Then, without providing the source, he told about the deer enclosure in the park behind Magdalen College, that the number of deer in the enclosure should be the same as the number of members of the college. That when one of them died a deer was shot and was served at the memorial ceremony for the deceased.
“You know, one of those typical English gentlemen’s dinners,” Johansson clarified. “Venison steak with overcooked vegetables and brown gravy. Can you find out if this adds up?”
“Deer enclosure, number of deer in the park, if a deer is shot when one of the professors dies, what is served at the memorial dinner,” Mattei summarized. Yuck, what awful food, and what in the name of heaven does this have to do with the assassination of Olof Palme? she thought.
“Brilliant,” said Johansson, patting her kindly on the shoulder. That girl can go as far as she wants, and finally this is starting to resemble something, he thought.
43
When Anna Holt returned to her office she continued checking the information she’d received from Bäckström. First she tackled the various turns in the “Bäckström weapons track,” and after an hour’s general pondering and two brief phone calls, she was clear in detail about what had gone on.
First she talked with Bäckström’s immediate boss. She explained the situation and asked for his silence. Then by virtue of his rights as a superior he went into Bäckström’s computer and inspected what had gone in and out during the last few weeks.
Rather little that had to do with his job, as it appeared. On the other hand there were a number of contacts with the tech squad regarding a revolver. Two e-mails to Holt. Finally an e-mail that he had sent that same morning to a not unfamiliar art dealer. Incompletely deleted, as so often before. Brief and cryptic in content, but in any case not an official matter that belonged on Bäckström’s desk. After that he called Holt back and reported his findings.
I see, thought Anna Holt as she hung up. The little fatso has tricked me.
About this Bäckström of course had no idea. When on Monday the same week he returned to work after his well-earned weekend’s rest, he started the day by calling his old friend and benefactor Henning on his cell phone. There was a constant busy signal, and because Bäckström had a lot to do he sent an encouraging e-mail instead, which he then deleted and put straight into the wastebasket. Just a few encouraging, discreet lines, that the project was proceeding completely according to plan. Hardly informative for all his so-called colleagues whose only task evidently consisted of spying on him.
Then he devoted half an hour to general optimistic musings. The weapon he had basically already found, and what remained was to get a bit more meat on the bones as regards the probable perpetrator, former Police Superintendent Claes Waltin. Who by the way would have believed there was so much spine in that little half-fairy? Other than Bäckström, of course, thought Bäckström.
As an initial measure he called his relative at the police union who knew basically everything about all former and current members. Also about Police Superintendent Claes Waltin, even though he was not even a member.
“He was one of those stuck-up little attorneys who go around thinking he’s a cop. He was a member of the union for law graduates,” Bäckström’s cousin explained. “Us old comrades in the corps were probably not fine enough for an asshole like that.”
“What was he like as a person?” said Bäckström. Phenomenally good formulation, he thought. What was he like as a person? Suck on those words, he thought.
“As a person,” said Bäckström’s cousin. “That’s a strange question. The bastard is dead. There’s nothing about the dead that isn’t good. Haven’t you heard that? We hold strictly to that here at the association.”
“But what was he like? As a human being? While he was alive, I mean.” There it was again, thought Bäckström. Soon you’ll be giving courses to those vultures on TV. Must be all the good Czech beer, he thought. Just bitter enough but still softly rounded off.
“He’s supposed to have been fucking hard on the ladies. Really hard, if you know what I mean.”
“Leather and chains,” suggested Bäckström, who was not entirely unfamiliar with the subject.
“Leather and chains,” Bäckström’s cousin snorted. “That was only the first letter, if you ask me. That old ass whipper that they ran on TV, the one who’s supposed to have shaved the mouse off of five thousand women before he beat them up…”
“Yes?”
“He could have sung in the church’s boy choir, compared with Waltin.”
“Tell me,” said Bäckström.
His cousin was happy to. Over the years various members of the association, all on duty of course and in connection with so-called external surveillance, had made the most peculiar observations of former police superintendent Waltin. Peculiar places, contexts, and people.
“A lot of those clubs for sex and leather and homos and dykes and God knows what. Plus all the usual pickup spots where he basically seems to have camped out. Plus all the stories, of course. You haven’t heard what he’s supposed to have thought up with that crazy colleague Wiijnbladh’s wife? The poisoner, you know. By the way, aren’t you working at the same place nowadays?”
“What did he do with her?” interrupted Bäckström. I’m the one asking the questions here, he thought.
Quite a bit worth sucking on, thought Bäckström contentedly an hour later, when his relative unwillingly hung up the phone. Then Bäckström punched out for lunch, and by the second pilsner he got an idea that was well worth trying. One of those small hunches that are granted only to real policemen. But first of all it was time for a conversation with the old poisoner Wiijnbladh.
Wonder if they had a threesome, thought Bäckström. The leather boy, the poisoner, and that red-haired sow he never managed to kill. He should have chatted with Waltin and got a few tips, he thought.
I have to talk with Bäckström, thought Holt. But before that there were other things to deal with. So she went over to their own intelligence squad and asked them to produce a list of all murder-suicides during the period from the beginning of 1980 through the end of 1985. Hopefully nothing earlier; unlikely that it could be later, she thought.
“We don’t have a special code for what the criminologists call extended suicide,” said the analyst, shaking his head. “Besides, it’s going to take awhile because this information is so old.”
“Two murders and a subsequent suicide. Start with the police authority in Stockholm. The weapon must have been a revolver.”
“Still going to take awhile.”
“It’s the big boss who wants this information,” said Holt.
“I understand. I’ll call you on your cell when it’s done, and what I find I’ll send on GroupWise.”
“When can I have it?”
“Give me an hour, at least,” the analyst sighed.
Wiijnbladh had gotten up off the floor since the last time. Now he was sitting at his desk thumbing through a gigantic art encyclopedia. In general he looked like always. Wobbly, shaky, weary. Small and hollowed out, with a noticeable lack of both teeth and hair.
“So how’s life with you, Wiijnbladh?” Bäckström asked as he sat down. Wonder how much electricity would be saved in the building if you hooked a battery up to the son of a bitch? he thought.
“Alive, but not much more than that,” said Wiijnbladh in a faint voice.
“I think you look fucking frisky,” said Bäckström. You can easily make the finals in the world championships for shaking like a leaf, he thought.
“That’s nice of you, Bäckström.”
“It’s nothing,” said Bäckström. “By the way, I met an old acquaintance the other day. Known art dealer. He told me he sold a really fine painting to a former colleague a bunch of years ago. It was a Zorn, apparently. It struck me suddenly that I think you knew him. Police Superintendent Claes Waltin. Weren’t you and he old friends?”