The Sandman

49

Carlos turns round quickly and sees Joona Linna standing in the doorway. The tall detective’s black coat is sparkling with snow.

‘Joona isn’t always right, of course,’ Carlos says. ‘But I have to admit... this time...’

‘So Joona was the only person who thought Jurek Walter had an accomplice?’ Nathan Pollock asks.

‘Well, yes...’

‘And a lot of people got very upset when he said Samuel Mendel’s family were among the victims,’ Anja says quietly.

‘True.’ Carlos nods. ‘Joona did some excellent work, no question... I’d only recently been appointed back then, and perhaps I didn’t listen to the right people, but now we know... and now we can go on to...’

He falls silent and looks at Joona, who steps into the room.

‘I’ve just come from Södermalm Hospital,’ he says curtly.

‘Have I said something wrong?’ Carlos asks.

‘No.’

‘Perhaps you think I should say something else?’ Carlos asks, looking embarrassed as he glances at the others. ‘Joona, it was thirteen years ago, a lot of water’s passed under the bridge since then...’

‘Yes.’

‘And you were absolutely right back then, as I just said.’

‘What was I right about?’ Joona asks in a quiet voice, looking at his boss.

‘What you were right about?’ Carlos repeats shrilly. ‘Everything, Joona. You were right about everything. Is that enough now? I think that’s probably enough...’

Joona smiles briefly and Carlos sits down with a sigh.

‘Mikael Kohler-Frost’s general condition is already much better, and I’ve questioned him a couple of times... Naturally, I was hoping that Mikael would be able to identify the accomplice.’

‘Maybe it’s too soon,’ Nathan says thoughtfully.

‘No... Mikael can’t give us a name, or a description... he can’t even give us a voice, but—’

‘Is he traumatised?’ Magdalena Ronander asks.

‘He’s simply never seen him,’ Joona says, meeting her gaze.

‘So we’ve got nothing at all to go on?’ Carlos whispers.

Joona steps forward and his shadow falls across the table and the room.

‘Mikael calls his kidnapper the Sandman... I asked Reidar Frost about it, and he explained that the name comes from a bedtime story the children’s mother used to tell them... The Sandman is some sort of personification of sleep; he throws sand in children’s eyes to get them to fall asleep.’

‘That’s right,’ Magdalena says with a smile. ‘And the proof that the Sandman has been there is the little gritty deposits at the corners of your eyes when you wake up.’

‘The Sandman,’ Pollock says thoughtfully, and jots something down in his black notebook.

Anja takes Joona’s phone and starts to connect it to the wireless sound system.

‘Mikael and Felicia Kohler-Frost are half-German. Roseanna Kohler moved to Sweden from Schwabach when she was eight years old,’ Joona explains.

‘That’s south of Nuremburg,’ Carlos adds.

‘The Sandman is their version of Wee Willie Winkie,’ Joona goes on. ‘And every evening before the children said their prayers she would tell them a bit more about him... Over the years she mixed up the story from her own childhood with a load of things she made up herself, and with fragments about E. T. A. Hoffmann’s barometer salesman and mechanical girls... Mikael and Felicia were only ten and eight years old, and they thought it was the Sandman who had taken them.’

The men and women seated round the table watch Anja prepare the recording of Mikael’s account. Their faces are sombre. For the first time they’re about to hear Jurek Walter’s only surviving victim talk about what happened.

‘In other words, we can’t identify the accomplice,’ Joona says. ‘Which leaves the location... If Mikael can lead us back there, then...’