Down for the Count

by Martin Holmén

  ‘And you, Detective Superintendent, should be bloody clear about one thing too: waistcoats are no longer fashionable in America.’

  With a grin, I nod at his well-tailored suit.

  The sun is turning to ash. In the failing light of dusk, Roslagsgatan shimmers as if metal flakes were falling from the sky. The pink rays are reflected against enamelled shop signs and plate-glass windows. Outside Nyström’s barber’s a gang of navvies are repairing the rails, but they’re not the same blokes who were here before. Hammer strokes ring out, and bounce between the façades. The acetylene flame hisses and throws up sparks as it attacks the metal.

  A discordant clattering of hooves can be heard when a stout working mare pulling a cart-load of planks shies away from the sound. The driver, who’s leading her by the bridle, struggles and forces her to keep moving. One of the navvies sits up on his knees and grimaces, his hand against the small of his back. He removes his cap and mops the sweat off his forehead.

  On the street corner there’s a tramp with a violin, a mess of fleas and rags. His only garment that’s not full of holes is a sturdy striped farmer’s vest. The violin’s out of tune, as is the tramp, but I stop for a moment, because it’s my favourite song:

  He owns neither father nor mother,

  And through his life there’s no one to keep him fed;

  Like a needy child at yet another

  Rich man’s table he begs for his bread…

  I hum along for a while, then take out my wallet.

  And so he becomes a man of the road,

  Seduced in his most youthful days;

  His name did find its charted abode

  Among Stockholm’s criminal ways.

  I find a five-öre coin, flick it through the air and manage to hit the violin case on the button. The tramp nods at me and I continue homeward, singing as I go.

  Little clusters of ragged-clothed children are hanging about on the street, free to do as they please on a Sunday. Their pockets are bursting with marbles. A couple of the older boys have ripped out a page of a newspaper with a photograph of Hitler, which they’ve nailed up on a tree outside the widow’s cigar shop. At the head of the group stands a spotty lad aiming a dart with red tail-feathers at the German leader.

  ‘It’s Allan’s turn,’ says a little lad in a red hat.

  ‘Allan’s out,’ answers the snotty kid holding the darts. ‘You have to hit him right in the peepers. Allan hit the eyebrow.’

  I smile and light a second Meteor off my first. My stomach is rumbling with hunger. Police porridge is hardly a filling meal.

  I still can’t get my head around the coppers letting me go, and them not even wanting to question me about the man in black – only about that other incident from several days before. I tip my hat back, shove my hands in my coat pockets and keep walking north.

  I find Lundin in the little workshop attached to the undertaker’s, where he’s assembling one of the prefabricated sections of the coffins that are delivered to him a couple of times every month. The various sections are laid out between two trestles, and he’s busy trying to fit the base onto one of the side panels.

  ‘Well, I’ll be damned.’

  Lundin straightens up, and stares at me as I stand there in the doorway. His bushy eyebrows shoot up on his high forehead. I lean against the doorpost.

  ‘Do I look as bad as all that? I suppose I need a bath and a shave?’

  I rub my chin and step in the poorly lit workshop. It smells of pitch pine and paint.

  ‘When did they release you, brother?’

  ‘I came straight here.’

  ‘I’ll be damned.’

  The undertaker leans over the wooden coffin again. He’s all smiles under the moustache.

  ‘It was about something completely different. Nothing big.’

  ‘And now it’s time to put all that business behind you, I hope? Pass me that wooden mallet, will you? The one with the rags around the head.’

  ‘You weren’t bloody serious about that cigar shop, were you?’

  ‘Of course I was. Keep this lower part steady, the sod keeps jumping out at the joint.’

  I feel I ought to take off my hat and thank him.

  ‘There’s one thing I can’t understand. If they shot her in the middle of the day, the shots would have echoed all through the street, and people would have come buzzing around like flies.’

  ‘Forget about that damned mess, now. Hold it firm.’

  The muted blows vibrate through the wooden planks of the coffin, travelling through my palm as I hold the side panel in position.

  ‘The junk man Ström saw them when they took out the body, although not up close. They carried the corpse out by the arms and legs, and loaded her and Petrus into an unmarked car. A black one.’

  ‘You know what they say about Ström, my brother. That he was Petrus’s father. Now we change places. Hold on as tight as you bloody can.’

  ‘Have you seen Dixie?’

  ‘Twice. Her food’s run out.’

  ‘It was the coppers that put a slug in the old girl.’

  Lundin straightens up and stares at me; a glint of fear shows in his iris.

  ‘Something’s amiss in your head, my brother. Beda wouldn’t have harmed a fly. A sick old woman. True to her word and always a good egg. Why would the authorities do away with someone like that?’

  ‘You can’t get away from a promise.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  Lundin sighs.

  ‘Anyway, that carrot-top is waiting in your flat.’

  ‘Elin?’

  ‘Been sitting up there for hours. Intending to give you the suit personally. I said you’d probably be delayed. Very delayed.’

  ‘My God.’

  ‘She was very determined. As carrot-tops often are.’

  I let go of the coffin and head for the door. I’d arranged to meet Elin yesterday. If I know her right she’ll make me feel the sting of that.

  ‘Brother?’

  I turn towards Lundin once more. He’s standing there with the mallet in his hand, his cravat hanging from his neck like a sleepy bat. With an almost timid glance, he says: ‘Shall we say I’ll take eight per cent of the profits instead of ten, once the debt is paid? From the cigar shop, I mean. To make sure you keep out of prison.’

  I need to clear my head with some fresh air before I meet with Elin. I button up my coat and fold up my collar. On the slope of Ingemarsgatan, I see Nisse’s Eva making her way to the bakery, with the last of the evening light on her back, and a shawl over her head.

  I throw my cigar end into the gutter and cross the street. Outside the laundry I stop and peer inside through the window, my hands cupped around my eyes. I can just about make out Petrus’s old broom. From some nearby courtyard, a fiddler starts to play.

  I turn around and look at my own building. The man in black must have seen our registration plates and checked the number within the space of ten or fifteen minutes, then parked somewhere and lurked in the shadows of Ingemarsgatan until I came home.

  ‘Where the hell did that damned Rolls go?’ I mutter to myself, getting out my third Meteor of the day. I light it and look up at the façade. My flat is dimly illuminated. A shadow is moving across the bedroom ceiling, as if Elin is pacing to and fro in there. Better not say a word about being attacked out here that night. The fewer who know about that the better.

  Filling my lungs with smoke, I turn south towards the general store. A couple of kids cycle past. They have both taken off the company signs from their delivery bicycles so they can use them on a Sunday. One of them is peddling along on a three-year-old Crescent, the other has an Adler which must be a new model, because I don’t recognise it.

  There’s an evening rush on at Bruntell’s. Both he and his wife are running between the shelves, the till and the scales. The fat grocer is sweating under his folding cap, and his wife has a strained smile fixed on her face. She’s a tall, quiet woman. Thi
n as a poker, even though Bruntell has given her six children.

  The women form a long, winding queue in front of the counter, carrying baskets and cloth bags filled with all sorts of shopping. They hardly pause to draw breath as they gossip about everything from food prices to the rotten weather we’ve been having, and the tragic story of the Jewel’s baby, which actually she left deliberately in a draught to make sure that it died. There’s no way of getting the slightest word in, so I just have to wait my blessed turn at the back of the queue. I’ve been kicking my heels for a minute or two when a voice rises above the hubbub: ‘At least my Ove doesn’t go for the booze like your bloke does!’

  A sudden silence falls in the shop.

  ‘Don’t you go getting on your high horse now!’

  ‘He’s pickled so often his long johns get tangled on the clothesline by force of habit.’

  ‘Why don’t you just worry about your own dirty hovel!’

  A tall, emaciated woman has tears of rage in her eyes as she spits her reply at a large-busted lady. The former looks like she’d like to stab the latter with her hatpin. Their neighbours in the queue start to tug at their sleeves, hushing and tutting.

  ‘Drunkenness is a self-inflicted foolishness.’

  The first woman turns back towards the counter, her lanky frame shaking with anger. I have to suppress a chuckle. At first only the odd mumble can be heard, then a general hum of chatter develops, and soon the sound level is back to what it was before.

  I have a headache. I need a drink or two, a bit of food, a bath. A decent night’s sleep. The wound in my side needs dressing. I catch the grocer’s eye and nod. He smiles cautiously under his ludicrous postage-stamp moustache, and leans over the ledger on the counter: ‘O-olsson came down and p-paid off half his debt.’

  ‘Well, I’ll be damned.’

  ‘If Kvist t-takes his other hand as well, I m-m-might get the other half.’

  ‘That wasn’t me.’

  ‘I hear he’s offering l-lodgings to gypsies.’

  ‘Maybe so.’

  ‘Beggars.’

  He spits out the word with disgust, as if he’s just noticed a rancid pork chop among the meat on his counter.

  ‘I’ll be taking charge of the cigar shop.’

  ‘Oh really? I heard it was f-for sale. I should wish you welcome, then. I’m the s-secretary of Roslagsgatan’s Merchants Association.’

  ‘Christ.’

  ‘Beg your pardon?’

  ‘Nothing. Has the portrait been developed?’

  ‘It’s v-very good.’

  Bruntell bends down behind the counter and, humming to himself, puts the photograph in front of me. It’s a half-length portrait, taken from the front. My eyes are shaded by the brim of my hat, but you can make out the cigar shop in the background.

  I buy potatoes, eggs and American back rashers for my dinner, but when I ask to have it on credit, Bruntell won’t hear of it and gives me the groceries free of charge. His wife packs it all into a rustling paper bag.

  ‘You-you came in the o-other day asking about Beda and Petrus,’ says Bruntell in a low voice, just as I’m about to leave. I stop and turn around again.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘I developed the ph-photographs from the party and the p-portrait, and there were a couple of other negatives th-thrown in as well. I-I-I don’t know if they’re of any use to you.’

  ‘What, exactly?’

  ‘I’m n-not quite sure, but I th-think it was the same day they picked her up.’

  Bruntell roots around behind the counter.

  ‘I h-had to feed the film through and I cli-clicked a few times just pointing the camera through the shop window.’

  I put my shopping bag down.

  ‘And I th-think, soon after that Ström c-came and t-told me what he’d seen.’

  He hands me a photograph.

  ‘I d-don’t know who they are.’

  There’s a blurred image of my own house, I recognise the sign over the funeral parlour. On the pavement in front of the house stand two figures wearing black, their eyes directed at the street. From what I can make out, the first figure looks like a man, partially obscuring a lady who’s pointing at the laundry.

  Bruntell stammers: ‘A m-man and a w-woman?’

  ‘Looks like it, judging by their hats. They seem to be walking arm-in-arm…’

  ‘No one f-from around here?’

  ‘Hard to say.’

  I study the picture more carefully. At the right-hand edge, I can see the back end of a passing car but it’s impossible to make out the registration plate.

  I turn to the line of gossiping women, stretching back through half the shop. I hold up the photograph and raise my voice over the general din: ‘Ladies! This is very important. I’m going to show you a photograph. If any of you recognise the people in this photograph, you must contact me urgently.’

  Elin is sitting in the warm kitchen, waiting. On the table are two food cartons from NORMA and a couple of bottles of pilsner. She’s gone for the octagonal plates. The table is laid for two but she’s already eaten. A fire crackles in the hearth. Cheery jazz tones can be heard from the neighbour’s transistor.

  ‘So what sort of time is this to turn up?’

  Beda’s illegitimate daughter rises from her chair and puts her plate and cutlery in the sink. She’s wearing a green dress with a pleated skirt. Pinned to her large bust is a brooch set with purple stones. The colour of her lipstick doesn’t go with her hair. She has plucked her eyebrows to a fine line. They curve over her green eyes as if scratched in with a seven-inch nail.

  ‘I completely forgot.’

  ‘Been on one of your benders, have you?’

  She turns on the water, and starts noisily washing the dishes. I shake my head.

  ‘No, hard at work. Late to bed, early to rise.’

  I take the big copper saucepan and go over to her: ‘Water.’

  She turns the tap and slowly the saucepan begins to fill up.

  ‘You stink,’ says Elin in a low, sharp tone. ‘Your suit needs pressing.’

  I don’t know how I should answer her. Either I have to tell her I’ve been in the clink or keep quiet about it. I keep quiet. The water trickles unbearably slowly. The brooch rises and falls violently with her breath.

  ‘Have you spoken to your friend at the police about the registration number?’

  ‘It’s Sunday.’

  I put the saucepan on the ring.

  ‘Horseradish beef with mash.’

  Elin nods her broad chin towards the NORMA carton on the table.

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘It’s gone cold.’

  ‘That doesn’t matter at all.’

  ‘I can heat it up.’

  ‘No, really.’

  I sit down and open the carton, shoving the food onto a plate and opening a bottle of pilsner.

  ‘Shouldn’t we report it to the police officially?’

  ‘I don’t think they’d put any time into it.’

  ‘What do we do if the registration number doesn’t match any of their records?’

  ‘Well, then we’ve done what we can. Damn, this is good!’

  ‘What about that school? The Asplund Institute for the Deaf, Mute and Blind?’

  ‘Your brother went there twenty years ago. What would be the bloody use?’

  ‘So, what next?’

  ‘What’s next is I’m opening a cigar shop and becoming a boxing trainer.’

  The clattering of dishes stops all of a sudden. The air is thick with silence. Elin wipes her hands on the towel hanging on the wall, then turns to me.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The widow’s cigar shop down the street is for sale. I’m borrowing some money from Lundin. It’ll go through tomorrow or on Wednesday.’

  ‘You going to run it all on your own?’

  ‘My nephew’s helping out.’

  ‘You said it yourself, Kvist, a promise is a promise. My mother
put all her hopes on you.’

  I carry on wolfing down the meat and potatoes.

  ‘There’s a limit to everything. I’ve done what I can.’

  ‘Is the suit for your nephew?’

  ‘Yes, I need to pay you for that.’

  ‘No need.’

  Elin sits down, facing me. I have a couple of big gulps of beer.

  ‘What do you mean? Course you have to get your dough.’

  ‘I’ve got a steady job and a fair amount in my bank book since the sale of the laundry. Not too bad for an orphan.’

  She brushes some crumbs from the table into her cupped hand. ‘I’ve always had a good head for figures.’

  ‘Well, thank you.’

  ‘Spent half my life standing at a till, and the figures always add up to the last penny at the end of the day after cashing up.’

  I help myself to another couple of spoonfuls of mashed potato with sauce.

  ‘Thanks for the food, it’s so good. From the NORMA on Kungsgatan, isn’t it?’

  ‘Giving the right change, calculating rebate percentages; it’s hard finding staff. You can’t count on young people.’

  ‘The one on Vasagatan isn’t much good. Kungsgatan is better.’

  Elin takes a deep breath. She looks out of the window towards the reservoir in Vanadislunden. I go on eating. Half a minute passes in silence. Then, to my surprise, Elin starts to sob.

  ‘But it never goes away. The loneliness. Once you’ve grown up alone you’re never rid of it.’

  I stay in my seat, staring at her, and take a long, slow swig of beer. On the hob, the water is slowly simmering in the red copper saucepan.

  ‘Yes, I suppose…’

  ‘It becomes a part of you and in the end you hardly notice it, like a tramp walking around stinking to high heaven but completely oblivious. You don’t notice it but it’s right there.’

  ‘Well…’

  My headache becomes a bellyache. I refill my glass.

  ‘I know she must have thought of me sometimes. A mother does think about her child even if she’s had her taken into care.’

  ‘That may well be so.’

  ‘Why did she never come and find me?’