Everyone sitting around the table blinked. A second later Irene realized what he meant. “It was already in the culvert and kept her body from washing away. Therefore, it was there first,” she explained.
“Maybe the bike could have been shoved in on the other side?” suggested Fredrik.
“Maybe so, but most logically the bicycle was thrown in while there was still ice. It also would have been easy to push Gunnela’s body over the ice to the culvert. If the weather hadn’t warmed so quickly, they’d still be hidden. Bad luck for the murderer, but good luck for us,” Irene concluded.
“Bad luck for Gunnela that she ran into Kurt Höök,” said Tommy glumly.
Jonny turned to Irene. “That tape you listened to … did Gunnela Hägg say that Linda rode her bike from the hospital?”
“That’s right. Should I get the tape?”
“Go ahead.” The superintendent nodded.
While Irene went for the tape, Birgitta called in the evening’s pizza order for delivery.
Everyone concentrated on the tape. Irene heard her own voice imitating Kurt Höök’s as he asked Mama Bird how the nurse left Löwander Hospital after her revenge, then her imitation of Mama Bird: “She took the bike. God punishes theft!”
“Good heavens. That’s the only place on the tape where she answers a question directly. But does she really mean that the person dressed as the ghost nurse biked off wearing the old-fashioned nurse uniform?” Irene wondered.
“Not all that improbable. The bike was shoved under the bridge. Then our murderer could have gotten out of costume.”
“But then why burn it up in the garden shed as late as Saturday?” Irene asked stubbornly.
“Maybe just to get rid of the evidence,” Tommy said. “No garden shed, no proof that Gunnela was staying there. No nurse’s uniform, no proof that someone was wearing it to spook the nurses at Löwander Hospital.”
Jonny looked at the tape player thoughtfully. “Gunnela said that the ghost nurse stole the bicycle. It was Linda’s, of course. Maybe it was Linda who had dressed up as a ghost to haunt the hospital? She left her apartment early enough to play the spook. So perhaps she was the one who murdered Marianne?”
Irene nodded slowly. “Not so crazy. But some things still don’t work. First, the night nurse who saw her was sure it was Nurse Tekla. I’ve seen a photo of Tekla. She was a large, strong woman, almost as tall as me, but bustier, with such thick hair it couldn’t be hidden by a nurse’s cap. Linda would never have been able to play Nurse Tekla. But I’ve met a woman who could.”
“Who?” everyone asked in chorus.
“Doris Peterzén.”
“Doris …? Why the hell would she want to kill Marianne Svärd?” the superintendent sputtered.
“Money. The most common motive in history. She’s inheriting millions. You should have seen her mansion in Hovås.”
“She doesn’t get anything from killing Marianne Svärd.”
“Sure she does, if the idea was to create an accidental outage so that the respirator goes out and Nils Peterzén dies a natural death due to unfortunate circumstances. Marianne would be able to do CPR until the power came back on. Marianne had to be taken out of the game.”
“But was killing her really necessary?” asked Tommy.
“Maybe it went wrong. Maybe Marianne was stronger than she appeared,” Irene suggested.
Birgitta shook her head. “No. She was strangled with a noose. Was it brought along? I think the purpose was to kill her right from the start.”
“You’re right. Honestly, though, it doesn’t seem to be Doris Peterzén’s style,” Irene admitted. “Cutting off the power to the respirator, committing a bloodless murder—that would not be out of the question. But killing an innocent nurse by strangling her … no. It’s hard to reconcile that with Doris Peterzén’s personality.” She thought glumly for a moment, then brightened up. “Then again, we have Göran.”
This statement was met with a polite, questioning silence from her colleagues. They knew that Irene’s brain worked so quickly she ran through ten sentences before speaking the eleventh.
Andersson sighed. “Göran who?”
“Peterzén. Göran Peterzén. Nils Peterzén’s son from his first marriage. He’s almost sixty years old. Seems to have been under his father’s boot his entire life. He said it would be hard to take care of business after his father’s death, and I find that suspicious. A man who is almost old enough to retire himself can’t run the bank without Daddy’s help? And of course he stands to inherit a great deal of money, too.”
Irene’s cheeks had gotten slightly pink from the ideas that came pouring in. Jonny brought her right back to earth. “And this Göran would look like the perfect Valkyrie in an antique nurse uniform?”
Irene thought back to Göran’s appearance and sighed. “No, he’s almost six feet tall and weighs well over two hundred fifty pounds,” she admitted. Her mood fell.
Jonny scoffed. “So Doris Peterzén, wearing a nurse’s uniform, drives over to Löwander Hospital to cut the power so the respirator stops working. At the same time, she strangles Marianne Svärd. After that she pedals away on Linda Svensson’s bicycle, wearing the uniform, and then shoves the bike down the culvert. She’s shocked the next day when she reads that there’s a witness and in some supernatural manner knows that this must be Gunnela Hägg. Maybe she’s psychic? Then she kills Gunnela. On Saturday she returns to set fire to the garden shed and the nurse’s uniform. And where does Linda fit into all this? Irene, I believe this is one of your worst theories ever.”
Irene sourly thought that some people seem to recover more quickly than others from stomach flu. The worst thing was that Jonny was right. Linda’s disappearance did not fit into her theory, and, of course, Linda was involved. Her day planner was in Marianne’s pocket, her bicycle was in the culvert, and she’d been gone ever since Marianne’s murder.
The pager buzzed to let them know the pizza had arrived. Irene and Tommy volunteered to go pick it up.
In the elevator Tommy said seriously, “We have to find Linda. Dead or alive. We won’t understand how the murders of Marianne Svärd and Gunnela Hägg are connected until we do.”
“So you believe it’s the same killer?”
“Oh, yes.”
THE SUPERINTENDENT STILL looked tired, Irene thought. This case was wearing him down. No one knew better than Andersson that they hadn’t gotten much further than they’d been a week ago, when the only thing they worried about was Marianne Svärd’s murder. So far the media hadn’t found out that Gunnela Hägg was dead. As soon as they did, they’d bite. Andersson didn’t realize that he’d sighed heavily, but everyone else heard it. Tactfully, they pretended that they didn’t notice. At his age he was allowed a few small eccentricities. Not to mention he was the boss.
“I want to hear that tape again,” Tommy said.
For lack of other alternatives, Irene started the tape from the beginning. Tommy leaned forward and listened closely until the end. “She took the bike. God punishes theft!”
“Yep! That’s exactly what she says.” Tommy looked at his colleagues in triumph. They all tried their best to appear as if they understood what he was getting at. “Don’t you hear what she says? ‘She took the bike. God punishes theft!’ So the bike did not belong to ‘Nurse Tekla,’ but she was the one who pedaled away on it.” Tommy used air quotes around the ghost nurse’s name.
“So you mean that Gunnela Hägg saw Linda arrive and park her bike at the hospital but it was not Linda who biked away again,” said Irene.
“Yep.”
“And the person didn’t resemble Linda,” Jonny pointed out.
“Why would Linda park her bicycle and then disappear completely?” Irene countered.
Jonny glared, but he was forced to agree.