The Ice Cage — A Scandinavian Crime Thriller set in the Nordic Winter (The Baltic Trilogy) (12 page)

‘
What?
’

She
’d
sounded totally
surprised;
as if it was more likely
the Finnish team would win the
FIFA
World Cup.

‘
Would you like to go and see a film
’
?

She’d stared at him in silence before turning and going to her friends. Watching her bouncy walk, he’d felt her rhythm pulsing in his body. He pictured her walking dow
n the poolside and making a perfect dive
. He was lost in thought. When he looked up
,
they we
re all laughing
–
Marja and her mates. They were mocking him and she was just like the others.
What had he done to her? He hated the stupid cow. Never agai
n was he going to be embar
r
assed
by a Finnish bitch, n
ever ever.
Who did she think she was?
!

22

Anna’s ex
Bengt
ran a garage.
W
hen I arrived, he was showing a couple a
VW
Polo. They were
already
seated, ready to drive off
for a test ride,
but i
t was only when they nodded that I recognised the Forsmans.
I tried making some small talk, but they treated me like a total stranger.
Clearly, c
onversation
didn’t happen spontaneously with them. They were diesels and needed warming up,
maybe an injection of aquavit?

Watching Bengt wave them off
,
I noticed
that he was short for
a
Scandinavian.

He hadn’t seen Anna for at least a month.

‘
Where did you meet?
’

‘
Ukraine
. A town called
Kherson
on
the
Black Sea
. I wa
s there
for an ice hockey tournament
and w
e met at the party held for the Mariehamn team.
Anna’s
family
has
worked for the local tractor factory for the last 30
years
, b
u
t since independence things have
changed. Private investors a
re trying to make a quick buck and the tractor company
has ru
n out of money. The
new owners don’t invest and the business i
sn’t viable
any more
. Anna’s father and brothers
have to
go fishing to feed the family.
And they’re not the only ones
–
t
he whole town is in depression. When I met Anna, her best friend had just committed suicide. The factory used to be the centre of their lives, the heartbeat of the town. P
eople made a
living
from it
and went holidaying in factory
-
owned
summer camps on the
Black Sea
. Now
that the safety net is gone
people starve. Anna wanted to get away, go somewhere where she could work, where there w
o
uld be more than one employer. Not
stuff all the eggs in the same basket.
’

Anna
obviously
had guts.
I asked Bengt where she could be.

‘
I
don’t know. I’m done with her.
’

‘
What do you mean you’re done?
’

He stared at me blankly and looked at his watch.

‘
You must have some idea
where she could have gone
.
’

‘
She wanted to go to
London
.
’

‘
Did she know anyone in Mariehamn?
’

‘
She went to the yacht club a
lot
.
’

He wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t know.

‘
Anywhere else?
’

‘
Your father asked the same question.
’

So my father had been round. At least I knew I was
on his trail
.

‘
What did he say?
’

‘
Like you, h
e called me a
liar, t
old me
I
must know
where
she
is
.
’

‘
Shouldn’t you?
’

‘
I’ve got enough on my hands without worrying about my ex girlfriends.
’

‘Who dumped who?’

‘It wasn’t like that.’

‘Was there a
particular
moment
?’

‘Not really, we just... drifted apart.’

‘
What happened with my father
?
’

‘
He was irritated
. I
n the end I told him to check out my boathouse. Anna l
iked
hanging out there when we were together, but I
only go there in the summer.
’

If there was the slightest chance my father and Anna had gone
there, I needed to see it
.

‘
Where’s the boathouse
?
’

23

It
was a good 15
-
minute walk. The
small bay
was
on the outskirts of
Mariehamn
.
Bengt had told me the key would be under a flowerpot on the window ledge. I
did find pot
fragments
on the ground below the window, but no trace of the key.
Turned out
I didn’t need it
. T
he door
was
open
, not that it was
a great omen after what had happened at my father’s house, but this was a smaller place and I couldn’t hear anything, so I went in.

Boathouse was a fancy name for an upgraded garden shed with a table, two chairs and a
bed
-
cum
-
sofa. It was a single
room with a freestanding wood st
ove but
without running water.
T
he view was breathtaking from the top of the
wooden
s
tairs at the back of the house and
I followed the
m
down to the jetty.
A little further down the shore was what looked like a
snow
-
covered beach.
When I looked back up at the house perched on top of the rock, it
wasn’t particularly impressive,
but what a location! Who cares about
size
when the archipelago is your living room?

When I went back in
,
t
he only traces of recent human presence I could see were cigarette butts
. I picked them up to check the brand. They were all the same
–
a name
embodying the American West. Whose
could they be
? I had neither
Thor’s
n
or Bengt’s number, so I rang
my father’s solicitor
Dahl to ask for Thor’s, but he
was out on his yacht again
–
I could hear the
wind whistling
in the background.
Yes, Anna smoked
Marlboros, he thought. He wasn’t sure about Bengt and didn’t have his number, but Bengt had told
me
he never went
to the boathouse in winter
.
Judging from
the dust
on the table
, i
t certainly didn’t loo
k like it had many visitors
.

I follow
ed
the road behind the house and found a side road leading down to the beach. It was difficult to picture bodies frying in the sun in the same spot
only a few months ago. My father lying on the ice
sprung to mind. There were no body imprints in the snow, but there were other tracks, snow
-
covered but still discernible. A car had driven down to the shore and seemed to have sto
pped
. T
here was
a
rectangle
in the snow
–
a shadow cast by the car? It could be a melting effect triggered
by
its heat
. What had it been doing here? It didn’t look like it had driven back up the hill, because the tracks continued down onto the ice
. It
would have
stoppe
d and then driven onto the ice, unless it had co
me from the ice an
d driven up the hill.
In any case, i
t
had come to standstill
, b
ut why? I looked around. There was nothing
besides the boathouse
,
which
was perfectly visible from the beach. Someone
had driven
here and someone had been in the house. It
could be
the same person, in which case h
e or she would have
got out here,
walke
d
up to the house
o
ver the rocks, up the stairs, had a cigarette
–
t
here were several cigarette butts in the house.
Or h
ad someone been waiting
in the house
?

I couldn’t
really
tell from the cigarette butts if there had been more than one person
in the house
, but it felt lik
e there had been only one
.
Did this mean
that the smoker
was
also the driver? Had the smoking and the driving even happened on the same day? Thor should be able to determine
if the tracks
were made around the time of my father’s death.
I gave him another ring and he said he
’d be
t
here in half an hour. I waited in the house, staring down at the spot where the car would have stood. I knew that Anna
was
a smoker, bu
t had she also been the driver?

When
Thor’s ice yacht zipp
ed into the bay,
I went down the stairs to
s
how
him the tracks. He thought they
must h
ave come after last
week
’
s thaw,
definitely before my father’s
death;
otherwise they’d be icier and shallower. He added that anyone driving dow
n here must know the area well.

‘
Which means it could be pretty much any local?
’

‘
It’s a small cove between two larger bays
and m
ost people don’t even know about
it. The turn
ing
is pretty much
invisible from the road.
’

‘
So two people showing up here at the same time would be quite a coincidence?
’

‘
Unless they had a date?
’

‘
What do you think of Bengt?
’

‘
Not a great yachter.
’

‘
Is he reliable?
’

‘
What are you getting at?
’

‘
I don’t know. Could he be hiding so
mething about Anna? She’s gone and he used to be the boyfriend
–
t
he reason she came here. H
e claims she didn’t
even contact him before leaving.
’