Knutas waved at the artist, and Mattis Kalvalis came over to say hello.
‘Are you here just for the funeral?’ Knutas ventured to ask in stumbling English.
He thought he saw Mattis’s eyebrow twitch slightly.
‘Actually I’m on my way to Stockholm, but I wanted to be here today. Egon Wallin meant a lot to me. We hadn’t worked together very long, but in that short time he accomplished a lot on my behalf. And besides, he was a good friend. I really respected him.’
Mattis Kalvalis seemed to mean what he said. Knutas hadn’t noticed before how slender he was. He had sloping shoulders, and his coat looked too big for his thin body. He wondered if Kalvalis was on drugs. His movements were abrupt, and what he said always sounded so disjointed. Even Knutas, with his lousy English, could hear that.
It was a lovely service. Almost every seat in the cathedral was taken.
The only awkward moment was when Egon Wallin’s son stumbled as he approached the coffin and almost fell on to an enormous marble vase that was filled with white lilies. He dropped the rose he was holding, and the stem broke. Knutas felt truly sorry for the man. He murmured something inaudible; then with a tormented expression he placed the rose on top of the gleaming black coffin.
61
There was nothing to do but admit it. The police investigation of Egon Wallin’s murder had come to a standstill. Knutas was becoming increasingly convinced that the guilty party was not a Gotlander, maybe not even Swedish.
The investigation involved so many theories, hints and leads that had taken them in all sorts of different directions, and it seemed impossible to pull them together into a coherent whole. When it came down to it, Knutas wasn’t even sure any more that the murder and the theft at Waldemarsudde were connected. Maybe the sculpture had been left there simply to confuse the police.
Knutas had been in contact with Kurt Fogestam in Stockholm, but even there the police had reached an impasse.
One positive thing was that the media frenzy had gradually died down, and the investigative team was now able to do its work undisturbed. Again and again they had gone over all the information that had come in and all the witness statements, but nothing had moved the case forward. Knutas was disappointed that they’d made no progress with the paintings that were found in Egon Wallin’s home, or with the mysterious renter at Muramaris. They still hadn’t identified or located the man.
The Agricultural Ministry hadn’t commissioned any sort of report on the future of the sugar industry, and no one there knew anyone by the name of Alexander Ek. The analysis of the strands of hair found in the hired van showed that they belonged to Egon Wallin. So it was now crystal clear: the man who had rented the cottage was the perpetrator. But where was he?
62
Hugo Malmberg lay in bed in his suite at the Wisby Hotel, unable to sleep. The funeral had been a torment. He’d been foolish enough to believe that he’d feel better after attending. But the sight of Egon’s family, relatives and friends had merely made him realize how alone he was.
It was absurd to think that a person could mean more after his death. When Egon was alive, they’d had a relationship, of course. It had been passionate and exciting in many ways, but Hugo hadn’t been in love. There was a certain infatuation in the beginning, but that had cooled after a while. After the first thrill was gone, he usually tired very quickly of his lovers. He and Egon had met whenever possible, without demands or expectations. They had both thoroughly enjoyed the hours they spent together, but afterwards they each returned to their own lives, almost forgetting about one another until the next time they met. At least that had been Hugo’s experience.
Now, after Egon’s tragic and violent death, he suddenly felt a much greater longing for him than when his Gotlander lover had been alive.
Maybe he was getting old. He would turn sixty-three at his next birthday. There was something about the funeral that made him start thinking about the past. His solitude frightened him. An emptiness had crept in, and he thought a lot about the decision he had made long ago, which he now regretted. Of course, he had a large circle of acquaintances, but there was no one who truly cared about him. It was somehow such a basic assumption that somebody would be there to take care of a person when he reached old age. Someone close, with whom he had a deep connection.
Yet he’d had a good life; he couldn’t complain about that. He’d had a successful career and made plenty of money. That gave him a freedom that he’d always enjoyed. He’d been able to buy whatever he liked, done things that interested him. And he’d travelled to all parts of the world. He’d been able to satisfy his needs, and his work was both interesting and stimulating. The only thing his life was really missing was a deeper love relationship. Maybe that would have been possible with Egon. If he had lived.
Egon had had a marvellous attitude towards art. He could talk about a work of art for hours, or focus on one small detail in a painting, or speculate endlessly about what an artist’s intention might have been with a specific work. Maybe that was precisely what Hugo was lacking. There was a genuine quality about Egon, an unfeigned joy and a curiosity about life.
It would be a long time before Hugo Malmberg returned to Gotland. If ever. For him, the island would always be too strongly associated with Egon. He wanted to forget about everything, the whole heinous story. He no longer cared who the murderer might be. The first thing he was going to do when he got home was to book a trip to somewhere sunny and warm. Maybe Brazil, or Thailand. He deserved a few weeks’ holiday after everything he’d been through.
He gave up trying to sleep and got out of bed. He stuck his feet into the slippers provided by the hotel and put on his dressing-gown. From the minibar he took out a little bottle of whisky which he emptied into a glass, then went over to the sofa to sit down. He lit a cigarette and slowly exhaled the smoke.
It would be damned nice to get home.
At that moment he heard a clattering sound outside the window. The suite was on the second floor, but there was a roof right outside. It was an old building that had been constructed with multiple terraces and levels.
He went over to the window, pulled aside the curtains and looked out, feeling uneasy. A faint light issued from a streetlamp below, but it didn’t reach far in the dark. There was nothing to see. It was probably just a cat. He closed the curtains and went back to the sofa, taking a gulp of the whisky, which warmed his throat wonderfully as he swallowed. He remembered that on Friday he was invited to a major social event at Riddarhuset, the House of the Nobility. That would be nice. He had many friends of noble birth.
Another clattering sound. He gave a start and glanced at his watch. It was 2:15 in the morning.
Quickly he stubbed out his cigarette, got up and switched off the lights. The room was suddenly pitch dark. Then he crept over to the window, took up a position against the wall and waited. The next second he heard a rattling noise followed by a thud. It sounded as if someone were right above him. He wasn’t sure what to do; he didn’t dare look out, for fear of being seen, in spite of the darkness. Then a light flickered outside. Through a gap in the curtains he saw the beam of a torch directed straight at his window.
With every muscle on full alert, he waited another minute.
Then he obeyed an impulse and picked up a table lamp with a heavy porcelain base. He took off the lampshade and carefully set it on the floor. Then he firmly gripped the base of the lamp. It was the best weapon he could find. He stood to one side of the window in a corner of the room; he’d managed to slip behind the heavy curtain to hide. The only thing he could think about was Egon’s terrible fate. And the threats that he’d received himself: the note in his letterbox and the mysterious phone calls.
An ice-cold sensation settled in the pit of his stomach. Someone was out for revenge, and now it was his
