Ларс Кеплер - Stalker

‘Are you trying to say that we aren’t going to act professionally?’ Benny asks with a cold smile.

‘I’m saying that there’s a chance that Erik will contact me, and I’d like to be able to offer him safe passage,’ Joona says seriously. ‘So that he dares to turn himself in and have his innocence proven in court.’

‘Of course,’ Magdalena replies, looking at the others. ‘That’s right, isn’t it?’

‘But if it’s true that you’ve already fired at him — how am I supposed to convince him to hand himself in?’

‘Just tell him we guarantee his safety,’ Benny says.

‘And if that isn’t enough?’ Joona says.

‘Lie better,’ he grins.

‘Joona, have you actually seen the pictures of Katryna?’ Petter says agitatedly. ‘I can’t believe it’s even her... What do I say to my wife? This is so fucking sick... I mean, think about Adam, think about what he’s going through right now... I have to say, I personally don’t give a shit what happens to your friend.’

‘Everyone’s upset,’ Margot says. ‘Obviously, we want to make it easier for him to hand himself in, and naturally, he’ll get a fair trial—’

‘Assuming he doesn’t hang himself in his cell before then,’ says a young officer who has been quiet up to now.

‘That’s enough,’ Magdalena says.

‘Or swallows some broken glass,’ Benny mutters.

Joona pushes his chair back and nods towards the others.

‘I’ll be in touch when I’ve found the real killer,’ he says, and leaves the room.

‘He’s totally fucking pathetic,’ Petter mutters as his steps fade away down the corridor.

‘Before we go on I want to say something,’ Margot begins. ‘Like you, I believe that Erik is the murderer, but if we all take a step back... Can we even entertain the possibility that we might be wrong, that Erik is actually innocent?’

‘Aren’t you supposed to be giving birth soon?’ Benny asks sarcastically.

‘I’ll give birth when I’m done with this case,’ she replies drily.

‘Let’s get to work,’ Magdalena says.

‘OK... This is how things stand at the moment,’ Margot says. ‘We’ve issued a national alert, but we know that Erik’s got enough money to leave the country... We’ve started our searches, of both Erik’s home and his place of work... We’re trying to trace his mobile phone... his bank cards have been blocked, but he managed to withdraw a large amount last night... the area around the cash machine is being searched... We’re watching five addresses, and...’

She tails off when there’s a knock at the door. Anja Larsson enters the room. Without acknowledging the others she leans over and has a whispered conversation with Margot.

‘OK,’ Margot says after a while. ‘It looks like we’ve managed to trace Erik’s mobile. He’s somewhere close to Växjö, in Småland. It looks like he’s heading south.’

Erik is lying wrapped up in the grey cover he took from a parked motorbike. He wakes up, freezing. It’s light now, and he realises he’s underneath an amelanchier in a thicket of ornamental shrubs. He must have slept for three hours, and his body feels tight with cold. His whole body aches as he sits up and looks around. A dark bronze woman in old-fashioned clothes stares blindly at him from her plinth.

The sun is shining off the green leaves, sparkling in the cold.

Erik climbs over a red fence and crosses over to the shaded side of the street. He slowly warms up as he walks. He can’t really believe everything that happened yesterday.

He was heading towards Aspudden on foot when he spoke to Joona, who told him to get rid of his phone. Erik ducked into a doorway, copied down the most important numbers in his contacts, then switched his phone off.

In front of a bike shop on Hägerstensvägen he found a bus with the word ‘Smälandsbussen’ on the side. A group of weary-looking youngsters in crumpled clothes was gathered on the pavement. Parents were helping to unload rucksacks and sleeping bags from the open baggage compartments.

Erik went inside the bus, pretending to look for something that had been left behind, and quickly pushed his mobile down between two seats.

He stepped out of the rear door, grabbed a cap from a case and tucked it inside his jacket, then carried on towards the underground station. He stopped at the cashpoint in front of the Nordea Bank. He didn’t look up, but was aware of the security camera as he withdrew the maximum amount possible from his account. Then he walked back towards the bus again, and watched as the doors closed and it drove off.

Only a couple of youngsters were left on the pavement.

Erik pulled on the baseball cap as he hurried along Södertäljevägen, crossed the Liljeholmen Bridge, bought water and a large hamburger from the Zinkensgrillen kiosk, and headed into a back street where he stood in a doorway and ate. When he was done he carried on walking, steering clear of main streets with banks and traffic surveillance cameras, and just kept walking for as long as he could, until he eventually found himself in Vitabergsparken.

Erik runs his fingers through his hair to flatten it. His clothes are creased but not dirty enough to attract attention. He needs to stay hidden until he can talk to Joona. He daren’t take any risks, even if the misunderstanding has hopefully been cleared up by now.

Erik starts to cross the street but stops abruptly between two parked cars when he happens to see a convenience store.

His stomach gurgles with unease.

Among the notification of lottery wins and adverts for the football pools, the flysheets of the evening tabloids scream: POLICE HUNT SWEDISH SERIAL KILLER.

He recognises himself from the pixelated photograph. In accordance with press ethics they have kept his identity hidden. It’s only a matter of time, but for the moment his features are concealed by a mass of grainy squares.

The early edition of the other tabloid has no picture, but the headline covers the whole flysheet in capital letters:

NATIONAL ALARM — SWEDISH PSYCHIATRIST SOUGHT FOR FOUR MURDERS.

Under the headline the paper’s contents are listed: victims, pictures, brutality, police.

He steps up on to the pavement and passes the shop as it gradually dawns on him the police really do believe that he murdered Katryna and the other women.

He’s the man they’re hunting.

Erik turns into a side street and his legs start to shake so badly that he has to slow down and eventually stop. He stands there, clutching a trembling hand to his mouth.

‘Oh, God,’ he whispers.

Everyone Erik knows will work out that he’s the man being referred to when they read the articles. Right now they’ll be calling each other, shocked, excited, disgusted.

Some of them will be full of schadenfreude, others will be sceptical.

It feels like he’s falling, but somehow he’s still standing.

Benjamin will know it isn’t true, Erik thinks, and starts walking again. But Madeleine will be frightened once his real identity starts to be blared out.

Through an open car window he catches fragments of a conversation in which he imagines he hears his own name mentioned.

Erik thinks that he’s going to have to hand himself over to the justice system after all, so that he can defend himself.

This can’t go on.

He pulls out a blister-pack containing four Mogadon pills, presses one into his hand, but changes his mind and throws the whole lot in a rubbish bin.

On Östgötagatan he finds a small shop selling second-hand mobile phones. While he’s waiting to be served he listens to the news on the radio. A neutral voice explains coolly that the hunt for the suspected serial killer is now in its second day.