Babylon (36 page)
He had left the shop, crossed the road and gone up the hill where he knew he could watch the shop without being visible from it.
David hadn’t said much, but what he had said was important. He turned the words over and over in his mind, tasted them: the order to leave Annelie alone, the threat that otherwise
we
would ring the police. A wave of nausea rose in his throat at the thought of
we
, of that evening in Istanbul when he opened up to her, lost control and told her about him and Henrik. How she had seen the real him, then made fun of it.
And in the end she had been afraid. Henrik had been sitting just next to them, it was crazy; it was as if he almost
wanted
Henrik to hear.
But Henrik had been so absorbed in Ann-Marie, he hadn’t heard a thing.
He had never belonged. He got angry but calmed down in a couple of minutes. He sat there looking down at the shop: the man behind the counter, the girl’s brown plaits, her white dress bobbing up and down, the door leading to the office at the back, then into the storeroom.
As soon as the girl had left the shop, he went back down the hill,
quickly crossed the road and shot David with the gun he had kept hidden ever since his visit to England, ever since Carla. David had put back the jars of flying saucers, fizzy cola bottles and foam bananas and was just turning around, his hand reaching in vain for the telephone. There was nowhere to hide. It was easy, just like the last time. The bullet hit his temple. It didn’t make much noise, you could easily imagine that nothing had happened. David didn’t make any noise either, he didn’t have time to scream or cry. Silently he doubled over and sank to the floor, then his top half fell to one side and it was almost as though he were stretching, as though he wanted to go comfortably into death.
There was no need to run. This time he didn’t panic, even though he hadn’t realised what he was about to do, nor did he feel that terrible exhaustion.
He wiped the gun, wrapped it in the towel and calmly left the shop.
Gothenburg
After the excitement of Copenhagen, Gonzales found it difficult to deal with the more mundane aspects of the investigation. The murders of Samuelsson and Karpov felt distant, particularly after the focus had shifted to the burglary. He wasn’t in the right frame of mind.
He had gone through the newspapers as he always did, looking for smaller articles on the Linné murders, which been splashed across front pages before the blood was even dry. And now not a word. It really was yesterday’s news.
He folded up the paper and tossed it away. The thought of backtracking to the point when Rebecca Nykvist was still the main suspect, back to Professor Alexandr Karpov or the gossiping students, held absolutely no appeal.
The Danish police were relaying information on a regular basis. As
they expected, both Knud Iversen and Dorte Sørbækk had an alibi for the time of the murders.
And Tell was on holiday.
He tried Annelie Swerin’s number again, almost out of habit, and was almost shocked to hear a human voice instead of an answering machine.
‘Annelie Swerin.’
‘Michael Gonzales, police. I’d like to talk to you in connection with our ongoing inquiry into the murders of Ann-Marie Karpov and Henrik Samuelsson. This is purely a matter of routine; we’re speaking to everyone who knew them. Could we arrange a time to meet as soon as possible?’
Höije appeared in the doorway.
‘Excuse me a moment.’ Gonzales placed his hand over the mouthpiece.
Höije pointed down the corridor. ‘Could you come to my office when you have a moment?’
Gonzales nodded, suspecting that it wasn’t really a question, and went back to Annelie Swerin, who had just returned from her dig. She didn’t sound particularly surprised to hear from him, which led him to assume she had already been informed about the deaths, probably by one of her fellow students. She had actually been thinking of ringing the police herself, she said; she talked quickly and sounded a little on edge.
Höije was still standing in the doorway, which made Gonzales nervous, and he tripped over his words.
‘I’ll get someone to contact you as soon as possible.’
To give himself something to do with his hands, and appear more efficient, he opened a Word document and started typing, nodding and making appropriate sounds of agreement.
‘No, you mustn’t feel stupid. Of course you don’t have to put up with that sort of thing if it makes you uncomfortable.’
Höije raised his eyebrows and Gonzales started to feel annoyed. What did the man actually want?
By the time he hung up, the boss had finally vacated the doorway. Gonzales headed for his office.
Höije was on the phone when Gonzales knocked, but waved him in.
‘Yes, of course we’ll consider all the options, yes, mm. Yes, that’s our target, that’s correct. But of course we must take into account . . . Yes, yes. I can definitely confirm that . . .’
Gonzales suddenly realised how tired he was, and that he was feeling slightly unwell. Perhaps the prawn salad he’d eaten last night had been off. He wondered how Höije would react if he bent over and threw up on his desk.
At that point Höije put the phone down.
‘Michael.’
He turned to face Gonzales, his fingers steepled beneath his chin. ‘I must applaud you for your efforts in Copenhagen.’
‘I didn’t do much.’
‘How long have you been working here now? As part of the team?’
What the fuck is this all about?
‘A couple of years, I think. Two. Just about.’
Höije nodded thoughtfully. ‘And you’re happy? In the team?’
‘Yes?’
Gonzales wondered feverishly what Höije was getting at. He hadn’t had many dealings with the new boss, but he didn’t believe for a moment that this conversation was about his feelings. Nor did it seem as if Höije wanted an update on the investigation.
‘You get on well with your colleagues?’
‘I think we all complement each other very well.’
He felt the urge to add a provocative ‘sir’. The whole situation felt stressful. He was struck by the thought, perhaps unfairly, that a conversation like this would never have taken place under their former boss. Ann-Christine Östergren had been Gonzales’ superior for just a year. That year had been enough for her to win his trust.
‘And your superiors?’
Ah, so that was it
. Gonzales stretched and adopted what he thought was a neutral expression. If Höije was after gossip, he’d come to the wrong person.
‘Well, you haven’t been in the post all that long, and we haven’t had a great deal to do with each other, but so far—’
‘I wasn’t talking about myself, but about your immediate boss.’
You think I don’t know that?
‘Tell?’
‘Christian Tell, yes.’
‘It’s fine.’
‘Fine?’
‘Fine.’
Höije seemed to be waiting for something more. Gonzales was waiting too – for him to carry on.
‘You’re . . . quite young to have got this far, to be where you are now.’
‘Yes.’
‘Part of this team.’
‘Quite.’
‘Hm. I can’t make any promises, of course, but . . . from what I’ve seen so far, I think you could have a very promising career ahead of you.’
Gonzales hadn’t the faintest idea what he was supposed to say to that.
‘I’ve always wanted to work in this team.’
If there’s something you want to say, let’s have it
. ‘I’ve never wanted to do anything else.’
Höije winked at Gonzales conspiratorially.
‘Oh, come on, Michael. Don’t tell me you’ve never toyed with the idea of promotion. And if you do, I won’t believe you. Don’t get me wrong, you’re still new. We’re talking about the future here.’
Gonzales could feel his irritation growing. ‘I thought you were doing most of the talking.’
Höije didn’t return Gonzales’s smile; instead he looked serious.
‘In that case, now it’s your turn to talk. According to what I’ve heard, from various people, I have the impression that Christian Tell can be . . .’
He fell silent, pretending to weigh his words carefully.
‘Can be . . .?’
‘Can be a little . . . unusual to work with. He likes to do his own thing.’
Gonzales adopted a puzzled expression.
‘I’ve heard he can be impulsive in a way that might negatively impact on team morale.’
Höije removed his glasses and rubbed at a mark on the lens. ‘The quality of our work is largely dependent on teamwork. If a leader is unwilling to listen to the concerns of his colleagues—’
‘Who – forgive me for interrupting – has this come from?’
‘That’s irrelevant. The main thing is that I know. And I want to hear
what you think. You’re relatively new, you haven’t become institutionalised, you have a fresh pair of eyes and you can look at things in an objective, constructive way. My predecessor mentioned that—’
‘Östergren had complete faith in Tell.’ Gonzales knew that his gaze was utterly steady. ‘And so do I. Besides which, I’m sure that the clear-up statistics prove that he’s good at his job.’
Höije pursed his lips; suddenly he didn’t look half as conspiratorial.
‘I wasn’t talking about the clear-up statistics, I was talking about what Tell is like as a leader, and how you function as a team.’
‘Brilliantly.’
The situation no longer felt uncomfortable; in fact, Gonzales wanted to prolong it, make it into a short film and post it on YouTube.
‘As I said, we work very well as a team.’
‘Thank you, in that case I’m satisfied.’
‘No,
thank you
. Can I go now?’
Höije laughed sourly. ‘You can go whenever you like.’
Gonzales made the victory sign at himself as he passed the mirror in the waiting room. Then he realised he really did feel sick.
Gothenburg
As she looked around the corner shop, Karin Beckman decided that the owner must have been a stickler for detail. A place for everything and everything in its place, if you ignored the equipment the investigators had spread around. There was a little label under each item for sale and not a single one was crooked. The floor was polished to a high shine, except for the pool of blood in which the man lay. The very picture of life’s fragility. He had been particular about his polished floor, but here he lay, and for what? A few hundred kronor?
Bärneflod put her thoughts into words in his own way as he fiddled with the buttons on the till. ‘What’s happening to this country? Mark my words, we’ll soon be in the same mess as America, where you can
be stabbed for a crap pair of trainers. I remember when there used to be a code of honour, even for gangsters. You didn’t shoot a guy for the day’s takings, it just wasn’t the done thing.’
He brought his fist down on the uncooperative machine and was about to threaten it with further violence when Beckman bent down and found the button underneath.
‘There. And keep your voice down. The family are still in the back.’
The man’s wife and son were in the room behind the shop. Beckman had made a fruitless attempt to persuade the family to go to hospital to see if they needed treatment for shock; the wife was on the verge of total collapse. The boy kept mechanically stroking her hair, his eyes frightened and full of tears as he took in the extent of her despair. He had lost his father. He swallowed. Over and over again. Beckman had seen it all before.
When the ambulance arrived, Beckman saw paramedics give the woman an injection, then she looked into the boy’s desperate eyes one last time before the doors closed.
She went back inside to Bärneflod, who was waving a bundle of hundred-kronor notes in the air.
‘I just don’t get it! Look at this!’
‘Perhaps they only took the bigger notes.’
‘There’s a couple of thousand here – show me the thief who’s too good to pocket that! Do you really think this was a robbery?’
Beckman put her hands in her pockets. The smell of blood seemed stronger now the body was gone.
‘I don’t know – it seems a bit odd. Have we got anything else on this place? Known association with gang activity?’
‘Not as far as I know. Did you manage to get anything out of the woman?’
‘No.’
Bärneflod disappeared into the back room and spoke to one of the technicians, but she couldn’t hear what they were saying. She let her gaze wander over the display of magazines: hardly anything but naked female bodies in degrading poses. One glossy was adorned with a picture of a pouting young woman with nothing but a big lollipop to cover her modesty.
She went outside to get some air. At first her legs seemed to move of their own accord, then she decided to go for a short walk. Not so
long ago she had hardly known that this area existed. She set off at a fair pace towards a yellow brick building which turned out to be a care home, then along a track that snaked down the hill. After the second bend she was confronted by the roofs of Majorna: a high, recently built tower block in the foreground, with Gothenburg’s trademark ‘governor’s houses’, imposing buildings set around courtyards, in the backdrop. Far away in the distance, toy cars sped across the Älvsborg Bridge towards the Sandarna area of the city. A mist was rolling in off the sea in spite of the fine weather. Or was it exhaust fumes?
Beckman turned, having established that the track went all the way down to Mariaplan, then marched back uphill until she could see the shop once more. Had the shooting been a spontaneous act? Surely the perpetrator must have checked out the area in advance, or at least known the lie of the land?
She scratched her hand as she grabbed a dry branch and pulled herself up onto the hill directly opposite the crime scene. Beer cans and sweet wrappers were strewn on the ground and there was certainly an excellent view into the shop. She would have a word with the crime scene technicians and ask them to take a look before they packed up; better safe than sorry.
A tiny drop of blood oozed from the scratch on the back of her hand. Beckman wiped it off on her jacket and looked up at the apartment blocks with their gleaming windows, then she slithered down the hill and went back into the shop.