The Voices Beyond: (Oland Quartet Series 4) (33 page)

‘Don’t move!’

Kloss took a deep breath, gathered his strength and kicked her hard in the thigh. The pain was horrendous; Lisa whimpered, but didn’t move. She could hear her own shallow breathing in the silence that followed. She reached up to her nose and felt drops of warm blood.

‘I don’t know who … who you’re talking about.’

‘Don’t you?’ he sneered.

Lisa released Lady Summertime, who snapped, ‘You and your family steal from the guests, too.’

‘Do we?’

She nodded. ‘Fourteen hundred for a bottle of champagne, Kent. Sparkling wine that’s probably smuggled in for fifty kronor a bottle … Isn’t that daylight robbery?’

‘Don’t change the subject. One of us has a problem here, and it’s not me.’

Summertime braced herself for another blow, but went on: ‘Call the cops, then.’

Kloss looked down at her. ‘Not yet.’

A blood vessel was throbbing on his suntanned forehead; he remained motionless for a few seconds, then relaxed. He took at step back and sat down on the bed, legs wide apart, leaving his crotch exposed.

‘There’s something you can help me with,’ he said.

Lady Summertime considered giving him a swift kick, right there in the middle. But Lisa pushed her aside. She got up cautiously, still expecting him to hit her again, but nothing happened. Kent Kloss had vented his anger, and he hadn’t called the police.

He glanced out of the window, as if to check that no one could see him, his fingers drumming on his thighs. Eventually, he spoke. ‘A man has come over to the island this summer, and he’s … he’s caused some problems. I didn’t know who he was at first, but now I do. His name is Aron Fredh.’

He was looking closely at Lisa, as if she might react to the name. But she’d never heard of Aron Fredh. Would Kent hit her again if she said the wrong thing?

‘OK,’ she said. ‘Aron Fredh.’

Kloss looked down at his tanned hands. ‘I don’t know what he looks like; he’s keeping a low profile … but I need to find him. I think you might be able to help me track him down. He’s here somewhere; I think he might be staying over at the resort, on the campsite or in a chalet under a false name. He must be, because he managed to poison our drinking water, and that can only be done from inside the complex.’

Poison our drinking water.
Lisa had extensive experience of the effects of that particular event.

‘The Ölandic Resort is enormous,’ she said. ‘How am I supposed to find him?’

Kent was smiling again now. It was as if the slap and the kick had never happened. ‘You snoop around, of course … After all, that’s what you’re good at.’

Lisa let out a long breath. ‘So you just want me to find this man, among all the guests, when you haven’t a clue what he looks like?’

‘He’s an old man, we know that, but in good shape for his age. And he’s probably alone. That description fits a number of men at the resort; we’ll tell you where they’re staying and, when their caravans or chalets are empty, you go and check them out. Discreetly.’

‘When they’re empty?’

‘Of course … We don’t want the guests to know what’s going on.’

‘And how will I know when it’s safe?’

‘The security guards will keep an eye on things. Most caravans and chalets are empty in the middle of the day.’

Lisa didn’t have much choice. ‘What am I looking for?’

‘Anything unusual. Guns, balaclavas, bundles of cash. You’ll know when you see it … This is no ordinary holidaymaker.’

‘And then I’m free to leave?’

Kloss got to his feet.

‘We’ll see. You’re not going to be arrested, anyway. And you can carry on gigging for the time being … as long as you keep your fingers to yourself.’

‘And what if I get caught snooping around?’

A victorious smile spread across Kent’s face. ‘You’ve already been caught, Summertime. That’s why you’re going to do this.’

There had been a few comments on the newspaper article about the knocking from the grave, and Gerlof was still hoping that it had been read by the right person. It was a bit like a personal ad. If Aron Fredh was still on the island, of course.

He sat down to wait for visitors. These were his last few days in the cottage; after the weekend, he was going back to his room in the residential home in Marnäs.

But on Friday he had a visit from a murderer. Not the one he was looking for this summer, but a murderer he himself had tracked down many years earlier.

Gerlof was in the garden as usual, in the shade of the parasol. It was always open these days; the heat of the sun was merciless.

His hearing aid was switched on, and suddenly he heard a rustling sound behind him, in the meadow. Footsteps, definitely footsteps. Gerlof turned his head, and a few seconds later the man appeared among the juniper bushes, wearing jeans and a shirt and loafers. He stopped on the other side of the boundary, in the tall grass. Gerlof recognized him.

This was the man who had killed his grandson.

The visitor remained where he was, and they looked at each other for a few seconds. Gerlof was glad his daughter Julia wasn’t in the village today.

‘Good afternoon,’ the man said quietly.

‘Good afternoon.’

Gerlof wondered if he ought to be afraid, but he wasn’t. Not at all. This murderer didn’t look dangerous, just tired and pale in the sunshine. Much older. And he had nothing in his hands.

So Gerlof nodded to him. ‘Come and sit down.’

The man walked slowly across the garden and sat down on the opposite side of the table.

‘So you’re out,’ Gerlof went on.

The man shook his head. ‘I haven’t been released. I’m out on parole. My first unsupervised outing, so I wanted to call round and …’ The man fell silent and looked around, over towards the gate and the cottage, then asked, ‘Are you alone?’

‘My grandchildren have gone for a swim. My daughters haven’t arrived yet.’

The man seemed to relax, at least until they heard a loud buzzing and a hornet appeared. Gerlof knew that their sting could be dangerous, but they were less aggressive than their smaller relatives. Perhaps their size made them calmer.

The hornet zoomed past, and in the silence that followed Gerlof asked, ‘So how long are you out for?’

‘Twenty-four hours. The probation service releases prisoners in stages. First of all, for just a few hours, then a little longer … if you behave yourself.’

‘And have you behaved yourself? Are you cured?’

The man looked down at his hands. ‘Cured … How am I supposed to know that?’

‘I’m sure you know how you feel,’ Gerlof said. ‘Whether you’re at peace with the rest of the world.’

‘I’ve tried,’ his visitor said. ‘I’ve had the opportunity to talk about … about my thoughts.’

‘So all that hatred is gone?’

The man nodded and looked up. ‘Do you hate me, Gerlof?’

Gerlof looked away. ‘That’s exactly what I’m wondering.’

He met the visitor’s gaze, searching for anger, but he found none. Only weariness. He changed the subject.

‘Niklas Kloss,’ he said. ‘Have you heard of him?’

The man nodded. ‘He’s one of the wealthy Kloss siblings, isn’t he? The owners of the Ölandic Resort?’

‘Yes, but Niklas is the black sheep of the family. He’s been in prison.’

The man nodded again, as if he recalled the story. ‘Not where I was. I’ve never met him.’

‘But you’ve heard of him?’

‘There’s always talk … I know why he was inside. Smuggling … on a massive scale. He was caught by customs with a truck full of spirits from Germany, worth millions. Kloss wasn’t driving, but he was the one responsible. So they say.’

Gerlof picked up on the last three words. ‘You don’t believe it was him?’

‘I think it was more likely to be his older brother, Kent Kloss. But Niklas went down for it; he got a couple of years. That’s all I know.’

‘I’m not surprised,’ Gerlof said.

‘No. People have always smuggled booze and tobacco across the Baltic, but the quantities are greater now. It’s difficult to understand who’s going to consume the amount that comes in. It will soon be like medieval times, when Swedes drank several litres of beer every day.’

‘But I don’t suppose it all stays on the island.’

‘No, some of it is probably transported over to the mainland.’

The man fell silent. Gerlof thought that, for a little while, he had felt as if he were chatting to just anyone, as if the man were an ordinary visitor – but every time there was a silence, the tension was there again.

‘It was brave of you to come here,’ he said eventually.

The man didn’t respond, so Gerlof went on, ‘I hope you can come back … To the island, I mean.’

‘That’s my goal,’ the man said. ‘To come home. Prison … that’s not a home.’

Gerlof had made a decision.

‘You asked if I hated you. I think it would be miserable to sit here in the sun, towards the end of my life, hating people.’

The man nodded; perhaps he was relieved. He got to his feet and gazed around the garden. ‘I’ll go back the same way I came, past the old mill … and the cairn.’

‘They’re still there,’ Gerlof said.

He raised a hand to wave, and his visitor was gone.

It was late in the evening, and the Homecomer was reading the local paper. It was on sale in the shop at the Ölandic Resort, and he had been buying it in order to follow the problems with the drinking water. However, he had found another interesting article in yesterday’s paper. The headline had caught his attention:

G
ERLOF
S
TILL
H
AUNTED BY
K
NOCKING FROM THE
G
RAVE

He looked at the photograph again and saw an old man leaning on his walking stick among the graves in a churchyard. Marnäs churchyard. The man had told the reporter an old story.

The Homecomer recognized the man after all the years that had passed, and he remembered the open grave.

He shivered, even though it was still warm down by the sea. He could feel the dead reaching out, clutching at him with invisible hands.

Terrifying noises echoed inside his head.

The sound of knocking from inside a coffin.

He had never been back to that churchyard, not in seventy years.

He felt alone. He
was
alone. Pecka and Wall were dead. Rita had left the island. He missed his wife and his child, but of course there was no way he could see them.

The road was dark and deserted.

The Homecomer didn’t have a telephone of his own, so he was standing in a kiosk. He had called Directory Enquiries to ask for Gerlof Davidsson’s number. He picked up the receiver and keyed it in.

The Trotskyites are standing in a line, silent and frozen. The wind is bitterly cold, but they are wearing only their dirty underclothes, so that none of them can hide any kind of weapon. Spindly legs, trembling arms. They are not only undressed, their hands are bound with wire. Sometimes a metre-long rope binds two prisoners together, so that when one of them falls his or her neighbour is almost pulled down, too. But not quite.

Vlad has noticed that, when an enemy falls forward, the man or woman attached by the rope always struggles to remain upright, standing with their feet wide apart and fighting to keep their balance. Often, they take a step to one side, as if the enemy who is still alive wants to get as far away as possible from the one who is already dead.

It is strange, Vlad thinks as he lowers the Winchester, that an enemy wants to live as long as possible. Even if it is only for a few extra seconds on the edge of a newly dug grave, where death is already clutching at them.

A deserted gravel pit – this is where the prisoners are transported to from the camp, in a steady stream of trucks. This is where they are lined up and shot, in a forest south of the camp, north of Lake Onega.

The end of the world.

Vlad is happy to get out of the camp, but the battle against the Trotskyites is no easier out here than it is in there. Arctic winds blow across the sand, and the young NKVD guards accompanying him just want to get the day’s work done and go back to the barracks.

Vlad is wearing two freshly laundered linen shirts, a well-worn but warm army greatcoat and sturdy new boots. He is protected from the wind, and the job he has to do makes him even warmer. He raises the rifle, takes aim, fires and lowers it, over and over again.

The guards are standing three paces away, with their guns trained on the prisoners. The most effective method would be to walk right up to each one and place the barrel of the gun against the back of the neck, of course, but operating from a short distance away means that the person firing the shot does not get dirty.

In Vlad’s opinion, it ought to be impossible to miss even from three paces away, if you hold the gun steady. But a guard will move the gun surprisingly often, so that the enemy is hit in the back, or the shoulder, or not at all. The prisoner jerks, but remains standing.

This is bad. Vlad never misses. He is in charge here, which means he is the one who has to step forward and fire a second shot.

On these cold autumn days, many of the prisoners seem to be foreigners, immigrants from the west who came to seek their fortune in the new country: Polacks, Germans, Canadians. A few Americans, some Norwegians and an endless stream of Finns. Sometimes, as Vlad raises his gun, he sees a prisoner turn his head. In spite of the fact that all hope is gone, someone starts pleading for their life, offering love or money, or simply begging for mercy.

Occasionally, he hears muttered prayers in Swedish or Finland-Swedish. Aron would like to stop and listen.

But Vlad does not listen to the enemy; he simply takes aim and silences the flow of words.

The guards have brought white cabbage, tinned meat and vodka to the gravel pit, and while a team of prisoners is busy shovelling sand over the bodies Vlad and his men can sit down and eat. After his time in the labour camp, he has built himself up with regular, decent food, but he still doesn’t drink alcohol. He gives away his ration to his colleagues. This makes him popular, but it also means that the aim of some guards is even worse after their break.