MemoRandom: A Thriller

by Anders de la Motte

  “That wasn’t actually my idea, David.”

  “So whose was it, then?” Sarac opened the bathroom door and found himself staring into Molnar’s sad eyes. His anger vanished instantly, he suddenly realized.

  “Mine,” he muttered. “The whole thing was my idea?” Sarac gulped, suddenly feeling rather sick. So that was what Bergh had actually meant. That he should have protected him from himself. “What you really want to know, Peter, is if I’m still planning to keep my word? If I’m going to take the blame when all hell breaks loose?”

  “For fuck’s sake, David!” Molnar looked pained and seemed to be searching for the right words.

  “Bergh’s wavering,” Sarac said. “The head of Regional Crime’s offered him a deal. Full salary to retirement if he takes the blame for the theft from the safe and keeps the other bosses out of it. It’s probably part of the deal for him to talk about Janus, say he’s an illegal infiltrator and so on.”

  Molnar pulled a doubtful face. “Kjell Bergh would never agree to anything like that. He’d never hang any of his own officers out to dry.”

  “No?”

  Sarac suddenly realized that he was standing in the hall wearing just his underpants, socks, and a T-shirt. He went into the bedroom. That too had been tidied up. There was a new mattress on the bed and he found all his clothes in the wardrobe, washed and neatly folded away. It must have been Natalie. For a brief moment he found himself wishing she was there. The way things had been going recently, she was the only person he dared trust.

  He heard Molnar shut the bathroom door, dug out a pair of jogging trousers, and pulled them on. Then he limped back out to the living room. His right leg was working better and better. The sofa was empty, and he heard Molnar running water in the bathroom. He sat down. The padding was hard but would presumably give a bit over time.

  “Wallin said someone was after me,” he said, loudly enough to be heard in the bathroom. “That someone had worked out that Janus is working for me, someone who might even have tried to kill me in the Söderleden Tunnel.”

  The bathroom door opened and Molnar came out.

  “And you believed him?” he said. “I’m guessing that Oscar also offered you protection, right? That’s what I’d have done in his shoes. First outline the threat, then offer protection. A classic way to recruit someone.”

  “So you think he’s lying?” Sarac said.

  “I didn’t say that,” Molnar said.

  Sarac suddenly clutched his head, shut his eyes, and leaned back. Sabatini was back in his head. The blood, and his gasped whisper: “This wasn’t supposed to happen. He promised . . .”

  “Sabatini . . . you knew him, didn’t you?” Sarac said.

  Molnar nodded. “I recruited him, once upon a time. You inherited him from me when I changed departments. A small-time crook, shame it had to end like this. You haven’t said what happened, or what you were doing up at Högbergsgatan.”

  “I realized I wanted to ask Sabatini about something. But I was too late,” Sarac said.

  Molnar sat down on the sofa.

  “Did he say who did it? Who stabbed him?”

  Sarac took a deep breath. The words It’s all his fault were echoing in his head.

  “He was muttering loads of things, only half of it was audible.” Sarac tried to keep his voice neutral. Why was he lying? Why didn’t he just repeat what Sabatini had said?

  “Brian Hansen, Selim Markovic, and Pasi Lehtonen,” Sarac went on. He saw Molnar stiffen. “They all worked for me, didn’t they?”

  Molnar nodded. “So you know?”

  “That they’re dead, murdered, just like Sabatini? Yes, I found out, all on my own. Without anyone telling me.”

  “The notebook.” Molnar’s eyes narrowed. “I had a feeling that was why you showed up at Sabatini’s. You cracked the code and got hold of a name, yet you still didn’t call me.” His voice sounded cool, nowhere near as friendly as before. “Don’t you trust me, David?”

  Sarac shrugged.

  “Do you trust me, Peter? Why didn’t you tell me that someone seems to be trying to get rid of my sources? Besides, there are other things you’re keeping from me, aren’t there?”

  Molnar looked at him, ran his tongue over his teeth, and seemed to be considering how to respond.

  “Okay, David,” he said. “You’re quite right. There are things I chose not to mention.” Molnar squirmed slightly, once again looking for the right words.

  “At the hospital, after the crash. Your blood tests.”

  “Go on,” Sarac said.

  “You tested positive for both THC and methamphetamine.”

  Sarac’s stomach clenched. He thought about the sticky meth pipe in his apartment. The smell, the feeling that it was a junkie’s home.

  “And I’m sorry to say that I wasn’t exactly surprised,” Molnar continued. “I’d had my suspicions for a while. I suppose I should say that I was thinking of raising the subject with you, but to be honest, David . . .” Molnar sighed. “You were working night and day with Janus. Delivering fantastic results, making us all look damn good. So why try to fix something that wasn’t broken?” Molnar looked down at the floor.

  “But I should have realized. The pressure of running such a big project, alone, without any backup. Knowing that you were running the risk of getting fired, maybe even prison. That’s like balancing on a high wire without the slightest margin for error.”

  Molnar held his breath for a moment before going on.

  “Sometimes we end up getting too close to a CI, David. Share information we shouldn’t. Janus was the only person who was in the same situation as you, the only person who knew what you were going through. Maybe he suggested taking a little something, just to help you cope? Amphetamines to stay focused, dope to come down? Either way, it’s history now. We fixed the test results so there’s no mention of anything in the report. And after three weeks in the hospital you were clean, so I decided not to say anything about it to you. Obviously in hindsight that was stupid, but the fact is that I was ashamed of not offering you more support. And of letting you get too close to Janus.”

  It’s all his fault, Sarac thought.

  Molnar was staring at the floor, then he straightened up.

  “What do you actually remember about him, David?” he said. “Things ought to be getting a bit clearer now, shouldn’t they?”

  Sarac shook his head. “Still not much. To recruit such a serious criminal I must have found a good way in. It couldn’t have been money, the police force pays peanuts. So it was something else, something important, probably some kind of secret.”

  “That’s what I’ve been thinking too,” Molnar said. “Go on, do you remember any details of his appearance?”

  “Hardly anything at all. Just a dark-clad figure with a hood pulled up over his head. Nothing about how to contact him, no meeting places, but I’m sure I’d recognize him if I saw him.”

  “I understand.” Molnar thought for a moment. “So how would you have gone about it, if we try to be less specific? You’re recruiting a heavyweight criminal source, someone whose identity absolutely mustn’t get out. You know you’re breaking the rules but that your boss will tolerate it as long as you do it discreetly. What’s the first thing you have to focus on?”

  Sarac considered this. He tried to set his brain to neutral. He thought about the room in his dream, the whiteboard, the photographs, the spiderweb. He thought about mentioning it to Molnar but thought better of it. Not until he knew more.

  “Funding,” Sarac said, and Molnar nodded.

  “I need money, to pay Janus. Travel, expenses, money to fund any deals he has to do. All expenses have to be approved by both Bergh and Kollander, so that’s no good. I might be able to come up with some of it myself, fabricating travel receipts or claiming it’s for other sources. But that won’t work long-term.”

  Sarac fell silent and reflected.

  “I probably need a backer,” he finally said. “Someone who�
�s prepared to cough up the money without asking any questions.” A name popped into his head, a name he had heard Bergh mention that same evening.

  “Do you remember who?” Molnar said.

  “Von Katzow,” Sarac said before he had even finished the thought. “Eugene von Katzow.”

  Molnar gave him a long, critical stare.

  “Are you really sure about that, David? Involving the Duke would severely complicate things. His name is still mud for some of the bosses. You know he was hung out to dry in the press and all that.”

  Sarac tried to think, tried to sort out small fragments of the information that was starting to swirl about inside his head.

  “I might well be wrong, of course,” he said after a while. “Bergh mentioned von Katzow in the car, that could be where the name comes from. As you know, the connections up here aren’t working too well right now.” He tapped his forehead.

  Molnar nodded. “Okay, let’s skip that for the time being. Let’s say you’ve sorted the funding, what would the next step be? How would you sort out contacts and meetings?”

  Sarac tried to get back to his train of thought. Then he shook his head. “Sorry, it’s completely blank.”

  “A car, maybe?” Molnar suggested.

  “No, this type of source wouldn’t like that. It would have to be somewhere that appealed to his ego. Showed how important he was to us. A good restaurant or a club. Cars . . .” He threw out one hand.

  “Are for small potatoes.” Molnar grinned, running his tongue over his teeth. “Good to hear that you remember what I taught you. You’re almost certainly right. Meeting someone like Janus would require a very specific type of place. Discreet but still appealing.”

  Molnar fell silent and seemed to be waiting for Sarac to say something.

  “How much do you know about Janus?” Sarac asked instead.

  The question seemed to surprise Molnar.

  “Basically no more than Bergh. In other words, practically nothing. Just that he’s an extremely well-placed source and that he presumably isn’t to be messed with. But, like I said, I’d worked out that you used a secret of some sort to recruit him.”

  Molnar ran his tongue over his teeth again. Was that an expression of nervousness, or just a tic he’d always had? Sarac wasn’t sure.

  “Okay, David, let’s go back to the funding. Like you said yourself, you needed money. You must have used at least one secret account, if not more? That occurred to me when we were out on the island. Was there anything in your notebook about money or payments?”

  Sarac shook his head. “Nothing at all, at least nothing that I’ve been able to work out.”

  “Shame,” Molnar said. “The way I see it, the money’s the only trail we’ve got that leads directly to Janus. I’m sure you see that, David.”

  He paused. He repeated that gesture with his tongue.

  “There’s only one way to regain control.”

  “Finding Janus,” Sarac said. “Thanks, that thought had occurred to me.”

  Molnar didn’t seem bothered by his sarcastic tone.

  “Listen, David. The business with the safe is Bergh’s problem, it doesn’t affect us. If he’s prepared to take the fall for that, fine. But seeing as neither Bergh nor Kollander know any details about the Janus affair, it’s difficult for them to pin anything on you, at least without any concrete evidence. Do you see how I’m thinking?”

  Sarac nodded.

  “Without Janus and without any other documentation, they haven’t got much of a case, have they?” Molnar went on. “They can’t prove that you or I have broken any rules at all. All we have to do is make sure that Janus never existed. Do whatever it takes to . . .”

  Protect the secret, Sarac thought.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  Atif had a fever. Probably a pretty bad one. His body felt sluggish and his head was throbbing. There was only one chemist in the whole of the inner city that was open all night, and he didn’t dare take the risk. Instead he popped out two more acetaminophen from the blister pack and swallowed them with some tepid tap water as he bent over the cracked little hand basin.

  After what had happened in Högbergsgatan he was in an even worse position than before. He had made sure that the two vultures filming what was going on only managed to get his rear view. But that red-haired girl on the side street had tricked him, whistling and getting him to turn around instinctively, then taking a picture of his face. She was gone before he worked out what was happening. Very neatly done!

  Janus was still one step ahead of him. He was getting rid of all the loose ends. He had already worked out what must have happened in Högbergsgatan. There had been a knock on the door and Rico had answered. That meant that Janus was either someone Rico knew or believed to be so harmless that he let him in. Someone delivering flowers, a postman, someone who wasn’t any sort of threat.

  No gun this time, no loud noises that might alarm the neighbors. Two well-aimed knife wounds to the gut, probably inflicted the moment Rico opened the door. A long, thin blade, to judge by the wounds. The perfect choice if you were aiming for internal organs. In ninety percent of cases a deep abdominal injury causes either severe bleeding or deep shock. After being stabbed twice Rico ought to have collapsed and bled to death in his hall while Janus walked calmly away. But Rico evidently belonged to the ten percent of people whose bodies reacted differently. People whose adrenal glands pumped out so much adrenaline that they managed to stay on their feet in spite of the severity of the injury, and even managed to walk a fair distance.

  He stuffed all his clothes in a plastic bag, tied the handles, and threw it over toward the door. Then he got in the bath and turned the shower on. He let the water stream down his head and shoulders and scrubbed the last traces of blood from his hands and arms. After a while he crouched down. His body was aching badly, a six, maybe even a seven.

  He needed to rest for a day or two and draw up a new plan. He had actually managed to find out something from Högbergsgatan. The film sequence had already been uploaded to the Internet. You could clearly see Rico dying in a pool of blood on the pavement. His own face wasn’t visible, thank goodness, but the other man’s was. You could even see his tears.

  He hadn’t been able to shake the impression he had got when he was there, and the video online had only made him more certain. The way he moved his head, the watchful look in his eyes, a few other barely noticeable aspects of his body language. The man was a cop. He had asked Sabatini about Janus and seemed to know what it was all about. As soon as the penicillin started to work and his body felt better, Atif was going to try to track him down.

  • • •

  Sarac locked the door, using all the new locks. He was exhausted and simply couldn’t talk anymore. All he wanted to do was collapse in bed and close his eyes. Try to convince himself that everything he had been through recently, everything he had found out, was just a bizarre dream. When he woke up in the morning in his old bed, life would carry on on the other side of the chasm in his head. And this whole nightmare would be over.

  Sure enough, the message on his bedroom wall was gone; Janus had probably wiped it off. He’d done such a good job that you couldn’t see the slightest trace of it with your bare eyes.

  Why hadn’t he told Molnar the truth? That Sabatini had mentioned both Janus and Erik Johansson? Why hadn’t he told him about the room in his dream, or the fact that he could remember an alarming amount of detail about Brian Hansen’s death?

  The explanation was simple. Somewhere deep inside he was still trying to protect Janus and preserve their shared secret. Even though the person he was trying to protect was probably a murderer. As soon as he shut his eyes he saw Sabatini’s ashen face in front of him and heard his rattling breathing.

  Five men on his list, a list crowned by a Janus symbol. Now four of them were dead. Why? That question was still waiting for an answer.

  But everything that had happened had at least done something to his brain. It was probabl
y the conversation with Molnar that had helped most. Ever since he found his office empty, Sarac had had the feeling that he was missing something. That he was interpreting things wrongly. And now he was certain of it. He had emptied his office himself; he even thought he could remember being there in the middle of the night, carrying out boxes. Moving everything to a safer place, away from prying eyes. Which meant that the room in his dream really did exist. That had been his base, the place where he had managed the whole Janus operation. It was somewhere out there in the winter darkness, maybe just a few blocks away. Guarding its secrets as it waited for him. That room was the corner piece he needed if he was to make a serious attempt to put the puzzle together. The only question was whether he really wanted to find it.

  He slipped slowly into sleep and for a brief while was floating in a gray limbo. In the distance he could hear a siren. He didn’t know whether it was outside or just in his head—sounds from the apartment upstairs. Someone was walking with heavy steps across the floor up there. An image appeared in his mind’s eye. A dark silhouette in a hood, facing away from him. The silhouette slowly turned around, so slowly, almost in slow motion. The light fell on the man’s shoulder, then the hood. But just as the light reached his face, just as he imagined that he recognized the man, another thought occurred to him. And suddenly he was wide awake. He had forgotten something, something he needed to check before he could sleep.

  He got out of bed and limped into the bathroom. He opened the cupboard under the basin and pulled out the bag Bergh had given him. The zipper was stiff, but after a bit of fiddling it reluctantly opened. At the top of the bag was a blue bulletproof vest, similar to the one that had saved his life in the crash. Beneath the vest was a shoe box, and on its lid was a note with a short message. Big, jagged letters that reminded him of the ones he had seen in the hospital.

  Everything begins and ends with Janus.

  The box contained a snub-nosed revolver with its serial number filed off.