He Who Kills the Dragon

89.

Early on Sunday morning Hassan Talib suffered further bleeding in the brain. The doctor who saved his life less than a week before had to make another attempt. This time it didn’t go so well. The operation was abandoned after just a quarter of an hour and Talib was declared dead at half past five in the morning in the neurosurgical department of the Karolinska Hospital.

It was never good when people like Talib died. There were far too many people like him who might start to get ideas. Five minutes later Superintendent Honkamäki decided to increase security. He spoke to Toivonen and Linda Martinez. Toivonen had taken the formal decision and called in another six uniformed officers and six surveillance officers.

The uniformed officers would reinforce external security. The surveillance officers would roam the hospital precinct and buildings hoping to discover suspicious vehicles and individuals in time, or simply anything that seemed out of the ordinary.

At nine o’clock that morning Frank Motoele had appeared in the orthopedic surgery department. He greeted his colleagues at the entrance, took the lift up to the seventh floor where Farshad Ibrahim lay locked in a single room with his left leg plastered from his ankle to his crotch.

‘Situation?’ Motoele asked, nodding to the officer who was sitting beside the entrance to the ward where Farshad Ibrahim was being looked after.

‘Everything’s fine,’ the officer said with a smile. ‘The patient’s asleep. I spoke to the ward sister a short while ago. They say he’s in a lot of pain and they keep pumping him full of painkillers, so we’re just going to have to deal with that. He spends most of the time asleep. If you want to talk to his little brother, he’s in the thoracic surgery department. Without a knife, this time.’

‘I might just take a stroll and have a look,’ Motoele said.

‘Go ahead,’ the officer said. ‘I’m going to hit the smoking room in the meantime. I’m going crazy here. That damn nicotine gum is a complete joke.’

There’s something not right here, Motoele thought, even before he opened the closed door to Farshad’s room.

Just to be on the safe side he pushed the door open with his foot, his hand on his pistol. The room was empty, the window was open, the bed had been dragged over to the window, and someone had tied an ordinary climbing rope to its legs.

Twenty meters to the slope seven floors below. Someone was already standing there, waiting for the man who was trying to lower himself down the rope in spite of his plastered leg. He had only got a few meters when Frank Motoele stuck his head out of the window.

Motoele grabbed the rope and started to reel it in. A simple task for a man like Motoele, one hundred kilos of muscle and bone, whereas Farshad Ibrahim on the other end of the rope scarcely weighed seventy. Besides, Farshad had made a mistake. Instead of easing his grip on the rope and just sliding down, he was clinging to it, and sliding up almost a meter before Motoele turned his gaze inward and let go of the rope. Farshad let go as well, falling helplessly and landing on his back almost twenty meters below. He died instantly. Only then did Motoele realize that Farshad’s accomplice had drawn a gun and was shooting at him.

He was a poor shot as well. Motoele, on the other hand, took his time. He pulled his weapon, crouched behind the window frame, aimed high on one leg, put both hands on the gun, both eyes open. Everything according to regulations, and if he was in luck he’d manage to hit the man’s femoral artery. The man below collapsed, dropping his gun and grabbing his wounded leg, screaming in a language Motoele didn’t understand.

Motoele, who had turned his gaze inward, holstered his weapon and went out into the corridor to meet his fellow officers. He could already hear the sounds of shouting and running.

Superintendent Honkamäki called Toivonen within thirty minutes and gave him a short status report. Someone had helped Farshad open the window of his room. The same person had given him an ordinary climbing rope, with knots in. About twenty meters long. Motoele had tried to reel him in. Farshad had lost his grip and fell, landing on his back on the slope twenty meters below. One of his accomplices had started shooting at Motoele. Several shots. Motoele had shot back. One shot. It hit high up on the leg. Rendered him harmless. The accomplice had been arrested, identified, and taken to the ER, just a hundred meters from orthopedic surgery. And they also had a good idea of who had helped Farshad with the window and rope.

‘We can’t locate one of the nurses, born in Iran, if you were wondering. She disappeared in the middle of her shift about an hour ago,’ Honkamäki reported.

‘What the fuck have you been doing?’ Toivonen said, and groaned.

‘Everything according to the rulebook,’ Honkamäki said. ‘What the hell would you have done?’

‘The younger brother, he’s still alive?’ Toivonen said.

‘Yes, he’s still alive. But I can see why you might wonder,’ Honkamäki said with a crooked smile.

‘Get him to prison,’ Toivonen said. ‘We’ve got to get to grips with security.’

‘I’ve already tried,’ Honkamäki said. ‘They’re refusing to take him. Say they haven’t got the necessary medical facilities.’

‘Drive him to Huddinge Hospital,’ Toivonen said.

‘Huddinge?’ Honkamäki said. ‘What for?’

‘I don’t want him in our district,’ Toivonen said. ‘Not while people are dying like flies out here, surrounded by my officers.’

‘Okay,’ Honkamäki said.

‘And as far as Motoele is concerned...’

‘It’s sorted,’ Honkamäki said. ‘Forensics are already here, and the internal investigation team are on their way. The only thing we’re missing is probably Bäckström,’ he said with a laugh.

Fucking hell. Three-zero to the Christians, Bäckström thought when he turned on the morning news on television. At last, pancakes and bacon, he thought. Seeing as his warden was evidently busy elsewhere.

‘I can understand that you’re in shock, Motoele,’ the internal investigator said.

‘No,’ Motoele said, shaking his head. ‘I’m not in shock. It was all done according to the rulebook.’ Respect, he thought, and turned his gaze inward.