The Beast (ewert grens)

by Anders Roslund

  LÅ: Mr Steffansson, I must remind you that Sweden, like very many other countries, has outlawed the death penalty.

  FS: If the police had managed to catch him in the end the likely sentence would’ve been closed psychiatric care. It’s even easier to escape from institutions like that.

  LÅ: Where does that take your argument?

  FS: Obviously, putting Bernt Lund away inside, anywhere, means nothing more than delaying the inevitable. Sooner or later he is back on the run, ready to kill more children.

  LÅ: And so it follows that you have the right to act as police, prosecutor, judge and executioner?

  FS: You deliberately pretend not to understand me. You twist what I say.

  LÅ: Not at all.

  FS: I can only repeat what I’ve said before. I didn’t kill Lund because I personally wanted to punish him or get anything else out of it. I killed him because, for as long as he was alive, he was dangerous. It was like what people do with a mad dog.

  LÅ: A mad dog?

  FS: The reason for killing a rabid dog is that it is a risk to others. Bernt Lund was a rabid dog. I did what anyone might’ve done.

  After every stage in the court proceedings she spent a long time waiting around, hoping that he would be escorted past her. She wanted to see him. They might even exchange a word or two. She tried different exits and entrances in turn, but saw neither him nor his guards.

  After the first day, he stopped shaving and bothering with a tie. She felt that he cared less and less, that he was about to give up. Now and then they exchanged glances and she tried to look very calm and reassuring, as if she knew it would turn out all right in the end.

  Agnes no longer came along.

  A few journalists had dropped out, but one of the two policemen on the case was there every day. She spoke a little to Sundkvist and liked his mild-mannered style; he was much easier to relate to than most police.

  Every day she drove back to Strängnäs and the home that belonged to them both. She had trouble sleeping at night.

  He got out at his familiar metro station and strolled slowly home through the quiet suburban streets, humming a little to himself. It was that kind of evening, mild and warm and somehow long, as if the next day was far away.

  The moment Lars Ågestam turned into his own street, he saw it. The car was eye-catching, the black lettering distinct against its shiny red surface.

  The letters were bounding along, attacking him.

  Peddo lover.

  You fuck kids.

  Arsehole.

  Who’s the psychopath?

  The words had been painted on both doors. And on the roof. And on the bonnet. Whoever it was had announced his hatred with spray paint and destruction. If something could be broken, it had been. All the car windows were reduced to splinters, the headlamps had been ruined and the mirrors were simply gone.

  He remembered vomiting with fear in the CPS toilet when he learned what kind of case he was landed with. Somehow he had foreseen all this.

  And then here was his house. It was a solid bungalow from the forties with a finish of yellow render. A bevy of relatives had come to help him put on a coat of fresh yellow paint that summer. Now the black letters screamed at him from the bright background, running all the way across the façade, starting at the kitchen window, over the door and on to the sitting room window. The black spray paint looked the same as on the car, and the writing did too.

  That alien hand had written one sentence.

  You will die soon, arselicker.

  Marina, his wife, was in the front garden, just metres away from the huge, angular letters, swinging in the hammock they had bought in a sale just a week ago.

  Her eyes were closed and she seemed utterly detached.

  He went up to her, but she said nothing, only coughed nervously. He hugged her.

  The trial had been going on for three days. What had to happen finally did. Public awareness of the father who had shot his daughter’s killer and killed him, risking a lifetime in prison, had permeated everything.

  That threatening being, the faceless citizen, acted accordingly.

  He couldn’t bear to stay in a house with letters sprayed all over it. He had got out of bed to empty his bladder and couldn’t get back to sleep, just lay there, his nakedness uncovered to let Marina have the duvet, searching the shadowy ceiling for answers.

  He thought about his battered car. The spray-painted text, telling him what he was.

  He was an arsehole. A psychopath. He loved paedophiles. He fucked children.

  Marina’s red and swollen eyes had avoided meeting his. She kept looking away. When he asked if she had been frightened, she shook her head, and when he wanted to know if she had been hurt or abused in any way, she shook her head, and when he held her tight, she turned away. In bed she lay facing the wall, leaving him alone with his psychopathy and his ruined car. After a while his breathing deepened, she noticed, but she kept staring at the wall until he had whispered her name again and again and she yielded, slipping into his arms and asking him to forgive her. Their skin, their nakedness touched and they made love for longer than they normally did; afterwards they held each other for a while before she turned back to face the wall again.

  He had to get up.

  Wandering naked round the house, he checked the time. Half past three. He made himself a mug of coffee, poured a glass of milk and another of orange juice, got out bread and cheese. He started reading yesterday’s papers, looking for what all the media called the paedophilia trial and marvelling at the space allocated to it, page after page of text and pictures.

  But it didn’t work; his fears, his restlessness, his anger were whirling inside him and he couldn’t just sit there drinking coffee.

  He went back into the bedroom, dressed and picked up his briefcase, then kissed Marina’s shoulder, and when she twitched and opened her eyes he explained where he was going, that he wanted to think in peace while the city woke. She murmured something he couldn’t catch. When he left, her back was almost up against the wall.

  He walked slowly, wanting to be alone with his thoughts in the sleeping city. But before he set out, after walking the seven paces along the path of concrete slabs set into the lawn, he turned round to take it all in.

  You will die soon, arselicker.

  The early-morning light seemed to magnify the letters and make their blackness more prominent. The writing was crude and had an awkward stiffness that made the whole thing look unreal. Surely it would all fade and vanish, dribble off the wall into sticky puddles among the roses in the border?

  Then he passed his car, new a year ago. He had borrowed to cover the cost. It was vandalised beyond all hope, wrecked like the cars he’d seen in the far-flung suburbs of Latin American cities. It would be taken away. Would the intrusive words go away?

  It took him two hours to walk from the western suburbs to the city centre, carrying his jacket over his shoulder and the briefcase in his hand. His black shoes didn’t fit him too well and pinched here and there, but he had time to think, to try to understand.

  What was all this about? He had wanted to be a prosecutor and that was what he did. He had been looking for a big case, and that was what he’d got. End of story. He wasn’t up to it, he was too young, not mature enough. Not good enough.

  An important brief meant getting lots of attention. Threats, as well as praise, were a consequence of being in the spotlight. Sure, he knew that. He had seen it affect older colleagues. Why did some vulgar graffiti scare him?

  He knew, but couldn’t tell why it should be so, that their lovemaking in the midst of Marina’s silence meant that he was alienated from who he had been. He had lost a dream and would age abruptly as he carried this trial to its conclusion, pushing for the maximum sentence. Afterwards? A desert. Nothing was self-evident any more. But, seemingly, he was on his own.

  He got to Scheele Street just after six o’clock. The Old Court was silent and still. A couple of gulls were rifli
ng through the bins. Thanks to a helpful nightwatchman he had spent so many nights and early mornings here that in the end the magistrates had relented and, uniquely, allowed him his own set of keys. The young prosecutor had spent a significant part of his life in the old stone building.

  He climbed the massive staircase all the way to the secure courtroom, went to sit in the place he occupied during the trial and opened his folder, spreading out the documents first on the tabletop and then, when he ran out of room, on the floor.

  He had been working for forty-five minutes when the door opened.

  ‘Hey, Ågestam.’

  The rough voice was only too familiar. It was actually hateful. He kept his eyes on his work.

  ‘Look, your wife told me that I could find you here. I’m sorry, I think I woke her.’

  Grens didn’t ask if he was welcome. He limped inside. His shoes had hard leather soles and his right footfall echoed round the room. Passing behind Ågestam, he glanced quickly at the pile of papers and went to sit in the judge’s seat.

  ‘That’s what I do. Start early, when it’s quiet. No fucking idiots around to annoy me.’

  Ågestam carried on as he was, checking points of law, memorising questions, arranging observations.

  ‘Can’t you stop doing whatever it is when I’m talking to you?’

  Ågestam turned, furious, facing the intruder.

  ‘Why should I? You have no fucking time for me. It’s mutual.’

  ‘That’s why I’m here.’ Grens fiddled with the judge’s gavel and cleared his throat. ‘I’ve made… an error of judgement.’

  Ågestam became still, in mid-movement, his eyes fixed on the older man, whose face was strained as he searched for words.

  ‘When I’ve made an error I admit it.’

  ‘Very well.’

  ‘And I was wrong this time. I should’ve taken your ramblings seriously.’

  The large, worn courtroom was as silent as the quiet streets outside, this early morning on a warm summer’s day.

  ‘You should’ve had police protection. You’ll get it. We have a patrol car in place outside your home already. There’s a car downstairs as well. The officer is on his way here to see you.’

  Ågestam went to the window. Just then a policeman shut the door to his car and turned to walk towards the front steps of the court building.

  The young prosecutor sighed. He felt suddenly very tired, as if the sleep he had missed that night was claiming him now.

  ‘It’s rather late in the day,’ he said.

  ‘That’s a fact.’

  ‘Yes, yes. Too true.’

  Grens was still holding the gavel. He swung it, made a sharp noise that bounced off the walls.

  He had said what he had come to say, but still gave no sign of leaving and didn’t speak either. Ågestam felt tense. The crippled old bugger simply sat there. What was he waiting for?

  ‘Are you done? I’m here to work.’

  Grens didn’t answer, only smacked his lips irritatingly.

  ‘Is that a signal? The all-clear?’

  ‘One other thing. I’ve bought one of those CD players. I put it in my room, next to the tape recorder. I can play that disc of yours now.’

  He stayed there, sitting quietly in the judge’s seat. Ågestam got on with his work, trying to muster the arguments that would persuade the media-conscious magistrates that a premeditated murder was simply that, and hence must be judged accordingly, regardless of any other circumstances. He wrote, scribbled out, reformulated. Grens, leaning back and staring at the ceiling, seemed half asleep, only making his presence felt now and then by that maddening noise with his lips.

  By half past eight, voices from outside reached them. People were shouting, loudly enough for the sound to get through the double windowpanes.

  They both went over to have a look and opened a window, letting in a gust of warm, gentle air. The open place in front of the court was no longer empty. They both started counting; roughly two hundred people had come along. They were facing the main entrance. The crowd was in perpetual motion; it looked like a collection of charged particles with waves of movement going through it, pulsating as people advanced towards the entrance and were pushed back by a line of policemen carrying plastic shields.

  People were shouting and waving placards. It was a loud demonstration against the judicial process that was about to start up again in half an hour’s time. These people wanted to show their anger and scorn against a society that couldn’t protect them and yet was prepared to convict a lone citizen who had tried to act in their defence.

  Grens and Ågestam exchanged a glance, and Grens shook his head.

  ‘What do they think they’re doing? As if that bloody racket would make a difference. They’re off their fucking heads. Our boys won’t let them in, threatening behaviour or not.’

  A stone flew through the air and hit a policeman at the end of the line. Ågestam shuddered instinctively, suddenly reminded of his house and his car, and of Marina, who perhaps was awake by now. She would see the patrol car, it would surely comfort her. He met Grens’ eyes again and felt he had to explain.

  ‘They’re scared, nothing more or less. Scared of sex offenders to the point of blind hatred. If a father kills one of them, he’ll naturally become a popular hero. He was the one who did what they’d like to but don’t dare to do.’

  Grens snorted.

  ‘You know what? I’ve got no time for mobs. All my life I’ve gone for them, broken them up. But not all mobs are the same. That man was a hero, they didn’t make him one. He did what we couldn’t. He eliminated a public menace.’

  Reinforcements were arriving. The dozen police in front of the court were backed up by another twelve, arriving in two mini-buses. The buses came to a sudden halt when two of the demonstrators walked towards them and the men in full riot gear rushed out to join their colleagues. The wall of men and shields grew more solid.

  Slowly the crowd calmed down. It stayed watchful, but the shouting grew less strident and the anger less obvious.

  Ågestam closed the window and the room was silent again. He had barely been able to stop himself from jabbing Grens with his elbow. There was something overbearing in the man’s tone of voice, something that irritated him like hell. Why was he always like that? Instead he started to review aloud the arguments he would soon use to the court.

  ‘I don’t understand this, Grens. How do you mean, a hero who has eliminated a menace?’

  ‘Steffansson made people feel safer.’

  ‘He’s a murderer. Lund was a murderer. Two of a kind. The people down there seem to think he shouldn’t be tried at all. Are we meant to regard personal courage as a mitigating circumstance? I don’t think so.’

  ‘I can only repeat that his action meant protection. Nobody else had given them that.’

  It seemed all ordinary people agreed that he had screwed up the case. He ought to think like them.

  He did. And he did not.

  ‘And I repeat that no one has a right to kill, no one. You don’t know me, Grens, and so you can’t work out if, really, at heart, I don’t agree that blowing the head off a sex maniac is a good idea. As it is, I’ll insist that anything short of a lengthy spell in the jug would be a mistake. Society must not send out signals saying anything other than when you kill, you must pay.’

  Ågestam went away to order his papers, to clear the floor and the desktop. Grens lingered by the window, watching as the crowd began to disperse. Then he went on to his usual seat at the back of the room, from where he had watched the trial since day one.

  The door opened and a porter entered. After him, the journalists streamed in, followed by the members of public who had managed to be at the head of the queue and got past the strict security checkpoint.

  The trial of Fredrik Steffansson was on its fifth and last day.

  Bengt Söderlund woke early. Two weeks of holiday left. The days were precious now. He had only slept for a few hours every night dur
ing the previous week. Only when he kept busy did he have a chance to forget that Elisabeth and the girl had gone and that he didn’t even know where they were. At first he had hardly been off the phone, trying her parents and friends and mates from her old job, but no one had seen her. Once that was clear, he didn’t bother with telling them why he asked. He wouldn’t have any of these buggers laughing at him, no way.

  They had agreed to meet at half past nine. He snapped his fingers and Baxter came running to his side. Only a few minutes to go, so he checked at the sitting-room window and there they were, Ove and Helena, Ola and Klas.

  They said hello, shook hands, that’s how they’d been greeting each other since they were quite young. That’s how you did it in Tallbacka.

  His garden shed was large and easily seen from Flasher-Göran’s windows, so he would see them go inside, and wonder what they were up to. He could stick his wondering up his arse. In the shed Bengt had lined up, end to end, his two tried and trusted sawing-horses, made of long, sturdy planks supported by angled legs. Ove and Klas brought a large plastic sack each, filled with empty glass bottles, in total forty, about half of them for wine, three quarters of a litre capacity, and half for mineral water, 33cc capacity.

  They lined up the bottles on the sawing horses and Ove got the lid off the oil drum in the corner behind the lawn mower. It was full to the brim with petrol. He lowered a can under the surface to fill it, watching the bubbles rise. Dribbling petrol as he went, he walked over to the row of bottles, where Helena was waiting with a large plastic funnel in her hand. Ola filled the first bottle to the halfway mark. They moved on to the next bottle; she held the funnel in place, he poured in petrol until the bottle was half full. They carried on like that until all the bottles were done and they had used up over twenty litres of petrol.