Europa Blues (31 page)

‘The Mexican composer Carlos Chavez’s most characteristic work.’

‘You seem to have had a right royal time,’ Chavez said sourly. ‘What did you say about me, then? About … Soli?’

‘That’s confidential,’ said Erik Bruun with his head held high. ‘But we mulled over the pair of you so much that I think I can claim to know roughly how you think.’

Without thinking, Paul Hjelm took another bite of his cinnamon bun. He regretted it long afterwards.

‘What do you know about this case, then?’ he asked, feeling the lump of mouldy bun stick to the roof of his mouth. Each attempt to poke it loose with his tongue was in vain.

‘Much too little,’ Bruun said apologetically. ‘Jan-Olov hasn’t really been himself. Do you think he’s getting sick?’

‘Hardly,’ said Hjelm. ‘But he’s brooding about something. And he doesn’t normally brood.’

‘No,’ Erik Bruun agreed, ‘he doesn’t.’

Jorge Chavez had grown tired of their empty chatter. He said: ‘You know about our interest in a man without a nose, at the very least.’

‘Of course,’ said Bruun.

‘Have you searched your memory?’

‘Wasn’t necessary. I remember it all.’

‘How unexpected,’ Chavez said frostily.

Erik Bruun laughed. ‘Soli, Soli,’ he said, as though he was talking to a disobedient but dear grandchild.

‘What do you remember, then?’ Chavez persisted.

‘There was really just one lead worthy of the name,’ Bruun said calmly. ‘It was 1981. The phenomenon of unregistered taxis had only just started to appear. An illegal driver called Olli Peltonen was sitting in a pub, reading the articles on the murder in
Aftonbladet
and shouting all about how he’d driven that body without a nose. A woman heard him and called the police. By the time we got there, he was gone, but the people from the neighbouring table told us who he was. It turned out that Peltonen had already gone underground as the head of Stockholm’s first illegal taxi ring. We showed his photo everywhere, but he stayed hidden.’

‘Why wasn’t there a word about this in your report?’

‘I put in a reference to the illegal taxi investigation,’ said Bruun. ‘I suppose it got lost when they transferred it all over to the new computer system. Unfortunately, the small print usually goes up in smoke. Especially with cases no one cares about.’

Erik Bruun paused and stared up at the ceiling. Finally a gesture which Hjelm recognised. Then he continued, his face still raised to the ceiling.

‘It was nearly twenty years ago. It’s strange what a memory for faces you develop as a detective. I saw Peltonen in the paper a while back. There was a taxi driver strike up at Arlanda, if you remember it. Quite an interesting event, societally speaking. A group of petty capitalists tied to the syndicalists launching a wildcat strike because the taxi ranks closest to the airport had been reserved for three big companies. Petty syndico-capitalists protesting against big capitalists. Might well be the tune of the future.’

‘And?’ Chavez said, sounding increasingly impatient.

‘One of them was Olli Peltonen. There was a picture of him kicking one of Taxi Stockholm’s cars. There was a name beneath the picture, but it wasn’t Olli Peltonen. Apparently he’s calling himself Henry Blom these days. He runs a little taxi firm with the confidence-inspiring name Hit Cab.’

‘And why didn’t you tell the police?’ asked Chavez.

Erik Bruun leaned forward and fixed his gaze on him.

‘I keep my distance these days,’ he said.

Hjelm could see that Chavez was reaching boiling point. Small smoke signals were rising from his ears. It would have been interesting to be able to interpret them.

‘He’s got one thing left, at least,’ said Hjelm.

‘What’s that?’ Chavez muttered.

‘The ability to rub people up the wrong way.’

Chavez mumbled something which, fortunately, was inaudible.

They were driving towards the Globe Arena. The enormous sphere was already towering up in the distance like a threatening ping-pong ball. ‘The Glob’. The great big lump of snot.

Hjelm was driving. Chavez was sulking next to him.

Soli, Soli, Hjelm thought, trying not to laugh.

They had managed to track down Hit Cab fairly quickly. It was run out of an office right next to the Globe. Hjelm called and Henry Blom had answered in shaky Swedish. Hjelm told him his name was Harrysson and that he was the chief accountant of ClamInvest AB, an organisation which made investments in the shellfish business. Harrysson claimed to be interested in using Hit Cab’s services on a regular basis. He asked whether Henry Blom would be in the office that day. He wouldn’t, but considering the potential size of the agreement, he would be willing to rearrange his schedule. Harrysson thought that sounded like a fantastic idea. He and his assistant (cue a grumpy look from Chavez) would stop by Hit Cab within the hour. Henry Blom gave Harrysson detailed directions and ended the call expectantly.

‘You’re a terrible human being,’ said Chavez.

‘Sometimes,’ said Hjelm.

And so Harrysson, chief accountant of ClamInvest, arrived along with his assistant at the Hit Cab office, right next to the World-Famous Glob.

Henry Blom was a bald man in his fifties who spoke terrible Swedish with a strong Finnish accent. He humbly greeted the two dignitaries, who sat down and were handed coffee by a girl who could hardly have been much out of high school. Henry Blom had already given the two dignitaries a couple of poorly assembled brochures when they suddenly held up their police IDs and said: ‘Olli Peltonen, I believe, the godfather of illegal taxis.’

He stared, fascinated, at the two men, who changed shape before his eyes.

‘I’m afraid we’ve got to destroy Hit Cab’s future,’ said Harrysson Hjelm. ‘Not just because you’ve been wanted for some time now in regard to illegal taxi rings, and not just because you started a business using a false name, but because you’re also employing girls who seem much too young to be employed.’

‘Child labour, that’s what they call it,’ said Assistant Chavez. ‘Really harsh sentences for that.’

‘But,’ Harrysson-also-known-as-Hjelm said, ‘there’s an alternative.’

Henry Blom or Olli Peltonen could sense that everything was about to come crashing down around him. It was clear that he had no escape plan.

‘What alternative?’ he stuttered.

‘You tell us about a man without a nose.’

With that, his mask finally came off. The man blinking profusely at them now was called Olli Peltonen and nothing else. Eventually he nodded, as though he had been gripped by an insight of some kind.

‘OK,’ he said. ‘And if I talk?’

‘We’ll think about that when it happens,’ Chavez answered tryingly. ‘Hopefully things will be looking much better by that point.’

‘What?’ said Peltonen.

‘You tell us, we look the other way.’

‘OK, OK. He was the one who got murdered, right?’

‘Exactly.’

‘Nineteen eighty … what was it … two?’

‘One,’ said Hjelm. ‘September 1981.’

‘I picked him up, that really is true. I remember him pretty well. It was horrible. He looked bloody awful. Weird injury.’

‘Where did you pick him up?’

‘Frihamnen. He must’ve arrived by boat.’

‘How did he get hold of you? You had no taxi sign?’

‘No. Unregistered taxis are taxis without signs.’

‘That’s what they call a euphemism. How did he get hold of you?’

‘I think I must’ve just been driving round down there. That’s how it still works, I think. I don’t know, I don’t have anything to do with that any more. You just ask people who look like they need a ride whether they need a ride.’

‘And when was this?’

‘I don’t remember the date.’

‘He was found on Sunday the sixth of September. It was a headline in the evening papers that Sunday so that must’ve been when you were sitting in the pub, shouting about how you’d driven him somewhere.’

‘Must’ve been the Friday then. Friday the fourth. In the evening. I mostly drove in the evenings, after seven.’

‘What else do you remember about him? How was he dressed? What impression did you have of him? What language was he speaking?’

‘He sat in the back. The only impression I had was that he didn’t have a nose – that pretty much takes the sting out of anything else. All he said was the address I should drive him to. Strong accent, I’m thinking. He was less Swedish than I am.’

‘And where did you drive him?’

‘I don’t remember.’

‘Come on, Ollipolli. Think.’

‘It’s not child labour anyway,’ Peltonen said suddenly. ‘She’s my granddaughter. She skives off school sometimes, and when she does, she comes to help out here. Rather that than her hanging out with all those drug addicts down in Högdalen.’

‘So it’s some kind of charity work then?’

‘She’s my granddaughter. I love her. You can’t send me down for child labour.’

‘We’re not planning to. Come on. Where did you drive the man without a nose? Where did he tell you he wanted to go?’

‘I need to know you’re not going to send me down. Can’t you write it down or something?’

‘Of course not. Are you guilty of any crimes under the name Henry Blom? Answer honestly and we’ll check later.’

‘No, no. Hit Cab was my way of returning to life. I was hiding for so long it got me down. It was unbearable. And then I realised I could find a new identity. It took time and it was hard work, but it was worth it. I’m honest now. I don’t earn much money and the big companies take most of the work. I protested against it at Arlanda.’

‘When did you change your identity?’

‘Three years ago.’

‘And you didn’t think that the period for prosecution would’ve expired by then?’

Olli Peltonen stared at them furiously.

‘It’s a bit ironic,’ said Chavez. ‘To get away from a crime that was no longer a crime, you committed a more serious one, and it’s the only crime we can send you down for. The fact that you call yourself Henry Blom.’

‘Please … is that true?’

‘Yeah,’ said Hjelm. ‘You were hidden for so long that the law stopped caring about you. But the law doesn’t turn a blind eye to murder. For that, the validity period is very, very long. So help us out now. Then you can be called Henry Blom for the rest of your life and no one will say a thing. You’ve got my word.’

Olli Peltonen was quiet, thinking about the irony of fate. Then he said: ‘South somewhere.’

That was all.

‘Come on,’ said Chavez. ‘You’re a taxi driver. You know every single street in the entire Stockholm area like the back of your hand. Where did you drive the man without a nose?’

Peltonen thought. He was forced to cross an enormous, terrible gap in time. He was balancing on the narrow plank, crossing the abyss. Step by step, swaying, he made his way across.

He made it to the other side.

‘Nytorp,’ he said, a strange tone in his voice.

‘What the hell’s Nytorp?’ said Chavez, who
didn’t
know every little street in the entire Stockholm area like the back of his hand.

‘Nytorp is in Tyresö,’ Peltonen said proudly.

Tyresö, thought Hjelm.

‘Do you remember the address?’ he asked. ‘The street?’

Peltonen racked his memory. It took its sweet time.

‘It was the name of a bird,’ he said.

Silence.

‘A common bird,’ he said. ‘A really ordinary Swedish bird.’

More silence.

‘Not the house sparrow,’ he said. ‘Not the great tit.’

He stood up and exclaimed: ‘Bofinksvägen!’

Chaffinch Street.

Paul Hjelm leaned back in his chair.

He had been there recently.

To the house of a son who had just lost his father.

Leonard Sheinkman had lived on Bofinksvägen in Tyresö.

17 February 1945

The noise has grown so loud now. It is almost starting to seem real.

Yet more real is my name, crowning the top of the list.

I thought the ceiling was going to come crashing down today. Pieces of it rained down onto us. They looked like ice floes. A shudder ran through the building. I do not know what is happening out there but I wonder whether we will survive.

Of course I know what is happening: they are, of course, bombs. The liberators’ bombs, killing the interned.

Dare we speak of irony?

Yes, we dare. We must. How else would we be able to breathe? Our last breaths must be taken through a filter of humour. I have been running through all the old Yiddish jokes I know. Not that there are many. I have never been particularly successful in my faith. I had too much respect for the soul.

They walk the corridors; I see them from my cell window, walking like lost souls through an environment which is already gone. They wonder why they have been left on the banks of the river of death. Like drunk ships bobbing on its waters. Their bandages shine like lanterns on their empty skulls.

Yes. I cannot touch upon the fate which awaits me. It simply isn’t possible. It is beyond all else.

I should not feel terror; it is a sign of life. I have no right to show signs of life.

I have no right.

The rain. Afternoons bathed in grey. They are taken away to be shot.

No. Elsewhere. Let me talk about time …

No. Not this time.

Speak clearly. You are on the verge of death, man. Speak clearly.

Your wife and your son were taken away to be shot. You saw them being led round the corner. They were being taken to their deaths at the execution spot. They were to be killed. Magda had stolen food from the barracks to give to Franz. He had been starving to death. For that, they killed my wife. And our son, as an example.

And I ended up here.

Though I was already in Hell.

18 February 1945

You think you will never manage to lift the pencil again. You think you have written the worst words imaginable. After that, what is the point of carrying on? And yet, you do. A new day always dawns.

The bombs are raining down more and more heavily now. I saw time itself shudder.