Liza Marklund - Red Wolf

Of course , she thought, waiting silently for him to go on.

‘He fell asleep on the bus,’ the boy said. ‘The driver had to wake him up at Mefos. I sneaked out of the back door while they were busy.’

‘Where did Benny live?’

‘Over on Laxgatan.’

He gestured vaguely in a direction that Annika couldn’t make out.

‘And you saw him walking home from the bus-stop?’

‘Yeah, but he didn’t see me. I made sure I stayed behind him, and it was snowing really hard.’

He fell silent. Annika was starting to feel hot in her padded jacket. Without saying anything she let it slide off her arms, picked it up and put it on the chair by the boy’s desk.

‘What did you see, Linus?’

The boy lowered his head even further, twisting his fingers together.

‘There was a car,’ he said.

Annika waited.

‘A car?’

He nodded frenetically. ‘A Volvo V70, but I didn’t know that then.’

‘When did you find out?’

He sniffed. ‘It had reversed back onto the football pitch, you could only see the front half. The front was sticking out from behind a tree.’

‘So you did notice it, then?’

He didn’t answer, knotting his fingers.

‘How come you noticed it?’

The boy looked up, his jaw trembling.

‘Someone was sitting in the car. There’s a yellow streetlamp at the crossing and the light was sort of shining on the car. You could see his hand on the wheel, kind of holding it, like this.’

The boy held one hand up in front of him, letting it hang in the air above an imaginary steering wheel, his eyes open wide.

‘So what did you do?’

‘Waited. I didn’t know who it was, did I?’

‘But you could see it was a V70?’

He shook his head hard. ‘Not to start with. Only once it had driven out. Then I could see the lights on the back.’

‘What about the lights on the back?’

‘They went all the way up to the roof. I liked the way it looked. I’m pretty sure it was a V70, gold…’

‘And the man in the car started the engine and drove off?’

Linus nodded, shaking himself to gather his thoughts. ‘He started the car and slowly pulled out, then he hit the accelerator.’

Annika waited.

‘Benny was drunk,’ the boy said, ‘but he still heard the car and sort of moved aside, but the car followed him, so Benny jumped the other way but the car followed him again, and then he was sort of in the middle of the road when the car…’

He took a deep breath.

‘What happened?’

‘There were two thumps, then he flew through the air.’

‘Two thumps, then Benny was thrown into the air? And landed by the fence up by the football pitch?’

The boy sat in silence for a few seconds, then lowered his head. Annika had to suppress the urge to put her arms round him.

‘He didn’t land by the football pitch?’

Linus shook his head, wiped his nose with the back of his hand.

‘In the middle of the road,’ he said almost inaudibly. ‘And the car braked so that all the lights on the back went on, that’s when I saw what make of Volvo it was. And he reversed slowly, and Benny was lying there, and he drove over him again, and then he sort of aimed for… for his head, and then he drove over his face…’

Annika felt her stomach turn, and opened her mouth to breathe.

‘You’re sure?’ she whispered.

The boy nodded. She stared at the white of his scalp between the tufts of gelled hair.

‘Then he got out, and dragged Benny by the feet up towards Malmvallen… sort of brushed him off… then got back in his car and turned off into Sjöfartsgatan, down towards the harbour…’

Annika looked at the boy with fresh eyes, through a mixture of suspicion, revulsion and sympathy. If it was true, that was disgusting! And, poor boy.

‘What did you do after that?’

The boy started to shake, first his hands, then his legs.

‘I went… went over to Benny, he was lying up there by the fence… dead.’

He wrapped his skinny arms round his body, gently rocking.

‘Part of his head and face were like gone, the ground was wet, his whole back was bent, the wrong way, sort of… so I knew that… and I just went home, but I couldn’t really sleep.’

‘And you haven’t told any of this to the police?’

He shook his head again, wiped away the tears with a trembling hand.

‘I told Mum I’d be home by quarter to ten.’

Annika leaned forward, putting her hand awkwardly on his knee.

‘Linus,’ she said, ‘what you’ve just told me is terrible. It must have been horrific. I really think you should tell another adult, because it’s not good for you to go around with this sort of secret.’

He pulled away from her hand, backing up against the wall.

‘You promised!’ he said. ‘You said I was anonymous.’

Annika raised her hands helplessly. ‘Hey,’ she said, ‘I’m not going to say anything. I’m just worried about you. This is one of the worst things I’ve ever heard.’

She let her hands fall and stood up.

‘It’s really important that the police hear what you saw, but you know that. You’re a smart boy. Benny’s death was no accident, and you’re the only one who saw it happen. Do you think the murderer should get away with it?’

The boy was staring stubbornly at his lap again. A thought suddenly occurred to Annika.

‘Did you…? You recognized the man in the car, didn’t you?’

The boy hesitated, twisting his fingers. ‘Maybe,’ he said quietly, then suddenly looked at her and said: ‘What time is it?’

‘Five to six,’ Annika said.

‘Shit,’ he said, leaping up.

‘What is it?’ Annika said as he flew past her and into the kitchen. ‘Do you mean that you might have recognized-’

‘It’s my turn to cook and I haven’t even started.’

Then he appeared in the doorway again.

‘Mum’ll be here any minute,’ he said anxiously. ‘You’ve got to go. Now!’

She pulled on her jacket, took a step towards him.

‘Think about what I said,’ she said, trying to smile.

Feeling utterly helpless, she left the boy alone.

Thomas could feel himself getting more and more irritated as he tried one code after another on the door of the nursery. The same thing had happened only yesterday, leaving him standing there like an idiot, unable to get in.

‘Do you know the code?’ he asked his son.

The boy shook his head. ‘Mum always does the code.’

A moment later the door was unlocked from inside. A woman in her forties with two snotty toddlers stepped onto the pavement. He muttered his thanks, held the door open for Kalle and went into the hall.

‘It was fun going to nursery,’ the boy said.

Thomas nodded absent-mindedly, gathering his thoughts. Every time he walked into the nursery he felt like an alien, his wax jacket and briefcase and tie seemed somehow to clash with the sensible shoes and cosy sweaters of the staff. Among the tiny boots and miniature furniture he was a clumsy giant, sweaty and out of place. But most of all it was communication that shut him out; he had never managed to have the same sort of relationship the staff had with his children. He couldn’t handle sitting and talking about the same drawing for ten minutes, the wire in his veins started tugging and itching after just a few seconds… yes, that’s lovely, Ellen, is it a cat? After that he was on to his next thought, the next action.

She was doing some cutting-out when he arrived, and enthusiastically showed him the fish and plants she had made for her little sea.

‘Shall I help you with your overall?’ he offered.

She looked at him in surprise.