Three Seconds

the table. Henryk started to walk beside Hoffmann toward the exit, but then slowed down and carried on half a step behind him, as if he were unsure of the way or just wanted to have control. Vasagatan was just as soulless from this angle. They passed the entrance to the metro and then crossed the road between the passing cars and followed the pavement on the other side to a doorway, where a security firm had offices on the first floor.

They didn't talk to each other, just as they hadn't spoken on their way to meet the Roof one and a half days earlier in Warsaw. They were silent as they climbed the stairs to the door of Hoffmann Security AB, and then carried on to the second, third, fourth, and fifth floors, and right on up ro the single metal door into the loft.

Piet Hoffmann opened it and they went into the dark. There was a black switch somewhere on the wall. He felt around and eventually found it after having fumbled considerably lower down than he could remember it being. They locked the door from the inside and were careful to leave the key in the lock, so that no one else could get in. The storeroom with number 26 on the door was empty, except for four summer tires that were lying on top of each other in the far corner. He picked up the top one and pulled out the hammer and chisel that were inside the rim, then went back out into the narrow passage with the dim lighting and followed the large, shiny aluminum pipe that was suspended a few centimeters above their heads to where it met the wall and disappeared into a fan heater. He placed the tip of the chisel against the edge of the steel band than joined the pipe and the heater and then hit it hard with the hammer until the band moved and he could rake out eighty-one whitish metal tins from the temporary opening.

Henryk waited until the tins were lined up on the loft floor and then picked out three: the tin farthest to the left, one from the middle, and the second last on the right.

'You can keep the others.'

Hoffmann put the remaining seventy-eight tins back in the hiding place in the fan heater while Henryk peeled off the protecting foil from the three that were left and the loft filled with a scent of tulips that was so strong it was almost unbearable.

A yellow, solid lump at the bottom of each tin.

Manufactured amphetamine cut with two parts grape sugar.

Henryk opened his black briefcase and set up some simple scales beside a stand with test tubes, a scalpel, and a pipette. One thousand eighty-seven grams. A kilo of amphetamine plus the weight of the tin. He nodded to Hoffmann: it was exact.

Henryk used the scalpel to scrape at one of the lumps until a piece no bigger than would fit in the first test tube loosened. He put the pipette into the second test tube, which contained phenylacetone and paraffin, sucked up the fluid and then released it over the loose bit of amphetamine, and shook the test tube a couple of times. He waited for a minute or two, then held the test tube up to the window: a clear bluish fluid equaled strong amphetamine, a dark cloudy fluid meant the opposite.

'Three or four times?'

'Three.'

'Looks good.'

Henryk sealed the tin with the foil and closed the lid, repeated the same procedure with the two others, looked again at the bluish clear fluid and, satisfied, asked his Swedish colleague to put them back in the heater, then hammer the band back in place until they heard the clicking noise that told them that the ventilation pipe was whole again.

The door to the loft was locked properly from the outside. Six flights of stairs down to the asphalt of Vasagatan. They walked in silence.

The deputy CEO was still sitting at the same table, a new half glass of orange juice in front of him.

Hoffmann waited by the long reception desk while Henryk sat down next to Wojtek's number two.

Clear bluish fluid.

Eighty-one kilos of cut amphetamine.

The deputy CEO turned around and nodded. Piet Hoffmann felt something relax in the pit of his stomach as he walked across the expensive hotel lobby.

'All those bloody bits. They just get stuck to your teeth.'

The deputy CEO pointed to his half-empty glass of juice and ordered two more. The waitress was young and smiled at them, just as she smiled at all the guests who gave her a hundred-kronor tip and might well order again.

'I will be leading the operation on the outside. You're leading inside, from Kumla, Hall or Aspsas. Maximum security Swedish prisons.'

'I need a coffee.'

A double espresso. The young waitress smiled again.

'It was a long night.'

He looked at the deputy CEO, who paused.

It could be a demonstration of power. Maybe it was.

'Nights sometimes are. Long.'

The deputy CEO smiled. He wasn't looking for respect. He was looking for a strength he could trust.

'Right now we've got four people in Aspsas, and three in both Hall and Kumla. In different sections, but they're able to communicate. I want you to be arrested within the week for a crime that is serious enough to merit a sentence in one of them.'

'Two months. Then I'm done.'

'You'll be given all the time you need.'

'I don't want more. But I do want a guarantee. That you'll get me out at exactly that point.'

'Don't worry.'

'A guarantee.'

'We'll get you out.'

'How?'

'We'll look after your family when you're inside. And when you're done, we'll look after you. New life, new identity, money to start over again.'

The lobby of the Sheraton was still empty.

Those who had come to the capital on business wouldn't check in until the evening. Those who had come in search of museums and monuments were already out and about with a fast-talking guide and new Nike trainers.

He had finished his coffee. He motioned to the reception, another double espresso and one of those little mint wafers.

'Three kilos.'

The deputy CEO put his glass of juice down next to the others. He was listening.

'I'll be caught with three kilos. I'll be questioned and plead guilty. I'll explain that I'm working on my own, so I get a short remand as charges can be brought immediately. I'll be given a substantial sentence by the city court- three kilos of amphetamine is a priority crime in Swedish courts, and say that I accept the sentence, so I won't have to wait until it enters into force. If everything goes smoothly, I should be behind bars in the right institution within two weeks.'

Piet Hoffmann was sitting in a hotel lobby in the center of Stockholm, but was in fact looking around the small cell in Osteraker prison from ten years ago.

Hideous days when voices screamed urine test and grown men lined up to stand in the mirrored room where gimlet eyes inspected their penises and urine. Horrendous nights with spot inspections, standing barely awake in your underpants outside the cell door while a gang of screws stripped, smashed, and emptied everything and when they were done, just walked away from the chaos.

He would deal with it this time. He was there for reasons greater than the humiliation.

'When you're in place, there'll be two stages to the operation. In exactly the same way that we took one prison after the other in Norway from Oslo prison, or in Finland from Riihimaki, which was the first.'

The deputy CEO leaned forward.

'You'll knock out any competition that's already there. Then we'll deliver our products through our own channels. To begin with, the remaining seventy-eight kilos that Henryk just approved: you'll use that to dump prices. Everyone inside has to learn that we are the dealers. Amphetamine for fifty kronor a gram instead of three