The Quarry

miracle.

He heard a rustling noise from somewhere in the bushes.

He looked around, suddenly afraid that he was being watched. And he was. A pointed, russet-coloured face was staring at him. At first he thought it was a dog with big ears, but then he realized it was a fox. It stood stock still for a few seconds, then it wheeled around and disappeared.

Per set off again, walking away from the stone.

The sun had almost set by the time he got back to Stenvik. There was a breeze blowing off the sea, and he could hear distant sounds from the southern end of the village. Laughter and cheerful shouts. People had begun to gather down on the shore to light the bonfire and to celebrate the end of winter and the coming of spring.

He was just too tired to go down there. He walked up the path to the cottage, took out his keys and unlocked the door. The smell of Vendela lingered in her jacket as he hung it up in the hallway. He went into the kitchen and put some water on to make vegetable soup before driving to see Nilla.

The note he had found in Hans Bremer’s kitchen was still lying by the phone, and he glanced over at it as he chopped some carrots. He looked at the last name: Danielle, whose real name had been Jessika Bjork, as it turned out.

Jessika and Hans Bremer had been in touch, despite the fact that she hadn’t worked for him for many years. Why? And why had someone murdered them?

The water was boiling. He added a stock cube, some herbs and the vegetables, and when the soup was ready he ate it at the kitchen table, still pondering.

Arsonists almost always operate on their own patch, Gerlof had said.

Jerry and Bremer knew the studio in Ryd better than anyone else. But neither of them could have rigged up and set off the incendiary devices in the house. Jerry was too old and too ill, and Bremer had been lying upstairs with his hands tied behind his back.

Per pushed his soup bowl to one side and looked over at the window. The sun had gone down by now, but a bright light suddenly fell across the cottage.

A dark-coloured car was driving along the coast road.

Was it a Ford?

He reached for the phone just as the car braked and turned off into the shadows by the quarry. It moved slowly down the track with its lights on, and stopped on the gravel at the bottom. Then it just stayed there.

Per picked up the phone and keyed in a number on the mainland.

A man’s voice answered: ‘Ulf.’

‘Could I speak to Ulrica, please?’

‘Who’s calling?’

‘Per Morner.’

‘I’ll just check …’

There was a noise at the other end of the phone, and at the same time he saw the car door open down in the quarry. He heard Ulrica Ternman’s voice in his ear: ‘Hello?’

‘Hi, it’s Per Morner again. Do you remember me?’

There was a brief silence before she answered quietly, ‘I don’t want to talk to you.’

‘I know,’ Per said quickly, ‘but I’ve just got one quick question.’

‘About what?’ said Ulrica Ternman, still speaking very quietly.

‘I was just wondering what Hans Bremer looked like.’

‘Bremer? I suppose he was … quite ordinary. He looked a bit like you, actually.’

‘Oh? But he was older than me, I presume?’

‘Younger.’

‘Much younger?’

‘I thought he was old at the time, but then I was a teenager … I suppose he would have been about thirty.’

‘Thirty?’

The driver was getting out of the car now. Per couldn’t see his face; it was too far away, and he was wearing a cap. The man looked around the quarry, glanced over at the houses, then got back in the car. He seemed to be waiting for something.

‘If Hans Bremer was thirty when you saw him in the studio,’ Per went on, ‘then he would have been about forty-five when he died in the fire. But that can’t be right. Hans Bremer had a younger sister, and she’s older than me.’

‘Oh? I really have to go now.’

‘Wait, Ulrica … I just want to say one thing. I’ve just worked it out: the director who took pictures of you and your friends wasn’t Hans Bremer.’

‘He said that was his name.’

‘Yes,’ said Per. ‘But if there’s one thing I’ve learned recently, it’s that nobody in the sex industry uses their own name. Everybody wants to be anonymous, don’t they? Even my father changed his name, from Gerhard Morner to Jerry Morner.’

She didn’t respond, so he carried on, ‘Someone had simply borrowed Hans Bremer’s name, paid him money so that they could call themselves Hans Bremer and avoid dirtying their own name.’

‘So I’m dirty, is that what you’re saying?’ snapped Ulrica Ternman.

‘No, I didn’t mean—’

But she had already hung up.

Per sighed and looked at the phone, but didn’t call back. He glanced down at the car in the quarry one last time. Then he left the kitchen.

On his way into the hallway he saw the old axe lying in the bedroom, and went to pick it up. He pulled on his jacket and went out into the cold once more. He walked along the side of the cottage with the axe in his right hand, but suddenly he thought he could hear someone wheezing in the shadows.

‘Jerry?’

He turned his head quickly, but of course it was just his imagination. There was no sign of anyone by the cottage.

The car was still parked down in the quarry. It was seventy or eighty metres away from him, between two heaps of stone. It was a Ford, but if it was the same car that had killed Jerry, there were no traces of the collision. The bodywork looked as if it had been recently cleaned.

Per thought he knew why the driver was still sitting in the car; he was waiting for darkness to fall.

The trolls come out at night, he thought.

He stopped at the top of the rock face and heard the sound of the engine being switched off. Silence fell, then the window opened and the driver stuck his head out. ‘Hello?’ he shouted.

‘Hello,’ said Per.

‘Is this Stenvik?’ The voice sounded lost.

‘It is!’ replied Per, gripping the axe more firmly.

The driver’s door opened again, and the man stepped out on to the gravel. ‘Are you Per Morner?’ he called out.

‘I am. Who are you?’

‘Thomas Fall from Malmo!’ the man replied. He held out a large object that he was carrying. ‘I just came to drop this off on the way to Stockholm. You did say you wanted it …’

Per nodded. ‘Excellent, that’s great. But you took a bit of a wrong turning, Thomas.’

‘Did I? But you said you lived by the quarry.’

‘Right idea, wrong track.’ Per pointed over his shoulder towards the cottage. ‘We live above the quarry, up there.’

‘OK … Well, anyway, this is Bremer’s briefcase!’

Per pointed at the steps and shouted, ‘I’ll come down!’

He made his way cautiously down the wobbly blocks of stone to the gravel at the bottom. It was a few degrees colder here in the quarry, as usual.

The car was still in the same place with its headlights on. They dazzled Per, and turned Thomas Fall into a