‘Were you any closer to his “secret”?’ Kevin asked.
Lennartsson slowly shook his head. ‘No. All he did say was that he wasn’t ashamed of what he had done, but he still felt guilty about the person it most affected.’
‘Sounds like some romantic interlude. A lover he shunned?’ Kevin suggested.
‘Whatever it was, the answer lies in Berlin.’
CHAPTER 12
It might be a Saturday morning, but Moberg had made sure the whole team was in – Wallen, Hakim, Brodd and himself. He had even avoided his usual Friday night booze-up with Pontus Brodd so that all his faculties were sharp for this meeting. He sensed that there was a chink of light in the case, where twenty-fours ago there had been none.
All the items retrieved from the Kronborgsvägen apartment were laid out on the meeting-room table. The nun’s habit was draped carefully over a chair. Moberg had had to cut Brodd off in mid-sentence when he realized he was going to come up with some inappropriately smutty joke.
Moberg started the meeting with: ‘Before we go through all of these items, we’ve drawn a blank on Julia Anna Akerman so far. We’ve found ten women with that name, and none are the right age. And certainly not one with a Malmö connection. I’ve still got people on it, but it’s not as straightforward as it should be.’
‘She could have changed her name,’ Brodd suggested.
‘But we’ve got a Swedish passport in that name on the table here,’ Moberg said, pointing out the obvious. ‘Right, let’s go through what we know we have. Klara?’
Wallen pointed to the bagged-up objects. ‘According to her passport, she is called Julia Anna Akerman; born May 20th, 1979. Birthplace: Malmö. Passport issued on February 16th, 2008.’
‘It looks like the genuine article,’ said Moberg, ‘but we can find no record of a Julia Anna Akerman being born on that date in Malmö, or any other time. We need it checked out to see if it’s a fake.’
‘The Easyjet boarding pass shows that she was flying back to Geneva the next day. We’ve checked, and she made six trips to Kastrup in the last seven months. Always for no more than a couple of nights here. So, she doesn’t live in the Kronborgsvägen apartment, but uses it for flying visits. Which also explains why she wasn’t seen by regular joggers in the park.’
‘Could she be an air hostess?’ Moberg wondered.
‘We’re checking that out.’
‘We’ve been on to the Swiss authorities to see if they can find a Julia Akerman. We’ve got a credit card from a bank in Switzerland, and she also pays her rent through them, according to Mankad, so there’s a good chance she lives there, or certainly spends a lot of her time there.’
‘Of course, if she is in the travel business, she may be based somewhere else, but Switzerland is a useful place to have a bank account.’ This was Wallen again, who was increasing in confidence. Maybe it was Anita who intimidated her more than Moberg, she wondered fleetingly before she moved on to the next object. ‘This key is for a Mercedes car. There was no sign of one near the apartment, so we conclude that she has one at home, wherever that is. It might be at Geneva airport. We don’t know. The others are house or apartment keys. Again, for where, we don’t know yet.’
‘And the mobile?’
‘It’s a basic Nokia pay-as-you-go phone, so we don’t know where it was bought, and it’s difficult to trace calls. I would have expected her to have a fancy phone. Strange thing is: she hadn’t received any calls. Of course, she may have deleted them. We’re going to get that checked out as well. She only had one number in her contacts section. It’s one in Skåne.’
‘And?’
‘We rang it, and it turned out to be a nursing home outside Sjöbo. They have never heard of Julia Akerman. And no one in the home is called Akerman.’
There was quiet as they all pondered this surprising piece of information.
‘I suppose we’d better deal with this,’ Moberg sighed incredulously as he waved a large hand at the nun’s habit.
‘As far as we can see, it is a proper habit. The kind an actual nun would wear. It’s not one of those sexy nun outfits that Brodd probably fantasizes about.’
‘What do you mean?’ Brodd reacted angrily.
Moberg was amused. Good for Wallen.
‘So, she’s not necessarily into sex games.’
‘But she had lots of revealing underwear,’ put in Hakim as he wondered how horrified his mother would be if she had seen him rifling through a woman’s knickers drawer.
‘You don’t think she could have been a real nun at some time?’ Moberg threw the thought into the open.
‘Well, she hasn’t half reformed!’ Brodd snorted.
Moberg ignored his comment. ‘The other religious connection is the cross round her neck. We’ve been told it’s Eastern European. Probably Polish. Does that give us any clues?’
‘Maybe that’s why we can’t trace her,’ suggested Hakim. ‘What if she was born in Poland and either changed her name to a Swedish equivalent or simply changed her name to fit in?’ He knew Poles got just as hard a time as Iraqis. Swedes always assumed they were going to pinch their cars and whisk them back over the Baltic.
‘So, we might have a religious Pole who has a Swedish passport and lives in Switzerland. It sounds like the start of one of your fucking awful jokes, Pontus. Right, there’s still a lot of checking to do. Unless we can nail down who she is exactly, we’re never going to come up with any suspects.’
CHAPTER 13
Anita and Kevin spent the rest of the day wandering around Simrishamn. Kevin seemed to enjoy the harbour, with its rows of colourful cottages huddled along cobbled streets. They had spent a couple of hours at the local loppis – ‘A bit like a British car boot sale,’ Kevin remarked – near the Nils Holgersson School. Tables were laid out with everything from second-hand clothes to unwanted bric-a-brac. A large crowd had gathered and business was brisk. Anita bought a couple of thick woollen jumpers – ‘Winter will be here soon enough.’ Kevin guessed it must be an example of Scandinavian pessimism.
Anita acknowledged the few familiar faces who greeted her with smiles of recognition. As Kevin was debating whether to buy a small porcelain shepherdess as a present for one of his daughters, he noticed Anita chatting earnestly to a ruddy-faced man in his mid-sixties with cropped hair like himself but with a far more impressive stomach. They parted with a burst of laughter. By that time, Kevin had abandoned thoughts of a purchase; the figurine was a bit tacky anyway.
‘That was Stefan. He’s a cop based here in Simrishamn. I’ve known him since I was a teenager; he used to come to our school and give talks.’
‘You looked to be in deep discussion.’
Anita smiled. ‘I was just being a nosy bitch.’
‘Your bête noire?’
‘Oh, yes. I was just wondering what she was doing here in Simrishamn. So are Stefan and his colleagues. Zetterberg just appeared yesterday and commandeered an office. They thought it might be something to do with Albin’s suicide, but now the rumour mill believes she’s been sent by Ystad to keep an eye on them. There have been large hints that there are to be job losses. They’re talking about centralizing things from Lund, so smaller police stations are under threat. As you can imagine, they’re all paranoid now. But Stefan’s not too bothered; he’s coming up for retirement and looking forward to concentrating on building his boats.’
Now they were sitting at the side of the Maritim Hotel on the raised decked area overlooking the harbour. Though the early evening was still warm, it was cool under the canvas canopy, and the waitress had thoughtfully brought out a couple of rugs to cover their knees. They had decided on beers, and Kevin was tucking into his Skånsk sisker from a local brewery in Tomelilla as he surveyed the fish he had ordered. When eating in a harbour town, fish was an obvious choice, though it certainly looked different from anything that was served up in his favourite Penrith chippy. Anita couldn’t remember the name of the fish in English but, after tentative proddi
ng, it turned out to be fried plaice. She had gone for the steamed lemon sole with lobster and elderflower pickled vegetables.
‘Quite a boat that,’ remarked Kevin, pointing with his fork over Anita’s shoulder at a two-masted tall ship swaying gently at its berth.
‘That’s the Sarpen,’ Anita replied, squinting round to see. ‘It’s old. Used as a training ship these days. When the masts had to be replaced, the new ones were made by a guy called Sven Geistrand. Lives not far from where we’re staying.’
‘That’s what I call woodwork.’
After a pause for some more food, Anita looked across at Kevin. ‘By the way, I’d better warn you that we’ve got visitors tomorrow.’
‘Oh, yeah?’ Kevin said warily.
‘Lasse and Jazmin are coming over from Malmö for the day.’ She grinned. ‘I think he wants to give you the once-over. See the unfortunate sap that his mother has dragged into bed.’
‘Is that the way he sees it?’
‘No. The other way round actually. He’s very protective of me, so you’d better be on your best behaviour.’
‘I’ll have an extra shower so I smell nice. And I’ll try and do it without flooding your bloody bathroom!’
Wallen had been working closely with Hakim all day. Fruitless calls and dead ends. They hadn’t been able to find any evidence that Julia Akerman was an air stewardess. The mobile phone hadn’t yielded anything either. No deleted texts or calls, except one to the nursing home a month ago. Wallen had dispatched a grumpy Brodd off to Sjöbo to see if he could find out anything. She had to admit that it was only to get him out from under her feet. He couldn’t do much damage out in the middle of Skåne. They could find no criminal records for Akerman – or health records either. Nothing on the electoral roll, no registration for a driving licence, nor enrolment on educational courses. And to add to their frustrations, they were also having difficulty at the Swiss end, as it seemed virtually impossible to get hold of anyone at the weekend.
Wallen had gone out of the meeting room to get some fresh coffee, and was thinking of calling it a day when she returned to see a smiling Hakim. ‘Found her!’
She still held on to the two mugs. The butterflies in her stomach were a good indication that this was a pivotal moment.
‘That was the airline. They’ve got her booking details, and we’ve got an address. It’s in a place called La Sarraz in Switzerland. I’ve Googled it, and it’s not far from Lausanne.’
‘Brilliant! Is Moberg still in?’
A few minutes later, they were standing in front of the chief inspector’s desk.
‘Right, we’ve got to follow this up. One of you needs to go out there and find out as much as we can about this woman. Actually, you can go, Mirza. I need you here, Klara.’ Wallen was secretly quite relieved. She was enjoying the responsibility that Moberg was giving her, and she wanted to remain at the heart of the investigation. Akerman may have come from Switzerland, but the murder took place here, and she was sure that the real answers lay in Malmö. ‘I’ll get it sorted out at this end and try to establish contacts with the Swiss police.’ He pointed a large, chubby finger at Hakim. ‘I want you on a plane on Monday.’
CHAPTER 14
Anita let Kevin drive back from Simrishamn after their meal. He had wanted to try out driving on the right, and, as the insurance covered the car and not the driver, there was no problem. Anyway, she was weary after the day out and wanted an early night.
As they approached the house, there was the outline of a figure on the porch.
‘Who’s that?’ Anita called out.
‘Klas,’ came the reply.
Anita inwardly groaned. Much as she liked Lennartsson, she wasn’t in the mood to listen to his stories. She had other plans.
‘It’s important,’ he said in Swedish.
‘You’d better come in.’
Once the lights were turned on and Kevin had offered to make them all a cup of tea, Lennartsson sat down on the sofa. Anita could see that he was tense and worried.
‘What’s the matter, Klas?’ The sooner she got to the point, the sooner he would go.
‘It’s Rylander.’ She knew it had to be. ‘I don’t think it was suicide. I want you to look into it.’
Anita tried to keep the sigh out of her voice, but failed. ‘Honestly, Klas, it’s obviously suicide. It’s disappointing, particularly for you. I understand that. But he’ll have had his reasons. And anyway, there’s nothing I can do about it. It’ll be officially dealt with.’ She plonked herself down on the chair opposite. After a pleasant meal with a nice male companion, this was not something she wanted to get involved with. ‘Besides, I’m on holiday.’
‘I’m sorry. But it’s not that simple. For starters, he didn’t leave a note. Isn’t that unusual?’
‘Yes. Suicides do tend to. But who was Rylander going to leave one to? He had no family.’
‘To me then.’
‘Why to you?’
‘I guess I was closest to him at the end.’
‘Is that all you have to go on?’
‘No.’ This was said with more determination. The self-pity of a moment ago was gone. ‘I spoke to Moa this afternoon. She was just as surprised as me.’
‘For the same reasons as you, I expect.’
‘No. She thinks that something’s not right.’
‘And why?’ One amateur sleuth was bad enough, but two! She just wanted to go to bed.
‘He was taking morphine sulphate for the pain. Once every twelve hours.’
‘Was this what he took to kill himself?’
‘In theory.’
‘Well, it’ll come out in the autopsy.’
‘That’s not the point, Anita,’ Klas said vehemently. ‘To kill himself, he must have taken ten to twenty tablets. With all the whisky he drank, that would do it. But Moa says that he didn’t have enough tablets left to take that kind of overdose. Moa says she usually gave him enough tablets to last four weeks. They were nearly finished. She was taking his next lot to him when she found him dead. Where did all the other morphine sulphate come from?’
‘Maybe he hadn’t taken all the tablets at the prescribed times. Maybe he was storing them up for the time when he felt he had had enough. Look, who’s going to bother killing someone who’s about to die anyway?’
Lennartsson looked unconvinced, but it seemed perfectly logical to Anita.
‘Anyway, after I’d seen Moa, I went to the police station and saw Inspector Zetterberg. She wouldn’t give me the time of day. She’d only say that it was a straightforward suicide. End of story.’
‘Oh, Klas. I know you’re upset, but going to the police! You just make yourself look daft. Especially in front of someone like Alice Zetterberg.’
They both sank into a sullen silence. Kevin entered with a tray with three mugs of tea. He passed the milk-free ones to the Swedes.
‘Did I miss anything interesting?’ Anita flashed him a filthy look. She didn’t want to start Lennartsson off again.
Lennartsson took a sip of his tea and reverted to English. ‘Albin Rylander made a remarkable claim. It’s one that can’t be proved.’
‘What’s that then?’ asked Kevin trying to lift the subdued atmosphere he’d walked into.
‘He reckons that his father saved Lenin’s life. In Malmö.’
Anita’s amazement was mirrored by Kevin’s.
‘I didn’t realize Lenin had ever been to Malmö,’ Kevin said in a tone of disbelief.
‘I must admit, I took it with a pinch of salt when he first mentioned it. Until he produced the old red handkerchief. He was clutching that when Moa found him, by the way.’ He took another gulp of tea.
‘What was Lenin doing in Malmö?’ asked Anita, whose lack of historical knowledge had already been exposed by Kevin’s questions on their trips out.
Lennartsson grimaced. ‘Long story.’
‘Short version please.’
‘When the Revolution broke out in 1917 and the Tsar was de
posed and Imperial Russia collapsed, the provisional government that took over was still committed to fighting what was the First World War against Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. This was important to their allies: France and Britain. It meant that the Germans were still fighting on two fronts – in the West against the French and the British, and eventually America – and Russia in the East. However, the hard-line revolutionaries such as Lenin, Sokolnikov, Zinoviev et cetera, who had been living in exile for many years, were stuck in neutral Switzerland, and obviously couldn’t have much impact on events back in Mother Russia. Of course at the time, there were lots of revolutionary groups, each with its own agenda, but many still supported the war that was being carried on by the Kerensky-led government, which was largely made up of liberals and moderate socialists. The one group that was totally committed to withdrawing Russia from the war was the Bolsheviks. They were small, but had a dynamic leader in Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov.’
‘Lenin,’ Kevin put in helpfully. The First World War was a subject that had always fascinated him. His great-uncle’s name was engraved on the Thiepval Memorial for those who had died in the Somme but whose bodies had never been found.
‘Exactly. Of course, the Germans were keen to take Russia out of the war so they could concentrate all their forces in the West. Through a German Social Democrat called Alexander Helphand, known to history by his pseudonym of Parvus, channels were opened up with Lenin and the Bolsheviks. Eventually, an agreement was made with the German Foreign Secretary, Arthur Zimmerman, in Berlin. The Germans would facilitate Lenin’s journey across their country from Switzerland to the Baltic coast, where he and his followers could then travel on their own through neutral Sweden and on to Finland and then Petrograd.’
‘Where’s Petrograd?’ asked Anita.
‘Saint Petersburg. The name was changed in 1914 to get rid of the German “burg”. Anyway, the Germans backed up the transport of these revolutionaries with huge amounts of money for the Bolshevik cause to allow them to make an impact on their return to Russia. It was ironic that an absolute monarch like the Kaiser was bankrolling a communist venture. Anyway, a train was arranged to take Lenin and about thirty companions.’
Midnight In Malmö: The Fourth Inspector Anita Sundström Mystery (The Malmö Mysteries Book 4) Page 6
