by Lars Kepler
“That won’t be enough,” Joona says. “We can’t go into an embassy with just a sketch.”
“But with a live witness who can point him out?” Penelope says, and she stands up to look Joona in the eye.
83
the suspect
Penelope stands between Saga Bauer and Joona Linna behind an armoured police bus parked on Skarpögatan beside the Japanese embassy. They’re barely fifty metres away from the German embassy. She feels the weight of the protective vest dragging on her shoulders and the tight fit around her chest.
They have to wait five minutes. Then three people will be admitted into the German embassy in an attempt to identify and arrest a suspect.
Silently, Penelope accepts the extra pistol Joona slides into the holster on her back. He adjusts the angle so that, if needed, it can be drawn out quickly.
“She doesn’t want that,” Saga protests quietly.
“It’s okay,” says Penelope.
“We don’t know what will happen,” Joona says. “I hope that everything will go smoothly, but if it doesn’t, this little backup might make a difference.”
Swedish police, Säpo’s officers, SWAT teams, and ambulances are everywhere.
Joona Linna looks over what remains of the burned-out Volvo. Only the charred chassis is still in one piece. Parts of the car are strewn all over the street crossing. Erixson has already found a detonator and traces of explosives. “It’s probably hexogen,” Erixson says as he pushes his glasses back up his nose.
“A bomb,” Joona says as he looks at his watch.
A German shepherd is nosing around the legs of a policeman and then lies down on the pavement and pants with its tongue hanging out.
A SWAT team escorts Saga, Penelope, and Joona to the gate, where four expressionless German military officers wait.
“Try not to worry,” Saga says softly to Penelope. “All you have to do is identify the suspect and you’ll be brought out again immediately. The embassy security guards won’t arrest him until you are out of the building.”
A strong-looking, well-built policeman with a freckled nose opens the gate and lets them onto the embassy property. He gives them a friendly greeting and introduces himself as Karl Mann, head of security.
They follow him up to the main entrance.
The morning air is still cool.
“I hope you’ve been well briefed. This man is an extremely dangerous killer,” Joona says.
“We understand. We’ve been informed,” Karl Mann replies. “However, I have seen nobody except employees of the embassy and other German citizens here all morning.”
“May we have a list?” Saga asks immediately.
“All I will tell you is that we’ve been reviewing the tapes from our security cameras,” Karl Mann tells them. “We think your officer was mistaken. Perhaps this fugitive got in over the fence, but instead of entering the building, he probably ran around it and kept on going.”
“A possibility,” Joona says calmly.
“How many people are here in the embassy right now?” asks Saga.
“It’s open for business and there are four appointments scheduled.”
“Four people?”
“Yes.”
“And how many employees are here?”
“Eleven.”
“And how many security guards?”
“Five, at present,” he says.
“No other people?”
“No.”
“No carpenters, no painters, or—”
“No.”
“So twenty people in all,” Saga says.
“Do you wish to look around on your own?” asks Karl Mann quietly.
“We would prefer to have someone with us,” Saga replies.
“How many?” asks Karl Mann.
“As many as possible and as heavily armed as possible,” Joona answers.
“So you really believe he is that dangerous.” Karl Mann smiles. “I can put two men at your disposal along with myself.”
“We don’t know what to expect, but—”
“You said he’d been shot in the arm,” Karl Mann points out. “I must say I’m not exactly afraid.”
“And it’s possible he never actually got inside. Or maybe he’s already left,” Joona says quietly. “But if he is here, we might lose some people.”
Silently, Joona, Penelope, and Saga, accompanied by the three policemen carrying automatic rifles and shock grenades, begin to walk through the corridors on the main floor. Renovations had been carried out throughout the building during the last few years while embassy business had been moved to Artillerigatan. However, in spite of the fact that the last few touches were being completed, embassy personnel had been moved back. It still smelled like paint and newly sawed wood. Some of the floors were still covered with protective paper.
“We would like to see your visitors first,” Joona says. “Not the regular employees.”
“I expected that,” Karl Mann says.
Penelope feels strangely calm as she walks between Saga Bauer and Joona Linna. Somehow she does not believe she will meet her pursuer here. The place seems too normal and peaceful.
Then she notices Joona’s caution, how his movements beside her change.
An alarm starts beeping. Everyone stands still. Karl Mann lifts his radio and speaks shortly in German.
“A door alarm is going off,” he explains to them in Swedish. “The door is actually locked but the alarm is so sensitive it acts as if the door has been opened for a few seconds.”
They keep walking together along the hallway and Penelope Fernandez is aware of the extra weight of the gun against her back.
“Here is the office of Martin Schenkel, our business attaché,” Karl Mann gestures. “He has a visitor, Roland Lindkvist.”
“We’d like to meet them,” Joona says.
“Martin has requested no one disturb him until after lunch.”
Joona says nothing.
Saga clasps Penelope’s upper arm and they stop while the others continue on towards the closed door.
“Wait a moment, please,” Karl Mann says to Joona as he knocks.
He receives a muffled answer, waits a moment, and then is given permission to enter. He does so, and closes the door behind him.
Joona looks at a room with a door covered by grey industrial plastic. A pile of gypsum board is stacked there. The plastic billows a little like a sail, just as sounds drift out from behind the closed door to the business attaché’s office. There are voices and a loud thud. Penelope’s thoughts fly back in time to the news reports about when this very embassy building had been occupied by Kommando Holger Meins in the spring of 1975. She remembers the demand that Andreas Baader, Ulrike Meinhof, Gudrun Ensslin, and thirty-five other prisoners from the Red Army Faction be released from their West German prison. It was in these very corridors that they ran and screamed at one another, pulling Ambassador Dietrich Stoecker by the hair and pushing Heinz Hillegaart’s bloody body down the stairs. She didn’t remember what they’d said or what the negotiations had been, but afterwards, the German chancellor Helmut Schmidt had told Swedish prime minister Olof Palme not to negotiate with the terrorists and then two of the hostages were shot. Karl-Heinz Dellwo had screamed that he would shoot one person every hour until his demands were met.
Now Penelope watches Joona Linna step up to the door. The other two men are standing totally still. Joona pulls out his gun, undoes the safety, and then knocks at the door.
There’s an odour spreading in the hallway as if someone left food burning on the stove.
Joona knocks again, listens, and hears a monotone voice as if someone is repeating the same phrase over and over. He waits a few moments, hides his pistol behind his back, and then pushes down the door handle.
Karl Mann stands directly below the ceiling lamp with his automatic rifle down beside his leg. He looks at Joona and then back at the man sitting in an armchair pushed deep into the room.
“Herr S
chenkel, this is the Swedish inspector,” he says softly.
Books and folders of scattered papers are spread all over the floor as if someone had pushed them off the desk in a fit of rage. The German business attaché, Martin Schenkel, is sitting quietly in an armchair watching television. A live broadcast of a football game is coming from Beijing. The game is between Germany’s DFB-Elf and the Chinese National Team.
“Wasn’t Roland Lindkvist here a minute ago?” asks Joona deliberately.
“He left,” answers Martin Schenkel without looking up from the television.
Joona and Karl Mann go back into the hallway. Karl Mann is annoyed as well as disquieted. He barks some orders to his men in a hard voice. A woman in a light grey knitted dress is walking quickly away down the hall over the protective paper.
“Who is that?” asks Joona.
“The ambassador’s secretary,” answers Karl Mann.
“We’d like to talk with her and—”
Suddenly an alarm rips through the air. Over the whooping noise, a calm, prerecorded voice admonishes them that this is no drill and that they should not use the lifts as they exit the building immediately.
84
the fire
Karl Mann spits rapid orders into his radio as he jogs towards the stairwell.
“The top floor is on fire,” he says shortly.
“How big a fire?” asks Joona as he keeps pace with him.
“We don’t know, but we’re evacuating the embassy and there are usually eleven people working upstairs.”
Karl Mann snatches a fire extinguisher from a red cabinet and pulls out the safety stopper.
“I’ll take Penelope outside,” Saga yells.
“He started the fire,” Penelope says. “He’s going to escape when everyone’s working to put out the fire.”
Joona follows the three military men up the stairs. Their steps echo between the cold cement walls although they try to run as quietly as they can. They come into the hallway on the third floor where there is a stronger smell of smoke and even grey wisps curling up to run along the ceiling.
They take turns yanking open doors but they find nothing in the rooms.
“It looks like there’s smoke coming from the Schiller salon.” Karl Mann points as he speaks.
At the end of the hallway, smoke is streaming smoothly from beneath the double doors. It flows like water moving in the wrong direction, up the doors and along the walls to spread out at the ceiling.
A woman screams somewhere and there’s a thud in the building as if there’s a clap of thunder within the walls. A sharp bang snaps from behind the doors as if a large glass pane had broken from the heat.
“We have to get people out,” Joona says. “There’s—”
Karl Mann motions Joona to be quiet as he listens to his radio. He puts the fire extinguisher down as he answers in German. He then turns to the whole group.
“Listen up!” he says in a steady voice. “Our security cameras have spotted a man dressed in black in the men’s bathroom. He has a pistol in the sink.”
“That’s the guy,” Joona says.
Karl Mann talks again to security in a low voice to pinpoint where he is in the bathroom.
“He’s two metres to the right of the door,” Karl Mann explains. “He’s bleeding heavily from the shoulder and he’s sitting on the floor … but the window is open and it’s possible that he wants to get out that way.”
They make their way quickly over the brown floor paper, past a propped-up painter’s ladder, and crowd in behind Karl Mann. It’s got hotter here and the smoke is curling like a dark clay ball near the ceiling. It’s crackling and roaring, and it feels as if the floor is quivering beneath their feet.
“What kind of weapon does he have?” Joona asks.
“They could see only the pistol in the sink. Nothing else—”
“Ask about a backpack,” Joona snaps. “He always carries one—”
“I’m doing this,” hisses Karl Mann.
Karl Mann signals one of his men. They all glance quickly down, double checking their automatic rifles, and then follow him into the dressing area. Joona stifles a warning as they head inside. He fears their standard attack will not suffice against this killer. They’re like flies lured to a spider. One by one, they’ll get stuck in his net.
Joona feels smoke sting his eyes.
A spider makes a net from two kinds of threads, he thinks. The sticky ones to catch her prey and the threads she makes for herself.
She remembers the pattern and can therefore jump past her own trap without getting caught.
Joona joins the military police, who have already taken shelter outside the bathroom door. One of them, with blond hair sticking out under the edge of his helmet, pulls the safety pin from a shock grenade. He opens the door slightly to throw the grenade across the tiled floor and closes the door again quickly. A deadened bang is heard and then the other men open the door with weapons drawn. Karl Mann makes a hurry-up gesture with his hand. Without a moment of hesitation, the blond policeman rushes in with his automatic rifle lifted with the piston on his shoulder. Joona’s heart pounds in worry. Then he hears the blond policeman’s frightened shout, almost childlike in its panic. Only a second later, there’s a massive explosion. The bodies of the men are flung back from the door with smoke and debris flying around them. The door is blown off its hinges. A policeman drops his weapon and slips aside, falling to one knee. The pressure wave forces Joona backwards. The blond policeman is on his back on the floor. His mouth is open and a pool of blood can be seen welling between his teeth. He’s unconscious. A large splinter sticks up from his thigh. Bright red blood is pumping out in splashing drops. Joona rushes forward and pulls the policeman over and turns the man’s face to one side. He makes a hurried field tourniquet with the man’s belt and a ripped-off sleeve. He ignores the warmth of blood on his hands.
One of the men is crying with a frightened, quivering sound.
Civilians are being led out. Two policemen help a grey-haired man through the hallway. The man’s face is sooty and he can hardly walk. A woman has wrapped her sweater around her mouth and she’s hurrying through the hallway with wide-open eyes.
Holding his pistol out, Karl Mann walks into the bathroom, crunching on splintered glass from the mirrors. He finds the hit man lying on the floor. The man is still alive. His legs jerk and his arms thrash wildly. His chin and most of his face has been blown off. Karl Mann surveys the scene and calculates what might have happened. He thinks the man had intended a trap using his own grenade but had been jarred by the shock grenade. He had dropped his own instead.
“We’ll evacuate everyone else,” Karl Mann says and leaves the bathroom.
Joona wipes blood from his hands. He calls the centre of operations and directs them to send medical aid to the bathroom. As he speaks, he sees Penelope hurrying towards him from the stairwell with Saga right behind. Penelope’s eyes are ringed in black fatigue. Saga is murmuring soothing words and tries to lead her away, but Penelope jerks free.
“Where is he?” Penelope asks with a haunted voice. “I have to look at him!”
“It’s dangerous for you here,” Joona says. “The fire could get here in just seconds.”
Penelope pushes past Joona and steps across the littered floor of the men’s bathroom. Staring around, she sees the man on the floor still flailing about with the chewed-up remains of a face. She whimpers and rushes back out to lean for support against the wall. A framed letter from former chancellor Willy Brandt slides to the floor and the glass cracks, but the letter rests upright against the wall.
Penelope’s stomach lurches. She swallows and feels Saga trying to put her arms around her to move her back towards the stairs.
“That’s not him!” Penelope whimpers.
“We have to get out,” Saga says urgently, and leads her away.
Medical personnel have come running in. They load the blond soldier onto a stretcher. A new heat explosion can be
heard. Glass shards and wooden splinters are in the air. A man stumbles along the hallway, slips, and gets back up. Smoke pours from an open door. A huge man stands silently in the hallway with blood running from his nose and over his shirt and tie. The military police herd everyone towards the emergency exits, shouting at them to move quickly. Flames suddenly shoot out from an open office door. The protecting paper on the floor catches fire and twists around as it burns. Two people are running hand in hand. A woman’s summer dress has caught fire. She’s screaming. An officer covers her with foam from his extinguisher.
Joona is choking from the smoke but doggedly returns to witness the devastation from the hand grenade. The hit man lies absolutely still now. Someone has wrapped his face with temporary bandages and gauze. Through the bullet wound in his forearm, dark red blood trickles down the sleeve of his jacket. A first-aid kit once attached to the wall is now on the floor and bandages have fallen out and are scattered with the dust onto the white tiles. The walls are blackened and most of the tiles have been blown loose. A toilet stall is demolished. Water pours across the floor from a broken pipe.
In the sink, there is a Heckler & Koch pistol with seven magazines of ammunition. Behind the door of another stall lies the black shape of a rough nylon backpack. It looks flattened and empty.
Yells, frightened voices, and barked orders come from the hallway outside. Karl Mann leads medical personnel in.
“I want a guard over him,” Joona says, gesturing towards the hit man as the men lift him onto a stretcher and strap him down.
“He’ll probably be dead before he gets to the hospital,” Karl Mann says, coughing up smoke against his hand.
“Even so, I want your word he’ll be guarded as long as he’s on embassy property.”
Karl Mann squints at Joona and then designates one of his men to take responsibility for the prisoner until they hand him over to the Swedish police.
Heavy black smoke now belches through the hallway with the sounds of loud roars and crackling coming nearer. Everyone is racing to get outside. Karl Mann squats below the layer of smoke and says shortly, “Someone from this floor is still missing.”
