girlfriend, Theresa. Have you got time to answer them?’
Silence on the line, as if Peter Skold is working out if he can avoid being questioned.
‘Can you call back later?’
‘I’d rather not.’
Another silence.
‘What about Theresa? Her parents called and asked if she was here.’
A hint of anxiety in his voice.
‘They reported her missing to us, and she told her parents she was going to be with you. But presumably you already know that?’
‘I’ve been out in the country for a few weeks. We were going to meet up when I got back.’
‘But she is your girlfriend?’
‘Of course.’
The answer comes too quickly. Next question, pile on a bit of pressure, Malin.
‘When did you last see her?’
‘Before I left town. We had coffee in the shopping centre in Ekholmen.’
‘She’s very pretty, Theresa. How did you meet?’
‘Sorry?’
‘How did you meet?’
‘She, I mean, we . . .’
Peter Skold falls silent again.
‘. . . met at a dance organised by both our schools.’
‘What school do you go to?’
‘Ekholmen.’
‘What year?’
‘Starting year nine soon. I’m fifteen.’
‘And where was the dance?’
‘Ekholmen. In our school hall. What is this? An interrogation?’
‘Not yet,’ Malin says.
You’re lying, she thinks. But why?
‘So she really is your girlfriend, then?’
‘I said so, didn’t I?’
‘And Nathalie? Do you know her?’
‘You mean Nathalie Falck?’
‘I mean Theresa’s friend Nathalie.’
‘Falck. I know her. She’s in the same year as me, in the other class. We’re not exactly close friends, but I know her.’
‘And she and Theresa are good friends?’
‘I suppose so.’
‘Have you got her number?’
‘Hang on.’
A bleeping sound on the line.
‘It’s 070 315 20 23. Look, I’m supposed to be going fishing with my dad, is this going to take much longer?’
Memorise the number.
Then: ‘Why do you think she told her parents that she was going to be with you?’
‘How the hell should I know?’
The father’s voice on the phone now.
Impatient. Tired.
‘So she’s disappeared. I see. Well, the parents did sound worried. It’s damn near impossible to keep control of kids these days. There was never any question of them spending the holidays together. We’re out in the country. We like spending time together, just the family.’
Are they really going out with each other?
Yes, he says they are. ‘But they never stay the night with each other and so on, that’s what kids their age do, isn’t it? But yes, they certainly spend time together, at least Peter often says so, but you know how it is, I don’t really have the time or inclination to poke about in their private lives, so what do I know? She’s been around at ours once, I think, so I can’t really say if they’re together or not.’
Poke about, Malin thinks. Do it. Poke about as much as you can.
Otherwise they might go missing.
And who knows if they’ll come back?
Secret teenage lives.
My own.
Tove’s.
‘Good luck with the fishing,’ Malin concludes.
‘Fishing? I never go fishing, I always buy mine from the fishmonger in town.’
Noisy hamburger kids all around Malin as she calls the number she memorised a short while ago.
‘Can we come and talk to you?’
‘Sure, but I have to work.’
Nathalie Falck. Studied nonchalance, an alert tone to her voice. Self-confident. Answered on the second ring.
What is that voice hiding? What secret?
Sven Sjoman’s words.
That’s what you said, isn’t it, Sven? Something like that, anyway.
Peter Skold’s voice. A liar’s voice? Malin wonders.
‘Nathalie, do you know Theresa Eckeved? Her parents have reported her missing.’
‘Yes, I know Theresa. So she’s missing? She’s probably just gone off somewhere for a while. She likes being by herself. And it’s not that damn easy to be left alone, is it?’
‘Where are you?’
‘At work, in the Old Cemetery.’
Zeke takes the key out of the Volvo and Malin can feel the fish-burger in her stomach, fermenting and trying to send sour gas back up, but she holds it down, would really rather forget that they ate lunch at the great Satan.
They get out of the car.
The wall of the Old Cemetery could do with painting, peeling grey strips are hanging down towards the tarmac of the car park. Opposite there are blocks of red-brick housing built in the late eighties. The buildings are quiet, almost constricted and uncomfortable in the heat. A balcony door on the first floor stands open, and when Malin listens carefully she can hear the stereo inside., Tomas Ledin singing stupidly about love and sex, but even though she doesn’t usually like it she likes it now, in this oppressive heat, because the music shows that there is still life in the city, and that an invisible hydrogen bomb hasn’t wiped out everything except evil.
Behind the wall grow tall maples, their foliage still green, but with a pale, dry nuance. Headstones in rows beyond them. Malin can’t see them, just knows they’re there.
The graves are old, just as the name suggests.
The cemetery shed is some hundred metres away, behind the memorial grove where Malin sometimes comes.
Malin and Zeke are wearing their sunglasses, walking along one of the cemetery’s raked paths, towards the
