He wondered about the woman they were going to see. He was still feeling upset about the failure of the identity parade. Öhrström’s reneging on her previous statement had turned the whole thing into a fiasco. Members of her family had been threatened and he understood how terrified she was, but there had been something else as well, something more than fear. She was also riddled with shame, the shame he had tried to explain to Ewert earlier. This had become obvious during their first interview, when she had told him that she grieved over the loss of her little brother but was disgusted with Hilding for being an addict and angry with him for indirectly being the cause of his own death.
She hadn’t been able to prevent it and that was what made her feel ashamed and gave her another reason, in addition to the threats, for not recognising Lang behind that one-way window. Sven felt sure that she was one of those people who agonised about being inadequate, always tried to help, but never felt they had done enough. Hilding was probably the reason she had chosen to study medicine; she was family and therefore believed that she had to save and help and save and help.
And now he was dead, despite all her help.
She might never be rid of her shame now. She would have to live with it for ever.
When they walked into the ward, she was sitting in the ward sister’s glazed cubicle. Her face was pale; the look in her eyes was weary. Grief and fear and hatred can each corrode your strength; together they consume your whole life. She didn’t greet them when they stepped inside the glass box, only looked at them and radiated something close to loathing.
Ewert ignored her manner – or possibly didn’t notice it – he just reminded her briefly of their previous conversation. She didn’t seem to care. It wasn’t easy to read whether her indifference was pretence, or whether she simply couldn’t bear to listen to what he was saying.
Ewert asked her to turn around. He had brought more photos.
It took some time before she stopped studying something on the wall, before she looked at the black-and-white photograph on the table in front of her.
‘What do you see here?’
‘I still have no idea what you’re trying to prove with this game.’
‘I’m just curious. What do you see?’
She stared at Grens for a while, then she turned her head.
She glanced at the photo, noting that it was printed on unusual, slightly rough paper.
‘I see a fractured elbow. Left arm.’
‘Thirty thousand kronor.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Remember the pictures I faxed to you? I’m sure you do. Three broken fingers; that is, one thumb at five thousand and two fingers at a thousand each. I told you that Lang operates with fixed charges, and also that he usually signs off a job by breaking a few fingers. Then I said that the poor sod had owed seven thousand kronor. That wasn’t quite true. In fact he had been in debt to the tune of thirty-seven thousand. It meant the elbow had to go as well. Losing an arm is worth thirty thousand, you see.’
Sven was sitting a little to one side, behind Ewert. He felt bad, ashamed. Ewert, you’re trampling all over her, he thought. I know what you want and I agree we need her as a witness, but not this, you’re going too far.
‘I have another picture. What would you say this is?’
The photograph showed a naked man on a stretcher. The whole body was in the frame and the picture had been taken from the side, in poor light as before, but it was easy to see what it was all about.
‘You seem to have nothing to say. Let me help. This is a dead man. The arm you have been looking at is part of his body. Look! There are the fingers. You see, I told another fib. This guy didn’t just owe thirty-seven thousand kronor, his debt amounted to one hundred and thirty-seven thousand. Lang charges one hundred thousand for a killing. This man’s bad debt has been cleared. He has paid. One hundred and thirty-seven thousand in all.’
Lisa Öhrström clenched her jaw. She didn’t speak, didn’t move, pressed her lips tightly together to stop herself from screaming. Sven watched her, then looked at Ewert. You’re getting there. You’re close. But, Ewert, your tactics are out of order. You are hurting her and will soon do it again. I’ll put up with it, despite feeling ashamed, ashamed of you, ashamed because of what you’re doing, though I have to accept that you’re the most skilful operator I’ve ever met in the force. You need her to testify and you will make her do it. But what about the other investigation? I should be helping you here, should be happy that you’ll soon have her where you want her, but, Ewert, Ewert, how are you dealing with the Grajauskas case? What underhand tricks are you playing? I’ve just been to see Krantz, which is why I can’t concentrate on what is going on here, can’t even bear to look you in the eye. Which is also why I’d like to lie down on this table and shout until you listen. Krantz told me what I already knew. There’s another videotape, another video, Ewert!
Ewert sat back and waited for Öhrström to cave in. Let her take her time.
‘Come to think of it, I’ve got another set of pictures for you here.’
Lisa whispered. Her voice was too weak. ‘You make your point very clearly.’
‘Good. Excellent. You’ll find the new set even more interesting.’
‘I don’t want to see them. And… there’s something I don’t understand. If what you tell me is true, if this is what Lang does and the sums you mentioned are his fixed charges, as you say, why hasn’t he been locked away long ago?’
‘Why? You should know. You have been threatened, haven’t you? You know all you need to know about how Lang operates.’
That man who had come to the ward kitchen and had got hold of her photos of Sanna and Jonathan. She felt it again, the ache in her chest, the trembling that wouldn’t stop.
Ewert put another envelope on the table, opened it and pulled out the first photograph. A different hand. Five fractures this time. You didn’t need to be a qualified doctor to see that all the fingers had been crushed.
She was silent. He didn’t taunt her, only placed another picture next to the hand. A cracked kneecap, very clear too.
‘It’s a little like a jigsaw, isn’t it? A knee here, a hand there. It’s fair to assume they belong together. They do, but this time the motive had nothing to do with money. This time it was respect.’
Ewert held both pictures in front of her face.
‘This time the message was that you must never spike Yugoslav amphetamine with prison-issue washing powder.’
Still holding the two images in front of her face, Ewert took a third one from the envelope and held it even closer.
It had been taken by someone standing in a staircase, a few steps up, positioning the camera at head-height and pointing the lens at a recently dead man. An overturned wheelchair lay next to him. The blood that had flowed from the man’s head had formed a pool around him.
She realised what the picture was and quickly turned her head away. She was crying.
‘And that is what this guy had done. He had messed around with a big dealer’s product. His name, by the way, was Hilding Oldйus.’
Sven had made up his mind during the car journey back from the hospital. He would keep a low profile for now and say nothing; he would not leave the police building until he had located the videotape.
Back at his desk, he picked up the pile of transcribed interrogations from the floor and started to leaf through them. He knew he had seen it somewhere.
He would read all of them again. Slowly. It was in there and he mustn’t miss it.
It didn’t take long, just about a quarter of an hour.
He had started with the statement made by the female medical student. The interview session had been brief, presumably she was weak and in shock. It would be a while before she had digested it all. Next he read the older man’s statement. The interview with Dr Ejder had taken longer and been more like a conversation. Ejder had controlled his fear by using his logic. As long as he was rational, he could avoid getting over-emotional. Sven had come across the need to suppress fear many times before and noted different ways of keeping panic at bay. Ejder’s self-control and intellectual approach also made him an exceptional witness. He was one of those people who spoke in images detailed enough to make the listener feel that they had been there. In this case, sitting at Ejder’s side, tied up and powerless, on the mortuary floor.