The Father: Made in Sweden Part I

by Anton Svensson

  Inside, the bank cashiers will be sitting behind their windows, and they need to be convinced that there are three adult males coming through those doors.

  The bulletproof vest took up so much space, pushing against his jumpsuit, making it difficult to move normally.

  You have to stand up straight when you walk. Put down your entire foot.

  And the submachine gun hanging diagonally over his shoulder still chafed like before.

  Imagine you weigh more, you’re heavy, and you know where you’re going.

  And no matter how much he looked into Leo’s neck, it felt as if he wasn’t getting any closer to the bank by being so careful to put down his entire foot.

  He wasn’t getting …

  He wasn’t …

  ‘Vincent?’

  Leo had stopped with only a single step left to the door. He turned round, put his hand on Vincent’s shoulder and spoke into the microphone they could all hear through their earphones.

  ‘You go straight through them.’

  A big brother’s voice inside his little brother’s head, one that had always been there. And now Leo moved his hand to his collar and the microphone in order to cover it, then leaned forward and with the other hand lifted Vincent’s ear protector.

  ‘Vincent?’

  And whispered.

  ‘You know I love you.’

  And then turned round, to the bank.

  Leo opened the glass doors, and Vincent followed him inside. I love you. Only Mamma ever said that. They walked through the narrow entrance, hot air blowing from above, and he wondered what Leo had really meant. Was he trying to make his little brother relax and walk like a man? Or maybe they were really going to die, and Leo knew it, but didn’t know how to say it.

  There was no longer any sound.

  It was silent as Leo fired eighteen shots at the surveillance camera, which turned inside out like a flower, long wobbly petals around a lens – silent as Jasper fired fifteen shots at the second camera, which fell apart, piece by piece, onto the floor.

  ‘Blue Four!’

  Leo shouted at him, lips moving behind the black fabric, but he didn’t even hear it.

  ‘Blue Four!’

  Vincent glanced towards the bodies crouched at his feet, their arms draped over their heads.

  ‘Blue Four – the cashier’s window!’

  And he started moving again.

  Towards the cashiers. He saw the woman in the yellow quilted jacket too late – stepped on her arm while the cashier slammed and locked the door, and threw herself down behind the counter.

  If the window was closed …

  If he couldn’t jump up on the counter and crawl through it …

  If he got stuck …

  ‘Sixty seconds!’

  Leo ran up beside him, shouting something, then that movement as he raised his rifle again, bouncing gently on his knee, his left hand against the wooden handle. Ten, twenty, thirty, forty shots.

  ‘Blue Four – now!’

  Suddenly Vincent was able to hear again. Everything was crystal clear.

  The glass hung in the air for a moment longer, as if the thousands of pieces had not yet understood that they should fall, and he rushed towards the cashier’s now missing window, wearing a vest that no longer felt tight, a belt that no longer chafed. He could hear the sole of his left boot crushing glass into the stone tiles as he took a run at it, a sharp, hissing sound as he landed on the cashier’s counter, the sole of his right boot grinding glass into the wooden panel, as if chewing on ice cubes, then both his boots hitting the floor on the other side, crushing shards into the carpet. And as he ran towards the inner door to let in Blue Three, then back towards the cashier screaming give me the keys to the vault, the voice he used sounded like the one he’d practised – and it worked. Fingers with red nail polish stretched up towards him, holding a set of keys.

  ‘Ninety seconds!’

  Leo was standing in the middle of the bank with six people at his feet: the young woman in the yellow quilted jacket who hadn’t made a sound when Vincent stepped on her; a man in a coat and brown loafers who refused to lie down until he forced him to with the butt of the gun; an elderly lady pressed against the counter following him with her eyes, not pleading, not afraid, more like she wanted to record what was happening; two guys behind a big palm tree near the front window around Vincent’s age, who would talk later of how they’d been there, in the middle of a robbery; and the woman holding a shopping bag, from which cornflakes and bread and a red container of baby formula had rolled out.

  ‘A hundred and twenty seconds!’

  From his station in the middle of the bank he was able to watch Blue Three open the door to the vault, shovel wads of cash from three shelves into his shoulder bag, and then shoot the safe open, and empty it of 500-kronor notes. Meanwhile, Blue Four moved methodically from till to till, knocking over the chairs that stood in his way, pulling out drawers and emptying the cash into his shoulder bag.

  Jasper was acting perfectly. Vincent was acting perfectly.

  Only Felix left.

  ‘Blue One to Blue Two.’

  He pulled the microphone on his collar closer to his mouth and looked through the window to the van, which still stood in the square with its engine running.

  ‘Do you see anything?’

  ‘I see something. You know the place next to the bank?’

  ‘I mean …’

  ‘The Ant Pizzeria. What a stupid fucking name.’

  ‘Blue Two … do you see anything?’

  ‘There are three men sitting in the window. They’ve each got a beer. They’re staring at me and drinking and …’

  ‘Damn it, Blue Two! Sirens, cops, do you see or hear anything?’

  ‘… they keep glancing over at the bank. Eating pizzas, with canned mushrooms and ham. They seem to be having a very nice time anyway.’

  A voice that often grumbled and questioned, but that you could always rely on. And because of that started talking about beer and canned mushrooms and three men in a pizzeria, calming his big brother who was standing on the other side of a display window, inside a bank, surrounded by terrified people, counting time.

  ‘A hundred and fifty seconds!’

  Time for Jasper to get out of the vault. For Vincent to finish with the cash tills. For Felix to start rolling the instant they came out of the bank. Leo would continue counting down, leaving the bank last and guarding their path to the getaway car.

  ‘A hundred and sixty seconds!’

  Vincent jumped over the counter, zigzagging between the bodies both on the floor and standing behind him. Felix hit the accelerator outside the window. And of course Leo stood still, watching, counting. Then one more shot was fired. Jasper. He should have been one step behind Vincent, but he was lingering in the vault, shooting the lock off the next safe, opening the next compartment packed with 500-kronor notes and stuffing them down into his bag.

  ‘A hundred and seventy seconds!’

  And the next safe.

  ‘A hundred and seventy-five seconds!’

  And the next safe.

  ‘A hundred and eighty seconds!’

  They had agreed to work together using a method that maximised profits without increasing risk – an agreement that Jasper was breaking. Again.

  ‘Out!’

  Leo took aim at the ceiling.

  ‘Get out!’

  And fired.

  ‘Out out out!’

  Two shots in the ceiling just above the vault. Drywall dust and plastic splinters fell onto the people hiding their faces on the floor. And it was as if Jasper suddenly understood – he dropped the box he’d just emptied, closed the bag’s zip and ran towards the entrance and the square and the car.

  32

  IT WAS ALWAYS cold in the cemetery. But somehow, when it was covered with leaves, it seemed warmer, wrapped up, cared for and protected.

  John Broncks wiped the water off a rickety bench and sat down.


  One of thirty thousand resting places in one of Sweden’s largest cemeteries. For a long time he’d avoided coming here. The headstone was beautiful. Black, smooth granite, not even twenty years old. He leaned over and adjusted a straggly brown plant that looked like heather, watered it a little. He wondered who’d put it there. He’d never done it. His mother? Why would she lay flowers on his father’s grave?

  Palm against the edge of the headstone. BORN. DIED. GEORGE BRONCKS. He’d been sixteen years old when the coffin had been lowered into its hole. And he remembered how heavy it had been on one side, that it had almost tipped over, and how his mother had stood nearby, weeping. Everyone else there was now a black mass in his memory – family, friends, and colleagues, people who John knew by name but whom he’d never met. The white tie had pinched his neck, and afterwards he’d untied it, burned it, vowed never to wear one again.

  Mamma had wanted to go there the next day.

  And he’d gone with her; he’d thought it was because she hadn’t been honest during the funeral – afraid that the black mass would be able to see what she really thought about her husband. But that wasn’t why. She still hadn’t absorbed what had happened, had really happened – she’d accepted being beaten, controlled day after day. The few times John had tried to talk to her about it, about what it had been like, she didn’t even seem to remember, what do you mean, as if it was held so far inside, you know what I mean, that his mother could no longer reach it, John, I don’t like it when you talk like that.

  They lay wreaths on the grave, said what you were supposed to say.

  John had stood beside her, and she’d stared vacantly at the pile of gravel, and he’d realised the real reason she was weeping: not for his father’s sake, but for Sam’s sake, who unlike her hadn’t surrendered, and it was probably at that moment that she’d decided to stop remembering.

  A few more drops of water.

  The car was waiting at the entrance, and he slowly left the stillness, heading along Solna Church Way towards the city. He was halfway to the police station when he heard the alarm for the first time.

  ‘Bank robbery. Svedmyra.’

  The other side of the city, too far away, so he drove on towards Kronoberg when the voice on the radio returned.

  ‘Heavily armed.’

  Something felt familiar.

  ‘Military-grade weapons.’

  Jafar. And Gobakk. He listened and changed direction, headed south.

  ‘Getaway car located 150 metres from the crime scene.’

  But this was strange.

  ‘A car park next to the Svedmyra Tunnelbana station.’

  Bank robbers don’t drive 150 metres, park their getaway car, take out their tickets, and ride away on the Tunnelbana.

  ‘The suspects have not left the car.’

  John Broncks grabbed his radio and spoke into the microphone.

  ‘Broncks, City Police, here. Repeat.’

  ‘The suspects have NOT left the car.’

  What hadn’t made sense before, made even less sense now. After only a few seconds of driving, they’d parked at the nearest Tunnelbana station. And then stayed there.

  Inside the car.

  Just before the crossing, a policeman in a neon chartreuse police vest waved him to the side of the road. And there, just after the junction, near the crime scene, sat the rotating blue lights of two police cars parked diagonally across the road.

  ‘Sorry, this road is closed. I’ll have to ask you to either turn around or take the exit to the right or left.’

  Broncks searched his inside jacket pocket for his black leather badge, an ID with a shield of yellow, blue and red.

  ‘John Broncks, Detective Department.’

  A young face, reflected in the light of the torch, examined his badge and nodded. Broncks was used to it. Every time he went through passport control, the officer would compare the picture with the real thing several times before being able to grasp his neutral appearance.

  ‘They’re apparently still there.’

  ‘I heard that.’

  ‘Heavily armed.’

  ‘I heard that, too.’

  He moved aside and shouted towards the other side of the intersection – one of ours, let him through – while Broncks rolled up his window and left the worried face of the young police officer behind, zigzagging between the slanted police cars, continuing down the completely deserted road. The Tunnelbana track, which at this time of day usually had trains barrelling down it every other minute, also lay deserted. That’s what he’d just seen in his young colleague’s eyes – everything that was normal had disappeared and his sense of security had gone with it.

  He slowed down at a roundabout. Blue and white plastic tape swayed in the evening breeze in front of the bank on Svedmyra Square.

  He parked on the cycle path and hurried through the wet grass.

  ‘How many in position?’

  The first policeman in uniform was waiting at the edge of the modest car park, taking cover between the large pillars. Broncks turned towards one of them, the same age, tall, someone he recognised whose name he couldn’t remember, a sergeant from the Södertörn police.

  ‘A team has been placed up on the platform. One team behind the kiosk, over there. One team on the walkway, by the hospital. There’s a team on the large plot of land over by that house, there, with its lights on.’

  The nameless man pointed in various directions, and John Broncks felt embarrassed. He should know his name.

  ‘And in front of us there – a SWAT team is preparing to engage.’

  There wasn’t much to the parking area. Ten spaces wedged between concrete pillars. The sort of place he’d usually pass by without even seeing it. Badly lit by the streetlamps. Two parked vehicles. An older, brown Ford with the sort of frame that rattled every time it drove over a speed bump. And a Dodge van, yellow, or at least he thought so – the colour blended into the darkness, and the only thing that was clear were the huge letters that spelled out HEATING SOLUTIONS on both sides.

  ‘Why the hell would you rob a bank and stay within sight of it?’

  The nameless man stared at the getaway car. He’d been standing like that when Broncks arrived – as if he was being sucked inside it.

  ‘John? Do you get it? It’s so fucking ostentatious! Rob a bank, get in your car, drive 150 metres, park. And then … wait.’

  John. He’d said his name. It was too late. Now it was Broncks’s turn to say a name, to prove recognition, acknowledge that they’d met before.

  ‘No …’

  Guilt. Damn. In the midst of pursuit of four violent bank robbers? It felt as if he were marginalising someone who remembered him and his name.

  ‘… I don’t get it either.’

  ‘Everyone in position.’

  The nameless man had his radio on his right collar, a clear loud voice that should have been quieter to avoid being heard inside the van.

  ‘Forced entry in five, four, three, two, one … now.’

  Then out of the darkness men emerged one by one, in black, with helmets, flak jackets, guns cocked – eight bodies in a single motion. John Broncks had seen this several times before. And he’d felt it several times before. Getting into position for a confrontation with violence and force. He’d never seen a bank robbery in progress, but he’d examined the surveillance images later many times, and it was clear that the police in uniform circling the vehicle were guided by the same motivations as those wearing ski masks inside – meet my enemies, see if I have what it takes, find out if I can accomplish what I’ve been training for without suffering any losses.

  Eight shadows moving forward.

  One stayed at the concrete pillars and took aim at the driver’s seat. Two knelt and aimed at the long windowless side of the van. Two continued to the other side of the vehicle and aimed at the rear doors.

  He couldn’t even feel the breath on the back of his neck any more. The nameless man had stopped breathing, as if with each inhal
ation and exhalation he’d been bringing the images from inside the van into himself, and now held them, frozen.

  Two of the three officers from the SWAT team continued towards the vehicle, stopped one parking space away and peered into the cab. Empty. Whoever was hiding inside was at the back of the van and every weapon was aimed there.

  One officer left.

  One officer who crept up to the side door, shone his torch at it.

  The van was unlocked.

  He put his left hand gently on the handle, pulled the door aside quickly and threw himself to the ground.

  No explosions flashed in the darkness.

  No shots echoed against the concrete.

  No screams, no hatred, just a voice over the radio.

  ‘The van is empty.’

  33

  LEO SHOOK THE beautiful bottle and the cork popped. The Pol Roger champagne bubbled over the sides of the narrow glasses as they toasted their first bank robbery, singing and hugging each other. Anneli drank up and refilled her glass. Vincent, who hadn’t said a word since they stood outside the bank, raised his glass and howled just as Felix had howled, out of the self-control that had kept them all together, which they could return to and draw strength from when needed. Jasper talked and talked about how he’d shot open every compartment in the vault and made another toast, voice bubbling over with champagne.

  ‘Everyone in position.’

  They fell silent, leaned forward, listening to the police scanner in the middle of the coffee table among half-full beer glasses and newly opened whisky bottles.

  ‘Forced entry in five …’

  A scratchy voice counted down as eight fully armed members of the SWAT team gradually approached the plumber’s van.

  ‘… four, three, two, one …’

  Now the voice fell silent, just as the voices in this room had, and they perceived new sounds. Not words, but still a language.

  the scrape of feet

  harsh breathing

  a car door squeaking

  And then.

  The most powerful and clear sound.

  silence

  The silence that occurs when a group stands close together, listening to an opponent who is defeated.