The killer's art

11

Knutas spent all of Sunday dashing madly between police headquarters and Dalman Gate. Late in the afternoon he suddenly realized that he had forgotten to ring home.

As soon as he heard Lina’s voice he remembered they were planning to have dinner with his parents at their farm up in Kappelshamn in northern Gotland. Damn it. He knew how particular they were about everything going according to schedule. In his mind he could already hear the disappointment in his father’s voice as Lina reported that his son wouldn’t be joining them. His father had never fully accepted the fact that Knutas had become a police officer. Not really. And his opinion still had an effect on Knutas, even though he was fifty-two years old. When it came to his parents, he would never be truly grown-up.

Lina, on the other hand, usually accepted a change in plan with equanimity, whether it was a postponed holiday in the mountains or a parent-teacher meeting that he had to miss. ‘It’ll work out,’ she would simply say, and it always did. He was rarely made to feel guilty because of his job, and that made his life so much easier. His Danish wife had an easy-going temperament that often made him think how terribly lucky he’d been. They’d met just by chance when he went to a restaurant in Copenhagen while attending a conference for police officers. Back then she was working as a waitress while completing her studies. Now she was a midwife at Visby Hospital.

There was standing room only at the press conference. Since the victim was so well known on Gotland, the story was big news for the local media. The fact that he’d been found hanging from a gate in Visby’s ring wall was enough to spark the interest of the media all over Sweden. And besides, it was a Sunday.

When Knutas and Norrby entered the room where the press conference was being held, the high level of anticipation was palpable. The reporters were seated in rows with their notepads ready on their laps. The camera people were setting up their equipment, and microphones had been affixed to the podium at the front of the room.

Knutas went over the most important information and revealed the identity of the victim. There was no reason to keep that secret. All of the family members had now been contacted, rumours had begun spreading in Visby, and flowers were piling up outside the gallery on Stora Torget.

‘Do you suspect a robbery?’

The question came from a representative of the local radio station.

‘We can’t rule out the possibility of a robbery at the moment,’ said Knutas.

‘Did the victim have anything of value in his possession? A wallet, for instance?’

Knutas gave a start. Johan Berg, of course. He and Norrby exchanged glances.

‘That kind of detail is under investigation, so I can’t go into it right now.’

‘How can you be so certain that it’s a homicide?’

‘A preliminary examination of the victim has been done, and he has sustained injuries that could not have been self-inflicted.’

‘Can you describe the injuries?’

‘No.’

‘Was a weapon used?’

‘I’m not going to answer that question either.’

‘How was he hoisted up so high in the gateway?’ asked the same aggressive reporter from the local newspaper, who had been at the crime scene. ‘You had to get help from the fire department to get the body down.’

‘We assume that we’re either dealing with more than one perpetrator or with a man who is unusually strong.’ ‘Are you looking for a body-builder?’

‘Not necessarily. Those types of guys often look much stronger than they actually are.’

Someone laughed.

‘Do you have any theories about whether the perpetrator is from Gotland or the mainland?’

‘We’re keeping that question open.’

‘If the murder didn’t result from a robbery, what do you think was the motive?’

‘It’s much too early to speculate about that. We’re working on a broad front and keeping all avenues open. Nothing can be ruled out at this early stage.’

‘What are the police doing at the moment?’

‘We’re interviewing people, knocking on doors, and going over tips that have come in. And we’re asking the public to come forward if anyone thinks he has seen or heard anything, either on the night of the murder or the day before. We think that the perpetrator may have gone to Dalman Gate to survey the area before the murder took place.’

‘Egon Wallin’s gallery had a big and well-attended opening the same day that he was killed,’ said Johan. ‘What do you think is the significance of that?’

‘We don’t know, but we’re asking everyone who attended the opening on Saturday to contact the police.’

Not much else was said. Knutas and Norrby ended the press conference and stood up to leave the room.

All the reporters immediately crowded around Knutas to get individual interviews. He tried to refer as many as possible to Norrby, who gladly dealt with one reporter after another.

Most people asked the same questions, and they didn’t vary greatly from what had been asked during the press conference.

After an hour, it was finally over and Knutas felt completely drained. He regretted offering to participate at all. Especially at such an early stage in a homicide investigation, when it was important for him to be available to his colleagues and not to journalists. Lars Norrby could just as well have handled the press conference on his own. He was the police spokesman, after all.