Down for the Count

by Martin Holmén

The doorbell tinkles cheerfully. I look around. Elin Johansson is standing at the far end of the boutique. She’s wearing a finely checked city dress, which clings to her voluptuous figure. Her red hair is neatly parted to the right, although it looks slightly fuzzed up. She’s showing a young man a poplin overcoat.

  ‘Obviously there’s no smoking in here!’

  A gangly girl with a boyish face has sneaked up on me. She’s wearing a green dress with a wide sash. Her left eye seems to move a touch slower than her right.

  ‘I do apologise.’

  My cigar bobs up and down in my mouth as I speak. I open the door and toss it out into the road.

  ‘Much better. How can I be of assistance?’

  ‘I was going to invite Miss Johansson for lunch.’

  The boyish face bursts into a full smile. Her teeth shimmer against her red-painted lips. Both eyes start glittering at the same time, much to my relief.

  ‘Elin is busy with a customer for the moment. Do you have time to wait a moment?’ the assistant twitters, putting her hands together across her bust. Her bony fingers have well-manicured nails, painted the same colour as her lips.

  ‘Naturally. Maybe you can help me, while I’m here. I was going to buy a suit for my nephew.’

  ‘Of course. Standards is a fashionable choice for young people. Is he coming out?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘He just needs a proper suit, simple as that.’

  ‘Everyone needs a proper suit. What size does your nephew wear?’

  I rub my chin. At the other end of the boutique, Elin recoils when she catches sight of me. She smiles in confusion at her customer and glances over at me with a raised eyebrow.

  ‘He’s a bit shorter than me. Slimmer.’

  A double furrow appears between the assistant’s eyes.

  ‘He’s blond.’

  The assistant shakes her head, smiling: ‘You really should find out what size he wears.’

  ‘That could be difficult.’

  ‘Maybe you should just try on something while you wait. At the moment we have promotions on old boy suits in both wool and serge, topcoats for sixty-five kronor and trench coats for sixty-nine.’

  ‘Thanks, but I already have six decent suits at home.’

  ‘I think Elin has finished with her customer now.’ The sales assistant leans forward and lowers her voice: ‘She’s fond of cut flowers. Preferably hyacinths. Difficult this time of year, but have a try in Klarahallarna.’

  She leaves me with an imperceptible nod. I tighten my tie.

  The two women meet halfway up the narrow shop and have to twirl around each other, as if in a dance. They exchange a meaningful look. The boyish assistant laughs. A slight scent of herring reaches me before Elin does. It must be her favourite food. She wrinkles her face into a frown and rests her right hand on the daring curve above her hip.

  ‘Lunch? What is this idea you and Alice have cooked up between you?’

  She purses her mouth. I attempt a smile: ‘You have to have something to eat either way…’

  ‘I hope you’re not getting the idea that…’

  ‘It’s only a question of a friendly lunch, nothing else.’

  ‘What for?’

  She turns her head, as if this might improve her hearing.

  ‘Lunch and an amicable conversation…’

  ‘You’re just the same, the whole lot of you. You bait the hook with flattery and gobstoppers.’

  ‘Gobstoppers?’

  ‘And then once you’ve made a mess of things you scarper.’

  ‘I can assure you that—’

  ‘Nonsense! Let me get my coat.’

  Elin bends her neck slightly and turns on a sixpence.

  Her fat behind sways to and fro as she clears a path back through the shop. Her colleague, Alice, inclines her head and shoots me a certain kind of glance. I fold up my collar, open the door and step out into the overcast November day. I met another Alice once. A bandy-legged carpenter’s daughter who was whoring on Kungsgatan, had a liking for Madeira wine. Our story didn’t have a very happy ending.

  A horse and cart are parked outside. The chestnut mare scrapes her hooves impatiently against the cobblestones. My extinguished Meteor lies on the pavement. I snatch it up while pretending to do up my bootlace.

  At the beer café on the crossing of Roslagsgatan and Odengatan, a mouthy waitress tries to direct the flow of lunch guests. Her rumbling laugh cuts through the clatter of crockery and the diners’ raised voices.

  On her tray: stacks of chipped sandwich plates and greasy soup bowls.

  ‘I’ll wager two cards.’

  ‘I’ll pass!’

  Four men in City District postal-delivery uniforms are playing auction behind me. The cards make a thumping sound every time one of them slams them down on the table.

  ‘I’ll pass as well.’

  At a table next to us, an old-timer with blue-veined cheeks fills his glass of pils to the rim. He nods to himself, fully satisfied, and opens his newspaper, Social-Demokraten.

  Behind Elin’s back, a gang of lads from Norra Latin are making a ruckus. They all wear the grammar school badge on their caps; they’re drinking milk. One of them is clumsily rolling a cigarette when his friend thumps him on the arm. The bottling machine gives off a dull thud at regular intervals.

  ‘So, how long has Miss been working at Standards?’

  I take a bite of my egg sandwich. Elin brushes a few crumbs off the table.

  ‘Too long.’

  ‘And in the meantime you had no idea that your mother and half-brother were living only a few blocks away?’

  ‘Like I told you earlier.’

  Elin takes a sip of coffee. Outside Oden-Bazaar on the other side of the street, old Johnsson is limping about with a broom in his hands. He’s had that limp ever since I paid him a visit. The number 57 bus pulls into its stop. At the café entrance stands a gang of grubby vagrants with weather-beaten, furrowed faces under their king-of-the-road Borsalinos, gesticulating wildly as they argue some point.

  ‘Laying it on a bit thick with your spades, aren’t you?’ hisses a throaty voice from the card game behind me.

  I take a puff on my Meteor and rub my chin: ‘Do you live around here?’

  ‘What concern is that of yours?’

  Elin’s eyebrow is raised again.

  ‘Just an innocent question.’

  The beer is lukewarm but refreshing. I drain my glass in two gulps and refill it. The vagrants have come to the end of their negotiations, and they sway in through the door. Their commander wears his cap cocked at a three-quarters angle; there’s a fag butt behind his ear, and traces of a nose bleed dried into his moustache. The leather uppers of his boots have split, and each of his laces is decorated with four or five emergency knots.

  ‘We have to get a move on,’ one of the grammar school boys exclaims behind Elin, and there’s a hustle and bustle as the lads stand up and put on their coats. I have another sip of beer and clean off the foam around my mouth with the back of my hand. Elin leans forward slightly.

  ‘So, Mister Kvist, tell me about Beda.’

  I turn on the charm: ‘I liked her a lot. You’ve been graced with her green eyes.’

  Elin’s mouth forms itself into a thin streak above her broad chin.

  ‘What was she like?’

  ‘Confused, at the end. Some say she was a compulsive liar but I don’t know if that’s anywhere near the truth.’

  ‘Damn it!’

  I gaze at her, feeling my smile falling off my face; but I manage to stick it back on: ‘Everyone in Sibirien knew who she was. She was well liked.’

  ‘And the other one?’

  ‘Your brother?’

  ‘Half-brother, thank you very much.’

  ‘They say he was retarded but I don’t think so. Just unusually good-hearted. A deaf mute, though. He helped as far as he was able. Beda used to say he came into the world back end first.’

  ‘I don’t under
stand what the purpose of this is!’ Elin clenches her fist on the table. Her cheeks are flaming. ‘First you near enough scupper my sale and then you turn up out of the blue and make the most chilling insinuations.’

  I try out another smile. The muscles are straining in my face. Elin flushes with anger.

  ‘I reckon Joel’s sitting on the diamonds,’ hisses the drunken voice behind my back.

  I rummage in my trouser pocket while she catches her breath.

  She raises her coffee cup to her mouth, with a shaking hand. There’s a ringing sound as I reach across the table and let the little lead bullet fall onto her saucer.

  ‘What’s that supposed to be?’

  ‘It’s a pistol bullet. I dug it out of the laundry wall last night.’

  ‘Put it away.’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Put it away. At once.’

  Her voice aches with held-back tears. I do as I’m told. My manoeuvre hasn’t quite gone to plan.

  ‘I don’t understand. Last night I was out having a good time with Stina at the old Fenix, and now I’m sitting here with you, and… I don’t understand.’

  ‘Your mother. She made me promise something, and a promise is a promise.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘That I’d look after Petrus if anything happened to her.’

  ‘And now?’

  ‘Now something has happened.’

  ‘Jesus bloody wept!’

  This boutique assistant curses more than many sailors I’ve met.

  Beside us, the old man with his Social-Demokraten chuckles loudly at something in the newspaper. I inhale deeply on my cigar and wonder where I should begin when giving her the whole story. Elin shakes her head when the waitress approaches with the coffee pot for a refill. The tramps have sat down behind Elin and pooled their collective assets on a handkerchief on the table. They order two bottles of pils and three glasses.

  I choose my words carefully: ‘When I came home a few days ago from a lengthy trip, I learned that your mother had died about a month back. People said Petrus had crushed her skull, which sounded unbelievable. He couldn’t even kill a sick rabbit. And she was going to die before long anyway. She had cancer.’

  A shiver runs through Elin’s stout body.

  ‘It started in her eye but before long it spread.’

  I get out Beda’s letter and hand it over.

  ‘When I was released this was waiting for me.’

  ‘Released?’

  ‘Came home, I mean.’

  Elin looks as if I just handed her a dead latrine rat by the tail, but she grips the envelope and slides out the letter. I have a sip of beer and watch her while she reads. The sheet of paper starts to tremble slightly; she takes a deep breath.

  ‘I have seen to it there’s a monthly bob or two for Petrus,’ she quotes.

  ‘Precisely. Yesterday I checked the Parish Register to see if the father was named, but he wasn’t.’

  ‘Was there anything about me?’

  ‘Regarding your father?’

  The words get stuck in her throat; she swallows a few times, then finally manages to whisper: ‘Yes?’

  ‘Don’t know a thing about it. What I do know is, the police came to Roslagsgatan in the middle of the day to pick up Beda’s body and Petrus, but no one saw them being brought out, at least not close up. A jumble dealer by the name of Ström spoke a few words with a plain-clothes officer when they came back the day after, and he found out that Petrus had crushed Beda’s skull with a stone from a mangle. Or an iron. It’s a little unclear.’

  I take a deep breath – I’m not sure I’ve ever said so many words in one go. Elin grows pale and looks as if she’s had one cup of coffee too many. I have a mouthful of beer to wet my whistle.

  ‘And?’

  ‘And there’s not a trace of anything in the laundry to show that anyone had their skull flattened in there. On the other hand I did find, like I said, a bullet lodged in the wall.’

  ‘Who would put a firearm in the hands of a retard?’

  I push my hat back.

  ‘There’s no bloody way it was Petrus.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  I raise my voice: ‘I mean someone is letting a deaf-mute bloke, who maybe’s not all there and can’t defend himself, take the blame for a murder he never committed.’

  ‘I’d say you’re the one who’s not all there.’

  Elin puts on her beret and picks up her handbag.

  ‘Your brother is locked up in Lunatic Palace.’

  ‘Half-brother, if you please. And as far as I can see it seems the right place for him.’

  ‘The problem is he hasn’t even been put on trial.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I spoke to a senior constable I know. No crime scene investigation has been carried out, no post-mortem or interrogation. That goes right against everything I know about coppers. Within twenty-four hours, Petrus was locked up in Konradsberg.’

  Elin sinks back into her chair.

  ‘Do you have a cigarette?’

  She sounds very tired.

  ‘Sorry, no.’

  Looking out of the window, she mumbles: ‘Stina’s fiancé is a policeman.’

  ‘Stina?’

  ‘We share a flat.’

  ‘So check with him, then.’

  I stub out my cigar and look out of the window. A few drops of rain have streaked the glass. A tramp ambles along the pavement. A horse-drawn cab brakes hard for a stray dog crossing the wide street.

  The three vagrants behind Elin get their pils bottles at last. They share the contents between them.

  Elin sighs desolately: ‘It’s not long till advent now.’

  I bite the end off a new cigar.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘I’ve never liked Christmas very much.’

  ‘Father Christmas and all that crap.’

  ‘Who would kill an old lady in that way?’

  ‘Haven’t got a clue.’

  Tears gleam in Elin’s green eyes when they look into mine. For a moment I think of Beda and the way she kept rubbing her running eye until they cut it out.

  ‘The man mentioned in the letter. If we assume he’s Petrus’s father… Maybe he’s married to someone else? Maybe he’s the one who’s behind all this? It wouldn’t be the first time some rich swine left an impoverished woman with a baby on her arm.’

  Elin’s eyes burn behind their veil of tears.

  ‘Maybe so,’ I said.

  ‘Men will be men. You can never keep your hands to yourselves.’

  I fumble with the matches before I manage to get the cigar going. The coarse smoke fills my mouth. I let it drizzle out of the corner of my lips.

  ‘As I said, no father is mentioned by name.’

  Elin peers at me. She puts down the handbag, takes off her beret and breathes deeply. Then her gaze meets mine with a different sort of light in it: ‘So how do we go on from here?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Surely you don’t imagine you can just show up and tell me these stories, and that’s the end of it?’

  ‘Listen to me. I wanted to know if you had any information about the case. I’ve worked on private investigations for dozens of years and the last thing I need is a…’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘This is a man’s job, simple as that.’

  ‘She was my mother.’

  Elin glares at me defiantly, bursting with conviction.

  A sudden headache cuts through my skull. I shut my eyes tight and massage the thick bridge of my nose with my thumb and forefinger: ‘Petrus spent a couple of terms at the Asplunden Institute for the Deaf, Mute and Blind. That trail’s been cooling down for the last twenty years, but I was going to see if anyone still remembers him there. Above all I plan to speak to Petrus himself.’

  Elin puffs up her unruly hair with one hand. Again her herring-breath cuts through the smells of cooking and tobacco. For the first time I see her smile. H
er top-left incisor is chipped.

  ‘You’re planning on having a word with a deaf mute who’s banged up?’

  ‘I know one of the asylum nurses. A drunk, a neighbour of mine.’

  Elin opens her eyes wide and stares dumbly at me.

  ‘And you waited this long to tell me?’

  She picks up her handbag, pushes back her chair and offers me her hand. There’s something very mannish about her, although not quite in the way I can usually appreciate.

  I stare at her hand. Her nails are dirty.

  ‘Come on! Too damned right I may not have known my mother, but maybe I can do something for my poor sod of a half-brother.’

  I push my hat up even further with my finger, then put my cigar in my mouth and give her my hand. She shakes it firmly.

  ‘Let me call Alice and ask her to cover for me this afternoon, then we can take the number 4 to Fridhemsplan and change to the number 2.’

  ‘Wallin might not even be at work yet. Sometimes he does the night shift.’

  Elin stands up and smiles again:

  ‘So much the better.’

  Wallin’s bedsit is acrid with a smell of sweat and stale hangover. Across the room runs a washing line, empty apart from a couple of pathetic grey clothes pegs. On a bureau is a crystal transistor marked with the manufacturer’s name: DUX. By its side, a sunken leather armchair is surrounded by empty bottles. One of them has been shattered, and blood is visible on the jagged glass of the broken bottleneck.

  The dirty wallpaper, which has come away from the wall along the edges, is covered in brown blotches from squashed wall-lice.

  He’s nailed up a bookshelf that he’s cobbled together from a few sugar crates. A couple of years’ worth of Sports News is kept there. The twat often brags about some nephew who, apparently, plays as centre half for Djurgården.

  Wallin is in need of a couple of hours of sleep and a few cups of hot coffee before he goes to work. His left hand is swaddled with a dirty piece of cotton. We take a seat around the kitchen table on some chairs with high armrests. The blinds are down but in the middle of the table is a lamp, which is switched on, and next to it an enamelled tub filled with grey soapy water, and two detachable celluloid shirt collars floating on the surface.

  ‘Well, I have to apologise for the state of the place. I don’t often get womenfolk visiting here.’