They walked past a sign with a red arrow saying 95:7 Dep. Forensic Med. Morgue.
She chewed the gum hard. They were walking among the trees: limes and maples. A gentle wind whispered in the leaves; perhaps the heat would finally let up.
She first saw the wide canopy roof over the entrance. It protruded from the bunkerlike building like an oversize peaked cap. The building material was the universal red brick, and the front door was of gray-black iron, heavy and shut.
STOCKHOLM MORGUE she read in capital gold lettering underneath the roof, and at the bottom, Entrance for relatives. Identification. Removal to mortuary.
The entry phone was made of chipped plastic. The guy pushed a button and a low voice answered. Patricia turned her back to the entrance and looked back at the parking lot. She had a vague sensation of the ground rocking, like the slow swell on a vast ocean. The sun had disappeared behind the Tomteboda School, and barely any daylight was left under the roof. Straight ahead was the College of Health Sciences: dull red brick, sixties. The air got heavier and heavier; the chewing gum grew in her mouth. A bird was singing somewhere inside the bushes; the sound reached her as if through a filter. She could hear her own jaws grinding.
'Welcome.'
The guy put his hand on her arm so she had to turn around. The door had been opened. Another guy stood in the doorway, smiling cautiously at her. 'This way, please. Step right inside.'
'I've got to get rid of my gum,' she said.
'You can use the bathroom,' he said.
The bitch and the shirt guy let her go first. It was a small room. It reminded her of a dentist's waiting room: gray couch to the left; a low birchwood table; four chrome chairs with blue-striped seats; abstract painting on the wall- three fields in gray, brown, and blue; a mirror to the right; cloakroom straight ahead; bathroom. She walked toward it with an unpleasant feeling that she did not reach all the way down to the floor.
Are you here, Josefin?
Can you feel my spirit?
Once inside the bathroom, she locked the door and threw the chewing gum in the bin. The wire basket was empty, and the gum stuck to the edge of the plastic bin liner. She tried to flick it farther down but it stuck to her finger. There were no paper cups, so she drank water straight from the tap. It's a morgue. The place is likely to be clean, she thought.
She breathed deeply through her nose a few times and went outside. They were waiting for her by another door, between the mirror and the exit.
'This isn't going to be easy,' the guy said. 'This girl hasn't been washed since she was found. She's also in the same position.'
Patricia swallowed. 'How did she die?'
'She was strangled. She was discovered in Kronoberg Park on Kungsholmen today at lunchtime.'
Patricia held her hand over her mouth; her eyes grew wide and filled with tears. 'We usually take a shortcut through the park on our way home from work,' she whispered.
'We don't know for sure that it is your friend,' the guy said. 'I want you to take your time and have a good look at her. It's not that bad.'
'Is she all… bloody?'
'Oh, no, not at all, she looks fine. The body has begun to dry out, that's why the face may look a bit sunken. Her skin and her lips are discolored, but it's not too bad. She's not horrible to look at.' The guy spoke in a quiet, calm voice. He took her by the hand. 'Are you ready?'
Patricia nodded. The bitch opened the door. A cool puff of wind blew from the room inside. She breathed in its moisture, expecting the stench of corpses and death. But, no, the air was fresh and clean. She took a wary step onto the shiny gray-brown stone floor. The concrete walls were white, plastered, uneven. Two electric radiators were mounted on the far wall. She raised her eyes- a cupola was suspended from the ceiling. Twelve burning lamps spread a dim light in the room. It reminded her of a chapel. Two tall, wooden candlesticks. They weren't lit but Patricia could still smell wax. Between the candlesticks was the gurney.
'I can't do it.'
'You don't have to,' the guy said. 'We can ask her parents to do it, or her boyfriend. But that'll take longer and give the murderer an even bigger lead over us. Whoever did this shouldn't be walking around.'
She swallowed. A big, blue textile screen hung behind the gurney, covering the entire back door. She stared at the blue, trying to discern a pattern.
'I'll do it.'
The guy, who was still holding her hand, slowly pulled her closer to the gurney. The body was lying underneath a sheet, the hands above the head.
'Anja will remove the sheet from her face now. I'll be standing right next to you all the time.'
Anja was the bitch.
Patricia saw the movement in the corner of her eye, the removal of white fabric; she felt the slight draft.
He's right, she thought. She looks fine. She's dead but she doesn't look disgusting. She looks surprised, she thought, as if she hadn't quite understood what had happened.
'Jossie,' Patricia whispered.
'Is it your friend?' the guy asked.
She nodded. The tears welled up; she did nothing to stop them. She reached out her hand to stroke Josefin's hair but stopped in midair.
'Jossie, what have they done to you?'
'Are you absolutely sure?'
She closed her eyes and nodded. 'Oh, my God.'
She put her hand over her mouth and shut her eyes tighter.
'Can you confirm that this is your roommate, Josefin Liljeberg, with one hundred percent certainty?'
She nodded and turned around, away from Jossie, away from death, away from the floating blue behind the gurney.
'I want to go,' she said in a stifled voice. 'Get me out of here.'
The man put his arm across her shoulders and pulled her close to him, stroking her hair. She was crying uncontrollably, soaking his ugly Hawaiian shirt.
'We'd like to do a thorough search of your apartment tonight,' he said. 'It would be good if you could be there.'
She wiped her nose with the back of her hand and shook her head. 'I've got to work. With Jossie gone, I'll have to do a lot more. They're probably missing me already.'
He gave her a searching look. 'Are you sure you can handle that?'
She nodded.
'Okay,' he said. 'Let's go.'
The press release dropped out of the fax machine at 21:12. Since the Stockholm police press department always sent their dispatches to the newsroom secretary, Eva-Britt Qvist, who didn't work weekends, no one saw it. Not until the news agency TT filed a brief item at 21:45 did Berit notice the information.
'Press conference at police headquarters at ten!' she called out to Annika on her way to the photo room.
Annika threw a pad and pen into her bag and walked toward the exit. Expectation was churning in her stomach- now she'd find out. She was nervous; she had never been to a press conference at the Stockholm police headquarters.
'We've got to move the fax machine from Eva-Britt's desk,' Berit said in the elevator.
They squeezed into Bertil Strand's Saab, just as they had last time, with Annika in the back again, in the same place. She shut the door softly this time. When the driver sped toward Vasterbroplan, she noticed that she hadn't shut the door properly. She quickly locked the door, grabbed the door handle, and hoped Bertil wouldn't notice.
'Where are we going?' Strand asked.
'The entrance on Kungsholmsgatan,' Berit answered.
