by Jon Stenhugg
When the MS Sally went to the bottom in September of 1994, several commissions had been funded to determine what lay behind the sinking and the tremendous loss of life that ensued. Prior to that the Swedish government had made their own inquiry, and specialists in the field were contacted. NUTS had entered a bid and the company was contracted for what was called an initial investigation. She knew her husband had been chosen to do the dive, and signed several non-disclosure agreements, promising never to divulge to anyone except the commission what he saw as he examined the wreck.
He was given the task of recovering the ship’s log, and reporting on the status of the vehicles on the car deck, especially the larger semis, making sure that none of them contained cargoes that might be dangerous to the environment if allowed to remain in the sea. They never spoke in detail about any of his dives at home, and he only referred to the dive to the Sally in single words: ‘horrible’, ‘terrible’ or ‘tragic’.
*
Spimler began the search in October, only a few weeks after the sinking, knowing he would very likely have to see the remains of the unfortunate victims, and that he was not allowed to document, or remove them from their watery graves, despite massive requests to recover their bodies.
The Arctic winter weather on the surface was unruly. Currents generated by the gale-force winds only days before hampered his progress to reach the ship, and he had great difficulty entering the gaping hole left in the bow.
After several dives to inspect the bridge and retrieve documents, he swam quickly through some of the passenger areas, noting that the bodies of many of the passengers were grouped in the stairwells, and he thought he could read in their sightless eyes the feelings of panic they must have felt trying to escape. He swallowed hard and swam on to enter the car deck of the MS Sally, and found it a shamble of automobiles and lorries piled one on top of the other.
Martin swam between the debris, careful not to get caught by any of the sharp edges protruding out of the darkness. Most of the trucks were full of ordinary loads; steel pipe, finished meat products, and textiles. He was happy not to encounter any more dead bodies.
He was nearly finished with the dive when the single beam of his spotlight picked up the contour of a long wooden box protruding from the side of a truck carrying bags of Estonian cement. The box had Russian markings, and he swam over to it, pulling away the tarp which covered the load. He held his breath as the beam of the spotlight lit up the Cyrillic letters 111-ва.
Martin nearly dropped the light in shock, and he backpedalled in the water. He swam closer again, knowing that a SHKVAL had to be inside, certain it shouldn’t be there, and convinced he didn’t want it on the surface. He had only fifteen minutes left of air for this dive and he made a quick decision that would affect the rest of his life, and in the end shorten it prematurely.
He surfaced and asked the dive crew for some inflatable lift bags and an electric propeller unit he could use to move some debris. In half an hour he was under the surface again with fresh cylinders of air. Using the inflated lift bags he managed to achieve neutral buoyancy for the box, and he pushed it in front of him like a ten yard-long needle, with the electric propeller unit mounted at the back, removing it from the truck and aiming it out the open bow door. He continued nearly twenty minutes in a westerly direction until he found the wreck of a trawler which had gone down a decade earlier and he placed the box alongside the keel, covering the markings with a layer of silt. He swam back to the wreck of the Sally with the lifting bags and the propeller and then swam up to the surface to end that day’s dive.
Martin Spimler never divulged to the commission what he had found, and he managed to keep the secret until the day Hoffberg had hatched the plot to blackmail the government.
His wife had just discovered the only reference he’d ever made of the dive. While exploring the contents of one of the boxes in her husband’s closet, she found a red plastic folder. She removed the dive protocol and a tourist brochure describing Estonia and the Baltic region. Stuck behind the brochure was a street map of Tallinn. She poured another glass of wine before unfolding the map, not sure if it was the alcohol, her grief or a smudge, but it seemed as if there was a dot pencilled on the brochure’s map of the Baltic near a town named Paldiski. She looked again, and this time she was sure that it was an intentional dot, and next to it she saw a strange group of letters in her husband’s handwriting: торпеда.
She couldn’t understand Russian, but could recognise the language with no difficulty. Her eyes brimmed with tears, and even though this clue offered her no explanation, she knew she had to call the police tomorrow morning. She fell asleep wondering what торпеда meant in Swedish.
In the meantime a supercavitating, rocket-powered torpedo lay on the bottom of the lake in the centre of Stockholm, the clock controlling the nuclear warhead in its nose counting down, defying the efforts of the new owner, the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States, to locate it.
*
Niklas Shoreman’s visit to Lars Ekman had alerted the NSS to the reality that Hoffberg’s threat might be more substantial than the Prime Minister was willing to admit. After speaking to Captain Peters, Ekman sat alone in his room, his right hand poised over the telephone which would bring him into immediate contact with the Prime Minister just by dialling a three-digit number.
He picked up the phone, punched two of the numbers, then hesitated before dialling the final number. He dropped the receiver onto the cradle, stood up and placed both thin case files into his safe. The yellow sticky-note with Captain Peters’ flight details clung momentarily to his fingers as he put it in his jacket pocket. He put on his raincoat and hat, then turned off the light.
He would have to be just a little more convinced before he blew the whistle. Maybe his meeting with Captain Peters the following day would provide the certainty he needed. One of the case files in the safe bore the name of Schneller, and the other Magdalena.
Chapter 8
Ekman drove to the airport north of Stockholm and stood outside the customs gate as Peters came through.
He was easy to spot, the only passenger wearing a khaki US Army uniform. Ekman smiled to greet him.
Peters’ body filled out his uniform well. He was tall all the way up from his polished combat boots. He would have worn his hair short in a crew-cut if there’d been any to cut. Peters had never been to Sweden before, and he felt a tingle of expectancy.
Lars Ekman was shorter than Peters had imagined him. The long, grey, bureaucratic raincoat belied the firm, bear-like grip of his handshake. They were both well-trained and this first greeting gave them insight even before they spoke.
“Hello, Captain Peters? I’m Lars Ekman of the Swedish National Security Service. You can call me Lasse.”
“Pleased to meet you, Lasse. Captain Charles Peters, US Army CID. You can call me Charlie.”
They exchanged small talk about the flight and the weather as they walked to the parking lot, then got into Ekman’s black Saab to drive into the city.
Ekman took a route that included a mini-tour of Stockholm, pointing out the sights as they got closer to the hotel. Peters had a map of the city on his lap and he followed Ekman’s commentary with interest.
“And the US Embassy?” asked Peters. “Could we run by that so I can see where it is? I’ll probably have to check in there before I leave.”
“Sure,” said Ekman. He made a quick left turn through a roundabout. “This is a very exclusive area of Stockholm,” he said, driving down Strand Way. “Flats here cost millions of dollars just to buy a lease.”
“I won’t be buying one this week,” said Peters. “I’m surprised anyone has a million dollars after your taxes. I’ve read that they’re pretty steep.”
“Yes,” said Ekman, “we believe in high taxation. But then we get a lot for it, I think. For example, this concert hall to the left is subsidised by our taxes. And that fortification there in front of us is your embassy. That’s
where your tax money goes.”
There was a long line of young people standing outside the embassy, waiting to be admitted for visa applications. Ten years ago the line would have been equally as long, but inside the building. Today even the embassy employees who worked behind one of the most secure perimeters in Sweden felt uneasy, a sign that the basic message of terrorism had made its point. No one could feel safe. Ekman circled back through the centre of the city to the offices of the NSS.
Lars Ekman began, “Captain Peters, uh, Charlie, let’s get some ground rules agreed upon before we start. Neither of us will make notes of anything the other person says, OK?”
Peters nodded.
“Any information revealed by you or me is on a deniable basis. If any of this information were ever to be made public, we will deny it, and call you a liar. I would expect you to do the same.”
Peters nodded again.
“Finally, none of this obligates either of us to any action, in spite of what is revealed, and I will be your only point of contact in Sweden. And I mean the only contact.”
“Aw, hell, Lasse, I was kinda hoping to have a chance to meet with that sweet little Sara that Hurtree talked to when he was up here.” Peters laughed. “But I guess you can begin now.”
Ekman ignored the joke about Sara Markham and began reading from his file. “You called our customs hotline last year, and according to this report you said you were convinced the MS Sally was carrying smuggled Russian weapons technology on its way to Stockholm.”
Peters nodded.
“And I suppose you know the MS Sally sank that same night?”
Peters nodded again.
“And now a man who sat on the Parliament’s own Defence Committee has been murdered. We have evidence which indicates some kind of link to the MS Sally.”
Peters sat there, listening intently, offering nothing in reply. Ekman had met his match in the game of poker face.
“So perhaps you could provide me with a few more details about this weapons-smuggling that took place. I’d also like to know if you have any ideas about what might have caused the sinking. There has always been a certain amount of controversy in our country surrounding the tragedy.”
Peters opened up a small brown leather portfolio and read from some notes he’d already prepared. “What I can tell you is, we were following a drug dealer who was providing drugs to members of the US Army in Germany. Most of the imports then came from Afghanistan via Belarus, and then to Switzerland via diplomatic channels. When the Russians left Estonia in 1994, the market shifted and drugs then went through to Estonia, then into the EU via both Sweden and Finland, where they were rerouted back into the countries of the EU which had signed the Schengen Agreement, eradicating borders between the countries that signed it. We’d tracked the man importing the stuff from Afghanistan via Belarus and Russia into Estonia. You must have heard of this before. We liaised with your officer in Gothenburg who did narcotics.”
“Yes, but the weapons – how did they get into the picture?”
“We were about to bust the narco with the help of the Estonian police when this weapons deal pops up. There he is, our villain, some Russian technician who had become stateless when Estonia became a nation, meeting with a man we later found out was from MI6, and they were very busy.”
“Did you say MI6?” Ekman lowered his head and shifted his position in his chair. “The Brits?”
“Funny you guys haven’t heard about this. Yes, the Brits.”
“Our intel told us it was your guys, the CIA.” Ekman tightened his grip on his case file.
“You say tomato, I say potato. Anyway, we listened a little longer. After a couple of days of surveillance we got a line on what was being sold and where it would be going. Finally, we see this truck getting loaded onto a ship, the MS Sally. The deal had been done, all handshakes and smiles. I called your hotline number. Unfortunately, the ship never arrived.”
“Did you ever arrest the Russian?” asked Ekman.
“The seller? Oh yeah, he went into jail and out like a frog thrown onto a frying pan. There were technicalities and his lawyer seemed to be in bed with every judge in Estonia. But he got the message. We haven’t heard of him since. He probably made enough off the weapons deal to buy his own little country and disappear.”
“What kind of weapon was it?” asked Ekman.
“Sorry, I can’t go into that kind of detail. We sent a member of our team to follow the truck when it came ashore, and he was supposed to hook up with the Technical Attaché at our embassy in Stockholm, and help Swedish Customs when the truck came ashore. Since the ship never arrived, there wasn’t much we could do. If we’d known then that MI6 was the buyer, we’d have had a celebration party instead of calling you guys.”
“I was hoping you could assist me to see if there was any connection to the murder we have on our hands,” said Ekman.
“You’ll have to find the connection yourself, if there is one,” said Peters. “There was someone you might have heard of. He was acting as the middleman in the weapons deal, too. He lived in Sweden as far as we could figure out. Our military intel had him pegged as an ex-Stasi agent who had been providing the East Germans with information about disarmament discussions in the Scandinavian governments, when there was such a thing as East Germany. He dropped out of sight after the weapons-smuggling deal went through, but he popped up again about a month ago. And it was connected to the same weapons technology.”
“Who?” Ekman played with his pencil.
“We never knew his real name, just a codename used to communicate with him. Schneller. You guys must have heard of him.”
“We thought Schneller lived on the border between Germany and Poland,” said Ekman. He got up from his chair, beginning to slowly pace back and forth.
“Yeah, the success of these agents is built on their ability to keep hidden. Maybe he was your man in Parliament,” said Peters, smiling widely at his obvious joke.
“No,” said Ekman. Peters noticed Ekman hadn’t taken it as a joke at all. “Not Schneller. There have been other Stasi agents who have been members of the Swedish Parliament. At least that’s what the Rosenholz list showed. We’ve been asked to keep them secret, but we know who they were. So Schneller would be living in Sweden. Interesting. Do you know where?”
“No,” said Peters. “We always clocked him at the border, and since we, uh, don’t have any official way to follow him in Sweden, we just left it at that. We assumed you guys had a handle on him. All this would have been easier if Sweden had been a NATO member.”
“Perhaps, but there might have been other problems if we had been. Anyway, no, I’m afraid we didn’t have a – what did you say? – hand on him. Did he use any consistent ID while travelling?” asked Ekman.
“No, he always used cash-ticketed transportation: trains, ferries or buses. We only knew he would be on the move from intercepting his codename when he dealt with customers.”
“We heard about Schneller before the wall went down, but we haven’t heard about him since. What would he be doing today?”
Peters stared down to his notes. The sound of the zipper seemed to fill the room as he closed the leather portfolio, and looked up at Ekman again. “We think he’s a hired killer.”
“Can you provide me with any background information on him?” Ekman leaned forward over the table. “The Stasi file on him was, let’s say, skimpy, to say the least. It was as though someone had doctored it before we got it.”
“As far as I know there’s only one person who had any real personal knowledge of Schneller, but he’s retired.”
“Perhaps he could be contacted – I mean, this is an important case for us. If Schneller is connected to--, uh,” Ekman regrouped this thoughts, “The murder of politicians is a matter of great concern in Sweden. Besides, there might be something else involved, possibly a larger threat to the state.”
“Yeah, I guess another politician’s death would be sensitive up here. Hey, did yo
u ever catch the guy who killed your Prime Minister?”
“Yes, we’re sure we did – the trial was a mess and he got off, but as far as we’re concerned that’s a closed case. The murderer died of an overdose a few years ago.”
“Congratulations, then most of the job got done. I think you might already know the guy who could help with identifying Schneller. It’s John Hurtree, you know, the ex-CID detective who was here a few years ago?”
“I was afraid you were going to say that,” said Ekman. As he spoke, a young agent poked his head inside the door, signalling to him. “Excuse me,” he said to Peters, getting out of his chair. “I’ll be right back.”
Ekman was only gone a few minutes, and he held a black-and-white photograph when he returned. He spoke quietly, as if he were afraid someone outside this highly secure room within the country’s most secure perimeter might be listening. “We have just received photographic evidence regarding the murder case we spoke of earlier. We found a map which relates to the case and there was a dot on it. I sent a diver out there earlier today and this is a picture of what he found. An empty box.” Ekman pushed the photograph over to Peters.
“Oh, sweet Jesus,” erupted Peters, as he read the Cyrillic letters. “And you said it was empty?”
“Yes, I’m afraid so.”
“I think it’s time for all of us to be afraid,” said Peters. “Do you know what this is?”
“I’m assuming it’s the weapon that was on board the Sally when she went down,” said Ekman. “Can you tell me what it is?”
“Not without clearance,” said Peters. “But you don’t have to ask me. Get on the internet and punch in the letters you see on the box, 111-ва.”
“We’ve already done that. Do you know if it was armed?”
“I can’t answer that either,” said Peters. “Hey, maybe the Russians got it. I heard they were mighty pissed off when they found out we finally managed to buy one.”