Helene Tursten - Detective Inspector Huss

A quick look at the clock revealed that she had fifteen minutes left until her meeting with Sylvia. It would be best to show up more or less on time. She stuffed the stack of faxes in her bottom desk drawer and slipped a notepad into her jacket pocket.

SYLVIA WAS still upset over the mess in the apartment. She grumbled at Irene, who represented the police in general and the technicians in particular. Irene let her rant, following in her wake into the magnificent living room. The curtains were still open, letting in the gray daylight. Irene went over to one of the high French doors and looked out. A narrow balcony no more than two meters wide ran along the entire room. The balustrade consisted of pink vase-shaped marble columns with lintels of black marble. The railing looked dangerously low. There were also no handles on the outside of the glass doors. This prompted Irene to dismiss her thoughts of a façade-climbing killer. It would be impossible to get in from the outside through the balcony doors. And people would have noticed him, since it would only have been a little past five o’clock. No, that theory was no good.

Her thoughts were interrupted by Sylvia’s plaintive voice.

“Pirjo isn’t answering the phone either, just one of her imbecile kids. Even when I speak Finnish to him he still can’t tell me where Pirjo is. He claims he has the flu and that a Finnish policeman is coming to talk to them this afternoon.”

“That’s true. One of our inspectors speaks Finnish. He’ll get in touch with Pirjo,” said Irene.

“What’s the point of that?”

“She and her daughter may have seen or heard something on Monday, when they were here cleaning. Does she usually bring her daughter along?”

“No, only if we’ve had a big party. And if the girl is free,” replied Sylvia brusquely.

Irene looked around the huge room. Now she saw that the columns supporting the floor of the upper level were not made of solid marble at all, as she had thought two days earlier. They were wooden columns very skillfully painted with a marble finish. Naturally, real marble would have been too heavy. The walls were lined with groupings of antique furniture and beautiful cabinets. And what paintings! Irene felt like a lone privileged visitor to an art museum. Parallel to the row of balcony doors shone a dark dining table of mahogany, the longest she had ever seen. She saw a good opening for her conversation with Sylvia.

“What a lovely table. And so long! Is this where you sat on Saturday evening?”

“Yes, of course we were here,” Sylvia said guardedly.

“How many were you?”

“Twenty. We didn’t want to invite too many, just our closest friends. They had all attended our wedding. Except for Henrik and Charlotte, naturally.”

That depends on how you look at it, in Henrik’s case, Irene thought.

Sylvia went on, “Richard’s sister and her husband couldn’t come. They live in Florida. He was having an operation on his prostate or something. He’s seventy-five.”

“And how old is she?”

“Sixty-seven.”

“Could you please tell me who was at the party?”

“Of course. Besides Richard and myself, there were Henrik and Charlotte, Sven and Ann-Marie Tosse, Peder and Ulla Wahl. They had come back to Sweden to see grandchild number four. They were here a whole week before the party. Their eldest daughter Ingrid and her husband came too. Ingrid was a flower girl at our wedding. She was five years old at the time, so sweet. She wasn’t the one who has the new baby; it was the middle daughter Kerstin. She was only two when we got married, so she wasn’t at the wedding. That’s why I didn’t invite her. Or the youngest daughter either. She’s the same age as Henrik.”

She stopped, looking confused. Irene realized that she had lost her train of thought. She had managed to jot down all the names Sylvia had mentioned and was pleased at the pause; it gave her a chance to catch up.

Irene took pity on her and said, “You’ve told me that your family, the Tosses, and the Wahl clan were present. What’s Ingrid’s last name?”

“Von Hjortz.”

“Thank you. I’d like to get the phone numbers for all of them before I go.”

Sylvia nodded and took a deep breath before resuming her guest list. “My mother, Ritva Montgomery. She’s seventy-eight. My sister Arja came over with her from Helsinki. Then there was Valle Reuter-”

She broke off. A cloud of undisguised contempt passed over her face. Quickly she continued, “We were so pleased that Gustav Ceder and his wife, Lady Louise, could come. Her father is almost a hundred years old and on his deathbed. They came last Friday night and flew back to London at lunchtime on Sunday. We haven’t seen them since their silver anniversary four years ago. They couldn’t make it to Richard’s sixtieth birthday, because that’s when her father fell seriously ill, although he made a recovery. .”

Suddenly she fell silent again, confused. Angrily she exclaimed, “God, how I’m going on! Now I’ve lost my train of thought again!”

She cast an imploring look at Irene, who humored her and said, “Valle Reuter and then Gustav Ceder with his noble wife Louise.”

“Thank you. Our good friend Ivan Viktors, the opera singer, you know, was here too.”

Irene vaguely recognized his name. Apparently he was someone she ought to know, since the superintendent had been so charmed when he heard of him. But Andersson was an opera fan, and Irene was not. The Beatles, Rod Stewart, and Tina Turner were more her taste.

“That leaves only Richard’s two cousins and their husbands. They’re the two daughters of Richard’s aunt. They’re our age and were, as I mentioned, at the wedding. Pleasant, but we don’t see them very often. Both of them live in Stockholm. My mother-in-law was from Stockholm. I’ll give you all the names and addresses you want,” Sylvia said.

She turned on her heel and began gracefully ascending the stairs to the upper floor. Irene decided to follow. The thick runner effectively muted her brisk footsteps on the stairs. At the top Irene caught a glimpse of Sylvia heading through the doorway to the room that was someone’s office. The desk and computer had led her and the superintendent to draw the erroneous conclusion that it was Richard’s. The ballet poster, however, indicated that it must be Sylvia’s. Richard had a whole apartment for his office, after all.

Irene quickly crossed the soft carpets in the hall and library. Sylvia gave a start when she realized she was no longer alone in the workroom. Irene was perplexed by this reaction, and by the expression on Sylvia’s face. She looked as if she’d been caught red-handed.

As Irene later recalled this fleeting image, Sylvia leaned her forehead lightly against the frame of the photograph that hung on the wall next to the computer table. Irene took a few cautious steps into the room and looked at the picture. The photo itself was A4 letter sized, surrounded by a broad mat within a narrow silver frame.

The smile was the same. The glint in his eyes, the expression of joie de vivre. A markedly pulsating, sensual presence. But it wasn’t Richard; it was Henrik. The short-cropped hair and the beret that sat nonchalantly-but certainly according to regulations-at an angle showed that the picture must have been taken when he was in the service. The commandos, the magazine article had reported.

Sylvia gave Irene a look brimming over with rage and hatred. Suddenly she started to cry. Her eyes wide, without blinking, she stood erect with her arms hanging loosely at her sides, without uttering a sound, but tears were streaming down her cheeks. Irene had an uncomfortable feeling of having witnessed something very personal. She felt the need to break the unpleasant scene which she had unintentionally provoked.