Last Will

by Liza Marklund

  “Christ …” Annika said.

  She sat quietly for a minute, thinking hard.

  “Mind you, we’re hardly alone in this,” she eventually said. “The CIA have evidently been hiring private planes and gone around picking up people from all over Europe in the past few years.”

  “They’ve given him a life sentence in Jordan,” Berit said. “They tortured him with beatings and electric shocks until he confessed; then a military tribunal declared that he was guilty of planning and carrying out acts of terrorism. His lawyer wasn’t allowed to call any witnesses, and the verdict can’t be appealed against. He’ll end up dying in that prison, and his daughters will never see their father again.”

  Berit moved her chair back to her desk. Annika stared at her for a few seconds.

  “How the hell did you find out about this?” she asked.

  “Fatima has visited him in prison, and he told her he’d been tortured.”

  “And the CIA?”

  “I got hold of the details of the plane. A Raytheon Hawker 88XP, registration number N168BF. It’s owned by a small American company.”

  “And?” Annika said.

  Berit looked up at her.

  “I called and said I’d like to hire it.”

  “And?”

  “They said they only have one client: the American state.”

  “Christ,” Annika said again.

  “Patrik’s checked out the plane, it’s been flying around picking up people all over the world. It often takes them to Cuba, to Guantánamo.”

  “But someone has to be responsible for this,” Annika said. “Someone has to be made to answer for this! Sweden’s a constitutional state—we don’t send people to be tortured and killed.”

  “The government claims that they were given guarantees by the authorities in Jordan: Jemal was going to receive a fair trial and obviously not be tortured. Well, we can see now how much that promise was worth.”

  “When are we running this?”

  “Tomorrow, I hope,” Berit said, standing up. “I’ve got to go. I’ve got a meeting with the foreign minister.”

  “You won’t get anything out of her,” Annika said.

  “Of course not,” Berit said, as she picked up her handbag and headed out.

  Annika sat down at Berit’s desk and started making phone calls.

  No answer from Birgitta Larsén, either at work or at home in Bisittargatan.

  Q’s number redirected her to reception.

  The duty desk of the crime unit was still refusing to comment on Ernst Ericsson’s death.

  The press office merely referred to a press conference planned for later that afternoon.

  She tried to find Ernst Ericsson’s children in the national database, hoping to find a son of the right age, but the surname threw up far too many results. And it turned out his ex-wife had moved to Provence.

  She called the Nobel Forum and spoke to a very polite but apologetic secretary who was unable to tell her anything about anything.

  Shit, this was hopeless!

  Perhaps Ebba knew something.

  She pulled out her cell phone and checked the number she had saved in its memory.

  “Hello?”

  “Ebba!” Annika said. “God, am I glad to hear your voice!”

  “Annika?”

  Ebba sounded surprised and slightly worried.

  “Yes! Have you heard what’s happened?”

  There was a lot of noise at the other end of the line.

  “What? Has there been a breakin? A fire?”

  Annika blinked several times; her eyes felt gritty.

  “A breakin? No, no, nothing to do with the house. It’s Ernst. Ernst Ericsson. You haven’t heard the news?”

  “I’m in the car, on my way down to the Co-op in Vansbro, in Dalarna, to pick up some food and a paper.”

  All of the sudden the call wasn’t so straightforward anymore.

  “Ernst Ericsson is dead,” Annika said. “He died last night.”

  There were a few moments of silence on the line.

  “Ebba?”

  “Yes, I’m here. Are you sure?”

  “The police think he was murdered.”

  “You’re kidding?” Ebba said.

  “I’m afraid not,” Annika said.

  “Murdered, how?”

  “Don’t know yet—they haven’t released the cause of death.”

  The news in the background got quieter; it sounded like Ebba had pulled over to the side of the road and stopped.

  “That’s awful,” she said. “I only saw him on Saturday.”

  “I know,” Annika said. “You said you were going to go to that seminar. How was it—was it good?”

  “Really good, but there was a bit of a fuss afterwards. Lars-Henry Svensson came to the buffet, and he was completely out of control. It ended up with the police coming out to pick him up. I feel so sorry for him.”

  “And he spoke to Ernst?”

  “I don’t know—I think so. He probably spoke to everyone. Why do you ask?”

  “The police have pulled Lars-Henry in for questioning,” Annika said.

  Ebba snorted audibly.

  “That’s ridiculous,” she said. “Lars-Henry would never hurt a fly.”

  Cliché of the month, Annika thought.

  “Did he say anything to you?”

  Ebba sighed.

  “He was angry because he thinks I bought my way into the scientific community, and he can’t seem to forgive me for that. He doesn’t mean anything by it—he’s completely harmless. You’ll see—the police are bound to let him go soon.”

  Annika heard Ebba put the car in gear again, then the crunch of gravel as she pulled away.

  Suddenly she had a flashback to her own car, standing at the traffic lights at the end of Barnhusbron the day before, a red Volvo station wagon in the next lane, a woman behind the wheel.

  “Where are you?” she asked.

  “I’ve just passed Hulån, and I’m on my way to Skamhed.”

  “You weren’t in Stockholm just after lunchtime yesterday?”

  “I should be back tomorrow afternoon, unless I have to set off earlier because of this business with Ernst. Well, I suppose I’d better …”

  Annika closed her eyes and tried to imagine Ebba driving her car, listening hard to see if she could pick up any sounds in the background. What did it look like outside the car? Dark pine forest? A built-up area? Surely she ought to be able to tell the difference?

  “Sure,” Annika said. “Call me if there’s anything you want to know.”

  And she hung up. She held the cradle down for a couple of seconds, then dialed the reception desk of the Karolinska Institute.

  Asked for Sören Hammarsten.

  Not available.

  Asked for Ernst Ericsson’s personal secretary.

  Was told he wasn’t there.

  She hung up and stared at the screen of Berit’s computer.

  Who else could she call? Who might know something about what happened on Saturday? The people who were there, obviously, but who would want to talk to her?

  She picked up the phone and dialed the Karolinska Institute again.

  “I was wondering if you had a Bernhard Thorell there?”

  There was the sound of tapping on a keyboard.

  “Thorell, with an h?”

  “I think so.”

  More tapping.

  “Yes, I’ve got him here. It’s a cell phone number. Wait a moment and I’ll connect you.”

  The phone rang again, three, four, five times …

  “Thorell.”

  Annika took a deep breath and cleared her throat.

  “Yes,” she said, “good afternoon, my name’s Annika Bengtzon and I’m calling from the Evening Post. We met very briefly yesterday, in the animal-testing lab. I was there with Birgitta Larsén …”

  “Ah yes,” he said. “The doctoral student.”

  Annika smiled.

  “Am I ph
oning at a bad time?”

  “That depends on what you’re phoning about,” the pharmaceutical company boss said, and it sounded like he was smiling back at her.

  “The death last night,” she said. “I’m interested in how it might affect your work.”

  “As far as I’m aware, the matter is being investigated by the police,” Bernhard Thorell said. “Obviously, it’s very tragic, but it won’t have any noticeable impact on our research project.”

  His accent was upper-class Swedish, not American English.

  “One professor is dead,” Annika said, “and a second is being questioned about the incident. Surely that would affect relations and the working atmosphere within the Institute? I know they had an argument after the seminar on Saturday, and I know you were there …”

  He breathed in so quickly and hard that Annika paused.

  “I don’t know what that was about at all,” he said rather abruptly, “so naturally I can’t say anything about it.”

  “I completely understand,” Annika said. “I just wanted to get an impression of what happened that evening, and I know that Lars-Henry confronted several other people, yourself included.”

  Thorell was quiet for several seconds.

  “In and of itself, that is correct.”

  “I realize that you don’t want to speak out of turn,” she said, “but I was wondering if you might be able to tell me what Lars-Henry said to you personally?”

  There was the sound of crackling on the line.

  “I have a lunch appointment at the faculty club,” Bernhard Thorell said. “Meet me outside there in half an hour.”

  He clicked to end the call without waiting for an answer.

  The faculty club?

  Was that the same thing as the Black Fox?

  Annika parked her car outside an old wooden building at number 2 Nobels väg. It was a red-painted cottage with yellow shutters outside the windows and white curtains. She got out, locked the car, and peered curiously through one of the windows. It looked like they were holding some sort of conference in there.

  With its mature trees and extensive lawns, the whole area exuded a sense of peace and quiet, with the noise of the expressway only audible as a distant rumble in the background. Ponytails and shirttails alike fluttered in the wind, the sound of footsteps and laughter echoing between the buildings. The spokes of bicycle wheels twinkled from the footbridge over to the Karolinska Hospital.

  Annika walked slowly down the dead-end road, passing the Medical Society and a Friskis & Svettis gym, heading for the restaurant where she had eaten lunch with Ebba and Birgitta last week. Yes, the faculty club was the Black Fox. She checked her watch, she was on time. Just to be sure she walked past the windows, looking in, but she couldn’t see any sign of Bernhard Thorell, nor of Birgitta Larsén, for that matter.

  She sat down on the steps leading up to the copper door.

  The sun was beating down on her head, and she turned her face to the warmth and closed her eyes.

  Lovely—she had forgotten how delicate sunlight could feel.

  Still with her eyes shut, she let her head fall forward and realized she was on the point of dozing off. She jerked and shook herself, pushing her hair back from her face.

  Bernhard Thorell was heading toward her from further inside the campus, his hands in his trouser pockets. His suit, gray and ever so slightly shiny, fit his body like a second skin. The wind ruffled his hair, and his eyes wrinkled as he squinted against the sun.

  I can see why Birgitta Larsén is so taken with him, Annika thought as she stood up and went to meet him.

  He took his hands out of his pockets and they greeted each other.

  “Sometimes Sweden really is lovely,” he said, his eyes looking her over.

  She realized to her surprise that she felt flattered, a little shiver of heat running through her body. She pulled her hand away.

  “So have you moved here for good?” she asked brightly.

  Bernard Thorell laughed, flashing his even white teeth.

  “Not at all,” he said. “I kept the family farm in Roslagen after my parents’ accident, and I try to spend at least a week or two there every year, to keep in touch with my roots.”

  Annika’s smile stiffened—was his parents’ accident something she should have known about?

  “Your parents?” she asked, feeling very stupid.

  He looked down at the gravel for a moment, then met her gaze with a hint of melancholy in his bright eyes.

  “They died when I was a teenager,” he said.

  Hadn’t Berit said something about them, about his father being a venture capitalist, and a car crash in the Alps?

  “Oh,” she said, “I’m sorry.”

  He smiled.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ve gotten over it—it was years ago now. Right now I’m only here to see how work on our research project is going.”

  Annika snuck a glance at him. He was taller that he looked when you saw him from a distance.

  “Is it going to lead to a Nobel Prize?”

  “For this?”

  He laughed.

  “You never know. There are so many worthy candidates, and often you don’t know until later which discoveries are going to stand the test of time, so that’s not a good way to tell. Nobel wanted the prize to benefit humanity in the long term, so it’s a good thing that the Committee takes its time making its choice. You wanted to know what Professor Svensson said to me?”

  “If you don’t mind telling me …”

  Bernhard Thorell looked out across the grass, deep in thought for a few moments.

  “The professor was very critical about our work,” he finally said. “Because we’ve found a way to slow down the ageing process, even to stop it. He accused us of wanting to discover the secret of eternal life, but that isn’t what our research is about at all.”

  “He thinks you’re playing at being God,” Annika said with a smile.

  Bernhard Thorell smiled back at her.

  “Sadly it isn’t possible to conduct any sort of reasonable discussion with the dear fellow. I would have to describe him as a fairly extreme creationist.”

  “So the pharmaceutical industry is the jaws of the monster?”

  “Exactly. And we have to watch out, because otherwise retribution awaits.”

  He said these last words in a hoarse voice with his eyes wide-open. Annika laughed.

  “So Nemesis is going to punish you?” she said, and Bernhard Thorell’s smile grew wider. Two dimples appeared in his cheeks, and the color of his eyes looked deeper. Annika looked into them and thought oh no, not again, not another Bosse, but she still couldn’t help smiling back.

  “So you know about Nemesis?” Bernhard Thorell said, taking a step closer to her.

  “The goddess of retribution,” Annika said. “And the title of a play by Alfred Nobel.”

  He tilted his head, smiling so that his teeth sparkled.

  “Not many people know that,” he said. “That Alfred Nobel was so interested in Beatrice Cenci.”

  He was standing so close that Annika’s head was spinning.

  “She was a fascinating woman, who met a very nasty end,” Annika said, thinking that her voice sounded strange, too high, too soft.

  He bowed his head while keeping his eyes on hers, then stuck his hands in his trouser pockets, making the shoulders of his jacket ride up slightly.

  God, Annika thought, he’s so handsome.

  “So young,” he said quietly, “and so beautiful …”

  It sounded as if he were caressing her.

  “I know,” Annika said breathlessly. “She was incredibly beautiful. Ebba, my neighbor, has a painting of her in her living room …”

  All of a sudden there was total silence between them. Bernhard Thorell was staring at her, the glint in his eye dissolving and fading away.

  “Not the one by Guido Reni?”

  Annika searched her memory, who did Ebba say had painted i
t?

  “I don’t know—I can ask,” she said with a confused little smile, taking a step back.

  “Ebba?” Bernhard Thorell said. “Not the one working here at the lab? Ebba Romanova?”

  Annika nodded—yes, that was her.

  His smile was back, just as warm as before.

  “Imagine,” he said, “what a small world.”

  And he turned without another word and went inside the Black Fox.

  The Kitten hung the bag holding her tennis racket higher on her shoulder and took hold of the bicycle’s handlebars with both hands. She let her ponytail fall down her back as she adjusted the visor over her eyes, her tennis shoes scraping the tarmac under her feet. Okay, off we go, and the bastard bike rolled along beautifully beside her. If there was one thing she was good at, it was melting into affluent suburban settings.

  This was the first time she had found anything remotely good about this bastard country. For the first time she had found a shred of a reason for these people to live up here at the North Pole.

  Naturally, she knew why—she didn’t need a shrink to explain her reasoning: the area reminded her of where her dad lived just outside Boston, where he moved after the divorce. Big, comfortable detached houses in muted colors. Small-paned windows that shimmered unevenly in the sun. Well-clipped lawns and blossoming fruit trees in spacious gardens, behind neatly painted fences and trimmed hedges.

  She had to admit she was surprised.

  There was some civilization up here, after all.

  The exception was that silly little reporter’s horrible modern monstrosity.

  On a flat patch of ground cut up by tire tracks she had chucked up a showy white house with dead architecture, with no sense of tradition or proportion. It had been easy to find the plan of the house in an old ad on the Internet. All open-plan and so-called modern on the ground floor, and four bedrooms upstairs. You didn’t have to be Einstein to work out how the Bengtzon family used the rooms.

  The two bedrooms at the front of the house were where the little darlings slept, blue curtains with pictures of toys on them for the boy, pastel-colored with flowers for the girl. Christ, it made her want to throw up. At the back lay the master bedroom and a small office, where Ms. Bengtzon had nice, tidy sex with her dull bureaucrat husband and wrote her nasty little articles.