The Sandman

63

Wet snow has started to fall outside the borrowed flat on Tantogatan. As the flakes hit the windows they make a clicking sound. On the pale wooden bookshelf there’s a framed photograph of a family in a pool. The dad’s nose is red with sunburn and the two children are laughing as they hold up inflatable crocodiles.

‘To start with, we’ve got very little time indeed,’ Nathan Pollock says.

‘We don’t even know if Felicia is alive,’ Carlos says, and starts tapping the table with his pen. ‘But if she is, it’s extremely likely that she’s suffering from Legionnaires’ disease.’

‘So we may have a week or so,’ Pollock says.

‘But the worst-case scenario is that she’s already been abandoned,’ Joona says, unable to conceal the anxiety in his voice.

‘What do you mean?’ Saga asks. ‘She’s survived more than ten years, and—’

‘Yes,’ Verner interrupts, ‘but one possible explanation for why Mikael was able to escape is that Jurek’s accomplice is ill, or—’

‘He could have died, or he might just have taken off,’ Carlos says.

‘We aren’t going to make it in time,’ Saga whispers.

‘We have to,’ Carlos says quickly.

‘If Felicia doesn’t have access to water, there’s nothing we can do, she’ll die today or tomorrow,’ Pollock says. ‘If she’s as ill as Mikael, she probably won’t survive more than another week, but at least that gives us a chance... there’s a hypothetical possibility, even if the odds are very low.’

‘If she’s only having to go without food, we may have three or four weeks,’ Verner says.

‘We’ve so little to go on,’ Joona says. ‘We don’t know if the accomplice is carrying on as if nothing’s happened, or if he’s buried Felicia alive.’

‘He may be thinking of keeping her in the capsule for another twenty years,’ Carlos says in an unsteady voice.

‘All we know is that she was still alive when Mikael escaped,’ Joona goes on.

‘I can’t bear this,’ Carlos says, getting to his feet. ‘I just want to scream when I think—’

‘We haven’t got time for tears at the moment,’ Verner interrupts.

‘All I’m trying to say is—’

‘I know, I feel the same,’ Verner says, raising his voice. ‘But in just over an hour the Prison Service Committee will hold an extraordinary meeting to take the formal decision to move patients to the secure unit at Löwenströmska, so—’

‘I don’t even know what I’m supposed to be doing,’ Saga says.

‘By then we need to have your new identity finished,’ Verner goes on, holding a calming hand towards Saga. ‘We need to have your medical history sorted, and the forensic psychology report; the District Court judgment will have to be added to the National Judiciary Administration database, and your temporary transfer to Karsudden needs to be organised.’

‘We’d better get a move on,’ Pollock says.

‘But Saga wants to know what the mission is,’ Joona says.

‘It’s just that it’s bloody difficult for me to... I mean, how can I have an opinion about what you’re discussing if I don’t even know what’s expected of me?’ Saga says.

Pollock holds a plastic folder up to her.

‘On your first day you need to place a tiny microphone in the dayroom, with a fibre-optic receiver and transmitter,’ Verner says.

Pollock gives her the folder containing the microphone.

‘Smuggled in up my backside?’ she asks.

‘No, they’re bound to carry out a full body-cavity search,’ Verner replies.

‘You need to swallow it, then vomit it back up before it reaches your duodenum... and then swallow it again,’ Pollock explains.

‘Never leave it longer than four hours,’ Verner says.

‘And I carry on doing this until I manage to place it in the dayroom,’ Saga says.

‘We’re going to have people positioned in a van who’ll be listening to everything in real time,’ Pollock says.

‘OK, I get that bit,’ Saga says. ‘But giving me a District Court conviction, a whole load of psychiatric evaluations and all that—’

‘We need that because—’

‘Let me finish,’ she interrupts. ‘I get it... I’ll have a coherent background, I’ll be in the right place, and I’ll plant the microphone, but...’

The look in her eyes is hard and her lips are pale as she looks at each of them in turn:

‘But why the hell... Why would Jurek Walter tell me anything?’