Anna-Maria looked. He was right.
She got up and shuffled the papers together. Resisted the urge to give her son a kiss, ruffled his hair instead.
“Good luck in the exam,” she said.
In the car she rang Sven-Erik.
“Yes,” he said when he’d fetched his copy of the picture. “It’s a cross that goes through a semicircle and ends in a hook.”
“We need to find out what it means. Who’ll know the answer to something like that?”
“What did they say at the lab?”
“They’ll probably get the picture today. If there are clear prints they’ll get them off this afternoon, otherwise it takes longer.”
“There must be some professor of religion who knows about the symbol,” said Sven-Erik thoughtfully.
“You’re a clever boy!” said Anna-Maria. “Fred Olsson can sort somebody out, then we can fax it to them. Go and get dressed and I’ll pick you up.”
“Oh yes?”
“You can come to Poikkijarvi with me. I want to talk to Rebecka Martinsson, if she’s still there.”
Anna-Maria pointed her light red Ford Escort in the direction of Poikkijarvi. Sven-Erik sat beside her, pushing his foot down to the floor in a reflex action. Why did she always have to drive like a boy racer?
“Rebecka Martinsson gave me copies too,” she said. “I don’t understand any of it. I mean, it’s something financial, but…”
“Shouldn’t we ask the economic crimes team to have a look at it?”
“They’re always so busy. You ask a question, and you get the answer a month later. It’s just as well to ask her. I mean, she’s already seen it. And she knows why she gave it to us.”
“Is this really a good idea?”
“Have you got a better idea?”
“But will she really want to get dragged into all this?”
Anna-Maria shook her plait impatiently.
“She was the one who gave me the copies and the letters! And she’s not going to get dragged into anything. How long can it take? Ten minutes of her holiday.”
Anna-Maria braked sharply and turned left on to Jukkasjarvivagen, accelerated up to ninety, braked again and turned right down toward Poikkijarvi. Sven-Erik clung to the door handle, thinking that maybe he should have taken a travel sickness pill; from there his thoughts turned spontaneously to the cat, who hated travelling by car.
“Manne’s disappeared,” he said, gazing out at the pine trees, sparkling in the sunshine as they swept by.
“Oh no,” said Anna-Maria. “How long’s he been gone?”
“Four days. He’s never been away this long.”
“He’ll come back,” she said. “It’s still warm out, it’s natural for him to want to be outside.”
“No,” said Sven-Erik firmly. “He’s been run over. I’ll never see that cat again.”
He longed for her to contradict him. To protest and reassure. He would stick to his conviction that the cat was gone for good. So he could express a little of his anxiety and sorrow. So she could give him a little hope and consolation. But she changed the subject.
“We won’t drive all the way up,” she said. “I don’t think she wants to attract attention.”
“What’s she actually doing here?” asked Sven-Erik.
“No idea.”
Anna-Maria was on the point of saying she didn’t think Rebecka was all that well, but she didn’t. Sven-Erik was bound to insist they cancel the visit. He was always softer than she was when it came to that sort of thing. Maybe it was because she had children living at home. Most of her protective instincts and consideration for others were used up at home.
Rebecka Martinsson opened the door of her chalet. When she saw Anna-Maria and Sven- Erik, two deep grooves appeared between her eyebrows.
Anna-Maria was standing in front, something eager in her eyes, a setter who’d picked up a scent. Sven-Erik behind, Rebecka hadn’t seen him since she’d been in the hospital almost two years ago. The thick hair growing around his ears had turned from dark gray to silver. The moustache still like a dead rodent beneath his nose. He looked more embarrassed, seemed to realize they weren’t welcome.
Even if you did save my life, thought Rebecka.
Fleeting thoughts flowed through her mind. Like silk scarves through a magician’s hand. Sven-Erik by the side of her hospital bed: “We went into his apartment and realized we had to find you. The girls are okay.”
I remember best what happened before and after, thought Rebecka. Before and after. I ought to ask Sven-Erik really. What it looked like when they arrived at the cottage. He can tell me about the blood and the bodies.
You want him to tell you you did the right thing, said a voice inside her. That it was self-defense. That you had no choice. Just ask, he’s bound to say what you want to hear.
They sat down in the little cottage. Sven-Erik and Anna-Maria on Rebecka’s bed. Rebecka on the only chair. On the little radiator hung a T-shirt, a pair of tights and a pair of panties over the “ei saa peittaa” sticker.
Rebecka glanced anxiously at the wet clothes. But what could she do? Bundle up the wet panties and chuck them under the bed? Or out through the window, maybe?
“Well?” she said tersely, couldn’t manage politeness.
“It’s about the photocopies you gave me,” Anna-Maria explained. “There are some things I don’t understand.”
Rebecka clasped her knees.
But why? she thought. Why do we have to remember? Wallow in it all, go over things over and over again? What do we gain from that? Who can guarantee that it will help? That we won’t just drown in the darkness?
“The thing is…” she said.
She spoke very quietly. Sven-Erik looked at her slender fingers around her knees.
“… I’m going to have to ask you to leave,” she went on. “I gave you the photocopies and the letters. I got them by committing a crime. If that comes out, it’ll cost me my job. Besides which, people round here don’t know who I am. I mean, they know my name. But they don’t know I was involved in what happened out in Jiekajarvi.”
“Please,” begged Anna-Maria, staying where she was as if her bottom was welded to the bed, although Sven- Erik had made a move to get up. “A woman’s been murdered. If anybody asks what we were doing here, tell them we were looking for a missing dog.”
Rebecka looked at her.
“Good plan,” she said slowly. “Two plainclothes detectives looking for a missing dog. Time for the police authorities to look at how their resources are used.”
“It might be my dog,” said Anna-Maria, slightly abashed.
Nobody spoke for a little while. Sven-Erik felt as if he were about to die of embarrassment, perched on the edge of the bed.
“Let’s have a look, then,” said Rebecka in the end, reaching out for the folder.
“It’s this,” said Anna-Maria, taking a sheet of paper out of the folder and pointing.
“It’s an extract from somebody’s accounts,” said Rebecka. “This entry’s been marked with a highlighter pen.”
Rebecka pointed at a figure in a column headed 1930.
“Nineteen thirty is a current account, a check account. It’s been credited with one hundred and seventy-nine thousand kronor from account seventy-six ten. It’s down as additional staff costs. But here in the margin somebody’s written in pencil ‘Training?’ ”
Rebecka pushed a strand of hair behind her ear.
“What about this, then?” asked Anna-Maria. “ ‘Ver,’ what does that mean?”
“Verified, authenticated. Could be an invoice or something else to show what the costs consisted of. It seems to me as if she was wondering about this particular cost, that’s why I took it.”
