Room No. 10

by Ake Edwardson

  “Sorry? What did you say?”

  “She had no reason,” Börge said in a low voice. There was something about his voice that Winter didn’t recognize from before, a different tone.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “What I’m saying.” Börge looked Winter in the eye. “She had no reason to stay at that place, not even for a few hours. Or to go anywhere at all. She must have gotten sick. Her home was here.” He looked around, at the home. “She belonged here.” He looked at Winter again. “This was where she belonged.”

  The guy sounds like he’ll never get to see her come home again, Winter thought. And at that moment, right there on the soft sofa, as the sun was suddenly hidden behind a cloud and everything became dim, dim like in the lobby of Hotel Revy, Winter believed that Christer and Ellen had seen each other for the last time.

  7

  The awning over the steps out front was blue now. There was no wind and no rain. The steps were dry. There were vertical cracks from the bottom up. A system of rivers without a delta.

  Winter went up the stairs. He saw the cracks between the steps, and the weeds that were on their way up from the underworld. The third world, he thought. It goes quickly once it’s started to go backward. An equalization occurs. It goes to hell on both sides of the equator.

  It was dim in the lobby, and the darkness was intensified by the bright light outside. The sky was wide open out there, as though it were trying to move the horizons. It had a lighter shade of blue, as though it had been scrubbed by the summer rain.

  He was alone in the lobby. Music was coming from somewhere, maybe from a radio. The music told him nothing. It sounded as though no one was listening.

  He walked up to the desk and looked around. The music had started again, a low hum. He remembered. Almost twenty years had gone by, but everything was the same. His sense of déjà vu was not déjà vu. It was real. Nothing really happens in twenty years, he thought; everything just repeats itself.

  The desk clerk showed up behind the reception desk. He stepped out through a doorway that had been in shadow, like everything else in there. There was no door, only a curtain.

  Winter recognized him immediately.

  The clerk recognized Winter immediately. Winter could see it in his eyes. They gleamed for a tenth of a second, like a flashlight, through the lobby.

  The clerk didn’t say anything, but his eyes made their way over to the stairs, up them, through the corridor, up to room ten. The room was still cordoned off. The whole floor was cordoned off.

  This man must have had a few days off. Winter hadn’t run into him during this investigation. But Winter wasn’t the one who interrogated the hotel attendants, not yet. Not until now. What was his name? Winter had forgotten. He had read it and forgotten it, strangely enough. This guy’s name was in Paula’s file, like all the employees of Revy. That meant that his name was in two files with twenty years between them. He didn’t look twenty years older. His hairstyle was different. Time moved more slowly in here, in the dimness. Out there in the light, beyond the awning, everything aged faster. But the clerk had recognized Winter. Salko. His name was Salko. Richard Salko.

  “It’s been a while,” said Salko.

  “So you recognize me?”

  “Just like you recognize me.”

  “The years have sure been kind to us,” Winter said.

  “Probably depends on what you started with,” said Salko, “in the beginning. What you had from the beginning.”

  Salko’s eyes slid off toward the stairs again, and back.

  “Horrible thing,” he said. “How could it happen?”

  Winter didn’t say anything.

  “I wasn’t here,” said Salko. “I was sick.”

  “I know.”

  “So I have nothing to say.”

  “What kind of illness was it?”

  “Migraine. It can last for a few days. A week, every once in a while.”

  Winter nodded.

  “I have medicine. I go to a doctor.”

  “I believe you,” Winter said.

  “When it . . . that happened, I was lying at home.”

  Winter held up a photograph.

  “Seen her before?”

  Salko studied Paula’s face.

  “That’s not the same picture as in the newspaper.”

  “No.”

  “She hardly looks the same.”

  “That’s why I’m showing you this one.”

  “No,” said Salko, shaking his head. “I haven’t seen her before.”

  “She hasn’t been here?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “None of your colleagues recognize her either.”

  Salko shrugged.

  “Yet she chose this hotel,” Winter said.

  “Did she?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Was she the one who chose it?”

  Winter didn’t answer.

  Salko shrugged again.

  “She checked herself in, if you can put it like that.”

  “She went up to the room, number ten,” Winter said. “As far as we know, she never left the room. She didn’t have a key. No one saw her come or go. She stayed there during the night. She had a visitor. We don’t know when. No one here saw any visitor.”

  “It’s a hotel,” Salko said. “People come and go.” He threw out his hand toward the lobby. “You can see for yourself. It’s so damn dark in here that you can hardly see your hand in front of your face.”

  “Why is that?” Winter asked.

  “Ask the owners.”

  They would. But it wasn’t a crime to skimp on electricity. And anonymity was part of this place. Electricity didn’t go very well with anonymity.

  “I hear you’re going to close,” Winter said.

  “Who told you that?”

  “Is it just a rumor?”

  “Don’t ask me.”

  “You don’t know anything about it?”

  “There are so many rumors,” Salko said. “This place has been about to shut down for twenty years.”

  “You must have a precarious job situation,” Winter said.

  Salko didn’t smile. “Maybe this time it’s true. The rumors might be true.” He looked straight across the desk at Winter. “I suggest you ask the owner.”

  Winter nodded. He noticed that Salko moved his gaze. He heard a sound behind him and turned around. The door was swinging, but he didn’t see anyone. He hadn’t heard anyone walk through the lobby. He turned back to Salko.

  “Who was that?”

  “Sorry?”

  “Who was that, who went out through the doors?”

  “I didn’t see anyone.”

  “But the doors were moving.”

  “Must be the wind.”

  “There is no wind.”

  “I didn’t see anyone, I said.”

  Winter could tell that he was lying. That was something you learned in twenty years. Seeing lies, that was his inheritance.

  “We’ve talked to the maid and she didn’t notice anything. I mean, the day before, or the few days before. Also, she didn’t clean the room the last two days.”

  Salko shrugged for the third time.

  “It was empty. What’s the point?”

  “Don’t you do . . . well, an inspection? Go through the rooms every day? Or night?”

  “No.”

  “Aren’t the rooms cleaned every day? At least if someone is staying there?”

  “It’s up to the guest. There’s a sign you can hang up.”

  “No cleaning, please?”

  “Do not disturb.”

  “That’s not the same thing,” said Winter. “I can’t understand how a hotel can not give a damn about cleaning.”

  Salko noticed the shift of nuance in Winter’s voice. If he had been planning to shrug, he stopped himself.

  “You realize what that could mean?” said Winter. “Do you realize?”

  • • •

 
Nina Lorrinder was half a head taller than Aneta Djanali.

  She had also been half a head taller than Paula Ney.

  It was quarter past five and the pub on Västra Hamngatan had opened. It was called the Bishops Arms and was the closest you could get to London in Gothenburg. Djanali had been there before, one relatively recent evening, along with Halders. After half an hour Ringmar and Winter had shown up. Winter had ordered a pint of the recently arrived fresh ale for everyone. It was the first time for Djanali, and the last. She could get a cheaper drink with the same taste and scent by wringing out a dishrag.

  “Ahhhh,” Winter had said when he’d taken a drink. “One more?”

  But now there wasn’t one more. There wasn’t any ale at all. Djanali and Lorrinder were drinking tea.

  Lorrinder and Paula Ney had each had a glass of white wine. They had sat at this table. It was the only one in the place that was empty, as though word had gotten out.

  Djanali had asked Lorrinder whether they should sit there, and she had nodded. This is macabre, Djanali thought. Maybe it will help her remember.

  “How long did you sit here?”

  “Haven’t I already answered that?” Lorrinder asked, but without a hostile tone.

  “We often ask the same question several times.”

  Sometimes because we’re stupid, Djanali thought, and sometimes because we get different answers each time.

  Lorrinder lifted her cup without taking a drink. She set it down again. She looked over at the door, as though Paula would step in. She moved her gaze to Djanali, as though Paula were sitting there.

  She began to cry.

  The cup trembled in her hand.

  “Let’s go someplace else,” said Djanali.

  • • •

  At a French café far south on the street, Djanali repeated the question.

  “About an hour.”

  “What time was it when you said good-bye?”

  “About ten.”

  “Was that outside the pub?”

  “I followed her up to Grönsakstorget. She was going to take a streetcar from there. The number one.” Lorrinder jumped as a streetcar clattered by outside. The door was open to the street. It was a warm evening, an Indian summer evening. “But you know that.”

  “Did you wait until she got on?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “My own streetcar showed up. The three.”

  “Why didn’t you get on at the stop at Domkyrkan?”

  “Oh . . . I guess we wanted to walk a little.”

  “So you got on the three while Paula waited for the one?”

  “Yes.” Lorrinder looked very pale in the light inside the café. The light in there was a pale mix of electricity and autumn sun.

  “Was that wrong of me?”

  Djanali saw the tears in her eyes.

  “Should I have stayed?” Lorrinder rubbed her eyes. When she took her hand away, her eyes had a film of tears. She sniffled. “I’ve been thinking about it. Almost all the time. If I hadn’t left, maybe it wouldn’t have happened.” She looked at Djanali with her transparent eyes. “Do you understand? If only I had stayed.”

  “You can’t blame yourself for any of this,” said Djanali.

  “How could I have known? How could anyone have known?”

  Djanali lifted her cup and drank her new tea. Right now, she was wishing for a glass of wine, or a whiskey. Lorrinder looked like she could use a whiskey. They could go to a bar in a little bit. It could be her treat. She had forced herself into Lorrinder’s sorrow.

  “None of us could have known,” said Djanali.

  “How could it happen?” Lorrinder looked at Djanali as though she could give her an answer. “Why?”

  “That’s what we’re trying to find out.”

  “Can you?” Lorrinder threw out a hand. It was like a reflex. “How can you find an answer to something like this?”

  How should she answer? There were thousands of answers, but maybe none of them was the right one. There were thousands of questions.

  “Among other things, by talking to everyone she knew,” Djanali answered at last. “What we’re doing now. You and I.”

  “She didn’t know that many people,” said Lorrinder.

  Djanali didn’t say anything, waited.

  “She wasn’t exactly the . . . how should I put it . . . the superficial type.” Lorrinder made that motion again, as though it went along with her voice. “Paula mostly wanted to withdraw a bit. Do you know what I mean? She didn’t want to be in big groups of people. She didn’t want to be the center of attention, or anything.”

  “What did she want to do, then? What did she want to do most of all?”

  “I . . . don’t know.”

  “Didn’t you ever talk about it?”

  Lorrinder didn’t answer at first. Djanali let her think; it looked like she was thinking.

  “She wanted to be someplace else,” Lorrinder said at last.

  “Where did she want to go?”

  “Where? Where did she want to go? If you mean a place or something, a country, she never said.”

  “But you know she wanted to get away?”

  “Yes . . . it’s hard to explain . . . it was like she was somewhere else sometimes. She wasn’t here. Do you know what I mean? She was here but at the same time she was somewhere else, where she most wanted to be.”

  “And she never talked about this place? Where she most wanted to be?”

  “I don’t even know if it was a place,” Lorrinder said. “I don’t even know if she knew, herself.”

  A young woman came into the café from the white street outside. She looked around for a table. There were several free. She saved the table closest to the wall with her long scarf and went back out and held the door open for a young man who pushed a stroller in and put it beside the saved table next to the window. A two-year-old child was sleeping in the stroller. The man sat down and took off his dark glasses. He blinked a few times in the weaker light inside the room.

  “Did she talk about anyone else?” Djanali asked, leaning over the table. “Was there a man in Paula’s life? Or a woman, for that matter.”

  Lorrinder gave a start.

  “That is one of the questions that has to be asked,” said Djanali. “It’s part of the routine, or whatever it’s called.”

  “Do you call it routine?” Lorrinder said, looking straight at Djanali. “How can you call it routine?”

  “It’s not a good word. I’m with you there.”

  “Do you do this kind of thing every day? Are people mur . . . murdered every day?”

  “No, no.”

  “What a job,” said Lorrinder.

  Djanali didn’t answer.

  Lorrinder turned her gaze toward the table over by the wall where the woman was coming back with a tray. She placed it on the table. The man spread it out. The woman sat down. The child was sleeping.

  “She wasn’t a lesbian, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Lorrinder said, her gaze still on the young family. “And I’m not, either.”

  “I’m not thinking anything,” said Djanali. “Right now I’m not allowed to be thinking anything at all.”

  “That’s part of the routine, right?”

  Lorrinder had looked back. Djanali tried to find a smile in her face, somewhere, but there was no smile.

  “Are you tired of this now?” Djanali asked. “Should we stop?”

  “There was a guy,” said Lorrinder.

  She looked at the couple again. The child had woken up and the mom was lifting it up right now. It looked like a boy. The coverall was blue. The mom gave him a kiss. The dad poured water into a glass.

  “Did Paula have a boyfriend?” Djanali asked.

  “Not now.” Lorrinder returned her gaze again. “Not that I know of, anyway. But there was probably someone a while ago.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You didn’t meet him?”

/>   “No.”

  “How do you know about him, then?”

  “Paula said something.”

  “What did she say?”

  “She didn’t say that she had a boyfriend. It was like, that wasn’t her . . . to even tell me wouldn’t have been her. But it was like I knew. Do you know what I mean? The kind of things you notice. As a friend. There’s something that’s suddenly a little different. We didn’t see each other as much as before, for example. She did something else on the weekends sometimes, when usually we would have seen each other. She went somewhere.”

  “Went somewhere?”

  “Yeah, for example.”

  “Is it just an example? Or did she really go somewhere? That you know of?”

  “Do you mean abroad, or what?”

  “I mean anywhere.”

  “I don’t actually know. But I know that I tried to reach her a few times one week and she didn’t seem to be home.”

  “When was that?”

  “It was . . . a few months ago. Three, maybe.” Lorrinder made that motion with her arm again, like a vague spasm. “Does that mean something?”

  “I don’t know,” said Djanali. “You never know. But I want you to try to remember when this was, as precisely as possible.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “Was it unusual?” Djanali asked. “For Paula to travel out of the city?”

  “Well, I don’t know that she did. That time. But from what I know of her, I guess it was . . . unusual.”

  “You never talked about it.”

  “No. It didn’t really come up.”

  “You never went on a trip together?”

  “Abroad?”

  “Anywhere.”

  “No. As long as you don’t mean on the streetcar.”

  “Not right now,” said Djanali.

  “We stayed here, in the city. But on the other hand we didn’t get together very often. It wasn’t even every week.”

  “How did you meet?” Djanali asked.

  Lorrinder nodded over toward the window. Djanali followed her gaze, past the young family. Djanali saw the street outside, a streetcar passing, people walking by. The facade of Domkyrkan, the cathedral.

  “We met at church,” Lorrinder said, nodding toward the window again.

  “Church?” said Djanali. “Do you mean at Domkyrkan over there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me.”