita would go there and sit in the garden awhile and talk to the American, a former army officer who had settled in the house during his retirement to write his memoirs.
As she went on up the steep slope Monita again reviewed the events that had brought her here. How many times she had done this in the last three weeks she couldn’t say. And presumably she’d never cease to be astonished that once she had made up her mind to act, everything had happened so quickly and with such self-evident simplicity. Nor would she ever quite get over the fact that, to achieve her end, she had killed someone; but no doubt, as time passed, she would become reconciled to the memory of that unintentional but definitive shot—which, during sleepless nights, still echoed through her head.
Finding that gun in Filip Mauritzon’s kitchen closet had decided matters. Actually, it was as she’d stood there in his kitchen with his automatic in her hand that she’d instantly made up her mind. Afterwards it had taken her two and a half months to decide on a plan of action and to summon her courage. Ten weeks—when she’d thought of nothing else.
When at last she’d acted, she’d thought over every situation that could conceivably arise, including all those that might occur while she was still inside the bank.
What she’d never reckoned with was the possibility of being taken by surprise. Which was exactly what had happened. She knew nothing about firearms. Since she was only planning to use the automatic to frighten people, she hadn’t even examined it very closely. That it could suddenly go off, just like that, had never really occurred to her.
Seeing that man come toward her, she’d involuntarily squeezed the trigger. That the gun had gone off was something she’d been totally unprepared for. Seeing him fall and realizing what she’d done, she’d been scared out of her wits. That she should have had the presence of mind to act more or less according to plan, even so, was still a source of amazement to her. Internally, she’d been paralyzed by shock.
After taking the subway home she’d stashed the bag with the money among Mona’s clothes in one of the suitcases she’d already begun packing the previous day.
But after that she’d begun to act irrationally. Changing her dress and sandals, she’d taken a taxi to Armfeldtsgatan. This had not been part of her original plan. But all at once she’d begun to feel that Mauritzon, at least in part, was guilty of the murder she’d committed. And she intended to put the gun back where she’d found it.
But when she again found herself standing in his kitchen she’d realized the unreasonableness of this notion. She’d panicked and run away. Reaching the ground floor she’d noticed the door to the cellar standing wide open. Down in the cellar she’d been just about to open the door and dump the bag among all the garbage there when she’d heard voices. Realizing it had to be the garbage men who’d come to empty the sacks, she’d run farther down the passage and found herself in a kind of storeroom. There she’d hidden the bag in a wooden box that was standing in one corner, waited until the door had slammed behind the garbage men, and then quickly left the building.
Next morning she’d left Sweden.
Monita had always dreamed of seeing Venice. Less than twenty-four hours after her bank robbery she’d found herself there, with Mona. They’d only stayed two days. Hotel rooms had been hard to find, the heat had been oppressive and—combined with the canal stench—almost unbearable. They could come back again after the worst of the tourist season was over.
They’d taken the train to Trieste and thence on to the little Istrian town in Yugoslavia where they now were.
In one of the suitcases standing in the clothes closet in her hotel room lay the nylon bag containing eighty-seven thousand kronor in Swedish banknotes. Several times it had occurred to her that perhaps she ought to keep the money somewhere safer. One day she’d go over to Trieste and put it in a bank.
The American wasn’t in, but Monita went out into the garden and sat down with her back against a tree, which she guessed must be a pine.
She drew her legs up, rested her chin on her knees, and screwing up her eyes looked out across the Adriatic.
It was an unusually clear day; she could see the horizon and a little white passenger steamer that was heading for the harbor.
In the noonday heat the rocks down there, the white shore, and the gleaming blue bay all looked inviting. In a while she’d go down there and swim.
The National Police Commissioner of Police had summoned Superintendent Malm to his large bright corner room in the oldest part of the police headquarters building. The sun was casting a rhomboid of light on his raspberry-red carpet, and through the closed windows could be heard faint noises from the construction of the subway line outside. They were discussing Martin Beck.
“Well, you’ve been in a much better position to appraise him than I have, both while he was on sick leave and these two weeks he’s been on duty,” the National Police Commissioner said. “How do you find him?”
“It depends what you mean,” Malm replied. “Do you mean his state of health?”
“The doctors are the best judges of his physical condition. As far as I understand, he’s recovered completely. Rather, I mean what impression you have of his psychological state.”
Superintendent Malm passed his hand over his well-combed locks. “Hmm,” he said. “I find it hard to say.…”
Silence fell in the room, and the National Police Commissioner waited awhile for him to go on. Then he said with a trace of irritation in his voice: “I’m not asking you for a detailed psychiatric analysis. I merely thought you could tell me what sort of an impression he makes on you just now.”
“I haven’t met him all that often, either, sir,” Malm said evasively.
“But you’ve more to do with him than I have,” the National Commissioner persisted. “Is he really his old self?”
“You mean, like he was before he was wounded? No, maybe not. But of course he’s been ill for some time and away from the job, and maybe it’ll take a little while before he’s back in harness again.”
“In what way do you think he’s changed?”
Malm threw his boss an uncertain look and said: “Well, not for the better, anyway. Of course he’s always been a bit strange and difficult to understand. And naturally he’s often been a trifle too inclined to take matters into his own hands.”
The National Commissioner leaned forward and frowned: “You think so? Well, I suppose it’s true. But up to now his work has always produced good results. Are you implying that his highhandedness has grown worse?”
“Well, sir, I don’t know. After all, he’s only been bac
k at work a couple of weeks.”
“My impression is that he’s absent-minded,” the National Commissioner said, “that he’s lost his sting. Just look at this latest investigation into the Bergsgatan death.”
“Yes,” Malm said. “He’s made a mess of that.”
“A scandalous mess. And not only that! The whole thing seems utterly confused. We can only be grateful the press hasn’t shown any interest in the case. Admittedly, it’s still not too late. The story can leak out, and that wouldn’t be good for us; least of all for Beck.”
“I don’t know what I should say,” Malm said. “Some aspects of that investigation seem to be products of sheer fantasy. As for that alleged confession … well, one doesn’t know what to think.”
The National Police Commissioner got to his feet, went over to the window, and looked out toward Agnegatan and the City Hall across the way. After a few minutes he went back to his chair, laid the palms of his hands on his desk, scrutinized his nails, and said: “I’ve given a lot of thought to this Beck business. And as you’ll understand, it’s been worrying me not least in view of our earlier decision to promote him to commissioner.”
He paused, and Malm waited attentively.
“Now this is how I see the matter,” the National Commissioner went on. “Beck’s manner of handling this Skold story …”
“Svärd,” Malm interposed. “Svärd, his name was.”
“What’s that? Ah yes, yes. Svärd then. Beck’s behavior seems to suggest he isn’t quite balanced, or what do you say?”
“In a way he seems raving mad, I think,” said Malm.
“Oh, let’s hope it isn’t as bad as all that. But psychologically he’s unbalanced, and my view is that we ought to wait and see whether this is permanent, or just a transient effect of his illness.”
The National Commissioner lifted his hands an inch or so above the desk top and then let them fall again. “In other words,” he said, “in this situation I think it would be a bit risky to recommend his promotion. He’d better stay where he is, and we’ll see how things turn out. His promotion, after all, has only been suggested. Nothing has gone up to the Board. So I suggest we quite simply drop the whole matter and for the time being let it rest. I’ve other suitable candidates to propose for that job, and Beck himself need never know his name was ever put forward, so no damage has been done. Shall we put it like that?”
“Yes, sir,” said Malm. “I’m sure that’s a sensible decision.”
The National Commissioner got up again, went over to the door, and opened it for Malm, who jumped up from his chair.
“I think so too,” the National Police Commissioner said and closed the door behind him. “A most sensible decision.”
When, a couple of hours later, the rumor of his inhibited promotion reached Martin Beck, he for once had to agree with one of the National Commissioner’s utterances.
Unquestionably, the latter had made a singularly wise decision.
Filip Faithful Mauritzon was pacing his cell. He found it was physically impossible to sit still. His thoughts, too, found no rest. But as time had passed they’d become more simplified. Nowadays they limited themselves to a little set of questions.
What had happened, really?
And how?
To neither of these questions could he find an answer.
Already the guards who were keeping an eye on him had had a word with the prison psychiatrist. Next week they’d tell the chaplain too.
Mauritzon kept on asking for explanations. Explaining things was something the chaplain was good at. Maybe he could be of some use.
Now the prisoner was lying quite still in the dark. He couldn’t sleep.
He thought:
What the devil happened, really?
And how?
Someone must know.
Who?
ALSO BY MAJ SJÖWALL AND PER WAHLÖÖ
ROSEANNA
On a July afternoon, a young woman’s body is dredged from Sweden’s beautiful Lake Vättern. With no clues, Beck begins an investigation not only to uncover a murderer but also to discover who the victim was. Three months later, all Beck knows is that her name was Roseanna and that she could have been strangled by any one of eighty-five people on a cruise. As the melancholic Beck narrows the list of suspects, he is drawn increasingly to the enigma of the victim, a free-spirited traveler with a penchant for casual sex, and to the psychopathology of a murderer with a distinctive—indeed, terrifying—sense of propriety.
Crime Fiction/978-0-307-39046-2
THE MAN WHO WENT UP IN SMOKE
Inspector Martin Beck of the Stockholm Homicide Squad has his summer vacation abruptly terminated when the top brass at the foreign office pack him off to Budapest to search for Alf Matsson, who has vanished. Beck investigates viperous Eastern European underworld figures and—at the risk of his life—stumbles upon the international racket in which Matsson was involved. With the coolly efficient local police on his side and a predatory nymphet on his tail, Beck pursues a case whose international implications grow with each new clue.
Crime Fiction/978-0-307-39048-6
THE MAN ON THE BALCONY
In the once peaceful parks of Stockholm, a killer is stalking young girls and disposing of their bodies. The city is on edge, and an undercurrent of fear has gripped its residents. Martin Beck, now a superintendent, has two possible witnesses: a silent, stone-cold mugger and a mute three-year-old boy. With the likelihood of another murder growing as each day passes, the police force works night and day. But their efforts have offered little insight into the methodology of the killer. Then a distant memory resurfaces in Beck’s mind, and he may just have the break he needs.
Crime Fiction/978-0-307-39047-9
THE LAUGHING POLICEMAN
On a cold and rainy Stockholm night, nine bus riders are gunned down by a mysterious assassin. The press portrays it as a freak attack and dubs the killer a madman. But Superintendent Martin Beck thinks otherwise—one of his most ambitious young detectives was among those killed—and he suspects it was more than coincidence. Working on a hunch, Beck seeks out the girlfriend of the murdered detective, and with her help Beck reconstructs the steps that led to his murder. The police comb the country for the killer, only to find that this attack may be connected to a much older cold-case murder.
Crime Fiction/978-0-307-39050-9
THE FIRE ENGINE THAT DISAPPEARED
The cunning incendiary device that blew the roof off a Stockholm apartment building not only interrupted the small, peaceful orgy underway inside, it nearly took the lives of the eleven occupants. And if one of Martin Beck’s colleagues hadn’t been on the scene, the explosion would have led to a major catastrophe since—for reasons nobody could satisfactorily explain—a regulation fire truck has vanished. Was it terrorism, suicide, or simply a gas leak? And what, if anything, did the explosion have to do with the peculiar death earlier that day of a forty-six-year-old bachelor whose cryptic suicide note consisted of only two words: “Martin Beck”?
Crime Fiction/978-0-307-39092-9
MURDER AT THE SAVOY
When Viktor Palmgren, a powerful Swedish industrialist, is shot during his after-dinner speech in the luxurious Hotel Savoy, it sends a shiver down the spine of the international money markets and terrifies the tiny town of Malmö. No one in the restaurant can identify the gunman, and local police are sheepishly baffled. That’s when Beck takes over the scene and quickly picks through Palmgren’s background. What he finds is a web of vice so despicable that it’s hard for him to imagine who wouldn’t want Palmgren dead, but that doesn’t stop him and his team of dedicated detectives from tackling one of their most intriguing cases yet.
Crime Fiction/978-0-307-39091-2
THE ABOMINABLE MAN
The gruesome murder of a police captain in his hospital room reveals the unsavory history of a man who spent forty years practicing a horrible blend of strong-arm police work and shear brutality. Martin Beck and his colleagues
feverishly comb Stockholm for the murderer, a demented and deadly rifleman, who has plans for even more chaos. As the tension builds and a feeling of imminent danger grips Beck, his investigation unearths evidence of police corruption. That’s when an even stronger sense of responsibility and something like shame urge him into taking a series of drastic steps, which lead to a shocking disaster.
Crime Fiction/978-0-307-39090-5
VINTAGE CRIME/BLACK LIZARD
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