Sail of Stone

“You weren’t there,” said Winter. “And I wasn’t a chief inspector at the moment.”

“Buckie,” said Macdonald. “The Cluny Hotel is something special; the Victorians would be proud. There’s a particular hotel in Cullen, too. It’s well known up there, but I don’t remember what it’s called.”

Bergenhem was hunting for stolen goods. It was a large operation, with people from all over the city. He crossed the no-man’s-land north of Brantingsmotet. Angpannegatan, Turbingatan. There weren’t many tips, but some of them seemed worth checking out. It was always a calculation. No one did anything for the sake of mankind. There was always a reason. Sometimes it had to do with revenge, sometimes jealousy, sometimes calculated favors and return favors, sometimes disappointment, sometimes arrogance, sometimes pure mistakes. It was like in other parts of this so-called society. The underworld wasn’t different from the regular world. Everything had a price.

A gasoline barrel was burning in a deserted roundabout. Some distance away, a few old men were hunching over their lunches, liquor. Bergenhem was playing Led Zep and looking for the address. Robert Plant was howling at heaven about the stairway up there. Bergenhem turned up the volume during the break. He could see Plant’s corkscrew curls. He had seen Zep in Copenhagen, that hair all over the stage. Jimmy Page seemed to be using his guitar as a crutch. He had been high as the sky. They could play. Bonham would die soon, but he beat his drums to pieces and got new ones onto the stage. Jeez.

Bergenhem found his way in another roundabout and drove up to the warehouse and turned off the motor. He looked around and dialed the number to operation command, which was in Kvillebacken for some reason. Maybe it was the McDonald’s at Backaplan that attracted them there.

“I’m outside now,” he said.

“Where’s your colleague?” crackled the communication radio.

“There’s no colleague here. Where is he supposed to be?”

“He was supposed to wait.”

“Then he probably got tired,” said Bergenhem, and he saw a small truck drive up to one of the loading docks and stop and stand with its motor running.

“A vehicle,” he said into the microphone, “a truck with a canvas cover. Looks like it’s privately owned.”

“What are they doing?”

“I don’t see anyone. It’s idling. In front of dock D.”

“Do they see you?”

“If the driver turns his head one hundred eighty degrees, yes.”

“Your colleague is supposed to be standing there,” scratched the voice. “Right there.”

“Good thing he wasn’t, then,” said Bergenhem. He saw the cloud of smoke from the tailpipe before the truck shot off. “Now it’s taking off!”

“Fuck.”

“Should I stay here or follow it?”

It crackled again, suddenly loud, like rusty metal against a rough stone.

“He’s disappearing,” said Bergenhem.

“Tail him.”

Bergenhem rolled out of the area where the warehouse stood in an angular semicircle, trying to surround rusty containers that were piled on one another like building blocks.

“There could be people in there, in the warehouse,” he said into the microphone.

“We’re on our way,” said the voice.

Aneta Djanali was having a few words with Ringmar.

“Is it true?” Aneta cried.

“Nothing has time to cool down in there,” said Ringmar. “Old Lindsten is working hard.”

“I’ll talk to him.”

“Wait a little. Wait and see for a day or two.”

Aneta thought of the Lindsten family. The apartment that was the daughter’s was really the father’s. Hans Forsblad didn’t appear, not inside and not outside. Anette was living at home, but maybe not. Sister Susanne had a permanent address. She was the only one who seemed to have one apart from Mr. and Mrs. Lindsten, but they seemed to be in eternal orbit between the beach cottage in Vallda and the house in Fredriksdal.

Where was Anette right now?

“Okay,” Aneta said to Ringmar. “There are other things to do.”

Bergenhem tailed the truck toward Frihamnen. He didn’t think that the driver of the truck up there had seen him. My car wasn’t visible. Something else caused him to leave. Maybe my colleague popped up from inside and I didn’t see it.

The warehouse was suspected of being full of stolen goods, or almost: It was being filled.

The truck up there, a Scania, could be full of stolen goods. Or maybe they were supposed to fill up in the warehouse and then ship to fences. There were lots of fences in Gothenburg.

He thought they were on their way to Ringon, but the truck lurched onto the viaduct and steered toward the bridge.

Aneta called Anette Lindsten’s number, and after two rings she got an answer she couldn’t understand.

“Is this Anette?”

Another mumble, and loud traffic noises.

And silence as the connection was broken.

She dialed the cell number again.

Busy. Dee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee.

She waited, walked through the brick hallway, which was dry and cool and smelled like absolutely nothing. Mollerstrom went by with a box of printouts in his arms, and he moved his head in some sort of greeting. Mollerstrom produced tons of printouts and then carried them around, here and there. He moved in mysterious ways. She watched him go.

Should they trace the route of Anette’s phone? No. No one would agree to do it if she didn’t have stronger grounds.

Her phone rang.

She answered and heard the loud traffic noises again; an indistinct mumbling. Then a voice:

“Is this Aneta?”

It was Bergenhem. She could hear his voice now, but just barely. The traffic roared and it sounded like a large bell was ringing in the background.

“Yes, sir.”

“Where’s Mollerstrom?”

“Lugging a box. What did you expect?”

“Can you check a license plate for me?”

Bergenhem followed the truck around Polhemsplatsen. The Goteborgs-Posten building bulged out above the traffic. The driver of the truck seemed to hesitate again but veered off toward Odinsgatan at the last second and ran a yellow light just as it turned red, and the maneuver caused a car in the next lane over to slam on the brakes and swerve to the right.

It was an illegal maneuver, but Bergenhem only had time to move around and past and keep an eye on the now-familiar vehicle up there; its cover was painted blue and white, the colors of the city; a rope or something fluttered like a tail from the covered bed of the truck.

But I’m the tail, thought Bergenhem.

They rolled through Odinsplatsen and continued east up Friggagatan and turned into Olskroksmotet and the truck lurched again, as though the driver had been interrupted. He’s talking on the phone, thought Bergenhem. Maybe he’s getting directions.

They continued across Redbergsplatsen, past Bagaregarden, and up onto Gamlestadsvagen.

Bergenhem’s phone jangled.

“Yes?”

“The plates belong to a Berner Lindstrom,” said Aneta.

“Gothenburg?” Bergenhem asked.

“The interesting thing is that they’re stolen,” said Aneta. “Because you said it was a truck, right?”