Lars Kepler 2-book Bundle (35 page)

“As young as you?”

“
Tal vez
.” Perhaps.

“A little bit older?”

She nods, but then says she doesn’t know; she saw the woman only for a second, and most of her face was hidden.

“
¿Y la boca de la señora?
” Joona demonstrates. What did the woman’s mouth look like?

“Happy.”

“She looked happy?”

“
Sí. Contenta
.”

When Joona can’t get any other description out of her, he asks about details, turns his questions around, and makes suggestions, but it’s obvious that Anabella has told him everything she saw. He thanks her and Jarl Hammar for their help.

On his way back upstairs, Joona calls Anja. She answers immediately. “Anja, have you found out anything about Eva Blau yet?”

“I might have, but you keep calling and disturbing me.”

“Sorry, but it
is
urgent.”

“I know, I know. But I haven’t got anything yet.”

“Fine, call me when you do.”

“Stop nagging,” she says, and hangs up.

Erik is sitting in the car next to Joona, blowing on a paper cup of coffee. They drive past the university, past the Natural History Museum. On the other side of the road, down towards Brunnsviken, the greenhouse shines out in the falling darkness.

“You’re sure of the name, Eva Blau?” asks Joona.

“Yes.”

“There’s nothing in any telephone directory, nothing in the criminal records database, nothing in the database of suspects, or in the register of those licensed to carry a weapon, nothing in the tax office records, the electoral register, or with the vehicle licensing authority. I’ve had every local record checked: the county councils, the church records, the National Insurance Office, the immigration authorities. There is no Eva Blau in Sweden, and there never has been.”

“She was my patient,” Erik persists.

“Then she must have another name.”

“Look, I damn well know what my—”

He stops as something flutters by, the faintest awareness that she might indeed have had another name, but then it simply disappears.

“What were you going to say?”

“I’ll go through my papers. Perhaps she just called herself Eva Blau.”

The white winter sky is dense and low; it looks as if it might start snowing at any moment.

Erik takes a sip of his coffee, sweetness followed by a lingering bitterness. Joona turns off into a residential area. They drive slowly past houses, past gardens dusted with snow, with bare fruit trees and small ponds covered for the winter, conservatories equipped with cane furniture, snow-covered trampolines, strands of coloured lights looping through cypress trees, red sledges, and parked cars.

“Where are we actually going?” asks Erik.

Small round snowflakes whirl through the air, gathering on the hood and along the windscreen wipers.

“We’re almost there.”

“Almost where?”

“I found some other people with the surname Blau,” says Joona.

He pulls up in front of a detached garage but leaves the engine idling. In the middle of the lawn stands a plastic Winnie-the-Pooh, six feet high, with the colour flaking off its red sweater. Other toys are scattered throughout the garden. A path made up of irregular pieces of slate leads up to a large yellow wooden house.

“This is where Liselott Blau lives,” says Joona.

“Who’s she?”

“I’ve no idea, but she might know something about Eva.” Joona notices Erik’s dubious expression. “It’s all we have to go on at the moment.”

Erik shakes his head. “It’s been a long time. I never think about those days now.”

“Before you gave up hypnosis.”

“Yes.” Erik meets Joona’s ice-grey eyes. “Perhaps this has nothing to do with Eva Blau.”

“Have you tried to remember?”

“I think so,” Erik replies hesitantly, looking at his coffee cup.

“Really tried?”

“Maybe not really.”

“Do you know if she was dangerous?”

Erik looks out the window and sees that someone has taken a felt pen and drawn fangs and ugly eyebrows on Winnie-the-Pooh. He sips his coffee and suddenly remembers the day he heard the name Eva Blau for the first time.

It was half past eight in the morning. The sun was pouring in through the dusty windows. I’d been on call overnight, and I’d slept in my office
, he thinks.

It was half past eight in the morning. The sun was pouring in through the dusty windows. I’d slept in my office after night duty, I felt tired, but I was packing my gym bag anyway. Lars Ohlson had been postponing our badminton matches for several weeks. He’d been too busy travelling between the hospital in Oslo and Karolinska and lecturing in London; he was due to take a seat on the board. But he’d called unexpectedly yesterday.

“Erik, are you ready?”

“Damn right I’m ready,” I’d said.

“Ready to get beaten,” he’d said, but without the usual vigour in his voice.

I poured the last of the coffee down the sink, left the cup in the pantry, ran downstairs, and biked over to the gym. Lars Ohlson was already in the chilly locker room when I got there. He looked up at me, then turned away and pulled on his shorts. Something in his expression was strange, almost afraid.

“You won’t be able to hold your head up for a week when I’m done with you today,” he said, looking at me. But his hand was shaking as he turned the key in his locker.

“You’ve been working too hard,” I said.

“What? Well, yes, it’s been—” He stopped and slumped down on the bench.

“Are you OK?” I asked.

“Absolutely. What about you?”

I shrugged. “I’m seeing the board on Friday.”

“Of course. It’s the end of your funding. Same song and dance every time, isn’t it?”

“I’m not particularly worried,” I said. “I think it’ll be fine. My research is making good progress, after all. I’ve had some excellent results.”

“I know Frank Paulsson,” he said, getting to his feet. Paulsson was a member of the board.

“Oh? How do you know him?”

“We did our military service together; he’s very much on the ball and quite open.”

“Good,” I said quietly.

We left the locker room and Lars took my arm. “Should I give him a call and tell him they just have to invest in you?”

“Can you do that sort of thing?”

“Well, it’s not exactly accepted practice. But what the hell.”

“In that case, it’s probably best if you don’t.” I smiled.

“But you have to carry on with your research.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“Nobody would know.”

I looked at him and said hesitantly, “Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea.”

“I’ll give Paulsson a call tonight.”

I nodded, and he smiled and gave me a slap on the back.

When we got into the big hall, with its echoes and squeaking shoes, Lars suddenly asked, “Would you take over a patient of mine?”

“Why?”

“I haven’t really got time for her,” he replied.

“I don’t know that I could do much better by her. My list is pretty full at the moment.”

I started stretching as we waited for a court to become free. Lars jogged on the spot but seemed distracted. He ran a hand through his hair and cleared his throat. “Actually, I think you could.”

“Could what?”

“Could do better by her. I think Eva Blau would benefit from being in your group,” he said. “She’s completely locked around some trauma. At least, that’s what I think, because I just can’t penetrate her shell. I haven’t got through to her once.”

“I’d be happy to offer my advice, if you—”

“Advice?” He lowered his voice. “To be honest, I’m through with her.” Even speaking quietly, he said this with some vehemence.

“Has something happened?”

“No, no, it’s just … I thought she was really ill. Physically, I mean.”

“But she wasn’t?”

He smiled, which seemed only to etch the stress on his face more deeply, and looked at me. “Can you just do me this favour?” he asked.

“I’ll think about it.”

“We’ll talk about it later,” he said quickly.

He fell silent and looked over at the court, where two young women who looked like medical students had a couple of minutes left of their session. When one of them stumbled and missed a simple drop shot, he snorted. “What a klutz.”

I rolled my shoulders and pretended to be looking at the clock, but I was actually studying Lars. He stood there biting his nails. Although it was chilly and he hadn’t begun to exert himself, he was sweating. And his face had definitely aged, grown thinner. Somebody yelled outside the hall, and he jumped and wheeled towards the door.

The women gathered up their things and left the court, chatting away.

“Let’s play,” I said, starting to move.

“Erik, wait a second.” He put a hand on my shoulder to stop me. “I’ve never asked you to take on a patient before.”

“I know. It’s just that I’m pretty full right now, Lars.”

“What if I cover your on-call hours?” he said, searching my face for a reaction.

“That’s quite a commitment,” I said, surprised.

“I know, but you’ve got a family and you ought to be at home.”

“Is she dangerous?”

“What do you mean?” he asked with an uncertain smile, fiddling with his racket.

“Eva Blau. Is that your assessment?”

He glanced over at the door again. “I don’t know how to answer that,” he said quietly.

“Has she threatened you?”

He considered his response for a moment. “Every patient of this kind can be dangerous. It’s difficult to judge … But I’m sure you’ll be able to cope with her.”

“I expect I will.”

“You’ll take her? You will take her, won’t you, Erik? Please?”

“Yes,” I said.

His cheeks flushed, he turned away and moved toward the baseline. Suddenly a trickle of blood ran down the inside of his thigh; he wiped it away with his hand and looked at me. When he realised I had seen the blood, he mumbled that he was having a problem with his groin; he apologised and limped off the court.

I had just got back to my consulting room two days later when there was a knock at the door. Lars was standing in the corridor. Several feet away, a woman in a white raincoat waited. She had a sharp and narrow face and a troubled expression in her eyes, which were heavily made up with blue and pink eyeshadow.

“This is Erik Maria Bark,” said Lars. “He’s a very good doctor, better than I’ll ever be.”

“You’re early,” I said.

“Is that all right?” he asked anxiously.

I nodded and invited them in.

“Erik, I can’t,” he said quietly.

“I think it would be helpful if you were here.”

“I know, but I have to run,” he said, raising his voice again and clapping me on the shoulder. “Call me any time. I’ll pick up, in the middle of the night, any time at all.”

He hurried off and Eva Blau came into my room, closing the door behind her. “Is this yours?” she asked suddenly, holding out a porcelain elephant on the palm of her hand, which was shaking.

“No, that’s not mine.”

“But I saw the way you were looking at it,” she said, in a sneering tone of voice. “You want it, don’t you?”

I took a deep breath. “Why do you think I want it?”

“Don’t you want it?”

“No.”

“Do you want this, then?” she asked.

She yanked open the raincoat. She wasn’t wearing anything underneath, and her pubic hair had been shaved off.

“Eva, don’t do that,” I said.

“All right,” she said, her lips trembling with nerves.

She was standing far too close to me. She smelled strongly of vanilla.

“Shall we sit down?” I asked, keeping my voice neutral.

“On top of each other?”

“Why don’t you sit on the couch?”

“The couch,” she said.

“Yes.”

“That would be a real treat, wouldn’t it?” she said. She went over to the desk and sat down in my chair.

“Would you like to tell me something about yourself?” I asked.

“What are you interested in?”

I wondered whether she was a person who would be easy to hypnotise, despite the intense effort she was making to appear hard, or whether she would resist, trying to remain reserved and observant.

“I’m not your enemy,” I explained calmly.

“No?” She pulled open one of the desk drawers.

“Please don’t do that.”

She ignored me and scrabbled carelessly among the papers. I went over, removed her hand, closed the drawer, and said firmly, “You are not to do that. I asked you not to.”

She looked at me defiantly and opened the drawer again. Without taking her eyes off me, she took out a bundle of papers and hurled them on the floor.

“Stop that,” I said harshly.

Her lips began to quiver. Her eyes filled with tears. “You hate me,” she whispered. “I knew it. I knew you’d hate me. Everybody hates me.” She suddenly sounded afraid.

“Eva,” I said carefully, “I just want to talk to you for a bit. You can use my chair if you want or you can sit on the couch.”

She nodded and got up to move. Then she suddenly turned and asked quietly, “Can I touch your tongue?”