Red Wolf

‘Margit never got rid of her guilt,’ he said. ‘She paid for it all through her life. I can’t go on like this any more.’

‘Have you told the police now?’

He shook his head. ‘But I’m going to,’ he said. ‘As soon as the Dragon’s been caught and the girls are safe.’

‘What do you want me to do?’ she asked.

He looked at her blankly. ‘I don’t know. I just wanted to tell someone.’

He looked out through the window and stiffened. ‘Hanna and Emma are coming,’ he said. ‘You have to go.’

Annika stood up without thinking, stuffing her pad and pen in her bag and hurrying out into the hall, where she pulled her jacket from the hanger and tugged it on. She went back into the kitchen, and saw the man sitting there motionless, his eyes blank.

‘Thank you,’ she said quietly.

He looked at her and tried to smile.

‘By the way,’ she said. ‘Did Margit have very small feet?’

‘Size thirty-six,’ he said.

She left him by the pine table in the scrubbed kitchen with the untouched cups of coffee gradually cooling.

43

The car had had time to get completely cold, so she kept her polar jacket on. For one panicky moment she thought the engine wasn’t going to start, that she was going to freeze in her hire-car among the identical seventies houses, for ever held fast in the little white lies of the Axelsson family.

She turned the key so hard that the metal almost snapped. The engine started with a hesitant rattle, and as she exhaled she saw her breath freeze to ice on the inside of the windscreen. She found reverse as the gearbox protested and backed into the street, hoping she wasn’t going to hit anything. She hadn’t scraped the rear window.

The two daughters passed close to her window. She attempted a smile and waved feebly as they looked curiously at her.

The rubber of the tyres creaked on the icy road as she rolled towards town. The nausea persisted, the smell of disinfectant still in her nostrils, the thoughts bouncing around her head and chest.

Was Thord Axelsson telling the truth? Was he exaggerating? Was he hiding anything?

She drove past the secondary school and the church and Ahlens department store, and was out of the town centre before she even realized she was in it.

He wasn’t glossing over his wife’s deeds, Annika thought, nor was he making excuses for her. On the contrary, he had stated soberly that she had set fire to the aviation fuel and caused the plane to explode. He hadn’t even tried to present it as an accident.

If he had wanted to lie, he would have done so then.

The Beasts, she thought. The Yellow Dragon, ha! What a stupid idea. What a load of crap! The Lion of Freedom, the Barking Dog, the Red Wolf, the Black Panther, the White Tiger.

Where are you now? she thought as she pulled out onto the deserted motorway again, heading towards Lulea.

The Yellow Dragon, Goran Nilsson, professional hitman back on home soil. The Barking Dog, Margit Axelsson, murdered nursery schoolteacher. The Red Wolf, Karina Bjornlund, Minister of Culture making panicky last-minute changes to government proposals.

And the rest of you? Three middle-aged Swedish men, where have you hidden yourselves away? How much have you forgotten?

She drove past the exit to Norrfjarden, feeling the cold whirling round her feet. The temperature had fallen to minus twenty-nine degrees; the sun was already going down, spreading a pale yellow light on the horizon. It was one thirty in the afternoon.

A child’s finger, she thought. Could that really have happened?

She swallowed, had to open the window for a few seconds to get some fresh air. Thord hadn’t said what the accompanying warning had said, but no one had blabbed about the Beasts, not ever.

She believed the finger had really existed.

The attack itself, three people involved, Margit and Goran and one other man. Did that make sense?

Margit had the same shoe size as the prints found at the site. Thord Axelsson’s story included enough detail to make her believe the basic chain of events, even if she would have to check the theoretical possibilities with the press officer at the base. So why should she doubt how many people were involved?

Karina Bjornlund wasn’t there.

She was innocent, at least as far as the act itself was concerned. Of course she could have been involved in the planning, maybe even assisted in other ways. And, apart from anything else, she must have known about it.

How can you be sure of that? Annika asked herself. If Thord is telling the truth, she may well have been ignorant of the attack. She had split up with Goran and wanted out of the group.

But in that case how could she be open to blackmail? Why was she allowing Herman Wennergren to scare her into changing government legislation?

And why had she put a marriage announcement in the local paper if she had broken up with him?

Maybe Karina herself hadn’t put the announcement in, she suddenly thought. Maybe the announcement was part of the jilted man’s strategy either to cause trouble or to get her back.

Annika rubbed her forehead, feeling suddenly thirsty, her lips dry. A few frozen houses from the thirties huddled in the twilight, plumes of smoke rising straight up from their chimneys, the wind had given up, the cold was clear as glass.

I have to talk to Karina Bjornlund, she thought. I have to set things up so that she doesn’t get away. She won’t wriggle out of this, lying and protecting herself at any cost.

She pulled her mobile from the bag, and found she had no reception. She couldn’t be bothered to get cross, just carried on towards Lulea, looking forward to being back in civilization again.

At the turning to Gaddvik she picked up her mobile again, shut her eyes and replayed the scene in her head: the Post-it note on the registrar’s computer screen, the Minister of Culture’s mobile number. The number of the devil, twice, and then a zero.

She keyed in 070-666 66 60, stared at the number on the screen for a moment, then realized with a start that she was on the point of ignoring a right-hand bend.

What was she going to say?

Karina Bjornlund will listen, she thought. It was just a question of getting hold of her.

She pressed the call button, feeling the warmth of the mobile in her hand, and pressed in the earpiece as she slowed the car’s speed.

‘Hello?’

Annika braked in surprise, the first ring had hardly started before a woman’s voice answered.

‘Karina Bjornlund?’ she said, pulling up at the side of the road and pressing the earpiece further in; there was a rushing, humming sound in the background.

‘Yes?’

‘My name’s Annika Bengtzon, I work for the Evening Post-’

‘How did you get this number?’