Time passed and Martha, who was sitting in the kitchen, started getting worried. Vinyl record after vinyl record revolved on the gramophone without anything happening. It seemed to be a very difficult task and was taking an awfully long time. When finally Anna-Greta did emerge to fetch her friends, she seemed to have been crying in despair, but had obviously also been consoled, because her cheeks were red and she had a little kiss mark on her throat.
Martha took a bottle of whisky, six glasses and a bowl of salted nuts into the library with her. Cloudberry liqueur seemed to be too mild for such a serious situation. Their proceeds from almost a whole year’s worth of robberies and fraud seemed to have vanished into cyberspace so something much stronger than cloudberry liqueur was called for. In fact, the loss was so great she simply wasn’t sure if she could take it in.
‘Well, then, let’s see what’s happened to our money,’ Martha said as she poured out the whisky. ‘Those millions must be out there somewhere.’
Gunnar reached out for a whisky glass and took a large gulp.
‘Whisky is just what we need.’
Then he described how he had found the payments going out from the Robbery Fund and had succeeded in identifying the account numbers of five retirement homes, the National Library and the National Museum in Stockholm.
‘But the mysterious thing is that—’ Gunnar started to explain.
‘The National Museum, yes, exactly,’ Martha cut him off. ‘I thought they were going to buy a Renoir, or at any rate a French Impressionist.’
‘And the money to the National Library is a self-evident donation. We must support literature,’ said Christina.
‘Yes, and you have sent some money to the Museum of Technology too, I see . . .’ Gunnar went on, and looked up from the screen, ‘but—’
‘Yes, of course; they need money to document old-fashioned technology,’ said Brains. ‘There aren’t many people who can take a car to pieces nowadays.’
‘You have transferred money to those accounts, but when I hack into them I can see that the money never arrived at its destination,’ said Gunnar, taking a handful of nuts and washing them down with a little more whisky. ‘It looks as though the money disappeared en route, so to say.’
‘What do you mean, “en route”?!’ Martha objected. ‘Anna-Greta knows about computers. There must be something wrong somewhere, unless a hacker has been at work.’
Anna-Greta raised her head and looked a little more satisfied.
‘Perhaps the money has been listed wrongly in the book-keeping?’ Brains suggested.
‘Hardly,’ said Gunnar.
‘What about the Police Pension Fund, then? Can you see the payments into that?’ Martha asked when she remembered that they had omitted to mention those transfers. It had been after a party with lots of champagne and in their joyful tipsiness they had decided to donate some money to such a cause. It was only a few hundred thousand kronor, but they could at least have a bit of fun. They had given those poor detectives enough work recently. Perhaps the money might pay for a few golf tournaments or a trip to the Canary Islands.
‘The police, hmm, you didn’t mention that. Let’s have a look,’ said Gunnar and he started looking for the pension-fund account. ‘Hmm, hard to open this, hang on a moment.’
He eagerly pressed the keys and tried various passwords. Then suddenly he whistled.
‘Here it is. I can see a donation of four hundred thousand kronor. So the money reached that account.’
Anna-Greta put her hands up to her face and moaned.
‘We were doing our best to help people who really needed assistance, and the only ones who actually received the money were elderly police officers!’
‘But they could surely do with a bit of help too,’ Gunnar said.
Martha went into the kitchen, got out a bottle of cloudberry liqueur and a bowl of chocolate wafers. Whisky wasn’t going to suffice here, after all.
Gunnar continued his efforts to trace the movements of the money. After a while he stopped and stared at the screen.
‘I don’t get this. There are transfers here of several millions to the Police Pension Fund.’
‘Well now, Martha, you did think it would be fun to give some money to pensioned-off constables. Lots of fun, right?’ Rake grumbled.
‘But they only got four hundred thousand, the rest of the money was to go to retirement homes.’ Anna-Greta blew her nose and leaned over Gunnar’s shoulder.
‘And look at this, the day after the money arrived, it disappeared again from the account. It just vanishes,’ Gunnar went on.
‘Somebody is pinching our stolen money. What a nerve!’ Christina exclaimed.
‘But if the money ended up in the wrong place, can’t we just grab it back?’ Brains suggested, trying to sound like a man of the world even though he didn’t know much about computers. ‘What I mean is, can’t we just press Control plus Z for example. On the computer, that usually works.’
Gunnar quickly looked down at the table so that Brains wouldn’t see that he was smiling.
‘Regrettably, you can’t just alter something like this by simply pressing a button. Besides, the Police Pension Fund is protected with passwords. We can’t go in there and mess around without leaving tracks behind us.’
‘Numbers on a screen, no, what I like best is solid gold,’ said Martha and without thinking poured some cloudberry liqueur into the whisky.
‘The boys who live up the road might be able to hack their way into something like this. I can go and ask them?’ Brains offered his services, being keen to have an excuse to visit the neighbours and have a closer look at their motorbikes.
‘No way! We are not going to mix with them!’ Christina exclaimed. ‘You must have seen the tattoos!’
‘Gracious me, we have made a mess of things.’ Anna-Greta sighed, stretched for her whisky glass and knocked back almost all of the contents in one gulp. The others gave a start. Their friend was usually very restrained when it came to liquor.
‘But listen now, look at this: a transfer of thirteen million,’ Gunnar suddenly said and pointed at the screen.
‘That’s the same amount we donated to the National Museum!’ exclaimed Anna-Greta. ‘How could that be?’
‘I don’t know, but when I trace the course of the money I get to Beylings Legal Firm. Perhaps the rest of the money has gone there too?’
‘Beylings Legal Firm,’ they all repeated in unison, and felt decidedly uncomfortable. Lawyers always made them feel like criminals.
‘But then all we have to do is go and fetch the money, right?’ Martha maintained, even though deep inside she realized it would be difficult.
‘No, I can’t get in any further,’ Gunnar mumbled. ‘At this point the money disappears into a myriad of accounts. And there are firewalls left, right and centre! Like a Berlin Wall.’
‘Firewalls or Berlin walls,’ Anna-Greta slurred her words and her breath smelt of Glenfield’s, ‘what difference does it make? We still can’t prove the money is ours. And if we start digging around, they’ll be able to trace us and then we’ll end up in prison. Remember that we’re still on the Wanted list.’
The truth sank in and they became silent. All the work they had done to gather in money for the Robbery Fund, and then somebody had pinched it and redirected the whole lot to a legal firm. It was just too much! And nobody could make the effort to comment upon it. Silence, save for the clinking whisky glasses, descended on the room.
‘We rob and we rob, and want to do a good job . . .’ Christina started to compose a poem but became silent when she couldn’t find any more words rhyming with rob. After such enormous losses, she was quite simply in poor shape. As were the others. Feelings of anger and despair were mumbled, along with various suggestions as to how they should move on. In the end, Anna-Greta spoke up:
‘There is no way we can just drop this. Whatever we do, we must get that money back!’
‘Absolutely! I’m certainly not going to give
up,’ said Gunnar.
‘And nor are we,’ agreed the others and felt a little bolder for having Gunnar’s support.
‘Yes, my dears. We shall get those millions back, but for now . . .’ Martha shut her eyes. ‘Whisky and cloudberry liqueur in the same glass isn’t to be recommended. I’m going to retire to my room.’
And without waiting for an answer, she put her cardigan over her shoulders and said goodnight. But when she reached the top of the stairs the others could hear her humming a tune. A song that just happened to be about a bank robbery.
11
Martha sat on the edge of her bed, looked at the floral wallpaper and pulled her nightdress over her head. Exhausted, she slipped in between the sheets. All the money that the League of Pensioners had worked so hard to rob was now gone! How in heaven’s name would they be able to get the missing millions that had travelled all the way from Las Vegas? Bandits who stole several hundred millions by computer hacking were not amateurs. Perhaps they were even mafia types. And challenging that sort was dangerous. For that matter, perhaps the bikers in the neighbouring house were dangerous too. The new name on their letter box, Outlaw Oldies, could attract more biker gangs. She must remember to remove it.
Martha raised herself on her elbow and adjusted the covers and pillows. She didn’t want to be involved with dangerous people. Would it not be better to start all over again with new crimes? They couldn’t just sit here and play bridge and fill in sudoku while the old and poor were in need. No, it was high time that the League of Pensioners struck again. And why not try a proper bank robbery, like the professionals? In fact, those institutions ought to get a prize for the smartest business in the world, she thought half-asleep, putting her hand over her mouth and yawning. The bank officials said that you should deposit your capital in their bank accounts, but as soon as you walked there to get your money out, then you couldn’t!
‘Because we have stopped handling large sums of cash,’ as a smiling bank official had explained to Martha one day. And perhaps they had to do that at the banks nowadays, when they lent out money they didn’t really have – with gold reserves and the like. And Martha thought that it was even more outrageous that they charged interest on that make-believe money!
Admittedly, the League of Pensioners would find it hard to conjure up such a brilliant scam, and – in comparison – a little bank robbery was nothing. Wasn’t it high time that somebody challenged the banks? And why not, in that case, a gang of pensioners? Martha puffed up the pillows, lay on her side and pulled the covers up to her chin. After a few moments a peaceful smile appeared in her wrinkled face. Her eyelids drooped and soon she was deeply immersed in an exciting dream where she robbed ten banks on the same day.
The next morning, Martha went down to the cellar and looked at their future gym. Next to the boiler room there was a space that at some time in the past must have been used as storage for logs and coal. Brains had promised to clean the place up but since computer games had entered his life he found it very easy to forget everything else. Martha couldn’t wait any longer. So she got hold of a firm of cleaners, and roped Anders and Emma in to give her a hand too. They painted the walls white, put up exercise bars and laid down some lino. Then, when it had all dried, they managed to get all the gym equipment down into the cellar. They even put up those big rings in the ceiling, but Martha saw those as more of a decorative feature. None of them could jump up that high – no way.
A few days later, everything was ready and Martha wrung her hands with delight. Now they would get back into shape! From today on, there wouldn’t be so many cakes and buns, and in their place would be more greens and fruit. The others reluctantly went along with this for the sake of their friendship, but deep inside they suspected that new plans were being laid. When Martha started talking about fitness and greens, a bank robbery tended to be in the offing.
And they weren’t wrong, as the very next day she started up. The cellar gym wasn’t very large, and already after thirty minutes there was a smell of sweat. Martha was a hard taskmaster and her poor friends had to suffer the consequences.
‘One. Two. One. Two. Full speed ahead! Up with your arm and up with your knee – a little higher. That’s it. Don’t cheat! What are you up to, Rake? Up, stretch, switch and up again, twist and bend down! That’s the way!’ Martha shouted out the instructions and waved her arms. ‘Lower your head a little, lean in, and continue for a while like that . . .’
She kept a good lookout so that nobody skipped anything, but she could hear from their heavy breathing that the others were beginning to tire. Just a little bit more, a little more effort. She thought about Anders and Emma, and was grateful that they had helped her with the gym. They had realized that she was cooking up some new robbery plans and they understood how stupid it would be if somebody was to fall and fracture their thigh right in front of the police. Suddenly the music stopped.
‘Oh dear, the music system evidently isn’t entirely synchronized yet,’ said Martha and she went up to the apparatus. The others relaxed and started to gather their things together. ‘Hold it there, we must go on. With a bit of gymnastics we will all be a lot fitter . . .’
‘ . . . to carry out new bank robberies,’ Brains finished the sentence for her.
‘I didn’t know you needed wall bars, rowing machines and treadmills to commit crimes,’ Rake muttered.
‘Exercise strengthens your arms and legs, and it will be helpful if we have to carry cases full of banknotes,’ Martha went on, panting while she checked the cables. But the music system had conked out. It had been tampered with and didn’t seem to want to play CDs. So instead they tried to connect to the vinyl gramophone – which pleased Anna-Greta.
‘It can be a bit tricky connecting a vinyl gramophone to this music machine,’ said Brains and he went and stood next to Martha. ‘Let me have a look.’
He fiddled around with the cables and before long the music started up again. Martha gave him an appreciative look and went back to her place.
‘Ready? Up, stretch, switch and up again, twist and bend down! That’s the way! And one more time!’ she called out.
‘Stuff this, I’ve had enough,’ said Rake stopping in the middle of a move.
‘But, my dear, you who are so fond of women. And they like a nice body to look at, don’t they? Not everybody is in as good a shape as you,’ said Martha.
Rake changed his mind and returned to his place. But before long Brains, too, protested.
‘I think we’ve done enough gymnastics now,’ Brains panted, and pointed at his sodden T-shirt.
Martha lowered her arms. Perhaps she was too demanding. But if you were going to rob a bank then you couldn’t just fall over and end up lying on the floor with bundles of banknotes around you. However, if the others were tired, then she would have to adapt to that.
‘OK, we’ll say that’s enough for today,’ said Martha. ‘After a shower we can get together and have a drink. It’s time to go through our plan.’
‘Your plan,’ Rake pointed out, and he picked up a towel and went on his way. Christina watched him a long time.
‘I don’t know what’s the matter with Rake. He’s become so sensitive lately.’
‘It’s probably my fault,’ Martha sighed. ‘I decide too much. Men don’t like that.’
‘No, it isn’t that. He’s been so difficult recently, it’s as though we’re not on the same wavelength. It feels like he doesn’t care about me any more.’
‘But, Christina, you know he is very fond of you. You are his best friend.’
‘Friend – but that’s just it. We have been more than that, but now it feels as if he just isn’t here, so to speak.’
‘Men live in their own world, and women in ours. Now and then they collide, but that can’t happen all the time,’ Martha consoled her. ‘And here I am bossing and ordering people about all the time. That’s a sensitive issue, I can tell you.’
‘Don’t worry about it, because if you hadn’t or
ganized us we would never have achieved anything at all,’ said Christina.
Then Martha, warm and sweaty though she was, went right up to her friend and gave her a big hug.
‘You know what?’ Martha said in a warm voice. ‘I think it will all sort itself out, the love bit as well as the money. It always seems to work out in the end.’
‘Like hell it does!’ said Rake who happened to pass by them just then.
12
A few hours later when they had all had a drink and were relaxing in the billiard room down in the cellar, they suddenly heard the sound of motorbikes. The sound came nearer and a happy expression spread across Brains’s face.
‘Harley-Davidsons. And more than one of them!’
‘A whole biker gang. What if they’re coming for us?’ Christina shrieked and turned pale. Martha rolled up the blueprints of the Handelsbanken premises, and got up. She quickly went across to a white plastic pipe which hung among the other PVC pipes up by the ceiling. She unscrewed the lid and put the blueprints inside. Then Martha closed the pipe again and had a quick look through the window.
‘The gang must be on their way to the Bandangels. Come and have a look! They’ve got some weird wings on their backs – you know, ones with skulls. Perhaps it’s best we go to bed,’ Martha suggested, and she moved towards the stairs. The others gathered their things together and followed her. They had hardly got upstairs to their rooms and combed their hair before the doorbell rang. They came out and stared at each other, then took some hesitant steps down the stairs again. They stopped in the kitchen, but then were uncertain as to what to do. In the end, Christina couldn’t keep quiet.
‘Shall we open the door?’ she wondered out loud, in a pathetic voice.
‘I’ll do it,’ Rake exclaimed heroically and strode up to the front door. He glanced quickly in the mirror and then stood in front of the door handle for quite a while and expanded his chest. Then he pushed the handle down as hard as he could.
The Little Old Lady Who Struck Lucky Again! Page 8