Mons Kallentoft - Autumn Killing

I see you leave Katarina’s house, Malin, then I see you enter the police station .

You’re trying to validate your own shortcomings in those of other people, aren’t you? You want so badly to believe that your own pain can be eased simply because other people feel a similar pain.

That’s arrogant, Malin.

But you’re good at dragging things out into the open, I have to admit that. You dare to follow your instincts, the traces of feelings lingering in the air, the way in which we human beings breathe each other’s love.

We are parasites on each other’s love, Malin. Trying to shift it to where we want it to be, trying desperately to understand what it wants with us. What are we to do with all the love, friendship, fear and despair?

Did you expect Katarina to answer your question?

Or that I would whisper the answer as I drift, my mouth just a few centimetres from your ear?

I don’t think so.

No victories are won so cheaply.

You can do better than that, Malin.

Now you’ve gone to see your boss, Karim Akbar.

He doesn’t mention it to you, but he’s just turned down a job he was offered at the Immigration Authority. Nor will he say that he feels good, standing there looking out over the innards of the police station, and the detectives he realised he appreciated more than he could possibly have imagined while he was thinking about the job offer.

Karim is also thinking about a book he’s in the middle of writing, about immigration issues, work on which has been very slow for too long.

And then there’s you, Malin.

What are we going to do with you?

What are we going to do with all these lives that are stuck inside themselves?

The paperwork Hell in the police station feels more claustrophobic than ever.

Lovisa Segerberg, Waldemar Ekenberg, and Johan Jakobsson have been over at the Ostgota Bank to fetch files and computers from Fredrik Fagelsjo’s office, as well as his personal computer, and other documents from out at the Villa Italia.

It’s half past three.

Outside in reception the vultures are waiting for some sort of statement, but apart from a press release confirming the name of the victim they haven’t been given a thing. Karim is refusing to hold a press conference, wants to let the investigation proceed in peace, as he just said in the staffroom.

Johan rubs his eyes, thinking about his wife, who’s probably at home playing with the kids now.

Fredrik Fagelsjo’s father.

Jerry Petersson’s files. They haven’t even got through a tenth of Petersson’s papers yet, and now there’s a whole new set from a new murder.

In spite of their silence, television and radio news are featuring the murder heavily. There are profiles of both Jerry Petersson and Fredrik Fagelsjo. Naturally the Correspondent has the murder as the lead item on its website, a lengthy article written by that journalist that Johan is convinced Malin is having a relationship with, or at any rate fucks sometimes. He’s written that the second murder might perhaps have been avoided if the police had been more efficient in solving the first. Was he even out there at the castle?

Waldemar is sitting at the end of the table sipping a cup of coffee. Strong and black, and he looks bored out of his mind. Huffing and puffing, he doesn’t seem to want to get down to work. Lovisa, on the other hand, is concentrating on Fredrik Fagelsjo’s computer, clicking from one document to the next. Maybe she’s hoping to find a connection between Jochen Goldman and Fredrik Fagelsjo?

Then Waldemar gets up and goes over to stand behind Lovisa, and starts massaging her shoulders, saying: ‘You like this, don’t you?’

Lovisa stands up.

Turns towards Waldemar.

Says in an ice-cold voice: ‘Don’t fucking touch me. I don’t give a damn how many young female officers you’ve sexually harassed in your time, but you don’t fucking touch me. Understood?’

Waldemar backs away.

Throws out his arms with a grin.

‘Calm down, love. No sense of humour?’

‘I’ve had an email from Interpol in Stockholm,’ Sven Sjoman says as he heads towards Malin’s desk.

The beginnings of a headache. Withdrawal, Malin thinks. But no hangover at least.

‘Jochen Goldman left Tenerife,’ Sven says. ‘Three days ago.’

‘Where’s he gone?’ Malin asks.

‘Stockholm, via Madrid. But no one knows where he went after he landed at Arlanda.’

‘So it could have been him who put the pictures through my letterbox?’

‘Unlikely. But he might have got someone else to do it. Maybe simpler for him to arrange direct from Stockholm.’

‘So he was in the country when Fredrik Fagelsjo was murdered,’ Malin says.

‘We haven’t got any connection at all between them so far, but we’ll see what the files throw up,’ Sven says.

‘We haven’t got anything on him at all,’ Malin says. ‘He’s got every right to do whatever he likes. Maybe those photographs are just part of a warped game.’

‘I still don’t get it, though,’ Sven says. ‘Why would Goldman want to come to Sweden right now?’

‘Who knows?’ Malin says. ‘But I’m convinced Jochen Goldman is behind those pictures. It can’t be anyone else. Aronsson just gave me the results of her search: no one I’ve put away who might want revenge has been released recently.’

Sven pulls in his stomach and reminds her that they have a case meeting in five minutes.

‘We really need to start making some progress here, Malin. The vultures in reception are demanding quick results.’

Tired detectives around a conference table.

Words flying through the air, summaries, new ideas. A criminal investigation that’s treading water, where every conversation and exchange risks leading their work in an emotional direction rather than a logical one.

The playground of the nursery empty.

Sven Sjoman summarises the state of the investigation.

‘We’re still going through Petersson’s files. Nothing unusual so far, no other relatives or significant figures in his life. We still haven’t found the murder weapon, probably a stone, or the knife that was used to inflict the post-mortem wounds.

‘We need to keep digging into Petersson’s relationship with the Fagelsjo family, especially Fredrik and Katarina. We also need to find out more about his dealings with Jochen Goldman. And we’re still looking into the circumstances surrounding the car crash.’

Then Sven falls silent.

Looks at Lovisa Segerberg.

‘Anything new?’

She shakes her head.

‘Nothing so far.’

‘There’s so much fucking paperwork,’ Waldemar Ekenberg snarls. ‘It doesn’t feel like we’re getting anywhere.’

‘If you feel stuck, dig even deeper,’ Karim Akbar says, and Malin thinks it sounds as if he’s trying to convince himself rather than his detectives.

‘We need to start making some progress here,’ Karim goes on. ‘We haven’t got anywhere yet.’

‘You’re right about that,’ Malin says.

‘The media are going crazy. We’ve got a press conference in two hours.’

‘Those pictures you received, of your parents. We’re assuming that Goldman’s behind them,’ Sven says, and Malin tries not to listen as he goes on about the photographs.

Then he runs through the state of the investigation into the murder of Fredrik Fagelsjo, about Axel and Katarina Fagelsjo’s questionable alibis, and the fact that Fredrik Fagelsjo’s parents-in-law have confirmed his wife’s alibi.

‘Most murders occur within families,’ Waldemar says. ‘And Axel and Katarina have plenty of reasons for wanting to get rid of that black sheep of theirs after he fucked up their finances. Maybe they were worried poor little Fredrik would crack and give them away?’