himself. All his life he had taken refuge in the artifacts that he worked with, and through them he had made contact with spiritual beings. He started having trouble distinguishing between what was real and what wasn't. He began regarding the artifacts as his own. He spent a lot of his free time sitting in front of the computer when he wasn't helping his parents on the farm, and after a while he discovered a market for ancient relics. He gradually started selling objects, and it went extremely well. Now and then he would go to Stockholm to meet a contact person. He made a lot of money on the thefts, and he used most of it for the farm.
Each of them had his own way of filling in the holes from his childhood-the lack of care and parental support and solace. Yet something more was needed to fill in the painful void. That was how the whole thing got started. Presumably the fire in which their parents had perished was the deciding factor. That was Knutas's theory, at any rate.
Prosecutor Birger Smittenberg thought there was sufficient cause to reopen the investigation. In light of the summer's violent crimes, there was reason to suspect that the brothers had also set the fire that brought about the death of their parents.
Knutas put aside the last report.
He left police headquarters and walked out into the rain. He now had a week ahead of him out in the country with his family before the fall semester started for his children. Then he would be alone in the summer house and could spend his time doing woodwork and going fishing, which was his favorite pastime. When he was halfway home, the sky darkened and he heard thunder rumbling in the distance, over the sea.
Somehow that seemed just as it should be.
