Gieger Page 14

  The body parts and the contorted, blackened remains of the car flew tens of metres up into the air before raining down on the ground again – asphalt, metal and blood.

  On the other side of the road, two cars coming the other way were blown into the air at the same time. But they were further from the point of detonation, and the whimpering, querulous sound of the dying could be heard for almost half an hour.

  Then there was silence.

  Absolute silence.

  18

  The white tower rose above its rural surroundings like a lighthouse – a lighthouse that was a long way inland. As if the sea had withdrawn, leaving behind a warning sign that no longer had anything to warn about.

  Agneta had had no idea that there was so much in the way of forests and wilderness so close to the centre of Stockholm. Despite having spent most of her life in the capital city, she’d never been to Norra Djurgården or Stora Skuggan. She’d heard the names and knew the areas were somewhere between the royal Djurgården, the university and the archipelago, but she hadn’t quite settled the map in her head. She’d never understood how it worked geographically. Now that she was standing before the white tower, it also felt as though it had been taken from a story book.

  But this was for real.

  She felt the weight of her Makarov against her thigh as she wandered up towards the rear of the tower. She’d left the car far away in the brand new stone-built suburb that had emerged in the space of just a few years on the edge of the Royal National City Park.

  A younger murderer might have ensured she changed weapons to avoid arrest while in possession of a pistol that could be tied to multiple bodies, but it didn’t matter to her how many murders she could be tied to, or whether the punishment would be any harsher. The only thing that mattered was that she managed to find and dispose of everyone.

  Anything else was failure.

  But if she pulled it off, then the police were welcome to arrest her. Or perhaps it would be one of the intelligence agencies.

  She’d been promised help if she got into trouble, but she wasn’t counting on that. Not in her line of work, and especially not after so many years.

  But the thought of spending the rest of her life behind bars didn’t worry her. She’d just released herself from a life sentence – being put away for another wouldn’t involve a change. Unlike her younger self, she now realised quite clearly that she might fail and be arrested or killed. The sense of immortality possessed by the young was long gone. Chastened realism had taken its place.

  And contrary to how it had been back then, she didn’t really have a life to lose now. She was too old. What was more, unlike so many others she’d had a life’s mission – a real calling. This was the life choice she’d once made and she stood by it. Now and always.

  Even if she felt uncertain about whether she would actually succeed in her mission, she was glad that the phone call had eventually come. That she hadn’t died before what she’d been trained for took place. Like Prince Charles dropping dead before getting his chance to be king. Or if Christer Fuglesang had never made it into space.

  But now the question was – should she prise open the lock or just ring the bell? He was expecting a text message, but she didn’t know whether he trusted her. If he was uncertain and planning any kind of trap, it might be worth taking him by surprise.

  What if he had a dog?

  She really hoped he didn’t. She loved dogs, but would be left with no choice if one turned up. She would have to shoot. She didn’t dare rely on the silent techniques any longer – she wasn’t sure they’d ever been that effective. There was nothing to guarantee that her close combat instructor hadn’t been a desk murderer. No one had ever described any assignments or missions where they’d actually made use of such skills. It wouldn’t surprise her if the intelligence services and underground organisations also had their fair share of overenthusiastic habitual liars. IB had definitely been full of angry amateurs.

  When she spotted that there was a stout old patent lock on the door, that decided matters. Pick it and sneak in.

  It was unfair that people who lived in places this beautiful were also so protected from burglaries that they didn’t need to get decent locks.

  Just like many years ago, she took several minutes to open the door. Millimetre by millimetre, a staircase appeared, winding up the curved outer wall of the house. And as you went up the staircase, the various flats had their front doors on different landings, as if curling up towards Heaven. An odd building.

  She went up the stairs just as slowly as she’d opened the door. She placed her foot on the edge of each step and pushed it forward, slowly increasing the pressure until she could rest her body weight on the foot. Each step took thirty seconds.

  The staircase continued upwards, but on the first landing a warm glow shone through the crack by the threshold and classical music was audible through the door.

  She leaned forward and glanced upwards, but the landings above were in darkness. She should really have looked up the plans for the building at the city planning department. But her perfect cover as Stellan Broman’s wife had the downside that she could be recognised almost anywhere she went if she met anyone over forty. And if some poor hollow-eyed bureaucrat happened to read that they’d found a dead body in a building whose plans she’d scrutinised, you could be certain the police would find out. She had the impression that the Security Service and counter-espionage operatives were more professional these days. They would actually be able to put two and two together.

  Not worth the risk.

  Pressing down the handle took her three minutes. When the crack along the door widened by a few millimetres, the music got louder. Mahler, it sounded like, if she wasn’t mixing them up. Once upon a time she’d had all the major composers and their most famous works down pat, as well as choice anecdotes about the conception of the works. Music, literature, art – a classical education, even if delivered mechanically – had been surprisingly effective tools in her arsenal.

  She was unaccustomed to her thoughts running away like this, and it was unfortunately dangerous. As she dreamed of the past, she dropped her concentration on the present and pushed the door slightly too quickly. At the very moment she realised her mistake, she caught sight of the man in the armchair.

  Kellner.

  He jumped when he became aware of the uninvited guest, and to her surprise he aimed a revolver at her. In the same second, she raised her pistol in a reflex movement and fired.

  She got there first, so his shot hit the ceiling. The man shouted and fell back into the chair.

  That part was at least working – the reflex of shooting without thinking if her body registered danger.

  But the shot from his gun had frightened her. Not because she was unused to the sound of shots – it had only been a few hours since the last time – but because she was so set on creeping about and being silent. She’d calibrated her hearing to listen for tiny, tiny sounds, which meant the sound of a pistol being fired had a tremendous effect.

  She raised her arm and took aim at him while approaching the chair. She tugged the revolver from his hand and put it in her pocket. A Smith & Wesson snub-nose 38. Odd choice.

  ‘Who sent you?’ he said.

  Agneta didn’t answer.

  ‘How many are dead?’

  She followed his gaze to the laptop on the coffee table. The Aftonbladet website was on the screen. ‘Uncle Stellan dead – murdered at home.’

  News had already got out. Jesus.

  She skimmed the text.

  ‘Found by his daughter.’

  Bloody hell.

  Did the grandchildren already know their grandfather was dead? Had Lotta and Malin already told them? It was lucky they hadn’t been close to Stellan. But where did they think she was? Their beloved grandmother . . . It broke Agneta’s heart when she thought about the fact that her grandchildren might be worried about her.

  ‘What do you want?’ said th
e man with the gunshot wound. ‘Are you . . .? What do you know? Or are they after you, too?’

  He clearly didn’t recognise her as Stellan’s wife. Men didn’t seem to suspect that she belonged in their world.

  ‘I need to know,’ said Agneta.

  ‘It wasn’t me who shot him, if you think that,’ he said. But she already knew that.

  ‘The codes,’ she said. ‘Where are you supposed to meet?’

  He simply stared at her.

  Well, why should he be any more feeble than she was? Same generation, same ideological motivation, same commitment.

  Behind him there were CDs along all the walls on what must have been custom-built shelves. Hundreds, if not thousands of hours of classical music.

  Who even listened to CDs nowadays?

  She looked at him again. He was clearly in pain as a result of the gunshot wound, but there was nothing in his face to suggest he’d given up.

  Kellner.

  For decades, it had been one of the key cover names, but now there was a face to go with the seven letters. An aged face. Weather-beaten but mild. A bald crown with a completely white mane of hair beneath it. Watery blue eyes that blinked with irritating frequency. The slightly bowed body of old age, and trousers too high around the waist. A short-sleeved check shirt and well-trimmed nails.

  An old man.

  Once upon a time, when he’d moved into this white tower, had he thought that someone like her would be here one day, holding a pistol?

  Agneta Broman. A completely peripheral figure to him. But with the power to decide how his life proceeded. His nemesis, summoned by tragic wrong choices in the past.

  ‘What are your instructions?’ she said.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘If the ring is to be activated.’

  ‘None at all.’

  She struck his nose with the butt of the gun. She wasn’t all that strong anymore, but the butt of a pistol hurt a lot anyway.

  He cried out.

  Blood poured out of his mouth and down his chin, some of it dripping onto the check shirt. He looked both angry and surprised.

  ‘I was to await orders,’ he said, once the pain had subsided. ‘Stand by.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Don’t know.’

  She hit him again. He cried out again.

  ‘Where are you supposed to meet Suleiman?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Abu Rasil.’

  ‘I don’t know. I was simply to await instructions.’

  Now he was off, talking. He would probably have dropped his guard by now.

  ‘Where are the codes?’ said Agneta.

  ‘Which codes?’

  She gripped the pistol, took aim and fired a shot into his right knee. He bellowed with pain, wheezing for a long time and writhing on the armchair. In the meantime, she went over and turned on the television and zapped through the channels until she found an action movie with weapons and lots of shouting. She turned up the volume as high as she could. She hoped no one would call the police. Then she went back to Kellner and clipped him around the ear.

  ‘Which codes?’ he cried out in despair. ‘I don’t know which codes you mean!’

  ‘One more chance,’ she said, pressing the barrel of the gun to his other knee.

  ‘No, no, no! I said I don’t know! I don’t know! You can have my money. I’ve got a hundred thousand in the bank. Take that.’

  She looked deep into his eyes and saw only panic. No secrets. While she took the only possible decision, she put her hand in her pocket and checked.

  Should she show him what she had there?

  Was he supposed to find out why she was doing what she was doing – why he had to die?

  No.

  She was building a world that he would never get to see.

  She moved the pistol from his knee to his forehead and pulled the trigger. His head jerked, but his body was held in place by the armchair. Then she put another bullet into his head to be sure, and he barely moved at all.

  No, he didn’t know anything about the codes.

  Jesus.

  But she couldn’t have let him live.

  She consoled herself that what she’d done was nothing compared with the treatment he would have received if the others had got hold of him.

  At any rate, there was one person fewer who knew the truth.

  Two down, two to go.

  At that moment, flashes of blue light penetrated into the room. She hurried to the window and peered out. She feared the worst, and her fears were borne out. A police car with lights flashing. The sound of footsteps on the gravel, a door opening and voices. Then new footsteps, and the sound of the downstairs doorbell.

  What should she do?

  Just sit and wait?

  She hadn’t done any reconnaissance on escape routes – she hadn’t thought that far ahead.

  Idiot. Stupid, decrepit idiot.

  Were they leaving again? The sound from the television could explain the first shot. She assumed that the neighbours had called it in right away, given that the police were already here. But if they could hear that the television was on and no one opened up when they rang the bell, perhaps they would have to force their way in. And no matter how well trained she’d once been, it was by no means tempting to contemplate a firefight at her age with young police officers in a confined space.

  But she didn’t have much choice.

  Best to try and gain the element of surprise.

  She crept down the steps again, stopping inside the door on the ground floor, where she raised the pistol and aimed it right at the door at chest height.

  The police rang the bell again. The sound of the television was audible from upstairs. Would they try to get in or leave?

  Her exit was unclear, but she couldn’t risk her mission. Then she had an idea.

  She crept back up the stairs again and saw that Kellner had also kept a landline. It was probably only old spooks who still did.

  She dialled 112 and explained in a jittery whisper that someone was ringing her doorbell, crying out that she was afraid because her brother whom she was visiting was not at home. She didn’t know anyone in Stockholm, and now she thought there were burglars trying to get in. She gave the address, and after a while the operator was able to confirm there was a police patrol vehicle on the scene and that it was probably the officers ringing the bell. Agneta said in a frightened voice that she wasn’t going to open up to anyone, no matter who they were. She made sure to stand right by the television when she called, so that the operator eventually asked her what the noise was, and Agneta explained it was the television.

  The manoeuvre seemed to work, because after a few minutes the police car departed, the officers probably cursing bumbling old hags who wasted their time when they had proper crimes to solve.

  Once the police had gone, she changed channel from the action film to the news, and it didn’t take more than a few minutes for Stellan’s death to be covered. His career, his violent end, the rise in violence. Sweden’s lost innocence, the crumbling welfare state.

  She turned the television off.

  She’d thought she would have several days before anyone found Stellan, but she would now have to anticipate that she would draw significantly more attention. They hadn’t mentioned her on the news, so the police must have kept her disappearance a secret. The question was what they thought had happened to her.

  She went into the kitchen and found a pair of scissors. She stood in front of the bathroom mirror and washed the makeup off her face. Kellner had nothing but soap, but it would have to do. Then she took the scissors, leaned over the basin and cut off her hair – lock by lock – until there was just a white stubble remaining.

  A completely different person met her gaze in the mirror.

  Older, tougher.

  Good. She needed to be someone else.

  She had really always been someone else.

  She collected the hair cuttings, flushed them down t
he toilet and then rinsed the final strands from the sink.

  She went to the front door and glanced back at the body.

  Kellner was out of the way, but she now had far less time to act freely.

  It was imperative she find Ober quickly.

  19

  Sara woke up at three o’clock in the morning. Martin had placed a blanket over her and she’d been sweating like a pig in the warm summer night, but she still appreciated the gesture. Perhaps he’d tried to wake her up so that they could go to bed together. Sara knew that she was almost impossible to rouse once she’d nodded off on the sofa. Long ago, Martin used to sit there and wait for her to come to enough that she could come with him to the bedroom. But he’d learned that it sometimes took hours – so nowadays he would let her sleep.

  She sat up and tried to interpret the strong sense of unease she was feeling.

  Ebba.

  When she spotted that it was three o’clock on the display of her phone, and that there was no message from her nineteen-year-old daughter who’d vanished off into town in not much more than her underwear, she panicked. At the same time, she didn’t want to seem too worried in case Ebba was simply still at the party and everything was fine. And she didn’t want to make her daughter think that she didn’t trust her.

  But what kind of student party carried on until three o’clock in the morning on a Monday night?

  She sent a text message.

  How’s it going?

  Then she waited.

  She went upstairs and brushed her teeth so that she had something to do.

  No reply.

  She peed, removed her makeup and brushed her hair.

  No reply.

  Another text message. More direct this time.

  Where are you?

  No reply after three minutes.

  Sara tried calling. There was no answer.

  Now she was worried.

  She called emergency dispatch and gave her credentials before asking whether there had been any reports of attacks on young girls.