Helene Tursten - The Glass Devil

“Sten Schyttelius. Sixty-four years old. Found dead in his bed. Shot in the head with one round. The point of entry was calculated as being just above the bridge of the nose. The remainder of the face was heavily covered with carbon and gunpowder residue. The weapon was fired from a distance of just a few centimeters. The bullet was retrieved from the floor under the bed.”

Andersson looked up again.

“The head injuries of all three victims were the same, so I’ll continue reading. Death was most likely instantaneous. Rigor mortis and their body temperature pinpoints the time of death at some eighteen hours before the victims were found, about one o’clock on Tuesday morning. The toxicology tests show that Sten Schyttelius had been drinking alcohol. His blood alcohol level was one point one. Elsa had high levels of nitrazepam and citalopram in her system, and the pathologist writes in parentheses that these are sleeping pills and anti-depressants. In Sten’s case, the bullet’s trajectory was slightly to the left. Elsa’s bullet veered more strongly to the left. Based on this, the pathologist determines that the murderer stood next to Sten Schyttelius’s side of the bed during both shots and that he’s right-handed. Comments?”

It was quiet for a few seconds before Irene asked permission to speak.

“The murderer sneaked into the bedroom after Sten Schyttelius fell asleep. He was probably sleeping quite heavily, based on his blood alcohol level. Elsa was also probably already asleep, because she was filled with sleeping pills. That’s why he shot Sten, then Elsa. What strikes me is that Elsa was also shot from a distance of only a few centimeters. He must have placed one knee on the bed and leaned over Sten in order to get so close to Elsa.

“Two shots hit Jacob, and one definitely fatal shot each for Sten and Elsa. Perhaps he didn’t want to fire more often so as not to risk being heard. One or two shots may pass as a backfire, but three or four will arouse suspicions,” Irene continued.

“The fact is that no one heard any shots at all. It was after midnight when they were shot,” Fredrik pointed out. “The rectory is in a remote location. The neighbors who might have heard something were probably in bed asleep.”

“We also have no reports of suspicious cars near the rectory. In such a small place as Kullahult, people should have noticed if an unfamiliar car showed up during the evening or night,” the superintendent said gruffly.

“But we have the car in the woods near Norssjön. And the technicians have confirmed that the woolen threads we found come from the same piece of clothing. Of course, we don’t know for sure that the clothing belongs to the murderer, but in any case someone walked between the clearing and the beach below the cottage,” said Irene.

Suddenly Andersson left the room. The others looked at each other in surprise. Since the door was open, they could hear him rummaging around in his office, mumbling, most likely swearing. He came back after about a minute, red in the face but with a triumphant smile. In one hand, he held a set of maps of Göteborg and surrounding areas.

“I found it. It’s more detailed than the road map,” he said while he was flipping through the pages to find the ones covering Kullahult and Norssjön.

“I thought about Fredrik and Irene’s walk from the position of the car in the woods to Schyttelius’s cottage, and then something struck me. If you drive on the roads, then it’s at least six kilometers between the cottage and the rectory. Let me check. . ”

With a lot of puffing and mumbling, Andersson measured the distance on the map and tried to transform the map’s scale into kilometers.

“Twelve kilometers, round trip. Plus two hundred additional meters to the suspicious car in the woods,” he determined finally.

He tore out the page for the Norssjön area and placed it next to the map of Kullahult. He placed his fat index finger where the cottage was located and said, “But if the murderer went to Norssjön and then walked straight through the woods, the distance would be considerably shorter. Let’s see. . ”

New grunting and measurements revealed that it was four and a half kilometers between the crime scenes, if one took the path through the woods.

“Add two hundred meters to reach the car. A total of nine point two kilometers back and forth. It’s not impossible to walk it,” said the superintendent.

“But terribly difficult! We were pretty tired after trudging those two hundred meters through the woods,” Irene objected.

“But we had on the wrong kind of shoes,” Fredrik said. “If this guy is used to being in the woods and had the right gear, then it wouldn’t be a problem.”

“But it must have been pitch-black in the woods if the murderer set out right after killing Jacob. He’d have to be careful not to break his ankle or get lost. But he might have felt safe if he used a flashlight,” Tommy added thoughtfully.

“The murderer seems to be very much at home. He knew where the keys were to the front doors and to the computer room at the rectory, and where the gun cabinet was. He knew of the small hiding place behind the panel in the cottage. And maybe he went through the woods between the cottage and the rectory. What strikes me is the degree of his local knowledge,” Irene concluded.

Fredrik glanced at Irene. “We never continued farther than the cottage. Maybe there’s a path or a trail there that we missed. Maybe we should go out and look again. .?”

“You can go out in the woods and look around,” Irene said. “I’m going to see Eva Möller.”

She really didn’t want to have him accompany her. At the same time, she wondered if she was crazy to take an airhead like Eva seriously. But she couldn’t get the cantor’s last words out of her head: “Together we can find out Sten’s hidden secrets. . ”

Irene called Eva Möller, and they arranged to meet at Eva’s place after two o’clock. That gave Irene a few hours to spend on the files and to write her report. As luck would have it, Tommy came storming in and insisted that she listen to the latest news about the Speedy murder.

“Everything changed when I had the idea of talking to Asko Pihlainen’s neighbor across the street, an eighty-year-old woman named Gertrud Ritzman. She has serious heart problems and doesn’t have much time left, she says. But her mind is clear as a bell. She was the one who came up with the idea that we should film her testimony, in case she gets worse or dies before the trial.

“When I asked her about the morning in question, when Asko and his neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Wisköö, claim they were playing cards, she said right away that it wasn’t true. She doesn’t sleep well and often gets up during the night. She remembered this particular morning really well. At about five thirty in the morning, Wisköö’s car pulled up outside Pihlainen’s shack, and Asko jumped out almost before the car stopped. He rushed into his place as Paul Wisköö drove the car into his carport. Neither Asko nor Paul Wisköö were playing cards with their wives at around five a.m.

“I did some research on Paul Wisköö, by the way, and, as you’ve probably already guessed, it’s a fake name. Guess what good old Neighbor Paul’s real name is?”

“No idea.”

“Paul Larson, alias Pepsi!”

Irene thought she recognized the name, but it took a few seconds before she was sure. She exclaimed, “Clark Bertilsson’s old buddy! Well, I’ll be damned. His resumé must be as long as the road between Kungsbacka and here. If he’s involved, then it’s definitely about narcotics. Lots of drugs.”

“Bingo. He’s served time for narcotics violations and bank robbery at various times. And a few years ago, Asko and Pepsi were in the same jail. They hit it off and became friends. They even live next door to each other.”