Meet me in Malmö: The first Inspector Anita Sundström mystery (Inspector Anita Sundström mysteries) (13 page)

‘I believe they contained threats against Malin Lovgren’s life?’ Anita had hazarded.

‘I don’t know about that,’ answered Agnes. ‘I misplaced the first one. She got lots of fan mail. Stuff disappears in a busy office. There’s only me here full time.’

‘That first one. Can you remember whether it was from Afghanistan?’

‘Goodness me, yes it was,’ Agnes said in surprise. ‘How did you know?’

‘We found a connection.’

‘But I probably wouldn’t have passed it on anyway because it wasn’t properly signed. If her letters didn’t carry a full name then I censored them. A lot came in anonymously. They usually contained filth. Sexual things.’ Anita could hear Agnes shudder. ‘Very explicit, some of them. Or just creepy.’

‘And this one from Afghanistan?’

‘I can’t remember it being like that, and I probably shoved it in with the others. It only came to light when Mick mentioned the hand-delivered letters down in Malmö.’

‘But others came through your office, posted from Malmö?’

‘A couple, but they didn’t have an address on, so we couldn’t reply even if we had wanted to.’

‘And the content?’

‘Pretty harmless stuff about how much he loved Malin. Nothing sexual. But they must have changed to get Mick so wound up.’

‘Ok, many thanks, Agnes.’ Anita was about to ring off when she remembered something Nordlund had mentioned at an earlier meeting. ‘One last thing. What was the relationship like between Malin and Bengt Valquist?’

She heard Agnes snort. ‘Uneasy.’

‘”Mick’s poodle”.’

Agnes laughed. ‘How did you know that?’

‘Just came up. Were there any serious disagreements between them?’

‘Well, I shouldn’t really say this, but Malin thought Bengt was too flaky. She could never relax around him. Made her nervous on set. There was gossip…’ Anita could hear Agnes stop herself.

‘Gossip?’ Anita pressed.

‘I’m sure it wasn’t true but there was a whisper that Malin was going to push Bengt out.’

Olander came bouncing into the office, a broad grin spread across his face.

‘The first murder case I’m involved in and we get such a quick result. There’s a pretty happy bunch of people out there.’

Anita was busy fishing about in her bag, trying to locate her tin of snus. She couldn’t find it. How annoying. In her mind’s eye she could see it in the kitchen next to the microwave. Or was it by her bed? She had left the apartment so sharply this morning that she had been more disorganized than usual. And she had forgotten to book her slot in the apartment block’s laundry-room rota. She’d soon have no clean knickers.

Her frown quickly punctured Olander’s enthusiasm. ‘You don’t appear too pleased,’ he observed, taking his seat on the other side of the office.

‘Too many unanswered questions, Mats.’

‘What questions?’ said Olander, easing his legs under the desk.

‘If Mednick killed Malin, why did he place her on the sofa, then let her slide onto the floor? Why take her into the living room at all? Why, if the murder took place in the kitchen, can’t we find Mednick’s footprints and fingerprints when they are elsewhere in the apartment? They are all in the places he said he went into. Why was he wandering around in the same jacket he committed the murder in? You’d expect him to get rid of that.’

‘Yeah, but we can place him in the apartment at the right time. We’ve got him on tape. The method of killing fits his training, he had a motive of sorts – he felt rejected. Admittedly, we haven’t got the letters but they carried threats. And we found the pendant in his apartment.’

Anita wasn’t listening, as she had just had a thought.

‘And why did he try and resist arrest if he was innocent?’ continued Olander. ‘The fact that he made straight for his hidden gun shows he was expecting a police visit at some stage.’

Anita was back again. ‘He must have known we would track him down eventually. He had been in the flat. I think he was just scared because he realized we would jump to the obvious conclusions, which we have. But there’s one question we haven’t asked Mednick. We know from the tapes that he was watching the apartment for some time. If he didn’t kill Malin Lovgren, then he probably saw who did.’

Ewan stood in the car park outside the back of the polishus smoking a cigarette with a local journalist called Kurt Ekholm. He worked for
Aftonbladet
, which was a popular national tabloid. This murder was right up his street. Ekholm had been standing next to Ewan in the crowded room in what turned out to be quite a short news conference. The commissioner had said a few words of introduction. His hardly suppressed grin told its own story. Then he had introduced Chief Inspector Erik Moberg. Ewan didn’t understand a word of what the angry policeman was saying, though he wasn’t looking as happy as he should have been at that moment. All the following questions were in Swedish so Ewan had collared Ekholm afterwards to try and get information out of him, as David hadn’t been available to translate.

 ‘It is not so much,’ Ekholm said between puffs of his cigarette, which Ewan had offered him to break the ice. ‘They are arresting this fellow who is helping them with their inquiries. This fellow has a military background. They say they are not looking for any other persons. They must be thinking he is the one. He was brought to this place on last night.’

‘And you think they have got it right?’

Ekholm shrugged extravagantly. ‘Who knows with Swedish police? They not always right. Is good for newspapers,’ he said with a wry grin.

Ewan glanced round at the polishus. It was a very large, very modern building. Five storeys high with alternate sections in red brick and beige tiles. Despite the muted scheme, it was more colourful than any other police headquarters he had ever seen. It was topped off with a tangle of antennae on the roof. Due to the surrounding streets and canal, it was triangular in shape, with the entrance and car park at its base. The few gangly, leafless trees near the glass-windowed entrance did little to soften the general feeling of functionality. This was a place designed to tackle crime, not to win architectural awards. It was at its most impressive round the other side, where it stood astride the bend in the canal. It reminded Ewan of a latter-day castle or cathedral. He coined a phrase in his head, “the cathedral of crime”. He thought he would use it in his next piece, until he realized that it didn’t make any sense. He was disappointed that there had been no sign of Anita at the press conference. Was she somewhere in that mass of offices and corridors?

‘This big story in England?’ Ekholm asked.

‘No. I’m here because I work for one of the top newspapers in the north of England,’ Ewan lied to cover the embarrassment that might come out if he had to admit he was working for a second-rate magazine with a third-rate editor. ‘Newcastle, that’s where Mick Roslyn comes from.’

‘Ah, Geordie!’ Ekholm laughed.

Ewan nodded. ‘Mick Roslyn’s a Geordie boy.’

‘You know him?’

‘No.’ He could sense that Ekholm smelt an angle on his story and he wasn’t going to provide him with one.

The sun glistened off the cars. It even contained a hint of warmth. As he had assumed that Sweden would be like the Arctic, Ewan was pleasantly surprised.

‘What happens now?’

‘If the prosecutor thinks the facts is strong against this suspect, she will go in the court no longer than three days and ask for this fellow to be held. The court it must decide to keep this fellow in
häktet
or to—’

‘Sorry?’

‘
Häktet
. Like prison. Or let him go. If they say prison, the Prosecutor has after two weeks to build the case.’

 ‘Thank you. That’s really useful. Doesn’t work in quite the same way in Britain. Well, not according to the all the detective dramas on TV.’

Ekholm took a last puff of his cigarette, dropped it onto the ground and crushed the dying ember under his foot.

‘And Mick Roslyn is famous in Newcastle?’ He was fishing again.

‘No. No one has ever heard of him. Except his parents,’ Ewan joked.

Ekholm gave him a puzzled look. ‘So why are you at Malmö?’

‘I was doing a travel article when this came up. Thought I’d stay on and find out more when the murder took place. Play up the local connection.’

‘Oh, well, we like to give our visitors something special. A good murder, eh?’ Ekholm laughed at his joke. ‘It sells newspapers. It is sad that there is no sex in the story as well. That sells even more newspapers.’ He was still chortling when he left Ewan.

The duty officer unlocked the door and let Anita in. She knew she shouldn’t be there, but Moberg was busy with the commissioner after the press conference, so she had time. Halvar Mednick didn’t move. He was sitting on the wooden bed, which was attached to the wall. The only other furniture in the cell was the table, also attached to the wall under the barred window, and a chair tucked under the table. It wasn’t meant to be homely. It was a place for concentrating minds.

‘How are you?’ It was a stupid question but Anita hadn’t been quite sure how to begin. Here was a man who had been arrested for the murder of one of Sweden’s most famous personalities. Things weren’t rosy and the commissioner, the public prosecutor and Moberg all believed him to be guilty. And so would public opinion once his name appeared in the press, which it would after Sonja Blom went to the district court. When he turned his wounded gaze on her he didn’t come out with the sarcastic reply she anticipated.

‘I didn’t kill her. I told you that.’

‘So you did. It’s just that when you have a gun pressed against your head, it’s hard to take in.’ Now she was being sarcastic. Stop it. This wasn’t helpful.

Mednick flicked an imaginary object away with the toe of his shoe.

‘I was frightened.’

So was I
, screamed Anita to herself, but she didn’t say anything. She pulled the chair away from the desk and sat opposite the prisoner.

‘I need to ask you a couple of things.’

‘I’ve told them everything.’

‘I’ve got a couple of questions that they didn’t ask.’

He screwed up his face and shook his head.

‘My lawyer says I’m not to say anything without him being present.’

Anita edged her chair a little closer to the bed so that their heads weren’t far apart. She fixed his stare. ‘You told me you didn’t kill Malin. Answer these questions and I might just believe you.’

The natural mistrust in his eyes faltered for a moment. Anita knew she was falsely raising his hopes, but she didn’t have time to waste.

‘When you entered Malin Lovgren’s apartment, did you go into the kitchen?’ Anita already knew the answer.

‘I told them. I went into the reception hall or whatever you call it. Then into the living room. That’s where I found her.’ His voice trailed off.

‘Did you go into any other rooms?’

He shook his head vehemently. ‘Once she slid out of my arms onto the floor I freaked out. I just ran out. Though I think I shut the front door.’

‘But not into the kitchen?’

‘Why?’ He treated it as though it was another stupid question.

‘Ok. How long were you watching the block that night?’

‘I was there from about eight. She came back around half nine.’

‘From half eleven onwards did you see anyone entering the block?’

He thought for a moment. ‘Yes.’

Anita suppressed a growing excitement.

‘Recognize the person?’

‘Yes.’

‘And?’

‘It was the man who lives on the first floor. Gunnarsson. His name’s by the buzzers on the front. I know all the residents by sight.’

Anita couldn’t hide her disappointment. Maybe she had been clutching at corroborative straws. If no one had entered, then possibly Moberg was right. She stood up and put the chair back in its place.

‘As a matter of interest, why did you go into the apartment?’

‘I just needed to talk to her. Tell her how I felt. Tell her that I cared and that I was here to look after her, which is more than her husband did.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘He was never there. He was married to the most fantastic woman in the world and he was always pissing off.’ She looked at the crushed human being in front of her and wondered what mental torments he was putting himself through. The psychiatrists would have a field day with this one. Put together a celebrity fixation with an anti-Muslim complex and throw in God-knows-what sort of hideous childhood experiences, and he could expect to enjoy years of expensive therapy at the taxpayers’ expense.

She knocked on the glass pane of the cell door to attract the attention of the duty officer. She felt pity for Mednick. He had probably been fine until his spell in Afghanistan. At least he’d come back alive, which was more than an increasing number of British and American soldiers were able to do. The key rattled in the lock and the door swung open.

‘There was something.’

Anita turned quickly. Mednick was rubbing his temple with the fingers of his right hand as though he was trying to squeeze out a memory.

‘I went and got a kebab. It was the only time I wasn’t watching the apartment. It was when I was coming back. The entrance door. I’m sure it was swinging back into place. Yes, it was.’

‘So you didn’t see anybody actually go in?’

‘They certainly can’t have been coming out. I would have seen them.’

At last, something to go at. They had checked all the comings and goings of the other residents and their visitors that night. No one had come in after Gunnarsson at 11.35, according to the reports she had gone through before coming down to the cells.

‘I assumed it was someone visiting one of the other apartments,’ continued Mednick, who had stopped toying with his temple.

‘And the time?’

‘About twenty to twelve.’

‘And did anybody come out before you went in?’

‘No.’

So, whoever went in at twenty to twelve was still in the building when Mednick discovered the body. Had that person heard Mednick come in? Were they still in the apartment all the time? Or skulking on the stairs? If that were the case, then they were dealing with a cool customer. Maybe the Säpo theory wasn’t a figment of Roslyn’s creative imagination after all.