Liza Marklund - Red Wolf

‘The steelworks?’ he said. ‘I thought you were going to the airbase?’

‘Yep, I’ve been there, but I met a young lad who-’

‘But you’ll make it okay?’

‘Make what?’

He had no answer. In the gap between them he really could hear the noise in the background, some sort of low rumbling. He felt the distance between them like a dead weight.

‘I miss you,’ he said quietly.

‘What did you say?’ she yelled above the noise.

He took a quick, silent breath.

‘How are you, Annika?’ he asked.

‘Really good,’ she replied, too quickly and too firmly. ‘Have you eaten?’

‘It’s in the oven.’

‘Why don’t you do it in the microwave? I put them-’

‘I know,’ he interrupted. ‘Can I call you later? I’m in the middle of things here right now…’

Then he was sitting there again holding his mobile, feeling an irrational anxiety that threatened to turn into anger.

He didn’t like Annika going away, it was as simple as that. She didn’t deal with it well. But when he raised the subject with her she became cold and dismissive. He wanted her here beside him so he could make sure everything was all right, that she was safe and happy.

After that terrible Christmas, once the worst of the attention had died down, everything had seemed pretty good. Annika had been quiet and pale, but okay. She’d spent a lot of time playing with the children, singing and dancing with them, cutting and gluing. She’d spent a lot of time on the new residents’ association, and on a small extension to the kitchen that they could have done now that they’d bought the freehold on the flat. The thought of the bargain they had got, buying the flat for less than half the market price, made her childishly excited, but then she had always been broke. He had tried to regard the purchase more soberly, aware that money came and went. Annika never let him forget that he’d lost his last savings on shares.

He glanced at the oven, wondering if the food was hot yet, but made no move to take it out.

When Annika started work again she seemed to slip out of reach more and more, becoming distant, unknown. She would stop in the middle of a conversation, her mouth open, eyes staring in horror. If he asked what was wrong she would look at him like she’d never seen him before. It gave him goosebumps.

‘Daddy, I can’t get the computer to work.’

‘Try turning it off and on again, then I’ll come and look.’

Suddenly he felt quite powerless. He glanced one last time at the paper, realizing that another day of journalistic effort was about to go straight in the recycling. With limbs heavy as lead he lay the table, threw the children’s dirty overalls in the washing machine, made a salad and showed Kalle how to restart the computer.

Just as they were sitting down to eat, the courier arrived with the brochures they were going to discuss and evaluate the following evening.

While the children chattered and made a mess he read through the advice on how threatened politicians should behave. All the way through, and then once more.

Then he thought about Sophia.

Annika switched off the car engine outside the darkened door of the Norrland News . The yellow streetlamps threw an oblique light on the dashboard.

The time she had spent at home had given Thomas space which he had soon made his own. In three months he had got used to total service from her, with the children as accessories; his evenings free for tennis and work meetings, weekends for hunting and hockey trips. Since she had started work again, she was still doing most of the work at home. He criticized her for working, under the pretext that she needed to rest.

In fact, he just wanted to avoid heating up the meals she had prepared, she thought, surprised at how angry the idea made her.

She threw open the car door, picked up her bag and laptop and stepped onto the snowy street.

‘Pekkari?’ she said over the intercom. ‘It’s Bengtzon. There’s something I have to talk to you about.’

She was let in, and felt her way through the dark entrance hall. The night editor met her at the top of the stairs.

‘What’s this about?’

She recoiled from the smell of stale alcohol on his breath, but stood as close as she could and said quietly, ‘Benny may have come across something he shouldn’t have.’

The man’s eyes opened wide, the broken veins evidence of genuine sorrow.

‘F21?’

She shrugged. ‘Not sure yet. I need to check with Suup.’

‘He always goes home at five sharp.’

‘He isn’t dead as well, is he?’ Annika said.

She was shown to the letters-page editor’s room, where she cleared away the neat piles of angry handwritten correspondence on the desk and unpacked her laptop. She switched it on as she called the police station; Inspector Suup had indeed left at precisely 17.00.

‘What’s his first name?’ Annika asked.

The duty officer sounded surprised by his own reply: ‘I don’t actually know.’

She heard him call, ‘Hey, what’s Suup’s name, apart from Suup?’ Muttering, the scraping of chairs.

‘He’s down as L.G. on the files.’

She called directory inquiries from the phone on the desk, only to find that the number was blocked. It had been the same on the Katrineholm Post , too, a subscription to a number service had been too expensive. She pulled the plug out of the back of the phone and connected her laptop instead, changing the settings to get a connection, then went in on the Evening Post ’s server.

On Telia’s website she discovered there was no Suup with the initials L.G. in the phonebook for Luleå, Piteå, Boden, Kalix or Älvsbyn. He could hardly commute further than that each day, she reasoned. Instead she went into the national census results, which, thank God, were now online. There was a Suup, Lars-Gunnar, born 1941, on Kronvägen in Luleå. Back to Telia again, Kronvägen in the address box, and voilà ! A Suup had two lines at number 19. She signed out, unplugged the lead and put it back in the phone.

No sooner had she done that than her mobile rang, and she put a hand to her forehead.

‘I’m so fucked up,’ she said to Anne Snapphane. ‘Why on earth don’t I call from this phone instead?’

‘ Que? ’ Anne said.

The noises behind her suggested alcohol and minimalist décor.

‘Where are you?’ Annika asked.

The line crackled and hissed.

‘What?’ Anne said. ‘Hello? Are you in the middle of something?’

Annika spoke slowly and clearly. ‘I’ve uncovered the murder of a reporter. Call me at midnight if you’re still awake.’

She hung up and called the first of Suup’s numbers, but reached a fax machine. She called the second and heard the theme-music of the evening news.

‘So you’re the sort of person who disturbs people at home?’ Inspector Suup said, not sounding particularly upset.

Like Benny Ekland , Annika thought, shutting her eyes as she asked: ‘That Volvo you found in Malmhamnen, was it a V70? Gold?’

The newsreader’s reliable tones filled the line for a few seconds, then the volume of the television was abruptly turned down.

‘Okay, you’ve got me really curious now,’ the inspector said.

‘There’s no leak,’ Annika said. ‘I spoke to a potential witness. Is the information correct?’

‘I can’t comment on that.’

‘Off the record?’

‘Can I switch phones?’

He hung up. Annika waited for an eternity before he picked up again, this time with no television in the back-ground.

‘You might have got the duty officer to read out the details of cars stolen from Bergnäset on Saturday night,’ he said.