Лейф Перссон - Another Time, Another Life

“Why didn’t you quit if he was so stingy?” Jarnebring asked.

Because she had Friday morning free anyway, and an old, considerably better client later in the day who lived right in Eriksson’s vicinity. She cleaned his office, and he didn’t know Eriksson, and what his name was didn’t really matter.

“He never tried to make a pass at you?” Jarnebring asked with an innocent expression.

Not Eriksson. Never Eriksson, but of course it had happened and it happened all the time with men other than Eriksson.

“Why didn’t he?” Jarnebring asked. “I would have.”

“He wasn’t interested,” said Jolanta, giving Jarnebring an appraising look. “He wasn’t interested in women. He wasn’t like you or other men.”

You don’t say, thought Jarnebring, but before he had time to ask the next question she anticipated him.

“And I’m pretty sure it wasn’t because he was interested in men instead of women.”

“What was he interested in then?” asked Jarnebring.

“Himself,” said Jolanta. “Power, money, bragging about how well he lived. Not sex. He simply wasn’t interested in sex. Some men are like that, you know.”

Actually I didn’t, thought Jarnebring. Not at Eriksson’s age in any case.

“I believe you,” said Jarnebring. Now it gets sensitive, he thought.

“How did you find out that Eriksson was murdered?” asked Jarnebring.

“You want to know what I was doing on Thursday evening,” said Jolanta.

“Yes,” said Jarnebring. “What were you doing on Thursday evening?” Here we go, he thought.

“That’s a little sensitive,” said Jolanta. “I have an alibi,” she continued, “but it’s a somewhat sensitive alibi.”

Sigh, thought Jarnebring.

“What is his name and what does he do?” said Jarnebring.

“He’s someone like you,” said Jolanta. “Besides, he’s married.”

Jolanta’s alibi was a police officer who worked with the uniformed police, and where didn’t matter. About Jarnebring’s age, married to another police officer, two teenage children. No intention of getting a divorce. They had met three years earlier when Jolanta reported her car stolen. On Thursday the thirtieth of November, when Eriksson was murdered, they had been in Jolanta’s bed in the bedroom next to her living room, where she and Jarnebring were sitting drinking coffee. Before that they’d had dinner in her kitchen. When he left her it was already past midnight. At seven-thirty on Friday morning — she was about to go into town to clean at Eriksson’s — he had called her and told her. That’s why she hadn’t gone there that day.

“Though I suspected you’d show up,” said Jolanta, smiling. “Would you like more coffee?”

“Yes, please,” said Jarnebring, holding out his cup. “How did he get out of the general call-up?” Jarnebring asked. “I thought there wasn’t a single uniformed policeman who wasn’t in service last Thursday.”

“He didn’t have to work,” said Jolanta. “He had some kind of overtime cap. But his wife had to work.”

She smiled weakly, shaking her head.

“What’s his name?” asked Jarnebring.

“I would rather not say, as you understand,” said Jolanta.

“I understand,” said Jarnebring. “But unfortunately I need to know who he is. And if it’s as you say, I’ll do what I can so that this stays between you and me and him.”

“Okay,” said Jolanta. “I understand. Let me think.”

“Another thing while you’re thinking,” said Jarnebring. “Do you have any idea who might have murdered Eriksson?”

Not a clue apart from the fact that she hadn’t done it. She had never met anyone that Eriksson knew, apart from the man at the TV company she already cleaned for. She didn’t even know if Eriksson knew anyone else, but she had a definite idea that he didn’t know very many people. So she had no idea who might have done it. Not even who might conceivably have done it if it necessarily had to be someone who knew Eriksson. How could they be so sure, incidentally, that he hadn’t been robbed and murdered by someone completely unknown? Such things happened all the time in her old homeland.

Did she have any idea why someone would have murdered him? Now she took her time before she answered.

“Yes,” she said, nodding contemplatively. “I can imagine that someone wanted to get free of him. Someone he had power over. Someone he was pressuring. He was like that. He liked having power over people, and he liked letting them know it.”

No, not that too, thought Jarnebring. This should be simple and obvious.

“Okay,” said Jarnebring. “We have one small detail left, and then I might ask you for a small favor too, and after that I promise not to bother you anymore. Though if you think of something I suggest you call me.”

“A small favor,” said Jolanta, raising her well-plucked eyebrows.

“If you have time tomorrow to come over and look at his apartment. If there’s anything that’s missing, if someone has changed anything. I’m sure you understand why. Then the technicians want to take your fingerprints too in order to eliminate them from the investigation.”

“Sure,” said Jolanta, nodding. “That’s fine.”

“Then only the one small detail remains,” said Jarnebring, looking seriously at her.

“Only the one? Okay then,” she said, nodding.

She gave Jarnebring the name of her lover, and an hour later the married police officer confirmed her alibi.

“What the hell do I do now?” he said, looking unhappily at Jarnebring.

“If I were you I’d keep my mouth shut,” said Jarnebring, who knew what he was talking about from personal experience. “Personally, I’m going to try to find a place for this information way in the back of all our binders.”

“Thanks,” said his colleague, looking somewhat less unhappy.

“Although actually you deserve a kick in the ass,” said Jarnebring. “You never intended to call any one of us in the investigation.”

“No,” said the colleague, looking unhappy again. “I guess I screwed up.”

“Then we have to hope it doesn’t happen again,” said Jarnebring, grinning. Because one or the other of us would probably start to wonder, he thought.

Always mistrust chance — that was the third of his best friend’s golden rules for a murder investigation. I have to call Lars Martin and tell him about the wedding, thought Jarnebring, humming happily as he strode in through the door of his prospective wife’s apartment. But for various reasons, roughly the same ones that had occupied him the entire weekend, there was no time left over to do that tonight. It would have to be tomorrow, he thought, as he fell asleep with his prospective wife’s head resting against his right arm and his left arm carefully over her hip while he held his hand lightly pressed against her stomach.

Jolanta was already waiting in the entryway when Jarnebring and Holt arrived at Eriksson’s building early Tuesday morning, and when they went through Eriksson’s apartment together she was thorough and took her time. There were three, possibly four things she was struck by, and the first was completely trivial. The coffee table in the living room was not where it usually was. Normally it would be farther from the couch than it was now.

“We’re the ones who probably moved it,” said Jarnebring.

“I should have realized that,” Jolanta replied, noticing the abundant traces of dried blood still on the floor.

Her second observation was more interesting. The drawers in the desk in the office were unlocked. Usually they were locked.

“You’re sure about that,” said Jarnebring.