Assassin's Game

FIFTEEN

The man they were looking for was, at that moment, thirty miles southwest on an express train paralleling the E4. The window at Slaton’s shoulder framed an interlaced mesh of freshly turned fields and conifer forest, brown leaves tumbling across land that was done with the business of summer and preparing for another season of survival. The kidon noticed none of it, his eyes a blank as they floated over the ever-changing portrait. His lost gaze was in part due to distraction, his thoughts managing the next few hours, but it also served to disengage the passengers around him. Happily, they all seemed similarly inclined, silently grappling ill-timed investments, marital disharmony, or whatever crisis had turned up on the threshold of their lives.

Everyone had problems. It was simply a matter of degree.

The train arrived after an hour in Nyköping, and there Slaton bore a ninety-minute layover at a station-side restaurant, taking espresso and a robust Smörgåstårta of ham, cucumber, and caviar on rye, before stepping onto his connection. The second train arrived at the village of Oxelösund, by the station clock, at 4:21.

Outside the terminal, Slaton stopped to get his bearings. To his right he saw an expansive iron mill fronting the Baltic Sea, acre upon acre of piping and machinery, mountains of ore rising from the scarred ground, all of it burnt rust-red by a windswept sea. Adjacent to the mill were working neighborhoods that had sprung up to house the attendant workforce. The homes reflected the mill — dated and worn, but soldiering on tenaciously in a changing world.

Slaton reckoned what he needed would be in the center of town, and a five-minute walk put him in Oxelösund’s market district, a modest arrangement of shops and restaurants. Turning left onto the main boulevard, Slaton saw a shoe repair shop, its faded sign overlaid by a banner for mobile phone service. Farther on, a sandwich board in the middle of the sidewalk advertised a restaurant’s new menu, traditional fare having given way to pizza and cappuccino. Slaton recognized the commerce of survival, and it was an inclination that suited him well. Unlike Stockholm, strangers here would not be regarded with suspicion. Quite the opposite, they would be welcomed openly for the kronor that might be in their pockets. And the chances of anyone on Oxelösund’s Esplanaden linking Slaton with a rash of terrorism on Stockholm’s Strandvägen? That was a chasm he was more than comfortable with. Better yet, there was probably not a Mossad operative within fifty miles.

On a waning Sunday afternoon the less robust establishments had already closed for the day, but Slaton was lucky to catch the owner of the local outfitter as he was reaching for the sign in his window. Even better, the man steered him to a rack where summer gear had been marked down for quick clearance. Assassins appreciate a bargain like anyone else, although Slaton’s direct reasoning — that he would not soon be forced to steal more money — was less than conventional.

Explaining to the proprietor that he was gearing up for some late-season hiking, Slaton selected a good set of trail boots, two pairs of heavy socks, a small backpack, and a GPS navigation device. From a half-price rack he selected a pair of trousers with multiple pockets down the side of each leg, and paired it with a thick cotton shirt and a rain-resistant jacket of medium thickness. That done, he turned to the main counter and committed to full price for a compact set of Zeiss field glasses and a handful of energy bars. His bill was driven higher by taxes — always the case in Scandinavia — but the owner allowed a reasonable exchange rate. Slaton walked out of the shop four hundred dollars lighter than when he’d gone in.

His final chore in Oxelösund was fixed in his mind as more of a question. How to hide a lie? The answer came in the voice of another long-forgotten Mossad instructor—With a smaller, more obvious one. Walking along the esplanade, this fluid pretense came solid in the form of a brassy lingerie boutique. Slaton dealt with a woman in her thirties who could well have modeled her wares, and he left the shop with a tiny pink bag in hand that contained one miniscule red negligee, matching panties, and two absurdly expensive chocolate bars. Back on the street, he initiated the GPS device and saw that Magnussen Air Charters was roughly a ten-minute walk from his present position.

Slaton set a quick pace, realizing that business hours for the day were nearing an end. The directions took him away from town, and he was soon drifting under long shadows in the low western hills. Evergreen walls swallowed a road that went from asphalt to crushed gravel, and finally, rutted dirt. Rounding a switchback turn, he broke into a clearing and saw the place he was looking for, a lone clapboard building, weathered and gray, and labeled with a hand-painted sign — MAGNUSSEN AIR CHARTERS. Above the sign he saw a second floor that likely doubled as a residence.

There were two small seaplanes. One was secured to a floating dock and bobbed aimlessly back and forth on tight mooring lines. The second craft was of the same type, a Cessna he thought, but this one stabled landside beneath an unwalled shed. The second craft was missing its engine, wheels, and the port float. Its innards had clearly been stripped, and open access panels swayed in the breeze. The approach seemed simple enough. One airplane was a flyer, and the other derelict and grounded, scavenged for spare parts like a wrecked car in a salvage yard.

Slaton walked to the building and knocked on the only door in sight, a wooden item in a bent frame that rattled under his knuckles. There was no answer, but he heard a small dog bark from the upstairs unit. Then from behind, “Can I help you?”

He turned to see a woman no more than five foot two. She was probably late fifties, blond hair giving to gray and a firm gaze that didn’t give a damn. She had a wrench in one hand, and grease stains on the sleeve of her navy coveralls. She looked like a diminutive Rosie the Riveter.

Keeping to the Swedish she’d begun, he said, “Yes, I’d like to inquire about a charter.”

“You’ve come to the right place.” She came closer, wiped her hand on a rag, and they shook hands. “Janna Magnussen.”

“Nils Lindstrom,” he said. “Are you the owner?”

“Owner, pilot.” She lifted the wrench and added, “Occasional mechanic.”

Her blue eyes were spirited and lively, and Slaton grinned as he corrected himself. A diminutive Amelia Earhart.

“Are you and your airplane available tomorrow?”

“We are. This time of year is slow. I don’t have anything until a supply drop to an island near Arholma on Wednesday.”

“Excellent. I represent CLT Associates. We’re a small company that contracts for private geological surveys. I need to reach an area near Bulleron Island tomorrow morning. I’d like to be dropped there for a day, then picked up and flown out the next morning.”

Janna Magnussen nodded as she considered it. Slaton was sure his request was not unusual. Bush pilots made their living flying people and supplies into places that couldn’t be reached any other way. Parts of Sweden were remote, islands and mountain lakes that might take a week to reach by more conventional means, some cut off completely in the winter. She walked toward the carcass of the dilapidated parts aircraft, bent down, and started working her wrench on the remaining float.

A woman with no time to waste, Slaton thought. That was good.

She said over her shoulder, “I charge fourteen hundred kronor per flight hour whether you’re on the aircraft or not. Bulleron is one hour north, so for two round trips…” she paused to calculate, “let’s say five thousand.”

Slaton converted to dollars and came up with approximately seven hundred. “Actually,” he said, “I may need more time. I want to do a visual survey when we get to the area, perhaps take a few pictures. Let’s plan for another hour tomorrow, two on Tuesday. The airplane seats four, is that right?”

“Yes.”

“I may need to bring a team member out on the return trip. Shall we call it seven hours?”

Now banging distractedly with a hammer, she said, “Eight thousand, then. Half up front.”

“Is cash all right?”

Janna Magnussen stopped what she was doing. She stood and stared at Slaton, her once-lively eyes stilled by suspicion. “Cash you say?”

Slaton stiffened noticeably. He’d carefully arranged his recent purchases in the outfitter’s shopping bag, now resting obviously on the ground by his knee. Magnussen came closer and her eyes slipped to the bag, or more succinctly, to what was in plain view on top — the red negligee held in a delicate shell of crimson tissue.

He sighed. “I’m sorry. I’m not really a geologist. I’m a—”

“A married man?” she suggested.

“Barely. I’ve arranged to meet someone I haven’t seen in a long time. Someone I care about very much.”

She eyed the bag. “Yes, I can see exactly how much you care. Tell me — how long have you been married?”

“Nine years. The first two were happy.”

She studied him for a long moment, and Slaton tried to look the part — no longer a man with a business proposition, but a caught-out philanderer. Janna Magnussen had the upper hand. Just as he’d planned.

“Join the club,” she finally said. “My bastard husband left me five years ago for a twenty-nine-year-old harpsichordist. But I got the last laugh.”

“How is that?”

She pointed to the rusted hulk behind her, an untidy skeleton of scrap metal that had once been a sleek seaplane. “I got her in the divorce settlement,” she said, a wisp of victory creasing her lips. “That was his airplane.”

They agreed to an eight o’clock departure the next morning. Slaton was doubly happy when Magnussen mentioned that her sister ran a small bed and breakfast only a short walk up the road, and given the season could likely be persuaded to accept a modest sum for a room and two meals. After a five-minute walk and the briefest of introductions, Slaton was shown to a room with a view of the harbor and Stjärnholmsslott Bay. He dined alone on authentic sjomansbiff, a hearty stew of potatoes in beef stock and dark beer. After dinner he took Aquavit, complimented Greta Magnussen on her cooking and hospitality, and arranged for an early-morning wakeup followed by breakfast. Back in his room by ten, Slaton organized his gear, and by ten-thirty, with the low sun creasing the western horizon over the bay, he shut his eyes for the last time that day.

As Slaton drifted to sleep, a deflated Arne Sanderson was walking into his apartment. He hung his overcoat on a hook by the door, making sure to pull out his cell phone and place it on the charger. It had been a wretched day, first getting bumped from the investigation and then suffering the humiliation of briefing his replacements.

The house seemed more quiet than usual and he turned on the television for company, only to find a press conference pertaining to the recent terrorist attacks. Sanderson turned the television off. Having just spent two hours explaining things to Anna Forsten, he was in no mood to watch her — lovely as she might be — preen in front of the camera.

He could not remember being more tired after a day of work, and to top it off he had a smashing headache. Overwhelmed by the idea of cooking a proper supper, he shoved a frozen beef entrée into the microwave and pulled a bottle of wine from his cabinet. Sanderson searched for the corkscrew but was unable to find it. Annoyed, he considered using a knife or a screwdriver, but in the end simply repulled the cork on the stale remains of a Merlot he’d begun a week earlier. He issued a tall serving, and by the time he’d sorted out the wine his main course was severely overcooked.

Sanderson ate in silence, stabbing and sawing at a slab of vulcanized beef. Divorced five years ago, he was accustomed to dining alone. The marriage had lasted nineteen years, and produced one daughter, two affairs, and considerable suffering all around. To this day the cause of the split escaped him. The infidelities — bilateral and concurrent — were an obvious enough excuse, but in fact only a symptom of some greater ill. He knew he shouldered much of the blame, his career having taken its predictable toll, but in the end the decision to separate had been a mutual one.

Ingrid, then fifty-two, had remarried quickly and well, latching on to a seventy-year-old bathroom fixture magnate whose relative age still permitted her trophy status. Sanderson saw her now and again, when she and the toilet king wintered in the city, and they remained friendly, always able to talk about their daughter who, in spite of her parents’ sufferings, had blossomed into a remarkably well-adjusted kindergarten teacher. Yet for all of Ingrid’s shortcomings, Sanderson did miss her cooking — and, if he were honest, her intermittent good humor. He’d seen a few women in the intervening years, but none who could make him laugh like Ingrid on a good day. And this was the time — quiet dinners over stale wine — when Ingrid had always been at her best. Not for the first time, he hoped the toilet king was an utter bore behind her braised veal and Chardonnay.

He finished dinner quickly and, relishing the one recompense of frozen entrées, tossed the plastic tray into an overflowing trash bin. Realizing that misery was getting the better of him, Sanderson did what he always did when he was feeling low — he poured a second glass of wine and turned his thoughts to work. He might have been put off the case, but it was not so easy to jettison the routines of a thirty-five-year career.

His instincts about Edmund Deadmarsh had been accurate. Unfortunately, he had not acted on them. He should have ordered comprehensive surveillance, not just a single man to watch over a target who was an unknown entity; indeed, one whose very identity had become an open question. As he’d been doing for hours, Sanderson thought about Sergeant Elmander. Had he put the man at risk? It was a discomforting idea, and one that made his head hurt even more.

He went to the medicine cabinet for ibuprofen, and in the mirror saw a tired man. He’d not been sleeping well in recent weeks, and today’s events weren’t going to help matters. Returning to the kitchen, he considered his schedule for the next day. He was to see Dr. Samuels at nine in the morning, with any mercy no more than an hour. After that, for the first time in thirty-five years, Sanderson had nothing on his agenda. He supposed he would go to the station. On principle he did not dispute Sjoberg’s authority to pull him from the case, yet as a practical matter he could never sit still while Edmund Deadmarsh, or whoever the man was, remained at large. Even more, Sanderson knew his vindication wasn’t going to come from any crackpot medical evaluation. Far better it should come from finishing the job he’d today put on a platter for Anna Forsten.

Tired, but increasingly restless, Sanderson checked the clock. Quarter past eight. It took no more than a minute of silence, a minute of staring at the dregs of the Merlot, to make up his mind. I might as well go back in. Sjoberg won’t be anywhere near the place. An hour, maybe two. Long enough for the ibuprofen to kick in. After that I might get some sleep.

There were still three fingers in the bottle when Sanderson recorked it. He put his coat back on and tapped the pockets to make sure everything was where it ought to be. Credentials, phone, wallet. He then cursed himself for succumbing to Sjoberg’s accusations. Alzheimer’s my ass.

Sanderson stepped outside and set a brisk pace in the cool evening air.