Lars Kepler - The Nightmare

There’s silence on the other end. Joona can hear the sounds of waves lapping.

“That pleasure boat you found,” Joona says. “I’m wondering if it was taking on water.”

“Why do you ask?”

“The bow is damaged.”

Joona begins to walk again, heading toward the boat as he listens to Lennart say, dismissively, “Dear Lord, I wish I had a crown for every drunk who’s trashed a-”

“I need a look at it,” Joona says.

“Let me brief you on what usually goes down,” Lennart Johansson says. “A group of drunken teenagers from… who knows, maybe Sodertalje… steal a boat, pick up a few chicks, drive around listening to music and partying, and then they ram into something. There’s a big bang as they crash and the girl lands in the water. The guys turn the boat around to find her, pull her on board, and when they realize she’s dead, they panic and take off.” He falls silent and waits for a reaction.

“Not a bad theory.”

“Okay,” Johansson says happily. “If you agree, you don’t have to make the trip out here to Dalaro Island.”

“Too late,” Joona says, and heads straight to the Coast Guard boat.

A Combat Boat 90 E is one of the two boats next to the pleasure boat. A man, about twenty-five, with a bare, tanned chest stands on deck, a phone to his ear.

“Suit yourself,” he says in English. He switches back to Swedish. “You have to call ahead for any sightseeing.”

“I’m here now. And I believe I’m looking right at you, if you’re the one standing on one of the Coast Guard’s shallow-draught-”

“Do I look like a surfer?”

The grinning young man looks up and scratches his chest.

“Pretty much,” Joona answers.

They each put their phones away and walk toward the other. Lennart Johansson buttons up a short-sleeved uniform shirt as he walks down the gangplank.

Joona gestures “hang loose.” Johansson’s white teeth shine in a big smile.

“I go surfing any time there’s more than a ripple. That’s why they call me Lance.”

“I get it,” Joona says drily.

The two walk over to the boat and stop on the dock by the gangway.

“It’s a Storebro 36 Royal Cruiser,” Lance says. “A good boat, but obviously it’s come down a bit. Registered to Bjorn Almskog.”

“Have you contacted him?”

“No time yet.”

They take a closer look at the damage to the boat’s bow. It looks recent, since there’s no algae mixed with the fiberglass shreds.

“I’ve called a technician-he’ll be here soon.”

“She’s gotten a proper kiss,” Lance says.

“Who’s been on board since it was found?”

“Nobody,” Lance answers quickly.

Joona smiles and waits patiently.

“Well, I have, of course. And Sonny, my colleague. And the ambulance guys who removed the body. Our own forensic technician, though he used protective mats and clothing.”

“Is that everyone?”

“Plus the guy who found the boat.”

Joona doesn’t answer but looks down into the shimmering water and thinks of the girl lying on the table in The Needle’s autopsy room.

“Is your technician completely finished?” he finally asks.

“He’s done with the floor and he’s filmed the scene where she was found.”

“I’m going on board.”

A narrow, well-used gangplank stretches between the dock and the boat. Joona climbs on board and then stands for a while on the rear deck. He slowly looks around, letting his eyes focus on each object one by one. This scene will never be the same again, fresh and new. Each detail he registers might be one that makes a crucial difference. Shoes, an overturned lounge chair, a bath towel, a paperback that has yellowed in the sun, a knife with a red plastic handle, a bucket with a rope, beer cans, a bag of charcoal for grilling, a tub with a wet suit, bottles of sunscreen and lotion.

He looks in through the large window and makes out the salon with the steering console and the decor of lacquered wood. From a certain angle, fingerprints shine on the glass doors when the sunlight passes over them: finger marks from hands that have pushed the door open and pushed the door shut or held on when the boat was in motion.

Joona steps into the little salon. The afternoon sun glistens on the varnish and chrome. There’s a cowboy hat and sunglasses on the sofa, which is covered with marine-blue pillows.

Outside, the water laps against the hull.

Joona lets his gaze wander from the dull floor in the salon and down the narrow stairs toward the bow. It’s as dark as a deep well down there. He sees nothing until he turns on his flashlight. The light shines down the glossy, steep passageway with an icy, dim light. The red wood shines as wet as the inside of a body. Joona continues down the creaking steps and thinks about the girl. He imagines her sitting alone on the boat, then deciding to take a dive from the bow. She hits her head on a stone, gets water in her lungs, but nevertheless manages to get back on board, takes off her wet bikini, and puts on dry clothes. Perhaps she feels tired and goes to her bed, not realizing that her injury is serious, a damaged blood vessel that leaks into her brain.

But in that case, The Needle would have found traces of the brackish water somewhere on her body.

This scenario is wrong.

Joona keeps going down the stairs, passes the galley and the head, and goes toward the large berth.

There’s a lingering sense of her death in the boat even though her body has been moved to the pathology department in Solna. The impression is the same no matter where he looks. It’s as if everything here stares back at him, as if it has had its fill of screaming, fighting, and sudden silence.

The boat creaks and appears to tilt toward the side. Joona waits for a second and listens before continuing into the forecabin.

June light streams through the small windows near the ceiling onto a double bed with a pointed head, formed along the bow. This is where she was sitting when she was found. A sport bag is open on the floor and a dotted nightgown has been unpacked. Just inside the door, there’s a pair of jeans and a thin cardigan. The owner’s shoulder bag hangs from a hook. The boat rocks again and a glass bottle rolls across the deck above Joona’s head.

Joona photographs the shoulder bag from various directions. The flash makes the room shrink as if the walls, ceiling, and floor were coming closer together for a moment.

Joona carefully lifts the bag from its hook and carries it with him up the stairs, which moan under his weight. He hears a metallic clink from the outside. When he reaches the salon, he sees an unexpected shadow in front of the glass doors and takes a step back into the stairwell, into the shadows and darkness.

Joona Linna stands stock-still, just two feet from the dark stairwell. From this angle, he can make out the lower edge of the glass doors and some of the rear deck. A shadow falls over the dusty glass; then a hand appears. Someone is moving very slowly. A split second later, Joona recognizes Erixson’s face. Sweat is dripping from it as Erixson puts gelatin foil over the area beside the door.

Joona carries the shoulder bag into the salon. Carefully, he turns it upside down and empties it onto the hardwood table. He flips a red wallet open with his pen. There’s a driver’s license in the scratched plastic pocket. He looks more closely and sees a beautiful yet serious face revealed in the flash of an automatic photo booth. She’s sitting slightly back as if she’s looking up at the observer. Her hair is black and curly. He recognizes the girl on the autopsy table at the pathologist’s: the straight nose, the eyes, the South American features. “Penelope Fernandez,” he reads. Somehow it sounds familiar.