Stalker

by Lars Kepler

  ‘Look at your own hands,’ he says, trying to keep his voice steady. ‘You’re looking at your own hands and you’re breathing slowly. With each breath you’re feeling calmer—’

  ‘I don’t want to,’ Björn whispers.

  Erik can feel that he’s forcing him, but he has to know the position Björn’s wife was sitting in when he found her.

  ‘Before I wake you up, we need to go deeper,’ he says, swallowing hard. ‘Beneath the house that you’re in is another house, identical to the other one … but down there is the only place you can see Susanna clearly. Three, two, one, and now you’re there … She’s sitting on the floor in the pool of blood, and you can look at her without feeling frightened.’

  ‘Her face is almost gone, it’s just blood,’ Björn says sluggishly. ‘And her hand is stuck to her ear …’

  ‘Keep going,’ Erik says, glancing at the door again.

  ‘Her hand is tangled up in … in the cord of her kimono.’

  ‘Björn, I’m going to bring you up now … to the house above, and the only thing you know there is that Susanna is dead and that there was nothing you could have done to save her … That’s the only thing you’re going to take with you when I wake you up, you’re going to leave everything else behind.’

  16

  Erik closes his office door and goes over to his desk. He feels that his back is wet with sweat when he sits down.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ he whispers anxiously to himself.

  He moves the mouse to wake his computer up, then logs in. With his hand trembling he pulls open the top drawer, presses a Mogadon out of a blister-pack and swallows it without water.

  He quickly signs into the database of patients, and notices how cold his fingers are as he waits to be able to perform a search.

  He jumps when Superintendent Margot Silverman opens the door without knocking. She walks in and stops in front of him with her hands clasped round her stomach.

  ‘Björn Kern says he can’t remember what you talked about.’

  ‘That’s natural,’ Erik replies, minimising the document.

  ‘How did you get on with the hypnosis, then?’ she asks, running her hand over the wooden elephant from Malaysia.

  ‘He was definitely receptive …’

  ‘So you were able to hypnotise him?’ she smiles.

  ‘I’m afraid I forgot to start the camera,’ Erik lies. ‘Otherwise I could have shown you, he went into a trance almost instantly.’

  ‘You forgot to start the camera?’

  ‘You know that this wasn’t an official interview,’ he says, a touch impatiently. ‘This was a first step towards what we call affective stabilisation, so that—’

  ‘I don’t give a damn about that,’ she cuts him off.

  ‘So that you can have a functional witness later on,’ he concludes.

  ‘How much later? Will he be able to say anything later today?’

  ‘I think he’s going to realise what happened fairly quickly, but talking about it is another matter.’

  ‘So what happened? What did he say? He must have said something, surely?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  ‘No fucking oath of confidentiality bollocks now,’ she interrupts. ‘I have to know, otherwise people will die.’

  Erik goes over to the window and leans on the sill. Far below a patient is standing smoking, thin and bent-backed in his hospital gown.

  ‘I took him back,’ Erik says slowly. ‘Into the house … it was rather complicated, because it was very recent, and full of fragments of terrible memories.’

  ‘But he saw everything … could he see everything?’

  ‘It was only to make him understand that he couldn’t have saved her.’

  ‘But he saw the murder scene, and his wife? Did he?’

  ‘Yes, he did,’ Erik replies.

  ‘So what did he say?’

  ‘Not much … he talked about blood … and the wounds to her face.’

  ‘Was she in a particular position? A posture with sexual implications?’

  ‘He didn’t say.’

  ‘Was she sitting up or lying down? How did her mouth look, where were her hands? Was she naked? Violated?’

  ‘He said very little,’ Erik replies. ‘It can take a long time to reach details of that sort …’

  ‘I swear, if he doesn’t start talking I’ll take him into custody,’ she says in a loud voice. ‘I’ll drag him off to headquarters and watch him like a hawk until—’

  ‘Margot,’ Erik interrupts in a friendly voice.

  She looks at him with a subdued expression, nods and breathes through her mouth, then pulls out a business card and puts it down on his desk.

  ‘We don’t know who his next victim’s going to be. It could be your wife. Think about that,’ she says, and leaves the room.

  Erik feels his face relax. He walks slowly back to his desk. The floor is starting to feel soft beneath his feet. As he sits down in front of his computer there’s a knock on the door.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘That charming superintendent has left the building,’ Nelly says, peering round the door.

  ‘She’s only trying to do her job.’

  ‘I know, she doesn’t really seem too bad …’

  ‘Stop it,’ he says, but can’t help smiling.

  ‘No, but she was pretty funny,’ Nelly says and laughs.

  Erik rests his head on his hand and she turns serious and walks in, closes the door behind her and looks at him.

  ‘What is it?’ she asks. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he replies.

  ‘Tell me,’ she insists, sitting down on the corner of his desk.

  Her red woollen dress crackles with static electricity against her nylon tights as she crosses her legs.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Erik sighs.

  ‘What’s up with you?’ she laughs.

  Erik stands up, takes a deep breath and looks at her.

  ‘Nelly,’ he says, and she can hear how empty his voice sounds. ‘I need to ask you about a patient … Before you started working here, Nina Blom put together a team for a complicated research project.’

  ‘Go on,’ she says, looking at him with obvious curiosity.

  ‘I know I outlined my cases to you, but this may not have been included, I mean …’

  ‘What’s the patient’s name?’ she asks calmly.

  ‘Rocky Kyrklund – do you remember him?’

  ‘Yes, hang on,’ she says tentatively.

  ‘He was a priest.’

  ‘Exactly, I remember, you talked about him quite a lot,’ she says as she thinks. ‘You had a file of pictures from the crime scene, and—’

  ‘You don’t remember where he ended up?’ he interrupts.

  ‘That was years ago,’ she replies.

  ‘He’s still inside, though, isn’t he?’

  ‘We’d better hope so,’ she replied. ‘He’d killed people, after all, hadn’t he?’

  ‘A woman.’ Erik nods.

  ‘That’s right, now I remember. Her whole face was destroyed.’

  17

  Nelly stands behind Erik as he makes his way through the patient database on his computer. He types Rocky Kyrklund’s name, searches, and discovers that he was sent to Karsudden District Hospital.

  ‘Karsudden,’ he says quietly.

  She brushes a strand of blonde hair from her cheek and looks at him, her eyes narrowing.

  ‘Do you want to tell me why we’re talking about this patient?’

  ‘Rocky Kyrklund’s victim had been posed. You won’t remember, but she was lying on the floor with her face horribly disfigured, and her hand round her neck … I’ve just hypnotised Björn Kern, and … and he described details that were very reminiscent of the old murder.’

  ‘The one committed by the priest?’

  ‘I don’t know, but Björn Kern said his wife’s face had been completely destroyed … and that she was sitting with her hand over her ear.’


  ‘What do the police say?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Erik mutters.

  ‘I mean, you did tell that … lovely pregnant lady?’

  ‘I didn’t tell her anything.’ Erik says.

  ‘You didn’t?’ she asks, a sceptical smile playing at the corners of her mouth.

  ‘Because it emerged while he was under hypnosis, and—’

  ‘But he wanted to talk, didn’t he?’

  ‘I might have misheard,’ Erik says.

  ‘Misheard?’ she laughs.

  ‘It’s just so sick – I can’t think clearly any more.’

  ‘Erik, it probably isn’t important, but you have to tell the police, that’s why they’re here,’ Nelly says gently.

  He walks over to the window. The area where the patients stand and smoke is empty now. But he can still see the cigarette butts and sweet wrappers that have been tossed on the ground, and a blue shoe-cover that’s been pushed into the ashtray.

  ‘It’s a long time ago, but to me … Do you know what those weeks were like? I didn’t want Rocky to be released,’ Erik says slowly. ‘It was everything … the brutality, the eyes, the hands …’

  ‘I know I read all about it,’ Nelly says. ‘I don’t remember the details of your recommendation, but I know you said he was seriously bloody dangerous and that there was a severe risk of a relapse.’

  ‘What if he’s out? I’ve got to call Karsudden,’ Erik says, then picks up his phone, checks his computer, and dials the number for Simon Casillas, the senior consultant in charge.

  Nelly sits down on Erik’s sofa while he talks to the doctor, and smiles at him when he looks at her as he exchanges the usual pleasantries and when he ends the conversation by repeating that the consultant’s article in Swedish Psychiatry really was excellent.

  The sun passes behind a cloud and darkness falls across the room, as if a huge figure were standing in front of the building.

  ‘Rocky is still in Ward D:4,’ Erik says. ‘And he’s never been let out on parole.’

  ‘Does that feel better?’

  ‘No,’ he whispers.

  ‘Are you losing your grip?’ she asks, so seriously that he can’t help smiling.

  He sighs and puts his hands to his face, then slowly lowers them, feeling his fingertips press gently against his eyelids and down his cheeks before he looks at Nelly again.

  Her back is straight as she looks at him carefully. A tiny, sharp little wrinkle has appeared between her thin eyebrows.

  ‘OK, listen,’ Erik says. ‘I know this is completely wrong, but in one of the last conversations I had with Rocky, he claimed he had an alibi for the night of the murder, but I didn’t want him to be released simply because he’d bought himself a witness.’

  ‘What are you trying to say?’ she asks quietly.

  ‘I never passed that information on.’

  ‘No way,’ she says.

  ‘He could have been released—’

  ‘Bloody hell, you can’t do that!’ she interrupts.

  ‘I know, but he was guilty and he would have killed again.’

  ‘That’s not our business, we’re psychologists, we’re not detectives, and we aren’t judges …’

  She takes a few agitated steps, then stops and shakes her head.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ she gasps. ‘You’re mad, you’re completely—’

  ‘I can understand you being angry.’

  ‘Yes, I am angry. I mean, you know, if this gets out you’d lose your job.’

  ‘I know what I did was wrong, it’s tormented me ever since, but I’ve always been utterly convinced that I stopped a murderer.’

  ‘Shit,’ she mutters.

  He picks up the business card from his desk and begins to dial the superintendent’s number.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she asks.

  ‘I need to tell her about Rocky’s alibi, and the whole business about the hand and the ear, and—’

  ‘Go ahead,’ she interrupts. ‘But what if you were right, what if his alibi wasn’t real? Then any similarities are just coincidence.’

  ‘I don’t care.’

  ‘Then ask yourself what you’re going to do with the rest of your life,’ she says. ‘You’ll have to give up being a doctor, you’ll lose your income, you might even face charges, all the scandal and gossip in the papers—’

  ‘It’s my own fault.’

  ‘Find out if the alibi checks out first – if it does, then I’ll report you myself.’

  ‘Thanks,’ he laughs.

  ‘I’m being serious,’ she says.

  18

  Erik leaves the car in front of the garage, hurries up the path to his dark house, unlocks the door and goes inside. He turns the light on in the hall but doesn’t take his outdoor clothes off, just carries on down the steep staircase to the cellar that contains his extensive archive.

  In the locked steel cabinets he keeps all the documents from his years in Uganda, from the major research project at the Karolinska Institute, and about his patients at the Psychology Clinic. All the written material is collected in the form of logbooks, personal journals and extensive notes. The recordings of his sessions have been saved on eight external hard-drives.

  Erik’s heart is thumping as he unlocks one of the cabinets and searches back in time to the year when his life crossed paths with that of Rocky Kyrklund.

  He pulls the file out of a black box and hurries upstairs to his study. He switches the lamp on, glances at the black window, removes the elastic band round the file, and opens it on the desk in front of him.

  It was nine years ago, and life was very different. Benjamin was still in primary school, Simone was writing her dissertation in art history, and he himself had just started working at the Crisis and Trauma Centre with Professor Sten W Jakobsson.

  He no longer remembers the exact details of how he was contacted and invited to join a team for a forensic psychology project. He had actually decided not to take part in anything like that again but, given the particular circumstances, changed his mind when his colleague Nina Blom asked for his help.

  Erik remembers spending the evening in his new office, reading the material the prosecutor had sent over. The man who was going to be evaluated was a Rocky Kyrklund, and he was vicar of the parish of Salem. He was being held in custody on suspicion of having murdered Rebecka Hansson, a forty-three-year-old woman who had attended Mass and then stayed behind to speak to him in private on the Sunday before she was murdered.

  The murder had been extremely aggressive, fuelled by hatred. The victim’s face and arms had been destroyed. She was found lying on the linoleum floor of her bathroom, with her right hand around her neck.

  There was fairly persuasive forensic evidence. Rocky had sent her a number of threatening text messages, and his fingerprints and strands of his hair were found in her home, and traces of Rebecka’s blood were found on his shoes.

  An arrest warrant was issued and he was eventually picked up seven months later in conjunction with a serious traffic accident on the motorway at Brunnby. He had stolen a car at Finsta and was heading for the airport at Arlanda.

  In the accident Rocky Kyrklund suffered serious brain damage which led to epileptic seizures in the frontal and temporal lobes of his brain.

  He would suffer recurrent bouts of automatism and memory loss for the rest of his life.

  When Erik met Rocky Kyrklund, his face was criss-crossed with red scars from the accident, his arm was in plaster, and his hair had just started to grow again after several operations. Rocky was a large man with a booming voice. He was almost two metres tall, broad-shouldered, with big hands and a thick neck.

  Sometimes he would faint, falling off his chair, knocking over the flimsy table holding glasses and a jug of water, and hit his shoulder on the floor. But sometimes his epileptic attacks were almost invisible. He just seemed a bit subdued and distant, and afterwards he couldn’t remember what they had been talking about.

  Erik and Rocky got on
fairly well. The priest was undeniably charismatic. He somehow managed to give the impression of speaking straight from the heart.

  Erik leafs through the private journal in which he made notes during their conversations. The various subjects can be traced from one session to the next.

  Rocky had neither admitted nor denied the murder; he said he couldn’t remember Rebecka Hansson at all, and couldn’t explain why his fingerprints had been found in her home, or how her blood came to be on his shoes.

  During the best of their conversations, Rocky would circle the small islands of memories in an attempt to discern a bit more.

  Once he said that he and Rebecka Hansson had had intercourse in the sacristy, albeit interrupted. He could remember details, such as the rough rug they had been lying on. An old gift from the young women of the parish. She had begun to menstruate, leaving a small bloodstain, like a virgin, he said.

  During the following conversations he couldn’t remember any of this.

  The conclusion of the examination was that the crime had been committed under the influence of severe mental disturbance. The team believed that Rocky Kyrklund suffered from a grandiose, narcissistic personality disorder with elements of paranoia.

  Erik leafs past a circled note, ‘paying for sex + drug abuse’, in the journal, followed by some ideas for medication.

  Naturally he shouldn’t have had an opinion on the matter of guilt, but as time passed Erik became convinced that Rocky was guilty, and that his mental disorder constituted a serious risk of further crimes.

  During one of their last sessions, Rocky was talking about a ceremony to mark the end of the school year in a church decked out with spring greenery, when he suddenly looked up at Erik and said he hadn’t murdered Rebecka Hansson.

  ‘I remember everything now, I’ve got an alibi for the whole of that evening,’ he said.

  He wrote down the name Olivia, and an address, then gave the sheet of paper to Erik. They carried on talking, and Rocky began to speak in broken fragments, then fell completely silent, looked at Erik, and suffered a severe epileptic attack. Afterwards Rocky didn’t remember anything, he didn’t even recognise Erik, just kept whispering about wanting heroin, saying he could kill a child if only he was given thirty grams of medical diacetylmorphine in a bottle with an unbroken seal.