The Blinded Man (26 page)

Norlander looked like a broken man. They wondered if he should have come back to work, but when he looked up at them with his red-rimmed eyes, they saw happiness beneath the tears, sheer happiness.

The more they got to know each other, the harder it became to understand each other. As always.

As they were leaving Supreme Central Command, Hjelm saw out of the corner of his eye Söderstedt go over to Norlander, put his arm around his shoulders and say something. Norlander laughed out loud.

Not much had been said during the meeting, no new progress had been made. They were now working from
the
theory that the killing spree was over, and that the deficit for the Swedish business world was going to stop at three and only three entries: Kuno Daggfeldt, Bernhard Strand-Julén and Nils-Emil Carlberger.

They were wrong.

19

THE ACRID SMOKE
has settled; the pungent smell has disappeared. The man has finally been put to rest. It took a bit longer this time.

It has been a long day.

Now it’s night.

It’s night in the living room.

As the first notes from the piano slide out into the room, he is leaning back against the sofa, looking at the man. The piano notes walk up and down, back and forth; the saxophone comes in and walks at the piano’s side. The same steps, the same little promenade.

When the sax takes off and the piano starts scattering the seemingly indolent chords in the background, it’s as if the man rises up off the floor. A couple of little drum fills. And when the sax continues to chirp with a few dissonant notes, it’s as if he’s bending over a void. The saxophone jabs, chops, works its way up in higher and higher spirals. The blood is running out of the man’s head.
It’s
as if he’s slamming his fist right into the abdomen of the void in front of him. When the piano falls silent, the other, harder blow slams against the void’s stomach.

It’s a pantomime, a peculiar dance of death.

Yeah. Whoo-ee. The first kick. At the knee.

The saxophone climbs even farther, faster and faster. Ai. The second kick. To the groin.

It’s so choreographed. Each blow, each kick at the void’s invisible body, has been predetermined, occurs in exactly the right place.

He has envisioned it so many times before.

And right there, when the applause comes in, that’s when the big punch is delivered. The audience is murmuring; the piano takes over. The blow falls at that very instant. The void’s teeth are rolling under the tongue, and that’s when it happens. At that precise moment.

The piano begins by taking a tentative step. Then it cuts loose. Ever freer wanderings, ever more beautiful. He is certain of the beauty now. It’s as if the man aims a kick at the prostrate void. It’s as if he kicks once, twice, three times, then four. The piano sings, lingering.

The void no longer exists.

The bass disappears. The piano is strolling again. Just like in the beginning.

It’s as if the man is aiming a fifth kick – when the front door opens out in the hallway.

‘Papa?’ shouts a girl’s voice.

The man collapses flat. Returns to a prostrate position.

He’s already out of the room, out of the house, out of the garden.

He’s so far away that he doesn’t hear the heart-rending scream.

That’s why he ran.

20

GUNNAR NYBERG WAS
jolted out of the double bed, which was still there, a symbol of hope in his three-room Nacka apartment. Viggo Norlander was wrenched from the more basic cot in his three-room place on Banérgatan. Kerstin Holm was pulled from the mattress on the floor in the little apartment belonging to her ex-husband’s ex-wife in Brandbergen. Jorge Chavez was yanked up from the little drop-leaf table in the kitchen alcove of his rented room at the intersection of Bergsgatan and Scheelegatan, where he had fallen asleep, holding a full wine glass in his hand and resting his face on the remains of his meal. Arto Söderstedt got up from his chair in his apartment on Agnegatan and took off his reading glasses. And Paul Hjelm was hauled out of the unpleasantly empty double bed in his terraced house in Norsborg.

Jan-Olov Hultin had already been roused out of bed. He was waiting for them in a kitchen in Rösunda, Saltsjöbaden.

Chavez was the last to arrive, looking unashamedly fresh, a night flower in the pitch-black May darkness.

‘What the hell? Did you take a shower?’ asked Hjelm, holding a big coffee mug.

‘Don’t ask,’ said Chavez curtly. ‘Okay, who is he?’

‘Have you had a look inside?’

‘It looks the same as usual. Have the techs started working?’

‘I called all of you here before I contacted the techs,’ said Hultin. ‘Among other things because I want you to see everything untouched. There were two shots to the head, right?’

A couple of the team members nodded. ‘The bullets are still in the wall,’ said Söderstedt.

Hultin nodded. ‘All right. We finally have something to go on. A different sort of society big shot. His name is Enar Brandberg. He became a member of parliament in the last election. Before that he was general director of a small government agency.’

‘The General Direction Fund,’ said Söderstedt. ‘It’s not really a government agency, but almost. Then he became a member of parliament, representing the Folkeparti.’

Hultin gave him a sidelong glance. ‘His daughter, Helena Brandberg, eighteen years old, arrived home a few minutes past one
A.M
., so about forty-five minutes ago. She heard jazz playing in the living room and thought it strange, since her father never listened to any kind of music. She went into the living room and saw
the
curtains fluttering in front of an open window. Outside a dark, unidentifiable shadow was running full tilt across the lawn and out to the street. In sheer bewilderment, she went over to the stereo and turned it off. Only then did she catch sight of her father lying on the floor. She screamed so loudly that the neighbours were over here in a matter of minutes. A family named Hörnlund. They have a daughter the same age as Helena Brandberg, and the two girls are best friends. Helena was clearly in a state of shock, and it was difficult to get any sort of eyewitness account from her. I mostly had to rely on the second-hand report from the Hörnlund family. Helena’s mother died of cancer this past year. The Hörnlund family accompanied the girl to the hospital. I’ve been out in the garden to take a look around; there seem to be a number of footprints in the grass.’

‘So that’s the end of leaving no evidence behind,’ said Chavez.

‘The Erinyes assume bodily form,’ said Hjelm.

Everyone stared at him for a moment. Söderstedt raised his left eyebrow and was just about to say something, but changed his mind.

‘Okay,’ said Hultin, summing up. ‘This time we have both bullets still in the wall and a good number of footprints. But above all we have the cassette tape.’

‘Cassette tape?’ said Holm.

‘The music. Jazz. In the tape player in the living room there’s a tape that in all likelihood belongs to the murderer. It’s not Brandberg’s at any rate. Neither he
nor
his daughter listened to jazz, and the tape was playing when Helena came home while the killer was still in the room. Apparently the music is part of our man’s set routine. After the murder he sits down on the sofa to listen to some jazz. Since Helena stopped the tape, we know which tune was playing. Since a couple of unit members here are interested in music, I thought we could try to figure out right now what he was listening to. That was one of the reasons that I waited to contact the crime techs. We probably have about twenty minutes before we’re locked out of the living room.’

‘I don’t know much about jazz,’ said Gunnar Nyberg.

They went into the room, stepping over the body on the floor. Wearing a latex glove, Hultin rewound the tape to the beginning of the tune.

After the first three or four piano notes, before the melody had even begun to stroll over the keys, two people said in unison, ‘“Misterioso.”’ Kerstin Holm and Jorge Chavez looked at each other in surprise.

Hultin stopped the tape. ‘One at a time.’ How unlikely was it that two of the attendant members of the A-Unit were jazz fanatics?

‘It’s a standard,’ Chavez said, after Holm nodded to him. ‘The Thelonious Monk Quartet. Monk on piano, Johnny Griffin on tenor sax, Ahmed Abdul-Malik on bass. And what’s the name of the guy on drums again?’

‘Roy Haynes,’ said Kerstin.

‘Exactly,’ said Jorge. ‘It’s the title track on the album
Misterioso
. If I remember right, it’s the sixth and last track
on
the original. Ten or eleven minutes long. Amazing sax-playing by Griffin, and Monk is in top form. Of course Monk wrote the piece, as usual. What else can I tell you?’

Kerstin Holm picked up where he left off. ‘All the tracks on the album were recorded on a magical summer evening in 1958 at the classic jazz club, the Five Spot Café, in New York. On the CD, a couple of other tracks were added from an earlier recording made during the same summer. One of them is also a standard, “Round Midnight”. We can tell whether it’s the CD or the original album that our man put on tape. If it’s from the CD, “Round Midnight” will come right after “Misterioso”. Otherwise, there won’t be any other tunes.’

She fast-forwarded to the final piano and sax promenade in ‘Misterioso’. After the applause and the whistling, a new tune started up, significantly more chaotic, free and ecstatic, as if born of that very moment of inspiration.
Not like a tune at all
, thought Hjelm, feeling ignorant. The sax and the piano inciting each other to something that was either a great achievement or sheer chaos. He couldn’t decide which.

‘No, no, no,’ said Chavez. ‘That wasn’t “Round Midnight”.’

‘I’ve never heard that piece before,’ said Holm. ‘How odd.’

‘What does it mean?’ said Hultin.

‘He could have taped something entirely different right afterwards,’ said Chavez dubiously.

‘Although that’s certainly Monk playing,’ said Holm.
‘Those
blue notes with even bluer notes on top. That’s him. His hands are lying practically flat on the keys.’

‘It sounds like a direct continuation,’ said Hjelm, expecting to hear sighs and groans from the experts. ‘I didn’t hear a real space in between.’

‘Actually, there wasn’t,’ Chavez surprisingly agreed. ‘Either our man is a damned good mixer—’

‘Or else,’ Holm finished, ‘this is a one-of-a-kind recording.’

‘How the hell do the two of you know so much about all this?’ asked Hjelm.

‘Haven’t you ever heard what jazz musicians say?’ asked Kerstin Holm. ‘“Those who talk don’t know, those who know don’t talk.”’

‘I know somebody, a fellow Chilean.’ Chavez mentioned his country of origin for the first time. ‘He’s a real
experto
on unusual jazz recordings. He has a little record shop in Rinkeby. We can go over there in the morning.’

Hultin had already worked out a plan, as usual. ‘Okay, since this is our best lead so far, I want all three of you on it. Holm, Chavez and Hjelm. But after you’ve heard what your Chilean friend has to say, Jorge, I want you back on the board-of-directors angle. That still could provide the best leads. But this murder may put an end to the business angle,’ he said to Söderstedt, who didn’t look the least disappointed. ‘We may send Pettersson and Florén back to the finance division. We’ll see. Arto, I want you to find out, of course, whether there are any business connections between these four men, but I think
that
this time we’re dealing with a different type of victim. We’re going to keep working in the same way. Nyberg will drag his notorious nets through the sea of snitches again and generally keep bottom-fishing. Norlander, if you’re ready to get back to work, I want you to stay on the mafia lead, as if nothing had happened.’

Norlander nodded emphatically.

‘The more important question is obvious,’ Hultin added. ‘Why has he started up again? After waiting more than a month?’

‘What about the tape?’ Hjelm asked, instead of answering the question. ‘We can’t let the techs sit on it for weeks. And leak it to the press.’

Hultin ejected the tape from the player. He held it in his hand for a moment, weighing the possibilities and risks. Then he tossed it to Kerstin Holm.

‘If we know our man correctly, then there won’t be any fingerprints. It looks like an ordinary Maxell tape, of a slightly older type. Probably untraceable. Am I right?’

Hjelm, Chavez and Holm all looked at the tape.

‘Yeah, you’re right,’ said Chavez.

‘Okay,’ said Hultin, with a little sigh. ‘Take good care of it.’

21

‘MISTERIOSO’ WAS PLAYING
on the door speakers, over and over again, like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

‘Did you guys get any sleep last night?’ asked Jorge Chavez.

They were sitting in Hjelm’s unmarked Mazda. Hjelm was driving, and Holm was sitting next to him, playing the Thelonious Monk piece non-stop on the car stereo. Chavez was just as constantly popping up from the back seat.

Hjelm and Holm replied only with slight movements of their heavy eyelids, which were trying to stay open, but also keep out the relentless glare of the summer-like sunshine. An impossible task.

It was 18 May.

‘Monk would turn over in his grave if he knew that his marvellous music had inspired someone to commit a series of murders,’ Chavez went on, not sounding particularly sad. They were on the trail. At last.

Again he received no answer from the front seat. That neither stopped him nor annoyed him.

‘I went over to headquarters last night, to look at the members of the boards of directors again. Intensive computer work. There are four ways to proceed from here. The most interesting is Sydbanken. All four men were actually on the board at the same time for a brief period in 1990. On the whole, that’s really the most promising lead. But maybe it’s even more interesting that Enar Brandberg was on the Lovisedal board at the same time as both Daggfeldt and Carlberger in 1991, the same media conglomerate that’s having problems with Viktor X’s protection racket today – GrimeBear, you sleepyheads. Assuming, of course, that Strand-Julén was a red herring. On the other hand, if our murderer has presented us with a red herring at this late date by killing Brandberg, then Ericsson and MEMAB will still have to be under consideration.’