Хеннинг Манкелль - The Man from Beijing

Julia’s house wasn’t locked. She went in and read the document that Huddén had found on the kitchen table. The answer she found to her question made her heart start beating faster. She sat down and tried to marshal her thoughts.

The conclusion she reached was improbable, but it might be correct anyway. She dialled Huddén’s number. He answered immediately.

‘I’m sitting in Julia’s kitchen. The woman standing on the road in her nightdress. Come here right away.’

‘Will do.’

Huddén sat opposite her at the table. Then stood up again and looked down at the chair seat. Sniffed at it, then changed to another chair. She stared at him in bafflement.

‘Urine,’ he said. ‘The old lady must have peed herself. What did you want to say?’

‘I want to try out a thought on you. It seems implausible, but is somehow rational nevertheless. I have the feeling that there’s a sort of underlying logic to what happened here last night. I want you to listen, and then tell me if I’ve got the wrong end of the stick.

‘It’s to do with names,’ she began. ‘We still don’t know the boy’s name, but if I’m right he’s related to the Andersson family who lived and died in the house where we found them. A key to everything that happened here last night is the names. Families. People in this village seem to have been called Andersson, Andrén or Magnusson. Julia’s surname is Holmgren. Julia Holmgren. She’s still alive. And then we have Tom and Ninni Hansson. They’re also still alive, and have a different surname. It should be possible to draw a conclusion from that.’

‘That whoever did this, for some reason or other, was out to get people with those names,’ said Huddén.

‘Think another step ahead! This is a tiny little hamlet. People probably haven’t moved. Most likely there has been intermarriage between the families. I’m not talking about incest, just that there is good reason to believe that we’re not looking at three families, but perhaps two. Or maybe even only one. That may explain why Julia Holmgren and the Hanssons are still alive.’

Sundberg paused for Huddén’s reaction. She didn’t consider him particularly intelligent, but she respected his ability to use his intuition.

‘If that is true, it must mean that whoever did this knew these people very well. Who would do that?’

‘Possibly a relative?’

‘A mad relative? Why would he want to do anything like this?’

‘We don’t know.’

‘How do you explain the severed leg?’

‘I can’t. But I think we have a start. That and a red silk ribbon are all we have.

‘I want you to go back to Hudiksvall,’ she said. ‘Tobias is supposed to be delegating officers to search for next of kin. Make sure that happens. And look for links between these three families. But keep it between you and me for the time being.’

Shortly before half past five, some of the senior police officers gathered in Tobias Ludwig’s office to discuss the press conference. It was decided not to issue a list of names of the dead, but they would say how many people had been killed and admit that, so far, the police had no clues. Any information the general public could supply would be appreciated.

Ludwig would give preliminary details, and then Sundberg would take over.

Before entering the room crammed with reporters, she shut herself away in a toilet. She examined her face in a mirror. If only I could wake up, she thought. And find that this whole business had gone away.

She went out, slammed her fist hard into the corridor wall several times, then went into the room chock-full of people and far too hot. She walked up to the little podium and sat down next to Tobias Ludwig.

He looked at her. She nodded. He could begin.

The Judge

A moth detached itself from the darkness and fluttered restlessly around the desk lamp. Birgitta Roslin put down her pen, leaned back in her chair and watched the moth’s vain attempt to force its way through the porcelain shade. The noise of its fluttering wings reminded her of something from her childhood, but she couldn’t pin it down.

Her memory was always especially creative when she was tired, as she was now. Just as when she was asleep, inaccessible memories from long ago might crop up out of nowhere.

Like the moth.

She closed her eyes and massaged her temples with her fingertips. It was a few minutes past midnight. She had heard the night security officers passing through the echoing halls of the court building as they made their rounds twice. She liked working late at night, when the place was empty. Years ago, when she had been an articled clerk in Värnamo, she had often gone into the empty courtroom late in the evening, switched on a few lights, sat down and listened to the silence. She would imagine she was in an empty theatre. There were echoes in the walls, whispering voices still living on after all the drama of past trials. Murderers had been sentenced there, violent criminals, thieves. And men had sworn their innocence in a never-ending stream of depressing paternity cases. Others had been declared innocent and reinstated as honourable men.

When Birgitta Roslin had completed her probationary period and been offered a post as an articled clerk in Värnamo, her intention had been to become a prosecuting counsel. But during her clerkship she changed course and began to specialise in what was to become her eventual career. To a large extent this was due to Anker, the old district judge, who made an indelible impression on her. He displayed exactly the same patience as he listened to young men who told obvious lie after lie in an attempt to avoid responsibility in paternity cases as he did when faced with hard-boiled men of violence who showed no remorse for their brutal misdeeds. It was as if the old judge had instilled in her a new degree of respect for the judicial system she had previously taken for granted. Now she actually experienced it, not just in word, but in deed. Justice meant action. By the time she left Värnamo, she had made up her mind to become a judge.

She stood up and walked over to the window. Down below in the street a man was peeing against the wall. It had been snowing in Helsingborg during the day, a thin layer of powdery snow that was now whirling along the street. As she watched the man nonchalantly, her mind was working overtime on the judgement she was busy preparing. She had allowed herself until the following day, but it had to be ready by then.

The man down below moved on. Roslin returned to her desk and picked up her pencil. She always worked with pencil until she’d finalised her work.

She leaned over the messy pages with all their alterations and additions. It was a simple case and the evidence against the accused was overwhelming; nevertheless, she was having problems making her judgment.

She wanted to impose sanctions, but was unable to.

A man and a woman had met in one of Helsingborg’s dance restaurants. The woman was young, barely twenty, and had drunk too much. The man was in his forties and had volunteered to see her home, then was invited into the flat for a glass of water. The woman had fallen asleep on the sofa. The man had raped her, without waking her up, then left. The next morning the woman had only a vague memory of what had happened on the sofa. She contacted the hospital, was examined, and it was established that she had had intercourse. The man was charged. The case came to court a full year after the incident had taken place. Birgitta Roslin had presided over the trial and observed the young woman. She had read in the preliminary case notes that the woman earned her living by working as a temporary cashier in various supermarkets. It was clear from a personal statement that the woman was in the habit of drinking too much. She had also been found guilty of petty theft and was once sacked for neglecting her duties.