Victim Without a Face

by Stefan Ahnhem

  He crossed Roskildegatan and was delighted to discover that the Kafferepet bakery was still there. Not much had changed in this neighbourhood. It was a different story closer to the Sound. What had once been the city’s backside — an industrial area full of railroad tracks, shabby warehouses, and rusty silos — had been transformed into a charming marina with boardwalks, restaurants, and cafés during his years in exile.

  There was a camera on the entry intercom for Lina’s apartment. Fabian tried to look casual. The door clicked open, allowing him to enter. Her apartment door was open, and the scent of freshly brewed coffee wafted into the stairwell. He said hello, but didn’t get a response, so he stepped onto the plastic that protected the floor in the hallway, closed the door behind him, and walked further along the crinkly plastic path to a large, unfurnished living room with an open kitchen.

  A coffeemaker in the kitchen was sputtering out black poison, and the balcony door was wide open. Fabian walked out and looked across the Sound, busy with traffic, thinking that you couldn’t live close enough to boats and the water. Cars were a completely different matter. He wondered what this apartment must have cost and decided that the view would have gone for over a million kronor.

  “Ah, there you are.”

  Fabian turned around a bit too quickly.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Did I scare you?” Lina put down a tray full of cups and a full coffee pot. Fabian took out the coffee bread he’d brought and laid it on its bag.

  “Mmm... from Kafferepet?”

  Fabian nodded. “What a fantastic view.”

  “Thanks. I’ve wanted to move here ever since they built up the area. But Jörgen refused to leave Ödåkra. Over my dead body, he used to say.” She poured the coffee. “Milk?”

  “Yes, please.” Fabian took a sip, thinking it was unusually good for being drip. “Lina, how are you, really?”

  She sat down, her eyes wandering out across the Sound. “To be perfectly honest, it’s been a long time since I’ve felt this good.”

  “You know the killer is still at large, and that there are a number of reasons to believe that he —”

  “Yes, but I was never one of the bullies. I never stood there egging them on like Pavlan, and I didn’t watch like Camilla.”

  “But Lina, we no longer believe that his motive is —”

  “Fabbe,” Lina interrupted, turning to Fabian. “Jörgen’s death was the best thing that could have happened to me — not that I wanted him to suffer the way he must have, but he’s out of my life at the end of the day. You can’t imagine the hell I’ve been through. It’s like I can breathe for the first time since I don’t know when. I’ve been walking around in fear for so long that I just can’t handle it anymore. Do you know what I mean? I can’t keep being scared.”

  “Why didn’t you leave him?”

  Lina laughed. “Jörgen Pålsson isn’t the kind of guy you just leave.” She shook her head as if it were someone else’s story she was telling rather than her own. “You needed my help, I believe.”

  Fabian took out the yearbook and his photo album. “I think I know who the killer is.”

  She looked him in the eye, her expression revealing that this was the last thing she’d expected to hear. He opened to their ninth-grade class photo and pointed at Claes’s hair.

  “Can you see how someone else is standing here behind Claes?”

  Lina took the yearbook and looked more closely. “Oh yeah... God, who is it?”

  Fabian shrugged. “I was hoping you could help me. I don’t suppose you happen to have a yearbook? Preferably one from before ninth grade?”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t have any of that stuff. Jörgen burned it all.”

  “Burned it?”

  Lina nodded. “It was a long time ago, sometime in the early nineties. He and Glenn were gone all night, into the early morning. I remember it clearly because Anki called to ask if I knew where they were. I had no idea, as usual, but they must have been up to some kind of shit, because once he came home I heard him drinking and ripping things off the bookshelf. I’d already gone to bed and I didn’t dare get up, because it was never a good idea when he was in that sort of mood. The next morning I saw that he had burned everything from school: pictures, report cards, exercise books, and yearbooks. Everything was gone, turned to ashes in the grill.”

  “Do you know why?”

  Lina shook her head. “I never dared to ask.” She returned to the yearbook. “So he’s been there all along.”

  “If it makes you feel better, I didn’t see him until late last night, and I don’t think anyone else in our class has either. Apparently the people who put the yearbook together didn’t even notice him. Everyone is listed but him. See for yourself.”

  “I believe you. And you’re sure it’s him?”

  Fabian nodded. “All I need is a name, and that’s where you come in.”

  “I don’t understand how I can help you. I had no idea there was an extra person in our class. Are you absolutely sure?” She picked up her coffee cup and tried to take a sip despite her shaking hands.

  “Lina, his locker was the one to the right of yours.”

  “What? How —”

  “We know which locker was his. Look at this photo.” He opened the album and pointed at the photo of Lina with her back to the camera; she was putting books in her locker. Lina looked at the picture and then at the other photos on the page: they were all photos of Lina taken from various angles, more or less aware that she was being photographed.

  “Did you take all of these?”

  Fabian nodded. “Just so you know, you’re the first and hopefully last person I’ve shown them to.”

  She met his gaze. “I don’t know what to say. Fabian, I’m sorry.”

  “You don’t need to be sorry. There was a time when I would have done everything for you. But that was then. Now I’m happily married, and I don’t have any —”

  “That’s not what I meant,” Lina interrupted him. “I just have no idea whose locker was beside mine. It was someone I obviously never spoke to. Was he really in our class?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry, but I have absolutely no recollection of him.”

  “Are you sure? Are you absolutely sure?”

  Lina nodded her head. Fabian felt the energy draining from his body. Maybe he hadn’t been expecting Lina to rattle off the name as soon as he crossed her doorstep, but he had hoped that her memory would be sparked in some way and, in the best-case scenario, that she would have the name on the tip of her tongue. But instead nothing had happened. Lina’s memory was just as empty as his own.

  “Is it okay if I take a look?”

  Fabian let Lina page through to another group of yellowed photos of herself. “I’ll never forget that moment.” She pointed at a picture where she was about to hit a tennis ball with a flat brännboll bat. Jörgen was standing next to her, holding out a round bat.

  “What?”

  “Don’t you remember? Jörgen would get so pissed off. He always wanted me to use the round bat, but I could only ever hit the ball with the flat one. I got a fantastic hit right after this photo was taken. It went so ridiculously far. Don’t ask me how, but everyone made it home and I even managed a double round.”

  “Of course,” Fabian said, although he couldn’t remember the event at all.

  Lina looked at another photo, where she was sitting at a school desk, looking bored. “Oh yes, those German classes. God, I hated those more than anything else. Aus außer bei mit... what was it?”

  “Nach seit von zu.”

  “Right. German sure was your specialty.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. It was more —”

  “Don’t even. I remember how you sat at the very front, always raising your hand and showing off.”

  “I wasn’t showing off. I was just interested. I actually thought it was fun.”

  “German? Fun? You’re kidding.”

  “Nein, ich schämten nicht! Für mi
ch war Deutsch immer viel spaß! Immer! Immer!”

  Lina burst into laughter. ”What was his name again?”

  “Whose name?”

  “Our German teacher!”

  “Helmut something, wasn’t it?”

  “That’s right, Helmut... Krull...?”

  “No, wait... Kroppen... Kroppenheim. That’s it! Helmut Kroppenheim!” Fabian felt like he’d just won a lengthy game of Trivial Pursuit.

  But Lina didn’t give him any applause or hurrahs. Instead, she was looking out at the Sound. “That’s right...”

  “What?”

  “It was so crowded around our lockers. Don’t you remember?”

  Fabian nodded. He could easily recall how crowded it was, and how you often had to wait your turn to reach your locker. But he didn’t want to verbally agree; he knew what was about to happen, and he didn’t want to risk disrupting her concentration for anything in the world. It was the very reason he’d come to see her.

  “I accidentally backed into him a few times because I didn’t even know he was there. And then I would do the very same thing again after the next class. God, it’s really awful when you think about it.” She shook her head and kept staring out into the distance.

  The silence didn’t last for more than a few minutes, but it felt like an eternity to Fabian. He started rummaging through his thoughts, trying to find something to say that might get her talking again.

  “Oh, that’s right... didn’t he always sit with Claes?” she said suddenly, turning to Fabian. “After all, no one else wanted to sit with him.”

  Fabian nodded, although all he could remember was that Claes usually sat as close to the teacher’s desk as possible. He had no idea who’d sat beside him. But Lina was right. It couldn’t be anyone but him.

  “Wait, I’ve got it. Torgny... wasn’t that his name?” she continued, looking at Fabian. “Torgny Sölmedal.”

  Fabian repeated the name to himself and realized that this wasn’t the first time his name had popped up in the investigation.

  81

  KLIPPAN DOLED OUT THE generic-looking hamburgers, fries, and Cokes to Lilja and Tuvesson, who were sitting in silence, trying to interpret the various hmms from his phone call. They were alone in the seating area outside the grill on Rundgången, a stone’s throw from the police station. Klippan had insisted on sitting outdoors: after what had happened with the camera at Söderåsen, he didn’t want to take any chances that the perpetrator might be listening.

  “Great. I’ll call if that happens.” Klippan stuck his phone in his shirt pocket and took a very large bite of his burger. Tuvesson and Lilja waited patiently for him to chew and swallow, only to watch as he took another bite.

  “I don’t suppose you were planning on telling us what was said,” Tuvesson said.

  Klippan pointed at his hard-working mouth. “Sorry, but I’m awfully hungry. Camilla’s kids are with their father.”

  “Oh, thank God.”

  “So far so good. The problem is, he’s not the one who picked them up from preschool,” Klippan said, devouring another bite of the hamburger.

  Tuvesson and Lilja had no choice but to wait for him to finish. “Let me get this straight: the kids are with Björne Hiertz, but he’s not the one who picked them up, even though that’s what the preschool says happened?” Lilja asked.

  Klippan bowed his head in agreement and started speaking, even though he wasn’t done chewing. “Since their dad doesn’t have custody of the children, I’m guessing he’s probably never been to the preschool, or at the most maybe been there once, which made it pretty simple for the perpetrator to pass himself off as their father. Remind me to send the preschool director a picture of Björne tomorrow.”

  Tuvesson and Lilja exchanged glances. “How did the kids get to their father?”

  “That’s the peculiar thing.” Klippan filled his mouth with fries. “Our guy dropped them off at his house.”

  “What? The killer was there?”

  Klippan nodded. “Apparently there was quite a bit of confusion, initially. Obviously Björne had no idea the kids were coming.”

  “How did the killer explain the situation?”

  “He told Björne about the accident on the E6 and identified himself as a father with kids at the same preschool, which was why he was dropping his children off.”

  “I don’t understand why he would have devoted so much time to picking up and dropping off the victim’s kids,” Tuvesson said.

  “Or why their mom was on her way north on the E6 instead of heading for the preschool,” Lilja added.

  “She did go to the preschool, but the kids weren’t there. The staff told her what they told us — their dad had already been by to pick them up,” Klippan said. “Which means the killer probably knew she would drive to Strövelstorp to get them.”

  “So he tailed her from the preschool,” Lilja said.

  “It still doesn’t explain how he managed to burn her eyes,” said Tuvesson. They stopped speaking and went back to their food, which had grown cold and even more tasteless, if that was possible. Tuvesson gave up with half her burger left and pushed her paper plate away. “But I think we should put the cause of death on the back burner for the time being and focus on catching the killer. How many of the classmates have we contacted so far?”

  “I’ve gotten a hold of eight,” Klippan said.

  “Four for me,” said Lilja.

  “So we’ve been in touch with all but one of them.”

  “Yes, assuming we’re not including Risk.”

  “We’re not. Who haven’t we managed to get a hold of?”

  “Seth Kårheden,” said Lilja.

  “Right — the pilgrimage guy,” Klippan said. “Isn’t he supposed to land at Kastrup tonight?”

  Lilja nodded and drank the last of her Coke.

  “And so far nobody remembers any extra members of their class?” Tuvesson asked.

  Klippan shook his head.

  “Stefan Munthe and Annika Nilsson said they had a vague memory of someone else,” Lilja said.

  “Why are you just telling us this now? Do we have a name?”

  “Unfortunately we don’t.”

  Tuvesson sighed. She had lost her appetite for examining each clue from all angles, reasoning through every possibility, and trying to see connections that everyone else had missed, that might not even exist. It was all to catch a killer that no one could remember, but soon would never be able to forget.

  “Astrid, we can’t just give up,” Klippan said.

  “Of course we’re not going to quit. Who said anything about giving up?” She saw Lilja and Klippan exchanging glances out of the corner of her eye. “But how do we move forward?”

  “If I may, I believe we are obligated to provide some form of protection for the remaining members of the class. They are clearly in danger, and it would be irresponsible not to look after them,” Klippan said.

  “How many of them are abroad right now?” Tuvesson asked.

  “Four of mine, but two are coming back tomorrow,” responded Klippan.

  “Just the pilgrim is away from my bunch but he’ll be returning soon,” Lilja said.

  “Are any of them vacationing in Sweden?”

  “No, but Christine Vingåker is renting a house with her family up in Lysekil.”

  “So we’re down to eleven members of the class. Have any of them moved more than four hundred kilometres away from Skåne?”

  “Lotta Ting lives in Oslo,” said Lilja.

  Klippan shook his head. “None from my group.”

  “Ten left. We’ll need twenty men in place around the clock. If we count shifts, we’re up to at least fifty officers,” Tuvesson said. “How many people do you think we can scrape together from our office? Five officers? You can see the problem for yourselves.”

  “What about Malmö?” Klippan said. “Haven’t you spoken with them yet?”

  “Yes, but they can only spare ten, which is more than I’d expected. T
hey’ll be here on Monday.”

  Klippan released a long sigh. “We can’t let him continue to pick people off one by one. He will keep going, and right now... dammit, right now they’re sitting ducks.”

  Tuvesson could only concur.

  “What if we gather everyone up?” Lilja said. “Collect the class members and put them all in one place. Then our five guys would be enough to protect them, don’t you think?”

  Klippan nodded. Tuvesson shrugged.

  “What sort of place do you have in mind?”

  “I’m not sure. What about getting some hotel rooms? It could be someone’s house... or anywhere really?”

  “I’ve got it!” Klippan said. Both Tuvesson and Lilja turned to look at him. He looked like he’d just hit the triple word score with both Z and Q. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of it sooner. The only question is whether we can convince them all to go along with it.”

  “Where, Klippan?” Tuvesson asked, but it was too late. He’d already taken a very large bite of her hamburger.

  82

  FABIAN RISK LOCKED HIS car and hurried across the street; his heart was pounding much faster than usual. He felt like he was finally starting to see light at the end of the tunnel. Lina Pålsson had remembered the perpetrator’s name, just as he’d hoped. He had discovered the killer’s name and how he wanted to pass the information on to his colleagues so they could do the rest. With a name like Torgny Sölmedal, the man’s address shouldn’t be hard to find.

  It was already past nine when he unlocked the door to the house at Pålsjögatan 17. It was quiet, with no Marilyn Manson to greet him. Did he dare hope that Theodor had finally grown tired of sitting alone in his room, destroying his ears? Or had that neighbour lady come over to complain?

  The kitchen looked just as he’d left it earlier that evening, which meant that Theodor probably hadn’t eaten in several hours. He was most likely caught up in Call of Duty and hadn’t had time to notice how hungry he was. Fabian didn’t understand how computer games contributed to teens’ weight gain; in his experience it was the other way around. He yelled that he was home, but didn’t receive an answer, so he took out his phone and sent a text: Hi Theo, I’m home now. Where are you? I was thinking we could go have a nice dinner at Pålsjö Krog in about half an hour. Dad.