The Savage Altar

by Unknown

  “What the…?” he said to himself.

  Rebecka had told him she was going up there because she knew the family, he thought. Saying she was the sister’s lawyer must be a mistake.

  He looked at Rebecka’s set face as she walked quickly toward the police station, her arm firmly around the other woman, who must be Viktor Strandgård’s sister. With her free arm she tried to fend off the woman with the microphone who was trotting along after them.

  “Is it true that his eyes had been gouged out?” asked the female reporter in a broad Luleå accent.

  “How are you feeling, Sanna?” she went on when she got no reply. “Is it true the children were with you in the church when you found him?”

  When they got to the entrance of the police station, the fox placed herself resolutely in front of them.

  “My God, girl,” sighed Måns. “What’s going on here? Hard-hitting American journalism á la Lapland?”

  “Do you think it might have been a ritual killing?” asked the reporter.

  The camera zoomed in on her glowing, agitated cheeks, then there was a close-up of Rebecka’s and the other woman’s faces in profile. Sanna Strandgård was holding her hands up to her face like blinkers. Rebecka’s gray eyes glared straight into the camera first of all, and then she looked straight at the reporter.

  “Get out of the way,” she said sternly.

  The words and the expression on Rebecka’s face stirred an unpleasant memory in Måns’ head. It had been at the firm’s Christmas party the previous year. He’d been trying to chat and be pleasant, and she’d looked at him as if he were something you might find while cleaning out the urinals. If he remembered rightly, that was exactly what she’d said to him as well. In the same stern voice.

  “Get out of the way.”

  After that he’d kept his distance. The last thing he wanted was for her to feel embarrassed and resign. And he didn’t want her getting any ideas either. If she wasn’t interested, that was fine.

  All at once things were happening very quickly on the screen. Måns paid closer attention, kept his finger poised over the pause button on the remote control. Rebecka raised her arm to get past, and suddenly the reporter had vanished out of the picture. Rebecka and Sanna Strandgård more or less climbed over her and went into the police station. The camera followed them, and the reporter’s furious voice could be heard over the clip.

  "Ow, my arm. Christ, did you get that on film?"

  The voice of the male reporter from Channel 4 could be heard once again.

  “The lawyer is with the well-known firm of Meijer & Ditzinger, but no one at the office was prepared to comment on this evening’s events.”

  Måns was shocked to see an archive picture of the company’s offices. He pressed the pause button.

  “Too fucking right,” he swore, getting up from the sofa in such a rush that he spilt milk all over his shirt and trousers.

  What the hell was she up to? he thought. Was she really acting as this Sanna Strandgård’s lawyer without telling the firm? There must have been some sort of misunderstanding. Her judgment couldn’t be that poor.

  He grabbed his cell phone and keyed in a number. No reply. He pressed the bridge of his nose with his right index finger and thumb and tried to think straight. As he was walking into the hall to fetch his laptop he tried another number. No reply there either. He felt sweaty and out of breath. He opened up the computer on the table in the living room and started the video again. Assistant Chief Prosecutor Carl von Post was speaking outside The Source of All Our Strength.

  “Damn it,” swore Måns, trying to start up the computer and holding his cell phone clamped between his shoulder and his ear at the same time.

  His hands felt clumsy and agitated.

  Måns found the earpiece and was able to make calls and start up the computer at the same time. Every number rang without anyone picking up the receiver. No doubt the phones had been red hot after the evening news. The other partners were no doubt wondering how the hell one of his tax lawyers could be up there flattening journalists one after the other. He checked his phone and found that he had fifteen messages. Fifteen.

  Carl von Post was looking straight at Måns from the television screen and explaining how the investigation was proceeding. It was the usual stuff about how the search was in full swing, door-to-door inquiries, interviewing members of the congregation, looking for the murder weapon. The prosecutor was elegantly dressed in a gray wool coat with matching gloves and scarf.

  “Bloody clotheshorse,” commented Måns Wenngren, failing to grasp that von Post was wearing virtually the same as he was.

  Finally someone picked up the phone. It was the husband of one of the female partners, and he wasn’t happy. She had remarried the much younger man, who lived well off his successful lawyer wife while he pretended to be studying, or whatever the hell he was supposed to be doing.

  He doesn’t need to sound quite so miserable, thought Måns.

  When his colleague came on the line the conversation was very short.

  “We can meet right away, can’t we?” said Mans crossly. “What do you mean, the middle of the night?”

  He looked at his Breitling. Quarter past four.

  “Okay, then,” he said. “We’ll meet at seven instead. Early breakfast meeting. We’ll need to try and get hold of the others as well.”

  When he had finished the conversation he sent an e-mail to Rebecka Martinsson. She hadn’t answered the phone either. He shut down the computer, and as he stood up he could feel his trousers sticking to his legs. He looked down and discovered the milk he’d spilt all over himself.

  “That bloody girl,” he growled as he pulled his trousers off. “That bloody girl.”

  And evening came and morning came, the second day

  Inspector Anna-Maria Mella is sleeping restlessly in the darkest hour of the night. Clouds cover the sky, and the room is pitch-black. It is as if God himself has cupped His hand over the town, just as a child places his hand over a scuttling insect. No one who has joined the game shall escape.

  Anna-Maria tosses her head from side to side to escape the voices and faces from yesterday that have occupied her sleep. The child kicks angrily in her stomach.

  In her dream Prosecutor Carl von Post pushes his face toward Sanna Strandgård and tries to force answers from her that she cannot give. He presses her and threatens to interrogate her daughters if she cannot answer. And the more he asks, the more she closes down. In the end she appears to remember nothing.

  “What were you doing in the church in the middle of the night? What made you go there? You must remember something, surely? Did you see anyone else there? Do you remember calling the police? Were you angry with your brother?”

  Sanna hides her face in her hands.

  “I don’t remember. I don’t know. He came to me in the night. Suddenly Viktor was standing by my bed. He looked sad. When he just dissolved I knew something had happened….”

  “He dissolved?”

  The prosecutor looks as if he doesn’t know whether to laugh or give her a slap.

  “Hang on, so you were visited by a ghost and you realized something had happened to your brother?”

  Anna-Maria whimpers so much that Robert wakes up. He raises himself on his elbow and strokes her hair.

  “Ssh, Mia-Mia,” he soothes her. He says her name over and over again, stroking her straw-colored hair until suddenly she gives a deep sigh and relaxes. Her face softens and the whimpering stops. When her breathing is calm and even once more, he goes back to sleep.

  Those who know Carl von Post probably believe he is sleeping well tonight. That he has eaten his fill of attention and golden dreams of what the future holds in her glorious lap. He should be sleeping in his bed with a contented smile on his face.

  But Carl von Post is tossing and turning as well. His jaws are clamped together so that the surfaces of his teeth grind impotently against one another. He always sleeps like this. The events of
the day have not saved him.

  And Rebecka Martinsson. She is in a deep sleep on the sofa bed in the kitchen of her grandparents’ house. Her breathing is calm and regular. Virku has kindly come to lie beside her, and Rebecka is sleeping with her arm around the dog’s warm body, her nose buried in the black woolly coat. There is not a sound from the outside world. No cars and no planes. No loud late-night revelers and no winter rain hammering against the windowpanes. In the bedroom Lova mumbles in her sleep, and presses closer to Sanna. The house itself creaks and groans a little, as if it were turning over in its long winter sleep.

  Tuesday, February 18

  Just before six o’clock Virku woke Rebecka by pushing her nose into Rebecka’s face.

  “Hello, you,” whispered Rebecka. “What do you want? Time for a pee?”

  She fumbled for the lamp by the bed and switched it on. The dog scampered toward the door, gave a little whimper, turned back to Rebecka and nudged her face with her nose again.

  “I know, I know.”

  She sat up on the edge of the bed, but kept the blanket wound around her. It was cold in the kitchen.

  Everything in here is my grandmother, she thought. It’s as if I’ve been sleeping beside her in the kitchen sofa bed, allowed to stay in the warm bed while she lit the stove and put the coffee on.

  She could see Theresia Martinsson sitting at the table rolling her morning cigarette. Her grandmother used newspaper instead of the expensive cigarette papers you could buy. She would tear the margin carefully down one page of the previous day’s Norbottenskuriren. It was wide and free from print, ideal for her purpose. She scattered a few strands of tobacco over it and rolled a thin cigarette between her thumb and forefinger. Her silvery hair was well tucked in under a head scarf, and she was wearing her blue-and-black-checked nylon overall. Out in the barn the cows were calling to her. “Hello, pikku-piika,” she used to say with a smile. “Are you awake?”

  Pikku-piika. Little maid.

  Virku yelped impatiently.

  “Yes, in a minute,” answered Rebecka. “I’m just going to light the stove.”

  She had slept in woolen socks, and with the blanket still wrapped around her she went over to the old kitchen stove and opened the door. Virku sat down patiently and waited. From time to time she gave a tentative little whine, just to make sure she wasn’t forgotten.

  Rebecka took a sharp Mora knife and with a practiced hand shaved sticks from one of the logs by the stove. She laid two logs on top of some birch bark and the sticks, and lit them. The fire quickly took hold. She pushed in a birch log that would burn a little longer than the pine, and closed the door.

  I should spend more time thinking about my grandmother, she thought. Who was it who decided it was better to concentrate on the present? There are many places in my memory where grandmother lives. But I don’t spend any time there with her. And what does the present have to offer?

  Virku was whimpering and doing a little pirouette by the door. Rebecka pulled on her clothes. They were ice cold, and made her movements rapid and jerky. She pushed her feet into a pair of Lapp boots that were standing in the hallway.

  “You’ll have to be quick,” she said to Virku.

  On her way out she switched on the lights outside the house and the barn.

  It had turned a little milder. The thermometer was showing minus fifteen, and the sky was pressing down, shutting out the light of the stars. Virku squatted down a short way off and Rebecka looked around. The ground had been cleared of snow right up to the barn. Around the house the snow had been shoveled up against the walls to provide insulation against the cold.

  Who’s done the shoveling? Rebecka wondered. Could it be Sivving Fjällborg? Is he still clearing the snow for Grandmother, even though she’s gone? He must be around seventy now.

  She tried to peer through the darkness at Sivving’s house on the opposite side of the road. When it was lighter she would look to see if it still said “Fjällborg” on the mailbox.

  She wandered along beside the wall of the barn. The outside light glittered on the roses of rime frost on the barred windows. At the other end was her grandmother’s greenhouse. Several broken panes stared hollow-eyed and accusing at Rebecka.

  You ought to be here, they said. You ought to look after the house and the garden. Look how the putty has given up. Just imagine what the roof tiles must look like under the snow. They’ve cracked and come loose. And your grandmother was so particular. So hardworking.

  As if Virku could read her gloomy thoughts, she came scampering across the garden behind Rebecka through the darkness and barked happily.

  “Hush,” laughed Rebecka. “You’ll wake up the whole village.”

  Immediately a couple of answering barks came from far away. The black dog listened carefully.

  "Don’t even think about it," warned Rebecka.

  Maybe she should have brought a lead.

  Virku looked at her happily and decided Rebecka would do very well as a companion for a dog in the mood for a game. She burrowed playfully down into the feather-light snow with her nose, came back up again and shook her head. Then she invited Rebecka to join in by plonking her front paws on the ground and sticking her bottom up in the air.

  Come on, then, said her shiny black eyes.

  “Right, then!” shouted Rebecka cheerfully, and lunged at the dog.

  She immediately fell over. Virku flew at her like an arrow, jumped over her like a performing dog in a circus, spun around and half a second later was standing in front of Rebecka, her pink tongue lolling out of her laughing mouth and demanding that Rebecka get up and try again. Rebecka laughed and set off after the dog again. Virku hurtled over the piled-up snow and Rebecka clambered after her. They both sank into the untouched snow behind, a meter deep.

  “I give up,” panted Rebecka after ten minutes.

  She was sitting on her bottom in a snowdrift. Her cheeks were glowing red, and she was covered in snow.

  When they got back in, Sanna was up and had put the coffee on. Rebecka pulled off her clothes. The outer layers soon got wet from the melting snow, and the clothes nearest her skin were already soaked in sweat. She found a Helly Hansen T-shirt and a pair of Uncle Affe’s long johns in a drawer.

  “Nice outfit,” sniggered Sanna. “It’s good to see you’ve adapted to the classic look up here so quickly.”

  “The baggy Gällivare look suits any figure,” replied Rebecka, wiggling her bottom so that the loose seat of the long johns flapped about.

  “God, you’re thin,” exclaimed Sanna.

  Rebecka straightened up at once and poured herself a cup of coffee in silence, her back toward Sanna.

  “And you look so sort of dried-up,” Sanna went on. “You ought to take more care what you eat and drink.”

  Her voice was gentle and concerned.

  “Still,” she sighed when Rebecka didn’t respond, “it’s lucky for the rest of us that most men like a girl with something to get hold of. Although of course I think it’s really attractive to be flat-chested like you.”

  Well, lucky me, thought Rebecka sarcastically. At least you think I look good.

  Her silence made Sanna babble nervously.

  “Just listen to me,” she said. “I sound like a real mother hen. I’ll be asking you next if you’re getting your vitamins.”

  “Do you mind if I put the news on?” asked Rebecka.

  Without waiting for a reply she went over to the television and switched it on. The picture was grainy. There was probably snow on the aerial.

  An item about the embezzlement of some EU funds was followed by the murder of Viktor Strandgård. The voice of the reporter explained that the police were following the usual procedures in their hunt for the murderer, and as yet there was no obvious suspect. Pictures followed one another in rapid succession. Police and dogs searching the area outside the Crystal Church as they looked for the murder weapon. Assistant Chief Prosecutor Carl von Post talking about door-to-door inquiries, in
terviews with members of the church and those attending the service. Then Rebecka’s red Audi appeared on the screen.

  “Oh, no!” exclaimed Sanna, crashing her coffee cup down on the table.

  “Viktor Strandgård’s sister, who found the dead man at the scene of the crime, also arrived under somewhat dramatic circumstances to be interviewed at the police station last night.”

  The whole incident was shown, but on the morning news almost all the sound had been removed, except for Rebecka’s stifled “Get out of the way.” It emerged that the reporter had reported the lawyer for assault, before the anchorman in the studio exchanged a few words with the weatherman about the forecast that would follow the break.

  “But you couldn’t see how aggressive and horrible that reporter was!” said Sanna in amazement.

  Rebecka felt a burning pain in her midriff.

  “What is it?” asked Sanna.

  What do I say? thought Rebecka, and slumped down on a chair by the kitchen table. That I’m afraid of losing my job. That they’ll freeze me out until I’m forced to resign. When she’s lost her brother. I ought to ask her about Viktor again. Ask if she wants to talk about it. I just don’t want to get drawn into her life and her problems again. I want to go home. I want to sit at the computer writing an analysis of income tax set against pension contributions.

  “What do you think happened, Sanna?” she asked. “To Viktor. You said he’d been mutilated. Who could have done something like that?”

  Sanna squirmed uncomfortably.

  “I don’t know. That’s what I told the police. I really don’t know.”

  "Weren’t you scared when you found him?"

  “I wasn’t thinking like that.”

  “What were you thinking, then?”

  “I don’t know,” said Sanna, and put her hands on her head as if to console herself. “I think I screamed, but I’m not sure about that either.”

  “You told the police Viktor woke you up, and that’s why you went there.”

  Sanna lifted her eyes and looked straight at Rebecka.