Jerry Schonbauer came back in with a small, nearly transparent old woman who came up to the vicinity of his hip. They stopped in the entryway.
“Yes?” said Larner.
“This is the only neighbor I’ve found who knew anyone lived here at all,” said Schonbauer. “Mrs. Wilma Stewart.”
Larner walked over and greeted the old woman. “Mrs. Stewart, what can you tell us?”
She looked around the room. “This is exactly how he was,” she said. “Expressionless, anonymous. Tried to avoid being seen. Reluctant to say hello. I invited him for a cup of tea once. He declined, not politely, not impolitely, just said no thanks and left.”
Larner made a small face.
“What has he done?” said Mrs. Stewart.
“Do you think you could help us make a portrait?” said Larner. “We’d be very grateful.”
“He could have murdered me,” she said quietly and insightfully.
Larner gave her a small parting smile, and Schonbauer escorted her to the door.
In the hallway, they met a small army of crime-scene technicians. One of them approached Larner, standing in the doorway. “We’ll take it from here,” he said briskly.
Larner nodded.
He waved the Swedes over. “Now we have to wait,” he said, “as though we haven’t done enough of that.” They all began working their way down the eight flights of stairs.
A few flights down he turned to them. “The devil’s lair never looks like you expect,” he said.
25
When two heads that were not usually the cleverest were put together, something new was born. Viggo Norlander was working on John Doe; Gunnar Nyberg was working on LinkCoop. At a certain juncture, their laboriously struggling thoughts met, and the world took on a new shape.
At first Norlander got nowhere with his unknown body. He had incredibly little to go on. He sat in his office and read through the autopsy report, time after time.
Directly across from him sat the considerably more swiftly working Arto Söderstedt, who had obtained his very own whiteboard and was playing mini-Hultin.
“What the hell are you working on?” Norlander said, irritated.
“The Lindbergers.” Söderstedt said distractedly, continuing to draw.
“Do you need a whiteboard for that?”
“Hmm, need… He left behind a lot of notes that have to be sorted out. And she had some, too…”
“She? You swiped her notes?”
Söderstedt looked up with a scornful smile. “Not swiped, Viggo. A policeman never steals. Just as a policeman never harasses female immigration officers and never runs down little girls.”
“Idiot!”
“A policeman never steals. He makes copies.” He continued to fill in his squares.
“Like that’s any better,” said Norlander.
Söderstedt stopped again. “It’s much better. Not least because you can compare what you’ve copied with what she chooses to share. The difference is what’s essential. As soon as I’m finished with this, I’m going to ask to look at her planner and see if she’s removed anything. Comprende?”
“That’s a grieving woman, for fuck’s sake! Leave her alone.”
Söderstedt put down his marker. “Something feels wrong about them. They’re in their thirties and live in an enormous apartment in Östermalm-eleven rooms, two kitchens. Both of them work at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and are gone half the year. In Saudi Arabia. If they’re up to something in the Arab world, and if it has anything to do with Eric’s death, then she is quite possibly the next victim. I’m not trying to harass her, Viggo. I’m trying to protect her.”
Norlander made a tired face. “Then put her under watch.”
“It’s still too vague. I have to figure it out. If I get the chance.”
Norlander threw out his arms. “I’m very fucking sorry,” he said.
He tried to return to the autopsy report but couldn’t. Thoughts of his unknown son, who was only just coming into being, wouldn’t let go. He stared out through the window.
It was late afternoon; soon it would be time to go home. Outside the darkness was thick; rain was still drowning Stockholm. He thought of the flood in Poland a year or two earlier, the one that had contaminated the Baltic Sea. How much rain would it take for Lake Mälaren to run over?
The door flew open, and Chavez put his head in. “Hi, middle-aged white men,” he said cheerfully. “How’s it going?”
“Hi, swarthy young man,” Söderstedt replied. “How’s it going with you?”
“Incredibly badly. I was just at Hall sniffing Andreas Gallano’s old underwear. What are you two doing?”
“I’m trying to figure out John Doe,” Norlander said grimly. “If I get the chance.”
“Okay, okay,” said Chavez, closing the door. He continued through the hallway till he reached Hultin’s door. He knocked, heard an indefinable mutter, and stepped in.
Hultin pushed his owlish glasses up toward his forehead and scrutinized him coldly.
“Have you heard anything from the United States?” said Chavez.
“Not yet,” said Hultin. “Leave them alone. How’s it going?”
“I’ve just returned from Hall. None of the other prisoners had anything useful to say; no one knew whether Gallano had contacts in the United States. And that new drug syndicate he’s supposed to have belonged to is invisible-no one knew anything about that, either. Here’s a list of what he left behind when he escaped: underwear, a few reminders from various authorities, electric shaver, and so forth. A total failure. Then I went to the cabin in Riala, talked to the techs. They’ve given up now, I think, incredibly frustrated that they didn’t find a single clue. Except what was in the refrigerator, and here’s a list: butter, a few packages of tunnbröd, hamburgers, cream cheese, honey, parsley, mineral water, bananas.”
Hultin sighed and took off his glasses. “And the blue Volvos?”
“It will take some time. There are sixty-eight dark blue Volvo station wagons with license numbers that start with B in the greater Stockholm area. Thanks to the rank and file, forty-two of them have been inspected and eliminated. I myself have looked at eight, and they were clear. If that isn’t a contradiction in terms. Two that are still missing are fairly interesting: one belongs to a company that doesn’t exist, at an address that doesn’t exist; the other belongs to a habitual criminal by the name of Stefan Helge Larsson. We haven’t had time to look at the other twenty-four yet, because I had to go to Norrköping.”
Hultin observed his frenzy neutrally. “Proceed.”
“I’m on it,” said Chavez, and rushed out into the corridor.
Outside the two middle-aged white men’s office, he couldn’t resist the temptation to yank the door open and yell “Boo!”
Söderstedt drew a broad line straight across the whiteboard.
Norlander jumped almost two feet. He threw the autopsy report at the door, but it was already closed.
“Fucking idiot,” he muttered as he bent down to pick it up. Söderstedt chuckled as he carefully erased the line.
Norlander once again opened the autopsy report. Four shots to the heart, each one of which would have been immediately fatal. No bullets were left behind, probably nine-millimeter caliber. The victim was generally in good shape. He had some old scars, probable razor scars along his wrists, at least ten years old, and some even older circular scars spread out over other parts of his body. “Cigarette burns?” Stranded had written in his sprawling, old-man handwriting. How had the old devil missed the computerization of the world? What planet did he live on?
Clothes. A blue T-shirt with no print. Beige lumber jacket. Jeans. Tennis shoes. Dirty white socks. Boxer shorts. None of that told him a thing.
He switched his attention to the man’s possessions. How many times had he dumped the contents of the little plastic bag onto the desk? Apparently often enough to get a frown out of Söderstedt.