Unspoken (22 page)

She led the way into the stable.

The horses had just been given their lunch feed, and the only sound was a pleasant munching along with an occasional stomping. Everything seemed very orderly. The floor was scrubbed clean, and the green-painted stalls were properly closed with locks. Halters hung on hooks outside each door. Shelves were filled with neat rows of supplies: bottles of liniment and baby oil, scissors, rolls of tape, hoof scrapers. Shin guards were stacked in baskets, along with rolls of binding tape, brushes, and other grooming tools. A barrel of sawdust stood in one corner. A black kitten lay on top of a feed box, sound asleep. In one window a radio was playing music at low volume.

They had made an appointment to meet with Sven Ekholm, who was both the trainer and the owner of the stable, but he was nowhere in sight. A stable girl appeared and took them over to a closed door that led to a coffee room.

Ekholm was sitting with his legs propped up on a round coffee table, talking on the phone. He motioned for them to sit down. Daylight was doing its best to penetrate through the dusty windowpanes. Spots of dried coffee marred the red plastic tablecloth. The table was covered with papers, stacks of racing newspapers, vitamin bottles, mugs, glasses, filthy riding shoes, rubber boots, and some threering binders. The ceiling was coated with spiderwebs. In one corner there was a kitchenette with a couple of hot plates, a dirty microwave, and a dusty coffeemaker. The walls were covered with finish-line photos of various horses, and a pile of dried roses lay on top of a cabinet. It wasn’t hard to see what took priority in the world of these people.

Ekholm took his feet off the table and finished his phone conversation.

“Hello, and welcome. Would you like some coffee?”

They both said yes. Ekholm was a handsome man in his forties. He was muscular and moved with grace. His dark hair was tousled. He was wearing black pants and a gray turtleneck sweater. With some difficulty he managed to find clean cups, and after a moment they each had a cup of coffee; a plastic box of gingersnaps sat in front of them on the table.

“Can you tell us about Fanny Jansson?” Jacobsson began. “We understand that she spends a great deal of her free time here at the stable.”

Sven Ekholm leaned back in his chair.

“She’s a smart girl who works hard. Not very talkative, but she has a good way with the horses.”

“How often is she here?” asked Knutas.

“How often is she here at the stable, you mean?” asked the trainer and then went on without waiting for a reply. “Probably four or five times a week, I would guess.”

“When was she last here?”

“Yes, when was she last here?” Ekholm repeated. “I think the last time I saw her was a week ago, maybe on Thursday or Friday.”

“How did she seem?”

“How did she seem?” Ekholm rubbed his chin. “I was busy driving, so I just said a quick hello. It might be better if you talked to the others in the stable—they spend more time with her than I do.”

“Is Fanny paid for her work here?”

“Is she paid? No, that’s how it is with stable girls, you know. They come here because they think it’s fun to be around horses. To groom them and take care of them. That’s how girls are at that age.”

Sven Ekholm took a quick sip of coffee.

“How long has Fanny been coming to the stable?”

“How long has she been coming here? Hmm, maybe a year or so.”

“Does she have a particularly good relationship with any of the employees?” asked Knutas, who was starting to get annoyed by the man’s tendency to repeat every question.

“Any of the employees that she has a particularly good relationship with? Well, yes, that would be Janne. They seem to get along well. Otherwise she’s quite shy, as I said.”

“And how often are you here?” asked Jacobsson.

“Hm, what should I say? Twenty-five hours a day,” he said with a grin. “Well, practically every day. I’ve been trying to take at least one day off every other weekend. I do have a wife and kids, too—I can’t just live at the stable.”

“How well do you know Fanny?”

“Not very well. She doesn’t exactly welcome contact. I always have so much to do that I can’t just sit around chatting with all the young girls who come here.”

Why didn’t Ekholm repeat the questions when Jacobsson asked them? Knutas found it enormously annoying.

“Where do you live?” Jacobsson went on.

“Right nearby. We’ve taken over my father’s farm. Well, my father still lives there, in the guesthouse.”

“Does your wife work at the stable, too?”

“Yes, she does. We have six full-time employees, and she’s one of them.”

“How is the work divided up?”

“We all help each other, training the horses and taking care of them, and lending a hand around the stable. It’s a full-time job all year-round, even when the racing season is over.”

“We’d like to talk to everyone. Can you arrange that?”

“Sure, no problem. Right now it’s just me and Jan, I’m afraid. But later in the day, or tomorrow.”

Knutas realized that he would have to ask one more question, just to see if the trainer had decided to stop repeating them.

“How many others work at the stable? Girls who work for free after school, and so on?”

“Girls who work for free after school, and so on? Well, we have quite a few of them. We used to have more, but it doesn’t seem to be as popular as it once was. Or else maybe they have too much homework lately,” said the trainer, giving Knutas a smile.

As they left the coffee room, Jacobsson noticed that her colleague’s expression was as dark as a thundercloud.

The interview with the stable hand, Jan Olsson, went better.

The man was slightly older than the trainer, maybe forty-five, Knutas guessed. He was darker than most Swedes. Brown eyes that were almost black, distinct eyebrows that grew together, and a stubble that looked to be several days old. Wiry and muscular from years of working with horses. Not an ounce of fat on his body—that was evident from the shirt and dirty pants that he had on. He was not wearing a wedding ring. Knutas wondered if he lived with anyone but decided to wait to ask that question. Instead, he asked him to tell them once again what happened when Fanny left the stable. Olsson gave the same account as had been recorded in the previous report.

“Try to recall any details you can,” said Knutas. “Anything that might seem insignificant could actually be important.”

Jan Olsson ran his hand over the stubble on his face. He made a very frank and sympathetic impression.

“No, I really can’t think of anything. She takes care of the horses and doesn’t usually talk much. When she came back from her ride, she was happier than I’ve seen her in a long time. Her eyes were actually shining. After grooming Calypso and taking care of the harness, she said good-bye and left on her bike.”

“What do you think might have happened to her?”

“I don’t think she committed suicide, at any rate. She was much too happy and upbeat when she left here. I have a hard time imagining her going off to kill herself.”

“How well do you know her?”

“Quite well, I think. She seems to like being here, but I understand that she doesn’t have an easy home life. She’s always in a hurry to rush home because she has to take the dog out. As I understand it, her mother is rather difficult, but I’ve never met her.”

“Has Fanny ever talked about any friends or anyone she hung out with?”

“She doesn’t seem to have any friends, since she spends all her time over here. Those of us who work in the stable are much older. Although she sometimes talks to Tom, who works in the next stable.”

“Is that right?”

“I’ve seen them talking to each other on the stable hill once in a while. They seem to get along. Fanny isn’t exactly the most open person, so I notice when she talks to anyone.”

“Are they the same age?”

“God, no. He must be thirty, at least. He’s American but I think he’s lived in Sweden for a long time. You can tell because of the way he speaks Swedish.”

“What’s his last name?”

“Kingsley.”

“And how long has he worked here?”

“At least a year, maybe more.”

Tom Kingsley was busy wrapping the hind leg of a horse when they entered the adjoining stable. Knutas and Jacobsson kept back a safe distance.

“We’ve heard that you know Fanny Jansson, the girl who has disappeared. Is that right?” Knutas began.

“Well, I can’t say that I really know her. I’ve talked to her once in a while.”

He didn’t look up, just went on with his work.

“We need to ask you a couple of questions.”

“Sure, I just need to finish this. I’m working on the last leg right now.”

In spite of a distinctly American accent, his Swedish was fluent. When he was done, he stood up with a grimace and stretched out his back.

“What do you want to know?”

“How well do you know Fanny Jansson?”

“Not very well. We talk occasionally.”

“How did you happen to meet each other?”

“Good Lord, we both work here. Of course we would see each other around the stables. We’re always running into each other.”

“What do you talk about?”

“Mostly about the horses, of course. But other things, too. How she’s doing in school and about her home, and things like that.”

“How do you think she’s doing?”

“Not great, actually.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“She complains about her mother, says that things are tough at home.”

“In what way?”

“She told me that her mother drinks too much.”

“So she has actually confided in you a great deal?”

“I don’t know about that.”

“Have you seen each other outside the stable?”

“No, no. Just here.”

“Do you know whether she has met anyone new lately? A boyfriend, maybe?”

“I have no idea.”

“When did you last see her?”

“It was on Saturday.”

“Where?”

“Here, outside.” He nodded toward the stables.

“How did she seem?”

“The same as usual.”

“Do you have any idea where she might be?”

“Not a clue.”

There was no one else at the stable to question. They left Tom Kingsley and went back to their car.

“What do you think happened?” asked Knutas as they drove back to police headquarters.

“It’s possible that she might have killed herself.”

“I have a hard time imagining that. She’s too young. Fourteen-year-old girls who commit suicide are rare. They’re usually at least a couple of years older. Besides, she didn’t seem particularly depressed, even though things might have been worse than they seemed on the outside. I think all three men at the stable seem credible, although the trainer was damned irritating.”

“I agree,” said Jacobsson. “I didn’t get any weird vibes from any of them.”

By the afternoon Fanny had still not turned up. Her mother called Knutas to hear how the search was going. She was distraught. Her sister in Vibble, south of Visby, had stepped in to look after her. Knutas decided to begin searching the areas surrounding Fanny’s apartment, her school, and the stable. A bulletin was broadcast on the local radio station and immediately attracted the interest of the media. Radio Gotland and both of the local newspapers,
Gotlands Tidningar
and
Gotlands Allehanda
, wanted to interview him.

Knutas tried to be generous with the press and agreed to brief interviews.

He dealt with one journalist after the other, and they all asked basically the same questions. He kept the interviews short, telling them only when Fanny had disappeared, where she was last seen, and what she looked like. He asked the reporters to say that the police were appealing to the public for help.

The search brought results. Fanny’s bicycle was found by a passerby. It had been tossed into a ditch less than a kilometer from the stable. It was immediately taken in so that the techs could examine it.

Johan Berg also called.

“Hi. Am I disturbing you?”

“I’m very busy at the moment.”

“I’m calling about the girl who disappeared. It just came over the wire service. What happened?”

Knutas gave him the same information that he had given to the other journalists, but he also told Johan about the bicycle. He thought he owed him that much.

“Do you suspect foul play?”

“Not at the moment.”

“Do you think she might have committed suicide?”

“We can’t rule out that possibility, of course.”

“What’s her home life like?”

“She and her mother live alone in an apartment here in Visby.”

“Is she an only child?”

“Yes.”

“The description says that she has a dark complexion. Was she adopted, or is her mother from some other country?”

“Her father is from the West Indies.”

“Where does he live?”

“In Stockholm, with his wife and kids. They don’t have any contact with each other.”

“Could she have gone there?”

“We’ve talked to the father, of course. And she’s not there.”

“She could still have gone to Stockholm,” said Johan.

“Sure.”

“Did she take along any money, or her passport?”

“There’s nothing to indicate that. All her belongings are still at home,” replied Knutas impatiently. Why couldn’t Johan Berg ever be satisfied with the same information he gave to all the other journalists? He never gave up asking more questions.

“The fact that her bike was found tossed aside could mean that she got into a car. Was it found near a road?”

“That’s right. I have to go now.”

“I realize that you’ve got your hands full, what with the murder investigation, too. Is there anything to indicate she might have fallen into the hands of the same perpetrator as Dahlström?”

“Not at the moment.”

Knutas shook his head as he put down the phone. What a stubborn man that journalist was.

The next second the phone rang again. The switchboard told him that a woman from the youth clinic in Visby wanted to talk to him. He told the operator to put her through.

“Hi, my name is Gunvor Andersson, and I’m a midwife. The girl that I think you’re looking for was here recently.”