The Hand that Trembles

by Kjell Eriksson

  According to the son, his father’s clients were mostly elderly women. One summer he worked at his father’s company and said it might as well have been a nursing home. He visited old people in Luthagen who had to sign documents. Company papers were probably no longer in existence.

  Jerker Bohlin had a faint memory of the fact that he, after his father’s death, had stored a couple of boxes with folders in a storage unit in Boländerna where he kept a few things he wanted to save but not ship across the Atlantic. He still retained a storage unit.

  He had naturally met Nils Dufva many times over the years but had no idea what tasks he had undertaken or how he had been as a person. Dufva was not a talkative sort. Bohlin remembered, however, that Dufva collected old coins.

  Berglund had the feeling that no one wanted to dig in all of this, at least no one who had any information, but he still received permission to look through the remaining documents in the storage unit.

  These turned out to be an unholy blend of copies of agreements, contracts, and estate inventories, spanning a period of twenty years. Berglund looked through the papers without encountering anything out of the ordinary. August Bohlin had clearly maintained his papers in an exemplary order; everything was sorted and numbered. On many of the documents, in his beautiful and delicate handwriting, he had made comments of an exceedingly personal character. In an estate inventory he might have said ‘a most honourable person who unfortunately passed away at too young an age’, whereas another one received the appraisal ‘a scrooge who never made anyone really happy except on aforementioned date’.

  Berglund had still taken the trouble to write down all the names that appeared in the documents, without nursing any real hope about its usefulness, and attached the list of names to the case files. Then he had returned the five boxes to the storage unit, contacted Jerker Bohlin, and asked him to keep the documents from his father’s agency.

  Now here he was, seven years later, at the Akademiska Hospital, looking through the materials. The leads were colder than ever. The ones who could talk were either old or gone for good, or simply unwilling to cast any light on Nils Dufva’s career.

  Whether Dufva’s past had anything to do with his murder was as unclear as before. If the intention had actually been to take out the old man then the deed was almost macabrely amateurish. A natural preventive measure would have been to try to conceal such a motive by stealing such items as could have been carried off, in order to make the whole thing appear as a straightforward robbery-killing.

  ‘Saab 9000,’ he muttered. ‘It pulls up, parks, drives away.’

  He could picture the whole scene: the curious neighbour, her hands in the dough, peeks out but turns away to take a tray of cinnamon buns out of the oven. The man gets out of the car and walks up to Dufva’s door. The concrete walkway is five, six metres long, the stairs have three steps.

  Does he walk straight in, does he ring the doorbell, or does he even have keys? Whichever it is, he gets inside. Dufva is in a wheelchair and defenceless against his attacker, who rushes toward him and hits him in the head. The power of the blow sends him tumbling to the floor with enough force to kill him instantly.

  Did the murderer bring the weapon or simply pick an object at the scene? Jenny Holgersson, the cousin twice removed, did not believe that anything had gone missing, but admitted that she did not have an exact inventory of all the items in the house. The murder weapon had never been located.

  The film played in Berglund’s head in meaningless reprise, but the sequences rolled of their own accord.

  His headache intensified. The effect of the tablets he had been given in the morning had worn off. He was still worried, although less so with each passing hour, that the operation would cause permanent damage, that he would lose his sense of balance, speech, or memory, or anything else that would happen to make a normal life impossible.

  He had attempted to walk in a straight line from the door to the window following a seam in the flooring. That he could manage. He had recited the names of all the towns in Skåne, Blekinge, and Halland, the capital cities of Europe, and the English football teams in the highest league. He had managed that too. He understood all the words in the Dufva files and when he read aloud to himself his tongue did not slip once. His handwriting was as even and legible as before.

  He would make a complete recovery. What was a little headache compared to when they carved in his head?

  He was going to struggle through the Dufva files one more time and find the despicable individual who had clubbed a defenceless eighty-five-year-old to death.

  Berglund got up and went back over to the window. He stood there for a long time looking down at the people in the street below and the small parking lot for which there was so much competition. Now they could come, the rascals from Violent Crimes.

  He glanced at the stack of papers on the night table and smiled to himself.

  NINETEEN

  Nilsson, Ottosson, Fredriksson, Haver, and Beatrice Andersson were all listening to Lindell’s lecture, but as if through a silent pact none of them revealed how comical her enthusiasm sounded. On the table she had spread out about a dozen photographs of the site and the surrounding area.

  She was talking about the archipelago.

  ‘It’s chilly out there now,’ Sammy Nilsson said.

  ‘Not really,’ Lindell said, ‘the sun was shining, it was idyllic.’

  ‘If it weren’t for that foot,’ Beatrice said roughly.

  Lindell shot her a look.

  ‘Can you describe the shoe?’ Haver asked.

  ‘One of those Chinese shoes made of cloth, with a strap across the foot, size five.’

  ‘It sounds more like a slipper this time of year.’

  Lindell smiled at Haver. He wanted to start bouncing off ideas.

  ‘Exactly,’ she said, and remembered at the same time that she had decided not to use that word so much.

  ‘So, you’re going to look into it?’

  Ottosson’s question was more of a formality. He knew now that it was Östhammar and not Öregrund, it was no longer an issue.

  Lindell nodded.

  ‘I started reading up on it last night.’

  She told them about Bosse Marksson observing fox tracks in the snow and getting the idea that an animal had dragged the foot to the spot. In fact he could not imagine another scenario. You just don’t go running around with a severed foot, as he put it.

  Ottosson smiled sweetly.

  ‘All right,’ he said. ‘If we look after things around here then you can head out to the coast. Or will you wait until tomorrow?’

  ‘I have some things to get done today,’ Lindell said, and stood up as she gave Beatrice a long look, but it was only now that she realised why Beatrice had had that expression and the ironic tone of voice.

  Her colleague had never made any bones about the fact that she found Lindell’s attachment to Edvard on Gräsö Island bordering on the unhealthy. During one party Ann Lindell had explained to Beatrice that she had left that episode behind her, but Beatrice – emboldened by wine – had told her to stop lying to herself and others. Why hadn’t she taken up with anyone new if Edvard was a closed chapter? Lindell had left the party.

  And now Beatrice had the stomach to joke at her expense at a case meeting. Lindell decided to ignore her.

  The night before, Lindell had called Elsa Persson’s home telephone repeatedly but no one answered.

  Even though Berglund had chosen another case, she had promised to contact the county commissioner’s wife, and therefore she decided to go out to see her. To be honest she was curious about what she looked like and above all how she had reacted to the news from India.

  Lindell fetched her car from behind the police building and drove out toward Luthagsleden Expressway. After a quarter of an hour she turned onto the street where Elsa Persson lived.

  Number 17 did not stand out noticeably from the row of houses that looked like a set of attached boxes. She p
arked, observed that the newspaper was still sticking out of the mailbox, got out of the car, and walked up the few steps to the front door. Not a sound could be heard on the cul-de-sac.

  The doorbell was discreet; a faint buzz sounded. After a second try and a minute’s pause she gave up.

  ‘Are you looking for Elsa?’

  Lindell turned. A woman had appeared in the door of the next house over.

  ‘Yes, actually. My name is Ann Lindell, from the Uppsala police.’

  ‘I see,’ the neighbour said doubtfully. ‘Are you investigating the accident? But then you would know …’

  ‘What accident?’

  ‘You haven’t heard?’

  Lindell walked closer to the low fence that separated the properties. She saw that the woman had been crying.

  ‘Maybe you could tell me what happened,’ Lindell said.

  She was invited into number 19 instead of 17 and got to hear the whole story at the kitchen table.

  ‘Did you know her husband?’ she asked when she had a clear understanding of the facts.

  ‘Of course,’ the woman said. ‘We lived right next door. And I know he has been seen in India recently. It must have been a shock for Elsa. Poor woman!’

  Lindell saw that the neighbour was close to tears again.

  ‘I know this is upsetting, but could you tell me a little more about Elsa?’

  The woman gave her a quick look.

  ‘What do we know about other people’s thoughts,’ she said finally.

  ‘But she must have said something.’

  ‘You say one thing, but maybe …’

  She fell silent.

  ‘Tell me what you’re thinking.’

  ‘Honestly speaking, I think she was just happy that Sven-Arne disappeared. But Elsa is so controlled, so measured when it comes to emotions. She was brought up that way. She is a teacher,’ she added after a short pause, as if this could further explain Elsa Persson’s reserve.

  ‘But then for some reason her world fell apart?’

  The neighbour nodded.

  ‘Could it be something financial?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Elsa managed well, and I don’t understand how a dead man’s unexpected return could disrupt her life in terms of money. But there was something that threw her completely off balance. She is not an absentminded person, she would never walk out in front of a car like that.’

  ‘Do you have any ideas?’

  ‘She talked about Sven-Arne’s uncle, Ante Persson. I have met him as well. He used to write letters to the editor. A real troublemaker, even in older days. He was against everything. Elsa has never liked him. I think – and now I am speculating – that the uncle said something when Elsa visited him right after she had been informed that Sven-Arne was still alive. He lives in a home – Ramund, I think it is – you know, the assisted living place in Eriksdal.’

  ‘What could he possibly have told her?’

  ‘Elsa said she had been betrayed. That uncle and Sven-Arne were close, maybe they had been in cahoots.’

  In cahoots, Lindell thought, and visualised two figures gathered around a pot of stew, nursing secrets.

  After a couple more minutes of conversation, Ann Lindell felt she had a clear picture of the situation. This restrained woman, Elsa Persson, had been completely thrown for a loop, that much was clear. It was enough to awaken Lindell’s curiosity, but she decided to drop the matter. Now at least there was something to report back to Berglund. Maybe he wouldn’t care, now that he had dusted off his old murder case, but she had done what was expected.

  TWENTY

  ‘There’s something I’ve been thinking about,’ Allan Fredriksson said.

  ‘I see,’ Lindell said flatly. She had hardly woken up. She looked at the time: a quarter past seven. Why is he calling so inhumanly early, she wondered, and immediately received her answer.

  ‘I’m going in for a procedure, so I thought I would catch you before you head out to the coast.’

  Lindell had not heard anything about a procedure.

  ‘I was looking at those photographs yesterday,’ Fredriksson continued. ‘Where they found the foot. There was a tree there, wasn’t there?’

  ‘Yes,’ Lindell said doubtfully, ‘there was …’

  ‘A pine,’ he determined. ‘At first I thought it was snow, but then I didn’t see snow in the other pictures.’

  ‘There was snow out there,’ Lindell said, completely baffled by what Fredriksson wanted. And what kind of examination was he undergoing?

  ‘But not at the scene?’

  ‘No, that area was in full sun, but where are you going with this? It’s a little hectic around here, Erik is eating breakfast.’

  ‘An eagle,’ Fredriksson said, his tone suddenly crisp. ‘The streaks on the tree are eagle droppings. It is an eagle tree.’

  Now Lindell sensed what he was getting at. She smiled to herself. Fredriksson was the division’s forest and bird fanatic.

  ‘It’s not a fox, it’s an eagle.’

  ‘You mean …’

  ‘Exactly, an eagle was sitting with the foot in the tree when something startled it, it lost its hold of the foot, and flew away. Eagles have favourite trees, a tall pine is excellent, it has a good lookout from there. Maybe it’s even a nesting tree.’

  Lindell had no problem imagining the eagle. She had seen many sea eagles at Gräsö Island. One winter’s day when she had been ice fishing with Edvard, five had been circling above the bay below Edvard’s house. She knew that they could get big, with two-and-a-half-metre wingspans, and that they could carry large prey. Viola, Edvard’s landlady, claimed once to have seen an eagle with a pig in its claws.

  ‘I don’t know if it means anything,’ Fredriksson said modestly, but had trouble concealing his satisfaction.

  ‘It could mean a great deal,’ Lindell said. ‘It could mean—’

  ‘—that the foot came from a long way away,’ Fredriksson inserted. Lindell was silent for a few moments. She visualised the bay with Bultudden Point on the other side.

  ‘What kind of procedure are you having?’

  ‘Routine examination,’ Fredriksson said.

  Lindell was tempted to ask more but ended the conversation by thanking him for the tip.

  ‘It’s nothing,’ Fredriksson said, and hung up.

  Meanwhile Erik had been trying to pour more yogurt into his bowl all by himself, but with mixed results, and had thereafter managed to tip the box of muesli on its side.

  ‘Good work,’ Lindell said. ‘We don’t need bowls anymore, we can eat straight off the table.’

  A couple of hours later she was back at the bay. ‘Bultudden,’ she murmured quietly to herself, and let her gaze sweep over the terrain and come to rest on the tall pine. The crown of the tree looked strange, the branches like fingers outstretched to the sky. It was probably the result of a lightning strike.

  Fredriksson’s theory that it could have been a nesting tree was not implausible. There were a number of old sticks in the palm that was created, but not enough for a whole nest. Perhaps the work had been interrupted.

  The remains of droppings on the trunk, dirty white streaks, had been left over a long period of time, that much she understood.

  The foot had been found next to the tree on a bed of pine needles. She decided to adopt the theory as her own, and dialled Bosse Marksson, who was in Forsmark checking on a series of summer cottage break-ins.

  He explained the way to Bultudden Point. There was no direct route from where Lindell was located, so she would have to retrace her steps to the main road, take a right turn north and drive a couple of kilometres, then turn south again.

  Lindell did not tell him why she wanted to go out to the point and Marksson did not appear the least curious. He also did not ask her why she wanted the mobile phone number of his friend who had discovered the foot.

  * * *

  She parked outside the first house half an hour later. Marksson had told her that there were sev
en properties on the point, but strangely enough none of them were holiday homes.

  Lindell stepped out of the car and looked the two-storeyed house up and down. She estimated it dated from the forties, now in terrible condition. The red siding was faded and flaking and the metal roof was corroded. Some twenty metres to the right there was an older barn and a few other smaller structures.

  Lindell thought she glimpsed movement in one of the windows and sensed that she was being observed. The gate was hanging on its post and the gravel path was thick with weeds. Beds planted with perennials lined either side of the path, the withered remains of which breathed neglect.

  When she was halfway to the house, the front door swung open and a man appeared. He was dressed in blue work clothes, and was about sixty and almost completely bald. He stared at Lindell for a couple of seconds before he launched into a string of invectives.

  ‘Go to hell! I said no, got it? The fact that he sent a woman doesn’t change anything.’

  Lindell stared back at him with astonishment. The outburst came completely unexpectedly and was so forceful it took her aback. He lifted one arm frenetically in a gesture that indicated she should leave, and his almost distorted facial features intensified with a next salvo.

  ‘Can’t you hear me? Go to hell!’

  He slammed the door hard. A flowerpot on the porch railing fell down and broke in two.

  Lindell walked over to the window where she had thought she had caught a glimpse of the man, took out her police identification, and held it up against the windowpane.

  After half a minute the door swung open again.

  ‘Who the hell are you, anyway?’

  ‘Are you always this hospitable?’ Lindell said with a smile.

  ‘Are you from the police?’