his body after his visit to the doctor at Ulleraker. He says hello to everyone and sits down next to Anja.
Carlos Eliasson is sitting opposite him. He wears a Santa hat and nods cheerfully at Joona. “We’ve already drunk a toast,” he confides. His normally sallow skin has a healthy flush.
Anja tries to slip her hand under Joona’s arm, but he stands up and says he is going for some food.
Joona walks between the tables full of people chatting and eating, thinking that he can’t really summon up the right frame of mind for a Christmas buffet. It’s as if part of him is still in the living room with Johan Samuelsson’s parents or at the psychiatric unit at Ulleraker, walking up the stone staircase toward the locked corridor with its rows of cells.
He takes a plate, joins the queue for herring, and contemplates his colleagues from a distance. Anja has squeezed her round, lumpy body into a red angora dress. She is still wearing her winter boots. Petter is talking intensely to Carlos; his head is newly shaven, and his scalp is shining with sweat under the chandeliers.
Joona helps himself to three different kinds of herring. He looks at a woman from another party. She is wearing a pale grey tight-fitting dress and is being led to the table by two girls with elegant hairstyles. A man in a grey suit hurries after them with a little girl in a red dress.
Joona ladles food onto his plate almost at random. There are no potatoes left in the small brass pan, and he moves on rather than wait for a waitress to come along with a fresh supply. There is no sign of his favourite dish, a Finnish turnip bake. Making his way back to the table, Joona balances his plate as he moves between officers who are now on their fourth foray to the buffet. At one table, five forensic technicians are singing
“You remember you said I could do anything I wanted with you.” She leans over and whispers loudly, “I want to dance the tango with you tonight.”
Carlos hears her and shouts, “Anja Larsson, you and I will dance the tango!”
“I’m dancing with Joona,” she says firmly.
Carlos tilts his head to one side and slurs, “I’ll grab a ticket and wait in line.”
Carlos is fast asleep on a chair in the cloakroom. Petter and his friends have gone into town to continue the celebrations at Cafe Opera, and Joona and Anja have promised to see that Carlos gets home safely. While they wait for their taxi, they take the opportunity to go out into the cold air. Joona leads Anja up onto the open-air dance floor, warning her about the thin film of ice he thinks he can feel on the wood beneath their feet.
Joona hums softly as they dance.
“Marry me,” Anja whispers.
Joona doesn’t reply; he is remembering Disa and her melancholy face. He thinks about their friendship over all these years and how he has had to disappoint her. Anja tries to stretch up and lick his ear, and he carefully moves his head a little further away.
“Joona,” she whispers. “You dance so beautifully.”
“I know,” he replies, swinging her around.
The aroma of log fires and mulled wine surrounds them. Anja presses her body against his. It’s going to be difficult to walk Carlos all the way down to the taxi stand, he thinks. Soon they’ll have to make a move toward s the escalator.
At that moment his phone rings in his pocket. Anja groans with disappointment as he moves to one side and answers.
“Hello,” says a strained voice. “It’s Joakim Samuelsson. You came to see us earlier today.”
“Yes, I know. What can I do for you?” says Joona. He thinks back to how Joakim Samuelsson’s pupils dilated when he was asked about Lydia Everson.
“I wonder if we could meet,” says Joakim Samuelsson hesitantly. “There’s something I want to tell you.”
Joona looks at his watch. It’s nine-thirty.
“Could we meet now?” asks Joakim, adding that his wife and daughter have gone to see his in-laws.
“That’s fine,” says Joona. “Can you be at police headquarters in forty-five minutes?”
“Yes,” says Joakim, sounding infinitely weary.
“Sorry, my love,” Joona says to Anja, who is waiting for him in the middle of the dance floor. “But there’ll be no more dancing the tango tonight.”
“Your loss,” she says acidly.
“Spirits don’t agree with me,” Carlos slurs as they begin to lead him down toward the escalator and the exit.
“Don’t throw up,” says Anja sharply, “because if you do I’ll demand a raise.”
“Anja, Anja,” says Carlos, cut to the quick.
Chapter 97
Joakim is sitting in a white Mercedes directly opposite the entrance to National Police Headquarters. The interior light is on, and his face looks tired and lonely in its dim glow. He gives a start when Joona taps on the windscreen; he is deeply lost in thought.
“Hi,” he says, opening the door. “Get in.”
Joona climbs in and waits. The car smells vaguely of dog. The back-seat is covered with a hairy blanket.
“When I think about myself,” says Joakim, “when I think about the way I was before Johan was born, it’s like thinking about a total stranger. I had a pretty tough time when I was growing up; I ended up in an institution for young offenders. I had been fostered out, but that doesn’t really mean anything; they just want you out of the system. But when I met Isabella, I pulled myself together and started studying properly. I qualified as an engineer the year Johan was born. I remember once we took a holiday. I’d never been on holiday before. We went to Greece. Johan had just learned to walk.” Joakim Samuelsson shuts his eyes, shakes his head. “So long ago. He was so much like me… the same…”
He falls silent. A rat, damp and grey, scuttles along the dark pavement by bushes littered with rubbish.
“What did you want to tell me?” asks Joona after a while.
Joakim rubs his eyes. “Are you sure it was Lydia Everson who did this?” he asks, his voice weak.
Joona nods. “I’m absolutely sure.”
“Right,” whispers Joakim Samuelsson. He turns his exhausted, furrowed face toward Joona. “I do know her,” he says simply. “I know her very well. We were in the youth offenders’ institution together. When Lydia was only fourteen they found out she was pregnant. They were shit-scared at first: then they forced her to have an abortion. It was supposed to be kept quiet, but they botched the job. There were all sorts of complications, infections. But after a while she recovered.”
Joakim’s hands are shaking as he places them on the steering wheel.
“We moved in together when we left the institution. We lived in her house in Rotebro and tried to have a baby. She was completely obsessed with the idea. But nothing happened. So she went to see a gynaecologist. I’ll never forget that day, when she came back from the doctor’s.” He runs his shaking hands through his hair. “They said there was too much scarring from the abortion and the aftermath. The doctor told her she could never get pregnant.”
“And the one time she
“Yes.”
“So you owed her a child,” Joona says, almost to himself.
Chapter 98
