On the other hand, the details of what she’d been doing on the toilet were unclear because any natural human sounds, the use of toilet paper and the like, were drowned out by the sound from the faucet in the sink that was still running. Then that too fell silent, and less than a minute later, thirty-seven minutes past ten that is, Birgitta Hedberg came back into the kitchen. With the coffee mug in her right hand and the bag of cookies in her left. After putting the cookies back in the pantry, she rinsed the coffee mug under running water, placed it in the dishwasher, sat at the kitchen table, and started working the crossword puzzle in that day’s Svenska Dagbladet. After writing and erasing for over half an hour, she put down the pen, sighed with a bad-tempered expression, folded up the newspaper, got up, and disappeared in the direction of the hall.
“Excruciatingly exciting,” observed Inspector Joakim Eriksson with the bureau’s detective squad as he stood behind the camera under cover of darkness in their little nest.
“It hardly gets better than this,” agreed his female colleague, Inspector Linda Martinez.
At the same moment Birgitta Hedberg came back into the kitchen with a red cell phone in her right hand.
“There it is,” Eriksson observed as his motor camera with telephoto lens whirred into action and took the obligatory still pictures at a velocity of ten pictures per second.
Birgitta Hedberg then turned off the light in the kitchen, went straight to her bedroom, turned on the lamp on her nightstand beside the bed, placed the red phone by the bed lamp, turned off the ceiling light, went over to the window, and pulled down the shade. Ten minutes later she also turned off the bed lamp. The room behind the shade was in darkness. That didn’t matter, because Martinez had already redirected the microphone toward her bedroom window.
From the audio recording it appeared that she had already fallen asleep within fifteen minutes. That she snored a few times during the night, audibly relieved the pressure in her bowels shortly after three o’clock, and woke up three hours later. When she pulled up the shade at six-fifteen in the morning she had already put on her bathrobe, and when she took the cell phone from the nightstand to put it in her pocket, officer Falk was already there and could see it with his own eyes.
During Sunday the same cell phone had been observed on another three occasions, and according to the memo that Lewin was reading, by Monday morning the team was already clear about her peculiar cell phone procedures. She did not seem to use it for her own calls. Nor did anyone call her. At the same time she made sure that it was always nearby. When she left her residence on Sunday to do a few errands on two occasions, she had it with her in her handbag. When she was at home it was in her pocket or near her. Apparently she made sure it was always charged. It was an ordinary, standard model Nokia supplied with a simple red plastic case. One of the most common cell phones in Sweden, but less common in Spain, and so far so good. What remained was to find out the cell phone number, so as to find her brother. If Jan Lewin was interested in tactical discussions in connection with this cell phone surveillance, he was welcome in Johansson’s office at ten o’clock.
Two minutes ago, thought Jan Lewin. Getting up he straightened his tie, put on his jacket, and turned off his computer.
In Johansson’s office the atmosphere was high-pitched. Johansson, Wiklander, Rogersson, Falk, Martinez, and Eriksson were there, and even before Lewin opened the door he was met by happy laughter from the other side.
“Sit yourself down, Jan,” said Johansson before Lewin could apologize for his late arrival. “Have some coffee,” he said, pointing to the tray on the table. “But be careful with the cookies. Linda just told us about the risks of eating too many cookies. Especially before going to bed. Increases audible intestinal activity in an unpleasant manner.”
Linda Martinez, thought Lewin, nodding at her. Same age as Lisa Mattei, just as street smart as Lisa Mattei was wise. As an investigator in the field, there were few like her. Which perhaps was lucky, considering everything he’d heard about her escapades, thought Jan Lewin, sitting down.
“Okay,” said Johansson. “The Hedberg woman has a cell phone. Almost everything suggests she has it for only one reason. To keep in contact with her dear brother. How do we get the number? Preferably immediately. Give me some bright-eyed suggestions.”
“If we only want to get hold of her number, I can arrange that during the day,” said Linda Martinez.
“How?” asked Johansson.
“By stealing it,” said Martinez, shrugging her shoulders. “As soon as she goes out I can lift her cell, and in the worst case I’ll have to grab her handbag too. But considering what I think you really want I would definitely advise against that. But, sure.” Martinez threw out her hands in an expressive gesture to show her goodwill.
“There is a completely legal possibility too,” Lewin objected with a cautious throat clearing.
“What’s that?” said Johansson, who suddenly looked rather suspicious.
“That the prosecutor lets us bring her in and confiscate her cell phone.” Like all normal police do, a hundred times out of a hundred, he thought.
“No way, José,” said Johansson, shaking his head. “If we let Linda steal it straight up and down, and considering how she looks these days she could pass for an addict who just snatched one more bag, then the Hedberg woman is probably going to call her brother anyway and tell him she’s lost her cell. By means of some other phone that we aren’t aware of either.
“It’s the same thing with your solution, Lewin,” he continued. “As soon as she gets the chance she’s going to warn him. Then we’re definitely cooked, considering that we’ve brought her in. Besides, we can’t rule out that they have some established security procedure we don’t know about. That she calls at regular intervals to confirm that everything is calm.”
Although of course there are no differences otherwise. Purely legally and such, and never in Johansson’s world, thought Jan Lewin.
The latter-some kind of security procedure-Wiklander had already thought about. For that reason at that very moment his co-workers were installing a special mobile monitoring device aimed at her residence. If her cell phone emitted a sign of life the monitoring device was ready. Likewise if Hedberg made contact with her. At the same time the problem was apparent. They were short on time. Assume they only communicated once a week. Or even worse. Once a month. Or never, if there was no particular reason to do so.
They could also forget about pinging cell phone towers. Because they didn’t have her number, that was practically hopeless. Monitoring calls from cell phones in the vicinity of her residence made to recipients on Mallorca-if that was even where Hedberg was-wasn’t a meaningful way to search for the number either. The apartment on Andersvägen was wall-to-wall with the north approach to Stockholm and denser cell phone traffic than in that area could hardly be found in the whole country.
“I hear what you’re saying,” Johansson interrupted. “What do we do?”
“If we can just call from her cell phone to one of our special cell surveillance numbers, we can get her number directly. Then we can start searching for what numbers she has called. Our computers are going to have a hard time of it, considering the extent of traffic. If we can get a certain day or a certain time too that would be a great help.”