Another Time, Another Life: The Story of a Crime

by Leif Gw Persson

  “You mentioned that you thought Eriksson had started drinking a lot recently,” said Holt. “Have you thought any more about that, Mrs. Westergren?”

  It was an impression she had, that was all. One time a month ago she thought she smelled alcohol when he greeted her on the stairway. Another time a week or so later she saw him get out of a taxi and thought he’d walked a little strangely when he disappeared into the entryway. She was already outside so they hadn’t even said hello to one another. It had made her think because these were new observations that didn’t jibe with her previous image of her reserved, well-ordered, and clearly sober neighbor.

  An elderly couple also lived on the same floor. Despite repeated attempts by younger colleagues from the uniformed police, they could not be reached. But by talking with their neighbors Holt and Jarnebring found out that they lived in Spain during the winter and left Sweden as early as the beginning of October.

  “Not so hard to find out,” Jarnebring muttered.

  “We did it,” said Holt happily. “Didn’t take us more than half an hour.”

  The third and final neighbor took longer than that, despite the fact that their younger colleagues had already talked with him on the morning after the murder. Back then they had received the brief reply that he had neither seen nor heard anything because he hadn’t been home during the evening in question, and if there wasn’t anything else then he preferred to be left in peace. And he would have been if it hadn’t been for the meticulous Gunsan, who found his name in an investigation file that the Stockholm police had set up before the expected disturbances in connection with the celebration of the anniversary of the death of Charles XII.

  The neighbor was born in 1920, retired major with the infantry. As a twenty-year-old he had served with the Swedish volunteer corps in the Finnish Winter War, and he had never made any secret of the fact that his political sympathies were quite far to the right. “Obviously not a Nazi but nationalistic like every true Swede,” as he himself put it at an interview in connection with his application for a position with the Ministry of Defense staff in Stockholm in the mid-1960s. He had of course not gotten this job, and in response he had requested, and immediately been granted, discharge from the military.

  For the last twenty years he had been a retiree, and he had apparently used his free time to give expression to his “nationalist sympathies” by promoting various societies and organizations. Finances had never been a problem for him both because he had wealthy parents and because as a youth he had inherited a large sum of money from an unmarried aunt. As with every real officer and gentleman “the pay was for keeping a horse.” He was a rumor-shrouded, decorated hero from the Winter War and the main character in many stories of a highly doubtful nature that were still part of the standard fare in officers’ messes around the country.

  On Thursday the thirtieth of November he had taken part in the laying of a wreath at the statue of Charles XII, and a number of photos that police detectives had taken supported this. As soon as the celebration itself was over, the responsible police commander ordered him and his sympathizers—“under protest”—to be packed into a couple of rented busses, whereupon they were driven to the subway station at Östermalmstorg at a fairly safe distance from the counterdemonstrators in Stockholm City. From there he had walked straight home to Rådmansgatan and had arrived there at a quarter to eight in the evening, according to the detective who had followed him just to be on the safe side, and whom the irreproachable Gunsan naturally had sniffed out, despite the fact that he had not intended to say anything himself. Whatever. The major had been at home and not out as he had said, and because of that there were very pressing reasons for further questioning.

  At first everything went beyond expectations. He was at home and opened the door and let them in when they rang. How often does that happen? thought Jarnebring. A short, austere, and very fit man who looked considerably younger than his almost seventy years. Who nodded brusquely at them as he looked at his watch.

  “Go ahead and ask. I don’t have all day,” said the major.

  But then things came to a dead halt. He had neither seen nor heard anything, and he firmly rejected all insinuations that he had previously given misleading statements.

  “I came home about eight o’clock, as I told the young constable, so I don’t understand what you’re after, Inspector,” the major said, training his eyes on Jarnebring.

  Hadn’t he heard that something was happening in the building? Had he, for example, not perceived that the police were conducting a rather extensive and far from silent crime scene investigation right outside his own front door? Had he not heard his doorbell ringing on at least two occasions during the evening? Had he not even peeked out into the stairwell through the peephole in his door?

  Answer: no. For one thing his hearing was a little bad, like so many others who had fired thousands of shots without ear protection during a long professional career. For another thing he had been watching TV and as usual he’d had the sound at a rather high volume.

  “I was looking at the news to see how much of our royal capital the police had let the hooligans tear down this time,” said the major.

  Then he had gone to bed and fallen asleep immediately as was his habit. He did not know Eriksson. He had only spoken with the fellow on one occasion, and after that conversation he had no reason to do so again. His neighbor had seemed generally unreliable and ingratiating, and his sudden demise left him cold. His own experiences were different.

  “Which experiences?” Holt asked.

  The major had seen better men than Eriksson cut down, and he himself had been wounded in the battle of Salla when he was only twenty years old, and had fought side by side with his Finnish brethren against the Russian Bolsheviks.

  “No big deal in itself,” said the major modestly. “I was on my feet within a week, which wasn’t true of most anyone. It’s a strange experience getting shot,” said the major, and for some reason it was Jarnebring he looked at as he said that.

  “I can believe it,” said Jarnebring.

  “The bullet entered my left side,” said the major. “The outside of the rib. But it bled copiously, and blood stands out against the snow, especially when it’s your own.”

  Jarnebring did not say anything, but for reasons that he did not at first understand he suddenly spotted the old-fashioned black telephone with a round dial that was on the major’s desk.

  “It took a while before my comrades could carry me out of there,” said the major. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt so alone, … and after what happened I became a different person. Neither better nor worse, but different.”

  “I understand what you mean,” said Jarnebring.

  “Yes, I suspected as much,” said the major. “People like me usually see these things.”

  Given this and other experiences of a similar nature the major was not one to spend time agonizing over someone like Eriksson, who had obviously socialized in the wrong circles and had met his death in an unfortunate way that was causing trouble for those around him. But what else would you expect from someone like him?

  “What do you mean by that?” It was Holt who asked the question.

  “A run-of-the-mill disguised proletarian trying to play the gentleman,” said the major. “He didn’t fool me.”

  How did he know that? Was he familiar with Eriksson’s background? Holt again.

  “You can sense that sort of thing. The fellow was a wretch,” the major snorted.

  “Nice old guy,” Holt giggled when they were in the car en route back to the office. “What do you think? I wonder, by the way, how many times he’s told that hero story for his audience in the officers’ mess.”

  A time or two, even if that’s not what it’s really about, thought Jarnebring, but naturally he hadn’t said that to Holt, because she still wouldn’t have understood.

  “I don’t think he killed Eriksson, even though he certainly could have managed it,” he said ins
tead. “It’s as though there isn’t space for that, and Eriksson already had a visitor when the old man returned home after having said his Heils for the evening.”

  “I get the feeling he knows something,” said Holt.

  “Or else it’s just that you don’t like him,” said Jarnebring, who had been around considerably longer than Holt.

  “I think he’s holding something back,” Holt persisted.

  “Or else he’s just generally delighted that someone got rid of a guy like Eriksson,” Jarnebring countered.

  “I still think he’s holding something back,” Holt repeated.

  “Possibly,” said Jarnebring. “If that’s so, I don’t think he intends to help by telling us in any event.”

  “Gloomy type,” said Holt.

  What do you know about that? You were never drafted, were you? thought Jarnebring.

  “Where did you do your military service, Holt?” asked Jarnebring, smiling his wolf grin.

  Despite what he had promised, Bäckström never had the chance to scare the shit out of anyone this gray afternoon at the beginning of December. When with his colleague Alm in tow he stepped unannounced into Tischler’s tastefully decorated office down at Nybroplan, the receptionist told him that the banker was not available. Because Bäckström wasn’t the type to take no for an answer, he persisted and finally got to speak with Tischler’s own secretary. A stylish woman in her fifties who went well with the decor. She apologized, but the banker himself was in New York at a meeting and was not expected home until Friday morning.

  “I know he is very anxious to speak with you gentlemen,” said the secretary. “So I suggest that you call me on Friday at midday, and I will try to arrange a time for you as soon as possible.”

  Fucking stuck-up bitch, thought Bäckström. Who the hell do you think you are?

  He and Alm did not have much better luck when they visited the TV building on Oxenstiernsgatan where Welander was to be found. The guard in reception paid hardly any attention to their police IDs, and after some negotiating they were at last allowed to talk to yet another secretary, but this time only on the phone. Sten Welander was occupied. He was in an important meeting and could not be disturbed. If they wanted to meet Sten Welander, she suggested they call to arrange a time, and it would surely be fine. After that she simply hung up.

  Fucking communist cunt, thought Bäckström. Who the hell do you think you are?

  In the car en route back to police headquarters that blockhead Alm started whining and coming up with a lot of suggestions about what they should have done instead.

  “I told you, Evert, we should have called ahead,” Blockhead moaned.

  Fucking idiot, thought Bäckström. Who the hell do you think you are?

  When Alm was about to drive the car down into the garage Bäckström jumped out on the street, hailed a taxi, and went straight home. What a fucking society we live in and what fucking people there are, thought Bäckström, leaning his full weight back against the seat.

  As soon as Jarnebring returned to his and his prospective wife’s pleasant little apartment on Kungsholmen he called up his best friend, police superintendent Lars Martin Johansson.

  Johansson answered on the first ring and sounded almost elated when he heard who it was.

  “Good thing you called, Bo,” said Johansson. “I’ve tried you a few times, but I suppose you’ve been working, as usual.”

  “Yes,” said Jarnebring. “There’s been a—”

  “What do you think about having a bite to eat on Friday?” interrupted Johansson. “My usual place at seven o’clock. Can you?”

  “Yes,” said Jarnebring. “I’d actually been thinking that—”

  “Excellent,” said Johansson. “Then that’s settled. I have a few things to tell you.”

  I see, thought Jarnebring. Wonder what that could be? He hasn’t heard anything, has he?

  11

  Thursday, December 7, 1989

  Holt was already at work before seven o’clock on Thursday morning. Nicke had spent the night with his dad, who would take him to day care. Holt woke up as usual, showered, had breakfast, and even managed to read the paper in peace and quiet, but when she was done with that she was still an hour ahead of her usual schedule. She went to work, and for lack of anything better to do while she was waiting for Jarnebring, she resumed her investigations of the mysteriously dedicated books she had found in Eriksson’s bookcase.

  After half an hour of searching she found the addresses for all four of the recipients of dedication copies that she had been able to identify, and the mystery deepened further.

  One of them, a woman born in 1935, had died a few years ago, but her husband was still living in the residence they had shared on Strandvägen. In the year 1974 a far-from-unknown author and member of the Swedish Academy had dedicated his newly published novel to her. The author was still alive, he was considerably older than his now dead “muse,” and the two of them had probably had a relationship at the time he had given her his book.

  Oh my goodness, thought Holt, continuing to search in her files.

  All the other three recipients lived in the same area. One, now an eighty-year-old bank executive on Narvavägen, had received a book about the Kreuger crash of 1932 written by another well-known financier. An executive on Djurgårdsvägen had received a book about Swedish chapbooks from a historian to whom he had evidently given a research grant. Finally, a very well-known publisher who also lived on Djurgården had received a book of poems from a poet unknown to Holt; the poet did not make a secret of the fact that he was thinking of changing publishers.

  One woman and three men, all fine people at fine addresses in the same limited area of Stockholm: Strandvägen, Narvavägen, Djurgården.

  This is a real detective mystery, Holt was thinking just as Jarnebring came into the office, his large body positively quivering with zest for work, as can easily happen when you’ve started the day by first, at full throttle and high volume, having sex with the woman you love, and then gobbling down a perfectly formidable breakfast.

  “Good morning, Inspector,” said Jarnebring. “Have we captured any suspects yet?”

  “Not yet,” Holt replied, quickly hiding her papers under a pile of regular searches.

  Why did I do that? she thought.

  During the morning they talked with Eriksson’s coworkers again. The tongues of several of them had now loosened, and in all essentials they confirmed what the doorman had already told them, though their choice of words was different. Eriksson had not been a good person. He had been sufficiently bad that none of them had had any desire to associate with him, but at the same time not so terrible that there was any reason to kill him.

  “Just an extremely unpleasant person,” one of Eriksson’s female coworkers summarized. “He really did nothing but snoop around.”

  None of them had socialized with him, none of them even seemed to have known him outside of work, and none of them had had motive and occasion to bump off Eriksson at home in his own apartment.

  How is this possible? No man is an island, thought Holt as they drove back to police headquarters on Kungsholmen.

  When they returned to their office after lunch the excellent Gunsan had solved Holt’s mystery of the mysteriously dedicated books, despite the fact that she wasn’t even aware of the problem. On Jarnebring’s desk was a typewritten sheet of paper on which Gunsan had compiled what she, with the help of the police department’s telephones and computers, had produced about Eriksson’s background. Jarnebring took it and started reading while Holt—for the millionth time—started thumbing through her own piles of papers.

  “Okay, it’s clear,” Jarnebring suddenly exclaimed. “Look at this,” he said, handing over the paper with Gunsan’s notes on Eriksson’s history.

  It appeared that Eriksson had worked as a mail carrier in Stockholm during the years from 1964 to 1975. First as a substitute mail carrier and then as a temporary, at the two post offices whose deli
very areas included Djurgården and the tonier parts of Östermalm. At the age of thirty-one, when he completed his part-time studies at the University of Stockholm with a degree in sociology, criminology, and education, he also quit the post office and got a job instead as an assistant statistician at the Central Bureau of Statistics.

  “But why did he steal books?” said Holt, looking inquisitively at Jarnebring.

  “Maybe he stole other things too,” Jarnebring sneered. “Who cares? This is already past the statute of limitations, and he’s dead anyway.”

  “But books,” Holt persisted.

  “I guess he liked to read,” said Jarnebring, smiling.

  Holt shook her head.

  “I think he was snooping,” she said. “I’m pretty sure that Eriksson was an extremely snoopy type.”

  In the afternoon the detective team met as usual and again took stock of how the investigation was going. As of yet nothing had been produced that was even reminiscent of a breakthrough.

  “I don’t understand this guy,” Jarnebring muttered. “He doesn’t seem to have known a soul. Well, besides those two you wanted to question,” he added, looking inquisitively at Bäckström. “How did that go, by the way?”

  “It’ll work out, it’ll work out,” said Bäckström evasively, and instead launched into a lengthy exposition of his pet homo theory, on which he and his colleagues had evidently put in some comprehensive work. Gunsan had searched out a large number of conceivable murderers of gay men, identified those who according to the computer already had something else going, for example, were sitting in prison or in one of the mental institutions for the criminally insane, and turned the rest back to Bäckström, Alm, and the others who had already questioned a number of them. Without any results, however.