Never End

by Ake Edwardson

  'You didn't see anybody else?'

  'Not a soul.'

  'How did you find the girl?'

  'We saw the bike, as I said, and stopped. I got out to investigate. It was obvious somebody had been walking at the side of the road. I didn't have to look very hard to find her. I mean, you've seen for yourself.'

  'Yes.'

  'We've all got our eyes peeled as well, after what's happened recently.'

  'Well done, Peter.'

  The constable looked at Winter, then into the bushes and trees.

  'Is it the same old story?'

  'What do you mean?'

  'Has he been at it again?'

  'No idea,' said Winter, going back to take another look at the girl.

  'Do you reckon it's rape?' asked Ringmar, who'd arrived only minutes after Winter.

  The pathologist shrugged.

  'He asked you a question,' Winter said.

  'Probably,' said the man, rising to his feet. The peak of his cap was pointing to the sky. That doesn't fit in here, Winter thought. Doesn't fit in anywhere, come to that. The doctor looked at Winter. 'OK, I know what you're getting at. Could be. I'll be as quick as I can.'

  'We'll have to bring in the coroner's office in Linköping as well,' Ringmar said. 'Where's Beier, by the way?'

  'In New York.'

  'New York?!'

  'A conference. Didn't you know?'

  'New York,' said Ringmar again. 'It must be even hotter there than here.'

  'I'll get her out of here now,' the pathologist said.

  'She's called Anne Nöjd,' Winter said. 'She has a name.'

  Her handbag had still been lying there. She had a name and an address. She lived on the west side. Winter had an uncomfortable feeling as he drove through the tunnel and out onto the motorway. All the victims lived on the west side.

  It seemed lighter there, even if the sun was rising behind them. There was a smell of the sea through the wide-open window. They were driving along narrow streets through old coastal communities.

  He felt like he was in Lilliput. There was a number over the verandah.

  'That must be it,' Ringmar said.

  There was a hedge all the way round. Boats were anchored only fifty metres away. The smell of the sea was even stronger now. Winter listened to the sound of the waves. He knew there were rocks just behind the promontory that lots of young people used as a base for swimming. If he went out onto it he'd be able to see the rocks. Jeanette had gone swimming there. And Beatrice, in another age, the previous century. Angelika too. Had Anne Nöjd sunbathed and swum there as well? Was that significant?

  The house was in darkness.

  She was twenty. This was evidently where she'd lived. That was all he knew. The house looked smaller as they drew closer to it. It ought to be the other way round. Winter bent down and peered through the window. He could make out dark silhouettes of objects. Ringmar knocked on the door. And again, harder this time. No response.

  Ringmar produced a bunch of keys that they had taken earlier from the girl's handbag. There were four keys. Two seemed similar and looked like they might fit the lock. The second one opened it. Ringmar shouted into the house. He shouted again and looked at Winter. Winter nodded. He could hear the first seagull of the morning as they entered the house.

  It was lighter inside than they'd expected, from what they'd seen through the window. They were in a hall, then turned left into a kitchen that couldn't be any bigger than six metres square. There was a newspaper on the table, and a cup beside it. There was a half-full glass of wine, glistening in the morning sunlight that was growing stronger by the minute now. Winter bent over the table and watched the sea shifting in the sunlight, changing in swell and colour.

  It must be great sitting here, watching the morning reflected in the water.

  Ringmar shouted from another room. Winter went back into the hall and then into a room off to the left that wasn't much more than a cupboard with a little table and a chair. The next room was a bedroom with a bed, a bedside table and a chair. The floor was wood, pine, polished. There was a smell of flowers. Ringmar spoke again. Winter continued into the living room. That was the whole of the house. The living room was a maximum of eight metres square and the windows looked out onto the road where he could see the tyres of his own car. There was a wood-framed sofa and an attractive-looking carpet in colours he couldn't yet make out. In another hour, perhaps, but not yet. There were pictures of various sizes hanging on the walls. In the dawn light the pictures looked like holes. Ringmar was standing by a table and on the table was a telephone with an answering machine. The red light was blinking. Ringmar looked at Winter, eyebrows raised. The light blinked.

  They hadn't found a mobile phone in the girl's handbag. Winter was sure that Anne Nöjd must have had a mobile. All young people had a mobile. Everybody did, come to that. They would have to search around the place where the body had been found. They'd also have to check if she'd had a contract.

  The light was blinking. A gull called outside the window. Winter nodded and Ringmar pressed gingerly on the button with his gloved finger. A shrill peep. Static. A voice.

  'Andy here. I got held up. You know how it is. Phone me when you get home. Ciao, baby.'

  The static again. Peep.

  Nothing.

  Something.

  Ringmar leaned forward to hear better. Winter took a step closer.

  They could hear her voice now. A scream. Another one. A ... grunting, or ... a weird noise, a scratching, like something brushing against branches, bushes ...

  'What the hell ...?' Ringmar said.

  'Shush,' Winter said. 'It's her.'

  Ringmar's face was stony. His eyes flitted from Winter to the answering machine, from the answering machine to Winter.

  'How on earth ...?'

  Winter held up his hand. He could feel it shaking.

  We're listening to a murder.

  NNNAAAAIEIERRYYYY!!!

  Words they couldn't quite make out. Sounds. Was this what Jeanette had meant when she talked about the noise her attacker made?

  He stared at the answering machine as if it were alive, a black beast, potentially lethal.

  They listened to the screams, the yells, the grunts, the roars, the repeated words naaieieier ... quietly the first two times, then louder, NNAAAIEIERRYYY!

  Sudden silence. Winter checked his watch. Not many minutes had passed but ... the message should have been cut off earlier. They waited but there was nothing else. There was a series of clicks from the answering machine and the tape rewound to the beginning. Ringmar pressed play again.

  'Andy here ...'

  They listened once more. Ringmar made notes.

  Silence.

  'We need to find this Andy,' Winter said.

  A gull screamed again. The sun had climbed over the hill to the west now, tumbled down the other side and scrambled as far as the house. The answering machine was suddenly lit up by the sunlight.

  Halders put on another record. Twenty more minutes and it would be light. Aneta Djanali could smell the whisky on his breath when he came back and sat on the sofa beside her.

  The music started. Some tentative piano chords. Then Bob Dylan's voice singing 'Blind Willie McTell'.

  Halders sang along for a few lines then mumbled something.

  'What did you say, Fredrik?'

  'No one can sing the blues like Bob Dylan.'

  She didn't answer.

  Halders started singing again.

  'Maybe you should go to bed now, Fredrik.'

  He leaned forward, picked up his glass and drank.

  'Am I behaving myself, do you reckon?'

  'You look tired.'

  'Tired? Huh!'

  'Don't drink any more now.'

  'That's up to me. Maybe I need it.'

  'Tell me that tomorrow.'

  'Tomorrow? You mean you're staying?'

  She stood up, went to the kitchen and came back with a glass of water. There were st
reaks of the new day in the sky through the patio door.

  Dylan and Halders continued their rendition.

  'You have to take the children to school tomorrow.'

  'No need to remind me of that.'

  'We're on duty at eight.'

  'I said you didn't need to remind me about ... about ...'

  The music stopped, Halders stood up and put the track on again. Then he turned to Aneta.

  He sang: 'There's no one that sings the blues like Blind Fredrik McTell'

  Then he fell over the end of the sofa and ended up with his head almost on the floor.

  'Fredrik!'

  Djanali rushed over to him and bent down. Halders' eyes were still open.

  'Fredrik?'

  He mumbled something and shook his head. He scrambled to his feet.

  'I'm ... I'm not all that drunk.'

  He started crying. Aneta Djanali hugged him. She felt his shoulders shaking. His neck was as tense as a steel cable. He wrenched himself free, stood up, then sat down again.

  'This is all going to pot, Aneta.'

  She sat down as well.

  'Have you really allowed yourself to grieve, Fredrik?'

  He stared at her like a man who didn't know what she was talking about. Or didn't want to know, it seemed to her.

  'This is all about you, Fredrik. Only you. And your children. You can't imagine. It's dangerous. You've just got to be yourself, and let yourself feel what you feel. Really feel. Do you follow me? Feel ... and let it show.'

  Forensics had the answering machine. Winter had a copy on tape. He listened to the beginning. Who was Andy? They could find out what number he'd called from, but a mobile was ... mobile. It moved with whoever was using it. He could have made the call from anywhere.

  Anne Nöjd had evidently lived alone. The SOC team was over there now. The forensic boys were crawling over wherever you looked. They'd found some names: parents, or other relatives. Winter had made a few unpleasant telephone calls. Her mother. That was just a couple of minutes ago.

  Now his own mobile rang. It was nearly 5 a.m.

  'I was wondering,' Angela said.

  'I haven't had time to ring.'

  'Come home when you can and I'll make caffelatte. Give me an hour and I'll go to the baker's and get some poppy-seed rolls to have with it.'

  'I'll try to get back for then. And stay for a while at least.'

  His desk phone rang. He said goodbye to Angela, then took the other call. It was one of the forensic officers from the house at Långedrag.

  'We have a young man here called Andy who was looking for the girl.'

  'Where is he?'

  'He's here, standing beside me now.'

  'Let me speak to him.'

  Winter heard a different voice. It sounded young, scared. 'What's going on?'

  Winter said who he was.

  'Can you come and see me now, right away?'

  'What's happened to ... to Anne?'

  'If you get yourself into the car that's waiting where you are and come over here to me now, I'll fill you in on everything.'

  'What's happened to Anne?!'

  Winter hesitated.

  'She was murdered last night. That's why it's so incredibly important that you get yourself here as quickly as possible, Andy. We need your help.'

  He heard a yell, or a scream. Static. It sounded as if the mobile had been thrown high into the air.

  'Hello? Hello?'

  Winter heard the forensic officer's voice again. 'We'll bring him in.'

  23

  Winter waited in his office, which was illuminated by the grey light of dawn. The greyness was in tune with his mood. A strange feeling as it was blended with the excitement he felt at what was coming next. Something was happening. He had a feeling of anticipation that was cold and, in its way ... undignified. It was like travelling through a barren landscape without hope, but feeling something reminiscent of hope even so.

  There was a scent of newly woken heat from outside. Birds were singing again. The street on the other side of the river was being cleaned by a sweeper-lorry. He could hear the enormous brushes from where he was sitting.

  The door was open, and in came a young man aged about twenty-five, accompanied by one of the forensic officers, who greeted Winter and then left. Andy looked as if his face had collapsed. His face had collapsed. Winter gestured towards the chair.

  'What ... what's happened?'

  Winter told him as much as he knew. But first he asked the young man's name.

  'Andy.'

  'Your surname as well.'

  'Grebbe. Andy Grebbe.'

  Andy sat down. The T-shirt he was wearing was torn in the left sleeve. His hair was cropped short but looked unkempt even so. There was a black ring under his left eye but not under his right. Winter could smell stale booze from the other side of his desk. Andy was sober enough now, but very tired. Nervous.

  'When did you last speak to Anne?'

  'Er ... that would be tonight ... no, I mean yesterday. Last night.'

  'When?'

  'What do you mean? I said—'

  'What time?'

  'Er ... about eight, I think. Eight, or thereabouts.'

  'Where?'

  'Where? It wasn't anywhere ... if you see what I mean. The telephone. I phoned her from home.'

  'And she answered?'

  'Ans– of course she answered. I told you, I spoke to her.'

  Winter nodded.

  'Then I phoned again later on, but she was out.'

  Winter nodded again.

  'I left a message on her answerphone. It must still be there.' He looked at Winter. A look that was white and red and black and tired and maybe hounded. 'If you play back her messages it must be there.'

  'We have done,' Winter said. He tried to hold Andy's eye. Was it now something would happen? Would he break down?

  'OK. So you've heard it.'

  'Yes. What time did you phone?'

  'Er ... after two. Half past two or so.'

  'Where from?'

  'From a place in Vasastan.'