The Beast (32 page)

    Still
no response.

    'I'd
like to talk to you for a while. I'll be straight with you, just as I was on
Monday. I think you're bloody difficult, and a real bastard at times. But I
need you. I haven't got anyone else to turn to in this case, no one who'll
offer me the resistance I must learn to deal with. No one who will ask the
right questions.'

    He
gestured vaguely towards the visitor's chair. Was it all right to sit down?
Ewert, still not uttering, waved distractedly as some kind of invitation.

    'I've
got to tell you this. I actually threw up yesterday. Breakfast, lunch, the lot.
Sheer funk. Instead of being handed my most important case on a plate, I've
ended up having to prosecute a grief-stricken father for shooting at and
killing a proven sex murderer. It can only go one way. That is, straight to
hell. You don't have to be a genius to work that out.'

    Ewert
shook his head, cackled briefly with laughter and spoke for the first time.

    'Serves
you right.'

    Ågestam
counted the seconds, his old trick in situations like this. Thirteen seconds.
That mean old bastard must surely see that he was on top now, was being
deferred to.

    'I'm
going to push for a life sentence.'

    He really
stuck his neck out and it worked.

    'Say
that again?'

    'You
heard me. I'm not going to stand for anybody appointing himself judge and
jury.'

    'Why
tell me? What's the fucking point you're making?'

    'No
special reason. Well, I wanted to find someone to tell my ideas to. To test
them.'

    Ewert
cackled again.

    'Still
scrabbling to get up the greasy pole, eh? Life, was that what you said?'

    'Aha.
Yes.'

    'You
know, half the punters who end up in prison have committed one or more violent
acts. Fucking idiots to a man, but still human beings. And victims as well;
almost all of them have been abused one way or the other, usually by their
parents. Even I can see where that might lead.'

    'I
know.'

    'Book
learning. You should be out there, seeing for yourself.'

    Ågestam
leafed through his notebook.

    'Steffansson
freely admitted that he planned the murder over the course of four days. He had
time to reconsider, but didn't. Not just judge and jury, he had to be the
executioner as well.'

    'Planned,
yes. But plans fail. He couldn't be sure he'd find Lund.'

    'When
he did, he still had a choice. He could've alerted the police. Christ, your
officers were on the spot. But that would've meant giving up the shooting he
had been looking forward to.'

    'Sure,
sure, he has committed murder. No fucking question about it. But life? No way.
Unlike you, I've seen real action, forty years of it, and that has meant
sometimes standing by as worse nutters than Steffansson got off with lesser sentences
than that. And I've watched hordes of fancy little prosecutors trying to pass
themselves off as hard men.'

    Ågestam
breathed in deeply and checked his notebook again. He was determined to keep
his cool and ignore the man's clumsy sarcasm. Then it came to him that what was
happening was exactly what he wanted. The sour old bugger was cross-examining
him. This would work as a kind of pre-trial trial. He smiled, still turning the
pages, but without taking in his notes. He could polish his arguments now,
muster his evidence. Great, he liked it, just like an exam oral.

    The
pause, maybe his smile, had irritated Ewert.

    'What's
your fucking problem now? Can't find what to say next from your shitty little
book? For your information, this is a case of murder with extenuating
circumstances. If pleading life gives you a hard-on, go right ahead. But be
ready to settle for eight or ten years. You and I are both part of this
society, you'd better put that in your notes, because it's a society that failed
to protect Marie Steffansson. And other kids.'

    'I
grasp the point you're making, of course. But does this failure by society
justify the summary execution of a
presumed
sex killer? Consider the possibility
that the victim was innocent, at least in this particular case. You know sod
all about it, and - more to the point - Steffansson knows sod all about what
the man he was shooting at was up to. Think again. Do you really think it is
right to kill Lund because he is seen near the site of the crime? Is that the
society you'd like to police? Where people take the law into their own hands,
DIY executions and all? It will certainly make a change. The laws I learned
about don't include anything about a death penalty. We are responsible, Grens.
We must demonstrate that in our kind of society, anyone who acts like
Steffansson will be locked up. For life. Grieving dad or not.'

    Silence.
Then the murmur of a Mediterranean-style ceiling fan stopped and the silence
became so profound that for the first time Ågestam actually noticed the fan's
existence.

    He
looked at it and then at the elderly man behind the desk. His lined face spoke
of a bitterness, a deep-seated fear, that drove both his withdrawal from other
people and his aggression towards them. What was the cause? Why was Grens so
ready to reject, so prone to swear and accuse and insult? DCI Grens was well
known nationally. Already at university Lars had heard the stories about him,
the policeman who walked alone, but was better at his job than most. Now,
having met the man, he was no longer convinced.

    All
he saw was a pathetic old sod who had painted himself into a corner socially
and had to put up with the consequences, isolated and angry.

    I
don't want to become like Grens, it's a grim state of mind, he thought, almost
as grim as being totally solitary.

    Ewert
turned over the CD, a flimsy piece of plastic holding twenty-seven tracks. His
fingers left greasy marks on the shiny surface.

    'Is
that it? Are you done?'

    'I
think so.'

    'Fine.
When you leave, take this with you. I haven't got the right kit for playing
it.'

    Ågestam
shook his head.

    'It's
a gift. It's yours now. If you have no use for it, throw it away.'

    The
elderly man put down the silent piece of plastic.

    Today
was the Wednesday of the second week since Lund's escape. Two guards had been
badly beaten up.

    A
little girl had died. Her killer had died.

    Her
father was in custody awaiting trial. He would get prison for life if that
poncy little prosecutor got his way.

    Sometimes
Grens didn't want to be around anymore. He almost longed for when it would all
be over.

    Dead
bodies are worse in hot weather. Sven was reminded of the kind of nature films
that he had come to detest. Overbearing voiceovers guide the viewers though
sun-baked African landscapes, flies buzz round the microphone and, sooner or
later, some kind of furry predator starts running after its prey, jumps and
bites its throat, rips the flesh off its bones, gulping down anything edible
until sated and ready to amble into the long grass to sleep, leaving the
bloody, rotting carcass behind for the flies and the heat to consume it until
nothing is left.

    Every
time he had to attend an autopsy such images haunted him with an inevitability
he dreaded. In this place, barely a week ago, he and Ewert had observed the
meaninglessly peaceful face of a little girl whose body had been ripped apart.
He had not had to watch the damage done to her, he had been allowed to look
away in an attempt not to face the lack of meaning all over again.

    Perhaps
that was why she had seemed so unreal. Far too young to die, still promising so
much life. He couldn't help remembering her tiny feet, their sadistic
cleanliness.

    Ewert's
concerned voice, without a trace of sarcasm, brought him back to the present.

    'Hey,
Sven. How are things?'

    'This
place gives me the creeps. I can't help it. Errfors seems a perfectly nice,
normal bloke, so why did he pick this hellhole for his place of work? How does
he stand it? Rooting around in cadavers. What kind of a life is that?'

    They
were walking through the central archive, past sliding metal shelving packed with
files, folders, boxes. It was a vast catalogue of death. The dead had become
lines on paper, arrayed in alphabetical order. Sven had been here once before,
he and a young medic who had helped him in a search. He hoped he'd never have
to do it again, these data searches made him think uneasily about interfering
with graves.

    Ludvig
Errfors was waiting for them in the same autopsy room as before. He was in
civvies, no sterile wraps, and as jolly and easy-going as ever.

    'It's
quite spooky, you know. I dealt with the victims in the Skarpholm case, then
with the Steffansson girl, and here I am doing the PM on their killer.'

    Ewert
slapped the dead man's leg lightly.

    'This
monster was bound to end up here. But you feel sure he did it this time?'

    'As I
said last week, the MO was as good as identical with the Skarpholm case. Gross
violation. I've been doing this job for longer than they advise anyone should,
and I must say, I haven't seen anything like it. Not towards a child.'

    'But
you'll get your conclusive proof,' he went on, pointing at the body. 'In time
for the trial we'll have checked the DNA in a semen sample and compared it with
samples taken from the victims' bodies. You and the judges and so forth will
get the data, in black and white.'

    'The
prosecutor lad is going for life. For Steffansson.' Ewert paused, looked at the
surprised faces. 'Oh, yes. Trying to grow into his posh suit.'

    Errfors
pushed the trolley into the circle of strong light, then remembered about Sven.

    'I
believe you took it a bit badly last time,' he said with a kind smile. 'This
body is rather mauled, so maybe you'd better look away for a moment.'

    After
registering a quick nod from Ewert, Sven turned away.

    'Obviously,
the face is well and truly gone,' Errfors was saying. 'One of Steffansson's
bullets hit the forehead, with explosive effect. The teeth were reasonably
intact, so we could identify him from his dental record.'

    He
adjusted the light to illuminate the lower torso.

    'The
other bullet hit his hip. It seems to have been the first shot. The pelvic bone
is partly shattered. The bullet went straight through the body, here. The two
impact wounds fit with what the witnesses said about having heard two bangs.
That's it. We've finished now.'

    Sven
turned back to the shrouded body. He remembered Lund's face. What was the point
of being Lund, of living with such sickness? If you must destroy your own
species, do you still have the right to be counted as a human being? In this
building, prompted by the presence of all the lifeless bodies, Sven felt unable
to escape these apparently unanswerable questions.

    They
got ready to leave.

    'Before
you go, I think you'd want to see these. I kept them for you. Here. I found
them on Lund's body when I undressed it.'