The Little Old Lady Who Struck Lucky Again!

by Ingelman-Sundberg, Catharina

  On their way home, they stopped at Byggmax in Nacka and purchased boat varnish, PVC plastic and various paints in shades of red, black and grey. With heavily loaded trolleys, they then returned to the minibus absolutely exhausted, and sat there with their arms around each other for quite a while to get their breath back before they could manage to drive off again. To be on the safe side, they stopped at Delselius coffee shop for something to restore their energy, and they both had a coffee and a prawn sandwich before driving on. It was lucky they did because, when they got home, they found the rest of the League of Pensioners full of energy and gathered around the computer. Gunnar and Anna-Greta were explaining something to the others.

  ‘Oh good, you’ve come just in time,’ said Anna-Greta in a jolly tone when she caught sight of them. ‘We’re busy setting up our secret archives for planning robberies: Stasi Senior.’

  ‘Stasi Senior? What a fine name. I assume it is about the preparations for the gold robbery?’

  ‘Yes, indeed. We’ve got the photos that Brains took in the Gold Room, and I hope that you got some good pictures today too. We’ll put them straight into the archives.’

  Brains handed over his mobile phone so that Anna-Greta could transfer the pictures to the computer.

  ‘I think we’ve got what we need,’ said Brains. ‘I took pictures of all the pictorial stones in the workshop, including the hardener and other materials they use for their plastic copies.’

  ‘It’s amazing how handy it is to store things on the computer. You can get everything in order,’ said Anna-Greta, delighted, and she created a new Stasi folder with the day’s date. ‘Right, let’s have a look.’

  She clicked her way to the photos from the docks, and the rows of luxury boats, Rolls-Royces and other cars appeared on the screen.

  ‘Goodness me!’ Anna-Greta exclaimed. ‘What on earth are these doing here?’

  ‘A secret storage place for bribes. Utterly crazy. They store things worth millions and millions,’ said Martha.

  ‘But why are they all stored there and not being used?’ Gunnar asked.

  Martha told them what the part-time security guard had said and they all sighed and shook their heads.

  ‘What a swindle! At least we’re working for the common good,’ said Christina. ‘Fraudulent use of taxpayers’ money is a serious crime.’

  Anna-Greta pulled out the desk drawer and took out a magnifying glass. ‘You can see the registration plates . . .’ she pointed out.

  ‘That’s what I thought. We must check with the national vehicle registry,’ advised Martha.

  Gunnar did some searches on his laptop. After a few minutes he stopped.

  ‘Mysterious. Most of them belong to a firm of lawyers, Beylings.’

  ‘Then that security guard with the mobile phone was right,’ said Brains. ‘The firm can’t own all that themselves. Those luxury goods are simply registered under their name.’

  ‘But who actually owns the cars and boats? We can’t just let go of this.’ Christina was curious now. ‘Those owners must have something to hide; tax evasion, fraud or even theft perhaps.’

  ‘Yes, you’re quite right, we must investigate this further. But first we must rob the Gold Room. Now we must concentrate on that,’ Martha reminded them.

  ‘Indeed we must,’ Brains agreed. ‘Anna-Greta, can you zoom in on those pictures from the restoration workshop?’

  While Anna-Greta clicked her way through the day’s images, Martha fetched some tea and scones. She had also bought some tasty cinnamon buns at Delselius’ that she put on the dish, together with some oat biscuits and sweets. It was important to keep everyone happy with an afternoon tea. However, nobody bothered to sit down and relax; instead, they each took a cinnamon bun and then gathered around the screen where they looked at the fantastic copies in full scale of the pictorial stones that Brains had photographed. Thanks to the fact that he had put a box of matches next to each object in the photos, you could work out exactly how high and wide the pictorial stones were. You only had to measure the matchbox and then you had the scale. Brains had thought of everything. After they had looked at all the pictures, the whole gang felt so tired that they decided to rest for a while. Then, after a little snooze and a good meal, Brains and Rake went straight out to the workshop. First they covered the windows with a piece of black board, and then they put on their working dungarees. After that they got out the compass saw and sawed out a template in full scale of one of the pictorial stones. It was very hard work and they had to take several breaks for a beer and to get their breath back. Every stage of the job gave them cause to have another drink, so, in the end, the pictorial stone in wood was not as precise as it could have been. ‘We’re not quite as strong as we used to be,’ protested Brains.

  ‘Mind you, we do have experience, and that makes up for a lot,’ said Rake. After a bit of discussion they realized that some stages of the work would need young strong muscles. They returned to the house and, after they had explained, Christina nodded and went to phone for Anders and Emma.

  The next day, the workshop was a hive of activity and Anders, who was a bit of a handyman himself, took charge. Admittedly, he was middle-aged and not quite as strong and supple as once he had been, but he had held a hammer and saw enough times to think he knew it all. With the help of a bit of hardboard and chipboard he managed to put together a pictorial stone with the same measurements as the museum’s large stone from Gotland. Then the girls took over and used a file and sandpaper until they got something reminiscent of rough stone.

  It was like a really weather-beaten pictorial stone, Rake thought after Christina had worked on it a while. ‘You’re really rather clever, you know!’ he told her.

  ‘Thank you, Rake. Well, as you’ll realize, this is not something a fortune-teller could do. And I can paint it, too,’ said Christina proudly with glowing cheeks.

  It wasn’t until the following day that the League of Pensioners had the energy to continue with their home-made pictorial-stone model. Brains mumbled something about casting in plastic not being one of his strong points, but he had at least learned enough for their little home project, so he greased the model and, together with Rake and Anders, put it into an enormous open tank in the workshop. Then he and Rake mixed together some hardener and the PVC plastic in a large bucket and got ready to pour.

  ‘Stand by! Now you’ll have to give us a hand, girls,’ he called out while the sweat dripped over his face and nose. ‘Right, tip the bucket now!’

  They all helped to pour the dough-like mixture into the tank while Brains and Rake mixed some more new dough until finally the whole pictorial stone was covered. Satisfied with their work, they stood there and looked down at the enormous stone buried in the plastic.

  Suddenly Christina cried out. ‘You know what? I think we’ve forgotten something.’

  ‘Oh no, I don’t think we have,’ said Brains confidently with his hands on his hips, but, nevertheless, he looked at his friend with some consternation.

  ‘When you cast something, you use a clay form and then smash the clay so that you can get at the cast object afterwards. But what do we do here?’

  They all stared at the pictorial stone which was completely buried and was in the process of being stuck forever to the PVC plastic.

  ‘Perhaps we’ve made a blunder here,’ said Brains.

  ‘We? You mean you?’ Rake sneered.

  And so it came about that the Great Gold Robbery at the Historical Museum had to be delayed for a couple of weeks.

  37

  Customs officer Carlsson hummed to himself while he checked the CCTV images from outside Handelsbanken. Mozart’s ‘Eine kleine Nachtmusik’ was playing in the background and he was in the best of moods. This was quite different from the extremely boring CCTV images at the airport. Here people were going back and forth on the pavement, sometimes a cyclist passed, sometimes a dog, or people hurried past with their briefcases, caffè lattes or Smartphones. Now and then someone t
ripped on a paving stone or stood there arguing, which looked absolutely hilarious. He zoomed in on the passers-by and, to be on the safe side, he had even got hold of the images from the week before the robbery. Suddenly, he thought he saw someone he recognized. Carlsson backed up the tape and looked at the scene again. On the pavement next to Handelsbanken stood an elderly lady with a hat and overcoat, talking on her mobile. Her appearance seemed familiar but he simply couldn’t recall where he had seen her before. He made a note and then continued to look through the footage. There she was again, talking on her mobile. He leaned forward and zoomed in on her. Indeed, the face was certainly familiar, but however hard he tried, he couldn’t remember who she was. One thing was certain, she was of interest for the investigation. She had been in the same place the week before. That could hardly just be a coincidence.

  Spring was in the air and all the members of the League of Pensioners had sauntered down to the bay with the intention of having a swim. If the wind hadn’t just started to blow, Rake probably would have dived in head first, but instead he did an elegant about-turn when he reached the edge of the water and mumbled some complicated explanation for why he wasn’t having a dip just this particular day. Instead, he went back to his sun chair on the veranda. The others followed his lead and they all sat in their white bathrobes and lapped up the sun. From a bowl of ice, Martha fished up some juice, beer and cider which she shared out. She looked out across the water and felt that familiar tingle in her tummy that always cropped up when she was slightly nervous. It often happened the day before something big was going to happen. Something criminal. The pictorial stones were ready, the plans had all been finalized and they only had to go through a final briefing.

  ‘My dear friends, tomorrow is the big day,’ Martha announced. ‘Just remember to handle the stolen articles carefully. We’re talking about Sweden’s national heritage here.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Anna-Greta agreed with a loud voice. ‘We’re only going to borrow the gold and it must be in just as good a condition when we give it back.’

  The others nodded in solemn unity. Everyone was pleased that finally they would be getting back into action. The preparations had taken longer than intended and the making of the pictorial stones had been much stickier and more difficult than they had thought it would be. In the end, Brains and Rake had managed to do the casting, and then the girls had taken over with the finishing flourishes. Thanks to Anna-Greta’s collection of history books, and under the guidance of Christina, they had been able to copy the pictorial stones exactly. The end products looked so natural with the boats and the figures, that Rake had become really interested in history. However, some details did differ from the genuine articles. On the back there was a door so that you could go inside the pictorial stone but since the shell was of Styrofoam and the PVC plastic had been much heavier than they had imagined, you couldn’t hang the stones directly on your shoulders. So Anders had helped Brains to put together a supportive wooden frame on wheels. In addition, the stones had been fitted with numbered hooks so that you could hang up the gold treasures inside. Then the five friends, with Gunnar’s assistance, rented a trailer, checked out where all the alarms were placed, and studied staff routines at the Historical Museum. Now the only thing left to do, was to actually carry out the Great Robbery.

  ‘Yes, my dear friends. Sleep well tonight. Tomorrow evening is the big event.’

  Martha raised her glass and they started singing the Swedish national song – after all, they were just about to lay their hands on Sweden’s national heritage.

  38

  All morning they had been adding the final touches to the pictorial stones before they fastened them securely on the trailer. Now the League of Pensioner’s old minibus trundled along in the Stockholm traffic with Anders at the wheel. He and Emma were on their way to the Historical Museum, as instructed by their mother. He slowed down at Narvavagen and turned left towards the museum. His right hand brushed his unshaven cheeks.

  ‘Like I said, there’s no rest and no peace when mother gets started, dear me, no,’ Anders sighed.

  Emma nodded, tired too.

  ‘Now Mum and the others are going to commit a crime again, what can we do about it?’

  ‘Sis, there isn’t much we can do, but look at it like this. Mum has her friends and is in good spirits. She is so perky that she can even babysit for you sometimes. She doesn’t complain about aches and pains and how lonely she is, but instead giggles when she talks about robbery coups and the like.’

  ‘Yes, of course, you’re right about that.’

  ‘Since they would refuse to live in any type of retirement home, we’ve simply got to help them as best we can.’

  ‘Yes, sure, but they’ve only recently committed a crime, so I thought we’d be able to take things easy for a while,’ Emma sighed. ‘Malin isn’t sleeping well at nights so I’m actually beginning to get a little tired.’

  After the Handelsbanken robbery, both Emma and Anders had intended living their usual and safe middle-class life, but now, once again, they had been pulled out of that calm existence. Not to help a tired, aging mother but to assist her in crime.

  ‘We can hardly protest. We are already deeply involved in their activities. If Mum gets caught, then we’ll go down with them.’ Anders scratched his chin.

  Emma pulled out some chewing gum and started to chew frantically. How long was the prison sentence for assisting in a robbery? Or stealing antiquities for that matter?

  ‘We are in this up to our necks; we’ve simply got to keep working. I think they could take things a bit easier. They are wearing us out.’

  ‘Don’t let Martha hear you saying that. Then she’ll force you to start in the gym too!’

  Emma laughed, the typical resigned laugh of an exhausted mother who hasn’t slept properly for several nights. ‘Right, here we are. Drive into the yard and stop by the steps.’

  She and Anders were wearing stained restorers’ working overalls and had timed their visit for when people were having their lunch break. At that time there were always a lot of visitors and nobody would bother about them. They parked the minibus, went round to the trailer and lifted off one of the pictorial stones. Thankfully, you couldn’t see the wheels because they were retracted, otherwise they would have been hard to explain.

  When the two of them passed the entry hall they cheerfully greeted the staff and continued towards the Gold Room. They put the first pictorial stone down just next to where the stairs started and then went to fetch the other two. Finally they put two notices next to the grand pictorial stones, museum notices which even had some text in English. Brains, who was very good at languages, had wanted to have Italian, Spanish, Russian and Croatian too, but the others had protested. The notices must look just like all the others in the museum. When Anders and Emma were finished, they took a step back. The pictorial stones with their images of ships, gods and legends really did look just like the real thing. Christina had even managed to portray Oden’s eight-legged horse Sleipner.

  ‘To think that Mum can forge things too!’ said Anders, sounding rather proud.

  ‘Say she can copy artefacts, not forge them, somebody might hear us,’ Emma whispered. ‘We’d best be moving!’

  Emma and Anders left the museum as quickly as possible so that few people would notice their presence.

  In the evening, the League of Pensioners arrived with a large group of people interested in history to listen to the museum’s evening lecture about the Vikings. A sprightly curator, who had recently defended his doctoral thesis which had come to the conclusion that the Vikings had never existed, was talking. All the studies must be done again, he claimed, and Martha quickly stood up to protest, but just as quickly sat down again. This particular evening it was best to keep a low profile. A very low profile.

  Later, when the guards had shooed out the last of the visitors after the lecture, Martha, Christina and Anna-Greta stayed on in the Ladies room.

  ‘Couldn’t
we have found a nicer place to hide ourselves?’ Anna-Greta whispered where she stood, squeezed inside one of the cubicles.

  ‘There are no CCTV cameras in here, so get your cleaners’ uniforms on,’ Martha reminded them.

  ‘Cleaners’ uniforms on,’ Christina and Anna-Greta repeated in unison and soon you could hear strange sounds from the cubicles accompanied by sighs and groans while the ladies changed. Then they were quiet again.

  ‘Ready?’ Martha asked.

  An affirmative murmur was heard and Martha’s mobile started to vibrate at the same time. This was the agreed signal. Martha pressed the key to see Rake’s text message. She shook her head. Rake had evidently tried to text her with the autocorrect programme turned on and all she could see was a row of a strange combination of letters.

  ‘Oh dear me, what a mess,’ said Martha turning pale. Why had Rake needed to show how modern he was just now? Did that mean that the coast was clear? Or that it wasn’t? She must make a quick decision.

  ‘Rake has sent a coded message from his Nokia,’ she announced. ‘It’s time to go now.’ And with that the three ladies left their temporary residence and set off towards the entrance hall.

  Outside the museum, Anders had driven up with the Volkswagen minibus, now transformed into a van with the name SENIOR CLEANERS on the side. Brains and Rake got out of the van, opened the back doors and took out two cleaning trolleys. Then they closed the doors, adjusted their work overalls and made sure they had their mops, cleaning rags and brushes with them. And Martha’s handbag. She had insisted that it could come in useful should something unforeseen happen, and must be put next to the lift. After looking around in all directions, they approached the disability lift on the street level, put Martha’s handbag in, pushed in their cleaning trolleys, and then went in too. They pressed the button for the entrance hall and, while the lift worked its way up, they prepared themselves mentally. The lift doors opened and they went straight out. Right into the arms of two guards.