Authors: Camilla Ceder
Solveig
Granith had sat down in an armchair by the window in the living room. The room
took the idea of clutter to a new level. After some hesitation, Seja pushed her
way through to a two-seat sofa and sat down opposite her. Solveig turned her
face to the window, despite the fact that the curtains were closed. They let in
only a thin strip of light which fell across her skinny thighs, over Seja's
stockinged feet and out across the parquet floor. The shards of a broken
ornament lay scattered in the shadow of the armchair.
'You
say you knew Maya?' said the woman in a monotone.
'I
knew her a bit,' Seja replied. 'We met occasionally, said hi if we bumped into
each other. We liked each other. I mean, I liked her and I think she liked me.
We were quite similar, I think.'
The
woman turned slowly to Seja. Something was beginning to move in those
grey-flecked eyes.
'You
liked her?' she said. Her lower lip began to quiver uncontrollably as the tears
welled up in her eyes.
Oh
my God,
thought Seja.
She's still a wreck after all these years. She
hasn't got over her daughter's death.
And even if it was only natural not
to emerge from such an experience with your life intact, something told Seja
that she had an explosive wreck of a person in front of her. All suppressed
bitterness and grief. How much hatred could a human body contain, she wondered,
without collapsing like a house of cards? Particularly such a frail body; this
woman couldn't weigh more than forty kilos.
Suddenly
everything fell into place for Seja:
This woman was so still, so detached
because she was afraid of falling to pieces! There was so much unresolved
hatred inside her that she was afraid she'd burst if she opened up the
slightest crack and let what was inside her escape. And she knew something. She
knew.
Seja
now understood the reason for her visit: despite the bad feeling she had, she
was going to find out the truth. She could feel the adrenalin pumping through
her body as she leaned over and took Solveig Granith's hand.
'Yes,
I liked her very much. It was difficult not to like her. She seemed to be an
honest person.'
Solveig
jerked as Seja touched her, but didn't pull her hand away. She closed her eyes
and allowed the tears to pour down her cheeks, soaking her stained sweater.
They
sat like that for a while, with only background noise.
Music
from somewhere in the building.
A neighbour throwing a
bag of glass bottles down the rubbish chute in the stairwell.
The
neighbour's door slammed shut and the key turned in the lock.
A
while later Solveig Granith dried her tears with her sleeve. Without a word she
got to her feet unsteadily and went into the kitchen, where she started
clattering about with the coffee machine.
'Is
it OK if I record our conversation? I'll just get my tape recorder.'
Seja
regretted the words as soon as they came out, afraid that her pushiness might
destroy the fragile bridge she had temporarily built between them. But Solveig
merely mumbled that it was fine, and yes, she was welcome to make notes too.
In
the hallway Seja's jacket lay where she had left it on the arm of a chair, with
the recorder in the pocket.
The
rotting smell seemed to have grown stronger. She looked around for the source,
but found nothing apart from a paper bag pushed underneath a low table in front
of the mirror. Dirty clothes protruded from the top of the bag, the edge of a
padded jacket, stained brown.
With blood?
Seja
pulled herself together; the woman was a nervous wreck, but she wanted to talk.
She
could hear Solveig returning to the living room. As soon as Seja appeared, she
started talking. When she talked about Maya, her earlier restraint disappeared,
as if the thought of forgetting her daughter was what terrified her, and the
only way to guarantee Maya a place in her memory was to keep going over old
ground.
Setting
the tape running, Seja quickly lost herself in Solveig's story. Sometimes she
felt as if Solveig was talking about her, as if she had been watching Seja ever
since she was born, although there were few similarities between Seja's own
mother and the woman sitting in the armchair opposite.
It
was amazing that this woman, who was obviously not of sound mind, had the
ability to paint such a detailed and accurate portrait of her daughter.
Idealised, certainly,
but then that's how we choose to treat the dead.
Suddenly Seja had the conviction that Solveig Granith had got to know her
daughter after her death, as an attempt to work through her grief.
T
heard from… another friend of Maya that she had met someone, someone she lived
with for a couple of years before she… passed away. Someone she was really
serious about. I thought perhaps you might have met her, that you might be able
to tell me something about her. I'm interested in her because…' Seja sighed. 'I'll
be honest with you…'
The
words just flowed; she was temporarily unable to control them. Her fears went
to the back of her mind. She was far too interested in Solveig's reactions.
'I've
been talking to someone who went to the same school as Maya. He knew her fairly
well, and the woman Maya was with, Caroline Selander, he said she loved Maya so
much that she seemed to want to own her.'
Solveig
Granith's eyes darted across the room. Seja assumed she wasn't comfortable with
the fact that her daughter had had a lesbian relationship - perhaps this
knowledge sullied the perfect image. But perhaps there was another reason.
Seja
suddenly remembered the long coat hanging in the hallway. She swallowed. There
was no going back.
'I
was just thinking
,
if this woman was so important to
Maya, and Maya was so important to her, maybe there's a chance I could talk to
her?' Then she added apologetically, 'For my story.'
Solveig
was now extremely worked up: her eyes had narrowed to slits and she was hugging
herself. Seja didn't dare to speculate on the cause of Solveig's sudden
agitation.
'Perhaps
I'd better go,' she said, trying to sound calm even though her heart was
pounding.
'No,
stay!' said Solveig sharply. 'I'll ask her.' The thin fingers grasping Seja's
wrist were cold and possessed an unexpected strength. 'I'll call her right
now.'
'Call
her?'
'Of
course you can talk to Caroline.'
Solveig
Granith's tone of voice had changed: she was speaking gently and reassuringly.
My God, she's completely crazy.
Seja
didn't dare say no but she really wanted to get out of the apartment. She knew
she was too high up to escape through the window. Hopefully the telephone was
in the kitchen, so she would be able to sneak into the hallway and grab her
shoes when Solveig went to make the call.
The bag in the
hallway, the jacket.
Blood.
But
Solveig had no intention of releasing her wrist.
'Come
with me and I'll ring her now. You might be able to speak to her yourself.
Or at least to arrange a time.'
Seja
nodded,
her mouth as dry as sandpaper. She had to
think clearly. She was taller and younger than this woman, although insanity
might make Solveig the stronger one.
The
best thing is to keep calm, to keep Solveig Granith calm. Try to talk your way
out of the situation.
Like
a mother who has lost patience with an obstinate child, Solveig now pushed Seja
in front of her, further into the darkness of the apartment.
Seja's
mind was whirling. She tried to turn around to make eye contact with Solveig.
Her voice became shrill.
'I
mean, I've got her name. I can ring her from home. I…
it's
fine…'
They
passed the kitchen, where an old-fashioned telephone sat on the table. Seja was
just about to make a serious protest, push past Solveig and run out of the
apartment, when she yanked open the door to what seemed to be a dressing room.
Seja
had no time to react to the darkness before a sharp knee in the small of her
back made her fall forward on to something at once hard and soft. Arrows of
pain shot up her spine. She managed to turn her head just enough to see the
silhouette of another person, just behind Solveig, blocking the light from the
hallway. Then she felt a blow to her head, and everything went black.
'He's
said he killed them, that they deserved it and he doesn't need a lawyer to
defend him. I don't suppose he thought there was anything to defend.'
Tell
and Bärneflod were round the back of the police station, a dreary area with its
neglected paving and half-rotten wooden benches. A concrete bin full of sand
was strategically placed for those who hadn't managed to give up when smoking
was banned in the building.
'So
you can't get anything out of him?'
'Not
a word.
Literally.
He hasn't spoken since he
confessed. He told his story, and since then he's kept his mouth shut. It's
bloody frustrating, I can tell you.' Bärneflod let out a long whistle between
his teeth. 'Who would have thought the little shit could be so cocky - he
seemed like a nervous wreck.'
Tell
lit his second cigarette in five minutes. Since he had taken himself outside to
smoke, he might as well make the most of it. In the past he often used to close
the door of his office, open the window and lean out, using one of the plant
pots as an ashtray - God knows how they'd ended up on his windowsill in the
first place. However, since he had found out about Ostergren's lung cancer, he
had followed the rules and taken the lift down here. That's how banal and
predictable he was.
'I
don't know if he's cocky,' said Tell, thoughtfully furrowing his brow.
He
had spent a number of hours with Sebastian Granith. There was no longer any
suspicion that he might be protecting another murderer in the cases of Lars
Waltz and Olof Bart. Particularly because his fingerprints matched the ones
they had lifted from the rented Jeep, and the tyre tracks of the same vehicle
had been found at the crime scene. And since the murder weapon had turned out
to be the same in both cases, Granith was also tied to the murder of Lars
Waltz.
The
case of Sven Molin was more difficult. Tell was convinced that
Sebastian
Granith knew who had killed Molin, but once he had got over his initial shock,
he hadn't shown the least sign of distress or given any indication that he
might start talking. Tell was becoming increasingly angry at being denied a
final solution to the case.
'No,'
he said after thinking for a while. 'He isn't keeping quiet because he's cocky.
He's just switched off. It's as if he's sitting there thinking about something
else entirely, as if he really can disconnect from reality at will.'
'It
seems to run in the family,' muttered Bärneflod. He looked as if he might well
have developed his theory if he hadn't been stopped by a coughing fit that came
from somewhere deep inside his lungs. He turned his back on Tell, his whole
body shaking, and Tell thumped him between the shoulder blades. For a moment he
felt like an actor in a bad comedy film.
'Are
you OK? You sound like someone with TB. What were you saying?'
Bärneflod
walked inside and pressed the lift button.
'I
was just saying that it runs in the family. I got exactly the same feeling with
the mother. That she just switched off from time to time - she didn't even
notice I was there - and at other times she was all too aware of me. What a
psycho. It's hardly surprising he went over the edge, poor kid.'
Tell
nodded absently. He was heading to the cafeteria instead of his office, since
he had the feeling he wouldn't be able to concentrate on anything properly.
Bärneflod followed in his wake, still talking. They both picked up a coffee and
a cinnamon bun and took them back to the department, where Gonzales caught up
with them.
He
seemed desperate for company after spending hours alone at his desk. 'My wrist
is absolutely killing me,' he complained. 'Don't you think we should have
headsets?'