‘A dark blue Saab.’
‘Was your uncle with you?’ Fredriksson broke in.
‘No.’
Sammy Nilsson decided to bullshit a little.
‘According to witnesses, there were two men who arrived in a car and parked outside Dufva’s house.’
Persson took a new bite and glanced briefly at Fredriksson.
‘He waited in the car,’ he said finally. ‘He had trouble walking.’
‘Were you expecting trouble?’ Sammy Nilsson asked.
‘I can’t really remember. But why else would I have brought the crutches?’
He washed down the sandwich with a sip of coffee.
‘That’s better.’ Persson smiled.
‘Did you know Dufva well?’ Nilsson asked.
‘No, not really.’
‘Then why on earth did you kill him?’ Fredriksson exclaimed.
‘He was a war criminal,’ Persson said calmly.
‘You’ll have to explain that.’
‘Most of all I’d like to rest for a while,’ Sven-Arne Persson said. He had consumed a cheese sandwich and finished his coffee in quick succession. ‘Would that be all right? I don’t want to be impolite but I am actually completely wiped out. A bit dizzy and shaky, actually. We can talk more later. You must have some little room where I can stretch out for a bit. Then I’ll be ready, and we can go through the whole thing.’
‘That’s all right,’ Sammy Nilsson said after a brief moment of hesitation, and formally concluded the session. He turned off the tape recorder.
After Fredriksson had shown Sven-Arne Persson to the jail, he returned to Nilsson’s office.
‘The things we hear,’ he said, and sat down in the chair that the county commissioner had just vacated. ‘What should we think?’
‘Either he’s a crazy cuckoo or else he is extremely clear on what he wants,’ Sammy Nilsson said.
‘He’s no cuckoo.’
‘He may have gone crazy in India,’ Sammy Nilsson said. ‘He may have gone there for spiritual reasons. I’m thinking of a guru or yogi or something along those lines.’
‘Hard to believe,’ Fredriksson said, and helped himself to a sandwich.
‘We should get in touch with Berglund. After all, it’s his “cold case”.’
‘I’ll call him at the hospital.’
‘Can you do that? I’d appreciate it. We’ll let the county commissioner sleep for an hour or two. I don’t know what you thought about breaking it off but he really did look wiped out. I’ll get the case files out in the meantime. Ask Lindell to come in so we can brief her too.’
Ann Lindell shook her head when Sammy Nilsson had finished his summation.
‘This is more than unlikely,’ she said. ‘I met with his uncle just the other day.’
Nilsson and Fredriksson stared at her, perplexed.
‘Do you know that his wife was run over on Luthagsleden a couple of weeks ago and is currently lying in a coma?’
‘Now you’ll have to tell us what is going on. Is it Berglund?’
Lindell nodded and then told them the whole story.
‘How does all this hang together?’ Allan Fredriksson said.
‘The answer is currently sleeping,’ Nilsson said.
‘Was it his wife’s accident that unleashed this whole thing, that he returned to Uppsala after twelve years to relieve his conscience? What role does the uncle play? Is he the connection between Dufva and Persson? What does “war criminal” mean in this context?’
Allan Fredriksson lined up the obvious questions.
‘The answer is sleeping,’ Nilsson repeated with a smile.
‘He does have crutches,’ Lindell said suddenly. ‘The uncle, I mean. I saw them in his room at Ramund.’
Allan Fredriksson shook his head.
After a brief discussion, they decided that Nilsson and Fredriksson would take on Sven-Arne Persson.
‘We’ll give him another hour before we question him,’ Nilsson said. ‘Then he can sleep on it again tonight and we’ll see if he sticks to his story tomorrow. After that we question the uncle. And at that point maybe you can help out, having met the guy?’
‘I have to get out to Östhammar first thing tomorrow morning,’ Lindell said. ‘But I could do it in the afternoon.’
She told them about Sune Stolt’s report from Thailand. In light of the county commissioner’s unexpected confession, the success in identifying the Thai woman appeared less extraordinary, and her colleagues did not look particularly impressed. Their thoughts were completely absorbed in Sven-Arne Persson and the murder of Nils Dufva.
‘Have you called Berglund?’ she asked.
‘He’ll come in tomorrow,’ Allan Fredriksson said.
‘How did he take it?’
‘He talked mostly about the motive. He got hung up on that thing about “war criminal.” He claimed that you had tipped him off about Dufva being a Nazi.’
‘Me?’ Sammy Nilsson exclaimed, and looked perplexed.
‘There was some book you had shown Berglund.’
‘That’s right. Damn. Now I remember. It was a catalogue of Swedish Nazis and Dufva was in some kind of register.’
‘Nazis,’ Lindell said, and recalled Ante Persson’s bookshelf. ‘If he was a Nazi then Ante Persson is very likely a Communist.’
‘And Sven-Arne is a socialist,’ Allan Fredriksson said.
‘Now all we have to do is come up with someone from the Folkpartiet and we’ll have a complete set.’ Nilsson grinned.
‘I have to go pick up Erik,’ Lindell said, getting up. ‘Good luck.’
Sven-Arne Persson woke up with a start, sat up in the camp bed dazed, and did not immediately recall where he was. He had dreamt of Lester and planting trees at Lal Bagh. He rubbed his eyes.
Then came the terror. He stared at the greyish, windowless walls, the attached sink and toilet, then lifted the blankets aside, and lowered his legs over the edge of the bed. The cell was several square metres. The solid door was fitted with a peephole.
He lay back down and curled his legs up into his body.
He was lying in this position when he heard a key turn and the door open. He shut his eyes. This is when I die, he thought. He imagined that they would crowd into the cell, strike him with bamboo sticks without saying a word, and thereafter drag him out into the courtyard in order to continue the beating. He knew it was an absurd thought – he was no longer in India – but he still steeled himself for the first blows.
‘It’s time,’ he heard a voice say, and he opened his eyes.
Sammy Nilsson was standing in the doorway. He was smiling.
‘Did you sleep well?’
Sven-Arne nodded, stood up, picked the blanket up off the floor, and started to fold it. Nilsson waited.
‘Yes, I have slept,’ Sven-Arne said. ‘And I…’
He did not complete the sentence. He arranged the blanket at the foot end of the camp bed with great care before looking up at the policeman.
‘Should we talk a little more?’
Sammy Nilsson nodded.
The session took two hours. It started with questions about India. Persson realised it was employed as a way to put him at ease and he spoke eagerly about the botanical garden and life in Bangalore. But soon the policemen started in on what had happened that autumn day in 1993. Again and again they made Persson go through the sequence of events. He answered Nilsson and Fredriksson’s questions vaguely and in monosyllables. They kept asking for clarification.
‘How did you enter the house?’
‘The door was unlocked.’
‘If you did not know him from before, how did you know where he lived?’
‘It was in the phone book.’
‘How was it furnished?’
‘I can’t remember.’
‘Nothing at all?’
‘Nothing. Well, maybe a little. There was some darkish furniture, a table, some sort of bureau… I tripped on a rug, I think… it was windy that day and I remember that there was some kind of tree outside the window that… well, you know, it was moving. The fact is that I don’t remember very much. Everything went so quickly.’