Anders Knutas 03 - The Inner Circle aka Unknown

by Mari Jungstedt

  "What about the crew?"

  "I think they all made it, actually."

  "Why hasn't she ever been salvaged?"

  "There was something about a loophole in the law that meant the shipping company couldn't be held responsible, and the owner didn't feel he could afford to have the boat towed away. That's why it's still there."

  "Incredible." Johan shook his head.

  "Yes, isn't it? You used to be able to see a lot more of the boat. She seems to be rusting apart. It won't be long before she completely disappears below the surface."

  For the time being they decided not to bother the police officers and walked up to the hotel entrance. They had made an appointment to meet with the manager, Kerstin Bodin. She was a slender, dark-haired woman who gave them a smile but looked tired.

  They sat down in the outdoor section of the restaurant, with a view of the harbor. Pia didn't have the patience to sit still, so she went off with her camera.

  "This is so unpleasant," said Kerstin. "Of course, it's not certain that anything awful has happened to her, but what if it has? I'm terrified that they're going to find her drowned out there. It's impossible to say what happened. She was apparently very drunk when she left."

  "Do you know Martina?"

  "We've talked a good deal. I've had more contact with her than with many of our guests. She's extremely nice. A very happy and open sort of girl. Her mother's from Gotland, you know. Martina has been to the island quite often."

  "Where is her mother from?"

  "Hemse. Both her mother and her grandparents are dead now, and Martina told me that she doesn't have any other relatives on Gotland. But she usually spends a week here every summer, on vacation."

  "Do you know where she usually stays when she's here?"

  "From what I understood, her family usually stays at the Wisby hotel. Apparently there's a special suite that they always reserve. She told me that her father knows the owner."

  "I see. What's his name? Or her name?" Johan quickly added, realizing that he was in fact sitting across from a female hotel manager.

  Kerstin smiled. "His name is Jacob Dahlén. We were in the same class in middle school."

  "Maybe that's where Martina is."

  "I don't think so," said Kerstin, shaking her head. "If so, why hasn't she called anyone? Surely she would know that everyone is worried."

  "Yes, you're right," Johan agreed.

  The link to the hotel owner in Visby was interesting. He would follow up on it later.

  Kerstin took her cell phone out of the pocket of her linen shirt and punched in a number. When someone answered, she got up and went over to the railing that surrounded the restaurant area. She hopped up to perch on the railing as she talked. Sitting there and dangling her legs like that, she looked like a young girl. Johan instantly started thinking about his newborn daughter. In a few years she would be able to sit like that.

  Kerstin came back to the table. "Jacob Dahlén doesn't know anything," she said. "He was shocked. He said he didn't even know that Martina was on Gotland."

  Because of the photo torn out of a newspaper that Jacobsson had found under Martina's pillow, they decided to drive farther south to Fröjel, which was about six miles from Warfsholm. They wanted to have a talk with the excavation leader, Staffan Mellgren.

  At the church Knutas turned off from the main road and parked outside the former school building, which now contained a café and a small exhibition space with a display about the excavations.

  A ladder led down to the dig area, and as they approached, they saw Mellgren walking among the students, who were hard at work. The ground had been divided into rectangles that were about a foot and a half deep. In several of the pits, portions of skeletons could be seen, along with other objects that Knutas had a hard time identifying. On a long table in the middle of the area lay folders, maps, and plastic bags marked with various labels. Mellgren had stopped and was writing some notes in a folder. He looked up when Knutas and Jacobsson greeted him. A tall, athletic man with thick, dark brown hair with a touch of gray, he had to be in his forties, Jacobsson guessed. His eyes were an intense brown, and she concluded that he was good-looking— more attractive than in the photos she had seen.

  "We'd like to talk to you about the disappearance of Martina Flochten," Knutas began.

  "Of course. Just a minute," said Mellgren. He turned to a younger woman in the next pit, asked her a question that they couldn't hear, and jotted down some illegible squiggles.

  There were objects inside the plastic bags on the table—bone fragments or tools. Jacobsson exclaimed with surprise when she saw a bag containing a silver necklace and another with silver coins.

  "What are you going to do with all this?" She turned to Mellgren, who now seemed to have finished writing his notes.

  "Every item we find is documented." He gestured to the ground behind them. "These spaces are called pits. We divide up the ground to facilitate both the excavation and the documentation. The items we find are placed in a bag on which we record the exact location and time of the find, in which pit and at what depth. When the workday is over, we lock up everything in those carts you walked past on your way here. Later the material is taken to our office at the college, where it's sorted and examined. Finally it ends up in the Antiquities Room for storage."

  "Could we sit down somewhere and talk?" asked Knutas.

  "Of course."

  Mellgren led them to a corner of the excavation area where there was a plastic table and a few simple chairs.

  "How long have you been digging here?" asked Knutas after they sat down.

  "You mean during this course? We're just starting our third week of excavation."

  "So by now you've all gotten to know each other well, is that right?"

  "Of course. We've spent an intense amount of time together."

  "Also in the evenings?"

  "Not always, but there are a number of evening lectures and other activities, and sometimes we eat supper together. My responsibilities as the leader don't end when the workday is over." Mellgren smiled.

  "What do you think of Martina?" asked Knutas.

  The excavation leader turned serious again. "She's very knowledgeable for someone so young. She knows a surprising amount about the Viking Age in particular. Other than that, she's a lively person with a lot of enthusiasm, which rubs off on the others. So she's definitely an asset to the group."

  "What do you think about her disappearing like this?" asked Jacobsson.

  "It's incomprehensible. I'm sure that she would have called if everything was okay. Now I'm worried that she's in some kind of trouble. I don't know how much longer we can keep digging if she doesn't turn up soon. The fact that she's missing has created an enormous sense of uneasiness among all of us."

  "When was the last time you saw her?" Knutas looked at the excavation leader attentively.

  "On Saturday, after we finished digging for the day. She rode home in the bus with the rest of the students, the same as usual."

  "What time was that?"

  "It was around four, I think. Everybody was going to the concert that evening, and they were in high spirits when they left here."

  "You didn't go?"

  "No. I stayed home with my family."

  "I see." Knutas wrote something in his notebook. "Could you describe your relationship with Martina?"

  "We get along well. As I said, she's doing a great job."

  "And you don't have a more intimate relationship?"

  "No, we don't."

  Jacobsson took the newspaper clipping out of her bag. "We found this under Martina's pillow on her bed."

  Mellgren glanced at the article. His face was expressionless. "What am I supposed to say?"

  "Why do you think she had a picture of you under her pillow?" asked Knutas.

  "I have no idea. And by the way, the article is about what we do in the course. It's not just about me."

  "Do you think that it's out of devotion
to her archaeological work that she keeps a photo of the excavation under her pillow?" Knutas's voice was heavy with sarcasm.

  Mellgren shrugged his shoulders. "How would I know? I don't know my students very well."

  "So you don't have a closer relationship with Martina? That would be easy to assume, from looking at this."

  "Absolutely not. Don't you understand that? I'm married and have four children. Besides, naturally I could never get mixed up with my students in that way."

  Jacobsson tried a different tactic. "Could it be that Martina is in love with you?"

  "I really don't think so."

  "Has she given you any signs to that effect?"

  "No."

  "Maybe you've encouraged her in her work, and she misinterpreted what you said?"

  "Of course that's possible, but not as far as I know, at any rate."

  "Has anything happened between the two of you?"

  "What do you mean by 'happened'?"

  "Well, is there anything going on between you?"

  "No. And now that's enough."

  Mellgren was about to stand up, but Knutas took his arm to stop him.

  "You haven't had a fight? Some sort of confrontation?"

  "Let's drop this topic. I have exactly the same relationship with Martina as with all the others. No more, no less."

  "Then what about someone else?" asked Jacobsson to ease the tension. "Do you know whether she's with someone else in the group?"

  "I don't really keep tabs on their relationships with each other."

  "You haven't noticed that she's had a fight with anyone?"

  "No. Martina was as happy as always when I last saw her. I just hope that she turns up soon."

  Jacobsson could see that they weren't going to get any further and changed the subject. She had become quite curious about what was going on around them.

  "Could you tell us a little about this site and the excavation work?"

  Mellgren sighed and leaned back in his chair, as if to collect himself after the assault on his integrity. Apparently he saw that Jacobs-son's interest was genuine, because as he began talking a new gleam appeared in his eye.

  "The fields that you see all around here, which to the naked eye look like ordinary fields and meadows, conceal a Viking Age settlement extending over what we estimate to be a hundred and twenty thousand square yards. In other words, the area is huge. Excavations have been carried out here since the late eighties, and so far we've explored only a small section."

  "How did you know that this would be an interesting area to excavate in the beginning?" asked Jacobsson.

  "Several reasons. A farmer who was planting his crops discovered something glittering in the soil. It was a bracelet from the tenth century. In addition, the location of the church interested archaeologists." He pointed toward the lovely whitewashed Fröjel Church, which stood on a hill. "It wasn't built in the middle of the parish where people live, like other churches. Instead it's on the edge of Fröjel parish, near the sea. Archaeologists pondered that and came up with the idea that it was probably because there was a harbor down here that was very busy, with people coming and going, and so the church was built nearby. You can also tell from the color of the soil that people and animals have lived here. It's rich in phosphate, which manifests as a darker color in the soil. After the discovery of the bracelet in the field, we initiated some test digs, and that led to the discovery of traces of a trading site with a permanent settlement—rather like Birka on Lake Mälaren on the mainland. We've found the remains of houses, several gravesites, a picture stone, coins, tools, and jewelry. Since we started excavating, we've found a total of thirty-five thousand artifacts."

  Jacobsson whistled.

  "From what time period?" asked Knutas.

  "Mostly the Viking Age, meaning around a.d. 850 to 1050, but we've also found artifacts from the seventh century and the twelfth century, so altogether we're talking about a period of five hundred years."

  "How do you know where to dig?"

  "When we start an excavation, we decide on a specific area that we think is interesting. Then we divide it into various pits that are each twenty-four square yards, as you can see here."

  The quadrants were marked off with string.

  "Each participant is given several areas, and then we dig until we reach a depth of ten to twelve inches. That's necessary if we're going to find the artifacts at their proper location; everything above that has usually been disturbed by working the earth, by plowing, for instance. After we've dug down a ways, we slice off the earth, almost like using a cheese slicer, very carefully, half an inch at a time, so as to minimize the risk of disturbing anything. It takes a few weeks to reach the level where it starts getting interesting."

  "I had no idea that you had found so much," said Jacobsson, fascinated. "Of course, we've all read and heard about the excavations, but I at least hadn't realized the extent of them until now."

  "Good Lord," said Mellgren with a sigh, looking at Jacobsson with amusement. "Nowhere else in the world have there been as many Viking Age coins discovered, for instance, as here on Gotland. The island was in the middle of the trade route between Russia and the Continent, after all, and the islanders were masters at trading goods from various regions."

  "What did they trade?" asked Jacobsson.

  Knutas was beginning to get a tense look on his face. They weren't here to listen to a lecture on archaeology. They were here to find out facts that might help them locate Martina Flochten. He made a deliberate show of leaving the others to get a firsthand look at the area. Jacobs-son seemed completely captivated by Mellgren, hanging on every word he was saying. Knutas hadn't realized that Jacobsson was so interested in history. Yet another side of her that he knew nothing about.

  He sat down on a bench that stood next to the area. Below him gaped a pit with a skeleton that lay completely exposed to the air.

  It was incredible to think that he was sitting here looking down at the skeleton of a human being that hadn't seen the light of day for a thousand years. How many people had walked across this field since then? Even he felt a certain fascination with the whole thing.

  So this was where Martina had sat, scraping away at the earth with the others a few days ago. Where in the name of heaven had she gone? Had she committed suicide? That seemed highly unlikely. She was so full of life, or at least that was the image she presented. Had she been the victim of an accident? She was apparently drunk. Maybe she had simply fallen into the water. So far they had only searched on land. Maybe it was that simple.

  Knutas decided to bring in divers on the following day if Martina hadn't turned up.

  In the car on their way back, Jacobsson was full of enthusiasm.

  "Just think how fantastic that is, all the things they've found. It's unbelievable. I was allowed to hold an amber charm from the tenth century. Can you imagine that? In my next life I'm going to be an archaeologist, no doubt about it."

  "At one point I thought we were going to spend all day there," muttered Knutas. "My stomach is completely empty. Don't you ever need to eat?"

  "Don't be so grumpy. I thought it was incredibly interesting. We'll pick up some food along the way. What do you think about Mellgren and his relationship with Martina?"

  "He seems sincere. I don't think he'd get himself mixed up with one of the participants in the course. It's not just his marriage that would be at stake, if you can use the word 'just.' He'd be risking his whole professional career."

  "Maybe he's tired of his job," said Jacobsson matter-of-factly. "Maybe it's a form of self-destructive behavior, although it could also be unconscious. Maybe deep inside he wishes that the whole thing would go to hell."

  "Another possibility is that he's fallen head over heels in love," suggested Knutas, who had a more romantic outlook than his colleague.

  "Sure," she said, smiling, "but the one doesn't have to exclude the other."

  Back at police headquarters they were stopped by Lars Norrb
y.

  "I've talked to a witness who had something interesting to say."

  "Let's take it in my office," said Knutas.

  They sat down on the little sofa group that stood over by the wall.

  "It was a man who called. One day he was biking along the road toward the Warfsholm hotel. He was actually going over there to have dinner. Apparently that's what he does every Monday, and this happened to be a Monday. Suddenly he caught sight of Martina walking along the road. He described her in great detail. He seemed positive that he had seen her."

  "And?" Knutas sounded impatient.

  "She was walking away from the hotel, along the edge of the road. The man said that he thought it was the left side of the road, but he wasn't positive. She was wearing a blue skirt; he remembered that quite clearly, but he couldn't remember what kind of top she wore at all."

  "Get to the point," barked Knutas.

  His colleague's long-windedness and tendency to report unnecessary details could drive Knutas crazy. Norrby glared at him, looking insulted.

  "Well. In any case, she got into a car that was parked right at the entrance to the mini-golf course."

  "How can he be so sure that it was Martina he saw?"

  "Apparently her archaeology colleagues have been going around showing people pictures of her. Or maybe it was just one picture."

  "I see. So they're doing their own investigative work?"

  "Exactly, and it has actually produced results."

  "Did he see who was sitting in the car?" asked Jacobsson.

  "He thinks it was a man about thirty-five or forty. Maybe older. He was wearing dark glasses, so it wasn't easy to tell. He wasn't sure about the man's hair, but he didn't think it was blond. Closer to brown."

  "When did this happen?"

  "A week ago. Last Monday, around five or five thirty."

  "Martina has been missing for three days. No longer than that," interjected Jacobsson.

  "Yes, but this could still be of interest," Norrby protested. "Obviously someone was waiting by the side of the road for her."