The Bomber

'I don't know what to do with that man,' Annika said to herself. 'Next time he starts whinging, I'll kick his fucking teeth in.'

She closed the door to get some space to think. She looked up Building &Plumbing in the phone directory and dialed a cellphone number some way down the list. As she had guessed, it was for the general manager of the firm, a man standing somewhere at a building site.

'Yes, I was at the Christmas party,' he said.

'You didn't bring a camera, by any chance?' Annika asked.

'Camera? No, I didn't. Why?'

'Did anyone else bring one? Someone who took pictures at the party?'

'What? It's over there, behind the scaffolding… Pictures- yes, I think so. Why do you want to know?'

'Do you know if Stefan Bjurling had a camera?'

The man went quiet, all you could hear was the droning noise of a lorry unloading. When the man returned, his voice had changed.

'Listen, lady, where did you say you're calling from?'

'I told you, Kvallspressen. I'm Annika Be…'

He switched off.

Annika put the phone down and started thinking. Who was the most likely person to have taken a picture of Stefan Bjurling together with the world-famous Games supremo? She took a few deep breaths and then dialed the number of Eva Bjurling. The woman sounded tired but composed when she answered. Annika did the usual commiseration bit, but the woman interrupted her.

'What do you want?'

'I was wondering whether you or your husband knew the MD of SOCOG, Christina Furhage? Personally,' Annika said.

The woman thought about it.

'Well, not me, I know that,' she said. 'But Steffe was sure to have met her; he did talk about her now and then.'

Annika switched on her tape recorder.

'What did he say?'

The woman sighed.

'I don't know. He would talk about her, saying she was a tough bitch and stuff like that. I don't remember…'

'But you didn't get the impression they knew each other well?'

'No, I wouldn't say that. What makes you think that?'

'I was just wondering. They sat next to each other at the Christmas party last week.'

'Did they? Steffe didn't say anything about that. He said it was a pretty boring party.'

'Did he bring a camera to the party?'

'Steffe? No way; he thought cameras were a waste of time.'

Annika hesitated for a couple of seconds and then decided to ask what was actually on her mind.

'You have to forgive me for asking this, but how come you sound so calm and collected?'

The woman gave another sigh. 'Of course I'm sad, but Steffe was no angel,' she said. 'It was hard work being married to him. I filed for divorce twice but rescinded both times. I couldn't get rid of him. He always came back, never gave up.'

The scenario sounded familiar. Annika knew exactly what her follow-up question should be:

'Forgive me, but did he hit you?'

The woman hesitated for a moment.

'He was convicted of assault and battery once. The court issued a restraining order, which he constantly violated. In the end, I'd had enough and took him back,' the woman said calmly.

'Did you believe he'd change?'

'He'd stopped making such promises; we were way past that stage. But he did get better after that. This last year it wasn't too bad.'

'Did you ever go to a women's shelter?'

Annika put the question quite matter-of-factly; she'd uttered it hundreds of times over the years. Eva Bjurling paused but for some reason decided to answer this too.

'A couple of times, but it was so hard on the kids. They couldn't go to daycare and school like they were used to. It all got too complicated.'

Annika waited in silence.

'You're wondering why I'm not brokenhearted, aren't you?' Eva Bjurling said. 'Of course I am sad but mostly for the kids' sake. They loved their dad, but it'll be better for them now he's gone. He hit the bottle pretty seriously from time to time. So, there you have it…'

They both remained silent for a moment.

'I don't want to disturb you any longer,' Annika said. 'Thanks for being honest. It's important to know about these things.'

Suddenly the woman remembered who she was talking to.

'Are you going to write about this? Most people I know really don't know anything about this.'

'No,' Annika said. 'I won't write about it, but it's important for me to know; it may help me to prevent it happening again.'

They ended the call there and Annika switched off the tape recorder. She sat staring into the air for a while. Wife-beating was everywhere, she'd learned that over the years. She had written many long series of articles about women and the violence they're subjected to. While she let her thoughts run on freely on the subject, she had a sudden realization. There was another common denominator between the two victims: People who didn't know them very well had paid warm tribute to both of them. Both had later turned out to be real bastards, unless Evert Danielsson really was lying about Christina.

She heaved a sigh and switched on her Mac. It was best to write everything down while it was still fresh in her mind. While the computer was booting up, she picked up the pad from her bag. She couldn't make Evert Danielsson out. One minute he seemed professional and competent, the next he was crying because they'd taken his precious company car away from him. Were men of power really that sensitive and naive? Yes, probably. Men of power aren't very different from other people. If they lose their jobs or something else that matters to them, they'll have a crisis. A hard-pressed person in a crisis situation isn't rational, regardless of what his job title is.

She had almost finished writing up all her notes when the phone rang.

'You told me to phone if something you wrote was wrong,' someone said.

It was the voice of a young woman. Annika couldn't place it.

'Yes, absolutely,' she said, trying to sound neutral. 'What can I do for you?'

'You said so when you were here last Sunday. That I could call you if there were any mistakes in the paper. Now you've really gone too far.'

It was Lena Milander. Annika's eyes grew wide.

'What do you mean?'

'Surely you read your own paper. There's a huge picture of my mother there, and then you've written 'THE IDEAL WOMAN' underneath it. What do you know about that?'

'What do you think we should write?' Annika asked.

'Nothing,' Lena Milander said. 'You should leave her alone. She hasn't even been buried yet.'

'As far as we're aware your mother was an ideal woman,' Annika said. 'How could we know otherwise unless someone tells us?'

'Why do you have to write anything at all?'

'Your mother was a person in the public eye. She had chosen to be one. The image is of her own making; if no one tells us differently, it's the only one we've got.'

Lena Milander was silent for a moment, then she said:

'Meet me at the Pelikan in South Island in half an hour. Afterwards you will promise me never to write trash like this again.'