The Man Who Watched Women (10 page)

He went into the kitchen, turned off the oven and opened the door. He picked up two pot holders and lifted the baking tray out of the hot oven. When Vanja saw the two golden-brown loaves in their rectangular tins, she realised she was hungry. They waited while Carl prodded the bread to check that it was ready, then tipped one of the loaves out and placed it upside down on a cooling rack on the draining board. As he repeated the procedure with the second loaf, he turned briefly to Vanja. ‘Which department are you with?'

‘Riksmord.'

Carl's attention was diverted from his baking. ‘Has he escaped?'

‘No.'

‘But someone has died, and you're interested in Hinde?'

Vanja glanced at Billy. Either Carl Wahlström was very bright and had put together what little information he had with unusual speed, or he knew that someone was copying Hinde's murders. Without giving away what she was thinking, Vanja went on: ‘Where were you yesterday between ten a.m. and three p.m.?'

‘I was here. I was studying.'

Carl placed a clean tea towel over the loaves, closed the oven door and came back to the little living room.

‘Were you alone?'

‘Yes.'

‘So nobody saw you all day?'

‘No.'

Silence. Vanja didn't need any more; she had already decided to run a thorough check on Carl Wahlström. She got to her feet.

‘Would you be prepared to provide a voluntary DNA sample?'

Carl Wahlström didn't even bother to answer. He tipped his head back and opened his mouth wide. Vanja dug a sterile cotton bud out of her bag and quickly drew it over his tongue and the inside of his cheeks.

‘So what about that list I gave you?' Billy asked as Vanja placed the cotton bud in a small plastic container and closed the lid.

Carl turned around, picked up the list and handed it back to Billy.

‘One. That one.' He pointed and Billy looked at the name. It didn't help much. It didn't help at all, in fact. Even if Hinde knew that Carl was contributing to that particular forum, he couldn't communicate with him. But at least it was a point of contact, which was something. And something was more than nothing, which was what they had had so far.

On the way out into the hallway, Vanja turned around. ‘Your insects?'

‘What about them?'

‘Where does the desire to stick pins in butterflies and moths come from?'

Carl smiled at her again, as if to show that he was prepared to indulge her ignorance. As if she was a little girl who didn't know any better. It was a smile that Vanja already hated, after only ten minutes in Wahlström's company. It reminded her far too much of Sebastian Bergman's superior smirk.

‘It's not a desire, it's an interest. I'm a lepidopterist.'

‘I presume that means you're a butterfly collector.'

‘Expert. A butterfly expert.'

‘How does it work? Are they still alive when you stick a pin in them?'

‘No, I kill them first with ethyl acetate.'

‘So you're interested in killing things?'

Carl tilted his head to one side as if Vanja had just said something enchanting and sweet.

‘Aren't you going to ask if I used to wet the bed and enjoyed setting fire to things as well?'

Vanja didn't reply. She bent down next to Billy to put on her shoes, avoiding that supercilious look.

Carl went on: ‘You do know it's a gross simplification to believe that when serial killers are young, they wet the bed, start fires and kill animals?'

Billy straightened up. ‘You seem to know a great deal about serial killers.'

‘I'm writing a dissertation about them. Among other things.'

‘And what's it about? This dissertation?'

‘When the desires of the individual collide with the rules of a civilised society.'

Billy met Carl's gaze and suddenly had the feeling that the topic was very definitely based on personal experience. In spite of the warmth in the apartment, he shivered.

‘He was creepy.'

Vanja and Billy had stepped out onto Forskarbacken and were walking along the pavement to the car when Billy put into words what they were both thinking. Vanja nodded, put on her sunglasses and unbuttoned her thin jacket.

‘Creepy, and taller than you.'

‘Yes, I noticed that too,' said Billy, unlocking the car even though they were still twenty metres away. ‘Shall we put him under surveillance?'

‘He seemed a bit too relaxed. If it is him, he knows we've got forensic evidence.'

‘Perhaps he wants to be caught?'

‘Why would he want that?'

‘The media haven't linked the murders yet. He's getting no publicity, no attention. If the kick he gets from killing is becoming weaker and weaker, he might need something else. An arrest and trial would not only show what he's done, but would provide him with acknowledgement. Make him someone.'

Vanja stopped dead and stared at Billy in surprise. Not only because that was probably the most she had ever heard him say without interruption, but mainly because she couldn't remember him speaking with such authority and insight. He was an expert when it came to technology and new gadgets, of course … but serial killers? When Billy noticed that Vanja had stopped, he turned back; even though he couldn't see her eyes behind the sunglasses, he could tell that she was surprised.

‘What?' he said.

‘You've been reading up on this.'

‘Yes, and?'

‘Nothing.' There was something in Billy's voice that told Vanja she shouldn't go any further, and that she definitely shouldn't joke about this. Not right now, anyway.

‘We'll keep an eye on him until we get the results of his DNA sample,' she went on. They got in the car and closed the doors. Vanja fastened her seatbelt as Billy started the engine.

‘So who's the girl, by the way?'

‘What girl?'

‘The girl you went to the theatre with.'

‘Nobody.'

Which meant it was definitely somebody. Vanja smiled to herself. She would get the details out of him during the short trip home.

Polhemsgatan. Again. Sebastian was sitting in the café where he could call himself a regular customer by now. At his favourite table, the one with the best view of his former workplace. Riksmord. Which was now her workplace. He was on his third cup of coffee, and he looked once more at the white plastic clock on the wall. He cursed himself. He cursed Stefan, who had got him to go all the way to Frescati to see a woman who hated him, as it turned out. He should have stayed in the café instead. Waited for her. It would have cost less.

He needed to see her.

Here in the café on Polhemsgatan he felt almost comfortable. The closer he was to his former workplace, the safer he felt. Here he didn't need to hide himself quite so carefully. There were several reasons why he should be here. If Vanja or anyone else saw him, he could always say that he was visiting. That he was waiting for a former colleague. That he had a meeting which had been cancelled. If they didn't buy that, he could always change tactics and claim that he was there because he wanted them to take him back. They would believe that.

Not that Torkel would ever do it. Not after Västerås.

But it would be logical. They would understand why he was sitting here with his cup of coffee, staring over at the concrete-grey building. It would be considerably more difficult to explain his presence if Vanja spotted him on the hill outside her apartment.

The big hand on the plastic clock had moved half a circuit, and was now showing five twenty-five. There were no other customers left in the café; the young couple who seemed to have relationship problems had disappeared without Sebastian noticing, and the older lady who he suspected was probably the owner had removed the ready-made sandwiches from the chilled counter. Sebastian looked out of the window again. At the concrete-grey facade. Failed to find what he was looking for. Suspected it might be time to make a move. The question was what to do now? He didn't want to go back to his apartment and the debris of his other life, and he didn't know if he had the nerve to go back to the familiar spot outside her building. It was too dangerous. From a statistical point of view, the danger of discovery increased each time he went there. But he had to do something. Something to ease the impatience and the irritation. He had no intention of seeing the woman from yesterday again, otherwise she would have been the simplest alternative. Ellinor Bergkvist. There was something about the way she had tried to keep him there in the morning, constantly wanting to know more and more, that had annoyed him. That and the fact that she had held his hand. There were limits when it came to intimacy.

Sebastian took out his frustration on the woman on the till.

‘The coffee's crap,' he said, staring at her.

‘I can make a fresh pot,' she suggested.

‘Go to hell,' he said, and stormed out.

That was probably the end of his stint as a regular customer, he thought as he walked out into the warm summer's evening. But he could always find somewhere else.

If there was one thing there was no shortage of in Stockholm, it was cafés.

And women.

After a few brief but failed attempts in hotel bars, trying to find someone with whom to finish off a bad day, Sebastian was on the verge of giving up. By this time even the Royal Library was closed. The ostentatious building in Humlegården was one of his favourite places when it came to fishing for female company. His technique was simple. Find a central seat in the big reading room. Borrow some books; it was important to take along a few copies of his own work and to make sure they were clearly visible. Then he would sit down and begin to struggle with a new text, battling to find the right words, and at the appropriate moment he would turn to a woman who happened to be passing: ‘Excuse me, but I'm working on a new book, and I wondered if you might just have a look at this sentence.' If he played his cards right, they were soon partaking of a glass of wine in the Hotel Anglais next door.

Sebastian was beginning to get annoyed with himself as he ambled aimlessly through the heat of the city; nothing he did seemed to work these days. He was getting crosser with every step. Positively furious.

Why the fuck did everything have to be this way?

Why the fuck did nothing ever turn out the way he wanted?

He ought to hit back at everything and everyone. Ring Trolle and ask him to dig as deep as he could. Drill right down into the lives of those perfect people until he finally reached the shit. Anna Eriksson and Valdemar Lithner were to blame for all of it. He ought to check out Anna too. Perhaps she was the weak link, the fissure that could make their perfect middle-class facade crack open. Surely he would be able to find some dirt on her. She wasn't exactly a stranger to secrets and lies. Vanja didn't even know the truth about her own father. No doubt Anna justified this to herself by claiming it was in Vanja's best interests. But who had given her the right to decide? Who said she could play God? He wanted to be close to his daughter, but right now that seemed to mean at least a couple of hundred metres away. As if he'd been issued with some kind of restraining order. He stopped. He would ask Trolle to widen the search. Take a look at Anna Eriksson. Sebastian took out his mobile, then put it away again. Why call? He turned around and headed for the nearest taxi rank. After all, he had nothing better to do. Trolle lived in Skärholmen.

Trolle was a person you could trust.

He would understand.

He had lost his own family.

Billy was sitting on the sofa with his iPad, surfing the net. Maya was in the shower. Billy was hoping they could go out and eat when she'd finished.

They had been together since midsummer. An old school friend of Billy's had a place on Djurö out in the archipelago, and it was the third year Billy had been invited to celebrate with them. This year another friend was there, along with his sister. Maya Reding-Hedberg. They ended up sitting next to one another at the traditional pickled herring lunch, and they stayed there all evening and most of the night. They had been together ever since, and saw each other nearly every day.