Mari Jungstedt - Unknown

At first he didn't comprehend what it was that came rushing out at him when the door opened. He fell over backward, and he could feel something big and bloody come toppling over him. He screamed when he looked into the dead eyes of a horse's head.

He washed his hands with great care, rubbing on the soap and scrubbing with the stiff brush so that his skin hurt. Then he continued up along his arms, brushing so vigorously that his skin stung and layers were gradually scraped off. He started to bleed. By that time he no longer felt any pain. The water didn't flow properly from the faucet, nor did it ever get truly hot. He didn't care; in some way that was all part of the whole process. He bled into the sink, and he liked seeing the blood splash up on the stainless steel sides. Then he scrubbed his chest, his stomach, his legs, and his arms in the same rough manner.

He came out here every time. This was his starting point, the center of his circle, the hub in his life. Here the present shook hands with the future, stood eye to eye with the past. Everything became knotted together into one entity. It was only in this house that he could feel peace.

The turning point had occurred here, and he knew exactly when it had happened. He now understood that he had been chosen, but also that this had not occurred by mere chance.

He had arranged it himself by finally taking command of his own life. He would never have to wonder what it was that had prompted his actions from the very beginning. Perhaps it was merely a feeling of satiety, that now it was enough. From being a victim, he had now gone on the attack. Once and for all.

There was something painful yet at the same time liberating about getting older. Life's insights caught up with you, and there was no avoiding them. They nudged the back of your knees, breathed down your neck until you let them emerge, and then it was like a dam bursting. All the torments that he had hidden under his skin came to the surface and broke through the wall of defenses that he had so carefully constructed since the very first violations in his childhood. To live was to suffer, but he had been punished enough. So one day when he was wandering through the woods alone, he confronted them eye to eye. They spoke through pine and spruce, juniper and blueberry branches. He could hear their whispering voices in the crowns of the trees, in the marshy ground, and in the overcast sky. When he trudged along the shore he heard their cries from far off in the foamy white wave tops and in the sandy dunes.

He screamed and drowned out the roar of the waves.

"I hear you, I hear you. I'm here, I'm yours! I'm your eternal servant, I offer my blood, my life!"

They answered him quickly and firmly. It was not his blood they were interested in.

The call came into police headquarters at 9:15 p.m. Speaking in a distressed and disjointed manner, Gunnar Ambjornsson told the officer on duty about the horse's head in his shed. The officer then contacted Anders Knutas, who in turned called Jacobsson. Since she lived within walking distance of Norra Murgatan, they agreed to meet there.

When Knutas arrived, she was already waiting outside the fence. They found Ambjornsson, with whom Knutas was slightly acquainted, wrapped in a blanket and sitting on a chair in the yard. He was speaking agitatedly with a female police officer. When he caught sight of Knutas, he stood up.

"Anders, this is insane. Come see for yourselves."

He led the way to the shed, which stood in a corner of the property.

Jacobsson took out a handkerchief in preparation for what they were about to see and pressed it to her mouth.

Her stomach still turned over when she saw what Ambjornsson had found an hour earlier. The swollen and bloody head of a horse was affixed to a sturdy wooden pole that was leaning against the door. The pole had been shoved up into the head through the neck. The mouth hung open, and the eyes gave both officers a glassy stare. Several seconds passed before anyone said a word.

"Do you see what I see?" said Knutas in a toneless voice.

Jacobsson slowly nodded from behind her handkerchief. She could hardly bear to look.

"What is it?" Ambjornsson seemed terrified.

Both the detectives gave him a solemn look.

"Do you know about the horse that was found decapitated recently?"

Ambjornsson nodded without speaking.

"Well, this head," said Knutas, "doesn't belong to the same horse."

When Knutas closed the door to his house and set off for work, it was only six thirty in the morning on the day after the discovery in Ambjornsson's shed. He had lain awake most of the night, and by five he gave up all attempts to sleep. As soon as he got outside, he perked up. The morning air was fresh and clear, and the city was quiet and still.

It was 11:00 p.m. by the time they left the house in Klinten the night before. Ambjornsson had reluctantly agreed to be taken to the hospital to be examined. He'd had a weak heart for many years and had to take medicine for it. Afterward he was given a police escort over to his girlfriend's place in Stanga. The police refused to allow him to spend the night alone in his house. The horse's head on the pole couldn't be regarded as anything less than a threat.

The conference room had a charged atmosphere when the investigative team took their places. A certain anticipation could be felt in the air. What had happened was definitely out of the ordinary.

"Good morning," Knutas greeted his colleagues. He then reported on the horrifying scene they had found at the home of the municipal politician Gunnar Ambjornsson the night before.

When Knutas told them that the horse's head that had been stuck on a pole did not belong to the decapitated horse in Petesviken, everyone was utterly silent.

"What was that you just said?" The words were hesitantly spoken by Martin Kihlgard.

"It's not the same head. The horse's head in Ambjornsson's shed belonged to a standardbred trotter; the horse in Petesviken was a Gotland pony."

"So that means that somewhere on Gotland there's another decapitated horse."

"Exactly," said Knutas. "We interviewed Ambjornsson last night, and he says he has no idea what this is all about. He hasn't had any quarrel with anyone, as far as he knows. But I think we still have to assume that this is a threat. What do you think?"

"Politicians are always being threatened in one way or another," said Wittberg with a snort. "It's obvious that Ambjornsson has reason to be frightened. Methods like this are straight out of the Mafia. It makes me think of drug deals."

"Do you really think the noble Ambjornsson would be fooling around with drugs? That's going a little too far." Jacobsson looked at her colleague in disbelief.

"I agree." Norrby shook his head. "The Italian Mafia in Visby? You've been watching too many action films, Thomas. This is real life-and on Gotland."

"The crime is a sophisticated one. That much we can agree on," interjected Sohlman. "Allow me to go over the technical details. The perpetrator shoved the pole up through the horse's neck, under the mandible, and in that way he could affix the head without using rope or anything like that. The pole was placed so that it would fall forward into Ambjornsson's arms when he opened the shed door. The man suffers from a weak heart; it's incredible that he didn't have a heart attack. The head remained attached, even when the pole fell to the ground, which indicates that the perp knew what he was doing. We called in Ake Tornsjo, the veterinarian, who examined the head last night. According to him, the horse was probably killed in the same way as the one we found decapitated in Petesviken, but he won't be sure until he examines the rest of the body. Unfortunately, we have no idea where to find it. At any rate, this head had been frozen and then thawed before it was fastened to the pole. We know this because it's swollen up, and the flesh is looser than it would normally be. It's impossible to say how long the perp may have preserved the head in a freezer-in principle it could have been for any amount of time. We've found a good deal of evidence on Ambjornsson's property: footprints, a cigarette butt that doesn't belong to him, and a button that he doesn't recognize. The grass has been trampled in several places, which indicates that the perp first had a look around, presumably to find a suitable place to position the horse's head. By the way, the head has been taken to the veterinarian's office for closer examination."