Frozen Tracks (26 page)

'You and Kaite were such good friends that you both
went to your home to help out with the potato picking,'
said Ringmar.

Smedsberg still didn't answer.

'Didn't you?' said Ringmar.

'So you've been to my dad's, have you?' said
Smedsberg. All I need to do is to mention
Die Heimat
,
Ringmar thought, and the lad's back home again on
that God-forsaken plain.

'Didn't you?' he said again.

'If you say so,' said Smedsberg.

'Why didn't you tell us about your friendship with
Aryan Kaite?' Ringmar asked.

Smedsberg didn't answer.

'What did your dad think about him?' Ringmar asked.

'Leave the old man out of this.'

'Why?'

'Just leave him out.'

'He's already in,' said Ringmar. 'And I have to ask
you about another matter that is linked to this
business.'

Ringmar asked about Natanael Carlström's foster
son.

'Yes, there was one, I guess,' said Smedsberg.

'Do you know him?'

'No. He moved out before I – well, before I grew up.'

'Have you seen him?'

'No. What are you getting at?'

Ringmar could see that the lad no longer looked
bored stiff. His body language had changed. He was
more tense.

'Do you know his name?'

'No. You'll have to ask old man Carlström.'

Ringmar stood up. Smedsberg followed suit.

'Please remain seated. I just have to stretch my leg
for a second. I think it's gone to sleep.' Ringmar sat
down again. 'You were the one who mentioned that
branding iron. Marking iron. We've looked into it,
but didn't get anywhere until we paid a visit to
Carlström.'

'Why did you go there?'

'It was your dad who thought that Carlström might
have owned an iron like that.'

'Oh.'

'Which he had.'

'Oh.'

'Did you have one on your farm?'

'Not as far as I know.'

'You said you did before.'

'Did I?'

'Were you making it up?' Ringmar asked.

'No. What do you mean?'

'You said you used to have irons like that.'

'I must have got it wrong,' said Smedsberg.

'How could you have done that?'

'It must have come out wrong. I must have meant
that I'd heard about irons like that.'

We'll come back to that, Ringmar thought. I don't
know what to think, and I don't think the lad does
either. We'll have to come back to it.

'Carlström had one,' said Ringmar. 'Or maybe two.'

'Really?'

'You seem to be interested.'

'What am I supposed to say?'

Ringmar leaned forward.

'It's been stolen.'

Smedsberg was about to come out with another
'really', but controlled himself.

'It's vanished,' said Ringmar. 'Just like Aryan Kaite
has vanished. And he has a wound that looks as if it
might have been caused by a weapon like that. And that
wound might be able to tell us something.'

'Isn't it a bit far-fetched for you to meet an old man
who's had an iron like that stolen, and that it should
turn out to be precisely the one that was used?' said
Smedsberg.

'That's what we're wondering as well,' said Ringmar.
'And that's where you come in, Gustav.' Ringmar stood
up and Smedsberg remained seated. 'If it hadn't been
for you, we'd never have made that journey out into
the country.'

'I didn't need to say anything at all about a branding
iron,' said Smedsberg.

'But you did.'

'Am I going to get fucked up for that, then?'

Ringmar didn't respond.

'I'll be happy to join a search party for Aryan if that's
what you need help with,' said Smedsberg.

'Why a search party?'

'Eh?'

'Why should we send a search party out to look for
Aryan?'

'I've no idea.'

'But that's what you said.'

'Come on, that's just something you say. I mean, a
search party, for Christ's sake, call it what the hell you
like when you're looking for somebody.'

'Search parties don't work in big cities,' said Ringmar.

'Oh.'

'They work better in the countryside,' said Ringmar.

'Really?'

'Is he somewhere out there, Gustav?'

'I have no idea.'

'Where is he, Gustav?'

'For Christ's . . . I don't know.'

'What's happened to him?'

Smedsberg stood up.

'I want to leave now. This is ridiculous.'

Ringmar looked at the boy, who still seemed to be
freezing cold in his thin clothes. Ringmar could lock
him up for the night, but it was too soon for that. Or
perhaps too late. And the evidence was too thin.

'I'll show you out, Gustav.'

Winter phoned Anette right away, from the nursery
manager's office. She was at home and Winter could
hear the humming of the extractor fan in the background.
Or perhaps it was a hair dryer. It stopped.

Camera? Yes, what about it? Yes, she had it to
hand. The film wasn't finished. Yes, he could come
and collect it.

Winter sent a car to Anette's flat. The camera really
was a very simple one. One of the technical division's
labs had the film developed and copied after Winter had
returned to his office.

He had the photographs on the desk in front of him.
They hadn't been taken by an expert photographer.
Everything was overexposed and slightly blurred. All of
them were of children, mostly in a location Winter recognised:
the grounds of Elsa's day nursery. Some of the
pictures featured members of staff he knew.

The park, the football pitch. A long line of children.

A man with a video camera could be seen in the
background, perhaps thirty metres behind them. His
face was hidden by the camera. That particular picture
was sharper than the others, as if it had been taken
by a different photographer. The man was wearing a
cap. Winter couldn't make out the colour. He was
wearing a jacket of the type you often see worn by
elderly men who buy their clothes at charity shops. It
was impossible to see what kind of trousers he was
wearing. More careful copying was necessary, and a
bigger enlargement.

Anette had taken two pictures in which the man was
visible in the background, but not in succession.

In the second one he had turned his back on the
camera and was evidently walking away. The jacket
could be seen more clearly. It could easily have been
made in the 1950s.

Perhaps the trousers as well. You couldn't see his
shoes, the grass was up to the man's calves. Nor could
Winter see the video camera.

'Has he still got it glued to his fizzog?' asked Halders,
who was poring over the photograph. 'The video camera,
I mean.'

They were meeting in the smaller conference room:
Winter, Ringmar, Halders, Djanali.

'It's not visible in any case,' said Winter.

'He dresses like an old man, but he's not an old man,'
said Djanali.

'What exactly does an old man look like?' Halders
asked.

'You're not going to goad me into going on about
that,' said Djanali.

'But seriously, what is characteristic of an old man?'
said Ringmar.

'He doesn't have the bearing of an old man,' said
Djanali. 'He's just chosen to dress like one.'

'Clothes maketh the man,' said Halders.

'The question is what this particular man has done,'
said Ringmar, looking at the photograph that could
possibly feature the abductor. He felt strangely excited.

'He was filming the children,' said Winter.

'That's not a crime,' said Ringmar, rubbing one eye.
Winter could see tension in Ringmar's face, more noticeable
than usual. 'There are normal people who take films
of anything in sight.' Ringmar looked up. There was a
red patch over one eye. 'He doesn't have to be a paedophile
or kidnapper or child molester.'

'But he could be,' said Djanali. 'We have a crime on
our hands. And he could be the one who did it.'

'We'll have to work on the picture,' said Winter. 'Or
pictures, rather. Perhaps it's somebody we can recognise
from the archives.'

'The camera looks new. It doesn't fit in with the dress
code,' said Halders.

Nobody was sure if he was being serious or not.

It was so crowded that it was difficult to move your
feet. A teeming mass of people, and he was sweating,
and if it hadn't been for that woman with the pushchair
ten metres ahead of him, he wouldn't have been here
at all, no, certainly not. He'd have been at home, on
his own.

It had looked as if the child was sleeping when they
were outside Nordstan. Then they entered the shopping
mall, the black sea of people walking, walking, walking,
shopping, shopping, shopping.

'The day before the day before the day before the
day!' somebody yelled, or something of the sort. But
what did he care about Christmas? Personally?
Christmas was a time for children. He wasn't a child.
But he had been one, and he knew.

It was a good idea. He'd had it before, but now
it was stronger than ever. Christmas was a time for
children. He was on his own and wasn't a child.
But he knew what children liked at Christmas time.
He was nice and he could do everything that would
make Christmas really enjoyable for a child. Really
enjoyable!

He wasn't at all sure that the woman in front of him
could do that. He didn't think that the child lying asleep
in an awkward position found the woman fun. She
didn't look fun. He'd seen her before, when she had
come to the day nursery and he'd been standing there,
watching, or maybe just walking past. In fact he'd seen
her several times.

He had seen the boy. And he'd seen a man who might
have been the boy's father.

He'd filmed the boy.

He'd filmed all of them.

The woman had paused outside Nordstan to smoke
a cigarette. He didn't like that. She had jerked her head
back and looked as if she were drinking the smoke. He
didn't think that she lived with this child. It might have
been her boy, but he wasn't sure.

Somebody bumped into him, then somebody else. He
couldn't see the pushchair, but then it came into view
again. He wasn't bothered about the woman at all, to
be honest.

He'd followed them when they left the day nursery.
He could collect his car later.

The weather had turned colder, but he didn't feel
cold. He thought the boy was cold: the woman hadn't
tucked him up properly.

That didn't matter so much now, it was warm indoors.
She was standing in front of one of the big stores that
sold everything it was pos-sible to sell. The doors were
open and as wide as sluice gates and people were flooding
in and out like torrents of black water, out and in, out
and in.

He saw the sculpture, the one he admired. It looked
so . . . so free, so liberated. Sculpted figures flying down
from the sky. They were free. They were flying.

He looked round and noticed that she'd parked the
pushchair next to where they sold perfume and hair
lotion and lipstick and all that kind of stuff, or maybe
it was clothes, but he hadn't checked very carefully.
Yes, it was clothes in fact, perfume was a bit further
on. He knew that really.

He could see the boy's feet sticking out, or one of
them at least. She seemed to be standing there looking
at the boy or maybe at something on the floor next to
the pushchair. Maybe it didn't make any difference to
her. He moved to one side, out of the way of people
flooding in and out. He was standing ten metres away
from her. She didn't see him. She moved the pushchair
closer to one of the counters. She looked round. He
didn't understand what she was doing.

She walked away. He saw her go to another counter,
and then he lost sight of her. He waited. He could see
the pushchair, but nobody else was looking at it. He
was standing guard while the woman was away doing
God only knows what.

He kept watch. People walking past no doubt thought
the pushchair belonged to somebody at one of the nearby
counters. Maybe someone who worked there. He looked
round but there was no sign of the woman. He checked
his watch, but he didn't know what time it had been
when she left and so he didn't know how long she'd
been away.

He took a few paces towards the pushchair, and then
a few more.

When Ringmar got home, he could feel that there was
something seriously wrong. Even as he took his shoes
off in the hall he could sense that the silence was heavier
than usual. He hadn't heard a silence like that before
in this house. Or had he?

'Birgitta?'

No answer, and there was nobody there when he
went to the kitchen, up the stairs, through the rooms.
He didn't switch on the lights upstairs as the neighbour's
illuminations were quite enough to fill the rooms
with a yellow day-before-the-day-before-the-day-beforethe-
day glow.

Back downstairs he rang his daughter's mobile. She
answered after the second ring.

'Hi, Moa, it's your dad here.'

She didn't answer. Perhaps she's nodding, he thought.

'Do you know where your mum is?'

'Yes.'

'I tried to phone her but there was no reply, and
when I got home there was nobody here.'

'Yes.'

'Where is she, then? Has she gone shopping?'

Ringmar could hear her rapid breathing.

'She's gone away for a bit.'

'Eh? Gone away? Where to? Why? What's going on?'

That was a lot of questions, and she answered one
of them.

'I don't know.'

'Don't know what?'

'Where she's gone.'

'Didn't she say?'

'No.'

'What the hell is this?' said Ringmar. I'd better sit
down, he thought. 'I don't understand a bloody thing,'
he said. 'Do you, Moa?'

She didn't reply.

'Moa?' He could hear a noise in the background, as
if something was moving fast. 'Moa? Where are you?'

'I'm on the tram,' she said. 'On my way home.'

Thank God for that, he thought.

'We can talk when I get there,' she said.

He waited on edge, opened a beer that he didn't drink.
The thousand lights in the neighbour's garden suddenly
started flashing. What the hell, he thought. They're
winking like a thousand compound eyes, like stars
sending messages down to earth. Before long I'll have
to call round and pass on an unambiguous message to
that stupid bastard.

The front door opened. He went into the hall.

'It's probably not all that bad,' was the first thing his
daughter said. She took off her coat.

'Is this a nightmare?' asked Ringmar.

'Let's go into the living room,' she said.

He trudged after her. They sat down on the sofa.

'Martin rang,' she said.

'I understand,' he said.

'Do you?'

'Why didn't she talk to me first?'

'What do you understand, Dad?'

'It's obvious, isn't it? He wants to see her but on no
account does he want to see me.' He shook his head.
'And she had to promise not to say anything to me.'

'I don't know anything about that,' said Moa.

'When's she coming back?'

'Tomorrow, I think.'

'So he's not all that far away?' said Ringmar.

She didn't answer. He couldn't see her face, only her
hair, which was speckled with the flashing lights from
the idiot's garden.

'So he's not all that far away?' Ringmar said again.

'She's not going to meet him,' Moa said eventually.

'I beg your pardon?'

'Mum isn't going to meet Martin,' said Moa.

'What do you know that I don't know?'

'I don't know much more than you do,' she said.
'Mum phoned me and said that Martin had been in
touch and she would have to go away for a short while.'

'But what the hell did he say, then? He must have
said something that made her clear off!'

'I don't know.'

'This is the kind of thing that happens to other people,'
he said.

She said nothing.

'Aren't you worried?' he asked.

She stood up.

'Where are you going?' he asked.

'Up to my room. Why?'

'There's something else, isn't there?' he said. 'I can
see it in your face.'

'No,' she said. 'I have to go to my room now. Vanna's
going to ring me.'

He stood up, went to the kitchen and fetched the
bottle of beer, went back to the living room and sat
down on the sofa again. Birgitta didn't have a mobile:
if she did, he could have sent her a message, said something,
done something. This is a situation I've never
been in before. Is it a dream? Or is it something I've
said? Something I've done? What have I done?

Why had Martin rung? What had he said? What had
he said to make Birgitta pack a bag and go off? Without
telling her husband.

He took a swig of beer and the illuminations outside
continued to flash and twinkle. He looked out of the
window and saw that some kind of portal in lights had
been created outside the neighbour's front door. That
was new. He clutched the bottle in his hand and stood
up. He saw the neighbour come out and turn round to
admire his garden of light. Ringmar heard the phone
ring and Moa's voice when she answered. He waited
for her to shout down to him, but she continued talking.
Vanna, no doubt, a fellow student who wore flowery
shirts. Would do well as a lawyer.

He carried on staring at his idiotic neighbour. It
looked as if the stupid bastard were fixing up several
more floodlights in one of the maple trees. Ringmar
slammed the bottle down on to the glass table with a
loud bang and went out on to the veranda facing the
lights. He didn't feel the frost through his socks.

'What the hell are you doing now?' he yelled straight
across the flashing Plough and the Great Bear and the
Little Bear and the Devil and his grandmother.

The neighbour's discoloured and mentally deficient
face turned to look at him.

'WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?' screeched
Ringmar, and even as he did so he recognised that this
was not the way to behave, that you didn't take out
your own frustration or worries on other people, he
knew that full well, but just then he didn't give a toss
about that.

'What's the matter?' asked the neighbour, who
Ringmar knew was some kind of administrator in the
health service. A real butcher, in other words, as Winter's
Angela would have said. I'll bet that bastard administrates
fucking light therapy at the hospital, Ringmar
thought.

'I can't take any more of your bloody lights in my
fizzog,' said Ringmar, and thought of Halders. I haven't
used the word fizzog for nearly forty years.