The Bomber

She ran down the stairs to catch the taxi, but of course it was already gone. She walked down to the square, but there were no cars at the taxi stand. She walked past the pharmacy and toward Kungsholmsgatan where there was another stand. There was one single car from some suburban company. She walked into the newsroom at five to nine. The place was deserted and quiet. Ingvar Johansson had gone home ages ago, and the night people had all gone to the canteen. She went into her room and started making calls.

'This is getting tedious,' said her contact.

'Don't be difficult,' she said wearily. 'I've been on the go for fourteen hours, and I'm getting fed up. You have the measure of me, and you know where I stand. Come on now- truce?'

The police officer at the other end clicked his tongue a couple of times.

'You're not the only one who's been at it since seven this morning.'

'You've got a fix on him, haven't you?'

'What makes you think that?'

'You usually stick to your working hours, especially when a big holiday is coming up. You've got something in the pipeline.'

'Of course, we always do. This is a big case, of course we're working late.'

Annika groaned out loud. 'For Christ's sake…'

'We couldn't leak any information about being close to apprehending the Bomber. You must understand that. Then he'll get clean away.'

'But you're closing in on him?'

'I didn't say that.'

'But are you?'

The man didn't reply.

'How much can I write?' Annika asked cautiously.

'Not one line, it could wreck the whole thing.'

'When are you moving in?'

The police officer was quiet for a couple of seconds, then said:

'As soon as we locate him.'

'Locate?'

'He's disappeared.'

The hair on Annika's neck rose.

'So you know who it is?'

'We think we do, yes.'

'Christ,' Annika whispered. 'How long have you known?'

'We've had our suspicions for a couple of days, but now we're certain enough to want to bring the person in for questioning.'

'Would you let us be there?'

'At the arrest? I find that hard to imagine. We haven't a clue where the person is.'

'Are there many of you out looking?'

'No, we haven't put out a wide alert yet. We want to check the places we know about first.'

'When will you put out an alert?'

'Don't know.'

Annika racked her brains. What could she write without using this?

'I know what you're thinking,' the police officer said, 'and you may as well give up wondering. Think of it as a test. I've trusted you with some information. Think very carefully before you use it.'

The call was over and Annika sat in her office with a pounding heart. She might be the only reporter to know about this, and she couldn't do a thing with it.

She walked out into the newsroom to calm down and have a word with Spike. The first thing she laid her eyes on was a dummy of the next day's front page. It said: 'CHRISTINA FURHAGE LESBIAN- Her Lover Talks About Their Last Hours Together.'

Annika felt the whole room turn around. It can't be, she thought. Christ, where did they get this? With tunnel vision, she walked up to the easel where the layout was fastened, pulled it down, and threw it down on the desk in front of Spike.

'What the hell is this?' she demanded to know.

'Tomorrow's biggest story,' the night editor said indifferently.

'We can't print this,' Annika said, unable to keep her voice under control. 'It has nothing to do with anything. Christina Furhage never spoke publicly about her sexuality. We have no right to expose her like this. She didn't want to talk about it when she was alive, and we have no right to do it now she's dead.'

The night editor straightened up, clasped his hands behind his head, and leaned back so that his chair nearly tipped over.

'It's nothing to be ashamed of, liking girls- I do, too,' he leered. He looked over his shoulder to get support from the sub-editors around the desk.

Annika forced herself to be businesslike.

'She was married and had a daughter. Could you look her family in the eye tomorrow if you print this?'

'She was a public person.'

'That's got fucking all to do with it!' Annika said, unable to curb her outrage. 'The woman has been murdered! And who the hell wrote the fucking story?'

The night editor laboriously got to his feet. He was riled now.

'Nisse has dug up some good stuff. He's got confirmation from a named source that she was a dyke. She had a relationship with that woman Starke…'

'That's my material!' Annika raved. 'I mentioned it as a rumor at our lunch meeting. Who's the named source?'

The night editor went up to Annika and said, inches away from her face:

'I don't give a fuck where it came from,' he hissed. 'Nisse has written the best piece of tomorrow's paper. If you knew about it, why then didn't you write something? Isn't it time you dried out behind your ears?'

Annika felt the words sink in. They landed in her midriff and added to the lump in her gut, making her lungs too small. She couldn't breathe. She forced herself to ignore the attack on her person and to focus on the journalistic part of the argument. Was she right? Perhaps Christina Furhage's sexual preference really was a scoop they should publish? She pushed the thought away from her.

'Who Christina Furhage slept with is neither here nor there,' she said softly. 'What is interesting is who killed her. Another interesting aspect is what effect it will have on the Olympic Games, on sports, and on Sweden's standing in the world. It's also important to sort out why she was killed, who the killer is, and what motivated him. I don't give a shit who she fucked, unless it's got something to do with her death. And neither should you.'

The night editor breathed in so forcefully through his nose that he sounded like a fan.

'Do you know what, Miss Crime Editor? You are so totally wrong. You should have made sure your feet were big enough before you stepped into those shoes. Nils Langeby is right, you obviously can't handle your job. Can't you see how pathetic you are?'

The lump of stress in her stomach exploded. She felt as if she had broken into pieces. All sounds disappeared and she saw flashes before her eyes. To her own surprise, she discovered that she was still standing up, registering things with her eyes and still breathing. She turned on her heel and walked over to her office, focusing on crossing the newsroom floor with the other reporters' eyes like darts in her back. She reached her office and closed the door. She slumped down on the floor inside the door, her entire body shaking. I'm not dying, I'm not dying, I'm not dying, she thought. It'll pass, it'll pass, it'll pass… She wasn't getting any air and tried desperately to breathe; the air wasn't reaching her lungs and she took another breath, yet another one, and in the end her arms started cramping. She realized she was hyperventilating and had too much oxygen in her blood; she got to her feet and staggered over to the desk, pulled out a plastic bag from the bottom drawer, and started breathing into it. She conjured up Thomas's voice: Nice and easy, nice and easy, everything'll be all right, my friend, just breathe, you're not falling to pieces, my sweet little Annie, nice and easy, nice and easy…

The shaking subsided and she sat down in the chair. She wanted to cry but swallowed it and called Anders