The Sandman

172

Saga is standing at the kitchen table drinking the strong coffee and looking at the reflections of the two candles in the double layer of glass in the window.

Joona’s so badly hurt, she thinks. He didn’t even hear her when she said Jurek was dead. He just repeated that Jurek was on his way to get Mikael.

Saga turns her weary body and feels the weight of her Glock 17 against her side, then moves away from the window and listens to the sounds of the large house.

Something makes her suddenly alert.

She takes a few steps towards the door, stops and imagines she can hear a faint metallic scraping sound.

It could be anything, a loose window ledge moving in the wind, a branch against a window.

She waits for a moment, then goes back to the table and drinks some coffee. She looks at the time, takes her phone out and calls Nils Åhlén on his mobile.

‘Nils Åhlén, Forensic Medicine Department,’ he answers after a few rings.

‘This is Saga Bauer,’ she says.

‘Good morning, good morning.’

A gust of cold air suddenly sweeps across the floor round Saga’s legs. She goes and stands with her back to the wall.

‘Have you looked at the body from the Söderleden Tunnel?’ she asks, as she sees the candlelight flicker.

‘Yes, I’m here now, they dragged me out of bed to deal with a body that...’

She sees the candle flicker again and hears Åhlén’s nasal voice echo off the tiled walls of the post-mortem room at the Karolinska Hospital.

‘The body suffered severe burns, it’s all cracked, pretty much charcoal, the heat shrivelled it up badly. The head’s missing, as well as both—’

‘But have you been able to identify him?’

‘I’ve only been here quarter of an hour, and it’s going to be several days before I can come up with any sort of reliable identification.’

‘Of course, but I was wondering—’

‘All I can say right now,’ Åhlén goes on, ‘is that this man was approximately twenty-five years old, and he’s—’

‘So it isn’t Jurek Walter?’

‘Jurek Walter? No, this... Did you think it was Jurek?’

There’s the sound of rapid footsteps upstairs. Saga looks up and sees the kitchen lamp quivering, and, caught in the candlelight, it casts a wavering shadow over the ceiling. She pulls her pistol from her holster and says in a low voice into the phone:

‘I’m at Reidar Frost’s house – you have to help me get an ambulance and police backup out here, as soon as possible.’