Never End

2

She had become numb, lapsed into unconsciousness, come back to life. Reached home. The sun was already hot, it felt like midmorning. She'd walked down the hill hiding her face, so that nobody would see what had happened to her, what she had done. What somebody else had done to her.

The room looked the same as before, but nothing would ever be the same as before.

She ripped off her clothes, ripped off her clothes, and flung everything into the washing machine without looking and turned it on. The sound of the water was comforting.

She stood under the shower and washed herself under her skin, or so it seemed. She stood there for a long time, rubbing her body and destroying all the evidence while the washing machine tossed her clothes back and forth, dissolving the evidence, back and forth. There was nothing left by the time Detective Inspectors Fredrik Halders and Aneta Djanali from the local CID arrived an hour later; nothing when the forensics officers from the police station in Ernst Fotell's Square eventually tried to find something among the threads and fibers.

The officer in charge who had sent them out, Detective Chief Inspector Erik Winter, suspected serial rape every time a rape was reported. He'd been right on two previous occasions.

Aneta Djanali eyed the park, Slottsskogen, as they drove past-the girl had told her mother and father it had happened in the park, they knew that. Djanali noticed the dog. Not something to play with. Nothing was to be played with. Three uniformed police officers were hovering around the parking lot. There were about ten cars there.

"Do you think they're checking the cars?" asked Halders, who was driving.

"Not yet, from the looks of it."

"You get this big show every time."

"Show?"

"They go crazy. Twenty-five cops with their hands in their pockets, and the bastard could have run off and left his car behind, that could be it there in the middle. That green Opel. Or that black Volvo."

"There are three of them, not twenty-five."

Djanali saw one of the officers take a notebook out of his pocket and start writing down the registration numbers.

"They're starting now."

The Bielkes's house was set back from the road, within a walled garden. The sea glistened only a few hundred meters away. Halders could smell the salt, see the water, hear the gulls, see the sails, a couple of ferries, a catamaran, the oil storage tanks, three cranes in the abandoned wharf on the other side of the estuary. A horizon line.

The house must be worth ten million, but he couldn't let that affect him. People had a right to more money than he had. It might be newly built. Inspired by Greek architecture. The thing looked like a whole Greek village.

He wiped the sweat from his brow, felt it on his back under his shirt. Aneta looked cool. Must have to do with genes or something. Black on the outside, cool on the inside.

'OK, then," he said, and rang the doorbell, which was a tiny button barely visible in the yellow-tinted plaster.

The door opened immediately, as if the man inside had been waiting for the bell. He was wearing shorts and a shirt, barefoot, sunburned, maybe fifty, glasses with thin frames, thinning hair longer in the back. Thin all over in fact, Halders thought. Red eyes. Scared eyes. Something had invaded his home.

Now reality was intruding for the second time: first a daughter who had been raped, then two plainclothes police officers. The two always go together. Hadn't occurred to me before, Halders thought. We're the ones who do the following up, the good after the bad; but for him we're each as shitty as the other.

They introduced themselves.

Kurt Bielke ushered them in. "Jeanette is in her room."

"Yes." Halders glanced up the stairs. "It won't take long. Then she can go to East General."

"East General?"

"The hospital. Women's clinic."

"I know what it is," said Bielke, stroking his high forehead. "But… does she really have to go?" He turned to face Aneta Djanali. "She says she doesn't want to."

"It's important," Djanali said. For numerous reasons, she thought to herself.

"Can we have a word with her now?" Halders asked.

"Yes… Yes, of course," said Bielke, gesturing toward the stairs. Then he just stood there, as if frozen, until his head moved once again. He wasn't looking at them. "It's up there."

They went up the stairs and came to a closed door. Djanali could hear the sounds of summer outside. A seabird laughed aloud, and the laughter was followed by more. The birds drifted off over the bay. A dog barked. A car tooted. A child shouted out in a shrill voice.

Bielke knocked on the door. There was no answer, and he knocked again.

"Jeanette?"

They could hear a voice from inside, but no words.

"Jeanette? The po… the police are here."

Some word or other from inside again.

"Let's go in now," Halders said.

"Should I come too?" Bielke asked.

"No," said Halders, knocking on the door himself. He turned the handle, the door opened, and they went in.

The girl was in her robe, sitting on the bed. It was as dark as she could make it in the room, with the Venetian blinds closed. The bright light of the sun was trying to break through. It's as though the girl is trying to hide from it on one corner of the bed, thought Djanali. She's clinging to the wall. She's named Jeanette, not "she." She has a name, but suddenly it has no meaning for anybody else; maybe not even for her now that she's a victim.

Now it's my turn to speak.

Djanali introduced herself and Halders, who nodded, said nothing, sat down in the desk chair, and observed her, gave her a friendly nod.

Half of Jeanette's face was hidden under the towel she'd wrapped around her head after her long shower. She was holding the collar of her robe closed with a dainty hand. Djanali's eyes had grown used to the half light in the room by now, and she contemplated the fragile skin on the girl's fingers. It seemed to be sodden.

She's been in the shower for hours. I'd have done the same.

Djanali asked a few brief questions, the simplest she could think of, to start off the first interview. The answers were even briefer, barely possible to comprehend. They had to move closer, but not too close. Jeanette spoke about the park. Yes, it had been late. No, early. Late and early. She was alone. She'd walked there before. Lots of times, at night, too. Alone? Yes, alone at night, too.

This time she'd been alone for only a moment. Or maybe it had been a few minutes. She'd been to two different places and she said where they were and Halders wrote them down. She spoke about the others who'd been there with her, for a little while at least. They'd been to a graduation party, just a small one. A quarter of the class. It was nearly a month since they finished their exams.

Djanali could see Jeanette's white cap on the chest of drawers under the window. She could imagine her joy at passing her exams, and earning the right to wear her white cap. It seemed luminescent in the darkness.

A little graduation party. Djanali shifted her gaze from the white cap to Jeanette's face. Nineteen years old. She would have liked to ask about boyfriends, but knew it was better to wait. The important thing now was basic questions about what had happened: when, how, when, how, when, how. Ask, listen, look. She'd done this often enough to know that the most important thing for an interrogator to do was to pin down what she called the incident behind the incident. Not just to take an account at face value. The victim's account. No, to start thinking about the difficult question: Is that really true? Is that really what happened?

She asked Jeanette Bielke to tell her what impression she'd gotten of her attacker.

Suddenly Jeanette said she wanted to go to the hospital, she wanted to go now. Djanali had known that would come, or maybe should have come before now.

"Soon. Just one more question. One second only."

"But I want to go now."

"Can you tell us anything about this man?"

"I can't remember."

"Was he tall?"

"He was big. Strong. Or maybe I didn't… didn't dar… want… didn't dare to try and struggle. I did try at first… but then I couldn't anymore."

She'd started to cry. She pulled at the towel and rubbed it over her eyes and it came loose and fell down and her wet hair became visible, stuck to her head as if by glue.

"He… he tied me," she said.

"Tied you?"

"Yes."

"How?"

"Well, tied… he had a noose around my ne… around my neck. My arms… then…"

She grasped hold of her throat. Djanali could see it now, a red mark like a narrow line around her neck. Jesus Christ.

"It was like a dog leash," Jeanette said. "It didn't smell like a dog, but it was like a dog leash." She was looking straight at Djanali now. "I could see it shining. I think."

"Shining?"

"It was shining around the collar. I think. As if there were studs on it, or something."

She gave a shudder, cleared her throat, then shuddered again. Djanali looked at Halders, who nodded.

"Just one last question, Jeanette. Did he say anything?"

"I don't remember much. I fainted. I think he said… something."

"What did he say?"

"I didn't hear what it was."

"But you could hear words?"

"Yes…"

"You didn't hear what language?"

"It wasn't like a language."

"What do you mean? Not like a language?"

"It was…just sounds…didn't mean anything. It was just something he…something I couldn't understand."

Djanali nodded, waited. Jeanette looked at her.

"He did it three times, or whatever. Repeated it. Or maybe it was just once. Just when he was…when he…"

The gulls were laughing outside the window again: they'd come back from the sea. A car engine started. A child shouted again. Jeanette rubbed hard at her hair with the towel. It was hot and stuffy in the room.

Djanali knew Jeanette had said all she was capable of saying just now, and that it was high time they got her to the hospital.

She could see Halders getting to his feet. It had all gone as usual. Rape. Report. First interview. Request for legal documentation. Car to the women's clinic.

This was real. Not just imagination.

Jeanette Bielke was being taken to the clinic: Aneta Djanali and Fredrik Haiders drove to the park where it had happened.

"What do you think about the description?"

Halders shrugged.

"Big. Strong. Dark coat. No special smell. Armed with some kind of noose. Made strange sounds. Or said something incomprehensible."

"Could be any man on the street," Halders said.

"Do you think she's reliable?"

"Yes."

"I would have liked to ask her more."

"You got what information you could, for now."

Djanali looked out at the summer. People weren't wearing much. Their races were beaming, trying to outdo the sun. The sky was blue and cloudless. Everything was ice cream and lightweight clothing and an easy life. There was no headwind.

Let's hope it isn't the beginning of something," said Halders, looking at her. "You know what I mean."

"Don't say it."

Halders thought about what Jeanette had said regarding the man's appearance, insofar as she could see anything. The rapist. They'd have to wait for the tests, but he was sure they were dealing with rape.

They could never be sure about appearances. Getting a description was the hardest thing. Never put your trust in a description, he'd said to anybody who cared to listen. None of it is necessarily related to the facts. The same person could vary between five foot ten and six foot three in a witness's eyes and memory. Everything could vary.

Last year they'd had a madman running round and knocking people down from behind, no obvious pattern, just that he knocked them down and stole their money. But he did have a habit of introducing himself from the side, that was the nearest to a pattern: some greeting or other to get his victim's attention, then wham.

The victims all agreed on one thing: he'd reminded them of the hunchback of Notre Dame-stocky, hunchbacked, bald, dragged one foot…

When they eventually caught up with him, in the act, he turned out to be six foot two with thick, curly hair, and he could have landed the job of Mr. Handsome in any soap opera you care to name.

It all depended on so much. What they saw. How dark it was. Where the light came from. Fear and terror. Most of all the terror.

He turned into the park and stopped the car. The uniforms weren't there anymore. The scene was roped off; two forensics officers were crawling on the ground. There was a bunch of kids hanging round the far barrier, whispering and watching. Some adults came past and stopped, then walked on.

"Found anything?" Halders shouted. The scene-of-crime boys looked up, then down again, without answering. Halders heard a short bark, and saw the dog and its handler.

"Found anything?" he said to the handler.

"Zack picked up something over there, but it melted away into the wind."

"Or up a tree," said Halders, looking up.

"Were you there when we caught that bastard the other year who tried to hide up a tree?" the dog handler asked.

"I heard about it."

"Them trees are clean, now, anyway."

"How did he get away, then?"

"Ran, I suppose. Or drove. You'd better ask forensics. But I doubt there'll be any tracks. Everything's so damn dry."

Halders looked around. Djanali was watching the SOC team. The police dog was scrutinizing first Halders, then the SOC team. Halders looked around again, walked a few paces.

"Have you been here before?" he asked the dog handler.

"What do you mean? For another crime?"

"I'm not talking about your private life, Soren. Have you ever been called out here after a rape?"

"To this park, you mean?"

"Yes. And to this very spot."

Halders was standing just outside the police enclosure: it looked out of place, as if it had been made by the kids who were sticking around to watch. The pond was to the right. It reflected pink from the flamingos standing on one leg by the water's edge.

The SOC team was crawling around in some shrubbery.

Next to it were two trees. Two meters or so away. Maples? There was a passage between them, wide enough to get through. It was shady inside. A rock sticking out turned it into a hollow, almost a cave behind the trees. The forensic officers were moving around there now, on their way into the cave.

A perfect place to commit rape.

Good God! Halders thought. He could see it all now. It was here.

The paved path was about ten meters away, but it might as well have been a hundred. A thousand. There was a minor road on the other side of the parking lot. A hedge between the cars and the park itself. The lighting in the park was a joke. He'd walked there hundreds of times at night, and the lighting was more of a hindrance than a help. They hadn't improved it, in spite of what had happened here.

A perfect place. It was as if the shadow between the trees was lying in wait. He hadn't caught on at first.

"This spot?" asked the dog handler. He looked around. "I don't think so." He looked at Halders. "What are you getting at?"

"It's happened before," Halders said.

"I don't follow."

"This is where it was." Halders looked at his colleague. "Damn it, Soren, it's the very same spot. The same spot!"

"What are you talking about?"

"Weren't you based here in Gothenburg five years ago?"

"I came four years ago."

"But you've heard about the Beatrice Wägner case, surely?"

The dog handler looked at Halders.

"Beatrice Wägner? That girl who was murdered?"

"Five years ago. She was raped too. Raped and murdered."

"I know about it… course I do. I read about it at the time. We'd…"

"It was here," Halders said.

"Here?"

"This is where it happened," Halders said to Soren and Djanali, who had just joined them. "This is where Beatrice Wägner was found. This very spot. She was in that hollow," he said, nodding toward where the SOC team was still combing the ground. "Lying between the trees. It's like a cave in there."

Raped, and strangled, he thought.

He noticed the dog following his gaze toward the cave and then back again. It jerked at its leash, then was calm again.