He Who Kills the Dragon

36.

Annika Carlsson had summarized the situation as she drove: Two seventeen-year-old kids. A girl and a boy. Lived in Jungfrudansen in Solna, at the top of the hill above the shores of Ulvsundasjön. They had gone down for a swim at about half past eleven at night. Their house lay just a hundred meters from their swimming spot.

‘Apparently the boy dived in on his own while his girlfriend sat on the rocks watching. He more or less dived straight onto a large bag, as far as I understand it,’ Annika Carlsson said. ‘Then he dragged it up to the shore and got it up onto dry land. When he looked in the bag he realized it contained a dead body.’

‘How the hell do we know that it’s Akofeli, then?’ Bäckström said. In the middle of the night, black as inside a sack, and a sooty in a bag, Bäckström thought. What do they mean, Akofeli? Hello, out here the place is crawling with sooties, he thought.

‘Holm and Hernandez were the first unit on the scene,’ Annika Carlsson explained. ‘Holm’s pretty sure it’s Akofeli. And he says he recognizes the bag. The same bag that Akofeli used when he was delivering papers. One of those big ones on wheels.’

‘Holm and Hernandez. Second time in a week. A bit much for my liking,’ Bäckström said, and snorted. ‘I wonder if we’re dealing with a couple serial killers in a patrol car?’

‘I doubt it’s quite that bad. Mind you, I can see what you’re thinking,’ Annika Carlsson said with a smile. ‘It’s all due to their rotation, and they don’t organize that themselves. This month they’re working nights every Wednesday to Thursday.’

‘What’s wrong with finding bodies in the daytime?’ Bäckström muttered. ‘Then at least you can see that you’ve found a body.’

‘Sorry I woke you,’ Annika Carlsson said. ‘But I thought it was probably best that you were in on this one from the very start.’

‘Very sensible of you, Annika,’ Bäckström said. And you got a chance to see how I live. Just in case, he thought.

‘But you were just about to go for your run anyway,’ she said with a smile. ‘I was actually a bit surprised.’

‘Surprised?’

‘At how nice your flat is. Nice furniture, all neat and tidy. Clean.’

‘I like things to be nice and tidy,’ Bäckström lied. Vojne, vojne, he thought, since he had to pay for every single desiccated dust ball in his Hästens bed.

‘Most of the male officers I know who live alone usually live in pigsties,’ Carlsson said.

‘Filthy sods,’ Bäckström said indignantly. You should be grateful, he thought. Who the hell can be bothered to clean after someone like you has come along and stolen their girlfriend?

‘You’re a man of hidden talents, Bäckström,’ Annika Carlsson concluded, smiling at him.

The rest of the drive had passed in silence. Carlsson had crossed the bridge over the Karlberg Channel and carried on beside the shore toward Ulvsundasjön. They must have driven a good couple kilometers along the footpath by the lake. Up a steep, winding hill. Cordons, vehicles, floodlights, the first curious onlookers already in place although it was the middle of the night.

‘This is it,’ Annika Carlsson said as they got out of the car to join the others sent by the emergency control room.

‘Is it the same distance from the other side?’ Bäckström asked. ‘If you’re coming from Huvudsta?’

‘Yes,’ Annika Carlsson nodded. ‘I see what you’re thinking,’ she said.

Gravel paths, hills, several kilometers on foot — the perpetrator must have had a car, Bäckström thought. This isn’t the sort of place you’d drag a bag containing a body, he thought.