The Disappeared (15 page)

‘Do you know who the father of her child was?’

There was only one possible answer to that question.

‘I can’t comment on that.’

There was silence at the other end of the line, and he could hear the sound of pain and loss.

‘Sometimes, I think I can hear her. All those little noises she used to make, and I never even noticed. I hear her, Alex. Does that sound crazy?’

When Alex tried to reply, the words stuck in his throat.

‘Not at all. I think it’s quite common to experience that kind of phenomenon in your situation. Losing someone you love can be like losing an essential part of your body. You’re aware of it all the time, even though it isn’t there any more.’

‘Phantom sounds.’

He smiled, blinked to clear his vision.

‘You hear them virtually all the time.’

‘Even though they’re not there.’

Her voice had faded to a whisper, and Alex rested his head against the receiver. He realised that he liked hearing her voice. It breathed life, even though it spoke of death.

When he had ended the call he went to look for Peder.

‘I want Gustav Sjöö brought in before the weekend.’

‘Me too,’ said Peder. ‘I’ve made a few calls, checked his alibi. It’s weak. He could easily have driven into Stockholm, picked up Rebecca and driven back to Västerås.’

‘Bring him in. Now.’

The view from her window was depressing; there was no point in looking out. How could anyone possibly have given planning permission to construct buildings as ugly as police HQ in Kungsholmen? One monstrosity after another. Small windows and poky offices.

There was no air, Fredrika decided. They assumed everyone had somewhere else to be where they could breathe more easily.

She rang home, checked that everything was OK. She sensed some imbalance in Spencer, but decided not to mention it on the phone. She couldn’t explain why, and that scared her. She could hear Saga in the background, and felt her heart swell. She had never imagined that it would be possible to feel such love. It was so pure, so self-evident and so unconditional; sometimes it left her speechless. She would catch herself watching the child and would suddenly realise she was on the verge of tears. If any harm came to Saga, she would lose her mind. Her very soul would be damaged.

Take my child and I would have nothing left.

She wondered if that feeling would weaken over time, if she would start to take Saga for granted or love her less. Didn’t Diana Trolle look like a woman who could learn to live again? After two years in the limbo of uncertainty she had finally found out what had happened to her daughter, and with that knowledge came a much longed-for peace. Fredrika was struck by a depressing thought: Diana had another child. Did that make any difference? Was the grief easier to bear if you still had one child left?

Take my child and I would have none left.

She tried to shake off the sense of unease that had crept up on her. Spencer didn’t want any more children, and she was almost forty. It was the right decision, not to have any more. For the whole family.

She unfolded the brochure she had slipped into her pocket earlier, and stared at Spencer’s name. It didn’t mean anything, she told herself, which was why she would ignore it. But she would keep the brochure.

Keep it and keep it to herself. A breach of the rules, but what could she do? There was obviously some logical explanation for the fact that Spencer’s name had come up.

The mentoring network, on the other hand, looked interesting. She checked on the website of Stockholm University’s students’ union and discovered that the scheme still existed. With a mentor by his or her side, the student was promised a guide, a greater sense of security and better preparation for life after graduation.

‘Have you decided what you want to be when you grow up?’ the website asked.

I haven’t, actually, Fredrika thought wearily.

All students were welcome to join the network. There were lectures and social events, a range of opportunities to develop contacts in different branches of industry. According to the website, a number of students would be selected on the basis of merit and education, and would be allocated a personal mentor. The mentors themselves had a variety of backgrounds, but were united by a desire to help ambitious young people progress in their chosen career.

But had Rebecca, a conscientious student with literature as her main subject, really been heading for such a career?

Valter Lund, the man who was predicted to be the next Swede to be invited to join the legendary Bilderberg Group – why had he been chosen to mentor Rebecca? Fredrika had read a number of articles about him, the financial superstar who came out of nowhere and eclipsed all the other stars in the sky. If she remembered correctly, he was about forty-five, and came originally from Norway. He looked pleasant; he was tall and slim. A much sought-after member of the most important company boards; a man who could reputedly turn cold ashes into gold. For Valter Lund, there was no such thing as poor soil or bad luck, simply an underlying belief in competence and ability.

How could he even find the time to be a mentor?

Fredrika found the number of the president of the students’ union on the website; he answered on the third ring.

‘Mårten, right in the middle of a meeting.’

‘Fredrika Bergman, police.’

Always equally effective; why did people have this innate respect for an organisation that aimed to manage society’s monopoly on violence?

‘OK, give me two seconds to finish off what I’m doing.’

He was back a moment later.

‘Police, you said?’

‘I’m calling about your mentoring network.’

‘Oh?’

A hesitant response, full of suspicion. Why would the police be calling about a network that could take the individual student to heights he or she couldn’t even dream of?

‘I’m investigating the murder of Rebecca Trolle, and your mentoring network has come up. I’d appreciate it if you could answer a few questions.’

‘OK. Although I wasn’t president when she was here.’

‘But you remember her being part of the network?’

‘Oh, yes, I was one of the people who set the whole thing up.’

A hint of pride in the voice, mixed with a distinctly less appealing smugness.

‘Valter Lund was Rebecca’s mentor.’

‘I remember that; a lot of people wanted him.’

‘Wasn’t it a bit strange that he ended up with Rebecca? Given that she was studying literature, I mean. She doesn’t seem to have been aiming for a high-flying career in industry.’

Fredrika was striving to maintain a neutral tone, trying to pretend that this question was just one of many that she was pondering.

‘It was different back then,’ said Mårten.

‘In what way?’

‘That was the year we set up the mentoring network. We thought the mentor’s role should be to coach and inspire, to be a kind of general guide. When we paired up the students and mentors, we disregarded what course they were following and their future plans, and tried to find a combination that was as exciting as possible. That meant we avoided pairing up men with men and women with women, business people with students of economics, artists with art students.’

‘That was daring.’

‘And stupid. It didn’t work at all, because it turned out that everyone thought the same as you. The students wanted a role model, and the mentors wanted a carbon copy.’

She heard him sigh.

‘So the following year we revamped the whole system.’

‘By which time Rebecca wasn’t there.’

‘No, and if she had been, she definitely wouldn’t have kept Valter Lund as her mentor.’

‘Did you know Rebecca?’

‘No, I can’t say I did. I saw her now and again through the network, exchanged a few words here and there. She seemed nice. Incredibly busy.’

‘Did you ever talk about her work with Valter Lund?’

‘That was the only thing we talked about.’

Of course it was.

‘Did she say how it was going? Do you know how often they met?’

‘He once invited her to lunch somewhere really expensive. And he came to listen to the choir; he does go to church, apparently. I think she said they went for a coffee afterwards. She didn’t say much about their work; I’m not convinced she was taking it all that seriously. That was also something we changed the following year; only those studying for a Master’s were allowed to take part.’

Fredrika tried to remember Rebecca’s diary. Surely, the abbreviation ‘VL’ had appeared more than twice?

‘Did you ever speak to Valter Lund? About his experiences as a mentor, I mean.’

‘I never spoke to him personally. We ran an evaluation session with the mentors, but he wasn’t here. Actually, now I come to think of it, he decided to leave the programme after the first year.’

‘He hasn’t been involved since then?’

‘No. He’s incredibly busy, of course. Several others left for the same reason.’

But none of the others had been working with a student who was murdered.

Fredrika ended the call with a vague feeling of unease in the pit of her stomach. She searched through the material from the original investigation and discovered that Valter Lund had been interviewed only once.

Why?

She found her copy of the lists Peder had given her showing the results of Ellen’s check on all the main characters who came up in the original investigation. There was no mention of Valter Lund. She was surprised, and sent an email to Ellen asking her to check Valter against police records like all the others.

From the tabloid press, Fredrika knew that Lund was one of the city’s most eligible bachelors. Could he have been Rebecca’s new love? That would explain all the secrecy surrounding both the relationship and the pregnancy.

The pregnancy that had frightened Rebecca, because she suspected that the father would want to keep the child. Would Valter Lund have expressed such a view? Would he have wanted to have a child with a student who was only half his age? And if he had, would he have been so upset over her decision to terminate the pregnancy that he killed her? Because Rebecca herself had probably not known who the child’s father was; perhaps she had thought it was Valter Lund.

Murdered, dismembered and buried.

Fredrika rested her head in her hands. The killer’s MO had to be taken into account. They couldn’t disregard the fact that the body had been dismembered; there had to be an explanation. The thoughts that had kept her awake at night were back. The person who had lifted a chainsaw above Rebecca’s dead body and sliced it in two could not possibly have been a first-time killer. It was out of the question. An inexperienced killer made mistakes, dumped the body where it could be found, left evidence behind, was spotted by witnesses. People didn’t disappear from a built-up area in the middle of Östermalm, only to have their dismembered body turn up two years later. Things like that happened in only the most evil tales.

18

As usual, there was no sound from the old lady’s room when Malena Bremberg knocked. She pushed the door open and saw that the lamp on the bedside table was on.

‘Are you reading, Thea?’

She moved quietly towards the bed, almost as if she were afraid of being seen. Thea lowered the book she was holding, looked at Malena then went back to her reading.

Malena wasn’t sure what to do next. She picked up an apple core that Thea had left beside the bed, along with some papers. She threw the rubbish in the bin and came back to the bed. She looked at the old lady, who was ignoring her completely. According to the information the care home had received, Thea hadn’t spoken since 1981. Malena had no idea what had provoked this self-imposed silence. In a way, she could see certain advantages in not needing to communicate with those around you, not being expected to join in all the time. But at the same time, she could see the high price Thea paid for her silence.

Thea was regarded as unhealthily antisocial. She never took part in the group activities that were organised at the home, and she always ate in her room. At the beginning, her divergent behaviour had caused serious concern for the staff, who had consulted a doctor on Thea’s behalf. The doctor offered to prescribe antidepressants, but when he heard about the background he changed his mind. Someone who had chosen not to speak for almost thirty years was unlikely to start playing bingo with other pensioners all of a sudden, simply because he or she was being fed antidepressants. He left his card with Thea and said that she was welcome to contact him at any time. Malena had sneaked a look in the drawer of Thea’s desk and seen that the card was still there.

In the end, Malena moved one of the visitors’ chairs over to Thea’s bed and sat down. She didn’t say anything; she simply gazed at the old woman in silence. After a while, Thea lost patience and lowered her book again, resting it against her chest. The expression in the pale blue eyes looking at Malena was razor sharp.

Don’t think I’m stupid just because I choose not to speak.

Malena swallowed several times.

‘I need your help,’ she said.

Thea stared at her.

‘If you don’t want to speak, then you have to help me in some other way,’ Malena whispered.

She broke off, trying to choose her words with care.

‘You know what I want to talk about; you’ve been following the news too over the past few days.’

Thea turned her head away and closed her eyes.

‘Rebecca Trolle,’ Malena said. ‘You have to tell me what you know.’

19

Peder Rydh breathed in the cool afternoon air through the half-open car window. The interior smelled unpleasant as a result of too much use and too little cleaning. His colleague in the passenger seat looked frozen, but said nothing. Peder kept his eyes fixed on the doorway of Gustav Sjöö’s apartment block on Mariatorget.

They had rung the bell, but no one had answered. Peder had shouted through the letterbox without success. There was a risk that Sjöö might be at his summer cottage in Nyköping; Peder had contacted the local police and asked them to send a patrol car to his address. They reported that the house was in darkness, and seemed to be empty.