The policeman listened.
'A radio patrol at Solna.'
'Well?'
'They've caught him.'
'Fransson?'
'Yes, they've got him in the car.'
Martin Beck came up. Kollberg bent down to hear better.
'What are they saying?' Martin Beck asked.
'No doubt whatever,' said the man in the radio car. 'Identity established. He has even confessed. What's more he had a pair of little girls' light-blue pants in his pocket Caught red-handed.'
'What!' Kollberg exclaimed. 'Red-handed? Has he…'
'No, they got there in time. The girl's unharmed.'
Martin Beck leaned his forehead against the edge of the car roof. The metal was hot and dusty. 'Good God, Lennart,' he said, 'it's over.' 'Yes,' Kollberg replied. 'For this time.'
Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo, his wife and co-author, wrote ten Martin Beck mysteries. Mr. Wahloo, who died in 1975, was a reporter for several Swedish newspapers and magazines and wrote numerous radio and television plays, film scripts, short stories and novels. Maj Sjowall is also a poet.
