The Little Old Lady Who Broke All the Rules

by Catharina Ingelman-Sundberg

  Rake, too, had been fairly comfortable because he had been able to do odd jobs in the garden. He liked plants, and he had even sown lettuce, cabbages and radishes. In addition, he had planted roses and perennials. He couldn’t deny that he found it hard to bend down, but Brains had constructed a tool holder and a foldable chair that could be adjusted to different positions. It was delightful how happy Rake had become, and he gladly sang one seaman’s ditty after another while he tended his plants. However, he didn’t like being locked in at eight in the evening, so to console himself he had put a calendar on the wall with lightly clad ladies. Because he didn’t have a photo of Christina, he said, but Brains wasn’t fooled. Rake had always had an eye for the ladies.

  A few days passed and then it was Rake’s turn to be told that he was going to be moved on. The friends packed their few belongings, and early one Monday morning they were driven off to Asptuna. Neither of them was seen as likely to try to escape, and there was no security risk either, so they weren’t going to be given electronic tags. Or, as one of the guards said, ‘A foot tag and a walker don’t seem to go together.’

  A few days later, they were installed at the new open prison and to their surprise, they found that they had been given wardrobe-sized rooms without a shower or a toilet and there was hardly enough space for their few belongings. They would get used to it, Brains thought, that’s how it was. People get used to anything. It was only the first day and already he had asked if he could start in the workshop, and he intended doing some exercising in the gym too. He had been a bit lazy about that when he hadn’t had Martha after him, and he wanted to be in top condition when they met again.

  ‘I’d like to go to the gym,’ he said to the guards.

  ‘Right, I’ll join you,’ said Rake, who also wanted to become fitter. Christina had said something about trim men. He took a portion of tobacco and smiled at the thought that they would soon see each other again. But where? He didn’t actually have anywhere to live. ‘Brains, have you thought about it?’ he went on. ‘When we get out. What’s going to happen then? I mean, we can’t stay at the Grand Hotel.’

  ‘It will have to be Diamond House until we find something else,’ said Brains.

  ‘Never!’

  ‘But your son has paid for your room, remember that, and that’s where we’ve got our things, and then there’re the girls.’

  ‘The girls, yes, of course,’ said Rake, immediately feeling a sense of warmth spreading inside him.

  They discussed various homes and hotels during the following weeks, but before they had solved the problem they found themselves with something else to think about. Late one afternoon a prison van drove in with two new prisoners. Brains gave a start. In the van sat a man he had seen before. Juro, the Yugoslav.

  Fifty-Eight

  ‘Hey, you!’

  At dinner the next day, just as Brains had sat down at one of the tables, he sensed a shadow behind him.

  ‘Hi, matey!’

  Juro gave him a thump on the back and sat down beside him with a more-than-full plate of spaghetti. Brains stared at his powerful shoulders and upper arms. Jesus Christ! Not an ounce of fat, just muscle. The Yugoslav looked like one of those people who could straighten a horseshoe with their bare hands. No, the legs of an oil rig!

  ‘Where have you been?’ Brains asked, hoping his voice sounded relaxed.

  ‘Isolation cell. Should be there but paper wrong.’

  ‘Bombed?’ said Brains, trying to sound criminal.

  ‘Bombing? No, not yet, bloody hell.’

  ‘No, I didn’t mean that.’ Brains turned bright red.

  ‘I stay low now a while.’ Juro pulled up a trouser leg and pointed at his tag. ‘Look, sock under so no rubbing. But more important, you know how short-circuit?’ He took a mouthful of spaghetti and it was like filling a container. Almost all the plate fitted in one gulp.

  ‘Mmm,’ Brains hummed. ‘Yes, that tag can be—’ He stopped himself at the last minute. Better to let Juro do his own thing. Otherwise the Yugoslav might try to enlist him again. Brains hardly had time to think that thought before Juro lowered his voice.

  ‘You not forget Handelsbank, yes? Now we have time, we plan.’

  The Yugoslav seemed to have something big coming up. Brains breathed more heavily. He ought to keep well out of this, but …

  The next morning, Juro was in the workshop waiting for Brains. He gave a sign that he wanted to talk to him. Brains fastened his piece of wood on the workbench and started the lathe. He was busy making a bowl for Rake. Brains had already made the basic shape, now he just had to make the hole in the middle. Rake needed something to keep his tobacco in. Juro cast a glance at the piece of wood.

  ‘You make?’

  ‘Yes, sometimes …’

  Juro glanced over his shoulder to make sure nobody heard them.

  ‘You. Most ready now, but the lock …’

  ‘Oh yes,’ mumbled Brains. ‘To the bank vault?’

  He nodded.

  Brains didn’t know what to say. On the one hand, he wanted to know everything about the planned crime and where they intended taking the loot; on the other hand, he wanted to keep as much distance from the Yugoslavian mafia as he could. A gang of pensioners was one thing, the mafia was something else altogether. At the same time, the ultimate crime did involve somebody else carrying out the deed while the five friends took care of the loot. To do that, he must find out where they were going to take the booty. He turned the lathe off.

  ‘So it’s coming up?’ Brains threw a shy look in Juro’s direction. The tattoo on his arm was of a burning torch, a knife and a sword. At the top, on his shoulder, a skull grinned at you.

  ‘Just take away tag, is all,’ said Juro.

  Brains breathed deeply. The electronic tag again. Should he say anything? No, perhaps not.

  ‘Now listen. Bank robberies are too risky. Besides, nowadays banks have so little cash. Hijack a security van instead.’

  The Yugoslav’s eyes glistened.

  ‘But that means many shooting.’

  ‘No, find out which vans are being used. They must go in for an annual service check, right? Then you can have your mechanics there and arrange things.’

  Juro raised his eyebrows, lifted his shoulders and waited for what was to follow. But Brains started the lathe up again. He felt that he must think this over.

  During the break, he wanted to test a new fishing rod, but he didn’t get very far before he noticed that Juro had followed him to the jetty.

  ‘What this, then?’ he wondered, pointing at the extendable fishing rod with hooks attached to the line. Brains had an inkling that he might find a use for it in the future—perhaps to go fishing in a drainpipe.

  ‘Have you thought about how often a fish gets off the hook? Now some will get caught on these,’ said Brains, holding out a bit of the line with barbs.

  ‘But how … hurts, yes?’

  ‘No, no. When you carry the rod around, the hooks are covered with protective tops that dissolve in the water.’

  ‘Oh, right,’ said the mafia boss, looking confounded. He sat down.

  ‘You, that money van. Mechanics fix, what?’

  ‘Then I need to know more about the whole thing.’ Brains avoided looking Juro in the eye.

  ‘We stop van. Crow feet and machine guns. Then explode van door and drive direct Djursholm with sacks.’

  Brains had considerable difficulty interpreting Juro’s rather limited language. Crow feet? What on earth …? But of course, he meant caltrops. Anyhow, he got the gist of what Juro was saying.

  ‘Forget the machine guns,’ said Brains. ‘The drivers are not armed. You want to manipulate the locks instead. That’s all you need to do.’

  ‘Money vans not bicycle locks, big locks …’ Juro indicated the size with his mallet-like hands. Brains opened his fishing-kit box with sinkers, hooks and lines and pointed at the lock. Then he took his chewing gum out of his mouth, put it between the bolt and th
e hollow, and closed the lid.

  ‘Now it looks as if the lock has engaged, but it hasn’t, not for real.’ He took a firm grip of the box and without using a key got the lid open again. ‘It’s the simple things that are difficult, you see?’

  Juro was all eyes.

  ‘When the vans are taken in for servicing, your mechanics will be there. They will hollow out a bit more by the bolt and then fill the hollow with metal shavings and resin so that it won’t be visible. The doors won’t shut properly but it will look as if they have. And you’ll be able to open them, I promise.’

  ‘Raisins? Everybody laugh me like hell.’

  ‘Not raisins, resin, the sticky stuff from fir trees,’ Brains said, laughing. ‘But I said that I’m not an expert, don’t forget. The post sacks will be going abroad. Switch the sacks with similar ones filled with false money. Deliver them to Arlanda airport. Watertight. Nobody will discover that the money is false until it gets to London, and then the cops can search all they want, but it’ll be too late.’

  ‘You not stupid,’ said the Yugoslav.

  ‘Nowadays, lots of different firms have these security vans. There’s lots of money on wheels just waiting to be picked,’ Brains went on. He then went off on a long ramble about the security-van coups in Hallunda, Gustavsberg and some other places, and how the robberies could have been carried out better. He spiced his tales with details that he had snapped up at the Täby prison and hoped he would sound sufficiently knowledgeable so that Juro would talk with him about the robbery. Then perhaps he would let slip where he was going to hide the money.

  ‘If you don’t like that trick with the lock, then I’ve got another idea,’ Brains continued. ‘Why not stage a police check-point? Dress up as police officers. When the van stops and they lower the side window, you throw in something to anaesthetize them. Ether, perhaps, or I don’t know what. When the guards have nodded off, then you’ll have plenty of time to take out the money.’

  ‘You one of us man,’ said Juro.

  ‘No, don’t get me involved,’ said Brains. ‘I can’t manage another stint in prison. I’m too old. This is my last time in here. Never again will a guard lock me in and tell me what time I should eat and sleep. I want peace and quiet the few years I have left. You’ll understand better when you get older.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Then there is my heart,’ Brains babbled on, putting his thin, sinewy hand on his chest. He wanted to fool Juro into thinking that he had left the life of crime behind him. In fact, his criminal career had only just begun. ‘Yes, it is tough getting old, but after the raid … by the way, have you thought where you can store the sacks?’ he asked, trying to look as indifferent as he could.

  ‘At eleven.’

  ‘Eleven?’

  ‘Yes, mother-in-law’s wine cellar on Skandiavägen … in Djursholm. Jesus, she has big house, big like castle, you know, with long fences. Then car to Dubrovnik and—’

  Juro went silent when one of the guards approached, and Brains quickly did a cast with his fishing rod. He stared at the float. Juro had been more forthcoming than he had dared hope. If the Yugoslavs stacked the loot from the raid in that wine cellar, then the five of them would get their chance. Now he must find out the date they were planning to carry out the robbery, and do so without Juro getting suspicious. But that wasn’t entirely simple. It wasn’t only a case of duping the police. The League of Pensioners would have to delude the mafia too.

  In the evening, Brains got out pen and paper and wrote a poem to Martha. This time he was even more cryptic than usual, and he wasn’t certain whether Martha would understand his poem. On the other hand, he didn’t dare be too specific. Stealing from the Yugoslav mafia was not something you did lightly.

  Fifty-Nine

  Martha’s first temporary release didn’t turn out as she had intended. She had planned to put on some sort of discreet disguise, walk into the Princess Lilian suite and then check everything was OK with the drainpipe. Instead of having several hours to herself, she had to drag along two supervising warders with her. One of them was the ponytail screw, the stone face who had searched her when she arrived at Hinseberg. This humourless being didn’t let her prisoner out of her sight, and she followed her so closely that Martha continuously found herself almost running over her with the walker.

  ‘Be careful!’ Martha hissed, full of defiance, but she realized that she must control herself. The guard with the ponytail would be happy to nail her if she could. The more months that Martha spent behind bars, the happier the ponytail would be. There were people like that. Martha was really meant to spend her first temporary release in Örebro, but she had specially asked to visit Stockholm. She had mentioned her old age and complained that she got dizzy sometimes and had problems with her balance. Now she wanted to see the royal palace one last time in her life.

  ‘And you can see it best of all from the Grand Hotel,’ she said when they reached the city.

  ‘First we must deal with your errands at the social welfare office and visit Diamond House,’ said the ponytail guard.

  ‘But please, the palace is sooo beautiful,’ Martha appealed, and she nagged until she got her way. It took a bit of time to walk there, because Martha was making herself look as frail as possible. It was necessary not to reveal just how trim she actually was. While she walked, she worried about the money in the drainpipe. What if Anna-Greta’s tights had been too old, or Rake had forgotten an important loop in his knots? The worry gnawed at her, and Martha was keen to get to the Princess Lilian suite straight away. She turned to the ponytailed guard.

  ‘When I stayed at the Grand Hotel, I lost my mother’s gold bracelet. I’d like to ask in reception whether they have found it,’ she said, and she steered her walker towards the entrance to the hotel.

  ‘Now? We haven’t time for that,’ answered the woman.

  ‘But the hotel has an elevator from the street and it’s easy for me to quickly reach reception. It won’t take long, I promise.’

  Her two supervisors looked at each other and nodded.

  ‘Okay, I suppose we can do that.’

  Martha was relieved, and soon the walker was rolling along on the familiar blue carpet with the gold crowns. It was rather embarrassing to return there as a criminal, but she had to put up with that. In reception, she explained her errand.

  ‘It would be wonderful if I could find the bracelet,’ she ended her explanation.

  ‘Your name?’

  ‘Martha Andersson.’

  Martha blushed; she realized that she must give them her real name to get up into the suite.

  ‘Martha Andersson, yes, you stayed in the suite in March this year, right?’

  ‘At the end of March.’

  ‘Martha Andersson, here is the entry.’ The girl clicked on the computer and scrolled down lists on the screen. ‘There were three of you sharing the Lilian suite, is that right?’

  Martha nodded.

  ‘No, we don’t have a bracelet, I’m afraid.’

  ‘But I think I know where it is. It won’t take long to—’

  ‘Sorry.’ The girl shrugged her shoulders. ‘The suite is occupied.’ Her voice suddenly sounded harsh and deprecatory. ‘Also,’ said the girl after a deep breath, ‘we don’t have any other room available either. Not for you.’

  Martha became sulky. The receptionist had realized who she was, but there was no reason for her to be impolite on that account. Then she remembered. They had left the suite without paying, and the hotel had been forced to take the money from Anna-Greta’s bank account. But Martha was not going to give up.

  ‘The bracelet was my mother’s and it means a lot to me. It is a family heirloom.’

  The ponytailed guard looked uncomfortable and indicated that they should leave, but Martha stubbornly stood her ground.

  ‘No, we won’t let anyone into the suite,’ the receptionist repeated, but then stopped. ‘Wait a moment. Martha Andersson, you said—’ The girl disappeared behind
the counter and returned with a letter.

  ‘This has been here a while,’ she said and handed it over to Martha. ‘We were going to forward it, but you got here first.’

  It wasn’t Brains’s handwriting, but it did say Martha Andersson on the envelope. The address was written on one of those labels you can print out from a computer. Martha ripped open the envelope before the guard could come up to her. In the envelope lay a little note:

  Hide 100,000 SEK in a stroller. Put it near the back entrance to the Grand Hotel at 13.00 on 30 October. Keep away and don’t involve the police. Come back to the same place after two hours. Under blankets and cushions you will find the paintings …

  Martha didn’t have time to read more before she heard her supervisors behind her. She pretended to have a coughing attack and between coughs she quickly chewed and gobbled down the note. Usch, how horrible it tasted, but that was what they did in crime novels. She turned around.

  ‘Weird, an envelope without anything in it,’ she said. Martha then got another coughing attack because a bit of paper had stuck in her throat.

  Sixty

  No, it couldn’t be true! Nurse Barbara trembled with indignation. The criminal choir gang was on its way back! They had evidently been model prisoners and after a few months in an open prison they would be living at Diamond House again. The problem was that they had paid for their rooms all the time they’d been away and, according to the social welfare office, she had no possible grounds to refuse them. On top of it all, Ingmar hadn’t considered it a problem—on the contrary, he had been very pleased.

  ‘What luck for us,’ he had said. ‘Now the spotlight will be on us. The media will be bound to follow the oldies and write articles. Can you imagine better publicity? Diamond House will be so well known everywhere that we can hike up the charges. Darling, see the possibilities!’

  Nurse Barbara had tried to explain that the five were a decidedly poor example for others, and she had warned of the chaos they would create. But he seemed unable to grasp what she meant.