Never End (28 page)

The man’s beer arrived. The music suddenly grew louder.

“Do you dance?” he asked.

“No, I sit on chairs.”

He took a sip of beer. Maybe he looked slightly embarrassed. You don’t have to be so damned bitchy, Sara.

“It’s not exactly my kind of music,” she said.

“Not mine either.” He took another drink. “I prefer rock.”

She nodded.

“Oh, I’ve forgotten your drink,” he said, picking up her glass, which she hadn’t yet touched. He held it up. “Shaken or stirred?”

“Shaken,” she said, as she watched Samic walk to the doorway, where he stood with his hands behind his back. The man next to her gave her glass a little shake and put it down again.

“Maybe I ought to introduce myself,” he said, holding out his hand. “Martin Petrén.” She shook it, automatically and somewhat diffidently as Samic was walking among the tables, perhaps on his way out.

“What’s your name?”

“Pardon . . . what?”

Samic had turned and was on his way in again.

“I just introduced myself.”

“Er . . . yes, of course . . . S... Susanne Hellberg.”

“Cheers, Susanne.”

He raised his glass, and she though she’d better do the same. He was pleasant and not unattractive. Maybe sometime when she wasn’t on duty . . .

“Well, look who it isn’t!”

She felt a hand on her shoulder and lost her hold on her glass which was halfway to her mouth. A hand shot out and grabbed it before it smashed onto the bar or the floor.

She hadn’t seen Bergenhem arrive. That was skillfully done.

“Nice to see you,” he said, still holding the glass. “This is a pleasant surprise.” He wasn’t smiling.

The man who’d introduced himself as Martin Petrén had put down his glass and was getting to his feet.

“Aren’t you going to pay?” Bergenhem asked.

“Wh . . . what?”

“Hold onto this but for God’s sake don’t drink it,” said Bergenhem to Sara Helander, giving her the glass and leaning over the man who was about the same age as him. Everybody was thirty this enchanting evening.

“I saw what you did,” said Bergenhem quietly. “I’m a police officer. I have my ID, you can be sure of that. I promise to show it to you later. We can leave here quietly and calmly and discuss this somewhere else. Maybe I’m making a mistake, but nobody is taking any chances. Nobody.”

The man looked around.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he whispered.

“There’s a tablet dissolved in that glass. I watched you drop it in. You might have more tablets in your pocket, or you might not. Shall we go?”

The man didn’t move. Bergenhem bent farther down over him, spoke even more softly. “Shall we go?”

“Now look. What the he—”

“I’m going to stand up now, and you’re going to do the same.”

Sara Helander watched the men stand up. She hadn’t heard everything Bergenhem had said, but she got the gist.

“Pay for both,” said Bergenhem. “Then come out to your car, but take your time.” He looked at the glass she was still holding in her hand. “Bring the glass with you. Don’t drink out of it.”

“I get it,” she said softly. “Am I an idiot, or am I an idiot?”

“Let’s go, buddy,” and they walked away, walked, like two friends, one with his arm round the other. Or two good-looking gays, Sara thought, as she paid and asked if she could take the glass with her if she paid for it. She wanted to go down to the canal to drink her water. The bartender shrugged and refused payment for the glass; she’d “already paid for it, really.”

 

 

Bergenhem was waiting in the parking lot. It wasn’t far.

“Who is he?” she asked.

“Give me the glass,” said Bergenhem. He put it in a special holder and covered it.

“Where is that pig?”

“The uniforms took him straight in.”

“Good Lord, are you sure about this, Lars?”

“Yes. But not of what it is. Hardly vitamins, in any case.”

“GHB?”

“Probably. Or Rohypnol . . . we’ll have to see.”

“I’m not even fit to go around handing out parking tickets,” she said.

“Now
that’s
a dangerous job.”

“You know what I’m saying, Lars. I’ve made an absolute mess of this job. I’m a triple idiot.”

“On the contrary,” said Bergenhem. “Between us, we’ve copped one of the dregs of society in the act of spreading his poison. We lured the swine into a trap and caught him red-handed.”

She looked at Bergenhem.

“Is that what you’re going to put in your report?”

“Of course.”

“You’re an angel, Lars.”

“You can buy me a drink sometime.”

“Whenever you like.”

“Be careful about accepting drinks yourself, though.”

“I’ll nev—”

“We’d better be getting on with the job,” said Bergenhem, tapping the glass. “I’ll have to take this shit in.”

“Do you really think I can go back there?”

“Nobody saw anything unusual.”

“Are you absolutely sure?”

“We’re professionals, aren’t we?”

“Well, you are at least.”

“I said we. Get yourself back there.”

 

 

It was the same bartender.

“How was the moonlight?”

“Beautiful.”

“Another glass of mineral water?”

“Yes, please.”

“Anything to eat?”

“Not at the moment.”

Half an hour passed. More and more people arrived. Sara Helander stayed in the crowded bar, turning down drinks offers. A new bartender appeared. He didn’t have time to favor his regulars.

She moved a bit to one side and caught sight of Samic again. He was wearing a smart, light-colored summer jacket that he hadn’t had on before. He walked through the tables and out into the street. If he took a taxi that would be fine. They weren’t planning to follow him by car tonight.

Samic walked northward toward the water, alone. Sara could hardly see him among the crowds of people flocking back and forth between the river and the town center. He crossed over the main road and turned right toward the marina. Lights from the Opera House glistened on the water. The café that formed a semicircle around the building was packed.

Then she saw Samic on the other side of the basin. He was standing still and appeared to be thinking. Behind him was a café closing for the night. It was one-thirty. Suddenly there was a woman in front of Samic, talking to him. Sara couldn’t make out her face at this distance. After five minutes they started walking toward the far end of the wharf. Sara walked quickly around the basin, keeping her eye on the pair. It was easier now as places were closing and there were fewer people around.

She saw Samic and the woman turn the corner. They were thirty meters away. She paused and thought. There was nobody between her and the corner. She took a few more paces. The sound of music drifted from one of the cafés. She didn’t hear the engine but saw the boat emerge from behind the corner and set off northward along the river. Quite a large motorboat that could be beige or light blue or yellow, but right now looked orange and black in the glow from the streetlights. Samic was at the wheel. He didn’t look back. The woman was standing beside him, her hair fluttering in the breeze.

 

 

When Lars-Olof and Ann Hansson came home early the next morning, having spent the night with friends in the archipelago, they could see that something was wrong. As they stood in the hall, they noticed that it still smelled of night, a cool scent.

The window of Angelika’s room was broken and standing half open. Paper and books and smashed ornaments were scattered over the floor. The desk drawers were wide open. Angelika’s clothes were in a mess in the wardrobe, and its door was ajar. Her bed was in disarray. The uncovered mattress was lying sideways.

Ann Hansson fainted. Her husband called Winter.

 

 

Winter and Ringmar stood in Angelika’s room. Winter noticed that the fresh flowers, formerly in a vase on the bureau, were now spread out in a semicircle.

“Somebody was looking for something,” Ringmar said.

“Can you guess what?”

“The photograph.”

Winter agreed.

“Didn’t bother to clean up afterward.”

“He knows what we’re looking for,” Winter said.

“Could be an ordinary burglar.”

“There’s a television set here,” said Winter, pointing. “And a telephone on the bedside table over there.” He gestured toward the bureau. “I’ll bet her jewelry is still in the top drawer.”

WINTER TRIED TO READ SOMETHING IN ANDY’S FACE. IT WAS A
map showing different directions.

“On which side of the river?” Winter asked.

“I don’t follow.”

“There’s a bar there, isn’t there? That Anne went to sometimes?”

Andy’s face indicated that he thought it was nothing to do with Winter, that it was irrelevant.

“It’s very important,” Winter said.

“Eh?”

“Can’t you get it into your head that this bar is relevant to her death?” You little shit head.

Ringmar could see what Winter was thinking. His face was a map now, too.

Winter put the photographs on the table. Andy took his time.

“I don’t recognize either of them,” he said.

“They’re both dead,” said Winter.

Andy was silent.

“In the same way as Anne.”

“I still don’t recognize them,” Andy said.

“Is there anything else you recognize, then?”

Andy turned to look Winter in the eyes.

“What do you mean?”

“The place. The surroundings.”

“No.”

“Take as much time as you need.”

“I don’t recognize it.”

Winter didn’t speak, just sat. He could hear faint noises of summer. They were in an interrogation room containing nothing of all the things outside. There were no colors in here. Sounds were muffled, filtered through the air-conditioning, flattened to a buzz that could be anything.

Winter felt for the pack of cigarillos in his breast pocket. He could see the sweat on Andy’s brow despite the low temperature in the room.

Maybe it would happen now.

“I don’t recognize it,” Andy repeated.

Then he said it.

“I’ve never been there.”

Winter was holding the pack halfway out of his pocket.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I’ve never been there.”

“Where?”

“There,” said Andy, waving his hand at the photographs on the desk.

“Where is it, Andy?”

“Where . . . where they used to go.”

“They?”

“Yes, they. There are several of them, aren’t there?”

Winter waited. A car set off on an emergency call, he could hear it. A voice shouted, more loudly than usual. Or maybe it was at normal volume in the thin air.

“You know where it is, Andy.”

No response.

“Where is it, Andy?”

He looked at Winter. His face changed, then changed again.

“What does it matter?”

“Have you still not gotten it through your head?”

“I’m just thinking of . . . of her.”

Winter nodded.

“Do you understand?”

“You can help her now.”

“It was so . . . innocent.”

“What was innocent, Andy? What?”

“The . . . the dancing.”

“The dancing,” Winter repeated, as if he’d been waiting to hear those words all afternoon. As if everything had been leading up to those words: the dancing. A dance for a murderer?

“Tell me about the dancing,” Winter said.

“It was just an extra job on the side.”

“Tell us about the extra job on the side.”

“I don’t know exactly what it was.”

“Just tell us about the dancing, then.”

“Some stripping,” Andy said. “It was . . . nothing much.”

“Some stripping? Striptease?”

Andy nodded.

“She was a stripper. Is that what you’re saying?”

“Yes . . . that’s what she told me, anyway.”

Winter held his eyes. Why hadn’t Andy said anything right at the beginning? From the first minute he knew what had happened to Anne. Dancing naked wasn’t the end of the world, not even to old men like . . . like him, like Winter, an old man of forty-one, knocking forty-two. It wasn’t the most desirable summer job, but it didn’t mean eternal damnation.

But had it meant eternal death for Anne? And for the others? Had the other girls also had summer jobs as strippers?

Winter wasn’t shocked to hear that young girls of about twenty earned extra cash at strip clubs. It wasn’t exactly news. It was rather an increasingly wearisome fact. He felt more angry about the unknown prostitution young girls could be led into. Not so much in the clubs, they had a pretty good check on those. But over the Net. The Internet, which was supposed to spread happiness and socially useful information to mankind.

At the very beginning of the case he’d ordered a check on the shady places they knew about in the seamier parts of town and by the railway line running east. They thought they knew more or less all there was to know about them. And the girls who worked there. Some had only just started secondary school.

Winter looked at the photographs of Angelika and Beatrice. Had they been there? Had they wiggled and waggled to kitschy disco music in front of that brick wall?

He thought. Then something dawned on him. Something quite different. It wasn’t a club, not a restaurant, not a strip joint, not a bar.

It was a home. Somebody’s private house.

If so, that would mean they’d have to start searching in a new way. A new way that wasn’t possible. It could be anywhere. Any house. Any dirty old man at all.