After shoving the body, which now felt heavier and more uncooperative, down into the pit, she spread the plastic out like a shroud, tucked in the corners around the body, and then shoveled the dirt back in. She worked quickly and single-mindedly, and when the last shrub was replanted she allowed herself to rest a minute or two. She crouched down. The rain ran over her face. She wanted to recite a prayer, or do something that might resemble a ceremony, but found that she could only remember a few lines of the Lord’s Prayer.
“Thy kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven … Amen,” she murmured.
Thirty-four
The phone rang at six thirty in the morning. The ring was unusually muted and Ann Lindell was grateful for that; Anders needed to sleep. As far as she knew he had been up working until far into the night. She woke up when he crept into bed and glanced at the clock: 2:33. She was happy, he had started writing again. This time it probably concerned the Middle East. She fell back asleep right away.
She was sure it was Ottosson and it was not without feeling a certain excitement that she hurried out into the hall to reach the phone. The calm of the past few weeks would now be broken by something more stimulating to the imagination.
That was a morbid thought, she admitted it, but homicide was her department.
She found the phone on the couch between two cushions.
“Yes, now she’s gone.”
Edvard’s voice sounded distant, as if he was far from the receiver.
“I thought you would want to know.”
Of course she wanted to know! She collapsed on the couch. The news was expected, but still Ann felt paralyzed. She could not get out a sound.
“She died in her sleep,” Edvard continued. “Calmly and peacefully.”
She heard now how tired he was.
“I sensed it last night and got up. Right when I came into her room she took a deep breath, just one. I waited but there weren’t any more. It was over. She was lying with her arms crossed over her chest and it looked like she was smiling.”
Ann had experienced this a number of times, how the dead seemed to smile, even after a violent, unnatural death.
“She had a long life,” was the first thing Ann could say.
It sounded like a platitude, she thought, but the words held much more than just the number of years Viola had lived and she sensed that Edvard understood what she meant.
Edvard hummed a little in response as if he agreed. She could picture him. He was no doubt sitting at the kitchen table staring out over the farmyard where dawn could still only be sensed. It struck Ann how alone he must feel.
“Is it very windy?” she asked.
“Yes, and it’s been a steady northeaster for a couple of days,” Edvard replied.
“Which she detested.”
“Yes,” said Edvard. “Which she detested.”
She wanted to say something to the effect that she could come out, but refrained. Perhaps he would misunderstand.
“Have you spoken with anyone else?”
“No, I’m going to call Torsten, Greta, and a few others. Then the word will spread on its own. But there’s no hurry.”
“Are you having coffee?”
“Mmm.”
“Have a sip for me too,” said Ann. “Will you be in touch?”
“Yes,” said Edvard.
She thought he was crying. After the call she remained sitting on the couch. She realized that a chapter in her life was about to end. Viola’s illness and death had made her and Edvard reestablish contact, she had visited Gräsö, something that only a few weeks ago would have seemed inconceivable. After Viola’s funeral there would be no real reason for continued contact. The story of Edvard led irrevocably to its end.
She wished she could go to the island to keep him company, console him, but that was out of the question. He would take it as a sign that she wanted them to continue seeing each other, perhaps even resume the relationship. But the feelings were not there. Or else they were so deeply pushed back that they could not make themselves known. Her reasonable self had mobilized all its forces to erase all the real or imagined feelings for the man she loved and then frittered away.
“Is she dead?”
Anders was standing in the door, looking at her. He looked as much the worse for wear as his threadbare bathrobe.
She nodded.
“Have you had breakfast?”
“No, it would be nice if you’d make some coffee.”
“Sad?”
“Yes, of course. Viola was a remarkable woman. A friend.”
“She lived a long time,” said Anders, and Ann wondered if he had listened to her call.
“I’ll put on a little java, that will perk us up.”
She smiled. He was the only person she knew who called coffee “java.”
“There will be one last trip to Gräsö. Do you want to come with me to the funeral?”
“Don’t think so,” he answered. “Funerals are not my strong suit. And I didn’t know her. It’s better if you go alone.”
And of course that’s how it was. They would both feel uncomfortable if he went along.
She heard him fill the coffeemaker and take out the mugs. Mostly she wanted to stretch out on the couch and let Anders wrap a blanket around her, but she knew that no pardon was given. She had to get up. The clock said seven. In one and a half hours she would be taking part in some kind of conference, the subject of which she didn’t even know. But she was sure it would not affect her work situation for the better. A grinding meeting without meaning or purpose. She would sit there and vegetate, while the knife man Ludwig Ohrman and his ilk could stretch out on any number of couches and plan new mischief. She would have to get to work on him. He did not show up for the interview she had arranged the other day.
Ann got up with some effort, forced, but also lured by the smell of coffee.
“Now your Nobel Prize winner is taking a beating again,” said Anders.
He sat hunched over the newspaper, grinning a little. He liked conflict and polemics.
“By who?”
“An Associate Professor Johansson, if you’re familiar with the name.”
“I am, in fact,” said Ann.
She leaned over Anders’ shoulder and peered at the prominently featured article. There was a photo of Ohler as well as Johansson, a twenty-year-old archive picture where the two were posing together in what apparently was a laboratory setting. Both dead serious. The associate professor looked young. She read the lead-in and the final paragraph.
“The mild-mannered old guy has sharpened his pencil properly,” she observed. “Now there will be a real feud with the neighbors.”
Ann briefly told about what had happened earlier. He was visibly amused and that made her happy. He was working. She was infected by his boyish delight at two neighbors attacking a third one.
“Torben Bunde has never really been in his right mind, but Johansson is all right,” said Anders. “No ferocious jabs or complicated academic double-talk—instead dry and factual but still razor sharp. I can imagine how the feelings are cooling at home with Ohler. This is not some outsider grumbling but someone who’s been there. That hurts.”
Ann wondered whether she should tell about the connection between the housekeeper and Viola, but refrained. It was good that their conversation had left the island.
She pulled the other section of the newspaper to her, opened a page at random, and found that divine justice had arrived before the worldly kind. The first thing she saw was Ludwig Ohrman’s obituary. He was forty years old, deeply mourned and missed by mother and father, and a whole throng of brothers and sisters.
She checked the date of death. I see, she thought, not strange that he didn’t show up for questioning.
“I’ll wake Erik,” said Anders.
It had become a routine for Anders to make sure the boy got breakfast in him and left home in time. Most mornings he went with Erik to school and then took a long walk.
&
nbsp; She knew that it was an arrangement Erik liked. Anders was something out of the ordinary where stepfathers were concerned. First he had been run over by a bus and then almost killed by knife thrusts administered by a murderer, with impressive scars as evidence.
Erik had decided to become a policeman. Ann did not bother to protest. Soon enough he would realize and start dreaming about something better.
She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.
“Thanks,” she said.
He looked up from the newspaper with surprise.
“For what?”
“For…”
She did not know how to continue. He smiled at her, but it was a doubtful smile and she saw a flash of worry in his eyes.
“You’ll have to guess,” she said at last, and left the kitchen.
Thirty-five
Ronald was a taciturn young man who lugged Agnes’s plastic bags and suitcases down without comment. He did not seem a bit impressed at finding himself in an aristocratic Nobel Prize winner’s home. Perhaps he was eager to get going.
Agnes stayed upstairs. Even though the two rooms she had the use of were emptied of her belongings she was worried about having forgotten something. She opened wardrobes and pulled out dresser drawers, wandering around like a lost soul in the bedroom and the small drawing room. Greta had silently observed her and then went down to help pack the things in the car.
Neither the professor, Birgitta, nor Liisa Lehtonen had been seen at all.
The atmosphere in the house was unnatural. In an attempt at a joke Ronald asked if someone had died.
When everything was packed there was nothing more for Agnes to do: She had to go down one flight. Birgitta was standing in the hall, pale and without makeup, peering out through the open door, as if she wanted to check what was being carried out of the house. Birgitta said nothing when Agnes slipped through the hall and into the kitchen. It was as if Birgitta did not notice her.
Greta had made coffee and Agnes really wanted a cup, perhaps have a sandwich, before she left. She had also thought about fixing something for Ronald and Greta but she remained standing in front of the counter in the kitchen where she had worked for fifty-five years. During the first twenty years there had been a cook. After that Agnes had been the one responsible for the food.
Everything went so fast, she thought. The idea that she would pack up and move away was a foreign thought only a few weeks ago. Sure, she had thought about having passed the retirement mark several years ago, but during the past week everything had accelerated with a dizzying velocity. She could barely keep up herself. Without Greta the departure never would have been possible. Then she would have submitted to the professor’s anger and Birgitta’s attempts at persuasion.
Mechanically she took out bread and fixings. She made a few sandwiches, had a few mouthfuls of coffee, and quickly felt livelier. It was also as if the weather powers were in a lighter mood. The clouds were pushed aside and she could glimpse a few patches of blue sky.
Agnes did not hear Birgitta slip into the kitchen and jumped in fright when she started talking. She stood leaning against the doorpost. Her expression was that of the injured party, it was the sullen Birgitta Agnes knew so well. She had nothing new to say but instead repeated her arguments that Agnes was putting them in a difficult position.
Agnes decided not to defend herself. She realized that it was pointless.
“So you don’t even notice me anymore?” Birgitta complained.
“I just didn’t hear you come in,” said Agnes. “Would you like some coffee?”
Birgitta shook her head. Bitterness made her ugly. She took a couple of steps toward Agnes and was preparing to go on renewed attack when Greta came into the kitchen. She ignored Birgitta. Agnes sensed that they had had a dispute.
“Everything is stowed away. Ronald is waiting in the car.”
“Doesn’t he want a sandwich?”
“No, he wants to get going.”
Agnes sensed that her sister was at least equally eager to leave the house. She had seemed strangely absent the whole morning, blamed it on sleeping poorly.
“Well, then we’ll say good-bye,” said Agnes, extending her hand.
Birgitta sobbed. Agnes felt sorry for her in a way, understood that in the future she was the one who would have to take the blows when the professor got worked up and shouted about things large and small. On the other hand her way of reacting with anger was insolent. If she had only been sad Agnes could have given her a hug and consoled her like in the past.
At the same moment the professor entered the kitchen. Behind him Liisa could be seen.
“See to it that you leave now!” he hissed.
Even Birgitta looked dumbfounded. Greta shook her head.
“Goodbye,” said Agnes, extending her hand.
The professor pretended not to see it. Instead he turned toward Birgitta.
“Now that the servants have abandoned the house you’ll have to see to—”
“We can talk about that later,” Birgitta cut him off.
The professor stared. Agnes knew that he loathed being interrupted. She saw besides that he was dizzy.
“Thanks, then!” said Greta, making an effort to continue, but Agnes stopped her by placing a hand on her sister’s arm.
Agnes did not want any trouble. She just wanted to disappear from the house.
“Hags,” the professor snorted.
“I am no hag to you!”
Greta held up an index finger in front of his face as if she were scolding a child.
“Is this the thanks I get?” the professor shouted. “Here we have fed you all these years. You’ve had it good here. Agnes! Don’t say otherwise, don’t try to lie!”
Agnes had not expected an affectionate farewell, but not this anger either, this aggressiveness, this injustice.
“Silence!” Greta thundered with Aron’s voice. “You should be grateful that we have been so loyal for all these years.”
She also assumed some of her father’s features: the face which despite its wrinkles stood out as sculpted, the prominent jaw and flaming eyes. The preacher who did not stand aside.
“Loyal,” the professor said with a sneer.
He twisted his lips but the effect was missing when he was forced to support himself with both hands on the back of the chair in front of him so as not to fall down. He was breathing with great exertion.
“Daddy!” Birgitta pleaded.
Despite Agnes’s renewed attempts to silence her Greta did not let herself be stopped. She placed herself close to the professor and forced him to meet her eyes. Agnes could glimpse fear in his eyes for the first time since she had been in the house. Was it due to Greta’s fury or was he worried about having a heart attack? It would be embarrassing for him to ask for a pill, it would be an illustration of his dependence and weakness.
“We know about everything that has happened here in the house,” said Greta. “Everything! And there are so many skeletons in the closet that it’s enough for a whole cemetery. Last night I rescued you from disgrace, but now I don’t know if I did the right thing. You have bullied Agnes all these years and it is a miracle that she put up with it. But now it’s over. We have done our part. And we don’t deserve to be scolded.”
The words positively rushed out of Greta’s mouth. She talked about the long shifts and the lack of freedom, the constant attending. Agnes stared at her sister. She recognized all this, but what was the disgrace Greta mentioned?
“Daddy,” Birgitta pleaded again, “we don’t care about that! Come!”
By pulling him on the arm she tried to get her father to leave the kitchen, lead him away from the verbal barrage. But such a retreat was inconceivable, Agnes understood that. That went against everything the professor stood for. He was not the one who stepped aside. On the contrary, he shook himself free and appeared to be recovering from the attack of dizziness. Then came the counterattack.
“Not free? If there is anyone who hasn
’t been free it’s me, who has taken responsibility for everything and everyone. Have you ever had to make a single decision about anything? Get out, you ungrateful cows!”
Greta’s reply came like a whiplash. “So you said that to Anna too?”
The professor stiffened. Liisa who had so far kept in the background took a couple of steps into the kitchen.
“Anna disappeared without saying anything,” said the professor.
“She was struck dumb,” said Greta. “Silenced. I don’t know what happened, but I can guess. And then the old professor went out to Father and talked nonsense about Anna.”
“You know nothing about that,” the professor snarled.
With his superior manner the professor had retaken command. It was as if nothing really had any effect on him. Greta did not have the same experience either in the art of being disrespectful and shameless. She closed her eyes for a few seconds and when she opened her eyes again she looked completely powerless. It was as if she had shot off all of her ammunition and more than anything wanted to disappear from the house and Uppsala.
“Ronald is waiting,” said Agnes, in an attempt to make contact with her sister.
Greta raised her eyes and took her hand. Together they left the kitchen, went through the hall, opened the door, and stepped out onto the stairs. When Agnes caught sight of Ronald, who was leaning against the car—unexpectedly enough with a broad smile on his face—she squeezed her sister’s hand. She was happy about Greta, about the smiling Ronald from Gräsö, and about being free. She had made it through.
Thirty-six
There was something strange about the flower bed. He saw it immediately, even if it took awhile before it became completely obvious. It meant he had to take out the binoculars. He had done that before, sneaked it out between the plants in the tower, to check the surroundings. He was ashamed, but not enough to keep him from doing it.
The perennials were sitting wrong. Haller would never be guilty of such amateurish planting. Maybe he had been in a hurry, been sloppy, been eager to get away? No, he had not gained any time by planting that way. It was simply poorly executed.
Open Grave: A Mystery (Ann Lindell Mysteries) Page 24
