by Kepler, Lars
It was a long time ago, and Saga no longer remembers what had happened, all she remembers is that her mum said Saga would end up in a children’s home if she said anything.
She slowly gets up from the chair and turns away.
Maybe it was just a throwaway remark, but why would she say she’d lose custody if Saga said anything.
‘I’m not saying you wanted to kill her,’ Jurek goes on, talking to her back. ‘But you neglected to save her, and that’s perfectly understandable, given what she’d done to you.’
Saga realises she’s let Jurek inside her head.
She looks up, stares at the simple floral pattern of the wallpaper and tries to compose herself.
It doesn’t matter, she tells herself. This is part of the plan, she can handle it.
She knows that his technique of mixing the truth with lies has an ability to open up the doors that lead to the catacombs. There’s no danger if she puts a stop to it there, he won’t get any deeper now.
She realises that he’s right when he says that someone at school must have understood things weren’t right. She remembers having bruises on her neck and upper arms, and she knows she used to be incredibly tired. They tried to talk to her, of course, took her to see the school nurse and the counsellor.
She turns back towards Jurek, clears her throat quietly, then looks him in the eye.
‘My mum was bipolar, and I loved her, even if it was hard sometimes,’ she explains calmly.
Jurek runs his large hand over the top of the computer.
‘It isn’t inherited,’ he says.
‘No.’
‘But there are genetic vulnerabilities that increase the risk of a child having the same condition by a factor of ten.’
‘Genetic vulnerabilities?’ she says with a sceptical smile.
‘Abnormalities in the configuration in the genes that control perception of time are passed down, they’re supposed to work on a frequency of twenty-four hours, of course, but if they don’t, then the risk of bipolar disorder increases.’
‘I sleep well.’
‘But I know you have periods of hypomania … when you get incredibly focused, think fast and are easily irritated.’
‘Are you trying to tell me I’m mad?’
Jurek’s eyes remain firmly focused on her.
‘You have a darkness inside you that’s almost a match for mine.’
‘What does your darkness look like?’
‘It’s dark,’ he says with a trace of a smile.
‘But are you healthy or are you mad?’
‘That depends who you ask.’
Jurek stands up and walks over to one of the doors. He listens, glances out into the corridor, then returns to Saga. The empty sleeve swings as he walks.
‘Isn’t your brother’s illness inherited, then?’ Saga says when he’s sitting down again.
‘Igor was just downtrodden.’
‘Why didn’t you look after him?’
‘I did …’
‘I was there in the gravel pit with the forensics team, I looked inside those barracks, went down into the old shelter, I saw everything.’
‘Nothing escapes forensics,’ Jurek sighs and leans back.
‘Your brother lived in utter misery,’ Saga says. ‘Did you ever go there, make sure he had a hot meal, sleep under the same roof?’
‘Yes.’
‘You treated him like a dog.’
‘He was the best dog I’ve ever had.’
‘And now you want to bury him like a human being?’
He smiles joylessly at her.
‘I’ve requested all the files about your brother,’ she goes on. ‘The request needs to be authorised, it’ll take a few days.’
‘I’m not the one in a hurry, am I?’
‘You only get the information if I get my dad back,’ she says, and feels her chin start to tremble. ‘I know how it sounds, but the best thing would be for you to let him go at once.’
‘You think so?’
‘I promise, you’ll get all the information relating to your brother’s body, but if my dad dies you won’t get anything.’
‘So don’t let him die, then,’ Jurek says simply.
He opens the laptop and turns the silvery computer towards her.
A web-chat program is already running. Using peer-to-peer technology, this computer is connected to another computer in another location. The two screens show what’s happening in front of the other computer in real time.
Saga can see that the other computer is trained on a cramped space with rough cement walls, lit by a bare bulb in the ceiling.
‘What’s that supposed to be?’ Saga asks, even though she knows the answer.
Black shadows are moving across the cement wall – as if they were reacting to her voice – then, a moment later, a figure appears off to one side of the screen.
It’s her dad.
He’s started to get a white beard, his glasses are gone, and he’s squinting in the harsh glare of the bulb. His brown corduroy jacket is dirty and sandy. Something scares him and he flinches as if he’s expecting to be hit.
‘Dad,’ Saga cries. ‘It’s me, Saga.’
When he hears her voice he starts to cry. She can see his mouth moving, but there’s no sound. He doesn’t seem to have been seriously injured, but there’s some dried blood on his face and white shirt.
‘Please, don’t get upset,’ she says to the screen.
Her dad approaches the computer, she sees the light of the screen reflect off his face. Trembling, he reaches out with his dirty hand. He tries to say something again, but she can’t hear anything.
‘Dad, listen,’ she cries. ‘I’m going to find you, I promise …’
Jurek breaks the connection and closes the laptop, then sits and studies her as if she were part of an experiment. With patient curiosity those pale eyes of his linger on her face.
‘Now the darkness will close around him again,’ he eventually says, very calmly.
59
Saga pulls the key out of the door and hangs it round her neck, covers the keyhole with duct tape, then tapes over the letterbox and turns round.
The light from the bathroom is falling across her face at an angle. She has a deep wrinkle between her eyebrows and lack of sleep has left her skin looking almost transparent.
The T-shirt under her jacket is wet with sweat around the neck.
She’s already searched her flat. That was the first thing she did when she got home.
She pushes past the armchair, goes into the kitchen and opens one of the drawers. The sheet of paper with the address of Hasselgården on it flutters as she walks past.
She takes out two sturdy kitchen knives, goes into the bedroom and tapes one to the back of the open door.
She and Jurek have met twice now. Maybe she could have killed him on the first occasion if she’d hidden her pistol better, if she’d been aware of him entering the flat.
It’s possible that she actually registered his presence in her sleep, through her eyelids, but dismissed the warning. She’s been sleeping with Randy too much, she’s no longer as alert as she used to be.
Saga tapes the other knife to the side of the toilet bowl, steps back to check that it can’t be seen, then turns out the bathroom light.
Her phone is lying dormant on the dresser in the hall. She hasn’t had any more messages.
Saga’s eyes are burning with tiredness as she goes into the living room to fetch the standard lamp. The wooden floor is covered with her dirty footprints. She puts the lamp in the hall, switches it on and points it directly at the door so it will dazzle any intruders.
Thoughts are swirling through her head, images tumbling towards her in a torrent.
The dead bodies at the care home, her dad’s frightened face.
His left eye was wounded, drooping slightly.
He was moving like someone who was dying.
Saga swallows hard and forces herself not to start crying, that
would be completely pointless. If she can’t sleep, then she needs to make use of the time, concentrate, think.
She sits down on the armchair with her pistol in her hand, the bag of ammunition by her feet.
Saga looks at her phone again, but the screen is dark. She puts the pistol on the arm of the chair and wipes her sweaty hand on her trousers.
She really should try to get some sleep, maybe dig out the morphine pills she’s saved.
That would calm her down.
Jurek isn’t likely to contact her again tonight. He thinks she isn’t going to be getting any more information about his brother’s remains until tomorrow.
She picks up her pistol again and stares at the front door.
There are air-bubbles trapped beneath the silvery tape.
She slowly closes her eyes, leans her head back and sees the light from the standard lamp through her eyelids.
She detects a slight change and immediately opens her eyes again.
It was nothing.
Saga can’t help thinking that they didn’t have to kill the night staff, they could have tied them up, locked them in somewhere. It must have been the Beaver. Jurek doesn’t enjoy killing, it’s of no significance to him.
If it was Jurek, then he did it because he wanted to frighten her, remind her how dangerous he is, that he’s serious about her not getting her dad back unless she comes up with information about his brother’s body.
She realises her hands are shaking when she checks again that her phone is charged and the volume turned up.
It’s half past five.
Joona wouldn’t have been happy with the way she’s handling this. He would have told her to kill Jurek the first chance she got, even if it cost her dad’s life.
That’s impossible for her.
It’s not a choice she can make.
Joona would have said that the cost keeps on rising with every second Jurek remains alive. It doesn’t stop until you’ve lost everything.
Perhaps she’s wrong, but it feels as if she and Jurek were sitting at a chessboard once more.
She was trying to lure him out through an opening in her defence.
That was the plan, anyway.
But what was she getting in return?
It must be something, seeing as you can’t move a piece without leaving a gap.
It feels like she’s missed an important detail, something she brushed past, something that could be pieced together with something else.
Her tiredness is suddenly gone.
Jurek managed to steer the conversation on to her mother even though she had drawn a sharp line there.
It was odd how easily that had happened.
She had felt she had control over the situation, that she had merely been denying false claims about her mum, but still managed to reveal that her mum had been bipolar.
It probably doesn’t matter, but it was unnecessary.
Sometimes she feels like a butterfly he’s trying to catch, but sometimes it’s as if he’s already got her in a glass jar.
Jurek Walter is smart.
He fed her a series of false suppositions before claiming that her mum had harmed her.
He was just guessing – but now he knows.
Every conversation with Jurek is a precarious balancing act.
She rubs her face hard with one hand.
She has to think.
Her memories of the conversation are growing weaker by the minute.
Jurek sounded cold when he said his twin brother was a dog; that was part of his strategy, he wanted to see how she reacted to his harshness, she’s sure of that. But when he talked about different homes, that was probably genuine. He said that some places have a sort of magnetic attraction that draws you back time after time.
‘Damn,’ she mutters, and gets up from the armchair.
There was something she’d meant to remember.
But it was as if the sight of the dead bodies had erased her ability to think strategically.
Saga glances at the door, then goes into the kitchen, puts her pistol on the counter and opens the fridge.
When she asked about his brother, she had allowed Jurek to steer the conversation to her mum’s bipolar disorder.
What had she got in return?
He was almost obliged to give her something.
Saga pulls a cherry tomato from the vine, pops it in her mouth, bites down and tastes the sharp explosion.
She tried to provoke him by saying he hadn’t looked after his sick brother, said she had seen the misery he lived in when they searched the old workers’ barracks at the gravel pit.
That was when it happened.
Jurek’s voice took on an unexpectedly derisive tone when she spoke about the police forensics team going through every corner of the gravel pit.
Nothing escapes forensics, he said, seeming to imply that they had actually missed the most important thing.
Saga pulls the clingfilm off a plate of leftovers and starts eating with her fingers as she tries to think through the entire conversation again.
Jurek claimed that Joona managed to find his brother after their escape from the cosmodrome in Leninsk because of their father’s work at the gravel pit.
She chews the cold pasta, swallows, then pops some of the chicken in her mouth, tasting the lemon and garlic on it.
The Beaver was standing behind Jurek, helping undo the straps. He spoke about prosthetics, and the fact that you start to adapt to their limitations.
A pointless contempt for weakness, Saga thinks. In her mind’s eye she sees the Beaver putting the prosthetic in the sink, then some sand had trickled out of the end of it.
She saw it, but didn’t understand at the time.
Jurek is living out at the gravel pit, that’s the only plausible answer.
He’s been there the whole time, she realises.
With trembling fingers she puts the empty plate in the sink and pulls the carton of yesterday’s falafel out of the fridge. She chews quickly, then bites the end off a green pepper.
The gravel pit is the magnetic place, she thinks. That’s where everything began and ended, that was where their father died, and that was where Jurek’s twin brother died.
When he said ‘nothing escapes forensics’, he meant the exact opposite.
There must be another bunker, one that they didn’t manage to find. Perhaps it’s even further underground, beneath the ones forensics have already searched.
Saga can’t help grinning to herself.
It could all fit.
She goes through the conversation again as she eats dried-up hummus and carrot sticks, drinks juice straight from the carton and wipes her sticky fingers on her jeans. She goes to the table, turns the sheet of paper over and starts to write down the key points, starting with the sand trickling out of the prosthetic.
Jurek hasn’t revealed anything obvious, but, taken as a whole, it’s possible that he let something slip.
He claimed he had lived with his brother, but there was no trace of him either in the buildings or down in the bunker.
The perfect hiding place. Jurek knew that the police wouldn’t find the hidden room, seeing as they’d already tried looking with all the resources at their disposal.
The cement wall that had been visible behind her dad could very well belong to a bomb shelter from the Cold War.
And once the connection with her dad had been broken, Jurek had said: Now the darkness will close around him again.
He didn’t say anything about a grave, nothing about digging.
Saga is almost certain her dad is in the gravel pit in Rotebro. She hurries out into the hall and grabs her phone from the dresser.
60
After finishing her call to her boss, Verner Sandén, Saga sits down in the armchair with her phone in her hand, feeling a frightening rush inside her. He had listened carefully to what she had said, only patronised her once, and agreed with her analysis on almost every point.
When sh
e explained the plan she had worked out, he was silent for a few seconds, then gave her the go-ahead to put together a small team. She would have access to rapid response officers from the National Response Unit, as well as an experienced sniper.
‘I’m shaken up and pretty tired … but maybe we can finally put an end to this, maybe we can save my dad, maybe Valeria too,’ Saga had said.
She stands up and goes into the kitchen.
The sky is getting lighter through the closed curtains.
When the police arrived at the care home, Jurek and the Beaver had long since left the building.
It isn’t certain that the operation this evening will succeed, she could be completely wrong, she has to bear that in mind, but right now she feels a huge sense of relief at just having a plan.
She’s going to prepare a trap that can be called off and evaporate like mist if circumstances change.
But with a bit of luck she’ll be one step ahead of Jurek for a few seconds, and if that’s true, they’ll be the last seconds of his life.
The plan entails her being in position at the gravel pit with the sniper and rapid response team when Jurek contacts her with the location and time of their next meeting.
She’ll tell him she’ll see him there, and if he shows himself he can be taken out.
Saga opens her laptop again and examines the satellite and drone pictures. It’s a fairly large area, with extreme drops in level.
She looks at the long grey block of the workers’ barracks, which form a narrow strip between the forest and the pit where sand was extracted.
Beneath them are the bunkers.
She calls her boss again and says she needs another two snipers.
Verner replies that she’ll have the whole team at her disposal in good time.
Saga puts her laptop and a scatter cushion with gold embroidery on it from the sofa in a blue nylon bag from IKEA, fetches her Game of Thrones mug from the kitchen, and unplugs the standard lamp.
It’s already night by the time Saga and Nathan Pollock approach the meeting point on the narrow road west of Rotebro.
Nathan’s phone buzzes, a text message from Veronica. She’s sent him a red heart.
‘I signed all the papers,’ he says.
‘Good.’
‘I have no idea why I was being such a pain.’
