Black Lies, Red Blood

Six

Beatrice Andersson had never seen a T-shirt that stained. It had once been white but was now covered with spots. She could not keep from staring. A dark whirl of hair stuck out at the chest. When he took hold of the T-shirt and pulled it away from his substantial stomach to study the variety of colors for himself, she observed that the man also had hair on the back of his hand and fingers.

Göran Bergman laughed.

“Yeah, I know,” he said. “If you’re selling laundry detergent you’ve come to the right place. Solvent would be even better.”

There was a pungent odor coming from the apartment, mixed with the smell of coffee.

She introduced herself and asked if he had time for a brief conversation.

“Sure,” he said. “It’s time for a coffee break anyway.”

He stepped to the side and let her into the apartment. On the floor below the coat rack, which held only two garments, was a wastebasket, a bucket of kitchen scraps, three pairs of shoes, all heavy work shoes, and a pair of sandals.

He pushed the wastebasket to the side.

“I’m in the middle of painting,” he said with his back to her, disappearing into the kitchen just to the right. “You don’t need to take off your shoes!”

Beatrice Andersson followed. The kitchen was small and dominated by an easel. The half-finished painting depicted a forest glade.

“Okay, and what does the police department want with someone like me?” he said, taking out two mugs and pouring coffee without ceremony.

“Fresh brewed,” he said. “Sit yourself down! Is this about the car? Has someone burned up my car?”

“You haven’t read the newspaper?”

Göran Bergman shook his head.

“It got too expensive, and there’s just a lot of crap in it anyway.”

She took a sip of coffee and waited until he sat down across from her.

“I don’t have good news. Your friend Bo Gränsberg was found dead yesterday. I’m sorry.”

Bergman slowly lowered the mug and stared at her.

“I see, he couldn’t take it anymore,” said Bergman.

“He didn’t die by his own hand,” said Beatrice.

“Someone killed him?”

“Yes, it’s that bad.”

Beatrice told how and where Bo Gränsberg was found.

“How did you find me?”

“His ex-wife said that you and Bo got together.”

Göran Bergman nodded. He fixed his eyes on the painting.

“He liked that, although it’s ugly as sin. I thought about giving it to him.”

“Where would he hang it up?” Beatrice asked.

Bergman gave her a look of surprise.

“You worked together?”

“Yes, for many years. He was the best. We were the best, that’s how it was! Damn it, we were the fastest and the safest scaffolders in town.”

“But then he injured himself?”

“Yes, so fucking stupid. And here I sit with damaged legs. Did you ever hear the like, I’m forty-eight and my knees are shot.”

“What were the two of you up to?”

“I see, Gunilla gossiped,” said Bergman with a crooked smile, and started to tell her.

The idea was that the two old workmates would start a company, scaffolding construction, of course, but other things too. What the “other things” might include was not clear from Bergman’s exposition. He thought they had the know-how and the contacts, plus a solid reputation, even though Bosse’s was somewhat tarnished, but no one could take from him the almost twenty years he had worked in construction and on building facades.

They could no longer perform the purely physical aspect, erecting the scaffolding, but Bergman thought-and Beatrice had no reason to doubt him-they could organize the work like nobody else. They knew all the tricks, they had a good sense of people and a realistic picture of what the job involved.

How much of a problem do I have with construction workers, wondered Beatrice. When she dropped off Haver at the police building and said she was thinking about visiting Bergman alone, he asked how much she knew about construction workers. As if he was an expert, simply because his father had been in the industry. She was well aware of his father’s reputation and above all his early, unpleasant death, and for that reason she did not say anything. Everyone on the squad knew that this was a sensitive chapter in their associate’s life, something he was still wrestling with after all these years. There was no reason to add to his burden, but she felt a certain sense of triumph in having gotten Bergman to talk so freely.

Because Bergman was talking away. It seemed as if he had repressed the thought of his friend’s death, and everything sounded to Beatrice very intelligent and thought out. They had done what many others who were going to start a new business did not have the sense to do, that is, market research. Bergman had called around and personally visited thirty or so “actors on the market,” as he put it, the majority of them, if not acquaintances, known from before anyway.

“Capital,” Beatrice interrupted the torrent of words.

Bergman abruptly fell silent, but recovered fairly quickly.

“Exactly,” he said with emphasis. “Cash is required, not enormous amounts, but still.”

Beatrice suspected that Bo Gränsberg did not have any concealed assets.

“A direct question: Do you have that kind of money?”

“Not exactly, but quite a bit.”

“And Bosse?”

“He was going to arrange it,” said Bergman, looking unhappy, because he was smart enough to realize that Bosse’s violent death might have concerned money.

“He was going to put in a smaller portion,” he explained. “Not fifty percent, that is.”

“How much?”

“Around a hundred and fifty grand.”

“That’s a lot of money for an unemployed, homeless person.”

Bergman nodded. He turned his eyes away. Suddenly he realized that there was a coffee mug in front of him and he took a gulp.

“Lukewarm,” he said.

“What do you think?” Beatrice asked.

“What do you mean?”

“How was he going to get hold of a hundred and fifty thousand kronor?”

Göran Bergman took another gulp.

“It’s a bit sensitive,” he said at last. “I don’t know if I should talk about it, but you’ve met Gunilla, Bosse’s ex, she’s a really good lady, you know. She has always-”

“Can she come up with that amount?”

Beatrice had the impression that Gunilla Lange lived quite frugally, but on the other hand, perhaps that was why she could invest so much money on a homeless, alcoholic former husband.

“A hundred anyway,” said Bergman.

“That’s a fair amount,” said Beatrice, and Bergman nodded in agreement.

“Why? Bosse was perhaps not the safest investment you could imagine.”

“No, but the fact was that he was sober for a couple of months. He really believed in this project, and I did too. I know we would have made it work. And I think Gunilla saw that too, she had seen him in his prime. He made decent money back in the good old days.”

“But then he was sober, uninjured, and had a well-ordered life,” Beatrice objected.

“That’s true, but he really wanted to. Adamantly. ‘This is my chance,’ he said.”

“Was there anything between Bosse and Gunilla?”

“No, no, but I think they still liked each other a lot. He often said that.”

“But he had another woman, from what I understand?”

“That one,” said Bergman. “She’s just after money. Do you know that old hag is a gambling addict? She can sit in front of those machines for hours on end. And sometimes she goes to Åland and gambles away tons of money on roulette.”

“She never wins?”

“Ingegerd is a loser,” Bergman maintained.

“And then she broke up with him?”

“She did,” said Bergman bitterly. “And Bosse had a relapse and got stinking drunk for two days. Deep down he knew that Ingegerd wasn’t good for him, but he was still depressed, because you need someone to hug now and then.”

Beatrice nodded.

“Do you have someone to hug?”

“Oh, sure,” he said. He smiled that crooked smile again. “Ursula is her name. The best thing that’s happened, they always say, but for me it’s true. A good lady like that is like a gift from above. She’s the one who gets me to paint too. She took a few paintings to a gallery in town and this fall I’m going to have a show. Can you imagine that?”

He shook his head and observed the painting on the easel again.

“Not that one maybe,” he said, laughing nervously, but soon became serious again. “But Bosse got back on his feet! He sat here and sweated and shook for a whole day. And I made coffee and painted and we talked and talked. He crashed over on the couch and came out like a human being. The next day he went and picked up a few things he had with that bitch. Bosse was strong sometimes. I know we would have managed it! Östen, the guy from the gallery, was here and took a look. He wanted to see more paintings. He called me a naivist and damn it, I probably am naive sometimes, but Bosse and I would have made the company work.”

“I think so too,” said Beatrice.

Bergman gave her a quick look. His eyes were misty.

“In a way I expected this,” he said. “Bosse was a very sad man.”