Emma called on the following day.
“Hi. It’s me.”
“Hi,” croaked Johan sleepily.
“I’m sorry I haven’t called before, but we’ve been away for Midsummer. And I needed to think about things,” she added in a low voice.
His drowsy state was replaced with a gradually increasing sense of hope.
“How are you?” she went on. “You sound really tired. Did you just wake up?”
“Uh-huh.”
“It’s two in the afternoon.”
“Is it that late?”
“I want to see you. We’ve had a fight. I told Olle that I needed to get away for a while. At least for a few days. He’s staying with the children at his brother’s house in Burgsvik. I need to see you.”
She was almost transparent, gray-faced and hunched over, as if she had shrunk since they had last seen each other. She just stood there, with a red nose and swollen eyes. He pulled her into the room.
“What’s happened?”
“Nothing’s happened. I’m just completely worn out. I have no idea what to do.”
“Sit down.”
Emma was sniffling. Johan brought her some toilet paper. They sat down on the bed.
“The holiday was awful,” she said. “We went out to visit Olle’s brother and his family. I knew I had to get away from you, to feel like things were normal and get some distance. We went swimming and played games and barbecued in the evenings. The kids were having a great time, of course, with their cousins and grandparents and all. It was tremendously difficult. Occasionally I felt completely empty. It was incredibly annoying that everyone acted as if nothing had happened. They just went on with all the usual things, you know. Barbecued the steaks and made coffee. Played kubb. It’s a Viking log-throwing game,” she explained when he looked puzzled. “Mowed the lawn. The more chaotic I feel inside, the harder it is to deal with all the normal things in daily life. Can you understand that?”
She went on without waiting for a reply.
“Olle is going to stay out there with the kids for a while. I said that I needed to go home. To be alone. Olle thinks this is about everything that has been happening, that I’m going through some kind of shock. He thinks it’s a crisis that will pass. He called up a therapist that he wants me to see. But I don’t think that’s the only thing going on. It doesn’t feel like it. It’s as if I don’t have anything to say to Olle anymore. As if we don’t have anything in common.”
She blew her nose hard several times.
“I have no idea what I’m going to do. This isn’t just about you and me. We’ve only seen each other a few times. It’s crazy. I don’t know what’s come over me. I must have a screw loose.”
“I’ve never met anyone like you before, but I don’t want to make trouble for you or your family,” said Johan.
“It’s not all your fault. I jumped into this situation with my eyes open. And why did I do that? It must be because Olle and I simply have nothing left. There’s nothing between us anymore. It’s over. Deep inside I don’t think it would have made any difference if you and I hadn’t met. Olle and I would still have split up, sooner or later.”
Tears spilled out.
Johan put his arms around her. “Maybe we should take a break from each other. Is that what you want?”
“No, I don’t.”
They were both silent for a while. Johan stroked Emma’s hair. Held her close. Felt the warmth of her body.
“I need a cigarette,” said Emma, and got up to get one. She sat down in the armchair next to the window. “Do you have anything to drink?”
“Sure, what would you like?”
“A Coke. Is there any chocolate?”
Johan opened the minibar and took out two sodas and a chocolate cookie.
“So what do you know about the latest murder?” Emma asked. “It’s such a nightmare. Pretty soon I won’t even dare go outside. Who was she? Do you know?”
“She was a potter. Her name is Gunilla Olsson. Thirty-five years old. Apparently she’s been living abroad until recently. She lived alone. She’s from Ljugarn. Did you know her?”
“No, I don’t think so. What is it that made him kill those girls? They don’t seem to have anything in common. One was married and had children, another lived with her boyfriend, and the third lived alone. One lived in Stockholm, one in Visby, and one way out in the countryside.”
She drank some of her Coke and lit the cigarette. “One worked with computers, one was a hairdresser, and then the third was a potter. It makes you wonder whether they all belonged to some strange sect or some chat room on the Internet. Were they living double lives? Haven’t you been able to find out anything?”
“No,” he had to confess, feeling ashamed. “I haven’t been able to dig up much in this case.” How much digging had he done, in fact? Not much. Of course he had contact with his source and several others at police headquarters, but he hadn’t invested a lot of effort in finding out any answers himself. And that wasn’t like him. It was Emma’s fault, he thought.
“I guess I’ve been thinking too much about you.”
“And I think too much about you,” she said. “I think about you all the time. Nonstop.”
She crept into his arms. Together they formed one body.
“I love you,” he said, his lips against her hair. For the first time he actually loved a woman. “I dream about you. I want to live with you. Have a house here on Gotland. Take care of your children and ours. Grow my own potatoes.”
He laughed and held her face between his hands. “Just think, that’s something I’ve always wanted. To have my own potato patch and be able to go out and pull up my own potatoes to eat with grilled salmon in the summertime. That’s what we did out in the country when I was little.”
As Emma drove home, she realized that she was in love. Head over heels in love.
Karin Jacobsson turned out to be right. A third murder committed within the course of a few weeks had scared both the Gotlanders and the tourists. Many women no longer dared go out alone. The high season on Gotland always started in earnest around Midsummer and lasted for almost two months, up until the annual Medieval Festival, which fell during the second week of August. Shortly after that, summer vacation would be over for all the schoolchildren, and then the tourists went back to the mainland.
In late August, life usually returned to normal, except for a few stragglers still enjoying a Gotland vacation. Right now it was the end of June, and the high season was just beginning, but cancellations were starting to pour in at the tourist bureau, the hotels, and the campgrounds.
The Visby police were feeling the pressure from all sides. On the morning of Midsummer Day, Knutas received calls from the county police chief, the head of tourism, the director of trade and industry, the chairman of the municipal executive board, and the county governor. Not to mention the conversation he had with the national police commissioner. What was required was quite simple and crystal clear. They had to catch the murderer.
The members of the investigative team had quickly returned to police headquarters in Visby, and now they were all sitting in the conference room of the criminal department. It was eleven o’clock in the morning.
Knutas began the meeting. He was grateful that the media had chosen not to divulge Gunilla Olsson’s identity. Almost twenty-four hours after the body had been discovered, the police still hadn’t been able to reach her brother.
“Welcome back,” he greeted everyone. “I’m glad that you could all be here. The latest victim is Gunilla Olsson, thirty-five, who was presumably murdered on the night before Midsummer Eve. She made her living as a potter, quite successfully, and she lived alone on a farm out in Nar. No children. We’ll start with a few pictures.”
The lights were turned off, and since the curtains had been drawn in front of the windows, it was almost
