Midnight In Malmö: The Fourth Inspector Anita Sundström Mystery (The Malmö Mysteries Book 4) (10 page)

‘I hope you’re right.’

Hakim glanced out of the window. Below him, beneath the scudding clouds the plane was descending through, was the choppy expanse of Lac Léman. He was slightly disorientated, and it took him a few seconds to work out which side of the lake the city of Geneva was on. Throughout the flight, his nervousness had increased as the realization dawned on him that he had never been abroad by himself before. His only trips out of Sweden had been with the family to Denmark and Germany, and, when he was younger, a visit to his mother’s brother on the outskirts of Paris. The brother had long since died, and they had lost contact with that branch of the family. Of course, his father had reminisced last night about his own visits to Switzerland in the 1960s, when he had been a successful art dealer in Baghdad, and it had been a centre of westernized culture. Switzerland had been a good place in which to buy and sell paintings. Uday had even come across the odd famous film star, like David Niven, who was a collector of art. Hakim had never heard of Niven. But Uday’s globetrotting days had been ended by a Saddam Hussein regime that distrusted the intellectual elite, and his comfortable lifestyle was to be replaced by a very different one in Sweden. For his new country’s hospitality, Uday Mirza had always been grateful, even though a climate of mistrust and hostility had seeped in over recent years. But he was proud that Hakim was an upright Swedish citizen, even if his natural distrust of the police – a result of years of harassment in Iraq – had prejudiced him against the path his son had chosen.

At passport control, Hakim was left standing while the official took an inordinately long time to scrutinize his document. It was when Hakim flashed his warrant card that his passport was reluctantly handed back and he was unsmilingly waved through. He headed through the airport, making his way past smart shop units and down an escalator to the subterranean train station. The train that was waiting was stiflingly hot despite the drizzly day and, to his surprise, left five minutes late. What had happened to the renowned Swiss efficiency?

Ten minutes later, the train stopped in Geneva, and many passengers disgorged to be replaced by businessmen, shoppers and students. The rest of the journey picturesquely followed the lakeshore. The rich, fertile belt of land between the lake and the foothills of the Jura Mountains was heavily influenced by man. Domestic dwellings, both grand and lowly, and industrial units squeezed themselves between neat fields with grazing cows and early-growing ranks of vines. The train stopped at small towns, many of which must have been developed in recent years, judging by the modern buildings. From what Uday had described of his visits, Hakim thought his father wouldn’t recognize the countryside. In his day, it had been almost totally agricultural between Geneva and Lausanne. But the stunning view on the other side of Lac Léman would have been the same; the Alps rose dramatically from the water’s edge and disappeared into the mists that camouflaged the peaks.

After Morges, it was only minutes to Lausanne. Hakim had his appointment at the Prefecture at four. That gave him an hour and a half. He would find his
pension
and drop his cabin bag, wash, and then make his way to see Inspector Boniface. The
pension
must be near the station, as the address was Avenue de la Gare. From his map, the Prefecture appeared to be fairly central, so it should be an easy walk. Once he came out of the grand, early 20th-century Gare de Voyagers, Hakim ruefully discovered that the Avenue de la Gare was on a very long upward slope, and his hotel was near the top. At first, he couldn’t find it, before he realized that some of the side streets were also part of the Avenue. The
pension
was in a tall, French-looking building that had seen better days. Probably built around the time the station was constructed. His room was very basic, but it had a basin in which he doused his face, and he also changed his shirt. It was somewhere to lay his head, and it was the best that the Skäne County Police were willing to fork out for.

Forty-five minutes had seemed to be plenty of time to reach the Prefecture in the Place du Château, according to the more detailed town plan he had picked up from the tourist office at the station. What the map didn’t tell him was that Lausanne is built on a hill; a very steep one. He set off in good spirits, but his progress became slower, the higher he went. He knew that he must make for the cathedral. He thought he was there when he reached the Eglise Saint-François. But it was onwards and upwards; past the Place de la Palud, and onto the atmospheric covered wooden staircases that eventually took him to the cathedral. He was out of breath when he arrived at the top, and he stood for a moment in the small square under the impressive medieval edifice. He leant against the low wall that skirted one side of the square and allowed himself time to take in the spectacular panorama across the town’s rooftops below, and over Lac Léman to the mountains on the French side of the lake. The mist had cleared and the sun was glinting off the water. It was a view which he didn’t have long to admire. He was almost running late. Fortunately, the terrain now levelled out, and the Place du Château was only a few minutes’ walk. The castle, an unshakeable massive rectangle of stone and brick, sported a round turret at each corner. Opposite was the Prefecture, which looked rather like a château itself of the more elegant French variety. The yellow parking spaces outside with ‘police’ written on them gave Hakim the clue he was looking for. Yet the building wasn’t his idea of a police headquarters, as it seemed to contain a number of other civic departments. The mystery was soon explained when he was ushered into a high-ceilinged office fifteen minutes later to meet Inspector Boniface.

Boniface was a dark-haired, dapper man, with a pencil-thin moustache which made him look like a 1930s matinee idol. His handshake was firm and his smile easy. He apologized for keeping Hakim waiting, but he was in the Prefecture for a meeting. Having quickly established that English was the language of communication, he explained that this was the gendarmerie and was responsible for security and traffic, while he was a member of the Sûreté. They dealt with criminal matters. Each of the twenty-six cantons in Switzerland have their own police departments – in the German-speaking ones they are divided into three. In Basel it is different again. He shrugged. ‘I know it is most confusing. It is even more complicated than I have said; but this is Switzerland,’ he added with an apologetic smile. ‘And it was easier to meet in the centre of Lausanne, as the Sûreté is out beyond the motorway.’ Glancing at his watch: ‘And it is nearly five, and I have a home to go to.’

Hakim was slightly taken aback, and then he smiled as he remembered the recent story of the hijacked Ethiopian aeroplane that had landed in Geneva. The Swiss Air Force hadn’t been able to guide it in because it was out of office hours, and the French had had to do it instead.

Boniface opened a slim file.

‘As you can see, we do not have much on Julia Akerman.’

‘Neither do we. She doesn’t seem to exist in Sweden.’

Boniface glanced at a couple of sheets of paper. ‘She arrived here in November, 2009. She bought an apartment in La Sarraz in July, 2010.’ Hakim noticed that he didn’t pronounce the “z” in Sarraz. ‘She is not a Swiss citizen, so she is really your problem, not ours. And as she was killed in your country, we can only offer help.’

‘I understand. But we are not totally sure that she is even Swedish, despite her passport. Do you know what she did?’

Boniface made a great play of scrutinizing the file.

‘Businesswoman. Or should that be business person?’

‘In what?’

‘We have no idea. It is not the Swiss way to probe too deeply. She has enough to buy an expensive apartment, she pays her taxes; and keeps her head away from the view, I think they say in English. We respect the privacy of those who live here, unless they are undesirable. People come here for many reasons. Work. Or to avoid high taxes in their own countries. Switzerland is full of the famous who want to protect their wealth,’ he said with undisguised distaste. ‘Or they come to escape their pasts.’

‘Was she married or had a family?’

Inspector Boniface shrugged again. ‘There is no sign of a husband in the records. It does not mean that she did not have a partner somewhere.’

‘If we could discover what she did, we might find a reason for her murder. At the moment, we have nothing to go on.’

‘I am afraid I cannot help other than her car was found at Geneva airport. That was bought from a Mercedes dealer in Lausanne last year.’ He glanced at another piece of paper in the file. ‘She made regular trips around Europe in the last few months. According to this, none to Sweden.’

‘She would have flown to Copenhagen. Malmö is just the other side of the Öresund Bridge. Fifteen minutes by train.’

‘Ah, that explains it. Yes. Copenhagen most months. You can have a copy of this, of course.’

‘Thank you.’

‘There was nothing in the car that puts a light on her and her activities. But I believe you have a key for her home, so you should be able to uncover many things. Tomorrow, you can take the train to La Sarraz. It only takes about twenty minutes. There you will be met by one of the local gendarmerie. He will show you where the apartment is situated. I am told he has a little English.’

‘Maybe he can talk to the neighbours for me. Find out more about Julia Akerman.’

Boniface gave Hakim a pitying grin.

‘You may find that they will not have much to say. The villages of the Vaud are very close. They do not welcome strangers, and this lady of yours was from outside. To tell the truth, they often do not like the people from the next village. There are many feuds. You may not get much information. I think your eyes will be a better guide.’

Boniface looked up the train times and made a quick call to arrange for the policeman to meet Hakim at the station – ‘He is called Lacaze.’ That concluded the meeting. Boniface walked Hakim out of the building.

‘Have a pleasant evening. Lausanne is a wonderful city. Oh, and if you do find anything tomorrow, you will tell me, will you not? I would not like you to remove things like computers. That sort of thing might be useful for us.’ The smile returned. ‘Can you find your way back to the Metro station?’

‘You mean there is a station?’

Boniface’s face creased into a wide grin. ‘It would have saved you a steep climb, no?
Bonsoir
.’

Hakim retraced his steps to the cathedral. Now he had more time to appreciate the view. He concentrated on the Alpine ridges on the other side of the lake. He had never before been this close to such huge mountains. Skåne was basically flat, and he had never been beyond Stockholm, so he hadn’t seen Sweden’s own higher ranges in the north. On the train from Geneva, he had had a slightly uncomfortable feeling of claustrophobia, being hemmed in by the mountains on both sides of Lac Léman. Up on the cathedral promontory, it wasn’t so bad. He wondered how people could live in the shadow of such colossi, however magnificent they may be.

He made his way down the stairs until he saw a little restaurant nestling under a high wall supporting the road above. Inside it was cosy, and had an Italian menu. He ordered a tuna salad and a coffee. Nothing extravagant. He had noticed the steep prices, and he didn’t want to run up huge expenses that he would have to justify when he got back to Malmö. The rain had started again. He stared out of the window, watching the office workers and tourists coming down the steps. The music in the restaurant was too loud, and he tried to shut it out by thinking about Julia Akerman. What had brought her to this land-locked country in the middle of Europe? Was it work? Was it to avoid punitive Swedish taxes? Or, as one of Boniface’s suggestions had been, was she escaping from her past? There was so much to speculate about. From Boniface’s sketchy facts, she didn’t appear to have a husband or a family. A boyfriend in Switzerland? That was unlikely, as she had had sex the day she died. Or was he just being naïve? He hadn’t had enough experience of women to know. He had concentrated so hard on carving out a career, that girlfriends hadn’t really featured in his life, a fact that Jazmin constantly reminded him of.

But what of Julia Akerman? Was she Julia Akerman? Maybe he would find out tomorrow.

The weather had turned, and the sun greeted Hakim as he walked down the slope to the station. This time he was less hurried, and he could appreciate the imposing exterior and atrium. Hakim had always been a fan of Art Nouveau, and the refined ornamentation on the façade immediately took his eye. He hadn’t really noticed the interior the previous day, but now, as he looked for his platform, he admired the long window bays bringing in abundant light. He quickened his step; his train was leaving in five minutes.

The train passed through dull suburbs of featureless apartment blocks and yet more industrial units. He was surprised at the amount of graffiti on show. It didn’t fit with his image of an ordered country of green Alpine slopes, contented cows and beautiful wooden chalets. Mind you, Malmö probably didn’t fit with people’s ideas of Sweden. After Bussigny, lush forests dominated the landscape, to be replaced by open fields. La Sarraz station consisted of a small building on one side of the track. As Hakim alighted from the train, the noise of roadworks greeted him, and only one other passenger disembarked at nearly ten o’clock that morning. A stout, pot-bellied, uniformed police officer was hanging around in front of the automatic ticket machine. His expression of disbelief was plain.

‘You cop? You Swedish cop?’ The voice was incredulous. Instead of a tall, blond Swede, he would be chaperoning a tall, dark Arab. What was the world coming to?

‘Yes, I am Detective Hakim Mirza.’

Another Gallic shrug.

‘Follow me.’

Hakim walked behind Lacaze to a waiting car.

‘We go long way. Roadworks,’ he said pointing down a street that bordered onto fields and a distant sports ground.

The car went up a hill into the centre of the village. Not that Hakim thought that “village” was an accurate description. More like a small town. It had a large castle looming above the main street onto which, hugger-mugger, spilled shops and houses of every era and style. Within minutes they had reached the edge of La Sarraz, and now the buildings began to look exclusive. There was a curious mix of old French houses and modern Swiss chalets, but they all looked expensive. Lacaze turned the car off the side road through a gateless gateway and up a tree-lined drive. At the top, surrounded by a swathe of tamed, neat lawns and a polychrome of wild-flower meadows, stood a large, graceful building in the typical style of a French manor house. It had a hipped roof, stuccoed white walls with cream quoin stones, and each window was flanked by open shutters. They drove round to the back of the house and came to a halt next to a couple of top-of-the-range cars on the gravelled parking area. This definitely wasn’t a cheap place to live. At the back, there were two access doors under a portico supporting a balcony.