The Demon of Dakar

by Kjell Eriksson

  “So you didn’t snuggle?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did Armas meet women?”

  Slobodan stared at her for a few seconds before answering.

  “It happened, but seldom.”

  “You mentioned last time that there was a woman in his life.”

  “That was more than ten years ago. She disappeared.”

  “Could Armas have been interested in men?”

  Slobodan burst into laughter. “My apologies, but this is too funny. You can count yourself lucky that Armas is not here to hear you.”

  “We found some pornographic materials in his apartment that leads us to believe this,” Lindell said and met his gaze.

  “Armas was not gay, whatever you have cooked up,” Slobodan asserted with a steadiness in his voice that surprised him. “I don’t want you to sully his memory, suggest a lot of nonsense that hasn’t got the least to do with his death.”

  “Would it bother you if this were the case, if Armas was attracted to other men?”

  “What do you mean, ‘other men’?”

  “Would it?”

  “That is the lowest! That is a pure insult. Should—”

  “I have no homophobia,” Lindell interrupted calmly.

  The exchange went on for several minutes. Slobodan thought longingly of another cognac. This ape, who insolently enough had kicked off her shoes and pulled her legs up under her, was egging him on like no one had done in decades. But he knew he couldn’t strike back.

  “In reality, you have nothing,” he said abruptly, with a fitting blend of contempt and exasperation.

  “On the contrary, we have a great deal,” Lindell said. “We know that Armas amassed a, perhaps not a fortune exactly, but at least a significant amount of money.”

  “How much?” Slobodan let out.

  Lindell smiled.

  “Perhaps the two of you were not close enough that he cared to discuss it,” she said.

  Slobodan did not answer. Instead he stood up, walked over to the wet bar, and poured out the cognac.

  “We also know that Armas most likely knew his killer.”

  “I see,” Slobodan said, relieved that he had his back to the detective. He wanted to know how they had arrived at this but hesitated to ask. Or should I display more curiosity?

  “Or at the very least did not feel threatened by the killer.”

  “How do you know this?”

  Slobodan turned around and at the same time drank some of the cognac so he would not betray his agitation.

  “I can’t tell you that,” Lindell said. “Another thing, you gave me a list of people that Armas knew. It was strikingly short. Have you thought of any other names?”

  “No, his circle of acquaintances was small.”

  “But large enough to include a killer.”

  Whore, he thought, I should throw her out. He started to ponder how best he could punish her, convinced as he was that every person had a weak point.

  “Perhaps you have this in common—an acquaintance or someone you at least know, who is prepared to hurt you or those close to you.”

  Lindell did not reply. Serves you right, you damn bitch, he thought and downed the last of his cognac.

  “One must feel somewhat vulnerable in your profession,” he added and set the glass down sharply, pleased with the turn their conversation had taken.

  “It is your business to satisfy peoples’ appetites in pleasant surroundings,” Lindell said and let her gaze wander to his belly, “and that is an honorable occupation.” Now she stared him straight in the eye, “It is my business, however, to put them on a rather restricted diet in a more spartan environment.”

  “From what I understand, the food served in our prisons is excellent.”

  “The menu is limited,” Lindell said, “and most likely tiresome in the long run.”

  Slobodan smiled tauntingly.

  “And no cognac is served there,” she added.

  He watched her march off across the parking lot. Their conversation had been brought to an end by her cell phone, and she quickly left, thanking him for their chat.

  He hated her. No one could treat Slobodan Andersson in that way.

  Thirty

  Lindell was worried. She had allowed herself to engage in a ridiculous war of words with Slobodan Andersson. It was amateurish and stupid. It worried her because it revealed the extent of her desperation. Armas did not want to take shape. He slid behind a curtain that consisted of an unknown background and such a strict and unimaginative life as to appear almost indecipherable.

  To understand the victim was many times the prerequisite for understanding the perpetrator. No one had known Armas fully, she was convinced of this, not even Slobodan.

  Who knows me? she thought as she took the walking path along the railway. The intense heat of the past few days had been replaced with large clouds that threatened from all sides. Will there be thunder? No one knows my fear of lightning, she thought, no one except Edvard.

  The telephone call from Haver that had prompted her to leave Slobodan Andersson was about the forensic investigation. Some fifty meters from the clearing that they believed to be the scene of the crime, the technicians had found tire marks from a car. The ground was dry and therefore the tracks were unclear, but it was apparent that someone had opened the barbed-wire gate, after following a old path down to the river, and had subsequently parked. The car had been hidden behind a thicket of alders and underbrush.

  Lindell went straight to Ola Haver’s office. He had barricaded himself behind piles of papers, his hair on end as it always was when Haver sat lost in deep thought.

  “The hardworking Constable Ola Haver,” Lindell said lightly, relieved to escape her own thoughts after the meeting with the restaurant owner.

  Haver grinned. Their relationship had only continued to improve after a romantic snag a few years ago. Nothing remained of their earlier attraction. Both of them realized now that it had never been a real infatuation,that what they had felt was simply a result of Lindell’s disappointment over her and Edvard’s relationship and Haver’s frustration with a marriage that appeared to be idling.

  “That Morgansson is a sharp bastard,” Haver said, “but you must already know that. I missed the marks but he’s a real pathfinder, quiet as the devil but tracks like an Indian.”

  “What do they look like?”

  Haver took out several photographs, but they did not say much to Lindell: the faint impression of what could possibly be traces of a car tire.

  “That isn’t much,” she said, disappointed.

  “Don’t say that,” Haver replied. “We’ll be able to match it to a tire brand, determine how wide the vehicle is, and from there perhaps even identify a specific make and model. It’s already clear that this is a small, narrow car.”

  “Why does someone camp?” she started, unsure of where the discussion would lead. “Well, if one is a guest in town and doesn’t want to be visible at a hotel. How do you get to Uppsala? In your own car?”

  “Doubtful,” Haver inserted, aware of where she wanted to go. “Why risk being seen in your own car?”

  “A rental,” Lindell said.

  “A person who camps is probably no Richie Rich,” Haver said. “I mean—”

  “If this was an isolated task, to kill Armas, then why the need to camp? He could have gone into town, done the deed, and disappeared.”

  “Maybe he had to spy him out first,” Haver said, “and needed a few days. Or the mission is more complicated than that.”

  The back-and-forth between Haver and Lindell led to the topic of motive and there they had nothing, even if they could speculate.

  “Slobodan became noticeably upset when I brought up the homosexual angle,” Lindell said after a while. “Maybe we should pursue that.”

  “A triangle drama, you mean?”

  “I don’t know,” Lindell said and shrugged.

  They stopped talking, well aware of the fact
that it was rarely useful to spin on for too long. Over the years they had developed this style of conducting brief discussions that could later be revisited in more detail.

  “Let’s see what the technicians uncover,” Lindell concluded. “Have you heard anything from Berglund?”

  “Not a word. Are you worried?”

  “Not really,” Lindell said. “But we need him.”

  Haver moved the computer mouse and the computer switched to another humming sound before it turned off.

  “There was one more thing,” Haver said as Lindell was getting ready to leave.

  “Oh?” Lindell said, pausing at the door.

  “It was Fälth, the technician, who discovered it.”

  “What?” Lindell said, tired of his evasiveness but also irritated at herself for her impatience.

  “He noticed part of a branch on the ground, it was close to the tent, and he thought it looked a bit strange. It had been torn off a larger branch at a height of three meters above the ground.”

  “How do you tear down a branch that high?” Lindell asked, and watched Haver revel in smugness.

  “A bullet,” he said. “And we were damned lucky to find it in a tree trunk.”

  “You mean a bullet was fired at the campground?”

  Haver nodded.

  “Nine millimeters. Fälth dug it out.”

  Lindell stared at her colleague.

  “I think Armas was armed, fired a shot, missed, and got his throat cut as punishment,” Haver said.

  “Only now? Shouldn’t they have spotted this branch before?”

  “One might have thought so,” Haver said laconically.

  “That makes this a completely different investigation,” Lindell said. “But it could equally well have been the perp who fired the shot?”

  “Morgansson doesn’t think so. Look at this and you’ll see,” Haver said and reached for a notepad.

  Lindell took a couple of steps closer, increasingly agitated by her colleague’s attitude.

  “This is what we think happened. Armas was standing here, facing the tree where they found the bullet, he fired, had his throat slashed, and fell backward. The bloodstains corroborate this.”

  “There was no trace of gunpowder on his hands,” Lindell said.

  “He was found in the water,” Haver replied.

  His smug expression had waned and he looked at Lindell with his former look of mutual understanding.

  “Armas had no gun license,” Lindell said.

  “How many gangsters do?”

  “We have nothing on him.”

  “He was a shady character, I am certain of it. This was an armed conflict with the owner of the tent.”

  “Slobodan Andersson,” Lindell said thoughtfully, registering the fact that Haver was smiling almost imperceptibly.

  “Should we put him under surveillance?”

  “No sense,” Lindell said. “If he is involved in any funny business, he’ll be lying low right now. Armas was going to Spain, packed, exchanged money, was ready to leave, and the question is, was the meeting down by the river planned all along, or was it something that just happened?”

  “Do we believe it really was a vacation trip, with a few Spanish restaurants planned in on the side, as Slobodan claimed?”

  “That’s impossible to verify,” Lindell said.

  She walked toward the door, but then turned again.

  “Have you ever worked with Barbro Liljendahl?”

  “Not really, we worked together a little before I started at violent crimes,” Haver said. “At the time she was a bit, what should I say, fussy. Why do you ask?”

  “She’s in charge of a case of a stabbing in Sävja and had some idea that there was a connection to Armas since both crimes were knife-related. Do you happen to know anything about Konrad Rosenberg?”

  Haver shook his head, closed a folder, and pushed the papers on his desk together.

  “I don’t either. We need a Berglund for that,” Lindell said and went to her office, logged onto her computer, and looked up Konrad Rosenberg.

  It was as if she and Haver were involved in two different investigations . Maybe his surprise song-and-dance number was a kind of protest at her way of leading the investigation?

  She smiled to herself as Rosenberg’s history slowly printed out. A bullet in a tree was indisputably progress. Before she turned to Rosenberg, she dialed Fälth’s number and felt incredibly generous as she praised the technician for his fine work.

  “One needs a Smålander for detail work,” she said. Smålanders were known for their attention to detail, and Lindell wondered if he picked up the compliment.

  Thirty-One

  A well-functioning restaurant kitchen is a strange creature, as sensitive as a mollusk, it reacts in self-defense with lightning rapidity at the smallest external interruption. Anyone who disturbs this vulnerable and sophisticated organism experiences this.

  “We don’t have time for this shit,” Donald snarled.

  Gunnar Björk pulled back quickly in order not to be in the way.

  “This is a workplace, not a social club,” the chef continued.

  Feo smiled, blinked at the union representative, and sat down on a stool with deliberation.

  “And on top of everything this is the worst possible time,” Donald went on, unusually expressive, though without explaining why.

  “What do you say, Eva?” Feo asked.

  “I belong to a different union,” she said tentatively, uncertain of the atmosphere in the kitchen.

  Gunnar Björk summoned up his nerve, encouraged by her words.

  “Then we’ll arrange a transfer for you to Hotel and Restaurant,” he said and immediately started to dig in his briefcase.

  “I will never join,” Donald said.

  “Why not?”

  Donald stopped short, turned to Feo, and bored his eyes into him.

  “I hate all organizations, all collective pressure where everyone has to sing the same damn song in the same damn choir.”

  “You can sing whatever you like,” the union rep said.

  “You know what, if you want to agitate, then go do it in your spare time and not here!”

  “But you agitate on the job,” Feo objected, and tried to catch Johnny’s gaze. He was standing right in the line of fire with a bunch of leeks in his hand.

  Donald twirled around and gave Feo a hard look.

  “Stop it! Get back to work.”

  Johnny started to cut the leeks. The sound of the knife against the cutting board softened the effect of Donald’s wrath somewhat.

  “I’ll come back at a different time,” Gunnar Björk said in a conciliatory tone.

  Donald returned to preparing the meat.

  “This land is free, isn’t it?” Feo said.

  Donald shook his head and sighed heavily.

  Johnny put the cut leeks into a bowl. Eva was standing in the doorway to the dining room.

  “I’ll go help Tessie,” she said.

  Feo stared at Donald for a minute before he also left.

  Johnny took out more leeks. He loved leek rings and could go on chopping them forever.

  “Lovely,” he muttered to himself. For the first time since coming to Dakar he experienced something of what he had been looking for: the joy of working a sharp knife on a chopping block. He was rested and sober. Two meters away, Donald started to whistle, as if his earlier irritation was already forgotten. The aroma of raw beef mingled with the pungent smell of onion. The fish broth was already starting to bubble and hiss and Donald reached out to turn down the gas flame.

  “Ten leeks are enough, don’t you think?”

  “That’s fine for now,” Donald said.

  Johnny felt his coworker’s gaze like a radiator in his back.

  “Do you know a chef called Per-Olof, nicknamed ‘Perro’?”

  “The one who left for the States?” Donald asked.

  Johnny nodded.

  “Sure, we worked together
at Gondolen for a year.”

  “He’s good,” Johnny said. “He trained me at Muskot in Helsingborg.”

  “Then you know Sigge Lång?”

  “That was before my time,” Johnny said, “but I know who he is. He went to Copenhagen.”

  “Didn’t he become head chef at some fish restaurant?”

  The conversation went back and forth, about restaurants and cooks, owners and head chefs, while Donald prepared duck breast, veal, and lamb and Johnny laid out ingredients for the garnish, took out the butter, kept an eye on bread in the oven, and tidied up.

  Dakar’s kitchen had been hit hard by Armas’s murder, and both of the cooks felt the need for casual chatter. Not because Armas had been particularly well-liked but because of the turbulence his death had caused. The police had questioned everyone, asked Donald to check the kitchen knives and make sure that none were missing. Donald tried to explain that every chef owned their own knives, and that it would never occur to them to contaminate them with human blood.

  “And the rest are so worthless that we basically never touch them,” he explained further and refused to entertain the idea that anyone at Dakar was a murderer.

  Feo returned to the kitchen.

  “The cops are coming here again,” he said. “They are going to talk to Tessie and Eva.”

  “Damn it, we have a job to do!” Donald exclaimed.

  “As do they,” Johnny said calmly.

  The police had searched every corner and taken a bag of papers from the small desk squeezed in behind the counter. The desk was Donald’s territory and it had upset him, though he had not said anything. He knew they would pay no attention to his objections anyway. Instead, the chef’s wrath had gone out over the rest of them and above all Johnny. It was as if Donald connected the murder with the arrival of the new cook.

  Donald hated change and irritating elements that disturbed the balance of the kitchen. He did not grieve for Armas as such but for the work peace that had been lost.

  Naturally there had been wild speculation about the motive of the murder. Feo had launched a theory that it was Slobodan who had taken out his companion. His coworkers listened in fascination as he embroidered a story that contained almost everything: black money, trade in prostitutes from the Baltic states, and Armas’s and Slobodan’s murky past.