Liza Marklund - Red Wolf

‘You’ve got to help him,’ Annika said to Karina. ‘At least put his coat back on.’

The woman shook her head, and at that moment the candle went out.

‘Light it again,’ Annika said, hearing the fear in her voice.

‘It’s burned out,’ Karina said. ‘There’s no wick left.’

And with the darkness came silence, as the cold grew sharper and drier.

Annika opened her eyes wide but could see absolutely nothing. She was hovering in an empty, ice-cold space, and was struck with a sense of utter and immense loneliness. Surely nothing in the world could feel worse than this. Anything but isolation.

‘We have to keep moving,’ Annika said. ‘Karina, don’t stand still.’

But Annika heard the minister sink to the floor, and a muffled and uncontrollable attack of sobbing rose from the corner.

The woman was crying, wailing, drooling, and Annika and Yngve were moving ever slower in the ice-cold freezer. She held the shivering man in her arms, feeling his limbs getting heavier and heavier, his breathing more and more strained, and she tightened her grip, her arms rigid.

Responsibility for others , she thought, staring into the darkness. Nothing without each other . And Ellen’s and Kalle’s soft faces appeared in front of her, she could feel their silky-smooth warmth and sweet smell.

Soon , she thought. I’ll soon be with you again .

The Minister of Culture gradually calmed down, her sobbing dying away. The silence that followed was even deeper than before. It took a few seconds before Annika realized why.

Göran Nilsson had stopped breathing.

The thought sent sparks through her mind. Her fingers itched like mad, a sound emerged. Panic .

A moment later Yngve slumped in her arms, his legs gave way beneath him and his head fell on her shoulder.

‘Shit!’ she screamed in the man’s ear. ‘Don’t die. Help, someone, help!’

She didn’t have the strength to hold the man upright, he slid into a heap at her feet and she was hit by a complete blackout.

‘Help!’ she screamed at the top of her voice. ‘Help us, someone!’

‘There isn’t any help,’ Karina Björnlund said.

‘Help!’ Annika shrieked, fumbling forward to where she thought the door was, and walked right into the compressor, her knee striking the metal. ‘Help!’

Somewhere behind her she heard muffled voices and for a moment feared she was about to suffer a new onslaught from the angels. Talking, cries, the voices were definitely human, and a moment later came a sharp knocking sound.

‘Hello?’ a male voice called from the other side of the wall. ‘Is there someone in there?’

She spun round and stared into the darkness in the direction the voice had come from.

‘Yes!’ she screamed, falling over Yngve. ‘Yes! We’re in here. We’re locked in. Help us!’

‘We’ll have to cut the padlock off,’ the man said. ‘It may take a while. How many of you are there?’

‘Four,’ Annika said, ‘but I think one man is dead. Another is on the point of falling asleep; I can’t keep him awake. Hurry!’

‘I’ll get the tools,’ the voice said, then Karina Björnlund came back to life.

‘No!’ the minister shouted. ‘Don’t leave me! I have to get out, now!’

Annika found her way over to Yngve where he lay on the floor, breathing shallowly. She stroked his rough hair, clenching her jaw, then lay down on the floor and pulled the man on top of her, wrapping the polar jacket around them both.

‘Don’t die,’ she whispered, rocking him as though he were a child.

And she lay like that until she heard the cutting torch break the lock and the door was pulled open, and a torch was shining right in her eyes.

‘Take him first,’ Annika said. ‘I think he’s about to give up.’

A moment later the man was lifted off her, put on a stretcher, and floated out of her line of vision in just a couple of seconds.

‘What about you? Can you stand?’

She peered up at the light, could see nothing but the silhouette of a policeman.

‘I’m okay,’ she said, and stood up.

Inspector Forsberg looked at her anxiously.

‘You’ll have to go to hospital and get checked out,’ he said. ‘When you feel like talking I want to speak to you down at the station.’

Annika nodded, suddenly mute. Instead she pointed at Göran Nilsson, noting that her hand was trembling.

‘You’re so frozen you’re shaking,’ Forsberg said.

‘I think he’s dead,’ she whispered.

The paramedics returned and went over to Göran Nilsson, checked his breathing and pulse.

‘I think he broke his leg,’ Annika said. ‘And he’s ill; he said he was going to die soon.’

They put him on a stretcher and carried him quickly out of the building.

Karina Björnlund stepped out from the shadows, leaning on a paramedic. Her face had dissolved in tears, her nose still bleeding.

Annika looked at her swollen face and memorized it.

Karina Björnlund stopped right next to her and whispered so low that no one else could hear. ‘I’m going to say everything myself,’ she said. ‘You can forget all about your exclusive.’

And then the minister went out to the floodlights and police cars and ambulances.

Inspector Forsberg had a cramped, messy office on the second floor of the yellow-brown monstrosity that was the police station. Annika was dozing off on one of the chairs, but gave a start and sat up straight when the door flew open.

‘Sorry you’ve had to wait. No milk or sugar,’ the police officer said, putting a steaming-hot plastic cup in front of her on the desk, then went round and sat on his swivel-chair.

Annika picked up the cup, burning her hands and blowing on the drink. She took a cautious sip. Machine coffee, the worst sort.

‘Is this an interrogation?’ she asked, putting the cup down.

Forsberg looked through a drawer without answering.

‘Witness questioning, I suppose we should call it. Where the hell have I put it? There it is!’

He pulled out a little tape-recorder and a mess of cables, straightened up, looked Annika in the eye and smiled.

‘You’re not too frozen, then?’ His gaze held hers.

She looked away.

‘Oh, I am,’ she said. ‘But I learned to dress properly the hard way. How are the others?’

‘Ragnwald is dead, like you thought. Yngve Gustafsson is in intensive care, his body temperature was down to twenty-eight degrees. He’ll make it though. Did you know he was the father of Linus, the boy who was killed?’

Annika looked up at the police officer, a lump in her throat, and shook her head.

‘And Karina Björnlund?’ she said.

‘She’s having her face patched up, and she’s got frostbite in her feet. So what happened?’

He leaned forward and switched on the tape-recorder.

‘Okay,’ she said, ‘do you want the full story?’

He looked at her thoughtfully for a few moments, then looked away and pulled out her personal details.

‘Witness questioning of Annika Bengtzon,’ he said, ‘of Hantverkargatan thirty-two in Stockholm; location: questioner’s office; conversation begins…’

He looked at his watch.

‘… at twenty-two fifteen. How did you come to be in an abandoned compressor shed near Swedish Steel in Luleå this evening?’

She cleared her throat towards the microphone, which was standing on a memo from the National Police Commissioner.

‘I wanted to interview the Minister of Culture, Karina Björnlund, and happened to catch sight of her at Kallax Airport, and I followed her.’

The inspector looked at her and smiled. ‘Interview her?’ he said. ‘What about?’