The Golden Calf

by Helene Tursten

  Our reporter had a tip that the princess of ph.com, Sanna Kaegler, twenty-nine, vacationed in Albufiera with her baby son and an unknown man. Since we know she married the Swedish restaurant mogul, Kjell B:son Ceder, fifty-three, less than a year ago, we expected to find her with her husband. But when her husband showed up at a nightclub with French actress Birgitte Defoe, thirty, our reporter realized there was more to the story. And it’s true. Sanna Kaegler has a new man in her life—though we haven’t yet identified him. Still, it’s obvious that a divorce is in the works, and we’ll soon find out the name of this new lover. They seem to be made for each other. He’s holding Sanna’s new baby boy as if it were his own—what a charming family!

  The picture was in perfect focus, and it was easy to see that the man Sanna was kissing was Edward Fenton.

  “The vacation in Portugal. Sanna told us about it yesterday,” Tommy said.

  “This photo appeared in a big US tabloid just over three weeks ago,” Hazel said. “Janice Santini got wind of it, I’m sure.”

  “This was right after Edward left his family behind in the States to come back to England,” Tommy said.

  “Exactly. A week later, this appeared, and Edward Fenton was identified.”

  Lee Hazel took another clipping from her red folder. The headline was LOVE AFFAIR BETWEEN HIGH TECH PRINCESS AND BANK KING! The article stated that neither person in the article could be reached for comment. Sanna had refused all contact with the media after Kjell B:son Ceder had been murdered, so she might not have known she’d shown up in the tabloids. But Edward must have.

  “He was hiding in Paris. Irene and I found him when we were searching the Bergman-Rothstaahl apartment there,” Kajsa said, gesturing at her multicolored eye socket.

  Hazel raised an eyebrow. “So that’s how you got that black eye. Yes, right, Irene told me about that yesterday. Edward was being chased by both the paparazzi and the Mafia. Janice had certainly set her father on him. And the Mafia found him first.”

  “So this explains why Edward Fenton was murdered, but what about the others? Ceder, Bergman, and Rothstaahl couldn’t have been killed for the same reason,” Fredrick pointed out.

  Hazel nodded and smiled at Fredrik. He blushed instantly.

  “The affair with Sanna Kaegler was not why Edward Fenton was killed. It was only the reason he lost immunity in the family; Janice had lifted her protecting hand from him. He’d felt pressure from the Mafia for years, and that’s where the murders of the three men come in, as well as the attempted murder of Sanna Kaegler.”

  “The band is slut!” Andersson said, not realizing he’d used a Swedish word with an entirely different meaning in English. He’d meant to say that the tape recorder had come to the end of its band. Andersson hadn’t understood much of what Agent Hazel was saying, but, to his great consternation, it appeared that his subordinates did. His newfound confidence in his English ability was shaken to the core. Once everyone else was gone, he’d have to ask Irene to repeat everything for him in Swedish. Naturally, he’d use the excuse that they needed to recap to make sure nothing was missed.

  Lee Hazel waited patiently for Andersson to flip the tape over. Once the red light of the record button had come on again, she resumed her report.

  “All of this began with the murder of Thomas Bonetti. In November 2000, the FBI received information that a cousin of Leonardo Bonetti had disappeared in Sweden. Thomas Bonetti’s family had turned to Leonardo to see if he could help them find their missing son. His parents already feared that their son had been killed. We connected the name pretty quickly with the same Thomas Bonetti who’d been featured in financial magazines during the heyday of ph.com and then its later crash.”

  Agent Hazel stopped for a second and found a disc in her red folder. She held it up in front of her audience and tapped it with a silver fingernail.

  “Let me change the subject for a moment. As you know, I was in London. This was retrieved from among Edward Fenton’s belongings. He had a smaller house on the estate, which he used as an office, with a safe behind a bookcase. There, in the safe, were a number of computer discs neatly sorted into boxes by the letters Bo, Be, C, and R. That is, Bonetti, Bergman, Ceder, and Rothstaahl. I’ve gone through them and have gotten a good idea of what went on. It makes you wonder why he didn’t destroy them, but he probably didn’t have the time. Or perhaps he thought he could use them to protect himself from the Mafia.”

  She set the disc on the table, and then she took another folder from the pile of documents. She said, thoughtfully, “Perhaps Poundfix is where everything started. As you know, Thomas Bonetti, Joachim Rothstaahl, and Erik Dahl, the Norwegian, had created a company where they could invest capital, mostly from Scandinavian companies, in an investment fund. Unfortunately it was just a huge pyramid scheme where they paid wonderful returns to initial investors from money they got from the later ones. Finally, the bubble burst. Thomas Bonetti and Joachim Rothstaahl escaped the net because they were Swedish citizens, while Erik Dahl went to jail.” Lee Hazel paused again. “But not only Scandinavian companies invested in Poundfix. Edward Fenton had put in one million dollars on behalf of an anonymous investor—illegal funds from the Santini family. Bonetti and Rothstaahl managed to steal most of this before the scheme was exposed. They used it to form ph.com.”

  Hazel let this information sink in for a minute before she continued. “It is obvious by Rothstaahl’s financial records that he was being blackmailed right from the start. You can say he got away with his life but not his money. They weren’t leaning on Thomas Bonetti, though. Perhaps because he was a Bonetti. The fact remains that Thomas Bonetti invested his entire share into ph.com. Those days it actually seemed smart to get into the rapidly expanding high-tech sector. Everybody was jumping onto the bandwagon. Even Edward Fenton realized that HP Johnson, and, indirectly, the Mafia, was ready to hop on board before the money train reached the end of the station. Edward saw to it that the Mafia invested over fifteen million dollars into ph.com.”

  “The last round—the anonymous investor! That’s where the ‘unknown person’ came into the picture!” Kajsa exclaimed.

  “Exactly.” Lee Hazel nodded. “We know what happened to ph.com. Every penny was lost; Sergio Santini was one of the biggest losers. Fenton was dealt two blows: his bank lost a great deal of money and prestige, and his Mafia family lost fifteen million dollars. Fairly quickly everyone suspected that the three founders had squirreled away a good amount. Thomas Bonetti had gotten the most because he’d already begun shifting money into his own accounts long before the crash. It was also thought that Bonetti, Sanna Kaegler, Philip Bergman, and Joachim Rothstaahl were involved in kickback schemes—for instance, Joachim Rothstaahl ‘consulted’ for the company while also being on the payroll. Of course, his salary was already astronomical as vice president and comptroller for the company. He also made sure, through his ‘consulting’ firm, that the three partners raked in a lot for their fictitious services.”

  Hazel fell silent to give her Swedish colleagues a chance to catch up. Everyone seemed to follow her words except for the heavy-set superintendent, who had a brooding look on his round face.

  “You can’t cheat the Mafia out of anything,” Hazel said. “Money from prostitution, drugs, and extortion—they bought it with sweat, blood, and lives long before it wound up in a banker’s hands. Sergio Santini decided it was time for payback.”

  Even Superintendent Andersson seemed to understand her last three words.

  Chapter 25

  AT THIS POINT, Special Agent Hazel requested a coffee break. She needed to catch her breath and give her Swedish colleagues time to digest all the information and maybe come up with a few questions. Once they all regrouped in the conference room, Irene raised her hand first.

  “It’s obvious from what you said that all the murders are related. It’s also clear that the attempt on Sanna Kaegler-Ceder was part of this, too. They’d all swindled the Mafia out of a great deal of money. But how
about Kjell B:son Ceder? He was not involved in ph.com. His marriage to Sanna Kaegler was arranged by Edward Fenton—so why was he killed?”

  Special Agent Lee Hazel tapped the disc again. “Thanks to this, we know the answer. When Mr. Ceder started to build his enormous hotel, the cost was estimated to be five hundred million Swedish kroner. In the end, it cost much more than that. No Swedish bank wanted to loan him more money or invest in the project except for his old friend Edward Fenton. Fenton invested ten million dollars. From an anonymous investor, of course. Six years ago, the FBI was already tracking some of this money. Two hundred million dollars was invested in various European hotels. We noticed this one immediately since, despite how lovely it is, Göteborg can’t be seen as one of the world’s most impressive cities. We may never know why Edward decided to send Mr. Ceder money, but he probably did it out of friendship. Edward Fenton learned to regret letting old loyalties determine his investment. The Hotel Göteborg lost money right from the start. Mr. Ceder was sometimes behind on paying back his creditors, but once you’re caught in the tentacles of the Octopus, it never lets go. So his good friend, Edward Fenton, was able to request a few favors in return. For instance, the marriage to Sanna Kaegler. Employing Michael Fuller. And speaking of Michael Fuller, I received confirmation from my colleague, Jack Curtis, that Michael Fuller was really Michael Falcone, a relative of Sergio Santini—his cousin’s son. Falcone was the Mafia contact man on behalf of the Santini family. Now we know who placed him here and why.”

  Irene was beginning to feel rather dizzy from all the names and new information, but she knew she had to concentrate on Hazel’s report. She saw all the remaining puzzle pieces sliding into place.

  “Edward Fenton made sure Michael Falcone got a job at the Hotel Göteborg. The Santini family was leaning hard on Edward. They could handle the loss of the money from the Poundfix blunder, but ten million in the Hotel Göteborg project and fifteen million in ph.com was just too much. Twenty-five million is not small change. They’d invested money so it could grow, but instead, it all went up in smoke.”

  At the time, the American dollar was around nine kroner to one, which meant that more than 220 million Swedish kroner had disappeared. No wonder the Mafia was mad! Irene thought.

  “Cosa Nostra does not like to lose even a single dollar. The Mafia ordered Edward to get the money back. Edward was desperate for fast cash. He took off the gloves. Thomas Bonetti had taken the largest amount of cash, so Fenton went after him first. Edward and Mike Falcone did the job. As you know, he was tortured before he was killed. All the money had vanished from his bank accounts, so they tortured the account numbers from him. These discs show us that the total amount from him was two and a half million dollars. Selling Bonetti’s boat gave them a few more bucks. His father-in-law was happy, so Edward kept it up. Mike Falcone probably suggested that they send the fingers to the others. It certainly has the whiff of Mafia tactics. The fingers, in the end, had two purposes, first to torture information out of Bonetti and then to threaten the other four. The message was clear: if you don’t pay up, your fingers are next.”

  Again, she paused for a sip of water.

  No one asked a question, so she continued, “The death threat was enough for Bergman, Rothstaahl, and Kaegler to start paying at once. They continued to pay up right until their deaths. Their estates are now worth nothing. Easy come, easy go.” She waved elegant hands.

  “But why were they killed? They’d actually paid back everything they had,” Kajsa said.

  “The murder of Thomas Bonetti was beginning to catch up to them. The Bonetti family had gotten a whiff of the fact that the Santinis were involved in Bonetti’s death. Any proof of that would be catastrophic. Suddenly, the fingers seemed like a bad idea. Edward wanted to get all the fingers and all the threatening letters back. He knew who’d gotten them. They would be physical evidence of blackmail, and if the Bonetti family got wind of blackmail, they’d know that Thomas had also been extorted. They knew his accounts had been stripped after his disappearance. Where did all his money go? To the Santini family, of course. A Mafia war might break out. Edward knew he’d never survive being caught in the middle, so he and Michael Falcone decided to eliminate all four people who knew anything about the letters and the fingers.”

  Irene decided to speak up. “This explains why Rothstaahl and Bergman came to Göteborg from Paris. Edward got them there by demanding they attend an important meeting. Perhaps he enticed them with an offer to invest in their new EuroFund. Falcone was waiting for them at Rothstaahl’s summer house. The same thing happened to Kjell B:son Ceder. He never suspected that Edward would lure him to that meeting in Askim just so Michael Falcone could kill him. Edward had an alibi—he was still in the United States. He pretended to be a go-between and conned all four of them out of their money, which then went directly to his father-in-law Sergio Santini.”

  Hazel nodded. “Exactly. Falcone sent Rothstaahl’s key to Edward. So Edward didn’t need to break in. The apartment key was found in his rental car, where he was found, too. Falcone, after killing his victims, sent all the discs and computers he found to Edward. Edward had gone to Paris to look for more, which was when Irene and Kajsa stumbled upon him.” Hazel pointed at her own eye while looking at Kajsa, and they both grinned. “My theory behind the attempted murder of Sanna Kaegler is this,” she continued. “Edward sent his cell phone to Michael Falcone and told him how to lure Sanna out of the house. Only Edward knew the proper code. If you hadn’t been there, Sanna would have been killed, and Michael Falcone would have gotten away. We might never have cracked the case. Now, at least, you have Falcone in custody.”

  “Is he going to talk?” asked Fredrik.

  “He might confess to the attempted murder of Sanna Kaegler, but probably nothing else. Perhaps you can convict him for the other murders on the evidence you’ve gathered, but he will never confess to them. Attempted murder, yes. Premeditated murder, no.”

  “Why anything at all?” Kajsa wondered.

  “Because he needs to chill for a while. A short stint in a Swedish prison doesn’t look half bad to him. In fact, being in an American prison would be life-threatening. The Bonetti family would be waiting. And I’d guess that the Santini family hasn’t much use for him, either. He was a hit man working for Edward Fenton, outside the family, and that’s not something they appreciate.”

  Hazel looked down at her paperwork thoughtfully. She tapped the top folder with her glittering fingernail.

  “Edward Fenton did his best to survive the Bonetti murder in one piece. He might have done it, too, if he hadn’t had the affair with Sanna Kaegler. In hindsight, that was probably the last nail in his coffin.”

  FREDRIK WAS GIVEN the task of driving Hazel to the airport. She would be able to catch the last plane to London with plenty of time to spare. Irene was by her office window on the fourth floor and saw Fredrik and Hazel walking to his car. They were exactly the same height. Her long black hair flowed down her back, contrasting with Fredrik’s blond tufts. They made a beautiful couple. She watched them until they’d gotten into the car and Fredrik began to back the car out of its spot in the lot.

  Sighing, Irene returned to her desk and sat down in front of the computer. She hadn’t had the chance to check her email for two days. The last message in her inbox was from Glen. It had been sent earlier that day. At the end, he wrote:

  Isn’t Lee Hazel something else? You should have seen her at work here when she was going through all those discs at superhuman speed. She must have a computer between her ears. Maybe she’s a Terminator? At any rate, she’s much better looking than Arnold Schwarzenegger. Still, it’s easy to see why she doesn’t work in the field. She is much too noticeable!

  Say hi to the family,

  Glen

  Epilogue

  ON THE FIRST Monday morning of November, Irene’s desk phone rang. After she answered, there was only silence on the other end. She was about to hang up when she heard someone clearin
g his throat.

  “Hello. Good morning. It’s Billy—Billy Hermansson. I just wanted to talk to you and let you know that my mother passed away on Saturday. I was thinking about … your investigation. That is, she can’t be your witness any longer about what she saw through her telescope. And … I thought of calling you because I couldn’t think of anyone else who would even care.”

  “I’m very sorry for your loss,” Irene said. She was touched that Billy had thought to contact her. He was probably right, too. No one else cared whether or not Annika Hermansson had died. Irene thought a long few moments about what she knew. She decided to go right to the point.

  “Billy … I know who your father is. Do you think you’d ever want to come down to the station and talk about it?”

  There was silence on the other end of the line for a long time.

  “No,” he said slowly. “I don’t think I want to know. At least, not yet. Maybe later. It’s too much to deal with now, with Mamma’s death and all.…”

  “I understand. I’ll get back to you,” Irene said.

  Once they’d hung up, Irene sat silently at her desk for a long time, until she decided what to do. She took out the business card from the pile of things in her desk drawer, where it had lain for weeks. She stuffed it into a small white envelope. She carefully sealed the envelope with a piece of wide tape. Then she wrote a message on her computer:

  Dear Billy,

  In this sealed envelope is a business card, which belongs to your father. If you don’t care to deal with it now, I suggest you put this envelope in a safety deposit box. You can get it when you feel ready to know. Otherwise, you could always burn it unopened.

  If you decide to contact your father, do not tell him how you got this. Instead, tell him that Annika told you when she was delirious during her final illness.