Open Grave: A Mystery (33 page)

They left. The sound of their car faded away. Greta left the kitchen. The clock in the parlor struck four. Agnes sank down on a chair. She heard her sister’s desperate weeping but was not able to get up, could not manage any more stress. It felt as if everything was her fault.

Thirty-eight

Ann
Lindell was standing in
front of an open grave, a pit down into the darkness, where the lid of the casket had just disappeared. It was raining, which is as it should be. There was a cold wind from
Ö
resundsgrepen.

The cemetery was very close to the ferry landing and there was scraping and creaking as the clumsy ferry docked. She heard the heavy thud as the steel plate clattered against the abutment on land and how the cars drove off. Somehow she thought it was wrong. Shouldn’t the island have stopped for a while when its oldest inhabitant was being buried?

Ann could not feel any sorrow that paralyzed her inside. Viola had lived almost a century. On the other hand she felt very melancholy. She was taking leave of a person she had liked very much, almost revered, for her great wisdom and warmth.

*   *   *

Edvard
Risberg took a step
back and placed himself beside her. He had been one of the pallbearers. It was strange to see him in a dark suit. He looked official in a way that was unlike him. He was aware of that. He seemed ill at ease. His face was closed.

It felt as if she was also burying her old life. After this she would never return to the island. He surely sensed that, which explained the weight in his face. He wanted her back, she knew that. His wordless, austere attitude, which in the beginning of their acquaintance she was attracted by, now stood out as only gloomy and oppressive.

The last lines in the story about Ann and Edvard were written in lower-case letters. There was no showdown, no harsh words were exchanged. Before, she would have feared his anger and been lost in shame. She had overcome that. Not completely, and definitely not when she was on the island, but enough to be able to reason with herself and not wallow in destructive self-contempt.

She sneaked a glance at him. He had aged, the wrinkles in his face had deepened, but he still had an energy that radiated. Even in a black suit in a cemetery. She did not understand why he wasn’t living with a woman. Perhaps there would be a change now when Viola had departed this life.

The ceremony at the grave was blessedly brief. Ann was so cold she was shaking. The group of funeral attendees, perhaps a hundred, slowly broke up. Ann nodded at Agnes and Greta Andersson. They had exchanged a few words earlier. Ann felt how they were keeping an eye on her and Edvard, certainly curious whether they could spot a somewhat more intimate contact between them.

“I wish she had been my mother,” Ann said suddenly.

Edvard did not say anything, perhaps due to the fact that his two sons were approaching. Ann placed herself in front of Edvard, pushed her arms around his body, and gave him a hug. He responded by putting his arms around her and squeezing. They stood like that a couple of seconds. Ann closed her eyes.

When she released her hold tears were running down her cheeks.
God how I loved that man,
she thought, and felt an impulse to strike at him, throw herself forward and pound on his chest.

She turned around and headed for the parking area. Never again Gr
ä
s
ö
. She would make it to the ferry that was waiting.

Thirty-nine

Ten days passed before worrying
made him call. There was something wrong. Not only in the flower bed and the fact that the bicycle still stood leaning against Lundquist’s wall. A planting can be unsuccessful or sloppily done and a bicycle can be left behind, but that Haller should wait so long to be in touch was not likely.

It was not just the books that the gardener promised to stop by with but more the hope the associate professor had seen in Haller’s eyes.

Haller had radiated loneliness, expressed in a kind of resigned nonchalance and evasive insinuations. He himself had taken his share, but hit back. But the associate professor had also glimpsed something else entirely, a kind of eagerness to be friendly and accommodating, which surely stemmed from the joy of having found someone like-minded.

They were two lonely men with a common interest. Chance had brought them together. Both had seen the possibilities of a friendship. Would Haller frustrate that now by staying away, break his promise about “the duplicates”? The associate professor did not think so. That was why he called the police.

The woman who took his report was very polite, asked questions, and little by little as he explained what had happened she acquired a sympathetic tone in her voice. It sounded as if she shared his worry. The associate professor, who to start with expressed himself cautiously, careful not to stand out as a senile and curious old man, became more forthcoming.

He told how he perceived Haller as an extremely lonely person. Sympathetic and social, but lonely. He put great weight on the flower bed, that a professional would never plant that way. To the question of why the plants were planted so amateurishly the associate professor could not give an answer, other than that Haller must have been very confused.

They talked for perhaps twenty minutes. Then he went up to his tower, satisfied with himself, happy about the conversation. The police had encouraged him to contact the neighbor to find out if he had had any contact with the gardener. But the associate professor was doubtful. Perhaps that was too obviously sticking his nose into other people’s business.

The bicycle was still there. He had only caught a glimpse of Lundquist once since then. He probably did not care that the wintergreen had been planted wrong. But the bicycle, didn’t he wonder about that? That made him decide to contact Lundquist.

Just as he took out the phone book it struck him that he had not thought about calling Haller himself. The policewoman had not said anything about that either, perhaps she assumed that he had tried to reach him by phone but failed. He looked up his name. There were not many Hallers. Karsten lived not far away, on Artillerigatan. Within walking distance, thought the associate professor.

After a moment’s hesitation he dialed the number. It rang ten times before he hung up. He looked up the neighbor’s number. Lundquist answered after two rings. The associate professor told him how it was, that he was worried. There was no reason to beat around the bush. Lundquist did not seem to be the type who appreciated small talk.

No, he had not seen Haller. Not heard from him either, no bill had come, but he was not particularly worried about that. He had determined that all the work ordered was done and was satisfied with it. He had not noticed Haller’s bicycle.

The associate professor apologized for the trouble—certainly unnecessary—thanked him and hung up. But he was not relieved in any way; on the contrary, his worry increased. Something had happened to Haller, he was sure of it. Could he call the police again without seeming completely nuts? He stared at the direct number the woman had given him. He resorted to magic to decide. If the sum of the figures in the telephone number was an odd number he would call. He quickly added the six digits and the result was twenty-seven. He immediately picked up the phone before he had time to change his mind.

Forty

“Reported missing” was an ominous
term, he had always thought that. It had to do with an experience in his childhood, he understood that very well. When he was thirteen years old his grandfather had disappeared. No one could explain how or why, neither then nor later. He was and remained missing, Fred Emanuel Nilsson. Suicide, it was said, but that was an explanation Sammy Nilsson never bought. The grownups put the lid on, never wanted to talk about what had happened, and were disturbed and at last angry at his constant speculations.

Was that perhaps why he became a policeman? Fred had been Sammy’s favorite relative. A person like that would never kill himself, was his teenage thought. He was still convinced, more than thirty years later, that Fred had not disappeared voluntarily.

Random harvest, he thought. He stared at the hastily jotted-down information and remembered the conversation he had had with the gardener. There can’t be that many Hallers. According to directory assistance there were two in Uppsala. One of them was Karsten. Sammy got no answer.

He called the person who made the report, Gregor Johansson, and got a little more meat on the bones.

He went to Lindell’s office. The door was open. She was studying the map hanging on the wall. Sammy studied her figure, noted that she had put on a few kilos.

“I have someone who’s been swallowed up by the earth,” he said.

Lindell turned around.

“You and your missing persons,” said Lindell.

She smiled at him. He knew that his fixation with missing persons was well-known in the building. Everyone in homicide knew that he regularly checked all reports that came in. It had become a habit. It had never had any significance for investigative work, but that did not matter. There were those who joked about it, but Lindell knew better than to tease him. She was also the only one who knew the background. He had talked with her about the Fred Nilsson mystery.

“Yes,” he said, “you know how it is. But this is a person we’ve met recently.”

He told about the associate professor’s report.

“Strange,” said Lindell. “But it’s probably a coincidence.”

Sammy looked at the notes again and nodded. They looked at each other. They both knew that he would check up on it. She grinned.

“Good luck,” she said.

*   *   *

Sammy
Nilsson immediately went to
Artillerigatan. The building had three entries and Karsten Heller lived in the middle one on the third floor. Lind and Svensson were the names of his nearest neighbors. Sammy pressed on the doorbell and waited. After half a minute he crouched down and opened the mail slot. On the floor in the hall not unexpectedly was a drift of newspapers and mail.

The air that streamed out through the mail slot was fresh, he could not detect any odor of the sort that bodies exude when they have been lying dead for several days in a warm apartment.

He straightened up and remained standing indecisively in front of the door. There were several alternatives. One was to contact the management of the co-op apartment association and perhaps get someone to open the door. That could entail complications. If there were ordinary reasons that Haller was not at home, he might have opinions later about the police going into his apartment.

Sammy decided to wait but in a final attempt to get clarity he rang the nearest neighbor’s door. A woman in her seventies opened almost immediately. Perhaps she had been watching him through the peephole in the door?

He introduced himself and explained his business. The woman reacted immediately and unexpectedly strongly.

“I knew that something had happened,” she said, and Sammy saw that she was on the verge of tears. “He would never go somewhere without telling me because I take care of his flowers when he’s away. I’m sure you saw how it looks?”

“How does what look?”

“In Karsten’s window. They’re drooping. Above all that fine flower from Africa. You should see the kind of plants he has.”

“Yes, he does work with gardening,” said Sammy.

“Exactly! He’s a good man. Never any problems. He helps me sometimes. I actually thought about going into his apartment today. Maybe he’s gone away for a few days and simply forgot to tell me.”

“You have a key?”

“Yes, how else would I go in and water?”

“Do you think that Karsten Haller would take it amiss if I borrowed the key and went into the apartment?”

“Perhaps he’s sick? Perhaps he’s lying in bed and can’t communicate?”

“That might be.”

The woman took down a ring with two keys that was hanging on a bulletin board right inside the door.

“Go on in,” she encouraged him.

He stepped over the mail and newspapers that formed a neat little pile inside the door, at the same time as he formed a picture of how the apartment was arranged: the kitchen to the left, living room straight ahead, bedroom to the right, and then the toilet.

In the living room a drooping plant was seen on the windowsill, just as the neighbor pointed out. He called out a “hello.” It could actually be the case that Haller was in bed, severely ill.

It only took a momentary glance to determine that the room was empty but to be on the safe side he crouched down and peeked under the bed. Dust and a shoe box.

He opened the two closets, where there were strikingly few clothes. Sammy counted half a dozen shirts and a couple of jackets in one. In the other were piles of garbage bags.

The living room gave a strange impression. Besides the many potted plants there was an armchair, an old teak table, and a TV on a bench. Against the one short wall stood a sparsely filled bookshelf but there were lots of notebooks of a kind that Sammy recognized well. They were of Chinese manufacture, with red spines and hard covers. He pulled out one of them and randomly opened to a page. Columns filled with figures: a workbook. Here was information about gravel, topsoil, and rented machinery. All neatly noted. He put the book back on the shelf.

A bachelor apartment, Sammy noted a little jealously. Sparse furnishing was something he had always wanted, but then he would be forced to get a divorce, and that was the most unimaginable scenario he could think of.

He went out into the kitchen. On the table was a passport and travel documents placed in a plastic sleeve. At the top a ticket issued to Karsten Haller. He was supposed to travel to Johannesburg a week earlier.

He remembered the man in the garden. He had stood out as frank and open, made an almost garrulous impression. What had they talked about? Sammy did not remember, everyday things surely, after Haller assured them that he had not seen anything peculiar in the neighborhood. After that the change had come, when he commented on Professor von Ohler. Haller’s facial expression darkened, the good-natured look disappeared.