ASA LARSSON ~ THE SAVAGE ALTAR (24 page)

I
t was the pastors’ secretary Ann-Gull Kyrö who answered the office telephone at the church when Rebecka rang at quarter past eight in the morning. Rebecka had just dropped the children off and was on her way back to the car. When she asked for Thomas Söderberg, she heard the woman on the other end of the phone inhale sharply.

“Unfortunately,” said Ann-Gull, “he and Gunnar Isaksson are busy with the morning service and cannot be disturbed.”

“Where’s Vesa Larsson?”

“He’s not well today, he’s not to be disturbed either.”

“Perhaps I could leave a message for Thomas Söderberg. I’d like him to ring me; the number is—”

“I’m sorry,” Ann-Gull interrupted her politely. “But during the Miracle Conference the pastors are extremely busy and won’t have time to ring people who are trying to get hold of them.”

“But if I could just explain,” said Rebecka, “I’m representing Sanna Strandgård and—”

The woman on the other end of the line interrupted her again. This time there was a certain element of sharpness beneath the polite tones.

“I know exactly who you are, Rebecka Martinsson,” she said. “But as I said, the pastors have no time during the conference.”

Rebecka clenched her hands.

“You can tell the pastors that I’m not going to disappear just because they’re ignoring me,” she said furiously. “I—”

“I have no intention of telling them anything,” Ann-Gull Kyrö interjected. “And there’s no point in threatening me. This conversation is over. Good-bye.”

Rebecka pulled out her earpiece and pushed it into her coat pocket. She had reached the car. She turned her face up to the sky and let the snowflakes land on her cheeks. After a few seconds she was wet and cold.

You bastards, she thought. I’m not about to slink away like a dog that’s afraid of being beaten. You will talk to me about Viktor. You say I’ve got nothing to threaten you with. We’ll see about that.

T
homas Söderberg lived with his wife, Maja, and their two daughters in an apartment in the middle of town, above a clothes shop. Rebecka’s footsteps echoed on the stairs as she made her way up to the top floor. Shell-colored fossils were inlaid in the brown stone. The nameplates were all made of brass, and etched in the same neat, italic script. It was the kind of silent stairwell where you can just imagine the elderly residents inside their stuffy apartments, ears pressed to the door, wondering who’s there.

Pull yourself together, Rebecka said to herself. There’s no point in wondering whether you want to do this or not. You’ve just got to get it over with. Like a visit to the dentist. Open wide and it’ll soon be over. She pressed the bell on the door marked “Söderberg.” For a split second she thought that Thomas might open the door, and suppressed the urge to turn tail and run down the stairs.

It was Maja Söderberg’s sister, Magdalena, who opened the door.

“Rebecka” was all she said. She didn’t look surprised. Rebecka got the feeling she was expected. Perhaps Thomas had asked his sister-in-law to take some time off work, and installed her as a guard dog to protect his little family. Magdalena hadn’t changed. Her hair was cut in the same practical pageboy bob as it had been ten years ago. She was wearing unfashionable jeans tucked into a pair of hand-knitted woolen kneesocks.

She’s sticking to her own special style, thought Rebecka. If there’s anyone who isn’t about to fall for the idea of dressing for success and slipping on a pair of high heels, it’s Magdalena. If she’d been born in the nineteenth century she’d have worn her well-starched nurse’s uniform all the time and paddled her own canoe along the rivers to the godforsaken villages with her super-size syringe in her bag.

“I’ve come to talk to Maja,” said Rebecka.

“I don’t think you’ve got anything to talk about,” said Magdalena, holding firmly onto the door handle with one hand and resting the other on the doorjamb so that Rebecka wouldn’t be able to get past her.

Rebecka raised her voice so that it could be heard in the flat.

“Tell Maja I want to talk to her about Victory Print. I want to give her the chance to persuade me not to go to the police.”

“Right, I’m closing the door,” said Magdalena angrily.

Rebecka placed her hand on the door frame.

“You’ll break my fingers if you do,” she said so loudly that it bounced off the walls of the stairwell. “Come on, Magdalena. See if Maja wants to talk to me. Tell her it’s about her holdings in the company.”

“I’m closing it,” said Magdalena threateningly, pulling the door back slightly as if she were going to slam it. “If your hand’s still there, you’ve only yourself to blame.”

You won’t do it, thought Rebecka. You’re a nurse.

R
ebecka sits down and flicks through a magazine. It’s from last year. It doesn’t matter. She isn’t reading it anyway. After a while the nurse who first saw her comes back and closes the door behind her. Rosita is her name.

“You’re pregnant, Rebecka,” says Rosita. “If you’ve decided to have an abortion, we need to book you in for a D & C.”

D & C. That means they’re going to scrape Johanna out of her womb.

It’s when Rebecka is on her way out that it happens. Before she manages to get past reception, she bumps into Magdalena. Magdalena stops in the corridor to say hello. Rebecka stops and returns her greeting. Magdalena asks if Rebecka is coming to choir practice on Thursday, and Rebecka looks uncomfortable, makes excuses.

Magdalena doesn’t ask what Rebecka is doing at the hospital. That’s how Rebecka realizes that Magdalena knows. It’s the things you don’t say. That’s what always gives a person away.

“L
et her in. The neighbors must be wondering what the hell’s going on.”

Maja appeared behind Magdalena. The years had etched two hard lines around the corners of her mouth. They grew even deeper as she contemplated Rebecka.

“You can keep your coat on,” said Maja. “You won’t be staying long.”

They sat down in the kitchen. It was spacious, with new white cupboards and a central island. Rebecka wondered whether the children were in school. Rakel must be in her early teens, and Anna should be at high school by now. Time had passed here too.

“Shall I make some tea?” asked Magdalena.

“No, thank you,” replied Maja.

Magdalena sank back onto her chair. Her hands moved to the cloth and brushed away nonexistent crumbs.

You poor thing, thought Rebecka, looking at Magdalena. You ought to get your own life, instead of being one of this family’s possessions.

Maja stared stonily at Rebecka.

“What do you want with me?” she asked.

“I want to ask you about Viktor,” said Rebecka. “He—”

“Just now you were standing out there showing us up in front of the neighbors and playing hell about Victory Print. What did you want to say about it?”

Rebecka took a deep breath.

“I’ll tell you what I think I know. And then you can tell me if I’m right.”

Maja snorted.

“According to the tax records I’ve seen, Victory Print has reclaimed VAT from the state,” said Rebecka. “A great deal of VAT. That indicates that considerable investments have been made in the company.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that,” snapped Maja.

Rebecka’s gaze was icy as she looked at the two sisters.

“The church of The Source of All Our Strength has informed the tax authorities that it is a nonprofit-making organization that is therefore exempt from income tax and VAT. That’s brilliant for the church, because it presumably rakes in a ton of money. The profit from the sales of books, pamphlets and videos alone must be huge. No translation costs, people do it as a service to God. No royalties to the author, at least not to Viktor, so the whole of the profit must have gone to the church.”

Rebecka paused briefly. Maja didn’t take her eyes off her. Her face was set, like a mask. Magdalena was gazing out through the window. In a tree just outside, a great tit was pecking eagerly at a bit of bacon rind. Rebecka went on:

“The only problem is that when the church is exempt from tax, it isn’t allowed to make deductions for its costs either. Nor can you reclaim VAT on those costs. So what do you do? Well, the smart solution is to set up a company and put all the costs and expenses that can give you back your VAT into that company. So when the church decides it’s a good idea to print books and pamphlets and copy videotapes itself, it sets up a trading company. The wives of the pastors are designated the owners of the company. The company buys all the necessary equipment. And it costs a lot of money. You get twenty percent of your outgoings back from the state. That’s a tidy sum in the pockets of the pastors’ families. The company sells services, printing and so on, cheaply to the church, and runs at a loss. That’s good, because then there’s no profit to be taxed. And there’s another good thing. The partners can claim up to a hundred thousand kronor each of those losses against their earned income for the first five years. I noticed that you, Maja, were paying zero tax this year and last year. Vesa Larsson’s wife and Gunnar Isaksson’s wife had minimal taxed income from employment. I think you’ve used the company’s losses to make your wages disappear, to avoid paying tax on them.”