Lars Kepler - The Sandman

Berzelius slumps over onto his side, thinking that he ought to try to crawl and hide somewhere, but an overwhelming tiredness sweeps over him like a storm.

He doesn’t even notice when Jurek sticks the knife into his body a second time. The blade goes in at a different angle, straight through his ribs, and stays there.

Saga reaches the top of the broad staircase and hurries through the rooms on the upper floor. There’s no one there, no voices. Tactically she tries to check off every dangerous angle and secure each zone as she passes through, but she keeps having to take risks so she can move more quickly.

She aims the pistol at a shiny leather sofa as she passes it, then points it towards the doorway, left, then in.

There’s a wax candle lying on the floor of the long, portrait-lined corridor.

The door to one of the bedrooms is wide open, and the bedclothes are on the floor. Saga hurries past, catching a glimpse of herself as a fleeting shadow in the window to her left.

Then there’s a loud bang from a firearm in one of the rooms up ahead. Keeping close to the right-hand wall, Saga starts to run towards the noise with her pistol raised.

‘Leave Micke alone!’ a man cries.

Running, Saga leaps over an upturned chair, covers the last stretch and stops in front of a closed door.

Carefully she pushes the handle down and lets the door swing open on its hinges.

The smell of a recently fired gun is heavy in the air.

The room is dark and still.

Saga moves more cautiously now.

She’s starting to feel the weight of the pistol in her shoulder. Her finger is trembling on the trigger. She tries to breathe calmly as she leans to her right to get a better view.

There’s a damp thud with a slightly metallic echo.

Something’s moving – a shadow vanishing.

She sees a pool of blood gleaming on the floor next to a tall cupboard.

Stepping forward, she sees a man on the floor with a knife sticking out of him. He’s lying on his side, completely still, with a fixed stare and a smile on his lips. Her first impulse is to rush over to the man, but something stops her.

The room is too hard to read.

She lowers her pistol and rests her arm for a few seconds before raising it again and moving further to the right.

One section of tapestry on the wall is open. Through it Saga can make out a short passageway leading to a narrow staircase. She can hear steps and dragging sounds from below, and raises her Glock towards the opening before moving closer.

The door at the other end of the room is open, leading to a dark library.

There’s a faint click, as though someone were moistening their mouth.

She can’t see anything.

The pistol is shaking in her hand.

The windows in front of her are black and she takes a step forward, holds her breath, then hears someone breathing behind her.

Saga reacts instantly and swings round. It’s still too late. A strong hand grabs hold of her throat and she’s dragged into the corner towards the cupboard with great force.

Jurek’s grip on her neck is so tight that the blood-supply to her brain has been cut off. He looks at her perfectly calmly, holding her quite still. Her vision is starting to go black and the Glock simply drops from her hand.

Impotently, Saga tries to twist free, and just before she loses consciousness she hears Jurek whisper:

‘Little siren...’

He slams her against the cupboard and her head hits the corner, then he smashes her temple against the stone wall. She falls to the floor, her eyes flickering. She sees Jurek bend over the dead man and pull the knife out of his body. A moment later everything goes black again.

They’re no longer trying to keep quiet. Mikael supports Reidar down the staircase to the narrow servants’ passageway. They turn left and walk slowly along it, past the old cupboard with the Christmas dinner service, and out into the kitchen.

Reidar has to stop, he can’t go any further, he needs to lie down, the cramps in his chest are unbearable.

‘You have to get out of here,’ he gasps, then coughs weakly. ‘Run, run out to the main road.’

On the kitchen table the candle is still burning, its flame flickering. The wax has run down one side of the bottle and onto the linen tablecloth.

‘Not on my own,’ Mikael says. ‘I can’t...’

Reidar takes a deep breath and starts walking again. His eyes are flaring as he leans against the wall, knocking the big Cullberg painting askew.

They walk through the music room and Reidar can hardly feel the floor under his naked feet.

There’s blood on the parquet, but they just continue into the hall. The front door is open and snow has blown in, across the Persian rug and all the way to the broad staircase.

Mikael runs to the wardrobe, pulls out Reidar’s coat and finds the pink nitroglycerine spray. With shaking hands Reidar lifts it to his mouth, opens wide and sprays some under his tongue, he takes a few more steps, stops and sprays again.

He points at the dish containing the car keys on the other side of the room.

Now they can hear heavy footsteps in the rooms leading from the kitchen. There’s no time. They rush out into the black winter morning.

The air is icy cold.

Snow has blown up over the stone steps. Mikael is wearing trainers, but the cold burns Reidar’s naked feet.

The pain in his chest has vanished and they can move much faster now. Together they run over to Saga Bauer’s car.

Reidar pulls at the door, looks in and sees that the keys are missing.

Jurek Walter emerges onto the steps and catches sight of them in the gloom. He shakes the blood from his knife, then heads straight for them.

They run through the snow up towards the stables, but Jurek is far too quick. Reidar glances across the fields. The dark ice of the river is visible as a curling band through the snow, leading off in the direction of the roaring rapids.

Saga wakes to find blood running into her eyes. She blinks and rolls over onto her side. Her temple is throbbing. She has a splitting headache, her throat feels swollen and she’s having trouble breathing.

She tentatively touches the wound on her temple and groans with pain. With her cheek to the floor she can see that her Glock is lying in the dust under the large chest of drawers by the window.

She shuts her eyes again and tries to work out what’s happened. Joona was right, she thinks. Jurek wants Mikael back.

She has no idea how long she’s been unconscious. It’s still almost dark in the room.

She rolls over onto her stomach and whimpers.

‘Oh, God...’

With a great effort she gets up on all fours. Her arms shake as she crawls across the pool of blood from the dead man towards the chest of drawers.

She stretches for the gun, but can’t reach it.

Saga lies down on the floor, reaches in as far as she can, but only manages to nudge the Glock with her fingertips. It’s impossible. She’s so dizzy that the room is tilting in violent lurches and she has to close her eyes again.

Suddenly she sees light through her closed eyelids. She looks up and notices a strange white glow. It’s bouncing shakily across the ceiling. She turns her head and sees that it’s coming from the park, sparkling in the ice-crystals on the outside of the window.

Saga forces herself to stand up, gasping as she leans against the chest of drawers for support. A string of bloody saliva is dripping from her mouth. She looks out of the window and sees David Sylwan running over, holding a burning flare in his hand. The bright light spreads out in a blazing circle around him.

Everything else out there is black.