Murder in Malmö: The second Inspector Anita Sundström mystery (Inspector Anita Sundström mysteries) (20 page)

It was mid-afternoon, and Anita was beginning to feel tired as she headed along the side of the canal. She had been awake since the early hours and so much had happened since. She had decided, with Nordlund’s approval, that they would try and do some more background checks before they presented their information to Moberg. They had to be pretty sure of their ground, because he was unlikely to be receptive to anything that involved Dag Wollstad. But now there was the possibility that the industrialist might be a possible target. And who were the other two people on the list? Maybe they were targets too. Her first port of call was going to be Stig Gabrielsson. He was a short cut to finding out more about Serneholt. Gabrielsson certainly knew Serneholt, and he might have information that wasn’t generally known about the playboy art collector. They disliked each other enough for Gabrielsson to have some dirt on his rival. And she also wanted to ask Gabrielsson a question that she had forgotten to put to him before – where had he got the fake Pelle Munk painting from?

When she arrived at Gabrielsson’s gallery, the assistant was locking up. This seemed odd, as it was only around three on a Friday afternoon.

‘You’re finishing early,’ Anita remarked.

The assistant almost jumped when she heard Anita’s voice. The glacial poise had melted away.

‘Stig’s instructions.’

‘And where is the delightful Stig?’

‘I don’t know.’ The woman was flustered.

‘You don’t know. So how do you know what his instructions are?’

The assistant dropped the gallery keys on the floor. She hurriedly retrieved them and stuffed them into her bag.

‘He told me before he left.’

‘Left for where?’

‘I’ve said I don’t know. That’s the truth. He said I was to close up early on Friday and keep the gallery closed until he returned.’

‘And when will that be?’

‘He didn’t say.’

‘So when did he tell you about closing the gallery?’

‘Two days ago. Right after your visit here. Whatever you said to him, he was really shaken. He was all over the place for a while. Then he suddenly announced he had to make another trip abroad. I asked him where, but he said he’d be out of contact for a few days. Then he left his instructions and off he went. He didn’t want to hang around.’

This was a surprise. Anita couldn’t understand Gabrielsson doing a runner. Why? He wasn’t a suspect, thanks to his alibi. Yet his behaviour made him appear guilty.

‘What’s your name?’

‘Inga.’

‘Inga, get your keys out and unlock the door. I want a look around.’

‘I’ll ask you again. What did you vote in the last election?’

Nilsson turned to his lawyer.

‘My client has already said that he voted for the Moderate Party.’

‘I think Fredrik Reinfeldt is doing a good job and deserved a second term,’ added Nilsson to justify the reason for his choice. ‘And Anders Borg seems to have a firm grip on the country’s financial situation, despite these difficult times for Europe.’

Trust a bloody accountant to bring up the Finance Minister. How could you take a senior politician with a ponytail seriously? Westermark thought that this line of questioning was an utter waste of time. But Moberg had told him in no uncertain terms that this is what he must do. It was all because that crazy bitch Sundström and old man Nordlund had come up with some cockeyed idea that there was possibly a political angle to the killings. He hated politics at the best of times and had never bothered to vote. Anyone standing for the “Rise in Salary for Public Servants” party may have conquered his apathy. Money played a big part in Westermark’s raison d’être. His lifestyle wasn’t easy to finance on his existing wages and he always had an eye on the next rung on the ladder, even if it meant pushing someone else off in order to reach it. Yet pissing around asking tomfool questions wasn’t going to lead to greater things. He had been the one to connect Ekman and Olofsson. Though he was convinced their murders were linked, he had been having doubts about Nilsson’s involvement. What he didn’t want was Anita Sundström charging in with a totally new connection between the crimes – and bringing in the Serneholt affair too. There was no way that he would let her steal his thunder. And if the cow hadn’t kept the bishop’s DVD from him, he could have scuttled this stupid right-wing idea before it was even floated. Now Moberg had to pay lip service to it to cover his back, though he agreed with the boss that they were clutching at straws. Also, like the chief inspector, he thought that the Serneholt murder was a totally separate business, and was plainly to do with those god-awful paintings.

‘So, you swing to the right?’ he asked wearily

‘I would say more a liberal conservative.’ Nilsson sounded more like his old confident self. He was on safer ground.

‘But you sympathize with the Sweden Democrats?’

‘I do not, Inspector. They’re so far to the right that they wouldn’t have let Milena Tadić into the country.’

‘Right, so what about Tommy Ekman? What were his views on immigrants or Jews or whatever?’

Nilsson ran a hand through his non-existent hair. ‘I don’t think we ever really discussed politics or immigration issues. He once made a very off-colour joke about a Norwegian.’

‘We all do that.’

This was hopeless. The interview was only making him hate Anita Sundström even more. He had felt humiliated when she had walked away from the bar the night before. He had been so sure that he had ensnared her, only to see her wriggle free. Did he believe her story? He did remember the discussion about Strachan and Roslyn and a girl falling off some tower in England during the Lovgren investigation. Yet he was sure that she still loved the bastard. Maybe he would look into the tower story. Could Strachan be guilty of a second murder? The thought cheered him up.

‘Interview terminated 4.37.’

Anita returned to the office, somewhat perplexed. The search of Gabrielsson’s gallery hadn’t yielded any new information, other than that he had a lot of scalpels. There was no sign of the fake Pelle Munk painting and Inga said that she knew nothing about it. According to her, they hadn’t had a Munk painting in the gallery for a couple of years. Yet Gabrielsson had disappeared within hours of her informing him of Serneholt’s murder. She had to admit that he had appeared shaken by the news when she delivered it. What did he know that made him so frightened?

Nordlund and Hakim had been busy on the phones, but had little to report. Nordlund had spoken to an old journalistic contact on
Sydsvenskan
who knew nothing of anything called “The November 6
^th
Group”. He had also spoken to Stockholm, and they had no such group on their radar either. The trouble was that they needed someone who was on the list that was still alive. Moberg wouldn’t countenance them approaching Dag Wollsad without a cast-iron reason. Maybe they were barking up the wrong tree. The initials, other than Ingvar Serneholt’s, might belong to other people entirely. The only nugget of information they had dug up that afternoon was the whereabouts of Bishop Green. He was safely back in Argentina.

There seemed nothing more to be achieved, and they decided that they would come in on Saturday morning and have a recap session and tackle Moberg on Monday.

Klara Wallen got back into her car. She was looking forward to tonight. She was going on a night out with some the other girls from the polishus. “Girls” was a misnomer - more women of a “certain age”. A meal, a couple of bars and maybe a club, if she didn’t have to come in first thing in the morning. She had mentioned it to Anita, but she never came out with them these days. Anita could be fun when she let her hair down. They had shared some good nights out in the past. But Anita had changed. Wallen knew that she was having counselling because of the Roslyn shooting, and understood her reticence to mix socially with the other women at headquarters. Wallen admired Anita. Especially the way she seemed able to hold her own in the presence of Moberg and Westermark. Anita had an inner strength that she didn’t possess. It was always Anita she turned to when the strain got too much. Anita had comforted her a number of times when she had retreated into the toilets in tears. Strangely, she wasn’t sure whether she really liked her. But as a colleague, she was supportive. Wallen dreaded having to work too closely with Moberg or Westermark. She had been relieved when she had been assigned to the task of trying to find witnesses on the night of the Serneholt murder. The team’s first house-to-house – more like mansion-to-mansion – had been unsuccessful. She had had to repeat the process because there had been a couple of houses where there had been no reply when they called the first time. She was glad she had come back. Persistence often paid off.

Wallen flicked through her mobile address list and found Anita’s number. She called.

‘Hi, Anita. Klara here. I’ve just spoken to someone who says he saw a jogger here a couple of times. The last time was on the night of the murder, about eleven. The light wasn’t good and the jogger had his hood up so he couldn’t describe him. But the witness said the jogger definitely had a small backpack. Black, he thought. Given the height and build, and the backpack, he could be the same one that was reported around Olofsson’s. Oh, and one odd thing. The jogger wore gloves. My witness thought it strange on a warm evening.’

The Saturday morning meeting, involving Anita, Nordlund, Hakim and a hung-over Wallen, was a rehearsal for putting the case across to Moberg on Monday. They felt there were definite connections between all three murders, and they had to be convincing. Firstly, there were the Gustav Adolf associations. Their main piece of evidence was now Serneholt’s list with the initials. Moberg hadn’t seen this, so it was important that he wasn’t given the opportunity to dismiss it. It was the only concrete thing they had that appeared to link Ekman, Olofsson and Serneholt – and possibly Dag Wollstad. The nagging doubt was that the initials may not belong to the people they had in mind. They needed corroboration. Wollstad couldn’t be approached at the moment, so who were the other two –
AG
and
LP
? And of course, the list may be no big deal - it could just be some rich man’s club and nothing suspicious at all. But, if they were right, then three of them were dead and that’s got to be more than coincidence.

‘What we need to try and establish is what the four men we think we know are on the list were doing on day of the meeting, April 16
^th
,’ suggested Anita. ‘What day in the week was that?’

‘Saturday,’ said Hakim.

‘That’ll be harder because their movements are unlikely to be in their business diaries. At least we can check and confirm whether they could have been together or not on that day.’

Then there was Nordlund’s theory that the murders could have been politically motivated – the methods used fitted in with Nazi concentration camp killings. Certainly the first two – Serneholt’s was far more tenuous. The problem with this angle was whether the three murdered men followed far right-wing ideologies. The Bishop Green DVD was filmed at Serneholt’s and turned up in Olofsson’s briefcase. That would indicate that both men shared the bishop’s views. Yet Anita’s talk with Olofsson’s neighbour at Vik made plain that Carolina Olofsson was an ardent Social Democrat and that Martin wasn’t really into politics. Westermark had reported back that Nilsson had no idea about Ekman’s political views. Information gleaned before Nilsson was released. Prosecutor Blom reckoned they hadn’t enough to hold him any longer for the murders, though it seemed likely that charges would eventually be brought for embezzlement. Moberg had not been a happy man.

‘What do we know about Serneholt’s views?’

‘I’ve done some digging into the family history, and there’s a strong German wartime link,’ said Hakim.

‘Fire away.’

Hakim produced some pages he had run off the internet, and other notes that he had assembled into a neat file. He was certainly thorough.

‘The money he inherited came mainly from his mother. Ingvar Serneholt’s father worked for Swedish Match and ended high up in the company by the time he retired.’ Hakim glanced up from his notes. ‘You probably know all about Ivar Kreuger’s matchmaking empire?’

Though Anita did, she wanted to allow Hakim the chance of explaining his findings without interruption.

‘Fill us in.’

‘To cut a long story short, by 1924 his companies were producing 70% of the world’s matches. There were factories in thirty-four countries. Kreuger became so rich that he was giving loans to prop up entire national economies. In gratitude, countries would grant him match monopolies in return. Eventually, it turned out that he was cooking the books and was found out by the Wall Street Crash. After a last failed throw of the dice, he shot himself in a Paris hotel in 1932. Though his empire collapsed, Swedish Match still had factories and monopolies all over the world, but especially in places like Eastern Europe.’

Hakim shuffled his papers before continuing.

‘The company was taken over by the Wallenberg family. Then the Second World War came along and the Germans marched through Europe. Thanks to Kreuger’s monopoly contracts, Swedish Match had exclusive rights to produce and sell matches in Germany, Poland, Romania, Hungary, Yugoslavia and the three Baltic States. Suddenly they were all under German occupation or were on Germany’s side. Swedish Match stood to lose a fortune if the Germans decided to confiscate their holdings or alter the terms of the monopoly agreements. In the early 1940s, the agreement with Poland was worth twenty-nine million dollars alone. Fortunately for Swedish Match, the Germans allowed the agreements to remain intact. That is until the arrest of the “Warsaw Swedes”.

‘I’ve heard of them,’ said Nordlund, who was engrossed in Hakim’s research.

‘Well, I haven’t,’ announced Anita. ‘Please enlighten us.’ She gave Hakim an encouraging nod.

‘Obviously there were a number of Swedes working in the occupied territories. A group of seven Swedish businessmen in Warsaw joined the Polish underground and became the vital link with the Polish government in exile in London. Some of the seven were Swedish Match employees. They were betrayed and arrested by the Gestapo in 1942. The businessmen’s activities put Swedish Match’s European commercial interests in serious jeopardy. The seven appeared before the German High Court in 1943 and four were sentenced to death. A fifth was given life imprisonment, while the other two were acquitted but remained in custody.’

‘It’s fascinating, Hakim,’ Anita interrupted, ‘but what’s the relevance to Ingvar Serneholt?’

Hakim raised his hand in annoyance. ‘I was just coming to that. The Germans didn’t carry out the sentences, but used the “Warsaw Swedes” as bargaining chips. The SS negotiated directly with Swedish Match. Serneholt’s father was part of that team because he was a director of operations in Nazi Germany at the time. He dealt with Walter Schellenberg, Himmler’s Chief of Intelligence and was the go-between with the Nazis and the Wallenberg family. After the war, he ended up marrying a wealthy woman with a Wallenberg connection. Anyhow, it’s believed that these negotiations led to various Swedish concessions, such as the export of ball bearings, which helped the German war effort. Used in tanks and other weapons and machinery. Later, as the war went against the Nazis, Himmler used the neutral Swedish connection to try and broker a peace deal with the Allies. These allegations are unproven, but the men in Gestapo custody were released over a couple of years.’ Hakim paused. ‘That’s it.’

‘An interesting story,’ said Nordlund after a short silence. ‘However, it doesn’t make Ingvar Serneholt a Nazi sympathizer. Or his father, for that matter.’

‘No. But his father lived and worked in Nazi Germany. He’d be exposed to the Nazi regime. He could have ended up having Nazi sympathies. I understand a lot of Swedes did at that time.’

‘Not our most glorious period,’ opined Nordlund.

‘Serneholt senior – he was called Ingvar too - mixed with some dubious characters. He may have passed on his ideas to his son. After all, his son obviously allowed a Holocaust denier to air his views on film in his house.’

‘Well done, Hakim.’ Anita was taken by the young man’s confidence in putting across his information and expressing his views. ‘It certainly is suggestive. And it’s these ideas that could have resulted in his murder. Our problem is to link it with the other two. And even if the men are connected ideologically, we have no idea who would have an obvious motive for killing them.’

‘More to the point, if they are in this “November 6th Group”, what is it they’re doing that makes someone want to kill them?’ Nordlund was right as usual, thought Anita.

Hakim pointed to the Bishop Green DVD that Anita had brought into the meeting. ‘The priest was inciting a war against incomers to Sweden, including the Jews. Should we be looking at the activity against ethnic groups in Malmö?’

‘That makes sense,’ answered Anita. ‘We’ve already got the “Malmö Marksman” gunning down immigrants. Remember, there have also been numerous well-publicised attacks against the Jewish community. They’ve even made the foreign press, and I read that the Simon Wiesenthal centre in America has asked Jews to exercise “extreme caution” when travelling in southern Sweden. The attacks have been blamed on Muslims, but they’ve been attacked themselves. And don’t forget the Bosnians and Serbs, who’ve been having their own turf wars. It’s turning into quite a melting pot. Worth looking at, because potential suspects could emerge from any of these groups. If that’s the case, the question is, how could they have found out about this obscure group if none of our contacts have ever heard of it?’

‘We’ve got the jogger with the black backpack,’ piped up Wallen, who had been drinking from a large bottle of water throughout the meeting. ‘I know we haven’t got a sighting on the actual night of Olofsson’s murder, but he was definitely about at the time of Serneholt’s killing. And wearing gloves on a warm evening.’

‘Yes. That’s interesting. We’re pretty sure a car was at Serneholt’s until quarter past eleven. Maybe the driver wasn’t the killer and the jogger went in afterwards. As with the DVD, the jogger could link Olofsson’s murder with Serneholt’s. And we know Olofsson had various business links to Ekman, but there’s nothing to connect Ekman to Serneholt, unless it’s the list. As for Gabrielsson’s disappearance, I don’t know where that fits in. OK,’ concluded Anita decisively, ‘we’ll present all our evidence and theories to the chief inspector on Monday morning and see what he has to say. Enjoy what’s left of your weekend.’

The drive over to Vik on Sunday morning was wet. It was the heaviest rain that there had been for weeks. The windscreen wipers on Anita’s car found it difficult to cope with the deluge and the constant spray from the vehicles going in the other direction. The weather matched her mood. She was sure that they were on the right track, though she was unsure of what Moberg would make of it. He was still convinced that Nilsson was their man. If he was right, then the Serneholt murder wasn’t connected. Maybe the bishop’s DVD was a red herring and that Nordlund’s gassing theory was just that – a theory. The more she thought about things, the more she began to doubt herself. And she knew that Westermark would do everything he could to torpedo her ideas. She wasn’t looking forward to Monday morning.

The rain had eased by the time she arrived in Vik. She parked her car and walked to Olofsson’s weekend cottage. She knew Carolina would be there because she had phoned ahead. Anita had hoped that she would be back in Malmö and that it would save her a journey. But Carolina hadn’t gone back to their Vikingagatan home since Anita had interviewed her with her daughter. Anita could understand why.

Carolina let Anita in and had some coffee ready in a thermos. Anita could see that she was still traumatized by the loss of her husband. She was distant and lapsed into periods of deep thought before politely answering Anita’s questions. Yes, Martin had gone off on April 16
^th
to play golf as usual. No, he wasn’t into politics and let her get on with her Social Democratic canvassing.

‘Did he ever express any right-wing political opinions? Or have, say, any thoughts on the number of immigrants in Sweden?’

The question had brought Carolina out of her trance. ‘Not that I can remember. If he had, he would have had an argument on his hands.’ She glanced down to her wedding ring. ‘I think that’s why we got on so well. I had my causes, and he was relaxed about them. His life revolved around his work, his golf and his family.’

Anita finished off her coffee and set it down on the table. The room had a number of family photographs, including some of Martin by himself. She wondered if these had been put on show since his death.

‘Have you heard of Bishop Green?’

Carolina didn’t seem to have heard her, so Anita repeated the question.

‘That abhorrent man! Yes, I saw him on the television not that long ago. How could they allow someone like that to voice his rabid racism on our television screens? What has Sweden come to?’ Carolina was suddenly animated. ‘I don’t believe in censorship, but letting someone peddle such lies! It would almost be laughable if it weren’t for the realization that some people will believe what he has to say.’

People like her husband, thought Anita. She hadn’t the heart to say where she had come across the Bishop, and was evasive when Carolina asked her why she had asked the question.

A brief visit to the Österlen Golf Club confirmed that Martin Olofsson hadn’t played a round that day. Anita had expected that; so Olofsson could have attended that meeting on April 16th. As he was over in Vik and pretending to go golfing, then the most likely location for “The November 6th Group” meeting was Österlen. And Wollstad’s was the most obvious venue. It fitted in with Olofsson’s furtive manner in recent months. If he was part of a right-wing group, then he was hardly going to admit it to a strongly opinionated wife like Carolina Olofsson.

As she had to drive past Pelle Munk’s house on her return journey, she decided to call in. It wasn’t because she felt that there was any need to update him on the theft of the paintings, as he wasn’t the one who had lost them, but more to show that the police cared about finding his works of art. And, as it was Sunday, Karin might be around. She had enjoyed their lunch together. She had sensed that they could rekindle the genuine friendship that had lapsed for over twenty years. Karin’s blue Volvo was parked next to Munk’s green Citroën. Both vehicles had seen better days.

As Anita came into the courtyard the sun was making a tentative appearance through rapidly brightening stratocumulus clouds. The earlier rain hadn’t deterred Munk, who was sitting on a bench with a glass of wine.

‘Hello, herr Munk,’ Anita said loudly.

Munk raised his glass to her. ‘Welcome. I remember you. You’re the pretty one.’

‘I don’t feel it at the moment.’

‘Believe me, you are. An artist knows these things. Come and join us. Karin!’ he shouted. Karin appeared at the kitchen door. ‘We have a guest.’

Within minutes Anita had a glass in her hand and was invited to stay for a late lunch. While Karin was in the kitchen getting the meal ready, Munk fixed Anita with his piercing blue eyes. ‘Now pretty policewoman, have you come here on official business?’

‘No. But I do have news that another of your paintings has been stolen.’

‘I haven’t heard anything,’ he said, draining his glass and filling it up again from the bottle on the table in front of them. He wouldn’t have, thought Anita. That was a detail of the Serneholt murder that hadn’t been released to the press. ‘Which one?’