identification.’
‘Do you indeed? Who?’
Lars Еgestam was slightly built, wore small round glasses and his short hair combed forward in a half-fringe, and, although he had just celebrated his thirtieth birthday, looked more like a little boy than ever as he leaned back in the large leather chair and listened.
‘A doctor in the ward where Oldйus was a patient. Woman called Lisa Ohrstrom. She is Oldйus’s sister.’
Еgestam didn’t reply at first. He pushed his chair back and got up.
‘According to a report from your colleague, DI Sundkvist, an identity parade did not have the expected outcome. Not so good. Lang’s lawyer won’t leave me alone, of course. He demands that his client be released instantly, as no one has identified him.’
‘Listen to me. You
The prosecutor sat down again, dragging his chair closer to the desk, and then raised his arms in the air, as people do in films when someone points a gun at them.
‘Grens, I give in. Explain what you’re up to, please.’
‘You will get your identification tomorrow. No further explanation required.’
Еgestam pondered over what he had just been told.
He was in charge of two separate investigations into three deaths that had taken place in the space of a few hours in the same building, and in both cases Ewert Grens was the man who reported directly to him. Somehow the stories Grens had just told didn’t ring true. Too simple.
Sljusareva had been sent home already, Lang had been identified – he should be satisfied that the superintendent running both shows insisted that everything was well in hand.
But Еgestam was not reassured. Something wasn’t right, something just wasn’t right.
‘The media are pestering me, you know.’
‘Sod them.’
‘I’m being asked about Grajauskas’s motive. Why would a young female prostitute want to kill a policeman and then herself? In a closed room, for Christ’s sake, a mortuary? I don’t know. I need answers.’
‘We haven’t got the answers. The case is under investigation.’
‘In that case we’re back to square one. I simply don’t understand you, Grens. If the motive is still unknown, why let Sljusareva go? A woman who is possibly the only person who might know something.’
Ewert Grens’s anger welled up, his permanent rage at these interfering prats. He was just about to raise his voice, but his burden, Bengt’s damned lie, stopped him, making him again into someone he was not, someone who looked before he jumped. He had to be cautious, just for once. Instead his voice dropped, almost to a hiss.
‘Look Еgestam, don’t treat me like you’re interrogating me.’
‘I’ve been reading the transcripts of the communications you had with the mortuary before the shooting started.’
Еgestam pretended not to hear the threat in his voice, didn’t look at the large policeman as he searched for the right sheets of paper in the bundle on his desk. He knew where they were, somewhere in the middle. He found what he had been after. He followed a few lines with his finger and read out loud.
‘Grens, this is you speaking, or shouting, actually. And I quote: “
Еgestam looked up and spread his thin, suit-sleeved arms in a gesture.
‘End of quote.’
The telephone on the desk between them suddenly started to ring. Both men counted the signals, seven in all, before it stopped to make space for their exchange.
‘Quote away. You weren’t there, were you? Sure enough, that’s how I felt at the time. That some personal issue was at stake. I still think that, but I don’t know what it was.’
Lars Еgestam looked Grens in the eye for a while before turning to the window and scanning the view of the restless city. You couldn’t get your head round it all, it was too much.
He hesitated.
The intrusive sense that something was not right had made him formulate what could be taken as an accusation against this powerful man, and he didn’t want to say it out loud. But he should, he must.
He turned to face Grens again.
‘What you’re telling me is… nothing. I don’t know what it is, I can’t put my finger on it, Ewert – I think that’s the first time I’ve called you that, Ewert – but what are you doing? I am aware that you’re investigating the murder of your best friend and understand that it must be hard for you, maybe too hard. I can’t help wondering if it is a good idea. Your grief… you’re grieving, I’m sure, it must hurt.’
Еgestam took a deep breath and jumped in.
‘What I’m trying to say is… do you want to be replaced?’
Ewert Grens rose quickly.
‘You sit here behind your desk with your precious documents, you ambitious little penpusher, but you’d better get this. I was investigating crimes, flesh-and-blood crimes, before your daddy got into your mummy’s knickers. And I’ve not stopped.’
Grens half turned, pointing at the door.
‘Now I’m going off to do exactly that: investigate crimes, that is. Back down there, with the hard men and the whores. Unless there was something else you wanted?’
Lars Еgestam shook his head and watched as the other man left.
Then he sighed. Detective Superintendent Grens seldom failed. It was well known. He simply didn’t make silly mistakes. That was fact, regardless of what you thought about his social skills or ability to communicate.
He trusted Ewert Grens.
He decided to carry on trusting him.
The evening had patiently dislodged those who spent hours of their lives commuting between their suburban homes and city-centre jobs. Stockholm Central Station was quiet now, preparing for the following morning when the commuters would be back, scurrying from one platform to the next.
Sven Sundkvist sat on a seat in the main hall, pointlessly staring at the electronic Departures and Arrivals board. Half an hour earlier he had gone in search of the downstairs storage boxes. He knew of them, of course, lock-ups intended as a service for visitors, but mostly used by the homeless and criminals in need of somewhere to stash belongings, drugs, stolen goods, weapons.
He had located box 21 and then stood in front of it considering what he should do. Would it not be best if he were to forget about having checked the hostages’ statements? No one else would read through them again.
Then he could go home to Anita and Jonas.
Nobody would give it another thought.
Home sweet home. No more of this shit.
As he hovered, he felt the rage come back, the pains in his stomach; it was more than just a feeling now. He remembered the talk with Krantz earlier and how certain the elderly technician had been. He had recorded the find of a used videotape with a broken safety tab.
Now, it was nowhere.
You’re risking thirty-three years of service in the force. I don’t understand you.
That’s why I’m here, standing in front of a locker door in Stockholm Central Station. I have no idea what I will find, what it was Lydia Grajauskas wanted to tell us, only that it will be something I’d rather not know.
It had taken him the best part of a quarter of an hour to persuade the woman inside the cramped left-luggage office that he really was a detective inspector with Homicide and needed her help to examine the contents of one of the boxes.
She had kept shaking her head until he got fed up with arguing and raised his voice to emphasise that it was within his rights to order her to open the locker. When he had added a reminder that it was her duty as a citizen to assist the police, she had reluctantly contacted the station security officer, who held spare keys to the boxes.
When Sven Sundkvist saw the green uniform in the main station entrance, he went to meet the man. He identified himself and they walked together to the lock-ups.
In the heavy bunch of keys, number 21 was indistinguishable.
The door opened easily and the security officer stepped aside to let Sven Sundkvist come closer. Sven peered
