He Who Kills the Dragon

12.

Detective Inspector Annika Carlsson had been at work since half past seven that morning, even though she hadn’t got to bed before midnight the previous evening.

She had hardly had time to sit down at her desk when Peter Niemi called her cell to tell her about the clothing they had found.

‘I’ve been chasing Bäckström, but he isn’t answering,’ Niemi explained.

‘I’ve been chasing him as well. I suppose he’ll show up in due course. I’m worried about him. He doesn’t seem well. He looked awful yesterday. I don’t know if you noticed.’

‘Yes, I did, but what the hell,’ Niemi said. ‘Since both the Pole and his workmates need to be interviewed, and the sooner the better, I thought I’d call you.’

‘Well, thanks for that,’ Carlsson said. Niemi’s good, she thought. Really good. Not only good at what he does, but the sort who actually gives a damn.

‘Like I said, I’ve been out to the site and we’ve been through the trash bin but didn’t find anything interesting. And there was nothing in the vicinity either, in case you’re wondering. We even took a dog patrol, even though it was the middle of the night. Since then I’ve spoken to the lad who found the bag containing the clothes. Nice boy. Almost speaks better Swedish than someone like me,’ Niemi said, his smile audible in his voice. ‘But because it was all a bit hectic, I didn’t get long to talk to him.’

‘So now you want me to do it properly, with a tape recorder and making notes?’ Carlsson said, also smiling so broadly it came through her voice. Why can’t all men be like Niemi? she thought.

‘Exactly,’ Niemi said. ‘That’s what we’re like, you know.’

‘I’d better get it sorted, then,’ Annika Carlsson said. Since it’s you, she thought.

Then she had called Bäckström again on his cell, but it was still switched off, even though it was now almost half past eight. Annika Carlsson had shaken her head and gone to find Felicia Pettersson, then took one of the cars and headed down to Ekensbergsgatan to talk to Jerzty Sarniecki and his four compatriots, who were renovating a small block of rented apartments in Solna, a thousand kilometers north of their homeland.

Felicia Pettersson, twenty-three, had graduated from the Police Academy in January that year. Now she was on her first practical placement, with the crime unit in Solna, and after just one week here she was helping with a murder investigation. Felicia was born in Brazil. She had been in a children’s home in São Paolo and was just a year old when she had been adopted by a Swedish couple who both worked in the police and lived on the islands of Lake Mälaren, just west of Stockholm. Now she herself was a police officer, like so many police children before her. Young and with no practical experience, but with good prospects. In good shape, calm and sensible, and she seemed to enjoy what she was doing.

She’ll turn out to be pretty good, Annika Carlsson had thought the first time she met her.

‘You know how to get to Ekensbergsgatan, Felicia?’ Annika asked, once she had settled into the passenger seat and fastened her seat belt.

‘Yes, boss,’ Felicia Pettersson said, nodding.

‘I don’t suppose you happen to speak Polish as well?’ Annika asked.

‘Yes, boss. Of course. Fluently. I thought everyone could?’ Felicia said with a smile.

‘Anything else I should know about?’ Annika Carlsson asked. She’s sharp too, she thought.

‘My friends usually call me Lisa,’ Felicia said. ‘You can too, if you like.’

‘They usually call me the Anchor,’ Annika Carlsson said.

‘Do you like being called that?’ Lisa said, glancing at her in surprise.

‘Not really,’ Annika Carlsson said, shaking her head. ‘I mean, what have I got to do with an anchor?’

‘Not sure,’ Lisa Pettersson said, and giggled. ‘But I think you’re pretty cool. And I mean that.’

Annika Carlsson and Felicia Pettersson were in luck. It may have been only nine o’clock in the morning, but Jerzty and the others were already eating lunch. They had got up before it was light, had breakfast at four, and had started work at half past. By nine o’clock it was high time for lunch if they were going to have the energy to keep working until the evening.

‘Sorry to disturb you in your breakfast,’ Annika Carlsson said in English, smiling and showing her police ID. ‘My name is Detective Inspector Annika Carlsson, and this is my colleague, Detective Constable Felicia Pettersson. By the way, does any one of you speak Swedish? Or understand Swedish?’

‘I speak a bit of Swedish,’ Jerzty said, as three of his workmates shook their heads and one nodded hesitantly. ‘I can interpret, if you like.’

‘We’d just like to ask a few questions,’ Annika went on. ‘Is it okay if we sit down?’

‘Sure,’ Jerzty said, quickly getting up. He removed a toolbox from a spare chair that was already standing beside their homemade table while one of his colleagues went to fetch a stool and offered his own chair to Detective Constable Pettersson.

Two beautiful young women. Who also happened to be Swedish police officers, even though one of them looked like she came from the West Indies. Friendly, cheerful, easy on the eyes, and well worth fantasizing about as you hammered in yet another nail. They would stay for an hour. But what did that matter? Eighty kronor was only eighty kronor, and they missed other things much more than work.

Had they noticed anything during Wednesday evening or early Thursday morning?

They had worked until eight o’clock that evening. Then they had stopped because the neighbors usually complained if they carried on after that. Then they had eaten. Chatted, played cards, went to bed at ten or so. None of them had left the building throughout that time, since it had been raining all evening.

What about during the night, then? Did any of them see or hear anything?

They had been asleep. None of them had any trouble sleeping. None of them had seen or heard anything. They had been lying asleep in their beds. One of them had got up briefly to go to the toilet. That was all.

‘Leszek, he’s a plasterer,’ Jerzty clarified, nodding toward the man who had emptied his bladder. ‘The toilet faces the street, it’s got a window,’ he added, preempting Annika Carlsson’s next question.

‘Ask him if he knows what time it was.’

‘He doesn’t know,’ Jerzty said after a few quick sentences in Polish and a shake of the head in answer to her question. ‘He didn’t look at the time. He had taken his watch off and put it beside his bed.’

‘Was it still raining?’ Annika Carlsson asked, having already read the report they had received from the meteorological office. Rain getting lighter though Wednesday evening, stopping half an hour after midnight on Thursday, May 15.

‘Not much,’ Jerzty summarized after a short exchange in Polish. ‘It was dark as well. As dark as it gets. When we woke up, the weather was beautiful. That was at four o’clock in the morning.’

About midnight, Annika Carlsson thought.

‘Ask him if he saw or heard anything. People, cars, any sort of noise. Or if he didn’t see or hear anything. As you can understand, absolutely everything is of interest to us.’

More Polish. Hesitant shakes of the head. Smiles from both Jerzty and Leszek. Then the latter had nodded firmly, said something more in Polish, and shrugged.

‘I’m listening,’ Annika Carlsson said. Watch yourself, Anchor, she thought. You’re starting to sound like Bäckström, and you don’t do that if you’re pretty cool.

‘He saw a cat,’ Jerzty said, smiling happily.

A little ginger cat. They often saw it and presumed that it lived somewhere nearby, even though it didn’t have a collar. They’d even given it some milk once.

But no people, no cars, no human sounds. It was dark, it was quiet, it was drizzling. No television or radio on anywhere, no lights in any windows. Not even a dog barking. A solitary ginger cat that had strolled past outside. That was all.