‘Good,’ says the man.
After that, a click, nothing more.
‘Customers want as little contact with the pimp as possible,’ says Miro. ‘They want to convince themselves we don’t exist. They’re too shy or discreet to pick someone up off the street, they prefer a helping hand to take care of practicalities, you know. But the pimp reminds them of the shitty side of what they’re doing. So that conversation was in no way unusual.’
‘You said that Angelica sounded stressed,’ says Birck. ‘And that you assumed she was tidying up.’
‘She sounded like she was in the middle of something. Whether anything was going on there, I honestly couldn’t say.’
‘Where you aware of any threat to Angelica?’ I ask.
‘A threat?’
‘From a punter, for example. Was she scared, did one of them maybe want to hurt her?’
‘Not as far as I know.’
‘Is it possible the threat might have existed without you knowing about it?’ Birck asks.
‘No.’ Miro sniggers. ‘Not as long as the punters were coming through me.’
‘Speaking of which.’ Birck turns his head while we wait for the lights to turn green. ‘You didn’t mention this to the police, did you? That you thought Angelica sounded stressed?’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
‘That kind of detail would’ve made them more interested in me and the other girls, I felt, and I didn’t want that. Someone being described as stressed shortly before they end up getting murdered doesn’t sound great. Perhaps I could’ve been the one threatening her? Or putting pressure on her in some way. It wouldn’t look good. And don’t forget, in 2010 I was on it. I wanted them to leave me and my firm in peace, as soon as possible, so that we could get back to what we were doing. Dead whores are bad for business. If you’ll excuse my bluntness.’
‘Those two calls, with the third man,’ I say, ‘what do you remember of them?’
‘I’ve told you.’
Birck retrieves his phone from his pocket, clicks through the menus, and then holds it up between us.
‘Is this him?’ he asks.
‘Dead woman at John Ericssonsgatan 16,’ Grim’s voice streams from the phone’s speaker. ‘Third floor. Hurry.’
‘John Ericssonsgatan 16,’ the operator repeats.
‘Yes.’
‘Dead woman. Are you there … ?’
‘Hurry.’
‘And you, what is your name …’
The call drops. I can hear that it’s him now; I can make out Grim’s voice. Speaking more slowly than normal, a touch softer. It’s enough to make him unrecognisable, unless you know that it’s him. I’m ashamed that I do.
‘Maybe,’ Miro says, hesitantly. ‘It was a long time ago, I can’t remember exactly what he sounded like. But that could’ve been him.’
Birck stuffs his phone back in his pocket. We’re coming up to Kungsholmen. I can see the high-rise headquarters of Dagens Nyheter in the distance.
‘Everything I said in those interviews was true,’ Miro continues, his gaze fixed on something about where the gearstick is. ‘But I didn’t exactly say everything. There was one more thing I didn’t mention.’
‘Which was?’ I say.
‘During that first call with the third client, I heard a sound in the background. Then it stopped abruptly, I think someone turned it off.’
‘A sound?’ Birck slows down as the lights ahead of us change from green to amber. The police radio crackles again: suspected theft from a storage room at Åhléns department store. ‘What sort of sound?’
‘Such weird timing,’ Miro says. With a crooked smile he nods towards the police radio. ‘It sounded just like that.’
20
Standing in the bathroom at Alströmergatan, I run my hand along my cheekbone, and for a second I catch a glimpse of my grandfather’s eyes. When I try and smile, I can just make out my dad’s dimples. He got them from his mother.
Your ancestry is always there when you look at yourself in the mirror. It doesn’t happen very often, but sometimes they become visible, the men and women who came before. You have to learn to accept it; there is no other way.
I walk out into the hall, check that the door is unlocked, sit down on the sofa, and open the half-full whisky bottle on the table. I pour a few fingers into two glasses and pick up one, then lean back.
It’s evening, but Sam’s not home, she’s working late at the gallery, preparing for tomorrow’s show. That’s lucky.
On the radio, an interview with a duty officer from Malmö. She explains how she, with little more than fourteen hours left until checks are to be launched, is yet to receive any instructions on how the task at hand is to be carried out.
At ten p.m. on the dot, the door opens.
It’s a novel sensation. One second he’s not there, the next he has appeared, discreetly and unnoticed.
Grim takes his coat off but keeps his shoes on, and inspects his surroundings.
‘Lovely place you’ve got.’
I reach for the other glass and get to my feet to offer it to Grim.
‘I don’t think I can take the credit for it.’
He takes the glass.
‘Thanks. Is Sam home?’
‘Why do you ask?’
Holding the glass in one hand and with a new chill in his stare, Grim starts backing away, towards the door.
‘There’s someone else here.’
At that moment, I hear footsteps behind me, as he makes his way in from the kitchen, where he’s spent the last few minutes waiting.
‘Good evening, John,’ says Birck.
After dropping Miro Djukic off, Birck and I went to an old dive bar on Vasagatan that’s almost always empty. Flying Dog. We sat down in one of the window booths, ready to eat.
‘There’s something I need to tell you,’ I said.
‘What?’
I squirmed in the booth.
‘The reason I wanted to look at this case again.’
I suspect he already had an idea what it was about. He was neither surprised nor annoyed, at least not outwardly. Instead, he just sat and listened until I’d finished.
‘So … this is all about him.’
‘It was, to begin with. Now I actually want to know what happened.’
‘Fucking hell, Leo.’
‘I know.’
He blinked.
‘So someone was out to get her.’
‘If he’s to be believed.’
Birck didn’t reply, and he’s been very quiet since then. Not even when we were sitting here, in the flat, ironing out details ahead of Grim turning up, did he say much.
It should’ve been a relief, finally getting to tell someone. That’s what getting something off your chest ought to feel like, but that’s not how it feels. All I feel is guilt and shame, and, as much as it hurts me to admit it, that an invisible bond has broken — a secret has been lost — between me and Grim.
‘Grim, listen to me,’ I say. ‘Nothing to worry about. We need to talk.’
‘You’ve tricked me, Leo.’
‘That was the only way to get you here.’
‘Don’t move.’
‘I can’t do this alone, Grim. Gabriel needs …’
‘No.’ Grim is standing with his back to the door. He has the whisky glass in one hand, and his coat in the other. In the gloomy hallway, his eyes seem black. ‘You tricked me, Leo.’
Grim lets the glass fall to the floor. The sound is muffled by the rug but the whisky trickles out. He puts his free hand on the door handle. In that same instant I feel a tug on my waistband, a hand grabbing my firearm, which I’d hidden behind my back.
‘Stand still, John,’ Birck says as he takes a step to one side, the weapon pointed straight
at Grim’s ribcage.
Grim looks at me, then the weapon. Maybe he’s weighing up an attempt anyway. I want to approach him, but I’m worried that the movement might seem too sudden.
Slowly, Grim lifts his hand from the door handle.
21
An awkward silence. We’re sitting around my coffee table, Sam’s coffee table — me and Birck at either end of the sofa and Grim in an armchair. I’ve poured another glass of whisky and put it in front of him. Birck is sipping away at his, with the gun lying there on the arm of the sofa.
‘Can’t you put that thing away?’ says Grim. ‘It’s making me nervous.’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’
He stands up and replaces the P226 in its holster, up on the hat stand. Everything has an air of deception about it.
‘What you told me,’ I say slowly, without looking at him, ‘I told Gabriel. This Lukas Bengtsson, who claimed to be with Stockholm Police, has probably got wind of you, directly or indirectly, via one of the people you contacted. If you can give us those names, then with a bit of luck they can lead us to the man we’re looking for. That’s what we’ve got.’
‘Assuming,’ Birck adds, ‘that you’re telling the truth.’
‘Have I given you any reason to doubt that?’
‘No, you haven’t,’ I say. ‘The people you contacted for information about Angelica Reyes. Tell us about them.’
Grim chuckles.
‘Say I do cooperate. That means that sooner or later you’ll be telling your boss about me.’
‘That’s a risk you’re taking whether you cooperate or not,’ Birck points out. ‘Since we’re sitting here, I mean.’
‘Exactly.’ Grim’s eyes burn into me. ‘Because you tricked me.’
I put the glass down, get up from the sofa, and walk over to him. Then I haul him up and slam him against the wall.
He lets go a heavy sigh as the air leaves his lungs. The painting on the wall next to him takes a knock and falls to the floor.
Sam and I bought the painting in an antique shop. She hated it, but agreed to let me buy it because I claimed that the scene — a sort of flat, open sea — had a calming effect on me.
‘For fuck’s sake, you were the one who came to me. After everything that’s happened, all that you’ve done, you asked me to do this. What the fuck was I supposed to do? If we’re going to do this, it’s going to be on my terms. You’ve got no right to decide how, when, or why anyone else does anything. You get that?’
Grim doesn’t respond. My hands are shaking from the unexpected adrenaline rush.
‘Leo,’ Birck says calmly behind me. ‘Sit down.’
‘You were the one who came to me,’ I repeat.
‘I needed your help.’
‘You make it pretty damn complicated to help you.’
‘Leo,’ I hear Birck once more. ‘Sit down.’
I take a step backwards, vaguely aware that something definitive might just have happened between us. Grim looks sad. He looks down at the painting, stoops to pick it up, and puts it back on the wall.
‘I made three calls,’ he says, trying to hang the painting back on its little nail. ‘One to an old smackhead who knows what’s what in prostitution in Stockholm, one to a weapons dealer with loads of contacts, and one to a little gangster with big ears. Lotta Jidhoff, Jorge Grens, and Ludwig Sarac.’
With the painting back in its rightful place, Grim takes a step back and cocks his head to one side as he admires the motif.
‘It looks peaceful,’ he says.
Birck types the names into his phone.
‘Who was the last one again?’
‘Ludwig Sarac.’
‘Did you contact them in the order you told us?’
‘Yes. Do you know who they are?’
‘Ludwig Sarac, not the other two,’ says Birck. ‘I’ve met Ludwig.’
‘But not in the context of being a little gangster, right?’
Birck’s stare slides towards me, hesitant.
‘No,’ I say.
The moon is a thin white shard. I stand over by the window to look at it while Grim returns to his armchair.
‘Ludwig Sarac is an informant,’ I say. ‘Or rather was. He was exposed in connection with a raid at the end of last year, and after that he went to ground. No one knows where he is.’ I turn to face Grim. ‘Why didn’t you contact her best friend, Jonna Danielsson?’
Grim stares coldly at me.
‘Best friends don’t usually know very much about each other.’
‘Okay, okay,’ Birck says. ‘Calm down. One of them is known to be more of a loudmouth than the others, so we’ll start with him.’
‘It’s not Sarac, though,’ says Grim.
‘How do you know that?’ I ask.
‘I’ve spoken to him today.’
‘How can you be sure that it isn’t him?’
‘Well that’s a funny story, too, as it happens,’ Grim says, scratching his temple. ‘And a bit confused, maybe. Then, I was the one who contacted him, from St Göran’s. Now, this afternoon, he was the one calling me.’
‘Eh? Sarac called you today?’
Yes. The phone rang, a number he recognised. That’s why he answered.
The man on the other end turned out to be a friend from way back: Ludwig Sarac, who’d heard that John Grimberg had been resurrected. Resurrected, that’s what Sarac said. He’s a bit odd. He’d doubted the veracity of the rumours, but he did after all have good reasons for trying to get hold of Grimberg.
‘Which are?’ Grim asked.
About a week ago, at around eleven in the evening on the second of November, way before he’d heard anything about Grimberg being back, Sarac had a visitor. That was pretty unusual these days, since Sarac was holed up somewhere that only a few people knew about. The man wasted no time on small talk, but wanted Sarac’s take on a very specific case. It all centred around John Grimberg.
‘Where is he?’ the man had wanted to know.
‘Grimberg?’ Sarac was taken aback. ‘You mean the guy who’s on the run?’
The very same.
‘Well …’ Sarac laughed. ‘Well I suppose he’s on the run.’
‘But where is he?’
‘I don’t know.’
Since Sarac knew nothing, the man accepted his answers. He got to his feet and left without another word.
‘Strange,’ says Grim. ‘Isn’t it?’
‘Yeah,’ I say.
‘That’s what Ludwig thought, too, hence why he tried to get hold of me.’
He couldn’t, because he didn’t have Grim’s number. He left it, until yesterday when he remembered that he’d brought his old phone when he went underground. He said he hadn’t known what to do with it, and leaving it behind was just too risky.
It was a few years old, so it should have Grim’s number on it. And it turned out that it did, once he’d got some life into the battery, logged in, and flicked through his contacts, by which time it was late in the evening. So Sarac called his old acquaintance to tell him what had happened.
‘Ludwig didn’t know who the guy was,’ says Grim. ‘Just who he claimed to be.’
‘Lukas Bengtsson,’ I say as it dawns on me. ‘Lukas Bengtsson, Stockholm Police.’
‘You got it.’
Grim’s chat with Ludwig Sarac ended up a short one, since fear got the better of him. If the man claiming to be Lukas Bengtsson really was a policeman and had Sarac under surveillance, then the call meant a chance of Grim being eavesdropped. If that was the case, then Stockholm’s countless mobile masts would be able to narrow down his environs and more or less reveal his position.
‘So …’ Birck says. ‘Where’s Sarac now?’
‘You think I’m going to grass on him? He’s managed to stay hidden for a while.’
&n
bsp; ‘Grim,’ I say. ‘We’re not going to …’
He waves his hand dismissively.
‘I should think he’s sitting where he is, waiting, at home on Västmannagatan. Not for long, I shouldn’t think. Someone clearly knows where he’s staying, so he’s probably busy looking for a new lair to slither into.’
‘Västmannagatan, what number?’
‘68.’
Birck leans forward on the sofa.
‘The visit Sarac had from this Lukas Bengtsson, Stockholm Police, was last Monday then? Second of November?’
‘According to Ludwig, yes. In the evening, about eleven. How come?’
Västmannagatan 68. Well blow me.
As the man who claimed to be Lukas Bengtsson, Stockholm Police, arrived at Västmannagatan to ask Ludwig Sarac about Grim’s whereabouts, me and Birck were sitting in a car equipped with both still and video cameras, having been seconded to Surveillance and tasked with recording everyone arriving or leaving through the entrance next door, Västmannagatan 66.
‘Well blow me,’ says Birck. He turns to me. ‘How well do you think you can see number 68 in the pictures we took of number 66?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Well enough?’
‘Maybe.’
‘What are you on about?’ asks Grim.
At that very moment, a text arrives from Sam:
just leaving the gallery now, home soon my little idiot x
Shit.
I get off the sofa.
‘You have to leave.’
22
It takes a while to get hold of the material from Surveillance. The guy I speak to perfectly embodies Surveillance’s general suspicion of, and unwillingness to help, the other employees inside HQ.
‘What a fucking mess. What the fuck happened?’ Birck says while we’re waiting. Then he changes tack: ‘What the fuck is happening?’
‘I don’t know.’
Lukas Bengtsson, Stockholm Police, first visits Grim at St Göran’s, then Ludwig Sarac on Västmannagatan a year and a half later. Is he on the hunt? Why? And who is he?
The picture of Angelica Reyes has changed, too. Why were they out to get her? She must’ve started some ball rolling, one that is yet to stop.
The Thin Blue Line Page 8
