“Excuse me?”
“Did she know? What did she know? Do you know that?”
“No. Not yet.”
“And now it’s not possible anymore,” Louise Keijser said, and covered her eyes with her handkerchief. “It’s too late.”
“Maybe we can uncover a few answers,” Winter said.
“Just so long as you find the little girl,” Louise Keijser said. “I feel somehow like a grandmother.” She looked straight at Winter. “Is it wrong of me to feel like that?”
“My God,” Ringmar said. “You mean to say that Brigitta Dellmar’s name has come up in connection with this case?”
“Yes. Mollerstrom dug up everything there is on her, and an APB was put out on her back then,” Winter said.
“Sven Johansson too?”
“He was questioned but they couldn’t tie him to it in any way. He had a watertight alibi.”
“But her name was in there?”
“Several witnesses were able to identify her from the photographs. A few of the robbers were Swedes-that much they knew. And one of the employees had seen a child.”
“What the hell are you saying? You mean they brought a kid along? For the actual robbery?”
“I don’t know for sure, but several witnesses testified to that fact. It’s all in there.”
“Good Lord. Where’s this taking us?”
“To a solution,” Winter said. “It’s yet another complication that will lead to a solution.”
“Or a dissolution,” Ringmar said. “She had the child with her?”
“It’s possible.”
“It boggles the mind,” Ringmar said.
“Do you remember the case?”
“Yes, but only vaguely. Now that you mention it. An officer was killed, if I remember correctly. That’s probably why I remember it at all.”
“An officer and two of the robbers.”
“Jesus Christ. Yeah, that’s right.”
“At least three of them got away. Along with the child, if the information is correct.”
Ringmar shook his head and picked up the incident report but held it without reading it. “You don’t bring a child along on an armed robbery.”
“Maybe something went wrong,” Winter said. “Could have been anything. Maybe the mother was supposed to be the driver and had to go anyway when nobody came to look after the child. I don’t know.”
“Danske Bank in Alborg,” Ringmar read. “Monday October 2, 1972. Danske Bank, on the corner of Osteragade and Bispensgade. At five past five in the afternoon.”
“Yeah,” Winter said. “No customers but plenty of staff inside the bank, working with money.”
“Plenty of money.”
“Seven million.”
“A big haul in Alborg.”
“Big anywhere. And there’s more.”
“What?”
“Helene was there.”
“What?”
“At about the same time we learned all this stuff, we also got everything else connected to the name Brigitta Dellmar.”
“Obviously.”
“It was the name that suddenly opened everything up for us. We had nothing on Helene Andersen, but we do on Helene Dellmar.”
“What do you mean, she’s been here? Helene has been here?”
“She was prepped for questioning and then questioned, when she was Helene Dellmar.” Winter fixed his gaze on Ringmar. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Bertil.”
“Just heard about a ghost, more like.”
“It’s just that I learned about this a few minutes before you did.”
“What did you get to know, for Christ’s sake?”
“We’ve got the files here. When the girl ended up at Sahlgrenska Hospital, or afterward, I’m talking about the four-year-old Helene now, right? There were suspicions coming from Denmark and they managed to tie her to her mother-who may have disappeared in connection with the robbery.”
“How did they identify her?” Ringmar asked. “At the hospital, I mean, or afterward, when she was questioned, or whatever. How could they make the connection with her mother?”
“They put out a description. And it appears some neighbors got in touch.”
“We’ll have to get that confirmed. Anyway, so they spoke to the girl here, at this station? Who was the interrogating officer?”
“Sven-Anders Borg, it says.”
“He went into retirement about five years ago.”
“But he’s still alive, right?”
“Still clear in the head, as far as I know. But he could hardly have been expected to sound the alarm about this.”
“If we had gotten a name earlier.”
“I’ll give him a call,” Ringmar said.
“Ask him to get down here as soon as he can.” Winter read the file while Ringmar dialed, but he was distracted by the call.
Ringmar covered the receiver and turned to Winter. “He’s got a pain in his leg, but we’re welcome to come by and see him. He lives in Pavelund.”
The light over the river was stronger than ever. They drove along Oskarsleden, and the cranes on the other side were ablaze in the glare from the Kattegat. Two ferries met out at sea, and Winter thought about Denmark.
“She drew a Danish flag,” he said to Ringmar.
“Who? Helene?”
“Yes. And her daughter, Jennie. They drew Danish flags.”
The distance between the ferries was growing. The larger one continued out across the sea.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Winter described the two different signatures.
“Have you sent them in for analysis?” Ringmar asked.
“On their way.”
“Christ.”
Winter followed the ferry’s westward progress. It grew ever smaller.
“Maybe they went there,” Ringmar said. “To Denmark. Anything’s possible now.”
Aneta Djanali introduced herself and Halders, and the man in the doorway invited them in. The house looked a hundred years old. Through the windows she saw the forest and beyond it a field. Two horses walked along the edge of the clearing with their heads bowed down to the ground. They were chestnut and sleek. There was a serenity in what she saw.
“Nice view,” she said.
The man followed her gaze as if it were the first time he had seen the forest and the field. They knew from their search at the Swedish Road Administration that he was sixty-nine years old. They had names, addresses, and personal identity numbers. According to the vehicle registration database, he owned a white Ford Escort with
