Linda, As in the Linda Murder

38 Växjö, Friday 25 July

Over breakfast the following morning, Bäckström read the Småland Post for the first time in his life. The main local paper had devoted a good deal of coverage to the newly established association, Växjö Men Against Violence to Women, and what had particularly captured Bäckström’s attention was the photograph of the association’s committee that covered half the front page. In the centre stood the chairperson, Lo Olsson, with Moa Hjärtén to her right and Superintendent Bengt Olsson to her left. On the flanks stood little Bengt Månsson and big Bengt Karlsson, twice his size. They were all looking seriously into the camera as they held each other’s hands.

What a load of idiots, Bäckström thought happily.

But the paper didn’t appear to share Bäckström’s opinion. The association was described in glowing terms, and was even honoured by a mention in the editorial, in which the editor-in-chief, in an unusually poetic turn of phrase, described the police as ‘an inadequate and poorly maintained fence trying to hold growing levels of criminality at bay’. The editor also declared that private law-and-order initiatives like this not only were desirable, but also should be taken very seriously indeed. ‘Even those of us living in such a predominantly peaceful town as Växjö have to realize that the battle against ever increasing levels of crime is actually our shared responsibility,’ he concluded.

Where the hell do they get all this shit from? Bäckström thought, putting the paper in his pocket so that he could laugh to his heart’s content as soon as he was shut inside his office.

Lewin, as was so often the case, had spent the night in Eva Svanström’s bed, but after she had fallen asleep he had lain there for another hour, worrying about what young Löfgren was actually up to. As soon as he got to work, he pulled out various files relating to the investigation, read them carefully, and then, after further thought, decided that he had probably worked out what was really going on. But because he had occasionally been wrong before, he called in von Essen and Adolfsson and asked them to check something for him.

‘There’s an old tip-off that I’d like you to follow up for me. I did mention it at our morning meeting on Sunday 6 July, and it probably isn’t that exciting, but I’d still like you to have a word with the informant for me. His name’s Göran Bengtsson. Here are all the details,’ Lewin said, giving the note to von Essen.

‘Gurra Yellow and Blue, yes, we know him,’ von Essen said, shaking his head.

‘Sorry,’ Lewin said. ‘What did you call him?’

‘Gurra Yellow and Blue, or just Yellow and Blue. That’s what he’s known as in town,’ Adolfsson explained. ‘Partly because he’s politically tainted, as it’s so politely termed, and partly...’

‘... because of the brown colours of the political palette, if I can put it like that,’ von Essen interjected.

‘He and his friends got a serious going-over when they tried to celebrate the Swedish Flag’s Day here in Växjö a couple of years ago,’ Adolfsson went on. ‘A load of thugs from the Anti-Fascist League and similar groups showed up, and Gurra and his friends got badly beaten up. Before we got the situation under control, they’d beaten him just as yellow and blue as his beloved flag.’

‘He says he saw Linda with a fucking big ni— a fucking big man,’ Lewin corrected himself, ‘at about four o’clock on the morning of the murder.’

‘Yes, that’s not a particularly rare observation on his part, and our student Löfgren is far from being the only black man here in Happy Valley,’ von Essen said. ‘Not these days, anyway.’

‘I’d still like you to go and talk to him. And I’d like you to show him some photographs, starting with Löfgren,’ Lewin said, handing over a transparent folder containing photographs of nine young black men, one of them Löfgren. ‘Then I’d like you to move on to Linda, and it’s important that you do it in that order.’ He handed them another plastic folder holding nine photographs of young blonde women, including one of their murder victim, Linda Wallin.

As von Essen and Adolfsson were ringing on the door of Yellow and Blue’s basic one-room flat in the centre of Växjö, Erik Roland Löfgren the police student stepped up to the reception desk in the police station on Sandgärdsgatan. He had with him a lawyer from Kalmar, who happened to be an old family friend, and he appeared in the nick of time. The prosecutor had just decided to issue a formal arrest warrant as a result of his absence.

Gurra Yellow and Blue was sitting at his computer playing a game that he had downloaded from the home page of the American organization White Aryan Resistance. Some of the computer geeks at WAR had put together a more ethnically focused variant of the old classics Desert Storm I–III, and Yellow and Blue was on a roll when von Essen and Adolfsson paid him a visit.

‘New top score,’ Yellow and Blue said, his cheeks glowing with excitement. ‘I wasted three hundred and eighty-nine blunt-nosed fuckers in just half an hour.’

‘Have you got a few minutes for a chat?’ Adolfsson asked.

‘Always happy to help the cops,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘It’s the duty of every Swedish citizen. It’s war now. We’ve got to close ranks if we don’t want the blacks to win.’

Löfgren wasn’t quite as enthusiastic as he sat in the interview room with Rogersson, who was leading the session, and Lewin as the official witness. To start with, he had been just as formal as his aged legal representative, who was three times his age.

‘Why do you think we want to talk to you, Löfgren?’ Rogersson began, after the usual introductory remarks for the recording’s benefit.

‘I was hoping you could tell me,’ Löfgren said with a polite nod.

‘You haven’t worked it out for yourself?’ Rogersson asked.

‘No,’ Löfgren said, shaking his head.

‘In that case I’ll tell you,’ Rogersson said. ‘I can understand that you must be curious.’

Löfgren made do with another nod, suddenly seeming more watchful than curious.

‘Hell, I’ve called loads of times and asked what the hell happened about my tip-off. It’s obvious the nigger did it,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘One of your colleagues must be protecting him. The police force is crawling with blacks working as officers now. Check them out, and you’ll get the killer.’

‘What did you do when you saw them?’ von Essen asked.

‘I said hello to that Linda. I recognized her, didn’t I? I’d seen her down at the cop shop.’

‘So what did you say, more precisely, I mean?’ von Essen persisted.

‘I asked if she didn’t have anything better to do than go home and suck on a stick of liquorice,’ Gurra said, smiling gleefully at them. ‘Yes, and then I said something about the risk of HIV as well. Hell, those liquorice cowboys are walking biological bombs, when you think about all the shit they’re carrying.’

‘Then what happened?’ Adolfsson asked.

‘The nigger went mad and started running at me, and his face was really dark blue, and I thought that you wouldn’t even want to touch that one because you’d die of herpes. At best. So I ran off.’

‘And it was then about four o’clock in the morning, and the incident took place on Norra Esplanaden, some five hundred metres from the Town Hotel?’ von Essen said.

‘Affirmative,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘Circa four o’clock, by the roundabout next to the health centre.’

‘We’ve got some pictures we’d like you to take a look at,’ von Essen said. ‘Do you recognize any of these men?’ He laid out the photographs of Löfgren and the eight others.

‘In the interviews conducted by one of my colleagues, you deny categorically that you had a sexual relationship with Linda,’ Rogersson said. ‘The way you describe it, she was an ordinary classmate.’

‘We were in the same class at college. But you already know that.’

‘Yes,’ Rogersson said. ‘We know that. And we also know that you had sex with Linda. Why didn’t you mention that?’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Löfgren replied stubbornly. ‘I never had any sort of relationship with her.’

‘It’s a simple question,’ Rogersson sighed. ‘Have you ever slept with Linda. Answer yes or no.’

‘I don’t understand what that has to do with anything,’ Löfgren said. ‘Anyway, I don’t talk about things like that. I’m not that sort.’

‘According to your friends, you’re precisely that sort,’ Rogersson said. ‘We’ve spoken to a number of them, and according to them you recently spent several months boasting about all the times you fucked Linda.’

‘Rubbish,’ Löfgren said. ‘I never talk about that sort of thing, so that’s complete rubbish.’

‘Complete rubbish, you say,’ Rogersson said. ‘If you’ve never slept with her, then all you have to do is answer no.’

‘You don’t seem to understand what I’m saying,’ Löfgren said.

‘I understand exactly what you’re saying,’ Rogersson said. ‘And I know that you lied when you were being questioned by the police, and now I’m hearing with my own ears how you’re trying to avoid answering a simple, straightforward question.’

‘Which doesn’t have anything to do with anything. I didn’t kill Linda. If you think I did, you’re mad.’

‘Assuming that you’re innocent, then you won’t mind providing a DNA sample so we can discount you from the investigation,’ Rogersson said, gesturing instructively at the test-tube containing the cotton-bud that was sitting beside the tape recorder.

‘I’ve no intention of doing any such thing,’ Löfgren said. ‘Seeing as I’m innocent, and you haven’t got a shred of evidence. What this is all about, and this is exactly what it is, is you trying to get rid of a future black officer.’ Löfgren looked as upset as he sounded. ‘That’s what this is about. The rest is just bullshit.’

‘And I’m telling you that you’re lying, and the fact that you’re lying to the police in a murder investigation which just happens to concern one of your classmates is enough to make me and my colleagues suspicious of you,’ Rogersson said. ‘For us, there’s nothing more to it than that.’

‘And that’s enough for you,’ Löfgren said heatedly. ‘You’re not even listening to—’

‘Not just for us,’ Rogersson interrupted. ‘The prosecutor is just as curious as we are.’

‘Pardon me for interrupting,’ the lawyer said, ‘but it would be interesting to hear the prosecutor’s opinion of this.’

‘It’s very simple,’ Rogersson said. ‘If Löfgren continues lying and refusing to provide a DNA sample, she will consider him a formal suspect and he will be remanded in custody.’ Rogersson exchanged a glance with Lewin, who nodded.

‘In that case, I would like it noted in the records that I don’t share her opinion,’ the lawyer said.

‘Noted,’ Rogersson said. ‘And I presume you are aware that if you wish to pursue the matter further, it isn’t the police you should turn to. One final question for you, Roland, before we arrest you—’

‘I’ve got an alibi,’ Löfgren interrupted. ‘Is that something your generation ever learned about? What an alibi is, I mean?’

‘It was him,’ Gurra Yellow and Blue said, smiling triumphantly and holding up the photograph of Erik Roland Löfgren.

‘There’s no rush, Gurra,’ von Essen said. ‘Take your time.’

‘I tend to think they all look the same,’ Adolfsson said. ‘How can you be so sure?’

‘You’re talking to an expert,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘I’m as good at niggers as Eskimos are at snow, or those Lapp bastards are at reindeer. Take this one, for instance.’ He waved the picture of Löfgren. ‘Typical blue nigger. Africa, if you ask me. But not just any Africa, because we’re not talking Eritrea or Sudan or Namibia or Zimbabwe, and we’re definitely not talking Masai. We’re not even talking Kikuyu or Uhuru or Watutsi or Wambesi or Zulu or—’

‘Hang on, hang on,’ Adolfsson interrupted, holding up his hands to stop him. ‘What part of Africa are we talking about? Never mind all the niggers that we’re not talking about.’

‘If you ask me, we’re talking west Africa, Ivory Coast, maybe. Basically old French west Africa, the Frogs’ niggers,’ Yellow and Blue said, nodding like a man who knew what he was talking about.

‘Thanks for your help,’ von Essen said. ‘Just one more question. If you wouldn’t mind taking a look at our pictures of girls as well.’

‘Come off it, Count,’ Yellow and Blue said. ‘Try listening to what I’m saying. I’ve spoken to her, when I was in the cop shop, I told you. It was her. I’m a hundred and ten per cent sure.’

‘Which one of these was it, then?’ Adolfsson asked, nodding towards the photographs of Linda and the other eight young women.

‘Tell me,’ Rogersson said. ‘Tell me about your alibi.’

‘I wasn’t alone when I left the hotel. I was with someone, and we went back to my place,’ Löfgren said. ‘I was with that person until approximately ten o’clock that morning.’

‘When you were questioned you said you went home alone,’ Rogersson said. ‘So that was a lie as well? Okay, give me a name. What’s the name of the person you went home with?’

‘I’ve already told you. I don’t discuss names,’ Löfgren said.

‘That’s not much of an alibi, then,’ Rogersson sighed. ‘Not from what I’ve ever learned about alibis, anyway. From the little I remember, the teachers kept going on about the fact that it was important to know who was providing the alibi.’

‘I don’t discuss names,’ Löfgren repeated. ‘Is that really so hard to understand?’

‘So what do you say now, lads?’ Yellow and Blue said, holding up the photograph he had picked out.

‘And you’re absolutely sure it was her?’ von Essen said, exchanging a glance with Adolfsson.

‘What do you mean, absolutely sure? I’m a hundred and ten per cent sure, I told you. I’ve spoken to her more than once down at your very own cop shop. She was a proper little bitch, if you want to know what I think.’

‘There’s something funny about what you’re saying,’ Rogersson said, looking at Löfgren sceptically.

‘What do you mean, funny?’ Löfgren said. ‘I don’t see anything funny in any of this.’

‘Your friends say you boasted to them about all the times you fucked Linda. In your own words. All the times you fucked Linda, as well as plenty more even worse phrases that I don’t intend to embarrass either you or your legal representative with by repeating.’

‘That’s up to them,’ Löfgren said. ‘I haven’t said anything.’

‘But when it comes to leaving the Town Hotel, on the other hand, you told them that you went home alone. There’s even someone who saw you going home alone. You said you were going home to get some sleep.’

‘So what? I don’t have to sit here and defend what other people have said. Besides, it looks like someone wants to talk to you,’ Löfgren said, nodding towards the door, which was slowly opening after a discreet knock.

‘Have you got a couple of minutes, Lewin?’ von Essen asked from the other side of the door.

‘This trick’s as old as the hills,’ Löfgren said to his lawyer. ‘One of the lecturers at college told us...’

‘Two minutes,’ Lewin said, getting up and going out, carefully shutting the door behind him.

‘I think we have a small problem,’ von Essen said.

‘I thought we might have, ever since first thing this morning,’ Lewin said with a sigh.

‘What did I say?’ Löfgren said triumphantly, patting his lawyer on the arm. ‘Five minutes, not two. What did I say?’

‘Excuse me for interrupting, gentlemen,’ Lewin said, looking at Rogersson for some reason. ‘Have I got it right if I say that you’re refusing to give the name of the person you claim could provide you with an alibi?’

‘Good that you finally get it,’ Löfgren said. ‘Absolutely right. That’s actually your job, not mine.’

‘Well, it’s good to know that we agree on something, at least,’ Lewin said. ‘In that case I would also like to inform you that the time is now 14.05 on Friday 25 July, and that the prosecutor has decided to remand you in custody. This interview is thereby suspended, and will recommence at a later point. The prosecutor has also decreed that we should take your fingerprints and a DNA sample.’

‘Hold on a moment,’ the lawyer said quickly. ‘Wouldn’t it be better if I could have a few moments to discuss matters alone with my client, so that we can try to find a more practical solution to this little problem?’

‘I suggest that you take the matter up directly with the prosecutor,’ Lewin said.

‘Bloody hell, Lewin, you were suddenly in a hell of a hurry,’ Rogersson said sourly five minutes later when they were alone in the room.

‘So would you have been,’ Lewin said.

‘What for?’ Rogersson said. ‘If you’d given me another hour I’d have got the name of his so-called alibi out of him, if there is one, and got him to stick the cotton-bud in his mouth.’

‘That’s what I was afraid of,’ Lewin said. ‘That we’d end up having to deal with a hell of a lot of paperwork.’

‘I don’t actually understand what you mean,’ Rogersson said.

‘Let me explain,’ Lewin said.

‘I can hardly wait,’ Rogersson said with a crooked smile, leaning back and making himself comfortable. ‘Bloody hell,’ he grinned five minutes later. ‘When are you thinking of telling Bäckström?’

‘Now,’ Lewin said. ‘As soon as I can get hold of him.’

‘I want to be there,’ Rogersson said. ‘Then we can both try to hold the fat little bastard down before he starts attacking the furniture.’

This is going to be a wonderful day, Bäckström thought. Only ten minutes before he had seen Adolfsson and von Essen go past in the corridor on either side of a crestfallen Löfgren, clearly heading towards the cells. As if that weren’t enough, Thorén had turned up in his office with the results of the check on committee member Bengt Karlsson, from Växjö Men Against Violence to Women.

‘This Karlsson looks like he used to be a really nasty piece of work. Not a very nice person at all,’ Thorén said.

‘How do you mean?’ Bäckström said. Not that I know what I’m going to do with him, seeing as the black guy’s already locked up, he thought.

‘He’s got a total of eleven offences on record,’ Thorén said. ‘And his speciality seems to have been abusing women he was seeing.’

‘Right man in the right job,’ Bäckström declared happily. And definitely the right man to use to take the wind out of little Lo and that idiot Olsson’s sails, he thought.

‘The only problem is that the most recent entry is nine years old,’ Thorén said.

‘I suppose he’s learned his lesson,’ Bäckström said. ‘He probably wraps a towel round his fist before he hits them now. Dig up all the shit you can find,’ he concluded, seeing Lewin and Rogersson standing in the doorway looking like two egg-bound hens. ‘Come in, lads, come in. Young Thorén here was just leaving.’

‘So, tell me,’ he said eagerly as soon as Thorén had closed the door behind him. ‘Did you get him to talk himself into a corner? I saw Adolfsson and that stuck-up poof he drags around with him taking him off to the cells.’

‘Sorry to disappoint you, Bäckström,’ Lewin said. ‘But both Rogersson and I are fairly convinced that Löfgren isn’t the man we’re looking for.’

‘I love it!’ Bäckström said, chuckling happily. ‘So what the hell’s he been locked up for, then?’

‘I’ll get to that,’ Lewin said. ‘But you should probably start getting used to the idea that he’s innocent.’

‘What for?’ Bäckström said, leaning back in his chair.

‘He’s got an alibi,’ Rogersson said.

‘An alibi,’ Bäckström snorted. ‘Who the fuck would give him an alibi? Martin Luther King?’

‘He doesn’t want to say,’ Lewin said. ‘So we thought we’d lock him up before he had time to change his mind.’

‘But Lewin’s worked it out anyway,’ Rogersson said happily.

‘So who are we talking about, then?’ Bäckström said, leaning forward and peering at them through narrow eyes.

‘We think this is what happened,’ Lewin said. ‘Young Löfgren leaves the Town Hotel at quarter to four in the morning. He makes a big deal out of the fact that he’s leaving alone, to go and get some sleep. He stops and waits a couple of blocks away for the woman he secretly arranged to meet while they were inside the club. She shows up just after four, and they both go back to Löfgren’s flat and get on with the sort of thing people usually get on with in circumstances like that.’

‘So who is she?’ Bäckström said, even though he had already guessed the answer.

‘Our colleague Anna Sandberg, according to a witness that we’ve spoken to,’ Lewin said.

‘I’ll kill the little bitch!’ Bäckström roared, getting up from his chair with a jolt. ‘God help me, I’ll—’

‘No you won’t,’ Rogersson said, shaking his head. ‘You’re going to sit down, nice and quietly, before you give yourself a stroke or something worse.’

Whatever the hell that might be, Bäckström thought, sinking back on to his chair. She has to die.

Trainee police officer Löfgren was allowed to leave the holding cell in Växjö police station before the door had even had time to close properly. An hour or so later he was in the car with his lawyer, on his way back to his parents’ summer house on Öland. He had also sworn to the prosecutor that he would be there for the foreseeable future, and would answer his phone if the Växjö Police needed to talk to him for any reason. The prosecutor had even given him a few words of advice before he left. Without going into detail, she had suggested that he might like to take some time to think about his plans for his future career. Löfgren had left behind him a set of fingerprints, a cotton-bud containing his DNA, and, as an extra bonus, a couple of strands of hair. All of it in all likelihood completely worthless to the current murder investigation.

While the local custody officer took care of the practical details concerning Löfgren’s prints and cotton-bud, Lewin was busy tidying up after himself and his colleagues. First he had exacted a promise of silence from those most closely involved in Bäckström’s secret operation, and then he had sat down with officer Sandberg to have a serious chat with her.

Bäckström had eventually calmed down. The worst of his anger had passed even though he was still up to his neck in the wreckage of the promising case that his useless — not to say criminally incompetent — colleagues had utterly ruined. For once Bäckström felt deeply miserable, because he had been so sorely and unfairly maltreated. He was surrounded by idiots, and it was high time he found something better, he thought as he stepped out into the shimmering heat outside the police station, on his way to the soft bed in his air-conditioned hotel room, with a stop to buy some drink on the way.

He began by forcing down the two chilled lagers that were already in his minibar, mainly to make room for the ones he had just bought. However, the customary pleasant sense of wellbeing failed to settle over his mind and body. Things might just be so bad that that little Sandberg bitch had sabotaged not only his investigation, but also his inner peace, he thought. In the absence of any better options, he switched on the television and lay there half watching a cultural discussion programme which the listings said would deal with the murder of Linda Wallin, but was actually just the usual poofs blowing smoke up each other’s arses.

Shipwrecked-Micke, famous from both ordinary Shipwrecked and Celebrity Shipwrecked, and a second-year student at the Institute of Drama in Malmö, had applied for funding for a drama-documentary about Linda’s murder. The cultural department of Växjö Council had turned him down flat, but he had managed to find a private investor willing to support the project. The script was pretty much ready, and the role of Linda would be played by a young woman called Carina Lundberg, better known to most people in Sweden as Big Brother-Nina. She had taken part in Big Brother and in Young Entrepreneurs on the new financial channel, had spent some time at theatre school, and was now making a name for herself in the cultural offerings of the state-funded broadcaster. She and Micke had known each other for a long time, and she trusted her director implicitly, even though the role of murder victim was far from easy. She was particularly anxious about the lesbian scenes, especially the ones in which she and her female co-star would be wearing police uniform.

What the fuck’s she saying? Bäckström thought, turning the volume up and sitting up on the bed.

‘Of course, a lot of young female police officers are dykes,’ Nina explained. ‘Almost all of them, actually. I’ve got a friend in the police, and she told me.’

‘I’ve set it up as a classic triangle drama,’ Micke explained. ‘You’ve got Linda and the woman she loves, who’s also a police officer, called Paula, and then there’s the man, the killer, full of hate and jealousy and rejection. His castration anxiety. It’s Strindberg, it’s Norén, it’s... classic male drama, basically.’

‘Yes, it certainly sounds like it,’ the presenter chimed in enthusiastically. ‘And of course that’s what this is all about. Another castrated man.’

Boiling these cretins down to make glue would be doing them a favour, Bäckström thought, switching off the television just as his phone rang, even though he had made it very clear to reception that he didn’t want any calls.

‘Yes,’ Bäckström grunted.

Fucking hell, he thought as he hung up.

Bengt Karlsson, committee member of Växjö Men Against Violence to Women, had piqued Detective Inspector Peter Thorén’s interest to the point where, even though it meant breaking the promise of confidentiality he had given Bäckström, he had felt obliged to let Knutsson into the secret. Mind you, it probably doesn’t matter much, considering what Bäckström was doing to that poor student, Thorén thought.

Bengt Karlsson was forty-two years old. Between the ages of twenty and thirty-three he had collected a total of eleven convictions for violent behaviour against seven different women of his acquaintance aged between thirteen and forty-seven when the crimes were committed. The convictions were for aggravated abuse, physical abuse, unlawful threats, unlawful compulsion, aggravated sexual abuse, sexual exploitation and sexual harassment. These had led to Karlsson’s being given seven different terms in prison, totalling four and a half years, of which he had served approximately half.

‘An interesting character,’ Knutsson agreed when he had read through the summary Thorén had produced from all the various registers and databases and electronic paraphernalia that the judicial system had at its disposal these days.

‘But why does he stop?’ Thorén asked. ‘The last conviction was nine years ago. Since then there hasn’t been a single complaint against him.’

‘Maybe he changed his modus operandi?’ Knutsson suggested. ‘Do you remember that thief who moved on to blowing up cash machines? He must have managed about a dozen before we worked it out. And all the while he was going round schools giving lectures about how he’d managed to break away from his criminal past.’

‘He might have moved away from women he knows, ones he lives with or has gone out with, to women he doesn’t know at all?’ Thorén said, as if he were thinking out loud.

‘Quite possible,’ Knutsson said. ‘Extremely possible, in fact. But there’s something else that’s struck me. Do you remember that lecture out at the Police Academy back in the spring, from that FBI officer?’

‘I remember the one,’ Thorén said. ‘Nothing but sex crimes. That was the FBI bloke’s speciality, if I remember rightly. Seemed to be pretty much the only thing in his head. Sex crimes.’

‘Then maybe you remember what he said about the sort of sex offender who plays cat and mouse with the people trying to investigate him? Who gets a really big kick out of standing very close to the people chasing him?’

‘Not really,’ Thorén said. Could it really be that simple, he thought, and at that moment he felt the tingling sensation that his older colleague Detective Superintendent Bäckström had felt about trainee police officer Erik Roland Löfgren.

‘We need a DNA sample,’ Knutsson said. ‘That man definitely has to be tested. God knows how we’re supposed to manage that without the rest of the committee and Superintendent Olsson finding out.’

‘It’s already sorted,’ Thorén said, not without a certain degree of pride. ‘It turned out that a sample of Karlsson’s DNA was already on record down in Malmö. He got caught up in some routine search in conjunction with the Jeanette murder five or six years ago. Mind you, that one’s still unsolved, so he must have been okay.’

‘So why didn’t they get rid of the sample?’ Knutsson asked.

‘That’s not the sort of thing you throw away just like that,’ Thorén said indignantly. ‘The National Forensics Lab obviously discarded their sample, because they had to, but our colleagues in Malmö kept a copy of the results in their files relating to the case. I’ve already got hold of it and faxed it through to the National Lab.’

Bäckström was still lying in bed, with a couple of extra pillows stuffed behind his back, looking like a perfectly ordinary overweight patient in a cardiac ward. She deserves no better, the little bitch, he thought, as he gestured towards the minibar with a fat, limp hand.

‘If you’d like a chilled lager, Anna, there’s one in the minibar,’ he said. Suck on that, you criminal little bitch, he thought.

‘You haven’t got anything else?’ Anna Sandberg asked. ‘I’ve finished work for the day, and I’m staying over in town. I could do with something stronger.’

‘Whisky, vodka, on the shelf over there,’ Bäckström said, pointing. What the fuck’s going on?

‘Thanks,’ Anna said, pouring a measure almost worthy of Rogersson himself in her glass. ‘Do you want one?’ she asked, waving Bäckström’s own bottle of whisky enquiringly.

What the fuck’s going on? Bäckström thought again. First she sabotages my investigation, then she comes bursting into my room, and a minute later she’s offering me my own whisky.

‘Maybe just a little one,’ he said.

Police Constable Anna Sandberg had come to apologize to Bäckström. She had made a damn fool of herself — her own words — and Bäckström was the first stop on her hike to Canossa. In so far as she had anything to say in her own defence, it was that Löfgren had promised over the phone that he would behave like a gentleman and immediately provide a DNA sample. Entirely voluntarily, and obviously completely unnecessarily, but, in light of what had happened, the simplest solution for both of them.

The reason she hadn’t been to see Bäckström to lay her cards on the table when Löfgren, in spite of his promise, had refused to come up with the goods was simply yet another example of human frailty. Partly because she had kept hoping that Löfgren would come to his senses, or at the very least help her out of a tricky situation, but largely because she had no idea what Bäckström and his colleagues were planning. Her chat with Lewin had changed all that.

‘There are quite a few people I need to talk to. You, Bäckström, and Olsson, and my husband. Not least my husband,’ she said, shaking her head and taking a deep gulp from her glass.

What? Bäckström thought. Women really aren’t right in the head. ‘Are you stupid? Surely you’re not thinking of telling Olsson about this?’

Evidently that was exactly what she was thinking. It was just as well to take the bull by the horns, get to grips with the shame and, if it came to it, leave the police force and do something else instead.

‘That’s none of my business,’ Bäckström said. ‘But I can’t see why you want to tell Olsson.’

‘Before he works it out for himself,’ Sandberg said sternly. ‘I’m not going to give him that satisfaction. Nor anyone else, for that matter.’

‘Correct me if I’m wrong,’ Bäckström said, ‘but I’m talking about Detective Superintendent Bengt Olsson. The Ritual Killer detective from the backwoods of Småland, who ends up deep in troubled thought every time he gets up from the toilet and finds he’s holding a piece of paper in his hand.’

‘So you don’t think I should tell Olsson?’ Sandberg asked, suddenly looking much happier.

‘No,’ Bäckström said, shaking his head. ‘Nor anyone else. Lewin and Rogersson have already talked to anyone who knows anything, so they’ll just shake their little heads if you try to talk to them. Forget it.’ Women are just crazy, he thought.

‘What about my husband?’ Sandberg asked. ‘He’s also in the force, but of course you know that.’

‘Does he get turned on by hearing stuff like this, then?’ Bäckström asked with a look of mild distaste. But, considering her husband was a neighbourhood officer, there was every reason to fear the worst, he thought.

‘I find that very hard to believe,’ Sandberg said.

‘Well, then,’ Bäckström said with a shrug. ‘What you don’t know can’t hurt you.’

Anna Sandberg nodded thoughtfully. ‘Can I have another?’ she asked, indicating her empty glass.

‘Sure,’ Bäckström said, holding out his own. ‘Get me one as well. Just a small one.’

It’s a shame little Lo isn’t here. She could have picked up a few tricks from an old professional, Bäckström thought. Sandberg already looked like a different, better person. Even her tits had perked up and were starting to look like their old selves. After just a couple of stiff drinks and few wise words, he thought.

‘Well, bollocks to all that, Sandberg,’ Bäckström said, raising his glass. ‘No one becomes a police officer. It’s just something you are, and a real police officer never shops a colleague.’ Even if it’s a woman who should never have been allowed to join the force in the first place.

That evening, after the now customary dinner in the hotel restaurant, Bäckström and Rogersson returned to Bäckström’s room, to talk through the case in a relaxed setting, and work out how best to proceed now that young Löfgren had faded from the investigation. Eventually both the lager and the spirits had run out, and Bäckström was so far gone that he wasn’t in a fit state to accompany Rogersson down to the bar to round off the evening. He spent Saturday catching up on his sleep, and naturally the lazy and unreliable hotel staff took the opportunity to exploit his tardiness by not bothering to clean his room or replace his dirty towels.